submission and patience of his Sonne on the Crosse. More then this if you will vrge on the person of Christ as needefull for our Redemption first proue it and then professe it at your pleasure otherwise if you boldly and vainely presume it your addle and idle wordes can not preiudice the setled and vndoubted principles of the Christian faith warranted by the word of God and fully receaued by the Church of Christ euen from the beginning To your maimed and ruinous foundation that Christ must suffer all and the very same punishment wages and vengeance of sinne which the damned doe suffer and we should haue suffered had we not beene excused by his suffering it for vs I haue plainly and sadly answered I know not how often it is a false and lewd imagination and so impious that your selfe dare not in your late Defence offer it to vew without many bridles to holde it from horrible blasphemie But Sir discourser why coyne you conclusions in christian Religion that must haue three or foure exceptions to saue them from open impietie and why see you not that your speciall reseruations ouerthrow the truth of your owne assertion for where the true and proper punishment wages and vengeance of sinne in all the wicked is spirituall corporall and eternall death in your limitations at last which you forgate at first you except Christ from spirituall death which is sinne and from eternall death which is damnation of body and soule to hell fier yet you still affirme that Christ suffered the full proper punishment wages and vengeance of sinne as though these two spirituall and eternall death were no parts of the punishment vengeance due to sin or these being excepted as vnfit for Christ to suffer you could truely say Christ suffered the full and proper punishment and vengeance of sinne which consisteth of these three kinds of death And who but you would send vs such headlesse and senselesse resolutions in Diuinitie as these are I affirme that Christ suffered all gods proper wrath and vengeance for sinne I say all that the very damned do suffer namely so described and limited as is aboue said And againe He suffered from Gods hand euen as the damned doe namely in these points which are both possible and reasonable Were you some new Euangelist or vpstart Apostle it were euen enough for you to referre Christs sufferings to your description and your limitation without any farther authority but when you take vpon you with your bare word to broch so many nouelties in Christian religion without one line or letter of holy writ to vpholde your dreames and deuices who can chuse but deride your follie You pinne mens faiths for the ground of their saluation to your descriptions and your limitations to possibilitie and reason measured by your rule without any text or title of Scripture to warrant your words and then you thinke the maine question is profoundly and fully handled but your sober and wise Reader will presently finde the lamenesse or leudnesse of your grand conclusion For if Christs person not only by your possibilitie and reason but by the soundnesse of trueth and sincerenesse of faith must be exempted from sinne which is the death of the soule and from damnation which is euerlasting death why write you so boldly that Christ must suffer all Gods proper wrath euen all that the damned do suffer whereas apparently those two being excepted Christ could suffer no kinde of death but only a corporall And if by your so describing and so limiting the matter you draw Christ within the staine or guilt of sinne or within the compasse or danger of damnation hope you to finde any Christian eares so patient that will endure that monstrous and sacrilegious indignitie But you will inuent a new hell for Christ which shall haue the substance but not the circumstance of damnation and shal be inflicted by Gods immediate hand properly ye a only in the verie soule of Christ which Gods owne infinite wrathfull power and iustice can inflict for satisfaction where and how it pleaseth him The question good Sir is not of Gods power what he can do but of his will reuealed in his Word and of his promise performed in the person of his sonne for our saluation and testified by the mouthes and pennes of the Prophets and Apostles that were guided by his holy spirit to speake and write the trueth I make no doubt but God can create another heauen another earth and another hell as quickly and as easily as he did these that now are yet if any man affirme that God will so do or hath so done I must holde him for an Infidell because he gainsayth Gods trueth and belieth Gods will by pretending Gods power Talke not therefore what God can doe shew rather by the word and witnesse of trueth what God hath done to that must we trust to that are you bound and from that are you slipt You haue not so much as any colour of Scripture for these desperate nouelties and vanities I will giue them no woorse words lest you complaine of my bitternesse and if any man be but so wise as to let your proue these things before he beleeue them he is safe enough for euer admitting them I may spare my paines in refuting them yet because destitute of all other helpe you appeale to possibilitie and reason to fourbish your new inuention of another hell let vs see how handsomely you hale it onward By the law of our creation as we are men hauing a soule besides our bodie so our soule hath in it a threefolde facultie of suffering paines First that which is proper and immediate iustly so called proper because it is proper only to reasonable and immortall spirits Immediate two wayes First because it can and doth receiue an impression of sorrow and paines made from God only by and in it selfe without any outward bodily meanes thereunto Secondly it is also an immediate punishment or els correction of sinne it commeth not for any other cause at all So that thus we meane when we speake of the soules proper and immediate suffering The soules second facultie of suffering paines is not proper but common to vs with beasts namely that which is by sympathie and communion with and from the body A third kinde of painfull suffering the soule hath namely her vehement and strong affections are painfull whether they be good or euill as zeale loue compassion pitie care c. neither are these immediatly for sinne whether punishments or corrections neither are they punishments or corrections at all properly in themselues accidentally they may be when they grow so strong that they paine and grieue the soule If the walles and roofe of your new hell rise no fairer nor stand no faster then your foundation doth a weake puffe of winde will blow all away If a man should shortly answer you That the soule of man hath but one
ourselues vnrâ—…ghteous and odious vnto him And yet in mercy towaâ—…ds â—…s and honor â—…wards his Sonne God would make him the Redeemer and Sauiour of the world not neglecting his Iustice nor forgetting his loue but so mixing them both together that his dislike of our sinnes might appeare in the punishment of them and his relenting from the rigor of his Iustice in fauour of his onely Sonne might magnifiâ—… his mercy satisfie his wrath and enlarge his glory and declare in most ample manner the submission compassion and peâ—…fection of his Sonne as only worthy to performe that worke which procured and receaue that honor which followed mans Redemption Christ then suffered from the hand of God but mediate that is GOD DELIVERED him into the hands of sinners who were Satans instruments with all eproach and wrâ—…nge to put him to a contumelious and grieuous death God by his â—…ecret wisdome and iustice decâ—…eeing appointing and ordering what he should suffer at theiâ—… hands Our sinnes â—…e bare in his body on the tree not that his soule was free from feare sorrow 〈◊〉 derision and temptation but that the wicked and malitious â—…ewes practised all kind of shamefull violence and cruell tortuâ—…es on him by Whipping Racking pricâ—…ing and wounding the tenderest parts of his body whereby his soule â—…elt extreame and intoleâ—…able paines In all which he saw the determinate counsell of God and receaued in the garden from his father this Iudgement for our sinnes that he should be 〈◊〉 dâ—…liuered into the hands of sinners For had he not humbly submitted himselfe to obey his fatheâ—…s will no power in earth could haue preuailed against him but as he had often fortold his Disciples what the Priestes Scribes and Gentils should doe vnto him so when the hower was come which was foreappointed of God to obey his fathers will he yeelded himselfe into their hands they persuing him to death of enuie and malice but God thus perfourming euen by their wicked hands what he had â—…oreshewed by his Prophets that Christ should suffer For they not knowing him â—…or the wordâ—… of the Prophets fulfilled them in condemning him yea they fulfilled all things which were written of him So that no man shall need to runne to the immediate hand of God nor to the paines of hell for the punishment of our sinnes in the person of Christ the Iewes FVLFILLED ALL THINGS that were written of him touching his sufferings and therewith Gods anger against our sinnes was appeased and God himselfe reconciled vnto vs. Esay speaking of the violence done by the Iewes to Christ sayeth he was wounded for our transgressions and broken for our iniquities and with his stripes we are healed Thus the Lord layed vpon him the iniquitie of all vs and he bare our sinnes in his body on the tree by those sufferings before and on the Crosse which the Scriptures expresly declare and describe And as for the immediate hand of God tormenting the soule of Christ with the selfe same paines which the damned now suffer in hell which is this deuisers maine drift when he maketh or offereth any proofe thereof out of the word of God I shall be ready to receiue it if I can not refute it till then I see no cause why euery wandring witte should imagine what monsters please him in mans redemption and obtrude them to the faithfull without any sentence or syllable of holy Scripture I haue no doubt but all the godly will be so wise as to suffer no man to raigne so much ouer their faith with fancies and figures vnwarranted by the Scriptures vnknowen to all the learned and ancient councels and Fathers vnheard of in the Church of Christ till our age wherein some men applaude more their owne inuentions then all humane or diuine instructions The feare of bodily sufferings you thinke could not be the cause that there strained out from Christ much sweat of clotted blood You straine the text of the Euangelist to draw it to your bent Saint Luke hath no such words that there strained out from Christ much sweat of clotted blood he sayth Christes sweat was like drops of blood trickling downe to the ground Theophylact a Greeke borne and no way ignorant of his mother tongue expresseth Christes sweat in the garden by these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christes body or face DISTILLED with plentifull drops of sweat And albeit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sometimes signifie the congealed parts of that which is otherwise liquid and compacted pieces of that which els is poudered yet often it noteth that which is thickâ—… in comparison with thinner or eminent in respect of plainer Now Christes sweat might be thicke by reason it issued from the inmost parts of his bodie and was permixed with blood or els it might breake out with great and eminent drops as comming from him violently and abundantly and being coloured with blood and congealed with colde might trickle downe like DROPS or strings of blood vpon the ground Howsoeuer the Scripture saith not his sweate was clotted blood but like to congealed or cooled blood neither that such clots were strained out from him but that his sweate being thicked and cooled on his face fell from him like strings of blood But grant there could be no reason giuen of Christs bloodie sweat in the garden no more then there can be of the issuing first of blood and then of water out of his side when he was dead which S. Iohn doth exactly note as strange but yet true will you conclude what please you because many things in Christ both liuing and dying weâ—…e miraculous I bind no mans conscience to any probabilities for the cause of this sweate but onely to the expresse wordes and necessarie consequents of holy Scripture and yet I wish all men either to be sober and leaue that to God which he hath concealed from vs or if they will needes be gessing at the reason thereof for certaine knowledge they can haue none by no meanes to relinquish the plaine words or knowen groundes of holy Scripture to embrace a fansie of their owne begetting The learned and ancient Fathers haue deliuered diuers opinions of this sweate which thou mayest see Christian Reader in my Sermons and which we shall haue occasion anon to reexamine euery one of them being as I thinke more probable and more agreeable to Christian pietie then this Discoursers dreame of hell paines or Gods immediate hand at that present tormenting of the soule of Christ. And if we looke to the order and sequence of the Gospell we shall finde that feruent zeale extreamely heating the whole bodie melting the spirits thinning the blood opening the pores and so colouring and thicking the sweate of Christ might in most likelihood be the cause of that bloodie sweate Which S. Luke seemeth to insinuate when he saith that after Christ was comforted by an Angell from heauen and so recouered from his
the extreamest part of his passion Gods wrath against mans sinne was indeede the cause of all that Christ suffered and not the extreamest part onely of his sufferings by which you would extenuate the rest as not extreame enough till that were added But the Booke of Homilies teacheth you no such Doctrine that proposeth the death of Christ suffered in his Body on the Crosse for the FVLL and ONLY satisfaction or amends of all our sinnes Heare the words that the Reader may see what a counterfeite pretence you make of publike Authoritie as if it were consonant to your new conceited errours when it plainly impugneth them So pleasant was this Sacrifice and oblation of his Sonnes death which he so obediently and innocently suffered that God would take it for the ONLY and FVLL AMENDS for all the sinnes of the world No tongue surely is able to expresse the worthinesse of this so pretious a death Yea there is none other thing that can be named vnder heauen to saue our Soules but THIS ONLY VVORKE of Christs pretious offering of his Body vpon the Altar of the Crosse. The death of Christs Body you thinke did not manifest the wrath of God against our sinnes the death of the Soule and paines of hell must be added before the wrath of God will appeare in Christs Crosse. So teach you but the Booke of Homilies teacheth the cleane contrarie Christ being the Sonne of God and perfect God himselfe who neuer committed sinne was compelled to come downe from heauen and to giue his Body to be brused and broken on the Crosse for our sinnes Was not this a manifest token of Gods great wrath and displeasure towards sinne that he could be pacified by NO OTHER MEANES but ONLY by the sweete and pretious bloud of his deare Sonne Therefore in the Booke of Homilies as there is no mention so is their no intention that Christ suffered spiritually the proper wrath of God which our sinnes deserued These are your phrases and fansies added to the booke of Homilies which neither speaketh nor meaneth any such thing as you idlely inferre Againe Christ bare all our sinnes sores and infirmities vpon his owne backe no paine did he refuse to suffer in his owne bodie But as he felt all this in his bodie so he must feele the greatest part primarily and much more deeply in his soule ergo he refused not to suffer all the paines of the wrath of God both in bodie and soule This kinde of ergoing passeth mine vnderstanding To the first proposition taken out of the booke of Homilies that Christ bare all our sores and infirmities vpon his owne backe refusing no paine in his owne bodie to deliver vs from euerlasting paine you put what pleaseth you without any proofe and then you inferre what you list without any sequele of reason or trueth For how hangeth this geere together Christ bare all our sores and infirmities in his owne bodie ergo he suffered all the paines of Gods wrath both in bodie and soule Are there none other paines of Gods wrath but the sores and infirmities of our bodies And if Christ did suffer all bodily paine incident to men heere on earth doth it therefore follow that he suffered all the paines both of bodie and soule that Gods wrath here and els where hath prouided for sinners If a man would set himselfe purposely to crosse the booke of homilies I know not how he might do it more directly then you do to conclude expresly the contrary to that which is there deliuered It is no maruell that so manie writers are of your side as you say when you can enlarge them and interlace them after this sort but you shall doe well to thinke that your Reader now hearkeneth after the publike doctrine of this Realme authorized by the lawes thereof in the booke of homilies as you professed and not after your secret conceits intercepting and peruerting the trueth there taught by your pernicious and erroneous glozes Christ you say must feele the greatest part of his bodily paines primarily in his soule Haue you not brought vs monsters enough in matters of faith but you must hatch vs more Must bodily paines for of those speaketh the booke of homilies as appeareth by the next words Christ refused no paine in his owne bodie and the first wordes are he bare all our sores and infirmities on his owne backe must I say bodily paines be felt primarily in the soule If you shift all sense to the soule then the bodie beareth that is feeleth nothing and so you refute the booke of homilies you follow it not If you allow sense to the bodie tell vs I pray you how violence first offered to the bodie is primarily felt in the soule It may be betwixt first in English and primus in Latine you haue found some deepe difference The soule you thinke doth primarily consider of the paines of her bodie that you meane by feeling Then leaue you to the bodie a second consideration of his owne paines and so you giue reason and memorie to the bodie distinct from the soule which well becommeth a man of your wisdome That Christ duely considered of the cause for which he suffered and of the Iudge by whose appointment he suffered these things in his bodie from the Iewes I haue often sayd it and you haue often reiected it as not sufficient to satisfie the wrath of God against our sinnes and therefore you euery where vrge the proper punishment and iust reward of sinne due to vs on the soule of Christ and when you come to proue it you rest on the religious consideration that Christ had of his sufferings and call that the wrath of God as if you might choppe and change the wrath of God to your best liking and neuer be constant in any thing Howbeit the question now is what the publike homilies teach the people to beleeue of the worke of their saluation and not how you can shift and sheere wordes to make them sort with your errours Shew therefore somewhat out of the booke of Homilies established by the lawes of this realme that may cleerely confirme or concurre with your doctrine and sell vs not the verdiuyce of your owne deuices in stead of good wine allowed by publike authoritie Christ tooke vpon him the reward of our sinnes the iust reward of sinne But the same homilie sayth the reward of our sinne was the iust wrath and indignation of God the death both of bodie and soule Therefore by the homilie Christ tooke on him for vs the iust wrath and indignation of God the death of the bodie and soule Your trade of iugling will but shame you if you can shift hands no cleanlier then here you doe Your first and second propositions here cited out of the Booke of Homilies are so curtayled by you that they seeme nothing lesse then that they are in their right places The writer of the Homilies hauing taught
patience whereby we might be assured that he felt his afflictions on the Crosse with quicker sense and greater paines then we are able with any patience to endure And is this all that now you would say that Christ found no ioy in his paines what Cow-keeper doth not know that paine is paine and not ioy but was Christes paine such that it excluded his soule from the remembrance or sense of all Gods graces so richly powred on him and promises so faithfully made vnto him you were best come in with your mooueable fittes of astonishment and tell vs that in one and the same sentence when Christ said My God my God he was in full and perfect assurance and assistance of Gods fauour whom els he could not call his God if he felt no comfort in him that is the God of all comfort and when he pronounced the next syllable why he presently fell into a sudden pangue where he was forsaken and left all comfortlesse and alone according to your deuices And if any man be so wise to let you lead him through such thornes as to graunt in Christ on the Crosse sometimes hope of glorie and sometimes feare of confusion sometimes comfort and suddainly distrust of his saluation sometimes Gods fauour and full assistance as in affliction and by and by the second death and the paines of the damned he may dally with faith and infidelity with heauen and hell with Christ and Beliall as you doe But if it were not possible for Christ crucified being the wisdome and power of God to be tossed and tumbled with such contrarie blasts then hath the forsaking which he complained of an other manner of sense then you imagine And whatsoeuer meaning you ascribe vnto it you may not with a word that admitteth diuers interpretations impugne the plaine and open wordes and deeds of our Sauiour in which is no question As when the high Priest asked him e Mar. 14. art thou Christ the sonne of the blessed Iesus said I am and ye shall see the sonne of man sit at the right hand of power and come in the cloudes of heauen And when the Theefe that was crucified with him said vnto him f Luc. 22. Lord remember me when thou comest into thy kingdome he answeared Verily I say vnto thee to day shalt thou be with me in Paradise As also breathing out his soule he said g Ibidem Father into thine hands I commend my spirit If to be the sonne of God and to sit at Gods right hand in glory if to dispose of Paradise at his pleasure and to commit his spirit into his Fathers hands be no signes nor proofes of comfort and ioy then let your exposition beare some shew but if these be more then arguments of most excellent honour and glory not onely reserued for him and confirmed vnto him but assumed and professed by him euen when he was condemned and crucified who that had any care of trueth or respect to reason would auouche that Christs h Defenc. pag. 108. li 9. godhead gaue him for that season of his passion no sense nor feeling of comfort and ioy neither in spirit soule nor body i Defenc. pag. 108. li. 16. This was that extreame humiliation and exinâ—…nition of nature wherein God spared not his sonne and wherein Christ spared not himselfe If you may sit iudge not only ouer Prophets and Apostles but ouer Christ himselfe you will soone appoint him to suffer what pleaseth you but when you come to make proofe thereof you betray the violence of your spirits that must haue all thinges giue way to your wills and the weakenesse of your iudgements that discerne not humility from infidelity nor religious patience from hellish astonishment k Philip. 2. Exinanition and humiliation the Apostle nameth in Christ but either voluntary and either in comparison of his diuine glory and maiesty wherein being equall with his father he tooke on him the forme of a seruant and Christ emptied himselfe of glory not of gracâ—… humbled himselfe becomming obedient to the death of the crosse The Apostle neither saith nor meaneth that Christ emptied himselfe of all grace or comfort in his whole humane nature but laid aside the vse and shew of his diuine power and honour whiles for loue to vs he performed the worke of our redemption in the shape of a seruant and became obedient vnto the death of the crosse which was painefull and shamefull but not astonished with the paines of the damned nor subiected to the second death This is your yarne which you would faine weaue into the Apostles words but truth and falshood haue no fellowship no more haue your dreames and the Apostles doctrine As much it maketh for you that God spared not his owne sonne but gaue him for vs all whence you may as well conclude that God adiudged his sonne to euerlasting destruction and damnation for that were indeed not to spare him as that he inflicted on him the true paines of hell least he should seeme to spare him The Apostles wordes expound themselues God spared not his sonne but gaue him for vs This giuing him into the hands of sinners for our sakes was Gods not sparing him otherwise that God spared him in nothing which either his power was able to impose or our sinnes did deserue this is doctrine for him that meaneth to be an Apostata from all faith and trueth to set the father at as great enmity with his sonne as our sinnes did deserue or could prouoke The higth of Christs not sparing himselfe was as the Apostle teacheth his obedience vnto the death of the Crosse if you will haue Christs obedience stretch to the second death of the damned you must get you some new Scriptures these that are already written witnesse no such thing How beâ—…t you will lacke no Scripture For rather then you will acknowledge your want in that behalfe you will make euery Chapter throughout the Bible to speake of your dreames For euen * 〈◊〉 pag. 〈◊〉 heere you quote Deutero 10 17 and Luc 16 17 in the first of which places the Scripture saith l Deut. 10. 17. The Lord your God is God of Gods and Lord of Lords a great God mightie and terrible which accepteth no persons nor taketh rewards What is this to Christes sufferings or to the paines of the damned was it after noone or after midnight when you quoted these places you knew not why nor wherefore So play you with Luc 16 17. where it is said m Luc. 16. 17. It is more easie that heauen and earth should passe away then that one tittle of the Law should fall Will you hence inferre which is the thing that you should prooue ergo Christ was forsaken of all outward and inward comfort and ioy besides you no man hath the grace to make such faire and cleare demonstrations of your doctrine n Defenc pag. 108. li. 21. This forsaking or
inuisible place expresly Paradise if that were so you must then confesse your hades is not common to good and bad and hath in it not only an heauenly place but an happie state which I trust you will not allow to the wicked and so hades and heauen to be all one with you which thing you so much disclaime But by your leaue it is not so your friends and you are ouerbold with Ireneus to make him say what you list Six and twenty Chapters before this he saith the elders which were the Apostles Disciples deliuered that such as were translated that is remooued hence with their bodies without dying as Enoch and Elias were translated thither euen to Paradise and there remaine they which were translated euen to the end shewing now a beginning of incorruption Againe he further sheweth that in the Scripture he taketh hades to be al one with death or the dominion of death where he readeth the text thus Vbi est mors aculeus tuus Vbi est mors victoria tua Death where is thy sting Death where is thy victory You shew your selfe to be well read in the fathers that cannot tell whether Ireneus wrote in Greeke or in Latin and therefore in steed of a most learned and most eloquent writer as Ierom calleth him you bring vs the authority of an vnknowen and obscure interpreter Were there no more but the very place euen now cited and abused by your selfe the parts whereof are found in Ireneus thrice after three seuerall interpretations as for example in Terra sepultionis in terra defossionis in terra stipulationis it were enough to shew the Author neuer wrote in Latine that varieth so much from himselfe and that the translator was verie seely but there are other arguments infinite the Greeke wordes expressing the conceits of heretikes aboue 120 euery where be retained the stile throughout exactly resembling the Greeke phrase the manifold citations thereof by the Greeke Fathers as 18. whole Chapters by Epiphanius 22. peeces and parts thereof by Eusebius and 14. by Theodoret besides Polycarpe his instructor and teacher euen in his youth who was altogether a Grecian But we shall not need to seeke reasons for it since Ierom so many hundred yeeres agoe when the originall was extant numbreth Ireneus amongst the Greek writers We shall seeme saith he to crosse the opinions of many auncient writers of the Latins Tertullian Victorinus Lactantius of the Greekes o omit the rest I will make mention onely of Ireneus Bishop of Lions And againe To name the Greeke writers and to ioine the first and last together Ireneus and Apollinarius Ireneus then writing in Greeke and citing the Apostles words likewise in Greek you cannot proue by the rude and late translation of his works which we haue how he read the Apostles text Gregorie Bishop of Rome more then 600 yeeres after Christ saith Scripta beati Irenei iamdiu est quòd solicite quaesiuimus sed hactenus ex â—…is inueniri aliquid non potuit The writings of blessed Ireneus we haue long and carefully sought for but hitherto nothing of his can be found he meaneth in Latin for before and after euerie Greek diuine as Basil Cyril Theodoret Occumenius Aretas Anastasius Damascen Procopius Nicetas cite Irenaeus workes and words The Latin translation of the Apostles words 1 Corinth 15 Death where is thy sting death where is thy victory I shall haue fitter occasion by and by to examine Tertullian doth likewise For speaking of Inferi which he taketh for the same that hades is he noteth it as the place quo vniuersa humanitas trahitur whither all mankind must goe and therefore of Christes going thither he saith Because he was a man therefore hee died according to the Scriptures and was buried according to the same also heere he satisfied the common law of nature by following the forme of mens dying and going to the world of the dead If you should not peruert both Tertullians wordes and sense neither would make for your purpose And though you gain not much by corrupting the coherence of his wordes yet are you so vsed to haue all to your liking that you cannot hold your hand from disordering other mens speeches Christ saith Tertullian being God because he was also man and died according to the Scriptures and was buried according to the same euen in this satisfied the law by performing the course of an humane death apud Inferos in the places below In steed of Legi the law you say the common law of nature apud Inferos you translate going to the world of the dead These bee your fansies added to Tertullians wordes and no parts of his purpose In the meane while you dissemble and therein abuse both your selfe and your Reader that euen in that Chapter and the sentence before Tertullian describeth Inferi to be a place vnder the earth whither the soules of good and bad descend after death the good to a kind of refreshing which is plainely Limbus so much refused by your selfe the bad to punishment His wordes in the fiue and fiftie Chapter which you quote precedent to those which you cite are these Nobis inferi non nuda cauositas nec sub diualis aliqua mundi sentina creduntur sed in fossa Terrae in alto vastitas in ipsis visceribus eius abstrusa profunditas Siquidem Christum in corde Terrae triduum mort is legimus expunctum id est in recessu intimo interno in ipsa Terrâ—… operto intra ipsam cauato inferioribus adhuc abyssis superstructo We beleeue Inferi to be no bare hollownesse nor any sincke vnder the world but in the gulfe of the earth and in the depth of vastitie and in the very bowels of the earth an abstruse profunditie For we reade that Christ was the three dayes of his death in the heart of the earth that is in an inward place within the midst thereof and couered with the earth and hollowed within the same and seated ouer mighty deepes below If this be your world of the dead let any man of vnderstanding iudge whether this be not a plaine euident description of that which the latter writers called Limbus and whether there can be any fuller delineation of it then a place vnder the earth and in the midst thereof euen hollowed in the bowels of the earth and couered with the same hauing vnder it mighty deepes And that in it there is as well rest for the good as torments for the wicked And the continuation of the very same sentence which you guilefully bring for your world of dead and the conclusion of both are deliuered by Tertullian in these words if Christ did performe the course of an humanc death in places below neither did ascend into the higth of the heauens before he descended into the lower parts of the earth there to make the
after his resurrection all power in heauen and earth that is in all places and ouer all things created is giuen vnto me Since then without question Christ had the keyes as well of death and hell as of heauen and so that sense of his words is most true let vs see which of our expositions hath best reason When Iohn for feare fell as dead at Christs feete would Christ to comfort Iohn in that plight say no more but that he himselfe was once dead and now aliue and had power to die no more as you expound Christs words how could this strengthen or restore Iohn that was euen dead for feare or did Christ rather encourage Iohn not to feare without cause seeing he himselfe not onely was risen from the dead but had all power ouer death and hell that is the keyes of both to dispose of ech mans life and Soule at his pleasure when therefore Christ that had all power of life and death Saluation and damnation laid his right hand on Iohn to protect him and bad him not feare but write the things which he saw had not Iohn iust cause to cast away all feare and cheerefully to obey the voice of him that was so able and ready to rescue him from all feare and danger whatsoeuer Christs power ouer death you will say was enough to preserue Iohns life and therefore mention of the key of hell was superfluous Iohn was to see and write the things that were and after should be in heauen earth and hell as is euident in his Reuelations yea the opening and shutting of the bottomelesse pit the chaining of Satan there the comming of the Locusts and the beast from thence and the lake of fire and brimstone euerlastingly burning there and who should be throwen into it were to be reuealed vnto him Lest therefore the sight of these things should amaze Iohn or the reporting of them should want credit with vs Christ did professe which is most true that he had the keyes that is all power euen ouer these secret and fearefull places so that Iohn should neither shrinke at the vision nor we distrust the Relation of them And though my reason of mentioning here the keyes of hell be such as you shall neuer counteruaile yet doe I not runne proudly and peremptorily as you doe in mine owne conceits I haue the iudgement of the best Interpreters old and new that haue intermedled with the opening of these reuelations Andreas Arch Bishop of the same Caesaria that Saint Basil was and within 600. yeeres after Christ though you skornfully reiect him as you doe that venerable writer Bede expounding these words of Christ I haue the keyes of death and of Hades saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is of the death of the Body and of the Soule Primasius expoundeth them thus I haue the keyes of death and hell idest Diaboli totius corporis eius that is ouer the diuell and all his body or societie The exposition of the Apocalyps extant in Saint Austens works thus I haue the keyes of death and Hell because he that beleeueth and is baptised is deliuered from death and from hell Haymo thus By the name of the keyes is shewed Christs eternall power by death the diuell is vnderstood by whose enuy death came into the world And by hell his members that shall come to the torments of hell Lyra. I haue the keyes of death and of hell that is power to deliuer thence the iust which Christ did in his Resurrection and to inclose there the wicked which he shall chiefly doe in the last iudgement Of our new writers Bullingere Christ then hath the keyes of death and hell because whom he will he deliuereth from the perpetuall damnation of death and whom he will he suffereth iustly to remaine in that perill of damnation Christ hath the supreme gouernment of the house or kingdome of God to quicken whom he will and to draw them from hell and damnation and whom he will damne with his iust iudgement to destroy For he hath most full power ouer death and hell He conquered and disabled both as it is Osee. 13. and 1. Corinth 15. Aretius He that resembled the Sonne of Man in the Apocalyps said I haue the keyes of hell and death hoc est in damnatos damnandos damnatorum loca that is ouer those that are damned or shall be damned and ouer the places of the damned Chytreus Christ deliuereth his Church from the captiuitie of death and hell casteth the wicked into the Dungeon of hell and of eternall death For he hath the keyes that is most full power ouer death and hell Sebastian Meyer whom Marlorate followeth I haue the keyes of death and hell that is power to pardon sinnes which being abolished both death and hell are depriued of their strength Osiander I haue the keyes of death and hell that is it is in my hand to kill and quicken to damne and sauc These men had both learning and reason to say as they did neither will any pick them ouer the pearch as you doe Andreas Caesariensis and Bede but he that hath neither Againe one sitteth on a pale horse whose name was death and Hades destruction the world of the dead or the kingdome of death followed after him This in no wise can be hell because the Text addeth power was giuen them to slay with the sword and with famine and with death and with wild beasts Hell slayeth none in that sort these are not the weapons of hell You lacke three Gennets to set your three poppets on horsebacke If by these three destruction the world of the dead the kingdome of death you meane in effect nothing but death as you vse to expound your selfe that is expressed before and Saint Iohn saith Hades followed after him Doth any thing follow after it selfe Againe will you bring your world of the dead that is all the Soules in heauen and hell to ride on horse-backe and that in the shew and shape of one person you would make good dumb shewes you haue such pretie fansies to make death goe first alone and his kingdome to come after him But though you play with Saint Iohns visions you haue no warrant to mistake Saint Iohns words and to muster your owne errors vnder his colours Saint Iohn doth not say that power was giuen to death and Hades to kill with the sword with famine and with death as you dreame but Saint Iohn hauing represented the sword or warre by the red horse verse 4. and famine by the blacke horse verse 5. and all sorts of diseases and pestilences by the pale horse verse 8. he saith power was giuen to them that is to the riders on these three horses to kill the fourth of the earth with warre hunger and sicknesse And because these three come not one after another but when God is greatly prouoked with
punishment and payment and vengeance for sinne such as the godly doe in no wise suffer Christ onely hauing wholy suffered that for vs all Therefore indeede his sufferings proceded from Gods proper wrath and were the true effects of Gods meere Iustice bent to take recompence on him for our offences Thou hast in these words Christian Reader the bulwarke of this mans cause concluding that Christ suffered the MEERE IVSTICE PROPER VVRATH and very CVRSE of God for sinne The frame of his reason if I vnderstand it as who vnderstandeth his mysteries but himselfe is this All paine in man is from God either as correction of sinne or as punishment for sinne In Christ there was no ‖ cause and so no neede of ‖ correction his sufferings therefore were the punishments of sinne They were punishments for sinne Ergo they were the true punishment proper payment wages and vengeance of sinne which proceeded from Gods proper wrath and were the true effects of Gods mâ—…ere iustice bent to take recompence on him for our offences His termes of TRVE PROPER and MEERE ioyned to the PVNISHMENT VVRATH and IVSTICE of God are not warranted by any Scripture much lesse referred to the sufferings of Christ nor so much as prooued by any testimony defined with any certaintie directed by any part or expounded by any meanes but onely proiected as Ridles and laberinthes to weary the wise to angle the simple and to refuge himselfe when he shall be pressed with the falsitie and impietie of his assertions Least therefore we wrangle about words in vaine which is his desire and deuise that he may seeme to say somewhat and carry the Reader into a forest of strange and vnknowen phrases where he shall hardly discerne what either side saith I thâ—…nke it needefull first to declare what the Scriptures meane by the wages of sinne and wrath of God and so to trie in what sense and with what truth his termes may be added to them and applyed to the sufferings of Christ. The wages of sinne is death saith S. Paul God himselfe foretold Adam it should be so Whensoeuer thou catest of the forbidden tree thou shalt die the death Then how many kinds of death are by God threatned and inflicted on sinners so many parts must the wages of sinne containe Now those are three the death of the Soule in this life which I call spirituall the death of the body leauing this life which I call corporall and the death of both in the next world which I call eternall For as man had two parts by which he did liue Soule and body and two places wherein he might liue if he obeyed God earth for a time and heauen for euer so disobedience depriued either part of man in either place of the life which he should haue enioyed and subiected him to the feares griefes and paines of death both here and in hell for euer The life of the body is the vnion of the Soule with the body the effects whereof are sense and motion to discerne obtaine and performe that which is needfull or healthfull for the body And as the presence of the Soule bringeth life to the body so the departing of the Soule taketh life from the body and leaueth it dead that is voide of all action motion and sense as to euery mans eyes is apparent in dead bodies The Soule therefore in the Scriptures is vsually taken for the life of the body which proceedeth from the Soule and is maintained by the Soule And these phrases to seeke a mans Soule tolay downe his owne Soule or to giue it for another to powre out his Soule vnto death with such like doe properly expresse the death of the body quickned by the Soule because men loose or leaue this life when they loose or leaue their Soules And where God threatned death to Adam euen the very same day in which he should transgresse we must not thinke that God either delayed the punishment longer or extended it farder then his words at first imported When therefore the very same day that they sinned God said to the woman increasing I will increase thy sorrow and to the man In sorrow shalt thou eate all the daies of thy life we must acknowledge that from that time forward death began to take hold and worke on both their bodies though not by present separation of the Soule from the body for Adam liued after that 930. yeeres yet by mortalitie mutabilitie miserie and namely by sorrow and paine as the instruments and agents of death Worldly sorrow causeth death as Paul witnesseth and a broken hart saith Salomon drieth the bones yea sorrow hath slaine maxy And were it not so written yet experience and nature teacheth vs that griefe of mind and paine of body where they continue or increase consume the flesh and hasten death so that when God the same day that they sinned subiected them to sorrow and paine which before they felt not He made way for death that it might continually worke in them and â—…ken them till they returned to dust The tiâ—…e of this life saith Austâ—…n is nothing elsâ—… but a race to death and truely after a mâ—…n begiâ—…th to be in this bâ—…dy he is in death The life of the soule is not her vnderstanding and will which she can neuer lose no not in hell but onely the trueth and graâ—…e of God by whose spirit she receiueth the light of faith to direct her and the strength of loue to stirre and iâ—…cite her in tâ—…is life to beholde desire and embrace the holinesse and goodnesse of Gods blessed will and promise for her euerlasting happinesse which with patience and comfort of the Holy ghost she expecteth till Gods appointed time do come The lacke or losse of this inward sense and motion of Gods spirit which only can quicken the soule is the death of the soule depriued of her life which is God and left to herselfe in blindnesse and hardnesse of heart and giuen ouer vnto a reprobaâ—…e minde and vile affections to worke wickednesse euen with greedinesse till contempt of Gods will and desperation of his mercy doe fearefully end her miserable time in this life and violently draw her from hence to see and suffer the terrible iudgements of God prouided for sinne in another world Life euerlasting is the perfect and perpetuall vision and fruition of Gods glorious presence in the heauens where vnspeakable light and honour ioy and bliâ—…e shall compasse and replenish bodie and soule in the fellowship of Christ and his elect angels for euer The exclusion and reiection of the wicked from this heauenly fâ—…licity together with the shame and confusion of sinne wounding and stinging the conscience without ease or rest and the dreadfull horror of hell the place of darknesse and diuels hauing in it continuall flames of intolerable and vnquenchable fire eternallie tormenting the soules and bodies of the damned the Scriptures call the sâ—…cond death
the wicked shall presently beholde and see themselues reiected thence they shall inwardly grieue with vnspeakable sorrow and outwardly mourne with gnashing their teeth for very anguish of heart as perceiuing themselues excluded from that inestimable blisse for euer This collection our Sauiour confirmeth in expresse words There shal be weeping and gnashing of teeth when ye shall see Abraham Isaac and Iacob and all the Prophets in the kingdome of God and your selues thrust out at doores Yea where there are two sorts of paines in hell Losse of heauen and sense of euill the learned and ancient Fathers haue professed the former to be a greater and grieuouser paine than the latter There are some saith Chrysostome of an absurd iudgement who only desire to escape hell contra ego multo durius esse tormentum quoddam assero quà m gehenna est hoc est non assecutum esse tantam gloriam illinc elapsum esse But I on the contrarie aâ—…firme there is a farre worse torment than hell it selfe is to wit the losse of so great glory and the falling there-from Neither doe I thinke that we ought so much to grieue at the euils in hell as at the losse whereby we fall from heauen qui nimirum est cruciatus omnium durissimus which doubtlesse is the bitterest anguish of all the rest S. Austen in like sort To perish from the kingdome of God to be banished from the citie of God to want so plentifull abundance of the sweetnesse of God as he hath layd vp in store for those that feare him tam grandis est pâ—…a vt ei nulla possint tormenta quae nouimus comparari is so grieuous a punishment or paine that no torments which we know may be compared vnto it NAZIANZENE Those that rise to iudgement this amongst other or rather ABOVE other punishments shall torment them that they are reiected of God And Basil. The estranging and reiecting from God is an euill more intolerable than all that is feared or expected in hell If the griefe shall be so great to be excluded from the kindome of God and the same be comprised in the sentence of the Iudge where he saith Depart from me ye cursed then is there no doubt but it is an essentiall part of the paines of hell since it is not only generall and perpetuall to all the damned but a necessarie precedent to the rest of their torments which can neither take full hold of them nor afllict them in the highest degree till they be wholly depriued of all consolation and expectation of any fauour from God and vtterly confounded with the griefe and shame of that reâ—…ection which they shall suffer at the hands of Christ before men and Angels Malediction the second part of the Iudiciall sentence against the wicked noteth as well the cause of their condemnation to be sinne for which onely both men and Angels are accursed as the sequels of sinne in the condemned whom this curse excludeth from all sense and hope of Gods blessings eternall and temporall for euer and wrappeth in the fearefull remembring and feeling the number and horrour of their offences that before flattered delighted and encouraged themselues in their wickednesse For where shame sorrow and feâ—…re are by Gods wisedome and trueth appointed as waiting mates on sinne and offered to the consciences of all men to stay them from sinne or leade them to repentance when they haue sinned if they doe not harden their hearts the wicked to take their full foorth in their vncleannesse cast these behind them and not onely conceale and excuse their sinnes but quench all reuerence and remembrance of God least any thing should hold or hinder them from their pleasures And therefore the Iustice of God arising to take finall vengeance of their rebellion against him causeth extreame and inward shame remorse and feare which they so much shunned when they might haue repented and desisted from their euill wayes most dreadfully to inuade them and as mightie streames to ouerwhelme them till they sinke to the bottome of all confusion compunction and desperation Which is a most iust reward of their dalliance with God and yet a most painefull torment to the damned who in their life time wilfully renounced God to enioy their delights but there and for euer after shall without remedie or mercie behold the lothsomenesse of their sinnes and grieue at the follie and furie of their disobedience God punishing the soule of euery such transgressour with the remembrance and remorse of his madnesse with the euidence and conscience of his vncleannesse and with the sight and assurance of his perpetuall wretchednesse Quae pâ—…na grauior quà m interioris vulnus conscientiae What paine more grieuous sayth Ambrose then the wound of the conscience within Amongst all the afflictions of mans soule there is none greater saith Austen then the conscience of sinne Howe thinkest thou saith Chrysostome shall our consciences be bitten and is not this worse then any torment what soeuer The most grieuous torment of all saith Basil shall be that reproch and eternall shame Omni tormento atrociùs desperatio condemnatos affliget Worse then all other torments shall desperation afflict the condemned Giue them griefe of heart euen thy curse vpon them saith Ieremie to God No doubt then the sting of conscience and shame of sinne which so extreamely shall grieue the heart is a part of that eternall curse which shall light on the wicked and so painefull and grieuous shall it bee vnto them that they shall curse the day of their birth time of their life and all the workes of their hands that occasioned or leasured them to come within the compasse of this fearefull and euerlasting curse Torments and sorrowes shall take holde on them in the day of iudgement or of death and they shall be pained as a woman in labour with child By which it appeareth saith Ierome they are tormented with their owne conscience Tunc ipsa conscientia proprijs stimulis agitatur atque compungitur Then the very conscience of the wicked is pricked and pierced with her owne goades and stinges Magna paena est impiorum conscientia The conscience of the wicked is a great paine or punishment vnto them You did well vtterly to exempt the Sauiour of the world from both these I meane from reiection and malediction you must otherwise haue depriued him of all grace and glorie and plunged him into the shame of sinne and remorse of conscience neither of which without open impietie can be ascribed to the soule of Christ and yet both these are essentiall paincs to the damned and not circumstances as you pretend of time and place How painefull they are I leaue the Reader to consider by that which is already said essentiall they cannot chuse but be to damnation and hell not onely because they are comprised in the sentence of the Iudge which
THE CROSSE OF CHRIST should be frustrate For the PREACHING OF THE CROSSE is to them that perish foolishnesse but to vs that are saued it is the power of God Christ crucified then being the very ground of our saluation and the Gospel declaring him to be the power of God to saue all that beleeue euidently the crosse of Christ was the maine doctrine of the Gospell which Paul preached to the Galathians and which the false Apostles mixed with circumcision and the righteousnesse of the law as well for the aduancing themselues being Iewes as for feare of their countreymen who vtterly disdained and egerly pursued all that taught a man hanged on a tree as a malefactor for so the vnbeleeuing Iewes conceiued of Christ to be the Sauiour of the world and complement of all Gods promises made to the seede of Abraham for their euerlasting blisse The rage of the vnbeleeuing Iewes against Paul for preaching the death and blood of Christ to be the Redemption of all the faithfull is manifest in many places of the Actes and of his owne Epistles which furie whiles the false Apostles sought to decline and somewhat to please and pacifie the Iewes they added circumcision and the obseruation of the law vnto the Crosse of Christ as necessary for iustification and saluation without which the death of Christ could doe vs no good This error then newly sowen among the Galathians to whom Paul before had preached Christ crucified as the sole and sufficient meane of their Redemption and Iustification through faith in his blood the Apostle throughout that large Epistle of his written vnto them with his owne hand doth purposely and mightily confute and is so farre from coupling any thing with Christ as requisite for righteousnesse or blessednesse and chiefly the law that he opposeth himselfe against men and Angels for the truth of his doctrine and resolueth cleane contrary to those false teachers and flatterers of the Iewish nation in most vehement manner Behold I Paul say vnto you that if yee be circumcised Christ shall profit you nothing Ye are abandoned from Christ whosoeuer are iustified by the law ye are fallen from grace His reasons are vrgent and euident If righteousnesse could be by the law then Christ died in vaine And that no man is iustified by the law in the sight of God it is plaine for the iust shall liue by faith now the law is not of faith For all haue sinned and are iustified freely by Gods grace through the Redemption that is in Christ Iesus whom God hath set foorth to be a Reconciliation THROVGH FAITH in his blood to declare his righteousnesse by the forgiuenes of sinnes As many then as are of the works of the law are vnder the curse but Christ hath redeemed vs from the curse of the law being made a curse for vs as it is written cursed is euery one that hangeth on a tree that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentils through Iesus Christ. And that made the Apostle enter this disputation with so sharpe a rebuke to the Galathians for sliding from this Gospel or glad tidings of their saluation in the Crosse of Christ to circumcision and the works of the law O foolish Galathians saith he who hath bewitched you not to obey the truth to whom Iesus Christ was before your eyes described crucified among you And in this confident course he goeth on with plentifull and substantiall proofes that the Redemption righteousnesse blessednesse adoption freedome and sanctification of Gods children proceede from the grace of God and of Christ who gaue himselfe for our sinnes that he might tast death for all and are receiued by faith in the blood of Christ which confesseth him to be the Sonne of God and the only Sauiour of the world What marueile then if in the close of this example when Paul had shewed his care to haue the Galathians persist in this truth in that he wrote so long a letter vnto them with his owne hand which otherwise he did not vse he did also traduce the pride and pollicie of the false Apostles who partly to aduance themselues because they were Iewes partly to shunne the enuie of their countrimen frustrated the Crosse of Christ by adding circumcision and the obseruation of the law vnto it not that they themselues kept the law but only because they would not suffer persecution for preaching the Crosse of Christ which the vnbeleeuing Iewes so egerly resisted and impugned and withall professed of himselfe that howsoeuer they reioyced in the flesh that is in the circumcision of the Gentils yet God forbid that he should reioyce but in the crosse of Christ as the most sufficient meane of mans Redemption by which he was crucified to the world and the world to him what persecution soeuer he suffered for it And the verses following which you peâ—…uishly pull to patience in persecution pertaine directly to establish the truth and force of Christs Crosse. For in Christ Iesus saith he that is to attaine saluation by Christ crucified neither circumâ—…sion anâ—…leth any thing nor vncircumcision but a new creature that is Regeneration in Christ when the inward man of the hart is renued by faith through the operation of the spirit And as many as walke according to this Rule of doctrine by preaching and beleeuing the crosse of Christ for many walke after an other rule of whom I haue often told you that they are the enimies of the crosse of Christ peace be vpon them and mercy and vpon the Israell of God that is vpon as many as be Iewes within and not without and haue the circumcision of the hart in the spirit not in the flesh whose praise is not of men but of God And therefore from hence forth let no man put me to businesse as if I liked or allowed circumcision when and where pleased me For if I yet preach circumcision why doe I yet suffer persecution the slâ—…inder of the Crosse is abolished and the Iewes haue no cause of offence against me But of the Iewes fiue times receiued I fortie lashes sane one I was thrise beaten with rods I was once stoned I haue beene in stripes aboue measure in prison frequent in death often I beare in my body the markes of the Lord Iesus that is the signes of these persecutions suffered for his cause which prooue that in preaching the crosse of Christ I goe not about to please men but God For if I would please â—…en I were not the seruant of Christ. There is no miscoherence with the Text nor dissidence from the truth in this exposition which not my selfe alone but the auncient Fathers and best Diuines both olde and new haue imbraced yea it fully agreeth with the maine intent of Paul in this Epistle with the perpetuall vse of his words and with the cleare light of other places where
speechlesse we die that are of the earth but he which came from heauen breathed out his soule with a loud voice We must say it was a shew of his diuine power to lay downe his soule when he would and to take it againe Yea the Centurio hearing him say to hiâ—… Father Into thine hands I commend my spirit statim sponte spiritum dimisisse and straightway of his own accord to send forth his spirit mooued with the GREATNES of this WOONDER said Truly this was the Sonne of God Chrysostome vpon these words of Matthew Iesus crying with a loud voice gaue vp the ghost sayth Idcirco magna voce clamauit vt ostendat haec sua potestate fieri Therefore Christ cried with a loud voice that he might shew this to be done by his owne power Marke sayth Pilate maruâ—…lled if he were alreadie dead And the Centurion also THERâ—…FORE CHIEFLY beleeued because he saw Christ die of his owne accord and power Victor of Antioch vpon the like words of Marke sayth By so doing the Lord Iesus doth plainly declare that he had his whole life and death in his owne free power Wherefore Marke writeth that Pilate not without admiration asked if Christ were yet dead addidit item ea potissimum de causa Centurionem credidisse he added likewise that the Centurion chiefly for that reason beleeued because he saw Christ giue vp the ghost with a loud crie and signification of great power Leo noting that Christ died not for lacke of helpe but of determinatâ—… purpose sayth Quae illic vitae intercessio sentienda est vbi anima potestate est emissa potestate reuocata What intreatie for life shall we thinke there was where the soule was both sent out with power and recalled with power Fulgentius Cum ergo homo Christus tantam accepâ—…rit potestatem vt cum vellet animam poneret cum vellet denuò resumeret quantam potuit habere Christi diuinitas potestatem Ideo autem ille homo potestatem animae habuit quia cum diuina potestas in vnitatem personae suscepit Where then the man Christ receiued so much power that he might lay downe his soule when he would and take it againe when he would how great power might the Godhead of Christ haue and therefore the manhood of Christ had power to lay downe his soule because the diuine power admitted him into the vinitie of person Sedulius Animam protinus suam sancto de corpore volens ipse deposâ—…it Christ himselfe forthwith vpon his prayer willingly layd off his sacred soule from his bodie Nonnius in his Paraphrase vpon S. Iohns Gospell expresseth the saying of Christ None taketh my soule from me in these words No birth-law taketh my soule from me no incroching time that tameth all things nor Necessitie which is vnchangeable counsell 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but ruler of my selfe I of mine owne accord yeeld vp my willing soule Beda vpon that place of Matthew And Iesus crying with a loud voice sent out or gaue vp his spirit writeth thus Quod autem dicit emisit spiritum ostendit diuinae potestatis esse emittere spiritum vt ipse quoque dixerat nemo potest tollere animam in that the Euangelist saith Christ sent out his soule or spirit he sheweth it is a point of Diuine power to send out the soule as Christ himselfe sayd None can take my soule from me Nullus enim habet potestatem emittendi spiritum nisi qui animarum conditor est For none hath power to send out the soule but he that is Creator of soules Which Bede buildeth vpon the words of S. Matthew who saith that Christ crying with a loud voice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dismissed or sent his soule from him Theophylact Iesus crieth with a loud voice that we should know it was true which he sayd I haue power to lay downe my soule for not constrained but of his own accord he dismissed his soule And the Centurion seeing that he breathed out his soule so like a Commander of death WONDERED and confessed him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for he died not like other men but as the Master of death Lyra vpon these words of Matthew Iesus againe crying with a loude voice sent forth his soule Whereby it appeareth that voice was not naturall but MIRACVLOVS because a man afflicted with great and long torment and through such affliction neere to death could not so cry by any strength of nature The latter writers concurre with the older in this obseruation Erasmus in his Paraphrase vpon Saint Luke Iesus when with a mighty cry he had said Father into thy hands I commend my spirit breathed out his soule to make it manifest to all that he did not faint as others doe the strengh of the body by little and little decaying but straightway vpon a strong cry and words distinctly pronounced laid downe his life as of his owne accord And the Centurion who stood ouerright as a Minister and witnesse of his death and had seene many dye with punishment when he saw Iesus besides the manner of other men after a strong cry presently to breath out his soule said truely this man was the Sonne of God Musculus That Christ sent foorth hiâ—… soule with aloude voice is a proofe of greater power then may be found in a man dying Whereby he shewed that he layed of his soule of his owne accord answerable to that I haue power to lay downe my soule and to take it againe To which end Iohn saith that bowing his head he gaue vp the Ghost Others first dye and then their heads fall but he first layeth downe his head and then of his owne accord deliuereth his soule vp to his Father Gualter But let vs see the manner of Christs death who as Iohn writeth with bowing downe his head yelded his Spirit Luke saith he cryed with a loude voice Father into thy hands I commend my Spirite Concurrunt hâ—…c non obscura Diuinitatis argumenta Here find we manifest arguments of his Diuinitie which the Centurion and others obserued as some of the Euangelists witnesse First this cry and distinct pronouncing of his last words sheweth a power and vertue MORE THEN HVMANE For we know that men dying so faint that the most of them cannot speake be it neuer so softly Againe he dyeth when he will himselfe yea and layeth of his soule with authoritie to shew himselfe Lord of life and death which is an euident proofe of his Diuine power It is profitable for vs diligently to marke the Diuine power of Christ which shewed it selfe so plainly in his death Marlorat vpon the words of Mathew and Iesus crying againe with a loud voyce sent foorth his spirit saith Declarat hic Christus maiestatem suam Christ declareth here his Maiestie that he layeth downe his soule not when men constraine him but when he himselfe will
Whereupon Pilat maruailed that Christ was so soone dead And the Lord himselfe said None taketh my soule from me but I lay it downe of my selfe I haue power to lay it downe and power to take it againe To which it pertaineth that is written he bowing downe his head gaue vp his spirit for other men first dye and then their heads hang but Christ first laid downe his head and then voluntarily rendered his soule to his Father Many moe might be brought of all ages and places confessing the same but if these suffice not what may be enough I doe not know To decline the Scriptures and Fathers that make against him the Discourser hath deuised two shifts very like the rest of of his tenents that is void of all truth and iudgement I deny not saith he but Christ might shew some strange vnusuall thing apparantly to the beholders in vttering his last voice which might very much mooue the beholders and hâ—…arers Adde hereunto that experience sheweth as Phisitians say how some diseases in the body bring death presently after most strong and violent crying Namely in some excessiue torments as of the stone Things reported and expressed in the Scriptures touching the strange and wonderfull manner of Christs death you deny and dreame of things there no way mentioned to coulour your matter and cosin your Reader That Christ did render his soule into his Fathers hands when as yet neither speech sense memory nor motion began to faile is diligently obserued by the Euangelists and was greatly marueyled at by the Centurion which saw the manner of his death As also that he breathed out his soule of his owne accord when he had spoken those words without any former or other degrees or pangs of death appearing in him is likewise witnessed by the Scriptures and constantly auouched by all the Fathers Saint Luke saith and speaking these words he breat hed out his soule Saint Mathew and crying with a loud voice he dismissed his spirit Saint Marke and sending a strong voice from him he blew out his Soule This did he of his owne accord and power None taking his soule from him as in death they doe ours but declaring himselfe by laying of his soule when he would and as he would to be Lord and master of life and death This is fit for all Christians to confesse least they dishonor the death of Christ by depriuing his person of that power and glory which he openly shewed in the eyes eares of all his persecutors This you shift of and instced thereof imagine some strange and VNVSVALI accident in the manner of Christs death which neither the Scriptures report nor you can expresse wherein you shew your selfe forward to inuent what is not written and backward to beleeue what is written which is the trade of such men as meane to make a shipwracke of their faith That a man may dye crying as Christ did you haue found at length if not from Diuines at least from Phisitians for I perccaue you haue sought all sorts of helps both farre and neere to vphold your fansies Pâ—…rchaunce Phisitians may tell you when a painefull disease possesseth the parts which are no fountaines of life or sense a man may cry till sense and strength begin to faile and so hasten his death by the violent spending of his spirits but that a man may by any course of nature retaine perfect memorie sense motion and speach to the very act of breathing out his soule I assure my selfe no wise Phisitian will affirme And if any more humorous then learned will wade so farre without his Art he must vnderstand that his word may not ouersway the Rules of Diuinitie and Principles of nature For what are the powers and faculties whereby the soule is conioyned with the body but life sense and motion so long then as they last the soule by nature neither doth nor can forsake the body But when sense and motion first outward and then inward are oppressed and ouerwhelmed then life also perisheth and the soule may no longer abide in her body the vnion by which she was fastened vnto it being wholy dissolued Wherefore death which is the priuation of life by Gods ordinance for the punishment of sinne by degrees surpriseth and in the end quencheth all sense and motion and so forceth the soule to forsake her seate which by Gods appointment is violently parted from hir body whether she will or no but neuer till the effects oflife which are sense and motion be first decayed and abolished A sowne is the suddainest ouerwhelming of the powers of life which any natural experience doth teach vs and yet therewith though outward sense and motion doe faile at an instant and the inward be very weake and almost insensible the soule doth not presently depart but stayeth a time till all sense and motion without and within except the partie be recouered be vtterly extinguished Wherefore in all men by necessitie of nature the powers and parts of life decav in some sooner in some later before they die and therefore in Christ on the Crosse it was MIRACVLOVS and aboue nature that hauing full perfect outward and inward sense speech and motion he did in a moment when he would and as he would render his soule into the hands of his Father without any farder decayes or other degrees of death precedent then the very act of breathing out his soule which left his body presently and perfectly dead Thou hast gentle Reader the causes and prooses that mooued me to obserue the manâ—…r of Christes death to bee different from ours which whether they be consonant to the Scriptures and rightly conceiued by those learned and ancient Fathers which I haue named vnto thee I leaue to thy discrecte iudgement assuring thee there is nothing to hinder the maine consent of so many old and new writers in a matter of so great consequence but onely the headdinesse of this discourser who vpon a bare pretence of one peece of Scripture not well vnderstood and worse applied thinketh he may worke wonders and conclude all these graue and sound Expositours to be so ignorant of the sense of that place and so vnable to reach to the depth of those words Christ was LIKE VS IN ALL things that with one accord they would affirme a sine fable a Paradoxe in Nature and contrarie to Scripture Howbeit it is no newes with this man to defend that Christ was distempered ouerwhelmed and all confounded both in all the powers of his soule and senses of his body He boldly auoucheth it was so with Christ before his death in the Garden and on the Crosse and therefore hee presumeth it might much more befall him at his death But let him keepe these secrets to himselfe I doubt not Christian Reader but thou wilt be well aduised before thou put the Sauiour of the world and the Sonne of God out of his wits or senses to make way for
dull conceite or eger stomacke rather betrayed by your foolish rolling to so many what ifs then my reason any way refuted I alter you will say the order of it Though I spake then more shortly then now I doe because I had no leasure to stand so long thereon yet he that will Reade but the third part of that Section whence you take this shall finde the very same parts and words that now I vse there contained and expressed But I afterward defend the proposition with the condition annexed to bee simplie true When I saw your humour was so franticke that not vnderstanding my words you would presently pronounce them in the view of the whole Realme to be a notorious Paradoxe and impietie I bid you take your vttermost aduantage of my words and as they stoode though that were not my first intent they were sound and good and your impugning them was prophane and false I yet auouch the same For where the Scriptures teach no Redemption but by the death and bloud of Christ your other deuâ—…sed Redemptions by the death of the soule and paines of Hell I account no better then false and prophane And therefore if our soules be not that way redeemed which the Scriptures reueile which is by the death and bloud of Christ they are not redeemed at all And being not at all redeemed I would faine know by the best of your skill what benefit of Redemption our bodies shall or can haue more then the bodies of Infidels Yea set that redemption aside which the Scriptures attribute to the death and bloud of Christ and neither bodie nor soule can be saued but infidelity and the wages therof I meane damnation both of soule and bodie preuaile in all men So that you were not well in your wits when with such an heat and huffe you cried out What a Pradoxe is it yea what impietie But I must chuse whether I will speake this sophistically or absurdly you say Is it any sophistrie or absurditie to speake as the Spirit of God speaketh in the Scriptures Your MEERE bloud of Christ is indeed absurd Sophistrie for you imagine by that word that Christ shed his bloud for our sinnes without any meritorious action or passion of the soule concurring which in the Redeemer of the world was so impossible as nothing more If I speake otherwise than the Scriptures speake take your pleasure at it so you bring reason for it but whe I keepe my selfe within the compasse of their speech your aâ—…ouching that I speake Sophisticallie or absurdlie reprocheth the Scriptures whom I follow In either of those points which you impugne as that our soules are redeemed by the bloud of Christ and that our bodies haue not redemption in this life I haue the Scriptures plainly precedent before me and therefore except they speake sophistically or absurdly I in retaining their speech and sense can do neither The difference betwixt the deaths of the faithfull and infidels is a thing well known to me and approoued by me yet must the Apostles words stand true that in this life we haue not the Redemption of our bodies but we must waite for it till the time that all things be restored That Christ hath already purchased and obtained it for vs by his death and passion I make no doubt as also that we rest in hope assured of it but hope which is seene is not hope and though the soules of the Saints retaine a firme faith and full expectance of Gods promise for the raising and Redeeming of their bodies from corruption and in the meane time discerne and feele as well the comfort that is in the death of Gods elect as the great blessings and benefites that follow their death yet their bodies lying in dust haue no shew nor sense thereof much lesse haue they that which Paul calleth the Redemption of the body From which words Saint Austen collecteth very truely Si Redemptio corporis nostri secundum Apostolum expectatur profecto quod expectatur adhuc speratur nondum tenetur If the Redemption of our body by the Apostles doctrine must be wayted for that which is expected is still hoped for but not yet obtained Take then the Redemption of the body for the incorruption of the same as Paul doth whom in that point I followed and tell me what benefite of incorruption which is the word you so much storme at the bodies of the faithfull haue more then the bodies of infidels You range aside as your manner is to the ceasing of sinne in the godly and their resting from labours as also the entrance of their soules into heauen as if the bodies of the wicked did sinne in their graues or were tossed with troubles when they were dead and rotten or in the Saints your sight did not serue you to distinguish their soules from their bodies For when I say as Paul sayth their bodies haue not yet redemption you replie their soules after death haue an entrance into heauen Euen so when I say that the death of the bodie to the saints is a part of that wrath curse and punishment which God inflicted on all mankinde for their sinne in Adam as shall after God willing more largely appeare you oppose the benefits which God of his peculiar goodnesse towards his children hath reserued for them after they haue obediently and patiently submitted themselues to his diuine pleasure in bringing their bodies to corruption for the sinne that dwelleth in them And thus by your mangling of matters you confound in the godlie their soules with their bodies and in God himselfe his iustice against sinne with his mercy towards his owne You might haue learned of S. Austen rightly to seuer them as he doth though you crosse him in this as in most of the things that are in question betwixt vs. Quamuis bonis conferatur per mortem plurimum boni vnde nonnulli etiam de bono mortis congruenter disputaverunt tamen hinc quae praedicanda est nisi misericordia Dei quòd in bonos vsus conuertitur poena peccati Though much good come to the godlie by death whereupon some haue accordingly written of the benefits of death yet what els in this must we acknowledge but the mercie of God that the punishment of sinne is turned to good vses And so that ancient writer of the booke Hypognosticôn amongst S. Austens works Vt moriantur homines poena peccati est vt reuertantur ad vitam Domini miserantis est That men die is the punishment of their sinne that they returne to life againe is the Lords mercie Before you depart from this point that not the bloud of Christ nor his flesh without respect to the merit of his whole soule was the full price of redemption you will shew how sundrie of the ancient Fathers doe agree with you sufficiently in this matter though afterwards in my booke I seeme to bring them against you If
you had Fathers to witnesse your fansies of Christes suffering the death of the soule and paines of hell you would soone recken them and more regard them than now you doe when they directly gainsay your late deuice of a new kinde of redemption which the Scriptures neuer specifie These Fathers I brought not against you as you imagine not perceiuing what maketh with you nor what against you In shew these places seemed to make against me and to disclaime that assertion which I concluded out of the Scriptures that the bloud of Christ redeemed and sanctified both our bodies and soules Lest therefore the simple should stumble at any such sayings of the Fathers not knowing their meanings I brought them to expound them and to let the Reader see that indeed I dissented not from them but confessed as they intended that in Christes suffering for sinne the whole man that is bodie and soule must be ioyned together And if any part of Christs humane nature were wholy freed and exempted from suffering that part in vs was not fully ransomed By which they neuer ment that Christs soule must haue seuerall sufferings for our soules and his body likewise for our bodies but as Adam sinned in both ioyntly so the punishment of sinne which Christ vndertooke for vs must be felt ioyntly in both and if either part in Christes sufferings were vntouched some part in vs was vnrestored This to be the true meaning of those Fathers and all that their words must inferre if they will speake trueth and agree with themselues as no doubt they doe your selfe is a witnesse sufficient against your selfe In defence of your doctrine you say It is most false that we precisely say that Christs body satisfied for our bodies and his soule for our soules yea ech of them in a seuerall and distinct kinde of satisfying which thing we neuer meant but acknowledge the sufferings of the whole man Christ do satisfie for vs wholly without any such precise partition What you dare not affirme because it is false and repugnant to the Scriptures I hope you will not impose on the Fathers so long as their words conclude no such thing They say precisely Christ gaue his flesh to be a redemption for our flesh and his soule likewise to be a redemption for our soules Whereby they meane no distinct sufferings of Christes soule for our soule nor of his bodie for our bodies but a ioynt suffering of both for both which you call the sufferings of the whole man Christ for vs wholly So farre we agree you acknowledging mine exposition of the Fathers to be such as you doe not nor dare not impugne for otherwise you must make them contradict both the Scriptures and themselues which they neuer ment if they should say that our soules are not clensed redeemed and sanctified by the bloud of Christ What now inferre you farder out of their wordes Marke well how these Fathers do not say that Christ gaue his life for a ransome only as you would construe it but euen his verie soule for our soules You are a worthie Clerke if you vnderstand not that nothing but the very soule of man is the life of his bodie and therefore Christ in giuing his life for vs must needs giue his verie soule for vs. The one of them doth not exclude the other as you vainly collect but implieth the other as by the vsuall speeches of the Scriptures and generall consent of all Interpreters olde and new may soone appeare They are dead sayth the Angell to Ioseph that sought the childes soule meaning Herod that went about to destroy Christ in his cradle Be not pensiue for your soule sayth our Sauiour what ye shall eat or what ye shall drinke Is not your soule of more value then meate Meate and drinke maintaine life and so continue the soule in the body otherwise they are no way needfull for the soule He that loseth his soule for my sake saith Christ shall saue it How can a man lose his soule for Christ but by laying downe his life for Christ There shall be no losse of any mans soule among you but of the ship said Paul to them that sayled with him which was performed in that they came all safe to land So of Epaphroditus Paul saith for the worke of Christ he was neere vnto death not regarding his Soule Nothing is more often in the Scriptures then for life to vse the name of Soule which is the cause of life and by the soule to expresse life which is a necessary consequent of the Soule remaining in the body as death is of the Soule departing from the body This kind of speech so familiar with the Hebrewes and so frequent in the olde and new Testament our Sauiour keepeth when he speaketh of his owne death The good sheepeheard saith Christ layeth downe his soule for his sheepe I am the good sheepeheard and lay downe my soule for the sheepe Therefore the Father loueth me because I lay downe my Soule to take it againe No man taketh it from me but I lay it downe of my selfe As also when he said the Sonne of man came to serue and to giue his soule for the ransom of many he intended no more then when he said I lay downe my soule for ‖ the ‖ sheepe which must needs be for the ransome of the sheepe So the Prophet foretold that Christ should power out his soule vnto death and make it an offering for sinne which loue of God we know by this saith Iohn that he layed downe his soule for vs. If auncient Fathers and learned expositors may be heard concurring with the Scriptures and obseruing this in the Scriptures we want neither old nor new all confessing it to be a case most cleere that by dying for vs Christ laid downe his Soule and gaue it for vs. Christ bowing his head saith Athanasius and yeelding vp the spirite which was within his body that is his soule declared whereof he spake this I lay downe my soule for my sheepe Austen the Soule is put for the life as where it is said he that hateth not his soule can not be my Disciple And likewise is not the soule more worth then meate that is this life for which meate is needfull And so that which Christ saith he will lay downe his soule for his sheepe by which he meaneth his life when he pronounceth that he will die for vs Ambrose Christ tooke vpon him the person of a sheepeheard and said a good sheepeheard layeth downe his soule for his sheepe Ideóque pro rationali grege seipsum passioni corporis non negauit and therefore for his reasonable flocke he yeelded himselfe to the passion or death of his body Cyrill When Christ might haue declined the rage of the Iewes and the gibbet of the crosse he so loued his that he refused not to die for the
life of all And that this is most perfect charitie I will cite our Sauiour himselfe for a witnesse where he saith greater loue hath no man then to lay downe his soule for his friends By all this Christ teacheth his Disciples to be so farre from shunning daungers and troubles for the saluation of men that the death of the flesh must not be refused for euen to that doth charitie stretch Fulgentius an other of the Fathers on whom you would faine fasten your error of Christs redeeming our soules by the death of his soule and our bodies by the death of his body not only noteth when and how Christ laid downe his soule for vs but why that phrase is applyed to Christs death and to all theirs that die willingly for loue not necessarily vpon constraint The whole man Christ laid downe his soule when his soule departed his flesh dying on the crosse And so againe Christ dying in the flesh laid downe his Soule and shewing the difference betwixt deliuering the body to death and giuing or laying downe the soule He saith Where loue is not the body is said to be deliuered but not the soule to be laid downe as the vessell of election plainly testifieth If I giue my body to be burnt and haue no loue it auayleth me nothing Here Paule declareth that without loue the body may be yeelded but not the soule laid downe For where he purposeth to signifie the purenesse of his loue he thus writeth to the Thessalonians Our goodwill was to bestow on you not onely the Gospell of God but euen our owne soules and to proue this an effect of his loue he addeth because yee were deare vnto vs. So that it is proued by manifest witnesse of Scripture that there wanteth loue where the body onely is layed downe to death but there is charitie where the soule is laid downe together with the body Beda Ponere ergo animam mori est Sic Apostolus Petrus Domino dixit animam pro te ponam id est pro te moriar carne To lay downe the Soule is to die So the Apostle Peter said to Christ I will lay downe my Soule for thee that is I will die in the flesh for thee A good sheepeheard saith Christ layeth downe his soule for his sheepe He did that he taught he performed that he commaunded he laid downe his Soule for his sheepe and shewed vs a way to contemne death which we must follow and a paterne after which we must be Printed which is first to extend our outward works of mercie towards his sheepe then if neede be to offer our death for them The later writers are all of the same mind and expound those words of our Sauiour the Sonne of man came to serue and to giue his soule a ransome for many and I lay downe my soule for my sheepe to haue none other sense then that he would die for vs as the Fathers before them did expound the same Erasmus in his paraphrase expressing our Sauiours meaning in both places saith in the person of Christ Therefore I came euen to serue the welfare of all in so much that I thinke it no burden to giue my life by the losse of one soule to redeeme many And againe Therefore my Father loueth me singularly as his Sonne because of mine owne accord I bestowed my life for the safetie of my Fathers flocke Bullinger likewise in the person of our Sauiour I came to serue the good of all and that which is farre greater I came into this world to giue my life for sinners And so I yeeld my selfe to death and euen to the death of the crosse that my sheepe beleeuing in me may liue by my death And alleadging and relying on Saint Austens words on the same place he addeth out of Austen To lay downe the soule is to die So Peter the Apostle said to his Master I will lay downe my soule for thee that is I will die for thee Attribute this to the flesh for when the soule goeth out of the flesh and the flesh remaineth without a soule then is a man said to lay downe his soule What saith the Euangelist Christ bowing his head gaue vp the Ghost this is to lay downe the soule Musculus Christ declareth what his ministerie is euen to redeeme mortall men and the chiefest degree of this ministerie is that he would giue his soule for them Then are we redeemed by the onely begotten Sonne of God and that dearely euen with his owne death For the Lord of heauen and earth humbled himselfe vnto death and that vnto a most shamefull death What was more vile or more abiect in the world then the death of the crosse And in the person of Christ Therefore my Father loueth me because I lay downe my soule that is because I die for my sheepe Caluine vpon those words of Christ I came to giue my soule a Redemption for many Therefore Christ mentioneth his death that he might withdraw his Disciples from a peruerse imagination of an earthly kingdome In the meane time the force and fruite of his death is aptly and rightly expressed whiles he affirmeth his life to be the price of our Redemption Whence it followeth that the price of our reconciliation with God is no where found but in the death of Christ and so It is no maruaile that Christ affirmeth himselfe to be therefore loued of his Father because he esteemeth our saluation dearer then his owne life He would by this arme his Disciples least seeing him soone after to be caried to death they should faint in hart as if he were oppressed by his enimies but rather acknowledge it to be the wonderfull prouidence of God that he should die to redeeme the flocke Gualter Christ saith he came to giue his soule to be the price of Redemption for many This passeth all offices that men may yeeld one to another For as him selfe saith no man hath greater loue then this to giue his soule for his friends But he vouchsafeth to die for his enimies And dying for vs he bestowed life on vs because his death was a ransome sufficient for the sinnes of the world And so A good sheepeheard saith Christ layeth downe his soule for his sheepe b As if he should haue said who can deny him to be a good sheepeheard that so much loueth his sheepe as not to refuse to redeeme their safetie with the losse of his owne life And because the Sonne of God hath exposed or yeelded his life for vs who can doubt but he hath satisfied abundantly for vs Vitus Theodorus Christ saith the sonne of man came to minister and to giue his life for the Redemption of all That surely is the chiefest and truest loue and seruice when a man serueth his enimies with body and life And likewise in the person of Christ. I alone am the good
be deliuered into the hands of men and they shall kill him And againe The Sonne of man shall be deliuered to be crucified and immediately before his apprehension Behold the houre is come the Sonne of man is deliuered into the hands of sinners This deliuering of Christ into the hands of men to be crucified was the not sparing him which the Apostle meant and was that for saking which Christ testified on the Crosse as Tertullian thinketh Filium dereliquit dum hominem eius tradit in mortem Hoc Apostolus sensit scribens si pater Filio non pepercit Sic reliquit dum non parcit sic reliquit dum tradit Ceterum non reliquit pater filium in cuius manibus Filius spiritum suum posuit Denique posuit statim obijt Spiritu enim manente in carne caro omnino mori non potest Ita relinqui á patre mori fuit filio God left or forsooke his Sonne as Christ complained on the Crosse whiles he deliuered his humane nature vnto death This the Apostle meant when he wrote if God spared not his Sonne So God left him whiles he spared him not so God left him whiles he deliuered him Otherwise the Father forsooke not the Sonne into whose hands the Sonne commended his spirit He laide it downe and presently died For while the spirit abideth in the flesh the flesh can not die at all Then to bee left of the Father was as much in the Sonne as to die Here are Tertullians words in order as they stand Where first he maketh the Sonne to die when hee laide downe his soule into his Fathers hands This death by which the soule of Christ departed from his body was that deliuering that not sparing which Paul meant and that forsaking which Christ spake of on the crosse What finde you here for the paines of Hell or for the proper sufferings of the soule You may peruert any mans words if you will but of them selues these are very coherent and euident In Ambrose you finde more hold He saith Minus contulerat mihi nisimeum suscepisset affectum Christ had done lesse for me if hee had not beene altogether affected as I should haue beene Though you be no good concluder yet are you a notable translatour For you can turne the English not onely cleane from but quite against the Latine Where Ambrose saith Christ had done lesse for mee if taking my nature vnto him hee had not also taken my naturall affection vnto him as feare sorrow and such like you misconster affection for punishment and mine that is naturally mine for that which I should haue suffered in hell and adding the word altogether of your owne you make Ambrose say that Christ was altogether affected that is punished in soule as I should haue beene in hell if I had not bene redeemed But by what Grammar doth affectus signifie hell paines Feare griefe and sorrow are naturall affections in all men and passions of the soule they signifie not in their owne nature the torments of the damned How shall we know this to bee Ambrose meaning Hee that hath but halfe an eye may see by that whole Chapter the roote of this sorrow to bee the infirmitie of our nature in Christ and the cause thereof to be his compassion and pitie had of vs and for vs. The next words to those which you bring are Ergo pro me doluit qui pro se nihil habuit quod doleret And presently taedio meae infirmitatis afficitur Christ therefore sorrowed for me who had nothing in him selfe for which he should sorrow he is affected with the tediousnesse of my infirmitie The tediousnesse of our infirmitie affected him not the torments of hell suffered in his owne soule Neque speciem incarnationis suscepit sed veritatem Debuit ergo dolorem suscipere vt vinceret tristitiam non excluderet Christ tooke vpon him not the shew but the trueth of our flesh Hee was therefore to feele griefe as a consequent to our nature that he might ouercome sorrow and not exclude it Tristis est non ipse sed anima Suscepit enim animam meam suscepit corpus meum Anima obnoxia passionibus Christ was sorrowfull not in person but in soule For he tooke vnto him my soule and my body Now the soule it is that is subiect to passions Is hell with you of late become a naturall infirmitie and affection that wheresoeuer you reade either of these words you streight inferre the paines of hell The causes of Christes sorrow will put all out of doubt and are plainely recited by Ambrose in the ende of this Chapter though stifly reiected by you because they sort not with your conceits Tristis videbatur tristis erat non pro sua passione sed pro nostra dispersione Christ seemed sorrowfull and indeede was sorrowfull not for his owne suffering but for our dispersing You say Christs sorrow was for the suffering of hell paines in his soule Ambrose saith in expresse words Christ sorrowed not for his owne suffering which of you twaine shall wee thinke best vnderstoode Ambrose meaning him selfe or you Christ sorowed saith Ambrose for our dispersion he sorrowed because he left vs orphanes he sorrowed for his persecutors All these occasions of sorrow in Christ at the time of his passion mentioned by Ambrose you vtterly disauerre and in spite of Ambrose teeth you will haue the infirmitie and affection of mans nature in Christ to signifie hell Yet Ierom shall helpe at a neede who saith That which we should haue borne for our sinnes the same Christ suffered for vs. You might haue done well to haue put quicquid for quod as one of your fellowes hath done alleaging this place that where Ierom would not say Christ suffered for vs whatsoeuer we should haue suffered your selues may speake it in his name Neither is it so strange a thing with you to translate all for some In the very next Page before citing Ambrose words hoc in se obtulit Christus quod induit Christ offered that in him selfe which he tooke of vs you render it Christ offered in sacrifice ALL that which he assumed which translation is euidently false whatsoeuer the illation be This place of Ierom I haue already answered in the conclusion of my Sermons and but that the booke happely will not alwaies be at hand I would spend no moe words therein The particular can not hurt me if it be simply graunted and the generall is not affirmed by Ierom. Howbeit Ierom in plaine speech presently expresseth what he ment Christ suffered for vs. By this saith he it is manifest that as Christs body whipt and torne bare the printes of the stripes and wrongs so his soule truely sorrowed for vs. What neede we any other exposition then his owne that Christ suffered for vs smart of body and griefe of minde which were due to vs in this world
his Resurrection as antecedent since he possessed not that immortall and heauenly life which now he hath but vpon his arising from the dead And so the Apostle placeth them Christ died and rose againe and reuiued into such power and glory that he was made Lord ouer dead and quicke And Cyrill who often times vseth this word he reuiued of Christ meaneth the third day after Christs death when the Scriptures affirme he rose from the graue So Cyrill and the Synode of Alexandria that ioyned with him in writing vnto Nestorius say of Christ. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he reuiued the third day hauing spoyled hell and so in his second confession of the true faith to the religious Queenes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christ spoyling death reuiued the third day And in his Epistle to those of Egypt Christ is said in the Scriptures first to haue died as a man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and after that to haue returned to life by that which he was by Nature If then he died not in the flesh according to the Scriptures he was not quickned by the Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is he reuiued not againe So that Cyrill hath not any seeming words for the death of Christs Soule but saith as Christ said in effect before that the Sonne of man gaue his soule or life to be a ransome for the life of all and not for the Soule of all which in the singular number is neither good English nor good Diuinitie though to smooth it you put the plurall and say for our soules which is not in Cyrill The words of Ambrose will prooue that Christ offered his Soule for vs hoc in se obtulit Christus quod induit Christ offered in Sacrifice all that which he assumed Besides that you falsifie Ambrose by adding ALL to his words which haue no such thing in them you â—…est Ambroses words against Ambroses meaning For though it may well be graunted that Christ offered body and soule as a Sacrifice of holinesse and obedience vnto God and that Christs Soule likewise was laid downe vnto the death of his body to feele the smart thereof and to be seuered by the force thereof in which respect Esay saith that Christ powred forth his Soule vnto death Yet Ambrose speaking of Christs sacrifice for the sinnes of the people meaneth as the rest of the Fathers doe that part of the Sacrifice which was slaine which was by his and their confession Christs body and not Christs Soule Heare Ambrose him selfe In quo nisi in corpore expiauit populi peceata In quo passus est nisi in corpore Wherein did Christ sacrifice for the sinnes of the people but in his body wherein did he suffer death but in his body And so Theodoret Christ was called a Priest in his humane nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and offered none other Sacrifice but his owne body Athanasius nameth what Christ put on and what he offered The word of God that made all things was afterward made an hie Priest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Putting on a body that was borne and made which he might offer for vs. Nazianzene saith to Christ. Thou art a sheepe because thouwast a Sacrifice thou art an hie Priest because thou offeredst thy body Augustine also Sacerdos propter victimam quam pro nobis offerret a nobis acceptam Christ 〈◊〉 a Priest for the Sacrifice he tooke of vs that he might offer it for vs. What that Sacrifice was he sheweth saying Assumpsit a nobis quod offerret Domino ipsas diximus sanctas primitias carnis ex vtero virginis Christ tooke of vs that he might offer to the Lord we meane the holy first fruits of his flesh taken from the wombe of the Virgine Theophylact A Priest may by no meanes be without a Sacrifice It was then necessarie that Christ should haue somewhat to offer Quod autem offerretur praeter eius corpus nil quidpiam erat necessariò ergo mortuus est Now there was vtterly nothing that he might offer besides his body it was needfull then he should die This that Christ tooke a body to offer is most agreeable to Ambroses mind as well in the booke which you cite as in other parts of his writings Ex segenerauit Maria Marie conceiued of her selfe to wit of her owne body that what was conceiued of her might be the true nature of a body And alleadging Saint Pauls words that Christ was made of the seede of Dauid according to the flesh Rom. 1. and made of a woman Galat. 4. He concludeth Ergo ex nobis accepit quod proprium offerret pro nobis vt nos redimeret ex nostro Then Christ tooke of vs that which hee might offer as his owne for vs to the ende he might redeeme vs by that which was ours And declaring what he meant euen by the words which you bring Christ offered that in himselfe which hee put on Ambrose addeth Non igitur diuinitatem induit sed carnem assumpsit vt spolium carnis exueret Christ put not on the nature of his Diuinitie but he tooke flesh that he might put off the spoyle of his flesh when he should die Now if the flesh of Christ were subiect to all iniuries how say you that Christs flesh is of the same substance with his Godhead What else doe you in so saying but compare Adams slime and our earth to the Diuine substance Here Ambrose plainely confesseth what hee meant Christ tooke vnto him and offered for vs euen Adams slime and our earth whereof his body was made Which elsewhere hee precisely auoucheth saying Corpus suscepit nostrae mortalitatis vt pro nobis haberet quid offerret Christ assumed our mortall body that he might haue what to offer for vs. And least you should after your trifling maner aske whether we exclude an humane soule from the body which Christ tooke of the substance of his mother and which hee offered for vs to death on the Crosse I answere with Ambrose Cum susceperit carnem hominis consequens est vt perfectionem incarnationis plenitudinemque susceperit Nihil enim in Christo imperfectum Where as Christ tooke vnto him the flesh of a man it is consequent that hee tooke vnto him the perfection and fulnesse of incarnation for there is nothing imperfect in Christ. And what neede was there hee should take flesh without a Soule when as an insensible flesh and an vnreasonable soule was neither subiect to sinne nor capable of reward An humane soule was a necessarie sequell to Christs body which he tooke of the seede of Dauid and substance of his mother as it is to all ours before we can be men but the soule is not comprised in the name of the body much lesse doeth it receiue the same conditions and properties which the body doth Though then I make no doubt but Christ at his birth and
any certaine measure of Christes paines felt in his bodie or soule by which his soule might easily be afflicted as farre as his humane strength could stretch but the matching and euening of it with hell fire I take to be a presumptuous and irreligious deuice of this Dreamer for the reasons which I haue formerly shewed to wit that hell paines are not executed in this life where Christ suffered nor sufferable to the bodie which is mortall nor tolerable to the strength of men or angels Now though the gifts and graces of Gods Spirit in the soule of Christ exceeded the measure of angels as well for himselfe who is Lord and Iudge ouer all as for vs that receiue of his fulnesse yet in his crucifying the Scriptures note his infirmitie not his infinitie and auouch him by the suffering of death to be inferiour to the angels and not in strength of flesh to be superiour vnto them who are not able to endure hell paines with patience as we finde by triall in diuels Wherefore assure thy selfe Christian Reader they are more than follies which this man fableth of Christes paines equall and euen to hell fire it selfe and such is his constancie in his new Diuinitie that sometimes Christ suffered the verie paines of hell themselues and the same which the damned doe sometimes Christes paine was equall to it and as hot as hell fire and so not the verie same that the damned do suffer who feele indeed the true force of hell fire though not in that heat and heigth which they shall feele it at and after the day of iudgement It is most necessarie and most comfortable to be vnderstood of all men how the Lord assigned to his Sonne in the worke of redemption two persons as it were or countenances or conditions His owne naturally which God euer deerely loued and our countenance or person or condition which the Lord truely accursed and punished His owne Nature felt the sorrow and paine of the curse and hatred but the hatred and curse was bent against the load of our sinne wherein he stood foorth as guiltie before God and appeared as it were clothed therewith The taking of our Nature person and cause by the Sonne of God for our saluation is a key of Christian pietie that most concerneth and most profiteth vs if it be rightly vnderstood But as Waspes out of sweete flowres gather sharpe and hote liquors so out of the wholsome mysteries of true religion you labour to encrease the tartnesse of your vnholsome humour The eternall and true Sonne of God by the determinate counsell of his Father tooke our humane nature that is both the bodie and soule of man into one and the same person with his diuine glorie that by the sanctitie power and dignitie of the one the basenesse and weakenesse of the other might with more certaintie securitie and facilitie performe the worke of our redemption For by the neere and inseparable knitting of those two natures together not onely the person was able by his owne power to destroy sinne death and Satan and of his owne right to giue the spirit of trueth and grace and euerlasting righteousnesse and happinesse to all that beleeue in him but his birth life and death that is his humilitie obedience and patience were of infinite price and value with God by reason the same person that so humbled himselfe to obey the will and suffer the hand of his Father was also God though he could not suffer in his diuine but onely in his humane nature And to assure vs of his mercies towards vs by making vs partakers of his graces and merits with him he tooke all his elect into one and the same bodie with him ioyning himselfe vnto them by the power of his spirit as the head to the members that from him they might draw the strength hope and ioy of eternall life and all his meritorious passions and victorious actions be fully theirs as performed in their names and to their vses by him that for their sakes became their like and their leader I meane their head and their Sauiour And because sinne was the thing which seuered vs from Gods holinesse and prouoked his iustice against vs subiecting vs to death and damnation Christ therefore tooke vpon him the recompence of his Fathers holines by his obedience the preseruance of his Fathers iustice by his patience admitting into his humane soule and bodie not the infection or pollution of our sinne much lesse the confusion or destruction due to vs for sinne since he could neither be defiled with our sinne nor damned for our sinne but the purgation and satisfaction of our sinnes To which end by his obedience he abolished our disobedience that as by one mans disobedience which was Adam many were made sinners so by the obedience of one which is Christ manie should be made righteous and through death suffered in the bodie of his flesh for the redemption of our transgressions he reconciled vs to God and set at peace by the blood of his Crosse things in earth and things in heauen bearing our finnes in his bodie on the tree that we might be healed by his stripes We then were in our selues defiled hated accursed reiected and condemned for sinne yet Christ our Redeemer and Sauiour tooke vs into himselfe and our cause vpon himselfe not to partake with vs in our spirituall filthinesse and eternall wretchednesse but to clense vs from the one and to free vs from the other So that we did neither defile nor endanger him But his blood washed vs from all our sinnes and by his death he destroyed him that had power ouer death euen the deuill You speake then not onely without booke but without trueth when you say that Christ was euer deerely loued of God for his owne condition yet in or for our condition he was truely accursed and hated You might with as much faith and religion haue said That Christ by or with our condition was truely polluted with sinne and truely reiected confounded and damned for sinne For so were we and if his taking our cause vpon him doe truely and necessarily subiect him to our deserts and dangers then can none of these things be auoided which you so much abhorre as blasphemies All those things were due to vs in the highest degree euen when Christ tooke vs and our cause vnto him and were not released vnto vs but in Christ and for Christ and consequently if your two countenances and conditions in Christ be such as you make you may aswell affirme the last as the first that is as well pollution of sinne and damnation for sinne as malediction and hatred for sinne But who is so foolish amongst men as to thinke or call him a Theefe and a Felon that vpon repentance of the partie and recompense for the fact intreateth and obteineth pardon for one that was a Theefe and a Felon or so childish to say that
to trouble the people with that Question and therefore I rested on a knowne and confessed principle of Christian truth and faith that we inherite pollution and death from Adams flesh without resoluing whence the Soule commeth which I did refraine before the multitude to speake of And since by the Scriptures the first Adam was a figure of the second the flesh of Christ giuen for vs must be as able to clense and quicken vs as Adams flesh was to defile and kill vs. To this reason you here pike many quarrels but in the end you slide it of as else where answered Your first quarrell is that I force what I promised to forbeare euen the difficultie whence the Soule of man is deriued As though the grounds of our Faith might be doubted because that Question in former times was vndecided That we deriue flesh from Adam and haue men for the Fathers of our bodies did neuer man yet that was in his right wits call in Question were he Christian or Heretick Iewe Turke or Pagan That likewise wee deriue with our flesh pollution and death from Adam the faith of Christ rightly grounded on the Scriptures doth not suffer vs to stagger at though whence our Soules are giuen vs some haue stood perplexed You thinke it much I should deliuer the one which is the pollution of our flesh professing not to determine the other and make it in me a kind of inconstancie to vrge the propagation of the flesh with her sequels of which no Christian may doubt because I thought it not fit to trouble the people with the deriuation of the Soule But so hath the Church of Christ alwaies done it hath cleerely confessed the deriuation of sinne and death from Adam and made it necessarie for all Christian men so to beleeue though some would not hastily or could not easily resolue the doubt whence the Soule commeth If our Soules arise in Generation from Adam as well as our flesh how can your reason be good by any possibilitie The conceit that our Soules are ingendred together with the seede of our bodies is so grosse and pestilent an error and so repugnant to all authoritie Humane and Diuine and so dissident from dayly experience that I had no cause to make that a Question in Religion or therein to refraine the audience of the people Ex nullo homine generantur Animae Soules are not generated from any man saith Ambrose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The principall facultie of the soule sayth Clemens Alexandrinus by which we haue discourse of reason is not engendered by proiection of seed Anima vtique nunquam ab homine gignentium originibus prebetur The soule neuer commeth from man in the generation of men sayth Hilarie Ierom vpon those words of Salomon the spirit of man after death returneth to God that gaue it writeth thus Ex quo satis ridendi sunt qui putant animas cum corporibus seri non à Deo sed à corporum parentibus generari Whereby they are worthy to be thorowly derided which thinke soules to be sowen together with bodies and not to be from God but to be generated by the parents of our bodies For since the flesh returneth to the earth and the spirit to God that gaue it IT IS MANIFEST that God is the Father of our soules and not Man And when Ruffinus professed he could not tell how the soule came to be ioyned with the body whether by propagation from Man or infusion from God Ierom replieth If the soule come by propagation then the soules of men which we grant are eternall and the bruit beasts which die with the bodie haue one condition And doest thou maruell that the Christian brethren are scandalized at thee when thou swearest thou knowest not that which the Churches of Christ confesse they know Theodoret in many places giueth the like testimonie The Church beleeuing the diuine Scriptures sayth the soule was and is created as well as the bodie not hauing any cause of her creation from naturall seed but from the Creatours will after the bodie once perfectly made The most diuine Moses writeth that Adams bodie was first made and afterward his soule inspired into him Againe in his lawes the same Prophet plainly teacheth vs that the bodie is first made and then the soule created and infused And blessed Iob spake thus to God Diddest thou not powre me forth like milke and thicken me like curds of cheese thou diddest clothe me with skinne and flesh and compact me with bones and sinewes And when by this Iob had shewed the frame of his bodie to be first made he addeth a thankesgiuing for his soule saying Life and mercie thou laydst with me and thy watchfulnesse preserued my spirit This confession touching the soule and bodie of man the Church hath learned from the diuine Scriptures The same reasons and resolutions he repeateth elsewhere in his fift sermon touching the nature of man Leo the great The Catholike faith doth constantly and truely preach that the soules of men were not before they were inspired into their bodies nec ab also incorporentur nisi ab opifice Deo neither are put into the bodie by any other workeman than God And Austen himselfe who to decline that difficultie how the soule commeth to be infected with originall sinne was the first that made this doubt whether the soule were created and infused or els deriued from the soule though not by the seed of the parents refuseth Tertullians opinion That the soule riseth from the seed of the bodie as peruerse and strange to the Church of Christ They sayth he which affirme soules to be drawen from the parents if they follow Tertullians opinion tooke them to be in some sort bodies corpulentis seminibus exoriri and to rise from the seed of the bodie quo quid peruersius dici potest than the which what can be sayd more peruerse Now in Austens rehearsall of heresies Tertullians assertion That the soule was a kind of bodie is excused as no heresie but his conceit That the state of the soule is propagated by traduction of seed is expresly put amongst his errours From these auncient Fathers swarue not the best of our new writers Bullinger All those other opinions haue beene refuted with sound reasons by the writers Ecclesiasticall and that receiued and auouched for the truest which teacheth the soule to be created of nothing and to be infunded into the bodie from God when the childe hath his perfect shape in his mothers womb And that we are not at this day otherwise created of God than by infunding the soule into the bodie first fashioned Iob is a most plentifull witnesse where he saith Thine hands o God haue made me and fashioned me wholly Didst thou not stroke me like milke and curd me like cheese with skinne and flesh thou coueredst me with bones and sinewes thou
superfluous That you will say is the proper and strict signification of the word satisfie but you take it more largely For the abuse of words I will not greatly striue so you build thereon no impieties howbeit when I say that nothing might satisfie for sinne but death I take satisfaction properly for the last and full payment after which no more was due for sinne and that apparantly by the Scriptures was the death of Christ before which the rest was not sufficient and after which no more was required by the righteous will and counsell of God So that although the obedience and patience of Christ all his life long did tend to satisfaction and made way for satisfaction as his hunger wearinesse pouertie and such like yet none of these did satisfie for sinne or acquite vs from sinne by the verdict of the holy Scripture but Christ after all these must yeeld himselfe to suffer that kind of death which the iustice of God should appoint and ordaine before we could be freed from our sinnes His blood you thinke did wash vs from all our sinnes Because his blood was shed for vs euen vnto death therefore his bloodshed expresseth the manner of his death as likewise his apprehension buffeting reproches and shame which the Scripture describeth in the order of his death and therefore compriseth vnder the name of his death For by Christes death as I haue often said the Scripture meaneth that kind of death in all respects and circumstances which the Euangelists in their writings report Who will grant in proper speech that those are his death The name of Christs death in the Scriptures containeth all those things which were coincident and concurrent to that death which Christ died for our sinnes according to the Scriptures Neither shall we neede your figure Synecdoche by a part of Christs sufferings to vnderstand all that he felt or suffered from his mothers wombe that is a loose deuise of yours to make any thing of euery thing and so to confound the Scriptures that no man shall knowe either what to beleeue or what to beware For where S. Iohn saith the blood of Christ doth clense vs from all our sinnes by your Synecdoche you imagine that the wine which he dranke at his last Supper the water wherewith he washed his disciples feete the teares which he shed for Lazarus death the iourney which he tooke to Galilee the sleepe which he fetched in the ship the hunger which he sustained in the wildernesse and what not should doe the like since euery thing that befell our Sauiour small or great did satisfie for sinnes as well as his death and passion What els is this but to mayme and mangle the Scriptures which name the blood of Christ to be the price of our redemption and his death the meane of our reconciliation if euerie thing that Christ did or endured shall be of the same force and weight to satisfie for sinne that his bloud and death were His bloud you will say is not his death The shedding of his bloud vnto death which the Scripture intendeth by his bloud is a plaine description of his death This is my bloud sayd he which is shed for many for the remission of sinnes And the rest which were appendants to his death expresse the maner of his death which the wisdome and iustice of God would haue to be full of violence iniurie reproch contempt shame and paine All which as they note the maner of his death so are they inclosed by the Scriptures in the name of his death and that I trust more properly being parts thereof than the naturall infirmities of his bodie as sleepe hunger and wearinesse or the voluntarie euents of his life as the rest of his actions and passions long before the houre came that he should be deliuered into the hands of sinfull men Why may not the proper sufferings of Christs Soule be as well admitted into the worke of Christs satisfaction although his SOVLE COVLD NOT PROPERLY DIE The sufferings of Christs Soule at the time of his death which the Scriptures mention we easily admit into the worke of his satisfaction for sinne but your satis-fiction of hell paines and of the death of Christs Soule we doe not admit because the holy Ghost so diligently describing the whole order and manner of Christs sufferings when he went to his death teacheth no such thing as you falsely collect from certaine words of his and chiefly from his bloody sweate whereof not knowing precisely the cause you surmise what best pleaseth your humor without all warrant of the word of God Prooue therefore by the Scriptures and not by your owne ghesses that Christs Soule suffered these things from the immediate hand of God which you suppose and we shall soone find a place for them in the worke of Christs satisfaction for sinne Till then giue me leaue to expound the Scriptures by themselues and not by your vnioynted and vntidie Commentaries confounding Christs life and death nature and will affections and punishments satisfaction and merits as if they were not different parts of our saluation to take our nature vpon him to worke all righteousnes in our names to suffer a shamefull and painfull death for our sinnes and to obtaine all spirituall and celestiall graces and comforts here and in heauen for vs. The first sinne committed by Adam and our continuall treading in his steps rest yet vndiscussed wherein we should not neede many words if you could or at least would rightly conceaue what is said and not ignorantly or purposely mistake and measure all things by your hastie humor To prooue that Christ must satisfie for sinne by the proper sufferings of his Soule and not with or by his body you brought this reason in your Treatise Whereby Adam first did and we euer since doe most properly commit sinne by the same the second Adam Christ hath made satisfaction for our sinnes But Adam first did and we euer since doe most properly commit sinne in our Soules our bodies being but the Instrument of the Soule and following the Soules direction and will Therefore Christ in his Soule most properly made satisfaction for vs In my Conclusion to your obiections I first denyed your Maior or former proposition For though the Soule of Adam as also our Soules quickly might and worthily did die for sinne and by sinne wherein they were the principall agents yet the Soule of Christ by no warrant of holy Scripture did or could die the death of Spirits and so could make no satisction for sin by her death Now by the Scriptures without death there was no satisfaction for sin and therefore the soule of Christ must satisfie for sinne by the death of her body not by any death proper to her selfe And so much the Scriptures auouch teaching vs that we haue redemption euen the remission of sinnes through his blood are reconciled to God
restraineth his wordes of Christs sufferings in that whole Section The death therefore which hee saith Christ suffered as the punishment appointed by God for haynous offences or for mans wickednesse and thereby conquered the deuill who had the rule of death was the cruell and shamefull death which the Iewes put Christ to on the Crosse which was the death that God either allotted to all men for sinne or prescribed specially for grieuous offences as an accursed kind of death euen in this life where Christ suffered though euerlasting death did ensue the wicked in the next world from which Christ was free Neither can the deuill be said to be the ruler of the second death if it be inflicted as you would haue it by the immediat hand of God except you make the deuill ruler and gouernour of Gods immediate hand which is notorious blasphemie It is there also written that Christs will was to suffer all extreamitie for vs who had deserued all extreamitie and all these things being taken vpon him hee destroyed them all You sliely slippe your Authors words in the question prefixed which is the cause of this answere and lighting on a Latine phrase which you scant vnderstand you pursue that to the pit of hell The question proposed in the Catechisme is this Since Christ had power in himselfe to choose what kind of death he would why would he rather be fastned to the Crosse then suffer any other kind of punishment The answere is Vltima omnia pati voluit pronobis quia vltima omnia eramus commeriti Christ would endure for vs in all things the vttermost which the Iewes could doe vnto him because in all things we had deserued the vttermost And that the phrase vltima omnia the vttermost in all things is referred to the Iewes to note the worst they could doe vnto Christ appeareth by that which is added as a reason of those words For the Crosse saith he was of all others a detested and abhorred kind of death which yet Christ would chiefly sustaine at the Iewes hands for vs that he might receiue on him the grieuous curse which our sinnes had fastned to vs and by this meanes deliuer vs from it All despightes all reproches and punishments offered him by the Iewes Christ counted light for our saluation and endured to be contemned and abiected by them as the basest or vilest of all men So that the Catechisme had no intent to say that Christ willingly would suffer the worst that God could doe vnto him that were defiance to Gods power and iustice which was fardest from Christs thought and must be from the Catechizers words except you will haue him blaspheme but in deede our Sauiour did submit himselfe to the worst and vttermost that men could doe vnto him which was the determinate counsell of God for the satisfaction of his iustice and redemption of our sinnes and therefore Christ made choise of the Crosse to yeeld vp his life that the Iewes might to the last breath loade him with all maner of despightes reproches and tortures which they by Satans instigation failed not to performe Leaue then your peruerting of other mens words and subuerting of their meanings and I see no one syllable yet cited by you out of the Catechisme that tendeth towards your new found hell or the death of the damned to be suffered in Christs soule But Christ you thinke could deliuer vs from no more then he suffered for vs. You might haue learned the contrarie to that out of the Catechisme where you are plainly taught that Christs corporall and temporall wrongs reproches and paines inflicted on him by the Iewes did quit vs from all spirituall euerlasting debts deaths feares and paines Christ in our name and place vndertooke to his Father to satisfie him for our sinnes and with the most sweete sacrifice of his obedience to appease his Fathers wrath conceaued against vs for our obstinacie and so to restore vs to fauour with God And therefore Christ the most innocent Lambe of God was bound with cordes to free vs who for our deserts were deliuered captiues to Satan sinne and damnation Christ who was vtterly without all fault was accused and condemned by the sentence of an earthly Iudge that he might absolue vs before the heauenly Tribunall who were euery way guiltie and most worthy of damnation Christ with his precious bloud shed for vs did wash and clense the spots and filthinesse of our sinnes Lastly Christ with the reproches which he sustained most vndeseruedly and with the most shamefull and most sharpe death which was inflicted on him deliuered vs from the punishment ignominie and death euerlasting which we had most iustly merited with our wicked offences and so all our sinnes were buried in obliuion and remooued farre from the sight of God by Christ. This doctrine if you could brooke you would not so much disable the sufferings of Christ at the hands of his persecutours as you doe not so hastily commit the soule of Christ to the paines of the damned from the immediate hand of God before you wil acknowledge our redemption to be perfect by the crosse and death of Christ but as your manner is you steppe by whole leaues that are against you and stumble at a word that happily may be wrested from his right sense and that you thinke is strong enough to beare the waight of all those absurdities if not impieties which you would reare Marke also what doctrine the Law of this Realme consonantly publisheth and commandeth in the homilies of Christs passion The first homily maketh Christes putting himselfe betweene Gods deserued wrath and our sinne the extreamest part of his passion You alleaged the Catechisme rather for your pleasure then any profit to your cause you do the like now with the booke of Homilies You cite but little thence and that to litle purpose That Christ put himselfe betweene Gods deserued wrath and our sinne to appeare the iust displeasure of God kindled against vs and to auert it from vs I knowe no man that maketh any doubt thereof and I maruaile to what ende you alleage it For what needed a Redeemer but to saue vs from the wrath of God prouoked by our wickednesse and armed with infinite power to take vengeance of mans vnrighteousnesse Or how could Christ be a Mediatour if he did not stand betweene vs and the dreadfull anger of God irritated by our iniquities to quench the same and to keepe vs from euerlasting destruction But the Homily you say maketh that the extreamest part of Christs passion which was a further feeling then the sense of bodily paine onely And therefore by the Homilie he felt Gods proper wrath spiritually which our sinne deserued You no sooner heare the name of Gods wrath but you run to your old bias and straightway pitch on your hell paines There are no such words in all that Homilie as that Christs putting him selfe betweene Gods wrath and our sinne was
to see him die as likewise his buriall by his owne followers the sealing of his Tumbe and his lying three daiâ—…s in the graue to omit I say all these things with silence and to produce a word which the Manichees reiected as odious and iniurious to Christ and the Christians defended none otherwise then as common to all men that die both good and bad were no small ouersight in so learned a writer But this is a â—…ite of yours to shift of the truth of his answere it is no part of his meaning He sheweth against the Manichees and likewise against you since you defend the Contrarie that the death of the Body is in all men the punishment of sinne and that this death INFLICTED ON MANS NATVRE for sinne which is the MORTALITIE OF OVR FLESH by the Scriptures is called a Sinne and a Curse euen in Christ not that Christ was properly and truly accursed with God as transgressours are which is your erroneous assertion but that he submitted himselfe to receiue the punishment of sinne in his owne person by the death of his Body which was common to him with all men If the former words of Saint Austen were not plaine enough he hath playner If thou deny Christ was accursed deny Christ was dead If thou deny he was dead now â—…ightest thou not against Moses but against the Apostles If thou confesse him to haue beene dead confesse that he tooke the punishment of our sinne without sinne Now when thou hearest the punishment of sinne beleeue it came either from Gods blessing or cursing If the punishment of sinne came from blessing wish alwaies to be vnder the punishment But if thou desire to be thence deliuered beleeue that by the iust Iudgement of God the punishment of sinne came from the curse Confesse then that Christ tooke a Curse for vs when thou confessest him to haue beene dead for vs Nec aliud significare voluisse Mosen cum diceret maledictus omnis qui in ligno pependâ—…rit nisi mortalis omnis moriens omnis qui in ligno pependerit and that Moses had none other meaning when he said Accursed is euery one that hangeth on a Tree then to say euery one that hangeth on a Tree is Mortall and dieth He might hauâ—… said Accursed is euery Mortall Man or accursed is euery one that dieth How thinke you would Austen prooue that Christ truely died because he was truely accursed or that Christ tooke vpon him a Curse because he tooke vpon him the death of the Bodie which is the punishment of sinne in all mortall men and so proceeded from the curse whereunto all men for sinne were subiect He doth not defend the Apostle by Moses but he expoundeth Moses by the Apostle and so resolueth in plaine words that Moses had none other meaning when he said accursed is euery one that hangeth on a Tree then if he had said accursed is euery mortall man because death came first on all men as a Curse for sinne You acknowledge not the death which all men die to be a punishment or Curse for sinne But all the wit you haue will not answere Saint Austens reasons For the death of the Body which is common to all mortall men must of force be a blessing or a Cursing If it be a blessing why doe we beleeue or hope to be free from a blessing but if we detest continuance vnder it and desire deliuerance from it then certainly the death of the Body in all men euen in the Saints of God was and still is a punishment and Curse of Sinne till Christ raise vs from it An other reason Saint Austen vrgeth to the same effect which is this Vnlesse God had hated sinne and our Death he would not haue sent his sonne to vndertake and abolish the same What maruaile then if that be accursed to God which God hateth God that is him selfe all life and gaue vs life as his blessing in this world must needs hate death which is priuation of life as repugnant to his Image and euerting the worke of his hands wherewith he ioyned Soule and Body to participate in life And though by his Iustice he inflicted death on all men for sinne yet of his mercie he sent his owne and PAINFVLL death to be that part of the curse which Christ suffered for vs. This I hope is more then shame though shame and reproch were not the least parts of Gods curse against sinne euen in Christ. You would needs in a brauado set vp your bristles and aske What nothing but the shame of the world will any man of common sense affirme that this was all the curse that Christ bare for vs I replied that shame and ignominie was an expresse part of the curse which Christ dying suffered for vs and that there was no cause you should so much disdaine Chrysostome and Austen for so saying The Scriptures themselues in that point concurred with them as I haue fully shewed in my Conclusion and you can not auoid it Lest therefore your Reader should take you to be tongue-tied you cleane change the case and would haue men beleeue that I defend and endeuoured to proue that shame was the whole curse which Christ endured As though I alleaged not S. Austen at large to proue that death in all men Christ not exempted was a part of the curse inflicted on mankinde for sinne And therefore when Chrysostome sayd the crosse is the onely kinde of death subiect to the curse I did not set him and Austen at variance as if the one did trippe the other but I thus reconciled them that not only death as in all men but the verâ—…e kinde of death which Christ died was accursed by the very words of the Law in Chrysostomes iudgement This then is one of your familiar trades and trueths to set downe that in my name which I neuer spake nor meant and so by lying when you can not by reasoning to support your cause Indeed if a man will admit your absurd and false positions so much is consequent out of their words For where you will not haue the death of the bodie to be any part of the curse inflicted on sinne except the death of the damned be coherent with it as in the reprobate it followeth from Chrysostomes words that the corporall death of Christ seuered from all other sorts of death had no part of Gods curse in it besides shame which yet is as farre from being a true curse where the cause is good as death it selfe since neither shame nor death are true and inward curses when they are suffered for righteousnesse but rather causes and increases of blessing not in nor of themselues but by Gods goodnesse accepting and recompensing them with all fauour and blisse Againe you mislike that I sayd Christs dying simplie as the godlie die may in no sort be called a Curse or accursed I mislike that you can not or
works and though his works must alwaies be measured by his wil yet must his power be limited to neither because God is able to doe many things which he neuer did nor will doe And in his works if you bind him with any necessitie to do as he did and leaue him not at libertie to doe all things according to his owne wisdome and will you reuiue the accursed error of the Manichees against whom Saint Austen fully resolueth Nullam ergo necessitatem patitur Deus neque necessitate facit quae facit sed summa ineffabili voluntate ac potestate God then suffereth no necessitie neither doth he the things which he doth with any necessitte but with a supreame and vnspeakeable will and power So that the words of Gregorie Austen and Ambrose are most true that God had other meanes in his power to saue vs then by the death of his owne Sonne but a BETTER or more conuenient way to demonstrate his loue and mercy towards vs and to manifest his wisedome power and iustice against sinne death and Satan he had not for no Question God chose the best And why these words should offend any Christian man I see no cause since they be both sound and sober They oppose Gods power against his expresse and reuealed will You were told it is an error to restraine Gods power to his will as if he could not doe more or otherwise then he hath done but in this you conceiue them not For they doe not say God had meanes to change his will or to alter his promise once published but when he first decreed this way to saue man it was in his power to haue appointed an other way if it had pleased him So that God was not tied to determine this way by any necessitie as if the power of euill preuailed against him or choyse of other meanes failed him but this in the wisedome of God common to all three persons in that most holy Trinitie was allowed as the most honorable and acceptable way to God and most fauorable and comfortable to man And this confession which you so much controle hath beene vsed by Diuines of all ages howsoeuer you know not what to make of it in your new Diuinitie Cyprian before their time Et sine hoc holocausto poterat Deus tantum condonasse peccatum sed facilitas veniae laxaret habenas peccatis effrenibus quae etiam Christi vix cohibent passiones God was able to haue pardoned so great sinne without this Sacrifice but the facilitie of forgiuenesse would loose the raynes to vnbridled sinnes which euen the sufferings of Christ doe skant represse Nazianzene euen with the eldest of them It was possible for God to saue man without taking flesh by his only will as he did and doth worke all things without the helpe of a Body Damascene after them He was not vnable that can doe all things by his Almightie power and strength to take man from the Tyrant that possessed him Bernard likewise Was not the Creator able to restore his worke without this difficultie He was able but he chose rather to wrong himselfe then the most lewd and hatefull vice of vnthankefulnesse should haue any colour in man Zanchius resolueth the same Could not mankind be deliuered by any other meanes then by Christs death who can doubt it Solo nutu iussu ac voluntate diuina poterat It might haue beene deliuered by the onely becke Commandement and will of God Master Caluin whose warinesse you so much commend where he maketh any thing for you doubteth not in this Assertion to ioyne with Ambrose Austen and Gregorie against you Poterat nos Dominus verbo aut nutu redimere nisi aliter nostra causa visum esset The Lord might haue Redeemed vs with a word or a becke of his but that for our sakes he thought good otherwise to doe it The Booke of Homilies on which you would seeme so much to depend goeth farder then either Ambrose or Austen saith Was not this a sure pledge of Gods loue to giue vs his owne Sonne from heauen he might haue giuen vs an Angell if he would or some other Creature and yet should his loue haue beene farre aboue our deserts All these Similitudes of Mediator Redeemer and Suretie may stand very well together in the office of Christ though you would perswade vs the contrarie yea rather they confirme ech other The names of Mediator Redeemer are exactly affirmed of Christ and often authorised in the Scriptures the name of Suretie to God for vs is not he is called Gods Suretie to vs of a better Testament then the Law because God in him and by him hath assured vs of his mercie and grace in this life and of his heauenly kingdome in the life to come And if you will needs vrge the Similitude of Sureties from the course and custome of humane Lawes which appoint and admitte Sureties they vtterly exclude vs in the case that we were in from hauing any Sureties For neither in Capitall crimes nor in Corporall paines doth mans Law allow any Sureties Againe no Suretie standeth bound for a seruant much lesse for a condemned dead person Since then we were not only the seruants of sinne but for haynous offences condemned Soule and Body to euer lasting perdition and already dead in Soule by sinne no course of Law allowed vs Sureties Moreouer the Prince who is the Lord ouer the Law may be no Suretie because he is not chalengable by the Law how then will you bind the King of Kings to be our Suretie as if the most Soueraigne were most subiected to the Law besides Christ freed vs by giuing himselfe and his life for vs. What Sureties doe so Christ bought vs with a Price to be his seruants Doe Sureties buy their debtors to serue them Christ gaue infinitely more then we were worth Is that possible for Sureties Christ did change our punishment in his person from eternall death to the death of the Crosse. Haue Sureties that libertie or authoritie We rested on Gods promise for our Redemption before it was performed Know you not that a bare promise by mans Law doth not bind though God be faâ—…thfull in all his words Albeit then Christ recompenced our debt and voluntarily by his owne death discharged our danger being no way thereto bound yet since he obserued none other conditions of a Suretie and no right or Law did allow vs Sureties I see no cause why you should change the honor of a free Redeemer so much mentioned in the Scriptures into the Thraldome of a Suretie bound with vs as you say to pay our debt which was euerlasting destruction of Body and Soule Our publike Churches Doctrine also auoucheth that â—…e was our Suretie Our Church alloweth that Catechisme to be taught in Schooles to Children with whom it may be you seâ—…ke to be sorted because you
Fathers haue duely obserued so much out of the Scriptures c August ad Simpli â—…anum li. 2. quaest 1. Vâ—…itur Deus ministres eitam malis 〈◊〉 ad vindictam malorum vel ad bonorum probatioâ—…m God vseth as his ministers euill spirits saith Austen to reuenge the wicked and to trie the good Saint Ierom. d Hierony in Ioâ—…l cap. 2. Non solum homines ministri sâ—…t vltores ira eius sed etiam contrariae fortitudines quae appellantur furor ira Dei. Not onely men are Gods ministers and reuenâ—… of his wrath but also the contrarie powers which are diuels are called the wrath and displeasure of God For e 〈◊〉 as the Babiloâ—…ans punishing Ierusalem are called Gods armies so wicked angels are called Gods hosts and camps whiles they execute the Lords will I 〈◊〉 sâ—… Basile f Basil. â—… Psal. 3â—… Euill spirits which execute punishment on the wicked and the powers that serue 〈◊〉 in that sort are called the Anger and wrath of God And that this was a receaued opinion amongst Christians Ierom giueth testimonie where he saith g Hierony in 〈◊〉 cap. 30. Plâ—…rique 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 â—…am â—…uroris Domini Diabolum interpretantur cui tradimur ad puniendum The most of our men interpret the wrath of Gods furie to be the diuell to whom we are deliuered to be punished And to that end this office is assigned the diuell and his angels h Idem in 〈◊〉 cap. 30. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to mentis praepositi sunt Wicked angels are appointed to inflict or execute torments Wherefore this resolution is learnedly and truely made by Zanchius i Duâ—… ad summam sunt officia ad qua Damones omnes sunt a Deo destinati There are summarâ—…ly two offices to which all the diuels are appointed of God One that by their tentations the godly elect may be exercised in patience and humilitie and so their saluation more and more â—…urdered the other that God by them as his ministers and executioners 〈◊〉 spirituall and corporall punishments on thâ—… wicked reprobate k Ibidem Id quod maxime 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fine seculi c. Which shall most be seene in the end of the worlde when God shall perfourme that the diuels shall be tormented themselues and torment others in the place of eternall punishments You take the diuels office from him and impose it on God himselfe making him the tormentor of damned soules with his immediate hand to which incomprehensible punishments as you call them you subiect the soule of Christ on the crosse without ground or grant of holie Scripture and as if this were not desperate impreâ—… enough with obstinate impudencie you say CERTAINLY it was so l Some God himselfe immediatly inflicted some he inflicted by meanes and instruments but 〈◊〉 his hand principally which did whatsoeuer was done vnto him You told vs not twelue lines before that Gods owne hand inflicted on Christ whatsoeuer he suffered now you tell vs some God himselfe immediatly inflicted some by meanes and instruments but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The first is a notorious and presumptuous vntrueth no way 〈◊〉 by any Scripture the next is a trifling cauill or a pestilent blasphemy for 〈◊〉 you meane no more then that God was the principall 〈◊〉 and Appointer how in 〈◊〉 and his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 should haue power ouer Christes bodie so God is the principall Agent not only in all the â—…usterings of Martyrs and Innocents but the supreame and 〈◊〉 Director and Disposer of all things done by angels men or diuels A thought can not rise in the heart a word can not proceed out of the mouth the hand can perforâ—… 〈◊〉 act without the power and will of the Creatour In n Acts. â—…7 him 〈◊〉 moue and 〈◊〉 â—…ur being and so haue the Angels all whose power commeth from him and 〈◊〉 him But if you meane that God by his reuealed will or publike ordinance sâ—…t the Iewes and the diuell on worke to kill his Sonne then you must either excuse them by Gods authoritie or charge God with the same iniquity o Defenc. paâ—… 82. li. 27. You can not say that Christes punishment was Gods meere and bare permission onelie What you meane by meere and bare permission I know not it proceeded I say from the 〈◊〉 kinde of will and power in God whence all the trials of his saints and deaths of his 〈◊〉 come though this were of more moment then all theirs in that it touched a greater person and tended to a greater honour then men might haue p Ibid. li. 2â—… Nay 〈◊〉 punishment was God written and reuealed will his expresse and publike ordinance and most 〈◊〉 appointment from the beginning of the world God in his written and vnwritten decrees in his publike and priuate ordinances is equally wise iust and holy that is he is alwayes like himselfe Wherefore this farre set Preface hath in it no strength to 〈◊〉 the whole 〈◊〉 of Christes sufferings to Gods immediat hand Did not God expresly by his Prophet denounce to Dauid what he would doe against 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wise and deuouring him with the sword And yet I trust you will not impute 〈◊〉 ambition rebellion and incest to Gods immediat action What q Matth. 24. affliction and tribulation the Church shall suffer towards the end what r 2. Thess 2. strange illusions and lying wondâ—…rs shall leade them to beleeue lies that receiue not the loue of Gods trueth what s â—… Tim 4. heresie and t 2. Tim. 3. iniquitie shall abound in the latter dayes the written and reuealed will of God his expresse and publike ordinance doth appoint foretell and assure Shall we therefore ascribe all these persecutions delusions and transgressions to Gods immediat action Except you be madde you will be of another minde In decreeing ordering and effecting all these God is most iust pure and holy and yet these actions in their immediat authors perswaders and approuers are most vniust impure and vnholy Wherefore this prating of Gods meere and bare permission will nothing helpe your false and wicked collection But God you say appointed Christes sufferings from the beginning of the world As if any thing were new and lately remembred with God From the beginning of the world all his works were knowen to him little or great all are alike decreed appointed and setled with him u Defenc. pag. 82. li. 33. The whole suffering of Christ was Gods owne and most proper action Most proper is that which is more PROPER then all other or at least as proper as any If these words of yours be true then all that Christ suffered in bodie was as properly Gods action as the creation of the world the renouation of mans minde the infusion of grace the mission of the Holy Ghost and glorification of his Elect. And consequently Christ suffered nothing at the hands of men but all that is reported in the Scriptures of his outward
flat falsity and impiety only the generall words that Christ suffered Gods wrath and displeasure against our sinnes may be tolerated because the Scriptures vse to call the bitternesse of affliction in whom soeuer the wrath of God by reason it riseth not simply out of Gods fauour and bountie but is permixed with his Iustice that the transitorie and tolerable smart of our sinnes may euen in this life when we feele it and faint vnder it commend vnto vs the wonderfull grace of God that hath for Christs sake released vs of those euerlasting and vnspeakable Torments which our sinnes iustly deserued the Reprobate fully feare and the damned by experience most dreadfully doe feele p Defenc. pag. 90. li. 8. You bring a Reason against this that God spiritually punisheth no man but for his owne vncleannesse which is a thing meerely vntrue Out of two Pages in my Sermons against the death of Christs Soule you piked two words where I call the death of the Soule spirituall punishment and because to auoyde tediousnesse I repeat not in euery line the same words you neglect that purposely in that Section I entreate of the death of the Soule that eighteene times in those two Pages I name the life and death of the Soule that ouer right those very words which you bring I set this Note in the Margine the Death of Christs Soule could neither proceede from God nor be acceptable vnto God as the summe of that which I intended to prooue in that place that my Conclusion immediatly vrged vpon these words is this q Serm. pag. 103. li. 1. Christ then might not suffer the inward or euerlasting death of the Soule All this I say you neglect and ouer-skip many sound and sure reasons in those two sides against the death of Christs Soule and carpe at two poore words where I vse spirituall punishment for the death of the Soule But take the words in their right sense for the death of the Soule whereof I reason in that place and then see what you and all your Adherents can say against them Eternall or spirituall death which seuereth the Soule from all grace and glory God layeth on none for an others fault because God neuer reiecteth or condemneth any Man but vpon his owne desert Punish one for another by affliction of Bodie or Mind he may because he can restore and recompence when he seeth his Time though no Man Christ Iesus excepted can want sinne whiles here he liueth which God may iustly punish when and in what respect he will r Defenc. pag. 90. li. 13. But I pray you shew me this mysterie how it is that God cannot punish spiritually where there is no sinne inherent but can and may corporally where there is none Though there lie no Children of Adam in whom there was not sinne either naturally cleauing to tâ—…em or voluntarily committed by them yet Infants after Baptisme by which Originall sinne and corruption in them is pardoned are said by better Diuines then you or I to haue no sinne and to be often punished corporally for other mens faultes Saint Austen asserteth both s August Epist 28. Quis nonit quid paruulis de quorum cruciatibus dâ—…ritia maiorum contunditur aut exercetur fides aut misericordia probatur Quis inquam nouit quid ipsis paruulis in secreto indicâ—…orum suorum bonae compensationis reseruat Deus quoniam quanquam nihil rectè fecerint tamen nec peccantes aliquid ista perpessi sunt Who can tell what good Recompence God reserueth in the secrecie of his Iudgements for those Infants by whose paines or Torments the hardnesse of their Parents or friends is repressed or their Faith exercised or their pittie prooued because though the Children did no good Acts yet neither suffered they those things for any sinne of theirs Neither doth the Church in vaine recommend those Infants to be honored as Martyrs which were slaine by Herode when he sought to kill the Lord Iesus Christ. Zanchius sayth the like Of t Zanchius iâ—… tractitionibus Theologicis de 2. praecepto pa. 340. the punishments pertayning to this present life by which we are visited of the Lord either in our outward goods or in our bodies it is a cleere case that God verie often doth visite the sinnes of the Fathers vpon the children But in the death of the soule which is the spirituall punishment that I ment God himselfe sayth u Ezech. 18. The soule that sinneth euen that shall die the sonne shall not beare the iniquitie of the father but the wickednesse of the wicked shall be vpon himselfe Saint Austen maketh the difference that I spake of x August â—…pist 75. Neque enim haec corporalis est poena qualegimus quosdam contemptores Dei cum suis omnibus qui eiusdem impietatis participes non fuerant pariter infectos Tunc quidem ad terrorem viuentium mortalia corpora perimebantur quando que vtique moritura spirâ—…tualis autem pâ—…na animas obligat de quibus dictum est anima quae peccauerit ipsa morietur This is no corpor all punishment in which we reade some despisers of God haue beene wrapped with all theirs that were not partakers of the same iniquitie for then to the terror of the liuing mortall bodies were slaine which at one time or an other must haue died But a spiritual punishment bindâ—…th soules of whom it is said the soule that sinneth that soule shall die Neither shall you euer be able to shew that one soule was slaine for an others fault as mens bodies often haue beene except they both did communicate in sinne which was the cause of their common destruction y Defenc pag. 90. li. 16. All the rest of your assertions Pag. 101. 102. 103. 105. 266. 94. are of this suite I like your wit that you can make short worke and when you can not answer to saie the things be of like sute But refell the reasons brought in these pages against the death of the soule and you will finde a warmer suite then you are ware of I need not repeate them if it please the Reader to peruse them let him iudge in Gods name whether it were weakenesse in you or in them that made you ouerslip them z Defene pag. 90. li. 17. By this one reason I weakened all yours but you could passâ—… that ouer aâ—…swearing vnto it not a word By what authoritie must euerie trifle of yours be tediously discusâ—…ed when you leape ouer sixe leaues at a iumpe least you should entangle your selfe with more then you could well discharge It was belike some worthie reason that I durst not so much as offer a word about it let vs heare it in Gods name a Ibid. li. 18. If Christs body hanging on the crosse and held by death in the graue was punished by God where yet hee found no sinne and which he still intirely loued and was neuer separated from then so he
might and did punish properly Christes soule also and yet neuer deuide his Godhead nor his loue from it The one standeth with Gods iustice and with the nature of man in Christ as well as the other A wanton colt when he winceth with his heeles thinketh he can batter walles and beate downe trees with a blow when yet the skittish thing doth but hurt it selfe Is this the reason which weakened all that I said in so manie sides against the death of the soule for of that I speake in all those pages which you quote Neede you a paire of spectacles so see the difference betweene the death of the soule and the death of the bodie that you so falsely idlely and foolishly match them together A verie drone would soone discerne that the death of the bodie innocently obediently and patiently suffered could no way separate Christ from the fauour and loue of God nor hinder the worke of our redemption though it depriued hiâ—… of life sense and motion in the bodie for the time which are the good blessings of God when they are vsed to his glorie and yet the death of the soule which leaueth neither action affection nor communion of grace trueth or faith in the soule seuereth both Soule and body quite from God and maketh them hatefull vnto God and altogether vnapt to reconcile others vnto God when they themselues are disioyned and parted from God And therefore notwithstanding your Crakes that you can blow mountaines afore you with your breath and your craft that shift the death of the Soule whereof I speake in all those places into a proper spirituall punishment of your owne framing you haue not auoyded any one Reason there nor offer so much as to come toward the matter in question but roue after your wonted manner with generall phrases proper to your selfe and then thinke that no man seeth you there are other punishments in the Soule besides death but none that can reconcile vs vnto God For b Rom 5. We were reconciled to God by the death of his Sonne c 1. Cor. 15. I declare vnto you saith Paul the Gospell which I preached vnto you and whereby you are saued For first of all I deliuered vnto you that Christ died for our sinnes according to the Scriptures Then you and whosoeuer else that preach or beleeue Remission of sinnes by any thing else but by the death of Christ you preach not the Gospell which the Apostle deliuered neither can you looke for saluation in Christ that leaue the maine ground thereof which is the death that he tasted for all and through which he destroyed him that had the power of death euen the diuell So that to step to any other spirituall punishments for the satisfaction of our sinnes and reconciliation to God then to that which the Scriptures call the death of Christ and the death of the Crosse is to renounce all that God hath ordained or reuealed for our Saluation and to create you new Sauiours after your owne conceits You must therefore be directly and plainly brought to this point whether Christ suffered for vs the death of the Soule by the Scriptures and not such giggers of proper punishments nor straines of improper speeches as you and your friends hunt after but fairely and fully according to the direction of the sacred Scriptures which must be heard and preferred before all your fansies as well touching the death of the soule as the trueth of our redemption by the bloud of Christ Iesus Wherein though I exclude not the sense and affections of his soule which felt the paine knew the cause and beheld the counsell of God in all those sufferings vndertaken for man through the tender loue that he bare to man yet none of those feares sorrowes nor paines which the soule discerned and receiued did any whit diminish the power of Gods spirit and grace in him nor the perfection of his faith hope and loue whereby the soule cleaued fast to God without any separation and consequently the innocence obedience and patience of Christes soule in his sufferings both outward and inward did confirme and manifest the life of his soule But of this more in due place d Defenc. paâ—… 90. li. 27. Then you addresse your selfe against another euen one of the chiefest reasons of mine which I make from the strange and incomparable agonies of Christ in the time of his passion You make no reasons from Christes agonie but assuming that for a shew which you do not vnderstand you inferre what you list by your rash presumptuous and manifest contradictions both to your selfe and to the Scriptures e Ibid. li. 30. These inuaded him as we reade principally at three times First in the foretaste of his passion Ioh. 12. secondly in the Garden a little before his apprehension thirdly in his very extreame passion it selfe on the crosse The Scripture mentioneth one agonie and you multiplie that to three In the twelfth of Iohn when some of the Grecians that came to worship on the feast of Easter were desirous to see Christ of whom they had heard much and made their desire knowen to Philip and he to Andrew and they both to Iesus Iesus answered them f Iohn 12. The houre was come euen at hand that the Sonne of man should be glorified by his death This therefore was not a time to shew himselfe when his heart or soule was troubled with other matters euen with the meditation and preparation of his death Now except you be so wise that you will make euery affection in Christ an agonie there is no cause to conceiue this to be an agonie He often times thought and spake of his death before where no man besides you doth dreame of agonies and this verie word is in other cases ascribed aswell to Christ as to others where no colour of an agonie doth appeare When he tolde his Disciples that one of them should betray him g Iohn 13. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he was troubled in spirit and meaning to raise Lazarus from death when he saw Mary the sister of Lazarus and the Iewes that were with her to weepe h Iohn 11. he groned in spirit and troubled himselfe insomuch that he wept which yet was no agonie but a touch of humane compassion shewing the loue he bare vnto them The complaint on the crosse besides the words had no shew of an agonie and what sense they beare we shall after examine Verily he that would not suffer his owne Disciples to beholde his agonie in the Garden would neuer in the eyes or eares of his enemies with his owne deeds or words verifie their reproches and taunts against himselfe as if he were forsaken of God which was the thing they vpbraided him with And therfore you may deuise not three but threescore agonies if you will The Scripture expresseth one and that you neither rightly conceiue nor rightly vse i Defenc. pag. 90. li. 35. To all that
on the Crosse was in the midst and extreamest of his paines now inherent and afflicting both soule and body You couple Christes agonie in the Garden with his complaint on the Crosse and yoke them together as proceeding both from one direct and particular cause which breedeth more doubt in my answer that should containe both in one than trueth in your argument that obiecteth both at once That the Reader may therefore perceiue wheâ—…eof we reason and so the better obserue the difference betwixt our assertions let meadmonish him that as euill to mans sense or reason dependeth on time either past present or to come so the impression that is thereby made in the soule of Euill past present or to come worketh sorow paine and feare in the souâ—…e of man man is either â—…orrow paine or feare Not that these wordes are not sometimes confounded and their causâ—…s conioined as sorow and feare haue paine in them that is a sense of â—…uill past or approching as well in others as in our selues and the continuance of paine may be feared euen whiles the present greeuance is suffered but that we can exprâ—…sse no truth nor admitt no speach of these things yf we keepe not their names distinguished as their impressions and passions are somtimes we make but two as timor and dolor feare and griefe and then we comprise the third which is sorrow for any good thâ—…ng past or lost in us or others vnder griefe which is the offence of mind that euill either presâ—…nt in sense or fresh in memory bringeth with it SORROVV then Sorrow I call the grieuous remembrance of our owne euils suffered or of their euils past or approching whom we loue FEARE is the doubt dislike of future euill to our selues Feare or others as also the declining of imminent euill and shrinking at the sight thereof Both thâ—…se are painfull affections and impressions of euill which according to their degrees and causes do often so farre oppresse and burden the soule in this life that they speedily part the soule from the bodie and both consist in the apprehension and estimation that the soule maketh of euill foreseene or suffered for some men feare that which others doe not and some regard not that which others exceedingly grieue at and so feare and sorrow require not onlie the cogitation and cognition but the iudgement câ—…nsure of the soule which PAINE doth not For paine dependeth neither Paine on the action nor imagination of the soule but is an absolute sense of present and inherent euill that naturally offendeth the soule for example in the paines of the bodie the soule naturally feeleth all offence rising within the bodie or violently offred vnto the bodiâ—… though she knewe not whence or how that paine commeth Therefore I make paine as it is distinct from feare and sorrow and riseth from neither of them to be a naturall and absolute passion and sense of euill present and inherent in soule or bodie q 1. Iohn 4. feare hath painfulnesse saith Saint Iohn and sorrow not only r 2. Cor. 2. swalloweth vp men but s 2. Cor. 7. causeth death as Paule writeth and experience teacheth yea t Prou. 13. hope differred afflicteth the soule saieth Salomon So that all our affections may haue griefe in them loue and ioy not excepted when they are disappointed and sorrow feare may be mitigated but not separated from griefe and dislike yet in neither of them is the euill present inherent nor the sense and feeling thereof absolute or meerely passiue but according as the mind conceaueth and esteemeth of the causes and obiects thereof so the griefe of feare and sorow increaseth or decreaseth Now touching Christes agonie in the Garden the Scripture auoucheth that feare and sorrow possessed and grieued his mind but that an absolute or inherent paine was inflicted on Christes soule by the immediat hand of god either in the Garden or on the Crosse this is a late and lew de deuice of yours it hath no ground nor proofe in the Scriptures And yf by paines you meane this absolute kind of torment impressed on Christes soule by Gods owne hand as you would haue it I vtterly denie that any such paines presently felt were parts or causes of Christs agonie in the Garden and so your proposition that you fained to be firme hath not one true word in it u Defenc. pag. 91. li. 27. Let vs trie your proofes for it and mine against it you meane no such matter as you pretend For first you tooke hold of Christs feare and sorrow which were painefull affections and when you haue thereby gotten the name of paine into Christes agonie you slide from his affections were they neuer so painefull and shuffle in your absolute torments of Christes soule from the immediat hand of god vnder the name of proper punishment and vengeance for sinne to be the true causes of his agonie yf you thinck I mistake you looke back to your iustified reason so lately iustled in and to the fathers which you brought to confirme the same and see whether I wrong you or no. your assumption and illation there were these Christ x Defenc. pag. â—…8 li. 2. succoureth vs in the feeling of the terrors of god and releaseth vs of the sorrowes vnmeasureable that rise thereof therefore Christ himselfe had experience of them Terrors are feares of thinges vnwoonted which make vs tremble and sorrowes are expresly named by you both which were affections in Christ as they are in vs. you cited out of Cyrill that y Ibid. li. 11. vnlesse Christ had feared and sorrowed at his passion wee had not beene quit from feare and sorrow and out of Ambrose that Christ z li. 38. in his agonie with the sorrow of his soule did extinguish the sorow of our soules As also that he caried about him our feares and our affections a Defenc. pag. 48. li. 17. minus mihi contulerat nisimeum suscepisset affectum Christ had done lesse for me if he had not admitted MINE AFFECTIONS Now when the affections of feare and sorow are confessed in Christes agonie you reiect that as absurd and will heare of no paines but of the torments of the damned from Gods immediat hand on the soule of Christ which though you neither do nor can prooue yet you hope with prating and wrangling to seeme to say somewhat b Defenc. pag. 89. li. 28. Before we come to proofs we must know that this your Resolution as you call it is first most vaine also directly contrary to your selfe and then altogether vnâ—…rue and presumed by wide coniecture as God willing I will presently shew Performe but one of these challenges to be true and take all the rest as granted for your small paines therein bestowed but your dreames are so violent that when you sticke in the mire you thinke you flie in the aire You will shew vs your owne erroneous and
by dangers and doubts weighed and considered by the spirit of Christe I know no reason why you ascribe them meerely to the flesh As for the contrarieties which you would take hold of that Christ as a man did abhorre and feare death and yet not somuch as to fall into that agony or bloudy sweate for feare of his sufferings with such a slacke and shallow Reader as you are they may beare a shew of repugnancie but to any man that marketh or vnderstandeth what is said it accordeth full well that Christ might haue a naturall feare of death which is common to all the godly and yet no such perplexed feare for any sufferings of his as to sweate bloud for paine therof And this maketh more against you then you wil seeme to acknowledge For if Christ had no such afflicting feare in regard of his owne suffring or passion but only in respect of vs and our danger then certainly by the censure of Ambrose Ierom and Bede Christ suffered no paines of hell nor of the damned since they would bread another maner of agony then this life could endure And howsoeuer the view of death fast clasped with hell till Christ did breake the knotte thereof might seeme terrible to Christes humane consideration yet for somuch as he was secured from the one by the innocency vnity and dignity of his person though he submitted himselfe to the death of his body this feare was both righteous and religious and as farre from the paines of the damned as any sufferings of the soule in this life might be e Defenc. pag. 100. li. 10. He would not he could not so feare and be affrighted yea and piteously astonished with such sorrow oppressing him as to sweate drops of bloud onely for feare of his bodily death Neither would he pray at all much lesse so vehemently and so often times as he did against that which he perfectly knew was Gods will and his owne most willing purpose to vndergoe It is more then folly to mistake misplace and misapplie euerie thing after this sort as you doe and then to collect you know not what nor why from your owne vnwise and rash presumptions What if Christ had more cause of sorrow in the Garden then his bodily death ergo he felt the paines of the damned inflicted on his Soule by Gods immediate hand Tie this argument to the manger litter is fitter for it then an answere Such blockish and brutish sequences were the first morter that plastred your hell paines to Christs passion The worke of our redemption which Christ now vndertooke to haue pronounced and setled by the righteous iudgement of God and his Elect to be freed and pardoned of all their sinnes by the sufferings of his person The worke of our redemption was cause enough to prouoke Christs bloudy sweate and to be restored to Gods fauour by his mediation as also satan to be reiected from preuailing against them or so much as accusing them was a matter of the greatest moment in all Christian Religion What maruaile then if the manhood of Christ when it approched so waightie a worke as by prayer first to obtaine and confirme all this that after he might the more cheerefully and constantly accomplish his obedience vnto death What maruaile I say if the glory of Gods iudgement and power of his wrath the number of our sinnes and neglect of our owne state the sharpe and eger malice of satan made Christ with all possible feare of the great might and maiestie of the Iudge all passionate sorrow for the crimes and contempts of the prisoners all earnest and zealous intention of prayer against the impugner and impediment of mans deliuerance to agonize himselfe euen vnto a bloudie sweate If in our prayers the spirit of Christ stirre vp f Rom. 8. sighes vnspeakeable when we remember what danger we were in what sorrow cries and teares may we iustly thinke the fountaine of mercie and pietie would powre forth in our behalfe when our saluation was now in question before the Iudge of all the world and how burned that fire and flame of Christs loue and care for vs till he was comforted and assured from heauen that God would not by our wickednesse or vnworthinesse be stayed from performing his mercies towards vs in Christ his Sonne nor from accepting Christs obedience and sacrifice as the full ransome for all our transgressions notwithstanding all the resistance that sinne or satan could make in the righteous iudgement of God This you will say God long before had purposed and promised vnto his Sonne Christ was most earnestly to aske what God had faithfully promised to graunt And that made Christ the more earnestly pray for it since God had from the beginning determined as well to haue it asked by his Sonne as graunted by himselfe And therefore Christs supplications for vs in the daies of his flesh and at the hower of his passion now approching were as needefull as his sufferings forsomuch as pietie and charitie are perceiued rather by the Soule then by the flesh and God would neuer haue accepted the outward murdering of Christs body without the inward and acceptable sacrifice of his voluntarie obedience patience and loue euen vnto death which were the points that were chieflly pretious in Gods sight g Defenc pag. 100. li. 19. Or else Cyrill meaneth no more but that Christ naturally misliked and 〈◊〉 euen as all flesh doth all bodilie paine and death This we alway yeelde and it maketh nothing against vs. It maketh lesse for you that Christ had and lawfully might haue as you graunt a naturall misliking and shunning of all bodily paine and death and consequently knowing the sharpnesse of the paine that was prepared for him on the crosse might without breach of pietie or repugnance to Gods knowen will desire to haue that Cup passe from him if it were possible for man by Gods good pleasure to be otherwise redeemed and saued And this reseruation of Gods will in his prayer FATHER 〈◊〉 Luke â—…2 IF THOV VVILT take away this Cup from me which was the possibilitie ment by Christ and his present preferring Gods will before the instinct of nature liking ease in presently saying Neuerthelesse not my will but thy will be done doth exquisitely proue that Christ was not astonished in his prayer nor past remembrance of Gods knowen will as you dangerously surmise and no cause you should conclude he felt hell paines in this agonie because the Scripture concealeth the sense of his feruent supplication when after comfort receiued from heauen he fell into an agonie of most earnest and ardent prayer in which his sweate was like drops of bloud And therefore your foolish and wicked imagination that Christ in his agoniâ—… was so amazed that he knew not what he prayed nor discerned when he impugned the will of God is without all leading or likelihood of the word of God and grounded onely vpon your wilfull and hastie
voluntarily subiect himselfe to our miseries paines and afflictions I then neither doe nor neede denie that our naturall infirmities were common to Christ with vs but those were voluntarily receiued in him e August de trinitate li. 4. cap. â—…3 quia voluit quando voluit quomodo voluit because he would when he would and as he would euen as Austen saith of his death And though it be most true which the Apostle writeth of Christ f 2. Cor. 13. He was crucified through or as touching his infirmitie which was the flesh of man in him yet Saint Austens exposition of those words is right good where he saith g Ibid. lib. 13. cap. 14. de qua infirmitate ait Apostolus quod infirmum est dei fortius est hominibus euen of that 〈◊〉 wherein Christ was crucified the Apostle also saith the weaknesse of God is stronger then men What seemed weaknesse in Christ and is so called in the Scriptures in comparison of his diuine power euen that farre passeth the power and strength of men and therefore the same Apostle calleth h 1. Cor. 1. Christ crucified the wisedome and power of God i Defenc. pag. 101. li. 9. Faine you would wipe away that Argument of ours which sticketh neerer to you then you will seeme In malefactours there is a quiet and contented suffering of most exquisite and extraordinarie torments often times which they endure onely by 〈◊〉 naturall strength and courage of mind How much more likely is it then that Christ the very Rock of all strength and fountaine of patience would not thus seeme affrighted and astonished for his meere bodily death and that before it came vnto him Your brablement is more tedious to me then your Argument troublesome You spend here a whole leafe to shew that Malefactors and Martyrs oâ—…ten suffer most horrible torments very quietly and altogether without any such agonie as Christ shewed in the Garden How maketh that against me who teach out of Hilarie Ambrose Ierom and Bede that Christ was not thus agonized for any sufferings of his owne much lesse for feare of a bodily death though he would be like vs in hauing a naturall horror of death as Athanasius Austen Cyrill and Damascene affirme What wandering and trifling is this to be loquent in things superfluous and silent in matters most serious The whole worke and waight of our redemption was now before Christs eyes and apprehension in more exact and liuely manner he now appearing before the iudgement seate of God then we in this body can discerne or describe For as all things needfull shall be present and patent to vs when we are brought to Gods Tribunall where no truth of things without vs or within vs which concerne vs shall be couered or concealed from vs so Christ presenting himselfe before the iudgement of God to haue Man redeemed by the ransome which he would yeeld for him and satan eiected from preuayling against his members by his mediation did perfectly and fully behold both the detestation that Gods holinesse had of all our sinnes and the power of his wrath prouoked by our defection and rebellion as also the dreadfull vengeance prepared and ordained for sinne and our dull and carelesse contempt of our owne miserie together with the watchfulnesse and egernesse of the Aduersarie the brunt and burden of all which he must receaue and auert from vs by that kind of satisfaction and recompence which the iustice of God should then require at his hands None of those things might be hid from Christs present and perfect view when he came now to performe that which the iudgement of God should thinke a iust price and full recompence for the sinnes of men The due consideration contemplation intuition and apprehension whereof being in Christ more cleare then we can conceaue might worthily make the Manhood of Christ not onely feare and tremble but in his prayers to God to stirre and inflame all the powers and parts of body and Soule as farre as mans nature and spirit were able with all submission intention and deprecation possible to powre forth themselues before God These you push away not as false but as parts of Christs holinesse as if any feare or sorrow could be in Christ which were not religious and holy and substitute other sufferings of the damned as the second death and the true paines of hell from the immediate hand of God deuiced by your selfe without any direction of the Scriptures and those you dreame Christ not onely feared but really felt in the Garden otherwise he could not sorrow and sweate as he did And because you would seeme to say somewhat though little to the purpose and lesse against me who auouch no such thing you heape vp heere malefactours murderers and theeues besides martyrs who neuer sweate bloud for any bodily torments inflicted on them Grant all this though there be differences which yet you see not what inferre you That Christ did not thus sweate for his bodily death What then Ergo he suffered in the Garden the death of the damned and the true paines of hell This conclusion hangeth to the premisses with hay-ropes you winde it which way you will and then you say I would faine wipe it off But to me that neither say nor said any such thing that Christ was thus agonized onely for feare of his meere bodily death these be rather wildgoose-races then sober mens reasons impugning any thing that I did or doe defend And yet your comparisons be not so currant as you conceaue them For though murderers or malefactors for obstinacie or stupiditie and martyrs for constancy may despise the torments which they suffer so long as strength of desperate malice in the one or of heauenly grace in the other resisteth or endureth the paine yet when nature is subdued and conquered by paine that the soule must yeeld to death and depart then can no man expresse nor euer could any man declare what conflicts of feare and horror the soule hath with death and in death Onely Christ who on the Crosse did voluntarily and instantly breath out his soule with all quietnesse contrarie to the course of mans nature might before hand shew in himselfe if it pleased him the anguish and agonie which naturally the soule hath in her strugling with death and fainting vnder death and which God had impressed on mans nature at the time of the departure of the soule from the bodie in remembrance and resemblance of Gods displeasure against sinne when by his mightie power he seuered the soule and spirit of man asunder to giue way to death for the reuenge of the first mans disobedience in all his ofspring I speake not this as if there were none other causes that might be of Christes agonie but to shew that your comparisons which you take to be so strong are woorse then weake since the soules both of Martyrs and Malefactors haue a naturall terror and horror of death
your vntuned and hie strained cratchets That Christ must and did breake the knot betwixt death and hell which otherwise were fast clasped together and by receauing the one in his owne person did free all his members from the other is no question neither with me nor I thinke with any Christian man The iust vengeance deserued and prepared for sinne which was temporall and eternall death the Redeemer must throughly know least he should ransome vs he could not tell from what Wherefore not your new found hell but the wages of our sinne which was eternall death vsually called hell in the Scriptures might not be hidde from the eâ—…es of Christ but euen the iust and full reward of our iniquities was to be presented to the sight and spirit of the Redeemer that in the presence of God he might behold the waight of our sinne the greatnesse and iustnesse of Gods anger against it and accordingly conceaue how deare the price and how sharpe the paine must be that should quitte vs from this debt and yet how pretious his person and infinite his obedience was that by one death should excuse vs from the other Whether these things were reuealed and shewed to Christ by sight as the terrors and torments of hell might be or by vision or in spirit I dare not pronounce I meddle not so farre with Gods secrets God hath waies enough to propose the Iudgemets of the next world to men here liuing when and how pleaseth him but of none of these might Christ be ignorant least we make him a Sauiour at peraduentures as not knowing all things that directly belonged to his office and sacrifice and to the causes effects of our Redemption That therfore Christ must haue a perfect knowledge and liuely sight and view of all these things pertaining to the waight and burden of mans deliuerance chiefly now when he appeared in Gods iudgement where nothing is couered to performe the fame I may safely grant but that he felt or suffered eternall death or the paines of the damned or the full wages of our sinnes this you shall neuer prooue how much soeuer you presume with licentious but irreligious words to couer it and conuey it into the Creed of Christians k Defenc. pag. 103. li. 29. He did not contemplate and looke on them a farre of nor had to do with one more then the other but by suffering one he felt both and by enduring one he endured both Your speaches are false absurd and impious howsoeuer you will qualifie them when you come to the point with the substances but not with the circumstances of eternall death and damnation First shew that the Scripture teacheth any such thing of Christ The Defender forgeth apace new parts of the Christian faith as that he suffered the second death or the paines of the damned Next that your deuice of this new second death which dureth but for a moment and proceedeth from Gods owne hand agreeth with the word of God And Thirdly that God did thus torment the soule of his sonne with his immediate hand either in the garden or on the crosse All these things are your owne dreames plainly plastered to the Christian faith with figures and phrases of your owne coining and yet you thinke you haue wrong if you be not suffered to change the whole Creede and outface the Scriptures with your idle fansies That Christ should and did suffer a bodily death on the crosse the Prophets did forshew the Euangelists doe witnesse and the Apostles doe confirme That he died the second death in the garden before the first or that this death came to him by fitts and dured but the turning of an hand and was inflicted on his soule by Gods immediate hand as the other death was on his body by the Iewes what Prophet what Euangelist what Apostle did euer teach or write And how hang your owne words with your owne conceits by suffering the one Christ felt both you say and by enduring the one he endured both Then in the Garden when as yet he suffered not the death of the body he felt not your second death and Gods immediate hand did cease if by the one which the Iewes inflicted he endured both If you fly to Christes fearing and apprehending the second death by the first then are you farre from his suffering and enduring it and this apprehension which was not erroneous in Christ as it is in you might offer him a feare of Gods power which is more infinite then the manhoode of Christ could comprehend and so might be terrible to him as it is to all the godly when they finde or feele Gods anger against sinne but it could breed no perswasion or distrust that God would destroy him for our sinnes since he perfectly knew God would saue vs by his sufferings l Defenc. pag. 104. li. Also you forget my argument that Christ alwayes charged his Disciples not to take their bodily death heauily for righteousnesse sake ergo he himselfe would neuer be so dismáyed with the feare of it As I did not professe in my conclusion to refute all your follies which were both trifling and tedious so if I had purposed any such thing I should haue skipped this as an argument rather of your ignorance and vanitie than of any force or veritie For first where did I defend in my Sermons that Christes bodilie death was the cause of this agonie recken my sixe causes on your fingers ends if your memorie be so fickle that refuting them you can not tell what they are and see whether Christes bodily death be any of them or no if it be none how doth this argument conclude any thing against me who shew so many things which might concurre in Christes feare besides his bodily death Wherefore your conclusion if it were good is no way preiudiciall to me nor beneficiall to your hell paines For though Christ feared somewhat els there is a large leape betweene somewhat els and the death of the damned But what was it that Christ willed his Disciples to feare Christ teacheth all his to feare Gods power as himselfe did in the garden Gods purpose meaning to condemne Christians to hell or his power that was able to destroy soule and bodie in hell Did Christ teach in these words a desperation of Gods fauour or submission vnder the mighty hand of God and a religious feare not to displease him To feare religiously not distrustfully Gods power since they were persuaded of Gods goodnesse whom Christ calleth his friends and so not to prouoke him considering the mightinesse of his arme is the summe of Christes doctrine in that place as God himselfe by the Prophet Esay taught all the faithfull saying m Esa. 8. Sanctifie the Lord of hosts and let him be your fearâ—… and let him be your dread A deepe impression of this feare commended to all the Elect whiles heere they liue Christ himselfe might haue and shew in the
agonie With this childish Art you haue almost waded by them not denying as indeede you cannot that they were then before Christs eyes when he feared and sorrowed in the Garden but that either they were no new things to him or else parts of his righteousnesse and holinesse Both which Answeres are very idle For your hell paines if that were part of his Passion were no more newes to his foresight then the rest and all Christs sufferings euen of your hell paines if that conceite had any truth in it were parts of his obedience and patience as well as his suffering of feare and sorrow or of bodily death Wherefore these be but straines and starts to make your Reader beleeue you haue somewhat to say when indeed your oppositions are so sleight that they bewray how gladly you would and how hardly you can distresse any of these causes which I said might concurre in Christs Agonie They all were weightie and godly respects impressing no small degrees of feare sorrow care and zeale on the Soule of Christ and directly pertinent to the worke of our redemption now in hand And where you shift them of as parts of Christs habituall holinesse alwaies resting in him know you good Sir that I speake not in this case of the permanent gifts of grace alwaies inherent in Christs Soule but of the painfull impressions which those respects did therefore now presently and sensiblie make on the Soule of Christ more then at other times because they came now to execution which before were but in cogitation by religious and humble praier he was now to settle the whole course force effects of his sufferings c Defenc. pag. 105. li. 10. Call you this greater perfection in him than in other men to pray expressely against the knowne will of his Father yea against his owne That Christ praied against the knowen will of his Father is an irreligious and dangerous dreame of yours This Toy you trump in euery where as if it were some choise Answere and yet this emptie reason maketh as much against you as against me if there were any waight in it For if Christ did suffer the paines of the damned according to your deuice was it not his Fathers knowen will he should so doe yea and his owne also How then doe the paines of hell excuse him from praying against his Fathers knowen will he was so amazed therewith you will say that he knew not what he did Christ must then be wholy depriued of all vnderstanding if he neither remembred his Fathers will nor his owne nor our saluation for whose sake he was content to suffer And how then came he so suddainly in the very next syllable to remember himselfe and his Fathers will He was now freed you will say from that astonishment How fell he then thrice into it he had so many touches of hell paines which must needs confound all the powers and parts of his body Then all the time of his apprehension examination condemnation and crucifixion he felt no such thing since the Gospels beare witnesse that he wisely religiously constantly carefully and euery way admirably behaued himselfe in eche word and deede after to the instant of his death and remembred all things that were written of him Is not here a fine mockerie which is the fortresse of all your hidden mysteries that to prooue your hell paines you must bring Christ into three such fits and pangs of confusion and obliuion that he knew not what he said or did presently with the speaking of YET to restore him againe to his perfect sense and memorie and so to free him from all your new deuised Passions besides your selues no writer old nor new did euer find in Christs prayer that he knew not what he said and the condition added before his prayer d Luke 22. Father if thou wilt take away this Cup from me and the submission following with the same breath yet not my will but thine be done doe plainely prooue that Christ had exact remembrance and regard of his fathers will besides that the Apostle affirmeth of this prayer that Christ e Heb. 5. was heard in that he feared So that if this be all the Scripture you can produce for your hell paines I protest before God and his whole Church I will sooner beleeue that you were out of your wits in writing this then that Christ was forgetfull in praying that which he spake in the Garden f Defenc. pag. 105. li. 10. Againe could this thing in any reason be such an horrible griefe vnto him to haue his flesh lie dead for a day and a few howers would the thought of this make him sweat bloud for griefe and to neede an Angell from heauen to comfort him and to pray three times vehemently this cup might passe from him verily it is vnreasonable to thinkeso Who hath bewitched you thus openly and vsually to fasten on vntrueths I alleaged six causes that might 〈◊〉 in Christes agonie you haue piked out of my wordes foure more then euer I ment to be reasons of his bloudie sweate and are nine of these now puft away with a breath and nothing left by your swelling and insulting eloquence but the deadnesse of Christs body whiles the soule wanted this it is for a man to trust to his tongue when his teeth be gone and to bleate when he cannot bite If the cause were not Gods it might be thought a pastime thus to faine and face but in so serious questions to vse such idle and false imputations and friuolous refutations is a griefe to any good mans eares and a corrosiue to his conscience Of Christes agony and the causes that might occasion his feare his sorow and his zeale in the garden I haue said so much that I am wearie with repeating though you be neuer weary with resuming the selfe same childish and erroneous mistaking The reason of my speach is plaine and euident howsoeuer you take the course rather to misreport it then refute it For if the soules of Gods saincts doe by nature vnwillingly leaue their bodies to which they are vnited though by them they are often molested and burdened otherwise death were no punishment of sinne but a signe of Gods far our which is nothing so how farre iuster cause then was there Christ should naturally dislike death not only because it was a subuersion of nature created quickned by God and an effect of Gods displeasure against sinne imposed on all men but also for that it should during the time depriue him of life sense and action with great slaunder and infamie and cheefely should exclude for a season his bodie from that blessed communion and fruition of his diuine grace and glorie which formerly it felt though the personall vnion should not be disâ—…olued now the more Christ liked and loued that adherence to God which he liuing enioied the more grieuous was the want thereof which death tooke from him for
of these words professing to cite the text you say But still he was in his agonie And as for the words he prayed more earnestly which are The 〈◊〉 corrupteth S. â—…uke immediate before Christes sweating bloud you shutte them cleane out as not fitting your turne lest the Reader should thinke his vehement prayer after comfort receiued was the cause of this agonie for that the Euangelist placeth it next before in the text Your wordes then hee was in his agonie are no good translation and that which is added but still he was in his agonie is a violent corruption for genómenos there doeth not signifie his being or continuing that which he was before but his becomming that which he was not before For example z Gal. 4. v. 4. God sent his Sonne genómenon made of a woman and genómenon made vnder the law Doth the word genómenos heere signifie that Christ was man before he was conceiued of his mother or rather that he was made of his mother which before he was not and so made vnder the law doth not import that Christ was subiect to the law before he was man but that being altogether free from the law he would become subiect to the law which before he was not Likewise a Ioh. 1. v. 14. ho logos sarx egeneto the word was made flesh which before it was not This difference of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Greeke Scholiast obserueth commenting vpon S. Pauls words I could wish to be separated from Christ for my brethren b Photius apud 〈◊〉 in 〈◊〉 9. Epist. aâ—… 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Paul doth not say he could be content to become a curse which is NOVV PRESENTLY to be seuered from Christ but to be or haue beene a curse that is to haue yet continued seuered from Christ. So that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be mâ—…de or to become is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the present time and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be is still to continue Wherefore genómâ—…nos enagonia is falling at that present vpon comfort receiued by the Angell into an agonie and not as you corruptly translate still he was in his agonie An agonie you will say you vse for all Christes affections and actions in the garden But so doth not S. Luke he referreth the word to Christes more ardent prayers and to his bloudie sweat If we speake abusiuely an agonie may be taken for feare as I haue formerly shewed or if defectiuely we name one part for the whole which How some vse the word Agonie some men vse to auoid length of speech and the number of particulars then Christs agonie may stand to note all his affections actions and supplications in the garden but if we speake properly as there is no cause nor proofe S. Luke should heere do otherwise then Christes agonie both by the proprietie of the Greeke word and by the circumstances of the text was that vehement contention of minde wherewith Christ prayed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more feruently than before being now strengthened or comforted by the Angels appearing and message and euen powred forth his spirit to God with so zealous affection that his sweat was like bloud This you would crosse by your corrupt translation in saying BVT STILL he was in his agonie though the words of the Euangelist doe not import that he continued still any former agonie but vpon the strength and comfort receiued by the Angell he fell into an agonie of most vehement desire to preuaile in the worke of our redemption and to remooue all impediments for which he vsed so strong cries and teares that his sweat was coloured like bloud All these things you venture to determine by your owne authoritie as if the Scriptures were vnder your command and little thinke that wise and godly Readers will censure your licentious intrusion on the Scriptures as it deserueth Neither can you cease for ought that I see for as you affirme that which our Sauiour assumed vpon the Angels message to haue possessed him before at his entrance into the garden so the words which he spake before any prayer in the garden and much more before the appearing of the Angel you make consequent to his bloudie sweat Your handsome and holie translation and exposition is c Defenc. pag. 107. li 3. but still hee was in his agonie and sweat like droppes of bloud trickling to the ground and presently sayth My soule is full of sorrowes to death Where you commit two notable falsifications euen of the Scripture it selfe The Dâ—…fender addeth to Saint Luke that which he neuer wrote and leaueth out that which he wrote For first these words My soule is full of sorrowes euen to death are not in S. Lukes Gospell whence you would seeme to cite them as presently sayd after Christes bloudie sweat Next you peruert both the other Euangelists in which these words are written for both Matthew and Marke which witnesse the speaking of those words precisely record that they were spoken to Christes three Disciples before he departed at first from them to pray in secret and before he began to expresse any desire that the cuppe might passe from him Reade the texts they keepe almost the same wordes When Christ had sayd to the rest of his Disciples d Mar. 14. v. 32 Sit you here till I haue prayed e 33. he tooke Peter and Iames and Iohn and he began to be afrayd and in great heauinesse f 34. and sayd vnto them My soule is very heauy vnto death tary here and watch g 35. So he went forward a little and fell downe on the ground and prayed that if it were possible that houre might passe from him You turne all vpside downward and tell vs out of S. Luke that still Christ was in his agonie and sweat like droppes of bloud and presently sayth My soule is full of sorrowes euen to death With such additions translations and corruptions against the circumstances described in the Scriptures some doubt may chance to creepe at a creuie into some mens consciences touching the cause of Christes agonie but your pains of the damned are not one iot the neerer for all your inuerting peruerting the Euangelists words to your will For what if Christ did sweat bloud at first which the Gospell referreth to the last doth that giue entrance to the second death and torments of the damned Are not the paines of this life able to make men sweat bloud but you must runne to hell for the lake that burneth there with fire and brimstone before mans body may colour his sweat with the shew of bloud Is it harder for Christ to resolue his bloud into sweat by zeale without paines or with bodilie paines whiles he was liuing than when he was dead to send out of his side first h Ioh. 13 v. 34. bloud and then water so distinctly and miraculously
greater than all the gifts of men and angels How then doth it follow that Christ was weake because Paul was weake Yea if Pauls weaknesse were perfected by Christes power as Paul himselfe confesseth in that place g Ibid. vers 9. Very gladly will I reioyce in mine infirmities that the power of Christ may dwell in me then from those words Christes power is prooued and not his infirmitie But take it which way you will though this be the trueth which I haue tolde these wordes doe nothing hinder Hilaries and Austens confession that Christes infirmitie was voluntarie where ours is necessarie and so infirmitie in him was not for want of strength but for merit of righteousnesse and was both receiued and directed by his will and power And where you are so often on the hoigh to impaire S. Austens credit with yours you shall do well to get you some more vnderstanding in him before you rush so rashly against him left if it come to the ballance whether you or S. Austen be in an errour you finde few friends so fauourable that will forsake him to follow you His resolution which you may put off with pride but you shall neuer refute with reason is this h August de ciuitate Dei li. 14. ca. 9. Habemus ergo has affectiones ex humaâ—…a conditionis infirmitate non autem it a Dominus Iesus cuius infirmit as fuit ex potestate 〈◊〉 etiam ipse Dominus in forma serui agere vitam dignat us humanam sed nullum habens omninâ—… peccatum adhibuit eas vbi adhibendas esse iudicauit Cùm ergo cius in Euangelio ista referuntur quod Lazarum suscitaturus lachrymas fuderit quòd propin quante passione trâ—…stis fuerit anima eius vsque ad mortem non falsò vtique ista referuntur Verum ille hos motus certa dispensationis gratia ita cùm voluit suscepit animo humano vt cùm voluit factus est homo We haue these affections of feare and sorow c. by the infirmitie of mans condition but the Lord Iesus had them not so whose infirmitie was of his owne power Wherefore the Lord when he vouchsafed to leade an humane life in the forme of a seruant but vtterly void of all sinne admitted those affections when he saw it fit to admit them And in the Gaspell when those things are reported of him as that he wept when he was about to raise Lazarus and that his Passion approching his soule was sorrowfull vnto death these things are not falselie written of him but he admitted these motions in his humane minde for certaine purposes euen when he would as when he would he was made man l Defene pag. 107. li. 20. 18. I iudge their very meaning to be that here appeared not Christs infirmitie onely in suffering but his diuine power also in punishing and this they speake fully for vs and against you If you make them speake that they neuer ment they may chance to speake with you but leaue them to expresse their owne minds and then they neither speake nor meane with you But what is the reason they so soone speake with you where not fiue lines before you controled their speech as repugnant to the truth haue you now by your glozes made them lyers like your selfe you should at least be more constant if not more prudent then first to chalenge in their speech a contrarietie to the truth and then to claime a conformity to their sense They ment no such thing as you make shew of but they speake of Christs power which stirred and gouerned his affections as he thought good that they might declare him a true man and yet be parts of his obedience and submission to his Father though withall they were religious and voluntarie For as he emptied and humbled himselfe so he weakned and troubled himselfe when he saw time not for want of power but of purpose so disposing and despensing his affections that by his vertue he might moderate them in his owne person and cure them in ours k Defenc. pag. 107. li. 28. Those other mysticall and figuratiue sayings of Austen Bede and Bernard how shall we admit them without better warrant that Christs bloudshed was to signifie that Martyrs doe shed their bloud what reason haue we so to thinke or that his bloudshed should signifie the purging of his Disciples harts from sinne yea or of all his Church in the whole world It did not signifie this but it did it indeede If their opinions of Christs bloudy Christs bloudie sweate might hauâ—… signification as well as the water that â—…anne out of his side sweate be not to be admitted because they bring no warrant besides themselues for it how should we admit your loose dreames and dangerous fansies of a new found hell inflicted on the Soule of Christ in the Garden by the immediate hand of God which is not onely strange but repugnant to the Scriptures theirs is possible and agreeable to the rules of faith yours is not Why Christ sent out of his side after his body was dead first bloud and then water can any man giue the reason Saint Austen saith i August in Iohan tract 15. De latere pendentis in cruce lancea 〈◊〉 sacramenta ecclesiae profluxerunt Out of Christs side pearced with a speare as he hanged on the crosse the Sacraments of the Church issued forth What warrant had he so to say the Scripture doth not vouch so much and yet the Church of God hath euer since regarded and receaued that speech of his So for Christs bloudy sweate finding no reason deliuered in the Scripture he descended to the signification which might be thereof that Christ by sweating bloud in his whole naturall body foreshewed the martyrdomes of his mysticall body the Church You aske for a Reason The resemblance is euident and the performance consequent greater reasons then which cannot be giuen of significations You like it not No maruaile nothing pleaseth you besides the wringing out of this sweate by the diuine power punishing You haue neither proofe nor truth for your second death to be suffered at this time and in this place and yet you would haue your absurd conceits preferred before Saint Austens iudgement It was aboue the course of nature you grant and since it was not naturall it must be miraculous if not mysticall Now if it were a miracle there may no reason be required of it but it must be left to the power and will of the doer To what end Christ did it if you like neither Austens Prospers Bedes nor Bernards iudgements in this case know you any man so vnwise as to like yours You say it did not signifie the purging of the earth from sinne it did it indeede Did the bloudie sweate of Christ in the Garden purge indeed all his Church in the whole world from sinne what needed then his death and passion afterward on the Crosse what needed his
yet will I looke againe toward thine holy temple Thou hast brought vp my life from the pit ó Lord my God z Ibid. ver 7. When my soule fainted I remembred the Lord and my praier came vnto thee into thine holy temple So that Ionas sainted with feare of death but not with the paines of the damned who I troe do not pray in their paines much lesse trust in God or are heard of him as Ionas was a Trea. pa. 46. Dauid wanted not the like in his manifold and fearefull agonies many times Though I exempt neither Dauid nor any of Gods saints here on earth from b 2. Cor. 7. feares within and sights without and troubles on euery side as the Apostle speaketh of himselfe yet is there no proofe that Dauid euer suffered the paines of the damned his words conuince no such thing Sheol which you would now turne to signifie hell though in the words of Dauid applied to Christ by Peter in the acts you stiffely refuse it standeth indifferent to note the pit prouided for the body which is the graue or prepared for the soule which is hell So that out of a word admitting this double signification you can neuer inferre which sense you please but by some other sound and sufficient circumstances Againe there are but two places which cleerly confesse that Dauid was compassed or ouertaken with the snares dangers or troubles of Sheol the 18 Psalme and the 116. In the first of which it is more then euident as well by the occasion of the Psalme as by the variation and coniunction of other words that Dauid ment the danger of death which often beset him vnder the persuit of Saul and other his enemies as the manifest words of holy writte do witnesse For this is the inscription of the Psalme c 2. Sam. 22. Dauid spake vnto the Lord the words of this song in the day that the Lord deliuered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul So that the snares and ropes of death which he speaketh of in that Psalme were apparantly the manifold dangers of life which his enemies and chiefly Saul put him in Secondly the titles that he there ascribeth vnto God proue that in his persecutions Dauid neuer doubted of Gods goodnesse towards him but in all his troubles held that for his chiefe hope and help d Psal. 18. v. 1. I will loue thee deerly saith he ô Lord my strength e 2. The Lord is my Rocke and my fortresse and my deliuerer my God my Rocke in him will I trust my shield the horne of my saluation and my refuge f 3. I will call vpon the Lord which is worthy to be praised so shall I be safe from mine enemies Thirdly the words there declaring his dangers and yet at last the destruction of his enemies argue as much For he saith g Ibid. vers 4. The ropes of death compassed me the floudes of vngodlinesse that is of the vngodly made me afraid The h 5. ropes of Sheol enuironed me the snares of death ouertooke me And so for the persons of his enemies he saith i Ibid. vers 18. They preuented me in the day of my trouble but the Lord was my stay the Lord rewarded me according to my righteousnesse because I kept the waies of the Lord. His seuering his enemies from God and iustifying himselfe not in the sight of God but in respect of them proueth all his intention in that Psalme to be touching his enemies whom by Gods aide and might hee k vers 37. persued and consumed wounding them that they fell vnder his feet and whose necks were giuen him that he might destroy them that hated him l vers 41. They cried vnto the Lord sayth he but there was none to deliuer them This no way concerneth the diuell nor his tentations much lesse any paines of hell from the immediate hand of God but most euidently the plots of men that were his enemies and sought his destruction The other Psalme maketh the like profession vpon the like occasion and affirmeth that God heard Dauid and inclined his eare vnto him when the m Psal. 116. snares of death compassed him when the straights of Sheol found him out when troubles and griefe tooke hold on him In other places where Dauid saith that his life or Soule was deliuered and saued from n Psal. 30. Sheol and euen from the o 86. lowest Sheol it is indifferent which sense wee follow since no doubt he did ascribe the euerlasting Saluation of his Soule from Hell vnto Gods goodnes and mercie no lesse then he did the preseruation of his life from the Graue And therefore I shall not neede to discusse any of those places which admit both constructions and yet bring not your hell-paines into this life any whit the sooner Againe when Dauid speaketh of feares ropes snares of hell if it were graunted that Dauid intended as well the inward assaultes of Satan to subuert his soule as the outward perils of his life to shorten his daies it helpeth not your cause For the gates euen of hell that is the power thereof preuaile in this life against all that are not of Christs true church and often compasse and besiege the faithfull and p 1. Pet. 5. the roaring lion that goeth about seeking whom he may deuoure is neither idle nor vnable to take hold of mens soules by sundrie sinnes tentations deceits and snares if he be not stedfastly resisted by faith and to make them the children of hell not by the present suffering thereof but by preparing and obliging them to the wrath to come Of the Scribes and Pharises Christ saith q Matth. 23. vers 15. You compasse sea and land to make one Proselyte that is a nouice of your profession and when he is gotten you make him filium gehennae the child of hell double to your selues Shall we hence conclude that the Scribes and Pharises and all their Proselytes were heere on earth in the true paines of hell and of the damned because our Sauiour who can not erre pronounceth them THE CHILDREN OF HELL or shall wee rather accept Christes owne Exposition where he saith r Ibid ver 33. O Serpents generation of Vipers how should you escape the future damnation or iudgment of hell Lastly as the name of God is added figuratiuely to manie things to signifie the beautie and excellencie thereof in their kindes as the s Psal. 36. hilles of God and the t 80. Ceders of God for faire and goodlie hills and trees so the name of hell is vsed in detestation for that which is fearefull and intolerable as the sorowes of hell and straights of hell and such like Whereby it is euident that you may dreame of Dauid as you doe of others that he felt in this life the paines of hell or of the damned but if you sett your selfe to prooue it
to all that obey him but that he must be God aswel as man to be able to suffer the paines of hell the second death that is a new deuice of yours not conuerting the Godhead of Christ to the infinitenesse of his merits but abusing it to the infinitenesse of his paines to make place for your new-found hell from the immediate hand of God where Scripture mentioneth no such thing in the worke of our redemption but plainly and fairely teacheth vs that we are k Rom. 5. reconciled to God by the death of his Sonne who l Coloss. 1. by the bloud of his Crosse procured perfect peace in heauen and in earth and restored vs to the fauour of God through death in the bodie of his flesh in which he m Rom. 8. condemned sinne that we might be n Heb. 10. sanctified by the offering of his bodie once made on the altar of the Crosse. And this doctrine so euidently and frequently deliuered by the Holy Ghost in the sacred Scriptures is so sufficient that I see no cause nor need of your hell paines besides no warrant nor witnesse of them except we dreame that the spirit of God did not well vnderstand or could not aptly expresse your hellish mysteries which he alwaies ouerpasseth with silence when hee speaketh of the purgation of our sinnes and our redemption by the precious bloud of the Lambe vnspotted and vndefiled If therefore it be not lawfull in the highest points of faith to adde ought to the word of God nor to thinke that the spirit of Trueth faileth or defecteth in his instruction vnto trueth I do not see with what dutie to God you and others may be so bolde with the Sonne of God as to subiect his soule to the second death and to the paines of the damned when the Scriptures offer vs no such part or point of our beliefe o Defenc. pag. 121. li. 36. You seeme to grant vnto Christ all naturall sorrow and feare neither doe we seeke any more but you trust the paine of the damned is more than a naturall oppressing and afflicting of the heart with humane feare and sorow For sooth it is not It is no more than a very naturall humane feare and sorow It proceedeth immediately and principally from God himselfe who is the Nature of Natures Also mans nature is apt to receiue such sorow and feare from him Thus the very paines of the damned are meerely naturall If you make vs many such conclusions you will proue your selfe a meere Naturall For if all things be meerely naturall to man that God either bestoweth or inflicteth on man then grace and glorie are meerely naturall to man yea heauen it selfe is as naturall to man as hell and the Holy Ghost himselfe shall become meerely naturall to man for God doth giue and we p Rom. 8. receiue the spirit of adoption whereby we crie Abba Father yea the second person in Trinitie is inseparably ioyned to mans nature and as well the â—…ather as the Sonne q 1. Ioh. 4. abide and r 2. Cor. 6. dwell in all the Saints So that the coniunction communion and inhabitation of the godhead in man is meerly naturall vnto man by your doctrine and not only God but the Diuell is as naturall to man and so are those things which are most vnnaturall and most repugnant to mans nature For man doth and suffereth them by and from God or the Diuel As corruption and incorruption mortality and immortality righteousnesse vnrighteousnesse saluation and destruction eternall life and eternall death are meerly naturall to man by your learned discourse which if you persist to defend take heed least men doubt whether frensie be naturall to you or no. Natural I called not whatsoeuer is any way incident to men in this life or the next but that which is generall necessary to all men in that they are men Wherfore I make neither hell nor heauen naturall vnto men since the one God giueth by his power and grace aboue our nature for our nature is not to be as the Angels of God and in the other by iustice and wrath God worketh against our nature For that fire should euerlastingly burne and flesh euerlastingly dure therein and soules be extreamely tormented therewith are to my vnderstanding farre beyond nature except you beâ—…eaue God of his almighty power and will which the Scriptures confesse in him and call him by the name of nature which is no more but the condition and operation that he hath assigned in this world to euery creature If you would needs know whence I tooke the word naturall read either Fulgentius or Damascene and you shall soone see what they and I meane by nature s Tulgentiâ—… ad Trasimundum li. tertio Because Christ saith Fulgentius tooke vpon him to be a true man ideo cunct as naturae humanae infirmitates ver as quidem sedvoluntarias sustinuit therefore he sustained all the infirmities of mans nature truely but voluntarily and so Damascene t Damas. li. 3. ca. 20. We confesse that Christ vndertooke all naturall and sinlesse passions Naturall and sinlesse passions are those which entered into mans life by the condemnation of Adams transgression as hunger thirst wearinesse labour weeping shunning of death feare agonie and such like which are naturally in all men So that what is geneâ—…all and necessarie to all men in this life is naturall to man which I trust neither hell nor heauen is though by iustice or mercie all men after this life shall feele the one or enioy the other u Defâ—…nc pag. 122. li. 6. Supernaturall I graunt they are if we meane this that they are aboue our natures state to beare or to comprehend them If your rule be true that men naturally receiue the paines of hâ—…ll why should not mans nature as well beare them or compâ—…ehend them as receiue them except you meane the bearing of them with patience or comprehending the end of them what punishment men receiuâ—… that they beare x Gala 5. He that troubleth you shall be are his condemnation whosoeuer he be And againe y Gala 6. euery man shall beâ—…re his own burden And so elsewhere z Ephes. 3. I bow my knees vnto the Father of our Lord Iesus Christ that he will grant you that ye may be strengthened by his spirit in the inward man that ye may be able to COMPREHEND with all Saints what is the breadth length and depth and height and to know the loue of Christ which passeth the knowledge of man And if men shall feele the paines of hell why shall they not comprehend that which they feele They shall apprehend no end nor ease thereof but feeling is a comprehension of the paine though it shall be so great that they cannot endure it with any patience And yet since you striue for the paines of hell in the soule of Christ aduise you whether Christ shall
So that all your platforme is quite ouerthrowen by the direct words of the Apostle freeing Christ and all his elect euen in this life from all power of the second death And therefore you set your selfe in this section euidently to confront the holy Ghost when you seeke to proue that Christ suffered the second death of the soule as the Scripture speaketh And besides the Scriptures if you talke of second deaths you may as well tell vs tales of a new world as of an other word without the witnesse of Gods spirit But you haue found out many places of Scripture where this last kinde of death is so called and named Eight you quote by the side in your margine but take not the paines to discusse one of them onely you pronounce after your stately manner that those places of Scripture prooue that which you meane to bee the death of the soule Now what if not one of them speake any such thing is not your Reader sure to find you a true man of your word when you quote eight places and not one of them to your purpose but this is your perpetuall course to mistake and misuse Scriptures at your pleasure and then to say you haue soundly prooued it On the contrary I affirme that none of these places intend any such thing as you imagine of your terrestiall and temporall hell but they exactly conclude against you that damnation is eternall and no death of the soule which is not euerlasting is expressed or intended in any of those Scriptures or in any other that you or your friends are able to picke out And though it may suffice me as well to say nay as you to say yea yet for the Readers better resolution I will not bee grieued to run through all these places as much as shal be needfull The first is l Ezech. 18. ver 4. the soule that â—…inneth it shall die These words may signifie either subtraction of grace in this life which is consequent to sinne in the wicked or exclusion Eight places of Scripture abused for the temporall death of Christs soulâ—… from glory in the next world which is the iust and full wages of sinne But that euery soule which sinneth hath felt or shall feele in this life your temporall hell or the pains of the damned this is a grosse error to be fathered on those words and repugnant not onely to the trueth of this text but euen to the sense and experience of all the Godly and such as your selfe dare not auouch since you qualifie your conceit in that behalfe with these words that m Defenc. pag. 134. li. 15. some in some measure are conformed with Christ in these his sufferings But if God by Ezechiel ment your earthly hell then absolutely all men children not excepted must feele in this life paines equall with the damned for so much as they haue sinned and deserued euerlasting damnation The second is the commination that God made to Adam n Genes 2. ver 17. Whensoeuer thou â—…atest thereof thou shalt die the death or surely thou shalt die Here are all sorts of deaths threatned but not to be executed either on all men nor in this present life God reseruing to himselfe power and libertie to dispose of all mens soules according to his determinate counsell though they should all be guiltie and liable to all kinds of death by vertue of those words vpon the transgression of the first man This exposition the Apostle giueth when he saith o Rom. 5. The offence of one came on all men to condemnation which is the verifying of these words that all men died in Adam to wit were subiect to death not onely by dying the death of the bodie which is appointed for all men but to the guiltinesse of euerlasting death not executed on all though deserued by all The third which is the p Rom. 6. Apostles conclusion is either generally ment of all kinds of death which came in by sinne as the rewards and punishments thereof and then it is nothing to your intention or else it expresseth the full wages of sinne to be euerlasting death by opposition to eternall life mentioned in the next wordes following For eternall life is the gift of God as eternall death is the wages that is bothe the desert and repayment of sinne Take which you will either the generall or speciall construction of death it is no way pertinent to your purpose Lesse is the fourth that the Apostles were the q 2. Cor. 2. vers 16. sauour of death vnto death in them that perished as they were the sauour of life vnto life in them that were saued For the preaching of the Gospell which the Apostle meaneth in that place doeth not proclaime a terrestiall or temporall heauen to them that beleeue in Christ but life eternall and consequently neither doth it denounce a temporall death to them which refuse Christ but euerlasting death And therefore there can be nothing more absurd then to conuert these places to the proofe of your temporall hell for so you should doe the reprobate a very good turne if you could shew that the death threatned them for not beleeuing in Christ were to dure but for a time or in this life only where your new found hell hath power and place and no where else With like successe you note for your fifth that the r 2 Cor. 3. vers 7. ministration of death was glorious the Apostle so calling the law because it denounced death not temporall but eternall to all transgessours So that if the full wages of sinne be eternall death by the word of God then did the law not denounce a temporall death due to all men by course of nature be they good or bad though euen that at first entered as a part of the punishment of sinne but euerlasting death which is the second death is reserued as S. Iohn writeth for all sorts of sinners and liers Saint Iames is the sixth who sayth s Iames 5. He that conuerteth a sinner erring from the trueth shall saue a soule from death If a man conuerted shall be saued from your temporall hell which you here would intend by the death of the soule then much more the Conuerter and he that neuer erred from the trueth shall be free from your hell and consequently Christ was most free who was trueth it selfe and neuer erred But as trueth is the way to euerlasting life and freeth men from all bondage of sinne and Satan so errour and infidelitie haue another maner of death than your terrestiall hell which you make common to Christ and some of his members and he that is conuerted from errour or sinne shall be saued from euerlasting perdition which indeed is the death of the soule depriuing it of all blisse and ioy for euer The seuenth and eigth you take out of Saint Iohn who sayth t 1. Ioh. 5. vers 16 17. There is sinne vnto
death for which we must not pray But whosoeuer is borne of God sinneth not that sinne and so neither Christ who was the true Sonne of God nor any of his chosen who are the children of God by adoption can sinne that sinne nor die that death because he that is begotten of God liueth by God who is eternall life to all that know him and cleaue vnto him without separation If then the sinnes of the Elect be not vnto death but such as we in pietie may and in charitie must pray for consequently the death of the soule here meant by Saint Iohn is such as is not incident to any of the sonnes of God and so not the temporall hell which you communicate to Christ and his members Heere are your eight places of Scriptures proouing as you pretend the second death of the soule which you ascribe to Christ in euery one of which saue the first and second there can be no question but euerlasting damnation is intended and in those two the guiltinesse of eternall death which is due to sinne may be comprised in the name of death which the Apostle iustifieth when he sayth t Rom. 5. v. 12. The offence of one came on all men vnto condemnation which is in effect that he sayd before Death went ouer all men forasmuch as all men haue sinned But that any of these intend your temporall hell brought into this life not by snares and feares working on the soules of men but by substance and essence and not eternall death in hell fire with the Diuell and his Angels you nor all your adherents shall euer be able by any ground of holy Scripture to make it appeare And therefore your presuming it vpon the bare shew of places concluding no such thing is a pestilent intrusion vpon the word of God whiles you sticke not to couple your conceits which are false and erroneous with his vndoubted and vndefiled trueth x Defenc. pag. 135. li. 31. First ordinarily and commonly it belongeth only to the damned wherewithall are the ordinarie accidents and concomitants desperation induration vtter darknesse c. with perpetuitie of punishment and that locally in HELL Generally and truely the Scriptures neuer vse the name of the second death but for the lake burning with euerlasting fire into which the Diuell and all the Reprobate shall be cast and whatsoeuer you otherwise pretend is your owne absurd deuice without the Scriptures and against the Scriptures to keepe your doctrine from open derision and detestation And since your selfe acknowledge that this is the ordinarie and vsuall doctrine of the Scriptures it shal be needfull for your Reader to hold you to that till you fully proue your extraordinarie deuice by the same Scriptures by which the other is euidenly confirmed and so much openly confessed by you y Defenc. pag. 135. li. 36. In this sense the Fathers generally do take it where they denie that Christ suffered the death of the soule and so do we If your cause haue so little holde in the Scriptures it hath lesse in the Fathers who in the necessarie worke of our redemption thought it sacriledge to say any thing that was not apparently proued by the Scriptures And as you light not on a true word when you come to deliuer vs the mysteries of your new hell so this is patently false that the Fathers generally take the death of the soule for eternall damnation only when they denie that Christ died the death of the soule They speake as the Scriptures leade them and confessing two deaths of the soule as the Scriptures doe which are sinne excluding all grace and the wages of sinne euen euerlasting damnation they generally denie that Christ died any death of the soule and haue for confirmation of their doctrine therein the whole course of the sacred Scriptures concurring with them x Defenc. pag. 135. li. 37. Secondly the death of the soule or the second death may be extraordinarily and singularly considered namely to imply no more but simply the very nature and essence of it You broach two apparent and euident vntrueths which you make the whole foundation of your presumptuous errour First that either Christ or his Elect in this life did or do suffer the very nature and essence of the second death Next that the Scriptures do singularly and extraordinarily reserue that kinde of second death for Christ and his members Shew either of these by the word of God before you make them grounds of your doctrine or els any meane Reader may soone conceiue you meane to teach no trueth confirmed in the Scriptures but a bolde and false deuice of your owne which you would extraordinarily intrude vpon the word of God a Defenc. pag. 136. li. 5. This is a death to the soule as before we haue shewed according to this sense the Scriptures and Fathers before noted may rightly be vnderstood not to denie it in Christ. When you glaunced before at the death of Christes soule you prayed vs to haue patience When the Defender shouâ—…d proue the death of Christs soule he sayeth bee hâ—…th proued it already till you came to the place where we should receiue a reasonable satisfaction and now you are come to the place where you should make iust and full proofe thereof you send vs backe againe and say you haue shewed it before What meaneth this doubling and deceiuing of your Reader but that you would seeme to haue many proofs when indeed you haue none and therefore you post vs to and fro to seeke for that we shall neuer finde In the 113. Page of this Defence you went about by your miserable misconstruing of certaine wordes vsed by some of the Fathers to enforce a shew of a death on the soule of Christ but against the haire as there I haue proued and therefore stand not on your former vnfortunate aduentures but either heere make proofe by the Scriptures that Christ died the death of the soule or leaue prating and publishing it so confidently as you and your adherents do for the chiefe part of mans redemption The Scriptures and Fathers you say before noted may rightly be vnderstood not to denie it in Christ. Is this all you haue to say for the death of Christes soule that the Scriptures and Fathers may be vnderstood not to denie it The Scriptures must affirme it before you can make it any point of Christian religion or part of our reconciliation to God b Rom. 10. Faith is by hearing and hearing by the word of God and not by not denying If that be your course to put any thing to the Creed which you list to say the Scriptures doe not denie you may quickly haue a large Creed containing all things which the Scriptures abused with your figures and wrested to your fansies shall not in expresse words as you thinke denie c Defenc. pag. 136. li. 9. Moreouer let it be obserued that if we had no proofes at all
ca. 1. epist. ad Rom. through the spirit of sanctification He meaneth by the holy Ghost which Christ gaue to the beleeuers in him Theodulus x Theodulus in cap. 1. 〈◊〉 ad Romanos through the spirit of sanctification that is by the holy spirit which Christ gaue to those that beleeued in him Theophylactus y Theophylact. in ca. 1. epist. ad Romanos by the spirit of sanctification that is by the spirit with which he maketh the beleeuers holy Haymo z Haymo in ca. 1. epistolae ad Romanos the spirit of sanctification is heere taken for the holy Ghost who giueth sanctity to men and Angels who also fashioned quickened and sanctified Christs manhood in the Virgins womb of the seed of the Virgin without the seed of man The new writers with one consent as Erasmus Zuinglius Peter Martyr Bullinger Musculus Gualter Hemmingius Aretius and Caluine himselfe follow the same interpretation so that your obseruation against and after all their iudgements is misbegotte and borne out of time and brought in of purpose to paue the way for your new found fansies which haue no ground but in your new made notes as much crossing probabilitie as authoritie Yea the obseruation wrongeth the distinction of the persons in the most blessed Trinitie and dishonoreth rather the Deitie of the Sonne of God then aduanceth it whiles the Sonne of God and the spirit of holinesse being both expresly named you take them both for one person and make the Sonne of God in his diuine nature to be lesse then the possessor or giuer of life and righteousnesse eueu a receauer of both For in all these places where you say the name of spirit is vsed to signifie Christs Godhead the power and worke of the holy Ghost is there intended and expressed as that Christ was a Rom. 1. declared to be the Sonne of God by the spirit of sanctification and was b 1. Tim. 3. God manifested in the flesh iustified by the spirit as also c 1. Pet. 3. mortified in the flesh but quickned by the spirit The spirit of sanctification is the title of the holy Ghost sanctifying as well the Manhood of Christ as his members and the giuing thereof declareth the Sonne to be true God whose spirit this is as well as the Fathers and by whom the Sonne worketh as well as the Father And where it is written that Christ was Iustified and quickned by the spirit if there you reade in the spirit meaning in the Deitie of Christ then Christes Godhead receaued life and righteousnesse which by your leaue is a speech ne allowed ne frequented in the Scriptures For though the second person in Trinitie by his internall and eternall generation receaued all that he hath from the Father who begat him yet of this generation which is secret substantiall and eternall the Apostles speake not when they say Christ was quickned and iustified but the one sheweth that Christes body which was put to death was raised againe to life by the power of his spirit the other noteth that he was God manifested in the flesh and iustified that is prooued and confirmed so to be by the mightie workes and graces of Gods spirit shewed as well in his owne person as in all his members For that is the intent of the Apostles wordes not that his diuine glorie was onely praised or acknowledged of men but that the world beleeued the Angels admired the spirit iustified that is most mightily and cleerely witnessed him to be God manifested in the flesh Then hath your obseruation his full discharge since there is no one place where these wordes the spirit and flesh are applied to Christ to note his two natures though his Godhead be testified and plainely prooued in most of the same places by more pregnant wordes then spirit which is common to Angels soules and windes and onely sheweth that it is no palpable or sensible body where the name of spirit alone in the Scriptures standing for the third person in Trinity noteth the power and grace of the holy Ghost by which these things were wrought for Christs manhood And in that place of Peter on which you most depend if you follow the Syriac translation to which your owne adherents so often appeale the Apostles words are Christ was dead in body but liuâ—…d in spirit which conuinceth first that flesh is there taken for the body of Christ contrary to your obseruation and that Christ still liued in spirit which euerteth your maine conclusion intended from this place for the death of Christs soule But were it as you suppose that flesh and spirit were ascribed to Christ to declare his two natures the one to be corporall and humane the other to be spirituall and diuine how doth it follow that euery thing affirmed of his manhood must properly agree both to body and soule by what Logicke conclude you that you may as well auouch that Christs soule is truely corporall or carnall because it is comprised vnder the name of flesh as that other attributes of the body are verified in the soule Which if you thinke absurd though the name of flesh by a figure of speach import the whole man because the Scripture speaketh not of a dead but of a liuing man then is there lesse cause that ech action or passion affirmed of the flesh should exactly or properly be referred to the soule since the common vse of speach intending the whole by a part is figuratiue and in figuratiue speaches as where the soule or the flesh are taken for the whole man the attributes cannot be properly restrained to ech part no more then the names are And euen out of those places by which you would collect death to be common to the body and soule of Christ the auncient fathers conclude death to be proper to the body of Christ and not common to the soule as Austin out of Saint Peter d August 〈◊〉 99. Quid est enim quòd viuificatus est spiritu nisi quâ—…d eadem caro qua sola fuer at mortificat us viuificante spiritu resurrexit What other meaning hath this that Christ was quickned by the spirit but that the same flesh in which onely he was put to death rose againe by the quickning of the spirit And Cyrill e Cyrill de recta fide ad 〈◊〉 li. 2. Was it not a worke of infirmitie to endure the crosse I confesse saith Paul hee was weake in the flesh but he reuiued againe by the power of God And how was he weake by suffering his owne bodie to taste death for vs and restoring to life againe that very temple of his bodie not doing this by the weakenessc of his flesh but by the power of God Christ f Ibidâ—…m died for vs not as a man like one of vs but as a God in flesh giuing his owne bodie a ransome for the life of all Wherefore his Disciple Peter saith wisely and warily that
you l Treâ—… pa. 78. li. 〈◊〉 butted both these as absurd and most false that Christ was made aliue either in his humane soule or by the same I replied that you refuted your owne position Foâ—… if in the former words of Peter his meaning were to say that Christes soule and bodie as you conceaue him were done to death then of necessitie Christ must be quickned and restored to life as well in his humane Soule as in his Bodie And this is so farre from being absurd and false as you proclaimed it that it is openly blasphemous otherwise to saie or thinke that Christ was neuer made aliue in his humane soule if once it were dead as you collected out of Peters words What course now take you to colour these incongruities You ment it was absurd to say that Christes soule was quickned as was his bodie Of the maner of death you speake there not a word but onely seeke to prooue that spirit in that place can not be taken for Christes soule because it is most absurd and false as you say that Christ was made aliue in his humane soule How you will iangle or iuggle touching your intent is not to this purpose you must answere for the sense which you would patch to Peters words The death which Christ suffered in his flesh by Peters assertion was it the death of the body alone or of both body and soule if of the body only then is your commentane which corrupteth Peters words absurd false and wicked Did Peter intend to teach that Christ died in both parts of his manhood that is in soule as well as in bodie then is it a necessarie trueth and point of piety to confesse and affirme that Chist was made aliue in his humane soule which you say is absurd and false Which way will your wisedome winde out of this grinne you ment it is absurd for the soule to be quickened as the body is You ment as best serued your turne but what ment Peter if he affirmed the soule of Christ died as you interprete him must not his words auouch that Christes soule was made aliue except you resolue that Christs soule once dead was neuer quickned againe and though you set a bold face on these contradictions and say you are farre from them yet ech meane Reader may soone perceaue how farre you were ouershot in them though heere you would outface them And where you now say that in such a sense you doe not denie but Christ may be said to be quickned in the spirit what is this but to grant that now which before you called absurd and most false m Dâ—…c pag. 140. li. 37. I hope it is cleere to reasonable men that Christes soule according to the Scriptures phrase may be said in some sort to haue tasted suffered death that is the extreamest feelings of Gods wrath for sinne and the most vehement paines of the damned but in a singuler maner and extraordinarie vvay And to the same reasonable men I referre it whether you haue brought one word or syllable out of holy Scripture concluding that Christ died the death of the soule or the second death The Scripture phrase you haue peruerted and distorted to your meaning but the words are farre from inferring any such thing euen in the iudgement of the meanest Your mittigations In some sort in a singular manner and extraordinarie way What argue they but your wresting of the Scriptures from their right sense since no such thing is there affirmed yea the death of the soule and the second death in the Scriptures are such as you dare not auouch of Christ but with these limitations which are no where mentioned in the Scriptures but are houels to shroud your absurd and false doctrine from the tempest of the word of God conuincing you of impiety and heresie if you did not thus delude the force of them But in vaine doe you seeke for these vnsound refuges when you be once driuen from your footing in the word of God For you must not only prooue by the Scriptures which you neither haue done nor can doe that Christ suffered the death of the soule and the second death as you say he did but you must shew also where these exceptions are written of Christ otherwise they are but shifts declining the maine and generall trueth of the Scriptures touching the death of the soule and the second death which can no more agree to Christ then sinne and damnation which you may as well defend IN A SORT in a singular manner and extraordinary way to be found in Christ as the other And therefore dally not with the word of God and faith of Christ your singular manner will not saue you from abusing the one and defacing the other except you can shew where your assertion as well as your exceptions be written in the booke of God As for the most vehement paines of the damned when you take the paines to prooue any thing otherwise then by the meale of your owne mouth you shal be answered The paines of the damned expressed in the Scriptures are reiection confusion worme of conscience and torment of hell fire which if by your cunning conueyance you cast vppon the soule of Christ you shall cough me a singular and extraordinary miscreant n Defenc. pag. 141. li. 6. Now besides the matter you gird at me in diuers places as where I say the death of the soule is such paines and sufferings of Gods wrath as alwayes accompanie them that are separated from the grace and loue of God This geere deserued more then girding other men vse to blush at such falsehoods but shamefastnesse and you are parted When you had thus grossely thwarted the trueth as to say that the paines of Gods wrath which here you make the most o Treatis pag. 77. li. 5. vehement paines of the damned doe alwayes accompanie them that are separated from the grace and loue of God your Printer or Corrector ashamed of that more then childish ouersight would not take vpon him to altar your text and so to amend your error but with a marginall note bridled your wordes making an addition cleane contrarie to your text For where you said alwayes he said ordinarily which is not alwayes and so he giueth you the lie and yet himselfe is as farre from the trueth as you are For neither alwayes nor ordinarily much lesse alwayes ordinarily which is as much as alwayes sometimes doe the most vehement paines of the damned accompanie them that are strangers to the grace and loue of God and therefore this Laborinth is like your other riddles in religion neither Writer Reader nor Corrector can tell what to make of them nor how to temper them with any trueth But now you will make amends for all p Defenc. pag. 141. li. 10. Forsooth it is true they are alwayes wicked whom these paines do accompanie ordinarily It is the first time I heard you speake
towards a trueth but this is cleane kam to that you said before Your former speach was these paines doe alwayes accompanie the wicked and now you turne the cake in the pan as if that side were not burnt and tell vs they are alwayes wicked whom those paines doe accompanie ordinarily Forsooth this is not How handsomly the defender shifteth hands that you said before and if you be ashamed of your follie and falsehood I am not against repentance But it were plaine dealing to confesse the fault and not to bring in an ape for an owle and say it is the same Creature And yet forsooth whether this position be true or not is without the compasse of your skill For first what is ordinarie with you once a weeke once a moneth or once in seuen yeeres you haue gotten a word that you may winde at your will and limite as you like best and yet without all proofe you resolue that these paines doe ordinarily accompanie the wicked experience I trust you will take none vpon you for then by your owne rule you must be alwayes wicked to sift other mens souls what paines they feele though they be wicked I win you haue no way but by report or conâ—…ecture which are both vncertaine Warrant in the word you haue none that such paines doe alwayes or ordinarily accompany the wicked the contrarie may rather be thence collected For when the wicked shall say q 1. Thess. 5. Peace and safetie then shall suddaine destruction come vpon them Peace and safetie in the paines of hell I suppose they haue nor cause nor will to say In Peace then safety not in the pains of the damned are many if not most of the wicked till destruction come vpon them which is not alwaies nor ordinary since they can be destroyed but once and vntill that time their ease and abundance make them forget God r Defenc. pag. 141. li. 18. Againe you pretend to haue much against me where I say the feeling of the sorrwes of Gods wrath due to sinne in a broken and contrite heart is indeede the onely true and perfectly accepted sacrifie to God True so I said and againe I say it What see you annsse in it Then vnhappie men are the godlâ—…e say you which are at any time free from the paines of the damned to what purpose is this I speake of Christs sacrifice Thus your triumphs before the victorie come to nothing but blasts of vanitie If I mistooke your meaning you are the more beholding to me the sense which you now expresse is worse then that I charged you with and yet I tooke your words as they lay which because they were namely applied neither to Christ nor to vs by you I pressed you with the lesser absurditie of the twaine Why your words might not be referred to the faithfull I saw no cause Dauid confessing that the s Psal. 51. v. 17. sacrifices of God he meaneth esteemed and required of God are a troubled spirit and a contrite and broken heart causeth the sacrifice of righteousnesse to be accepted I strained your words no farder then Dauids but sayd you miâ—…construed the wordes of the holy Ghost if you tooke a broken and contrite heart repenting his former sinnes for the paines of hell suffered in the soule You now say you ment this of Christ that his broken and contrite heart feeling the most vehement paines of the damned was the onely true and perfectly accepted sacrifice to God and aske me what I see amisse in this I will soone tell you Where I would haue charged you with a single error against the Godly by reason your wordes are indistinct and doubtfull you loade your selfe with a double iniurie against God and his Sonne For first the sacrifice of Christes bodie by which we are sanctified as saith the Apostle is excluded from being a true and perfectly accepted sacrifice if the paines of hell in his soule be onely the true sacrifice Secondly a false sacrifice deuised by your selfe and neuer offered by Christ is obtruded by you vnto God as the onely true sacrifice which he must perfectly accept and so where before you blazed an vntrueth you be now come to bolster it vp with impietie For where no Scripture doth witnesse that Christ suffered any such sorrowes and paines of hell as you surmise you now openly professe that all sorrowes and sacrifices besides this were neither true nor acceptable vnto God and that this your deuice surpasâ—…eth all the merits and obedience of Christ whatsoeuer t Defenc. pag. 141. li. 30. Where Austen seemeth to denie that Christes soule might die he denieth that Christ suffered any paines of damation locally in hell after his death as it seemeth some held about his time whom heere he laboureth to confute If your ignorance were not euery where patent some man perhaps would stumble at your report but you are growen to such a trade of outfacing that almost you can doe nothing else That any such opinion was held in Austens time as you talke of and that he laboured there to confute the same is a maske of your making to hide your owne blemishes Austen refelleth that as a fable in exact words when he saith Quis audeat dicere who dare say so Now if some had so held he must haue said some doe say so but who dare say so is as much as no man dareth say so If no man durst so to say then no man was so wicked or irreligious in Austens time as to dare say that Christs soule died which now is become the greatest pillar of your pater noster As for suffering in hell locally it is a fiction of yours fastened to S. Austen he hath no such words and therefore no such meaning u Defenc. pag 141. li. 37. He had no necessary cause â—…o speake of the second sense thereof how the soule may be sayd to suffer death extraordinarily for sinne imputed onely neither doth he speake against that in Christ. S. Austen a man would thinke had cause to know how we wâ—…re râ—…d by Christ and surely if he were ignorant thereof you would not iudge him worthy to be a Curate in your Conuenticles but shew that he who taught so much and wrote so much as his works declare euer spake word of your new-found redemption by the paines of hell suffered in the soule of Christ or by the second death Against it he often speaketh when he so soundly and sincerely collecteth out of the Scriptures that Christ died for vs the death of the body onely and not the death of the soule And this how could it be a true or tolerable assertion if the Scriptures did auouch or the church in his time had professed the death of Christs soule to be the chiefest part of our redemption for sinne and reconciliation to God Wherefore neuer dreame he had no necessarie cause to speake of your sense if your sense had beene a part
death haue had place in him if he had not had a mortall bodie And againe o Idem de incarnat verbâ—… Death of it selfe could not appeare but in the bodie and therefore Christ put on a bodie that finding death in his bodie he might abolish it Ambrose p Ambros. de fide ad Gratianum li. 3. ca. 5. Who is he that would haue vs partakers of his flesh and bloud Surely the Sonne of God Quomodo nisi per carnem particeps factus est noster aut PER QVAM NISI CORPORIS MORTEM mortis vincula dissoluit IN QVO NISI IN CORPORE expiaâ—…t peccata populi IN QVO PASSVS EST NISI IN CORPORE Sicut supra diximus Christo secundum carnem passo How was he made our Partner but by flesh and by what death other than the death of his bodie did he dissolue the bands of death WHEREIN BVT IN HIS BODIE did he expiate the sinnes of the people WHEREIN BVT IN HIS BODIE did he suffer As wee sayd before Christ suffered in the flesh Chrysostom q 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r We died a double death therefore we must looke for a double resurrection Christ died but one kind of death therefore herose but one kind of resurrection Adam died body and soule he died to sinne and to nature In what day soeuer ye eat of the tree said God ye shall die the death That very day Adam did not die in which he did eat but he then died to sinne and long after to nature The first is the death of the soule the other is the death of the body For the death of the soule is sinne or euerlasting punishment To vs men there is a double death and therefore we must haue a double resurrection To Christ there was but one kinde of death for he sinned not and that one kinde of death was for vs. He owed no kind of death for he was not subiect to sinne and so not to death Therefore he as free from sinne rose but one 〈◊〉 We as gâ—…e of sinne die a double death and so must haue a double resurrection This Sermon whence these words are taken thought it be not amongst Chrysostomes printed Volumes yet besides that it was published in print by FRONTO DVCâ—…VS it is found in the written Greeke copie of Chrysostom lying in New Colledge Librarie in Oxford whence these words are taken little differing from the printed copie Out of Augustine though much be sayd and much more might be yet thinke I not meet to omit some places as well for the cleerenesse as the rarenesse of them some of them being sufficiently witnessed vnto vs by others though they be not found at this day among his printed works And first of those that are found s August de 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 4 ca. 3. Vtrique rei nosâ—… id est animae corpori medicina resurrectione opus crat Mors animae impiet as est mors corporis corruptibilitas Sicut enim anima Dco deserente sic corpus anima deserente nâ—…ur vnde illâ—… sit insipiens hoc exanime Huic ergo DVPLAE MORTI NOSTRAE Salâ—…or impendit SIMPLAM SVAM adfâ—…ciendam vtramque resuscitationem nostram in Sacramento exemplo praeposuit proposuit VNAM SVAM Neque enim fuit peccator aut impâ—… vt et tanquam spiritu mortuo in interiori homine renouari opus esset sed Indutus carne mortali EA SOLA MORIENS EA SOLA RESVRGENS EA SOLA NOBIS ad vtrumque concinuit cùm in ea fieret interioris hominis sacramentum 〈◊〉 exemplum Either part of vs that is both soule and body needed curing and raising The death of the soule is impictie and the death of the bodie corruptibilitie As the soule dieth when God for saketh her so the bodie dieth when the soule for saketh it whereupon the one is soolish the other senselesse To this double death of ours our Sauiour applied his single death and to make a double resurrection in vs he preferred and proposed his one kind of death for a Sacrament and for a Precedent for he was no sinner or wicked person that he should need any renewing as one dead in spirit but putting on mortall flesh and dying in that ALONE and rising in that ALONE he fitted that ALONE to both our deaths placing therein a Sacrament for our inward man and an example for our outward So againe t Idem contra 〈◊〉 Arianum ca. 16. ca. 18. Sensit mortem Christus sicut omnes sentiunt qui moriâ—…nte carne mentibus viuunt c. Credo mortuum esse filium Dei illa quae secundum naturam generalis est cunctis non illa quae specialis est malis Christ selt death as all feele it who dying in the flesh liue in their spirits I beleeue the Sonne of God died that death which by Nature is common to all not that which is proper to euill men The words which the second Councell of Hispalis doth cite out of S. Austins writing against Maximinus are woorth the hearing though they be not now in his printed works as many other things are not which Bede and others alleage out of him u Concilium Hispalens 2. ca. 13. ex August aduersus Maximinum Vbi resurgit nisi in eo quod potuit cadere Vbi resurrexit nisi in eo vbi mortuus Quaere mortem in verbo nunquam esse potuit QVAERE MORTâ—…M IN ANIMA NVNQVAM IBI FVIT Quaere mortem in carne planè ibi fuit Et paulò pòst Quid miraris Nec mortua est anima nec verbum mortuum est CARO TANTVM MORTVA EST. Where was Christ raised but in that which might fall Wherein did he rise but in that wherein he died Seeke for death in his deitie it could neuer be there Seeke for death in his SOVLE IT NEVER VVAS THERE Seeke for death in his flesh there was it indeed And a little after Why doest thou maruell Neither was Christes soule dead nor his Godhead ONLY HIS FLESH DIED Neither want the same words in effect in his printed Sermons x In Iohannem tractat 47. Hoc suscitabatur quod mâ—…ur Nam verbum non est mortuum anima illa non est mortua That was raised in Christ which died The Deitie died not yea his soule died not y Ibidem Quid fecit mors nisi corpus ab anima separauit in morte sola caro est a Iudaeis occisa What did death in Christ more than seuer his bodie from his soule in death his flesh only was killed of the Iewes The councell it selfe adding of their own saith z Concilium Hispalens 2. ca. 13 Prophetia quoque in psalmis passionem Christi in carne sola sic asserit Foderunt manus meas pedes meos dinumer auerunt omnia 〈◊〉 Vbi non deitatis sed tantum
God Esay saith p Esa. 53. v. 4. We did iudge him as plagued and smitten of God but he was wounded for our transgressions And S. Marke when the Iewes had crucified Christ amidst two theeues saith q Mark 15. vers 28. Thus the Scripture was fulsilled which saith he was counted among the wicked Thereby noting their errour not Christs desert Besides it is somewhat saucily said that Christ was accounted wicked in the righteous iudgement of God not by the malitious error of the Iewes Such pleasure you take against both Scriptures and Fathers to auouch what you list yea though it draw with it an iniurious slander to the sonne of God The words of the Prophet he t vers 9. made his graue with the wicked compared with those that solow though he did no wickednesse clearely conuince that Christ was an innocent though he were counted and vsed with malefactours and that the Prophet neuer ment to correct Gods iudgement as corrupt but to shew the wisedome and goodnesse of God deliuering his Sonne to be esteemed and vsed as wicked by the wicked and not by himselfe Howbeit there is no necessity to referre these words to the person of God the Father but they more fittely expresse the humility of Christ himselfe who made his graue that is was content to die in the midst of two Theeues and to be buried as they were considering the coherence with the words precedent which out of all question must be vnderstood of Christ himselfe For thus they stand s vers 8. He was cut out of the land of the liuing he was plagued for the transgression of my people t vers 9. He made his graue with the wicked Where no reason forceth any change of persons and so the same person of Christ who was cut from the land of the liuing made his graue with the wicked u Defenc. pag. 143. li. 11. But chiefly considering withall that also before he made his soule a sinne offering Therefore you must needs graunt that Gods word maketh Christs soule to be sacrificed for our sinne And we desire no other death of the soule It is maruaile you doe not out of this place inferre that Christs soule was made sinne for the words are when he shall make his soule sinne But an offering for sinne is the vsuall signification of that word in the Scriptures and therefore you did well in confessing so much to saue me that labour Christ then made his soule an offering for sinne what deduce you out of those words we desire no other death of the soule In faith you be a sillie sacrificer that know not a dead soule A dead soule is no sacrifice for sinne to be no sacrifice for sinne A dead soule is void of all things which should please God and so can be no sacrifice accepted for sinne x Psal. 51. A troubled spirit sorrowing for sinne is a sacrifice to God saith Dauid But doth repentance kill or quicken the soule God y Acts 11. giueth repentance vnto life that is he raiseth the soule first dead in sinne by repentance vnto life z 2. Cor 7. Worldly sorrow causeth death but Godly sorrow causeth repentance vnto saluation Now saluation is not the death but life of the soule a Hebr. 11. Without faith it is impossible to please God And the sacrifice that shall abolish sinne must needs please God It must then not want faith by which the righteous liue Wherefore by your leaue I make the cleane contrarie conclusion out of those wordes The soule of Christ was a sacrifice for sinne but a dead soule is no sacrfice for sinne the soule of Christ therefore was not dead Without death you will say there is no redemption for sinne Without bloud which noteth the death of the bodie there is no redemption for sinne but the soule I trust hath no bloud to be shed And so much the bodies of beasts offered did prefigure I meane the death of the bodie but not of the soule Willing obedience constant patience and assured confidence in the soule of Christ submitting it selfe to the counsell and will of his Father was the spirituall and inward sacrifice which Christ ioyned with the externall and bloudie sacrifice of his bodie For hauing two parts as all men haâ—…e a soule and a bodie neither part might be withdrawen from this sacrifice but his bodie must be yeelded vnto death and his soule must yeeld her selfe pure vndefiled and void of all spot yet feeling and enduring withall meekenesse and humblenesse of heart the paine of death separating her from her bodie And graunt the soule were heere taken for life what so great improper or vnused speach is that since the soule is truely and properly the life of the body b Defenc. pag. 143. li. 16. We denie not but this phrase Animam ponere is to lay downe the life and in diuers placâ—…s signifieth no more then simply to die both concerning Christ and other men yet this is no necessarie reason that heere in I say the soule should be taken figuratiuely for the life onely the rather seeing heere the text precisely setteth downe the great worke of our redemption and to take it as we doe literally impugneth no ground at all of faith or charitie The words to lay downe or power forth the soule import as you confesse not the death of the soule but the death of the bodie And since in the words of Esai Christ powred forth his soule vnto death there can by no learning bee more concluded out of that place but that Christ willingly layd downe his soule to depart from that bodie which is no way the death of the soule as you fansie but a plaine description of the death of Christs body And where for your pleasure you will take it litterally that is no proofe for the death of Christs soule because the word soule may bee properly taken when it is powred forth of the bodie by death but it noteth a willing submission to death where otherwise our soules are taken from vs or we loose them whether we will or no when we are left or put to death against our wils c Defenc. pag. 143. li. 27. Austen hath not a word against vs in that great place which you cite his whole argument being to an other purpose Austins wordes in that place be pregnant against you for all your dissembling d August in Iohannem tractat 47. Quid fecit passio quid fecit mors nisi corpus ab anima separauit What did Christs passion what did death but separate his bodie from his soule If the death and passion of Christ did nothing but separate Christs soule from his body then neither Christs death nor passion preuailed to the death of his soule And if his soule were not touched by death then was it neuer dead and so much Saint Austen witnesseth in the very same tractate e Ibidem Verbum non
man of any learning or vnderstanding thus in print and open view of the whole Realme to rage revell rush on with lying craking and facing when he speaketh not one true word for first Sir flincher is this the point heere or any where proposed by me whether Christs sufferings were only bodily did I promise or produce any Fathers to that end is it not the death of the soule and the paines of the damned which I impugned in Christs sufferings haue I not most truely performed which I euer professed that the whole Church of Christ for so many hundred yeeres neuer thought neuer heard of the death of Christs soule in the worke of our redemption but rested their faith on the death of Christs body as a most sufficient price both for the soules and bodies of the faithfull What cunning then is this first to shift your hands of that you can no way prooue though you still doe and must professe it and then to clamour at me for drawing the Fathers cleane from their intent and meaning is this the way to credit your new Creed by such deuices and stratagemes to intertaine the people of God least they should see how farre you be slid from the ancient primatiue Church of Christ take a while but the thought of a sober man and this pangue will soone be ouerpast Did you not vndertake to prooue the death of Christs soule by Scriptures which indeed I first and most required and haue you so donne looke backe to your miserable mistakings and palpable peruertings of the words of the holy Ghost and tell vs what one syllable you haue brought sounding that way are your secrets such that they be no where reuealed in the word of God must all faith come from thence and is your faith exempted that it shall haue no foundation there are men and Angels accursed that preach any other Gospell then was deliuered and written by Christs Apostles and shall you be excused for deuising a new kind of redemption by the death of Christs soule no where witnessed in the Scriptures you see how easie it were to be eloquent against you in a iust and true cause but words must not winne the field What I impugned my sermons will shew what I haue prooued I will not proclaime If I haue failed in that I endeuoured the labour is mine the liberty is the Readers to iudge Let the indifferent read it they shall find somewhat to direct them let the contentious skanne it they shall see somewhat to harle their hast and perhaps to restraine their stifnesse What euer it be I leaue it to others since the discourser hasteth towards an end and so doe I. s Defenc. pag. 146. li. 2 This is the profit that comes by ordinarie flaunting with Fathers which many do frequent in these dayes Thinke they if the Scriptures alone suffice not for things in religion that the Fathers will suffice or if the Scriptures may be wrested by subtle heads that yet the Fathers can not Is it not enough for your selfe to be a despiser of all antiquitie and sobrietie but you must insult at them that beare more regard to either than you do If to flaunt with Fathers be so great a fault which yet respecteth their iudgements that haue beene liked and allowed from age to age in the Church of Christ what is it to fliske with pride and follie grounded on nothing but on selfe-loue and singularitie It were to be wished that euen some of the best writers of our age as they thinke themselues had had more respect to the auncient Fathers then they shew we should haue wanted a number of nouelties in the Church of God which now wee are troubled withall as well in Doctrine as in discipline This course of concurring with the lights of Gods Church before our time in matters of faith though you mislike other manner of men then you are or euer will be haue allowed and followed as u August contra Iâ—…num li. 1. Augustine x Theodor. diol 2. 3. Theodorete y Leo epist. 97. 〈◊〉 Leonem Leo z Cassi. de incarnat Domini li. 7 ca. 5. Cassianus a Gelas. de duabus in Christo natâ—…ris Gelasius b Vigilius li. 5. cap. 6. Vigilius and the two c Hispalensi concilium 2. ca. 13. councels of Hispalis and others not doubting the sufficiencie of the Scriptures but shewing the correspondencie of beleeuing and interpreting the Scriptures in all ages to haue bene the same which they imbraced and vrged And in all euennesse of reason were it better to feede the people with our priuate conceits pretended out of Scripture or to let such as be of iudgement vnderstand that we frame no faith but such as in the best times hath bene collected and receiued from the grounds of holy Scripture by the wisest and greatest men in the Church of God your only example turning and winding the words of the holy Ghost to your owne conceits will shew how needfull it is not to permit euery prater to raigne ouer the Scriptures with figures and phrases at his pleasure and thence to fetch what faith he list If you so much reuerence the Scriptures as you report which were to be wished you would why deuise you doctrine not expressed in the Scriptures Why teach you that touching mans redemption which is no where written in the word of God Indeed the Scriptures are plaine in this point of all others what death Christ died for vs if you did not peruert them against the histories of the Euangelists and testimonies of the Apostles Omit the description of his death so farely witnessed by the foure Euangelists what exacter words can we haue then the Apostles that Christ d Coloss. 1. pacisied things in earth and things in heauen by the bloud of his crosse and reconciled vs which were strangers and enemies in the bodie of his flesh through death Beleeue what you reade and what you reade not in the word of God beleeue not and this matter is ended but by Synecdoches without cause you put to the Scriptures not what you read in them but what you like best and by Metaphores and Metonimies you will take bodie for substance and flesh for soule And so where the Apostle auoucheth that we were reconciled to God through death in the bodie of Christs flesh you tell vs we could not be redeemed without the death of Christs soule and the essence of the paines of the damned suffered by suddaine touches from the immediate hand of God after an extraordinarie manner If you teach no doctrine but deliuered in the Scriptures aband on these deuices not expressed in the Scriptures If you content your selfe with the all sufficient word of God in matters of faith you must relinquish the death of Christs soule and paines of the damned as no part of our redemption since there is no such thing contained in the word of God To me and
prepared which were requisite to offer the sacrifice for our sinnes behold the Priest with his sacrifice Christ with his body the body I say of him that was God who through voluntary obedience to his Father and most ardent loue to vs offered himselfe to God for a most sweet smell And where did he offer himselfe on the altar of the Crosse he suffered and died and that on the crosse k Ibidem Patitur in anima summam tristitiam timorem ignominiam in corpore summos dolores in singulis membris atrocissima flagella l Ibidem In ligno moritur vt mors per lignum ingressa in mundum per lignum tolleretur è mundo He suffered in soule most exceeding heauinesse feare and shame In his bodie most bitter paines in euerie member most grieuous scourges On the tree he died that as death came into the world by a tree so it might be taken out of the world by a tree m Idem in ca. 1. ad Ephes. v. 7. To that point how we are redeemed the Apostle saith by his bloud that is by 〈◊〉 sacrifice which consisted of the offering of his body deliuered to death and his bloud shed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fuit proprius modus this was the proper manner or onely way how we must be redeemed from the captiuitie of sinne and death This n Ibidem sacrifice which is often signified by the name of Christeâ—… bloud alone is that price of which the Prophets before and after the Apostles say we were redeemed by it For o Ibidem we are redeemed and haue remission of sinnes in Christ by his onely bloud p Idem de tribus 〈◊〉 1. cap. 5. test 9. This is euen he who by the onely sacrifice of his bodie should effectually clense the sinnes of the world And so againe The Apostle q Idem in ca. 1. ep ad Coloss. vers 22. expresseth the materiall cause of our reconciliation or the thing wherewith the Father reconciled vs to himselfe to 〈◊〉 by the oblation of the true and humane body of Christ deliuered to death for our sinnes This he meaneth when he saith in the body of his flesh through death For this body which was truely flesh and an humane body not simply but as it died is the matter of our reconciliation by that was reconciliation made He r Ibidem ioineth the body with bloud because both are the price of our reconciliation and by both were our sinnes clensed The Apostle then s Ibidem signifieth reconciliation was by the oblation of the body of Christ as by the true sacrifice sor sinne Zanchius speaketh not precisely you will say against the death of Christes soule In plainely and fully deliuering the matter and meane of our redemption to be the ONELY SACRIFICE of the body and bloud of Christ offered on the crosse to death he excludeth all other ransomes for our sins so maketh the death of Christs soule not onely to be superfluous to mans saluation but no meane of our redemption For in his iudgement t Zanchius de tribus Elohim part 1. li. 5. ca. 1 〈◊〉 10. Christ is the propitiatorie sacrifice for sinne not simply but as he died for vs with the shedding of his bloud and u Ibidem this ONELY SACRIFICE the shedding of Christes bloud vnto death God chose from euerlasting for the expiation of our sinnes and promised the same from the creation of the world and shadowed it with resemblances And touching the death of the soule if you teach as Zanchius doth you will presently finde it is open blasphemie to ascribe to Christ any death of the soule x Zanchâ—… tractat theologicâ—… de peccato originali ca. 4. thes 3 A triple death saith he God threatned to Adam for disobedience a spirituall death which was the separation of grace of the holy Ghost and of originall righteousnesse from the soule and body of Adam of which death in the Scriptures there is often mention made This death Adam died as soone as he did eate The second was a corporall death whereby the soule is seuered from the bodie To this Adam was presently vpon his eating made subiect though he did not straightwayes actually die The third is euerlasting death which is knowen to all of this death Adam was forthwith made guiltie This triple death was the punishment of his disobedience And vpon like occasion comparing the death of the soule and of the bodie he saith y Ibidem in ca. 2. epist. ad ephes vers 5. There is a triple death spirituall of the spirit or soule corporall knowen to all men and the third is that eternall death pertaining to bodie and soule wherewith all the wicked shall be punished in hell These all God threatned to Adam when he said what hower soeuer thou shalt eate c. thou shalt die the death For he straightway died in spirit or soule he incurred also the death of the bodie because he became mortall and was made guiltie of eternall death z Ibid. We haue rightly said death to bee the priuation of life and so of all the actions of life consisting in the separation of bodie and soule The like we must say of the spirituall life and death The spirituall life is a certaine spirituall and diuine force whereby we are mooued to spirituall and diuine actions by the presence of the holy Ghost dwelling in vs. The holy Ghost regenerating vs in this spirituall life is as it were the soule thereof And holy and spirituall thoughts holy desires holy actions both inward and outward are the operations of this spirituall life What then is the death of the spirit euen the priuation of the spirituall life and consequently of all spirituall and good actions in a man destitute of the presence of the holy Ghost which should quicken him comming from sinne and for sinne a Ibidem What strength hath a man dead in bodie to the actions of this life so neither can he that is dead in spirit or soule do any workes of the spirituall life Heere is a full and true description of the death of the spirit or soule of man which if you and your friends dare attribute to Christ then doth Zanchius fauour the death of Christs soule but if euery peece hereof applied to Christ be euident heresie and infidelitie then did Zanchius no way defend the death of Christes soule to be any part of our redemption and as for the second death he acknowledgeth none but that which is eternall and inflicted in hell on all the wicked Much more might be brought to like effect shewing the true and onely meane and matter of our redemption and reconciliation to be the only body and bloud of Christ yeelded vnto death for the ransome of our sinnes but I should make a new volume if I should stand thereon It may suffice in the iudgement of any reasonable man to refute the slaunderous
after openly proclaime That Dauid was not ascended into heauen If it be so firme a promise as you pretend then Dauid as well as the rest must locally accompanie Christ whithersoeuer he went and consequently ascend to heauen with him which Peter vtterly denieth And all the Fathers of Christs church had little vnderstanding of Christs words when they generally denied that the soules of the Saints are yet in the same place of glory where Christ is If you beleeâ—…e not my report of them peruse their owne words following Irenaeus It is manifest that the soules of Christs Disciples shall goe to an inuisible place appointed them of God and there shall remaine vntill the resurrection and after receauing their bodies and rising perfectly that is corporally as Christ did rise shall so come to the sight or vision of God Iustine the martyr The soules of the righteous are caried to Paradise where they inioy the company and sight of Angels and Archangels and the vision of Christ our Sauiour and are kept in places fitte for them till the day of resurrection and recompensation Tertullian It is apparent to any wise man that there is a place determined which is Abrahams bosome for the receauing of the soules of his sonnes That region I meane Abrahams bosome though not heauenly sublimiorem tamen inferis yet higher then the places below shall giue comfort to the soules of the righteous vntill the end of things with the fulnesse of reward bring the resurrection of all men Heauen is open to no man so long as the earth remaineth together with the passing away of the world shall the kingdom of heauen be opened Origen The Saints departing hence do not presently obtaine the full rewards of their labours but they expect vs though staying though slacking For they haue not perfect ioy so long as they grieue at our errors and lament our sins For these saith Paul haue not yet receaued the promise God prouiding for vs a better thing that they without vs should not be perfect Hilarie The day of iudgement is the repay of euerlasting happinesse or punishment But the time of death till then hath euery one vnder his lawes whiles either Abraham or torment reserue ech man vnto iudgement Ambrose Till the fulnesse of time come the soules departed expect their due reward for some paine for some glory is prouided Chrysostom Though the soule were a thousand times immortall as she is those admirable good things she shall not enioy without her flesh If the body rise not againe the soule remaineth vncrowned and without that heauenly blisse Augustine After this short life thou shalt not as yet be where the Saints shal be to whom it shal be said Come ye blessed of my Father receaue the Kingdome prepared for you from the beginning of the world thâ—… shalt not as yet be there who knoweth it not but thou maiest be there where the poore Lazar was seene afarre of by the proud rich man In that rest shalt thou securely expect the day of iudgement when thou shalt receaue thy body and be changed to be equall to an Angel Theodoret The Saints haue not yet receaued their crownes For the God of all expecteth the conflicts of others that the race being ended he may together pronounce all that overcame to be conquerers and so reward them Oecumenius All the fore said Saints haue not yet receaued the good things promised to the iust God prouiding better for vs. Least they should haue more then we in that they were crowned before vs he hath therefore appointed one certaine time that we should be crowned with them Andreas Caesariensis It is the iudgement of many godly fathers that euery good man after this life hath a place â—…itte for him by which he may coniecture the glory prepared for him Theophylact. The Saints as yet haue attained nothing of the heauenly promises God hath appointed one time to crowne all Bernard you perceaue there are three states of the soule the first in this corruptible body the second without the body the third in perfect blessednesse The first in the Tabernacles the second in the Courts the third in the house of God Into that most happy house of God the soules of the Saints shall not enter without vs nor without their bodies Neither doe I find any Scriptures that allow the Saints deceased the same place of glory where Christ now is at the right hand of God in the highest heauens till the last day come What Abrahams bosome is whither Lazarus soule was caried by the Angels or where it is I dare not define Only the Scripture faith it was a place of comfort after death and vpvvards farre of from Hell a great gulfe being set betweene that and hell Of Paradise where Christ promised the penitent Thiefe should be with him the very day that he died I read what Paul writeth how he was taken vp into the third heauen and into Paradise Whence we may rightly collect that Paradise is in the third heauen Now what number of heauens the Scripture deliuereth is not so certaine as some men suppose We find the whole region of the aire to be called Heauen as where Christ nameth the byrds of heauen and the clouds of heauen Againe that place of the firmament where the Sunne the Moone and the starres are is called heauen Let there be lights said God in the firmament of heauen to separate the day from the night And I will multiply thy seed as the starres of heauen The third heauen if I be not deceaued the Scripture maketh to be the originall and proper habitation of Angels where they were first placed and whence they fell that are now called Diuels The Angels which kept not their originall saith Iude but left 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 THEIR PROPER HABITATION hath Godreserued in euer lasting chaines vnder darkenesse vnto the iudgement of the great day In this celestiall Paradise which at first was the proper mansion of Angels as the Scripture obserueth there was not only place for sinne and danger of falling as we find by experience of the reprobate angels but after this was left an higher degree of perfection and a greater increase of glory as we perceaue in the elect Angels who were confirmed in goodnesse and aduanced to the presence of Gods throne there to behold the face of God in the proper place of his sanctity and maiesty Of this third heauen the booke of Iob saith God found no stedfastnesse in his Saints yea the heauens are not cleane in his sight since there he found sinne in those transgressing Angels which left their proper habitation and pressed with pride and disobedience to the throne of God This fault and fall the Prophet resembleth when he saith How art thou fallen from heauen ô Lucifer Thou saidst in thine heart I will
not that his soule should be subiect to any infernall power but that subduing the gates of hell he might deliuer our souls from that tyrannie Of the article of Christs descent to hel I am not ignorant how diuersly learned men doe thinke It is somewhat obscure indeed and subiect to many disputations but yet no godly man vpon that occasion will resist or offer force to the Apostles words thou wilt not leaue my soule in hell but will desire of God the vnderstanding therof and in the meane time with a single faith cleaue to the word of trueth although he can not cleerely perceaue the maner how that was performed Of this Article see Austâ—…n Epistle 99. Vrbanus Regius The Church deliuereth vs out of the Scriptures that Christ after he was dead on the crosse descended also to hell to suppresse Satan and hell to the which we were condemned by the iust iudgement of God and to spoile and destroy the kingdome of death Zacharias Scilterus The descent of Christ to hell whereof mention is made in the Apostles Creede after the death and buriall of Christ is to be vnderstood simply according to the letter and without allegorie of the ostension and declaration of Christes victorie no lesse glorious then terrible as Luther writeth to Philip Melancthon indeed made to the diuels in hell or in the place of the damned and of Christes expugning disarming spoyling and captiuating the power of Satan and of his destroying hell and euerting the whole kingdome of Satan and of his deliuering vs from the power of death and eternall damnation and out of the iawes of hell Dauid Chytreus The Article of the Creede let vs retaine simply as the words sound and let vs resolue that the Sonne of God truely descended to hell to deliuer vs from hell to which we were condemned for sinne in Adam and from the power and tyrannie of the diuell by which we were held captiue Of which effect and fruit of Christs descent the Fathers speake as Ierom Christ descended to hell that we might ascend to heauen And Fulgentius The man which God assumed descended thither whither man separated from God by defert of sinne fell that is to hell where the soule of a sinner vsed to be tormented And Augustine Dying for thee I descended to hell to bring thee to Paradise Tartara adij vt tu in caelo regnares I went to the place of the damned that thou mightest raigne in heauen Georgius Mylius in his explication of the Augustane confession The true and proper sense of this Article is that no metaphoricall but a reall descent of Christ to hell must be vnderstood whereby he descended to the lower parts of the earth Eph. 4. vers 9. Et ipsas Damnatorum sedes adijt and went to the very place of the damned The second point is that this Article is no part of his passion and humiliation but of his victorie and triumph I omit infinite others not onely priuate writers but Vniuersities Cities and Countries that haue publikely approoued the same doctrine admitting and allowing the Augustane confession exhibited by the States of Germanie to Charles the Emperour which thus they declare in their booke of Concord With one consent we aduise this matter not to be disputed but this Article of Christs descent to hell to be most simply beleeued and taught It ought to suffice vs if we know that Christ descended into hell destroied hell to all beleeuers and by him or his descent thither we were taken out of the power of death and Satan from euerlasting damnation and euen out of the iawes of hell The maner how this was done let vs not curiously search but referre the exact knowledge heereof to an other worlde where not onely this mysterie but many others simply beleeued of vs in this life shall be reuealed which passe the reach of our blinde reason And where some would so moderate this Article as if it ment no more but that the force and effect of Christes death was manifested as well to the damned to exclude them from all hope as to the faithfull to encrease their comfort Luther sharpely but truely thus refuteth that fansie Thou wilt not leaue my soule in hell The sense heereof is most plaine so plentifully and diligently deliuered by the Apostles But euen here haue men presuming all things of their wittes begun to dispute whether Christ were in hell as touching his soule and the substance thereof and what this meaneth that he was in hell And a great number haue dared to contradict the spirit of God that Christs soule was not in hell but by effect being for sooth handsome glozers of the word of God Thou wilt not leaue my soule that is the effect of my soule in hell Christ descended to hell that is he effected somewhat in hell but despising these friuolous and impious trifles let vs simply vnderstand the wordes of the Prophet as they are simply spoken and if we can not vnderstand them let vs faithfully beleeue them Greater is the authoritie of this Scripture then the capacitie of all mens wittes as Augustine saith For the soule of Christ according to her substance truely descended to hell To like purpose might exceeding many new writers be brought all confessing the descent of Christes soule to the very place of the damned and of the diuels that the trueth force and glory of his humane soule might appeere as well to the reprobate angels and spirits vnder earth as to the elect aboue the earth God making the humane nature of his Sonne this recompence that as he was despised and reproched by Satan in his instruments so he should be adored and feared euen of all the powers of darckenesse and wholy despose of them and their kingdome but these may suffice the sober Reader to let him see that I deliuer none other sense of that Article then hath beene formerly receaued in the church of Christ with full consent and to this day is continued in the same by many great and graue Diuines whose iudgements I need not be ashamed to follow though I confesse I depend not on their wordes farder then they conforme their writings to the word of God which in this case I take to be plaine enough howsoeuer some quarrell be made to the diuers significations of Sheol and Hades which is as easily done in other Articles of the Creed as in this if it were the part of a Christian to wrangle with euerie worde that hath sundry senses or vses in the holy Scriptures To my purpose other Scriptures doe make very much as where Christ saith Father into thine hands I commend my soule and to the thiefe that hung by him This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise You bring Scriptures rather for shew then substance since they inferre no such thing as you would enforce on them The soules of the Saints liuing and dead are in the hands of
the perfection of their celestiall glory Otherwise against you and all that out of this place surmise that iust mens soules shall not be deliuered out of Sheol till the resurrection the sense and words of Dauid in this are pregnant enough For Dauid putting a difference in thâ—…se two verses betwixt himselfe and the wicked and that with an aduersatiue coniunction since the soules of the wicked are in Sheol presently vpon their deaths if Dauids must be there also what distinction doe his wordes make betweene himselfe and those others of whom he spake before Againe he saith God will deliuer his soule from Sheol ki cúm or quia when he shall receiue me or because he will receiue me Take which you will it is plaine by the Scriptures and by these very words of Dauid that so soonâ—… as God receiueth the soule of man it is deliuered from Sheol But hee receiueth the soules of his Saints instantly vpon their deaths they are therefore presently deliuered out of Sheol and stay not there by any force of Dauids wordes vntill the resurrection Lord Iesus sayd Steuen euen as he was stoned receiue my spirit The begger died saith the Gospell and was caried by the Angels into Abrahams bosome This day shalt thou be with mee in Paradise said Christ to the theefe He that beleeueth in him that sent me saith Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is already passed from death to life If the faithfull passe so soone to life they bee as soone deliuered from Sheol by Dauids owne confession against which I will heare neither you nor any man liuing Againe that Psalme sheweth it also where it is thus written My soule is filled with sorrowes and my liâ—…e draweth neere to Sheol by his life he meaneth his soule the proper cause and fountaine of life in him which also in â—…e first part of the sentence hee nameth By these rouing and licentious glozes builded on the sands of your owne saying you thinke you may prooue what you will and all shall be expresse Scripture if you say the word Life you will haue to be soule drawing neere to be abiding in The graue to be the generall condition of soules deceased and to warrant all this your selfe is the soothsayer By his life he meaneth his soule which also in the first part of the sentence hee nameth as the manner of phrase in the Psalme is in the second part to speake of the same things that are in the former Many verses in the Psalmes doe illustrate the selfe same generall with diuers parts adiuncts and consequents but that the words be of all one force or signification in euery such verse this is an other of your new found methodes which is nothing else but a meere confusion of all things For will you see with your manner of phrase as you finâ—…ly furbish it what consequents hang on these kind of collections This life of which Dauid speaketh continueth not in Sheol because it is vtterly exstinguished by Sheol ergo the soule likewise is mortall and wholy perisheth in Sheol for so doth the life mentioned by Dauid which you say is all one with the soule Againe if both these parts import one sense then the iust in Sheol are filled with sorrowes for so are the former wordes of Dauid And if that be true how much hath the spirit of God deceiued vs who bad S. Iohn write blessed are the dead which hereafter die in the Lord euen so saith the spirit for they rest from their labours But that was the spirit of trueth and therefore the spirit of error in you sucketh these absurdities out of the Psalmes by your misconstruction of them Indeede I denie not but life may signifie heere the whole person of man and so may nephesh the soule also very well and then Sheol and Hades signifie not peculiarly and distinctly the graue which is only for the car casse but the condition of the whole man after he hath no being in this world And per aduenture so it is vnderstood heere in thâ—…se places in which sense Sheol and Hades are farre from signifying hell yea or heauen either yea or onely and meerely the graue but it signisieth destruction out of this world and not being heere any more as aforetime to the whole person that is both to the bodie and to the soule The idle deuices of this wild-gooseracer who would spend either time or paines to tracke when he reeleth to and fro like a man pot-shotten with it may be and per aduenture it is so and closeth vp all in the end with a dangerous destruction which he maketh to be iust nothing Boyes meanely Catechised can soone conceiue that death or the graue bringeth with it an end of all earthly things from which the wicked are loth to depart as hauing no farder nor better hope after this life and therefore to them death is a destruction indeed that is a ceasing of all their pleasures and an encreasing of all their paines To the godly who put not their hearts to the things of this world but desire to bee dissolued and to bee with Christ and in comparison of his presence account all earthly things to be base and burdenous death is a gaine and no destruction because they renounced the loue of all these worldly thinges before hand and sought for the permanent citie whose founder is God Wherefore to them this bodie is a burden this life is a warefare and this world is a desert full of snares and pits Wherein they wander as pilgrimes and strangers If then to lay aside these troubles and trifles and to be freed from all labours and dangers and to come home to the countrcy and citie which God hath prouided for the faithfull be in any wise mans sense a destruction then haue you some reason to call the generall condition of death as well to the iust as to the wicked a destruction but if that thought and speech be void of all religion and reason then doe you houer in the midst betweene heauen and hell and huddle saluation and damnation in one generall condition or state as you call it and when you sce what inconuenience will follow thereof you make it nothing but a meere priuation or an end of things past And this you would applie as well to the person of Christ whose soule you say was in no Sheol but this as to al his members whose soules shall not be freed from this destruction and Sheol till the day of resurrection Did you speake of the nature of death in it selfe or as it taketh hold on the wicked I would allow the word destruction which if it be well vnderstood is more then a mâ—…re priuation but when you presume to peruert the Scriptures with peraduentures and to sow to them what sense you list as may best fit your monstrous fancies lâ—…t no man be offended if I often thinke it fit to reiect your
to the enemie The diuell therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thinking to kill one lost all and hoping to carie one to Hades hell was himselfe cast out of hades hell 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hades hell is abrogated death no more preuailing but all being raised to life neither can the diuell stand vp any more against vs but is fallen and indeed creepeth on his brest and bellie And therefore of the Saints he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in fine they saw Hades hell spoiled Epiphanius in sundrie places expresseth the parts and purpose of Christs descending to hell or hades He was crucified buried 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hee descended to the places vnder earth in his diuinitie and in his soule he tooke captiuitie captiue and rose againe the third day What here he calleth places vnder the earth whither Christes soule went after his death that elswhere he calleth Hades The Godhead of Christ would performe all things that perteined to the mysterie of his passion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and would descend together with his soule to the infernall places to worke the saluation there of such as were before dead I meane the holy Patriarcks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that he might performe the things he would against hades in the forme of a man euen in hades that the chiefe Ruler HADES and death thinking to lay hands on a man and not knowing his Deitie vnited to his sacred soule Hades himselfe might rather be surprised and death dissolued and that fulfilled which was spoken Thou wilt not leaue my soule in Hades Basil Death is not altogether euill except you speake of the death of a sinner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because their departure hence is the beginning of their punishments in hades againe the euâ—…s that are in hades haue not God for their cause but our selues the head and root of sinne is in vs and in our willes And againe Dathan and Abiram were swallowed vp of earth the gulfes and clefts thereof opening vnder them Heere were not they the better for this kinde of punishment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for how should they be so that went to hades to hell but they made the rest the wiser by their example And writing on the 48 Psalme Because man turned himselfe from the word of God and became a beast the enemie caught him as a sheepe without a shepheard 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and put him in hades hell but when he sayth God will redeeme my soule from the power of hades he doth plainly prophesie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the descent of the Lord to hades who would redeeme the Prophets soule with others not to abide there Nazianzene in his second Oration against Iulian the Renâ—…gate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Stop thou thy secrets and wayes that leade to hell hades I will declare the plaine wayes which leade to heauen And of Christ he sayth Christ died but he restored to life and with his death abolished death He was buried but he rose againe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He descended to hell hades but he brought backe soules and ascended to heauen Macarius When thou hearest that Christ deliuered soules 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of hell hades and darkeneâ—…se and that the Lord descended to hades and did an admirable worke thinke not these thinâ—… to be farre from thine owne soule And thus he maketh Christ to speake to death and to the diuell 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. I command thee hades and darkenesse and death restore the soules inclosed And so the wickâ—… powers trembling refund man that was inclosed Cyrill of Alexandria In olde times before Christ the soules of men departing from their bodies were sent to fill the receptacles of death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in dennes vnder the earth But after Christ commended his oâ—…ne soule to his Father he renewed the same way for vs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And now we goe not to bades from any place but we follow him rather in this and committing our soules to a faithfull Creatour we rest in excellent hope Yet of Christ he aâ—…firmeth The soule which was coupled and vnited to the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 descended into hades and vsing the power and force of the Godhead 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shewed it selâ—…e to the spirits or soules there For we must not say that the Godhead of the onely begotten which is a nature vncapable of death and no waâ—… conquerable by it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was brought backe from the dâ—…es vnder the earth Cyrill of Ierusalem like wise in his Catechismes vpon those words of the Psalme If ascend to heauen thou art there if I goe downe to hades tâ—…u art preâ—…ent sayth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. If tâ—…ere â—…e â—…ing higher than the heauens and hades be lower than the earth he that compreâ—…â—…eth the â—…owest doth also touch the earth And to those that were baptized he sayth When thou renouncest Satan thou hast vtterly abrogated the couenant had with him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. euen the olde couenant â—…ith hades hell and the Paradise of God is opened to thee In the Homilies which Leo the Emperour made for the exercise of his stâ—…le and confession of his faith it is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christ is risen bringing Hades prisoner with him and proclaiming lilibertie to the capitues He that held others bound is now in bonds himselfe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christ is come from hades with the ensigne of his triumph the sowre and heauie lookes of those that are vtterly ouerthrowen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as of Hades death and the hatefull diuels Damascene 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The soule deisied descended to Hades that as to those on earth the Sonne of righteousnesse was risen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so to those that sate vnder the earth in darkenesse and in the shadow light might shine The brazen gates were torne the iron barres were broken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the keeper of Hades hell did shake for feare and the foundations of the world were laid open Cydonius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That there is in hades hell vengeance for all sinnes heere committed not onely the consent of all wise men but also the equalitie of the Diuine iustice confirmeth and strengthmeth this opinion Aeneas Gazeus He that in a priuate life committeth small sinnes and lamenteth them escapeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the punishments that are in Hades hell Gregentius Christ tooke a rodde out of the earth which was his pretious crosse stretching his right hand strake all his enemies conquered them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is Hades death sin and that wilâ—…e serpent Theophylact. The rich man dying is not caried by the angels 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but
to fast then to marrie Now for these very points that none are in Paradise but only martvrs and that the soules euen of the Patriarks and Prophets and all other godlie Christians are apud inferos in places vnder the earth and so shal be till the fulnesse of the resurrection Tertullian vrgeth in his booke De anima and in this chapter the authority of his paraclet which was the founder of Montanus new prophesies Agnosce differentiam Ethnici fidelis in morte si pro Deo occumbas vt pâ—…racletus moâ—…et non in mollibus febribus in lectulis sed in an Acknowledge the difference of an Ethnicke and a beleeuer euen in their deaths if thou die for Gods cause as the Paraclet warneth not in casie agues and soft beddes but in Martyrdomes And that these were the very words of Montanus new prophesie may easily be perceaued by Tertullian himselfe who writing against all flight in persecution which booke was specially written against the Church by Ieroms owne confession citeth them as the words of the spirit to witte in the new prophesies of Montanus Spiritum si consulas c omnes pene ad martyriuns exhortatur non ad fugam vt illius commemâ—…ur publicaris inquit â—…onum libi est Qui enim non publicatur in hominibus publicatur in Domino Sic aâ—…bi Nolite in lectulis febribus mâ—…llibus optare exire sed in Martyrijs If thou take counsell of the spirit he exhorteth all very neere to Martyrdome not to flight as to remember you of that speach Art thou made a publike example saith he it is good for thee He that is not made a publike â—…xample amgoÌ„st men shal be made one with God And so in another place desire not to depart this life in beds easie agues but in Martyrdomes These words Tertullian alleageth as euidently written by the spirit which since they be no where found in any part of the new or old Testament disagree both in words matter from the stile truth of the sacred Scriptures they sauour of another spirit must of force be referred to the prophesies of Montanus who in this very point was condemned by the church of Christ against which as Ierom auoucheth Tertuilian wrote this book in fauor of Montanus heresie And so much also that learned obseruer Rhenanus affirmeth vpon this place Verba sunt Prophetiae Paracleti Montanici These are the words of the prophesie of Montanus spirit Your friends therefore who lent you their paines were not well aduised in excusing Tertullian in this matter from Montanisme since not onely the error of Montanus is heere defended but the verie words of his new reuelation are heere alleadged Also in that obiection of certaine Heretickes whom he confuteth not the true Christians as you misconceaue They argued thus as you doe In hoc Christus inferos adijt ne nos adiremus Christ therefore went to hell to the end we should neuer come there He answereth them that it is false that Christ went to inferos in that sense that is to hell For then what difference is there between the wicked heathen and the godly Christians if one and the same prison after death were for them both taking it for a thing generally graunted in the Church that it were a WICKED AND HERETICALL THING to thinke he went where the damned were that is into hell Ignorance maketh you not onely blind and bold but presumptuous and sawcie to acquite from heresie and condemne for heresie whom pleaseth you And therefore I must not thinke it strange to be chalenged by you for a wicked and hereticall opinion since you grosly belie the whole Church of Christ and dippe them in the same vate of wicked and heretical things with me You wilfully wrest and misconstrue Tertullians words smoothing him in a manifest error against the whole Church of Christ and roling them vp with wicked heresie that were the greatest lights of Christian religion next after the Apostles Tertullians resolutions in this very Chapter are plaine enough to him that is not more then blind Habes de Paradiso anobie libellum quo constituimus omnem animam apud inferos sequestrari in diem Domini Thou hast a book of ours written touching Paradise wherein we determine all soules to be kept sequestred apud inferos in infernall places till the day of the Lord. And in the sentence next before that which you cite he sayth with like confidence Habes regionem inferûm subterraneam credere illos cubito pellere qui satis superbè non putent animas fideliuÌ„ inferis dignas serui super DominuÌ„ Discipuli super MagistruÌ„ aspernati si forte in Abrahae sinu expectandae resurrectionis solatium carpere Thou hast to beleeue that the region of inferi is vnder the earth and to push them from their opinions who proudly enough will not thinke the soules of the faithfull to be fitte for infernall or Iower places seruants aboue their Lord and Scholers aboue their Masters in that they skorne perhaps to haue the comfort of expecting the resurrection in Abrahams bosome Heere Tertullian positiuely declareth that he taketh inferi for a place or Region vnder the earth and that such as thought not the soules of the faithfull fitte for that place till the resurrection did proudly presume to be aboue their Lord and Master and skorne Abrahams bosome where the rest of the Patriarks Prophets are kept as he dreameth and so shal be till the day of iudgement Now whose opinion I pray you was this that the soules of the faithfull after Christs resurrection went to Paradise and not to places vnder the earth was it not the maine confession of Christs Church Tertullian then purposely refuting that opinion what els doth he but traduce the generall persuasion of the faithfull in fauour of his new prophesie which reserued Paradise onely for Martyrs and in that respect abandoned all the soules of the godly dying in their beds to places vnder the earth there to be kept till Christes comming But examine the words which he reiecteth and see if they sauour of heresie or Christianity For thereby we shall best iudge whether they were Hereticks or Christians whom he there impugned His words are Sed in hoc inquiunt Christus inseros 〈◊〉 ne nos adiremus But to this â—…rd say they Christ went to inferi the places bâ—…low that we should not come thither If these wordes imply heresie then was Saint Austen a manifest hereticke for he affirmed as much in effect as this commeth vnto Ideo Christus peruenit vsâ—… ad infernum ne nos maneremus in inferno Therefore Christ came euen vnto hell that we should not remaine in hell Men that come thither abide there If therefore Christ freed vs by his descent thither from remaining there he freed vs from comming thither And Ambrose was likewise an
to heauen as Dauid likewise foretold of him and there sitteth at the right hand of God vntill all his enemies in the rest of his members be made his footstoole and thence hath he shed forth this which you now see and heare euen the promise of the holy Ghost receaued of the Father for all his Know ye therefore for a suertie that God hath made him both Lord ouer all in heauen earth and hell and Christ euen the annointed Sauiour of all his elect Against this illation neither all the miscreants in earth nor all the Diuels in hell can open their mouths Where first we may see that Peter resteth more on the manner and power of Christs resurrection then simply on this that his soule was reunited to his body from which by death it was seuered Secondly he bringeth the words of Dauid to shew that either part of the Messias submitted to death for the time was to returne againe to life with greater glory the flesh free from all corruption the soule superiour to all destruction Thirdly that these things neither were nor could be verified in Dauid since Dauid saw corruption as his sepulchre prooued remaining to that day and Dauid was not as then ascended to heauen much lesse made Lord ouer all his enemies Heere is no such prerogatiue mentioned If this were common to Christ with Dauid and others of the faithfull how could Peter hence conclude that this was not spoken of Dauid but onely of the Messias Againe if this were no prerogatiue what need was there that Dauid should be a Prophet by speciall reuelation to know this much and that which Dauid knew was not onely this that Christ should rise to life againe but the words are that God would raise vp Christ after death to set him on his throne that is to giue him an euerlasting kingdome euen all power in heauen and earth subiecting all his enemies vnder his feet So that simply to rise from death was no prerogatiue nor proper to Christ but to rise Lord ouer all death and hell not excepted this was peculiar to Christ and not common to him with Dauid and therefore must needes be a speciall priuiledge to the manhood of Christ which is expressed chiefly in these words Thou wilt not forsake my soule in hades but bring me thence conquerer of all mine enemies You adde no flesh dead was euer free from corruption but onely Christes what then ergo his soule was in hell Why winch you where no man toucheth you doth any man say Christes soule was in hell because his flesh saw no corruption or rather that Dauids wordes are as plaine and peculiar to Christ in the one that Christes soule was not forsaken in hell as in the other that God would not suffer his flesh to see corruption and both being affirmed of Christ by way of speciall prerogatiue why should not both be likewise performed in Christ were not some being dead raised to life againe before their flesh putrified The promise of God to Christ that his flesh should not see corruption doth not onely assure a speedie resurrection but an impossibilitie that any corruption could preuaile against his flesh since the returne of his flesh to dust to which all others are iudged would bee the dissolution of his person for the time which by no meanes might befall him his Godhead being vnited vnto flesh and not vnto dust In these words therefore of Dauid the soule and bodie of Christ were appointed to be superiour to all contrarie powers that is the soule to hell the flesh to the graue and from both was Christ to rise as subduer of both that he might sit on his heauenly Throne as Lord ouer all not by promise onely as before but by proofe also as appeared in his resurrection And yet so many dayes as Christ did lyeth no man in his graue without some taint of corruption which in Christ was vtterly none It is a strange absurditie still to abuse your Reader calling this word hell which indeede is nothing but death in effect Againe to presume that we take it for Paradise or heauen or hell when wee referre it alwayes to the generall state of the dead and no farder immediately Then when you expound the wordes of the Creede Christ descended to hades your meaning is nothing in effect but that Christ died which was before deliuered in plained and shorter wordes and so your exposition is an idle and obscure repetition Againe hades in the new Testament is neuer taken for the death of the bodie since it is annexed to bodily death as a consequent after it and so your acception of it is repugnant to the trueth of the Scriptures And where you will at no time haue Hades taken for Paradise Heauen or Hell as here you pretend when you thereby note the place of soules deceased meane you they are neither in Heauen Paradise nor Hell are you not a wise man to talke so much of an inuisible place and when you come to the point you will haue it no place at all but you referre it alwayes to the generall state of the dead and no farder immediately An inuisible place you referre immediately to no place and thus when you will be frantike or foolish words shall loose their proper and plaine signification and containe no more then pleaseth you Shew vs a place where soules deceased are besides Paradise Heauen and Hell and wee will graunt you may exclude these three by some pretence when you spake of the place of hades but if you cannot then topos aides a place vnseene which you haue so much bowled at will be a place in spite of your heart and that immediately and consequently will bee Paradise Heauen or Hell whatsoeuer you presume or dreame to the contrarie Christ had another inestimable cause to reioyce that he was raised to life againe namely that he might fulfill his whole worke for our saluation which before his resurrection and ascension he could not accomplish When I told you that Christ after death was to conquere Hell and to free vs thence you would needes defend that Christ on the Crosse perfited our redemption and wrought our saluation and now you say which I take to bee the truer though you meane not to bee constant therein that before his resurrection and ascension hee could not accomplish the worke of our saluation The text saith God raised him vp loosing the sorrowes of death because it was impossible for him to be holden fast of it Will you conclude from hence ergo there were present sorrowes in the place where Christ was there is no strength in this reason There is more strength in it then either you will acknowledge or can answere The sorrowes of bodily death are all dissolued by the separating of the soule from the bodie Then after death there are no sorrowes of bodily death But God raised vp Christ loosing the sorrowes of
after Like sheepe in Sheol shall they be put is the occasion but no iustification of your error since the verbe they shall be laid or put hath no sense at all except you repeate Sheol with the preposition after it and say they shal be laid in Sheol like sheepe So that vnlesse you will bee more then like a sheepe you must leaue this kind of collecting Your quoting of the Prophet Abacuk and of the Prouerbes to shew that all things are in Hades because neither Hades nor death can bee satisfied is much like your sheepe in Sheol Doe proud men couet chaulke and chibols because in the same verse it is said they can be no more satisfied then death and Sheol I winne not but rather as death and Sheol cannot be satisfied with bodies and soules of men which are things by them desired and receiued no more can the proud oppressour be satisfied with the spoiles of many countries but seeketh to gather vnto him all nations and to heape vnto him all people euen as death and Sheol doe The place of the Prouerbes which you bring ioyneth with Sheol a barren wombe and the earth which cannot bee satisfied with water And thence you can no more conclude that all kind of creatures are in Sheol then that they are in a womans wombe which is barren And but that I see men loose their wits aswell as their senses in Hades I should much maruaile what were become of yours all this while that speake not onely so impertinently and vntowardly but so absurdly and ridiculously that men will stoppe their eares for very shame if you will not stoppe your mouth Yet we must comeneerer You alleage two friuilous proofes of sheols signifying hell viz. when it hath opposition to beauen and situation as the lowest For the situation of hell it is a secret which Gods word hath not reuealed at all Neither ought we to determine as you very rashly doe if hell be any where there can be no doubt but it must be in the lower parts of the earth You that haue ranged so farre both from the trueth and from the matter in question had need at length come somewhat neerer The proofes produced by me that Sheol when it is opposed to heauen or described to be in the lowest parts of the earth importeth hell are not so friuolous as your follie maketh them they are grounded on better and surer rules of holy Scriptures then are your toyes of birds and beastes in Hades And first touching the place of hell below in the earth which you labour to crosse as much as you can though I before haue shewed the constant opinion of old and new writers yet can I be content to reason it farder with you because you and your friends are deuising new hels and heauens euen as you are hammering of a new Hades That hell is a place of torment the Gospel is euident Being a place it must be either in heauen aboue vs or in earth beneath vs except you will coyne vs a new Creede and say God is creator of heauen earth and of hell also which is neither in heauen nor in earth But you may not controle the Creede except you will also correct the Scriptures For that diuision of the created world into heauen and earth is witnessed in infinite places of holy Scripture to be most sufficient Hell then since it is somewhere must be within the earth vnder vs except you will make it a part of heauen ouer vs and then must men ascend to hell as they doe to heauen and no longer descend But the Scriptures are plaine that hell is beneath vs if they make mention at all of any hell which perhaps you will call in question as well as you doe the rest Those whom the Apostle calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which stoupe to the power of Christs kingdome and confesse him to be their Lord who are they but reprobate and condemned men and Angels and where is the place of the punishment but vnder the earth since dead bodies can neither yeeld subiection nor make confession vnto Christ you selfe graunt Abyssus in the Scripture doth signifie a vast and deepe gulfe in the earth and Abyssus is a place whither the Diuels feare to be sent where they are chained and bound when pleaseth God Now euidently by the Scriptures from this Abyssus to the earth is an ascent no descent And therefore the dungeon for diuels which is hell is vnder vs that are in earth not aboue vs. The very name of Gehenna vsed by our Sauior for hell confessed by you to be the most proper name of hell doth it not conuince hell to be Gehennam ignis a vale of fire and where are there vales but in earth hell is called Ge-hinnon saith Peter Martyr because a vale being a low and deepe place doth resemble hell quod infra terram esse creditur which is beleeued to be vnder the earth The pit lake also which are words vsed bythe holy Ghost to expresse hell as the pit of perdition and lake burning with fire and brimstone doe confirme the same since there are no pits nor lakes but in the earth By Moses God saith A fire is kindled in my wrath and shall burne to the lower Sheol and inflame the foundations of the Mountaines A man would thinke these wordes were plaine enough to prooue the lower Sheol to bee vnder the foundations of the hils and that there burneth the fire of Gods wrath with which the wicked are punished after this life Of the lower earth I haue spoken before and prooued it to be equiualent with hell in the iudgement of the best Hebraicians and Diuines of our times And if the lower earth be hell then is hell without question in the lower parts of the earth Bullingere saith As touching the place of punishment where the soules and bodies of the wicked are tormented the Scripture simply pronounceth saying the wicked descend to hell vnde constat inferos esse infra nos in terris constitutos whereby it is certaine that hell is beneath vs that abide heere on earth We must throughly maintaine against scoffing Epicures saith Gualtere that there is a certaine place prepared for the wicked into which their soules straight after death and their bodies after the resurrection are receiued Of which place Moses speaketh when he writeth that Core Dathan and Abiram were swallowed vp with the gaping of the earth and descended aliue with all theirs to hell But hauing treated thereof in sundrie places before I will end with a verse of Sibyllaes prophesie alleaged and allowed for a Christian trueth by Lactantius Austin and Prosper where speaking of the last iudgement and the signes and consequents of that day she saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The earth gaping or cleauing in sunder shall then shew or lay open
serueth For that a vast and deepe gulfe in the earth should be nothing els but an abolishing of any visible creatures hence or that this should be the most proper sense of Sheol and your vast and deepe gulfe a resemblance thereof this hath neither top nor toe If Sheol be properly nothing but a priuation how can it be a vast and deepe gulfe in the earth or what proportion or similitude hath the one with the other These are therefore nothing but your fictions imagined of your owne braine to delude the Scriptures and to auoide the lower Sheol indeed which is the place of torment for the damned How Capernaum was exalted to heauen whether in her owne proud conceit after the example of the king of Babylon of whom Esaie speaketh or whether Christ ment that by reason of his often preaching and working miracles amongst them the kingdome of God was in the midst of them but not receaued nor regarded by them which some thinke to be the meaning of this place I stand indifferent so long as we keepe Sheol opposite to heauen I meane not to the clouds nor to the skies as you would shift the matter but to the place aboue where the way of life is and the brightnesse of Gods glorie that thereby we may conceaue in the lower sheol darknesse and death for euer euen as in the higher sheol both are for the time The way of life saith Salomon is on high neither in the clouds nor starres but in the seat of the blessed euen in heauen to him that declineth Sheol below Where speaking of eternall life since bodily life is heere on earth he warneth vs that eternall death is in sheol below The rest of your stuffe is not woorth the sticking at For what if God by Ieremie threatned Babylon that though her walles were thicke and her gates high the one should be broken and the other burned and though she should mount vp to heauen by raising her walles neuer so high yet her destroyers should come from God Doth this being spoken of the walles and gates which should be razed prooue that her walles and gates should descend to Sheol Where hath the prophet any such words of the walles gates or buildings of Babylon And for you to expound Sheol by what you list is a larger commission then I know any you haue I haue no doubt but walles and gates cannot reach vnto the clouds much lesse to the starres and therefore heauen applied to them standeth for that which riseth on high in the aire but that the pride of the king of Babel lifted it selfe aboue the clouds and starres I haue prooued by the plaine report of the Prophet against which no exception can be taken Next let vs view the Corinthians O death where is thy victorie ô hades ô destruction or ô power of death where is thy sting Heere it is referred to the destruction of the whole and intire persons of men taken away by death out of this world What is now become of your world of soules which you so often vrged as properly signified by hades What is become of your vast and deepe gulfe in the earth which sheol and hades did import as yon told vs but euen now Nay what is become of your destruction of stones and their descending to Hades which you said was threatned to Capernaum Are all these out of date and in euerie new place must you be forced to frame vs a new Hades You will rest somewhere at last if it be possible for your vnquiet head to haue or like any rest Well now then hades is the destruction of the whole person of man taken out of this world by death And why should not hades heere be taken for hell The whole scope and drift of the Apostle heere is to speake of the resurrection of the bodie and you graunt it What then The Saints receauing their bodies endued with immortalitie may they not reioice in their deliuerance from corruption and insult as hauing then the full victorie ouer hell and death Our full deliuerance from hell and from Satan is obtained in this life as it is written we being deliuered from our enemies and from the handes of all that hate vs. We are so deliuered from their hands or power which is all one that we shall not need to feare them but we are not yet actually freed from their snares since we daily must pray not to be ledde or left into temptation neither are all our enemies yet fully destroied since as the Apostle saith the last enemie that shall be destroied is death If all Christes enemies were put vnder his and our feete he should no longer raigne as Redeemer and Sauiour of his Church for he must raigne till he hath put all his enemies vnder his feete and then shall deliuer vp the kingdome to God euen the Father which is not before the end And yet were all things granted which you intend it helpeth you not one whit for may not the saints giue thankes for all euen then when all is fully finished though part be before perfourmed And may they not iustly reioice against all the power of Satan I meane sinne hell and death when the last enemie is in sight conquered though they be formerly freed from sinne and fully deliuered from the danger and feare of hell Your speech is very bad and scandalous where you say the bodies of the Saints lying in their graues are in the diuels walke For then the graues where bodies lie senselesse are a part of hell properly taken You told vs euen now that the aire on high was the place of diuels thinke you much that vpon occasion I should say the graues vnder the earth are within Satans walke The booke of Iob saith Satan compasseth the earth and walketh in it And Peter confirmeth the same saying He walketh about seeking whom he may deuoure So that the diuels walke for all your saying is farre larger then hell And if our Lord and master most truely said of the woman which was crooked and could not lift vp herselfe in any wise that Satan had bound that daughter of Abraham lo eighteene yeeres may not the dead bodies of Abrahams children be in Satans walk as well as their liuing bodies be in Satans bands And you that be so curious in other mens speeches doe you looke to your owne Doe not you defend that the soules of the blessed in heauen may be said to be in inferno and vnder the power of death whereof the Diuell hath the rule by the Apostles doctrine we being heere truely iustified by Gods grace are fully freed and deliuered from all the power of our enemies Are we so fully freed that we can neither sinne nor die or are sinne and death no parts of Satans power When I speake of a full conquest ouer hell and death in both parts of man soule and
bodie which is not performed before the bodie rise to glorie you turne it as if I professed our redemption from hell to be imperfect till the last day And when I mention with Saint Paul the redemption of our bodies from corruption which shall not be before the resurrection you would inferre thereupon if you could tell how that the bodies of the Saints remaine subiect to the power of hell to the curse of the law and to the claime of Satan Thus you runne on like a riotous spaniel chalenging vpon euery foote but finding nothing With like wit and trueth you inferre vpon my wordes where I say the death of the body was inflicted on mankind as part of the wages of sinne that therefore the godly must pay a part of their owne redemption and satisfaction for sinne and then Christ was not our onely and absolute redeemer But which way doth this follow can you tell punishment for sinne is in our persons neither redemption nor satisfaction for sinne in Christs person it was both Know you not the difference betwixt Christs person and ours But I say pa. 216. that the bodies of the dead Saints are in the possession of hell and in the handfact of hell In wresting and wrangling is all your grace Where some auncient writers seeme to say that Christ deliuered some of the Saints out of the present possession of hell all the defence I said that could any way be made out of the Scriptures to excuse this was to take hell improperly for the sting and wound of bodily death which Satan the ruler of hell procured to man by sinne For sinne death and corruption are the workes of the Diuell which Christ came to dissolue God made not death as the wiseman obserueth but created man without corruption and through the enuie of the Diuell came death into the world This then being one of the wounds which Satan through sinne gaue vnto our first father and all his ofspring this is not perfectly cured but with the resurrection of our bodies to eternall life though the poyson of this wound bee in the meane time allayed and the danger secured And thus whiles I seeke to mitigate other mens wordes and to extenuate the name and power of hell vnderstanding thereby nothing but the dissolution of mans life and corruption of mans bodie which Satan occasioned by sinne you make the Reader beleeue I take the name of hell properly for the power and right that hell hath ouer the bodies of the wicked and teach that the Saints are not deliuered from hell till their bodies rise from death which when you list you can find to bee refuted elswhere by me and therefore to be no part of my meaning heere How death is an enemie which must be destroyed aswell as sinne and hell we neede not your commentarie except it were stoared with better Diuinitie It hindreth the Saints you graunt from enioying their appointed felicitie yet as a peaceable and quiet stop Ascribe you this peace and quietnesse to their bodies voide of life and sense or to their soules staied from the full fruition of eternall glorie by that meanes And troe you the soules of the Saints be well and quietly content to lacke their appointed felicitie not at all to desire it or not earnestly to pray for it were plainly to loath it and not obediently to expect it Wherefore they exceedingly affect and instantly pray for the destruction of this enemie that keepeth their bodies in dishonour and corruption and hindereth their spirits from enioying that glorie which shal be reucaled in the last time which appeareth by their vehement prayer in the Reuelation how long O Lord holy and true doest thou not iudge and auenge our bloud on them that dwell on the earth Where they in heauen seeke not reuenge on them for whom they prayed in earth but they expresse their continuall and ardent desire for that day when they shall be wholy conformed to Christ their head And when they are willed to rest for a season they gladly submit themselues to the will and wisedome of God but meane while they hate death as an hinderer of that blisse and ioy which they so much loue and long for and shall no doubt reioyce exceedingly when this last enemie is swallowed vp in victorie as the rest were before But let death be an enemie which way you will how doth this conclude that Hades here 1. Corinth 15. in no sort signifieth hell The very text seemeth thus to expound it selfe saying where is thy sting O Hades the sting of death is sinne Where the later seemeth a direct exposition of the former noting these two wordes Hades and death as Synonymas for one thing being applied to men When you talke of the text of holy Scripture you should not leaue the wordes that are extant in all our printed copies retained and alleaged by the best and most of the Greeke Fathers as likewise of our new writers and cleane to the single conceite of some one man taking vpon him to correct all the printed copies that euer he saw and of his owne authoritie to alter the Originall I doe not therefore by your and his leaue admit this for Saint Pauls text since it is his priuate change of the wordes in the Greeke against all the copies that are either manu-scripts or printed at this day His owne confession is this Contrario ordine legunt hunc locum non modo Graeci omnes codices quos inspeximus sed etiam Syrus Arabs interpretes Not onely all the Greeke copies that we haue seene but the Syriack Arabick Interpreters read this place in a contrarie order that is they put these words ô Hades where is thy victorie in the last place which you set in the first and the other words ô death where is thy sting they set first which you will haue to be last Thus then stand the Apostles wordes cleane contrarie to that which you bring 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O death where is thy sting O Hades wher is thy victorie And in this order doe Luther Erasmus Zuinglius Peter Martyr Caluine Bullingere Gualtere Aretius Hemmingius Hyperius Osiander Marlorate and I know not how many more both keepe and cite that text in Latin vbi tuus mors aculeus vbi tua Inferne victoria Where is thy sting O death where is thy victorie O hell And touching the Greeke copies and Fathers that are auncient and obserue the same order of the wordes for the Apostles text we haue Origen Athanasius Nazianzene Nyssene Epiphanius x Chrysostome x Oecumenius and though the translatours of x Theodoret and x Theophylact retaine the wordes of the old Latin Bible in this place for the text yet there is no likelihood that these two in their own tongue varied from the rest specially Theophylact who in his commenting
Hades as is mentioned in the thirteenth verse If you like not this shew vs a reason why the earth is here ouerskipt in which are the most of the dead bodies both of good bad vnlesse it were because no doubt was of the earth in refunding her dead and we will make you a playner explication of these parts which now seeme somewhat doubtfull Howbeit death and Hades cannot stand for one and the selfe same thing as you would haue them since the holy Ghost applieth the plurall number to them and maketh them places not phrases to containe the dead in them by saying death and Hades gaue vp the dead which were in them Words haue no dead in them but places haue which because S. Iohn maketh to bee plurall death and Hades cannot here be taken for one thing Neither were those writers whom you reiect so inconsiderate as not easily to wipe away the force of your faint reasons Bede vpon these words the Sea death and hell gaue vp their dead saith Iohn signifieth the bodies shal be gathered from the earth and their soules from their seuerall places The good vnder the name of death which suffered onelie the dissolution of their bodies and no farder punishment the euill he designeth by the name of hell Andreas Caesariensis taketh the Sea for the earth as Bede doth either because they thought the earth should then be plaine like the sea as Sibylla prophesied Equâ—…ntur campis montes hills and vales shall then be all euen or because heauen and earth were before said to be fled away from his face that sate on the throne and their place no more to be found or for that at the mutation of the world the earth shall melt and burne all ouer like a sea of fire and of the rest he saith Death is the separation of the soule from the body Hades is a place to vs vnseene that is darke and vnknowen which receaueth the dead soules departing hence And those soules are dead which cary with them dead works For the soules of the iust as the wise man saith are in the hands of God and no torment shall touch them Dead soules I read with the interpreter and not our soules as the Printer in Greeke hath mistaken the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not onely because the interpreter had first the copie before him and tooke more care to render it right then the Printer but also for that the Author in the very next words declareth what he ment by dead soules before of which there is no mention precedent if that word be not kept where the translator putteth it Saint Austen taketh the sea for this world and shewing how those that liue on earth may be called dead euen by warrant of holy Scripture and this life be counted no better then a death addeth Nec frustra fortasse non satis fuit vt diceret mors aut infernus sed vtrumque dictum est Neither happily without cause was it not enough to say death or hell but both are named death for the good who might suffer onely death and not also hell and hell for the wicked which are punished in hell And of the next words death and hell were cast into the lake of fire he saith His nominibus significans Diabolum quoniam mortis est author infernarum poenarum vniuersamque simul Daemonum societatem By these names Saint Iohn signifieth the diuell because he is the Author or first occasioner of death and hell-paines withall the whole multitude of diuels Primasius as he was S. Austens scholar so doth he writing vpon the reuelation retaine S. Austens sense and sentences as they are alleaged next before Aretas writing on the same words S. Iohn saith he meaneth those that haue done things worthy of this punishment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 making vp the people of the second death Death and hades gaue vp their dead By death saith Haymo we may simply vnderstand the death of the flesh by hell the places of darkensse Death and hades that is all the members of the Diuell with their head were cast into the lake of fire that is into the deepe damnation of hell And rightly are all the reprobate figured by hell either because abiding there they make but one house with hell in which they abide or els for that imitating the worâ—…s of the Diuell they are neuer satisfied with euill as hell neuer saith it sufficeth The new writers doe not dissent if it were worth the time to repeat manie of them Bullinger Death and hell were cast into the lake of fire Hades hell heere doth signifie not the place of punishment but those that are or were in hell whose soules were hitherto deteined in hell or such as are appointed for hell Death also signifieth those that are dead in sinne and which from a spirituall and temporall death directly passe to eternall death Aretas and Primasius are of the same opinion with vs. Chytreus Death shall restore all the bodies slaine by him and hell shall refund the soules of the wicked to be ioined to their bodies Hades in Greeke is deriued from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is not to see or a place lacking light which in the 22 of Matthew is called vtter darkenesse where the wicked depriued of the sight light comfort and life of God not onely suffer perpetuall night or darknesse but great and vnspeakeable paines and torments of soule and body The Latines call it infernus because the place of the damned is thought to be somewhere in the earth beneath vs as it is said in the 16 of Numbers they descended aliue to hell and the earth couered them Thus haue we for your pleasure runne ouer all the places of the new Testament where hades is vsed and for ought we see or you say find the plaine and perpetuall vse of hades to signifie hell and not any such priuations destructions conditions and dominions of bodily death as you dreame of And as for the circumstances of the places they all concurre exactly and directly with this signification of hades which I obserue notwithstanding your Cabbinet of conceits that hades shall designe you know not what where nor when The reasons of my obseruations are manifest For where throughout the old Testament with the Septuagint hades doth alwaies import the pit for dead bodies or soules that is the graue common to good and bad or hell peculiar to the soules of the reprobate with the consequents of either and the writers of the new purposely distinguish 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 death from hades and mention death expressely that is by name or by description in euery of those places where hades is found in the new Testament saue in Christs threatning of Capernaum in which it is opposed to heauen as fardest distant from it and most repugnant to
their Creede yet retained the sense and meaning of them in that they were perswaded this was the law of humane necessitie without Christ that as mens bodies were buried so their soules descended to hell which descent Christ refused not to restore men as Hilarie and others auouch This you say was Ruffines owne meaning who going about to proue by the Scripture that Christ descended to Infernum sheweth that he meaneth his death hereby his buriall I suppose few men will trust you hauing tried you false so often Ruffine going about to prooue by the Scripture of the old Testament that euery part of Christes passion and his resurrection was fore-shewed in the law and the Prophets plainely distinguisheth his death buriall and descent to Hell For Christs death he saith spiritum post haec scribitur reddidisse after this it is written that hee gaue vp the Ghost This was fore spoken by the Prophet saying into thy handes I commend my spirit Sepultus quoque perhibetur He is then said to be buried For which he alleageth a place of Ieremie and addeth Euidentissima haec Sepulturae eius indicia propheticis vocibus designata sunt accipe tamen alia These most manifest signes of his buriall are expressed in the Prophets speeches and yet thou shalt haue other Where he alleageth three other places of Scripture how fitly to his purpose I need not pronounce Then commeth he to Christes descent to hell and saith Sed quód in Infernum descendit euidenter praenunciatur in Psalmis That also he descended to hell is evidently fore told in the Psalmes Now whether his places bee aptly cited or no is not to the question though you make that your whole aduantage For first they be as aptly cited as the rest Next they haue euery one of them somewhat more in Rusfines apprehension then of Christes buriall For hee standeth not onely on those wordes the dust and corruption of death but hee fastneth most on the words of descending and bringing downe in limum profundi to the mire of the deepe Which things though you flurt at as waighing light in your eyes it is certaine he intended thereby more then the graue as is euident by his owne wordes For citing the place of Peter thus In which spirit Christ descended to preach to the spirits inclosed in prison which were incredulous in the dayes of Noe he addeth in quo quid operis egerâ—…m in Inferno declaratur in which it is declared what Christ did in hell In the graue I trust Christ did nothing In Paradise he did not preach to those that were in prison disobedient in the dayes of Noe. Since then this end of Christs descent to hell is expressed by Ruffinus and this could not bee done either in the graue where nothing can be done or in heauen where these disobedients were not in prison It is cleere that Ruffinus had no such meaning as you make him by Christes descent to intend no more but his death and buriall He holdeth indeed that Christ went downe to Infernum that is to Limbus patrum as an opinion then common among them and worthie as he thought to be beleeued If hee ment this as you now confesse then he ment more by Christes descending to Infernum then Christes death and buriall And so by your owne mouth you are conuinced of a lie fathered on Ruffinus against both his words meaning And yet I find no such expresse mention or description of Limbus in Ruffines words as you would seeme to impose vpon him He mentioneth Christs conquest ouer hell quód Inferna sibi Regna 〈◊〉 that Christ would subiect the Infernali kingdome to himselfe qui mortis habebat Imperium disruptis Inferni claustris velut de profundo tractus he that had the rule of death was drawen as it were from the deepe the cloisters of hell being broken open He saith also Animabus de Inferni captiuit ate reuocatis the soules being reuoked from the captiuitie of hell but whom he thereby meaneth he expressed before with the Apostles words when he said qui simul consuscitauit nos simulque sedere fecit in caelestibus Christ raised vs vp together with himselfe and made vs sit in heauenly places with him So that if you and your friends when you prate so much against all or the most of the auncient fathers as vpholding Limbus would bethinke your selues that most of them speake indifferently as well of the liuing and yet vnborne as of the dead before Christes time when they say that soules were deliuered out of the bondage and captiuitie of hell and Satan you should doe them lesse wrong and lesse deceaue your selues then now you doe And for those fathers that indeede were of this opinion that before Christes resurrection Abrahams bosome was vnder the earth you shall doe well to thinke and speake more reuerently of them considering what master Bullingere a learned and graue Diuine resolued euen of that point Sinus Abrahae aliud non est quam portus salutis vbi autem fuerat quondaÌ„ hic locus an apud superos an apud inferos nolo pronunciare imo malo ignorare quam temere definire quodliteris sacris expressum non habeo In his vt curiosus esse nolo ita nihil desinio cum nemine super hac re contendere volo Satis mihi est intelligere fateri veteres sanctos in refrigerio loco vtique certo non in tormentis ante ascensionem Domini fuisse vt maximé ignorem vbi ille locus fuerit The bosome of Abraham is nothing els but an entrance or port of saluation Where this place formerly was whether aboue in some part of the heauens or below vnder the earth I will not pronounce Yea I had rather be ignorant thereof then roshly to define that which I find not expressed in the Scriptures In these things as I will not be curious so doe I determine nothing neither will I contend with any man about this matter It shall suffice me to vnderstand and confesse that the godly of the old Testament were in a certaine place of rest not in terments before the oscension of Christ though I know not where that place was That it was no part nor member of hell we haue S. Austins firme resolution grounding himselfe on the words which our Sauiour in the Gospell ascribeth to Abraham Betweene you and vs there is a great gulfe setlâ—…d But whether it were vnder the earth till Christs resurrection of that some fathers doubted wherein we may not be reprochfull to them though we dissent from them since the Scriptures as this great Diuine thinketh expresly decide not the question Ignatius you thinke is cleerely yours likewise one Thaddeus by Eusebius report one of the 70. disciples which the Euangelist Luke speakes of Also Athanasius Creed Ignatiâ—… saying Christ desâ—…ended to hades alone but rose againe with many meaneth euidently
mortall and miserable life in this world but to be conformed to his glorious body that is to incorruption and immortality g Thus I vnderstand your Thaddeus also Athanasius in his Creed as it seemeth most reasonably and necessarily because they expresse neither his death nor his buriall at all in any other words saue these he descended to hades You runne so fast on your owne conceits that you see not what you passe by Hath Thaddeus no words touching Christs death what make you then of these scant a line before 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 how Christ humbled himselfe and died And though the Creed prouided for the simpler sort distinguisheth Christs crucifying death buriall and descent to hell yet what need is there that the learned euery time they talke of Christs crosse or death should number all these seuerally and orderly as they stand in the Creed crucifying is enough to note his death for they crucified him vnto death Christs buriall had in it no more but the certainty of his death and by Gods prouidence the vigilancâ—…e of his enemies that his body should not be thought to be stolen away by his owne Disciples Other moment or matter of our redemption there was none in Christs buriall The goodly words with which you would feed vs that in the graue he came vnder the power strength dominion and kingdome of death are rather variations for a nouice then any points of sensible doctrine for a diuine So that Athanasius expressing Christs suffering for our saluation his descending to hades and rising the third day from the dead fully compriseth all the principall works which Christ performed for our saluation from his crosse to his resurrection Now what Athanasius meaneth by hades since his works are extant in Greeke we shall not need to depend on your partiall coniectures We haue many plaine and perspicuous places which deliuer his sense and meaning vnto vs. I haue shewed before which I must not so often repeat that Athanasius maketh two places of condemnation whither man after death was adiudged for sinne 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the graue and hades And of Christs body and soule he directly saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The bodie of Christ went to the graue the soule to hades these places being diuided with a great distance and the graue receauing the presence of his body for there was his body present and hades receiuing his humane spirit Thinke you this to be plaine enough that Christs descent to hades was not his buriall where his body lay but the going of his soule to hades whither man was condemned for sinne and which Athanasius saith The Diuell kept as the onely place of his strength The enemie saith he fallen from heauen remoued from the earth expelled from the ayre 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 euery where vanquished determined if he could to keepe hades safe For this place was yet left vnto him But as soone as Christ died the world wanted the light of her Sunne the Vaile of the temple rent the earth trembled the Rocks did cleaue in sunder 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the souldiers together with the keepers of Hades did shake for feare 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the Diuell thiâ—…ing to carry Christ to hades was himselfe throwen out of hades 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For it was not long after but Christ loosed the sorrowes or paines of hades Athanasius then without peraduentures taketh hades for hell and Christs descent thither in soule to worke the subuersion of Satans kingdome and deliuerance of all his elect thence were they liuing dead or yet vnborne Your seeking to peruert this reason because the auncient Creedes want sundry other Articles which now are in our Creede is to no purpose For so much as they all do euermore intend to set downe perfectly the summe of Christs accomplished Redemption and mediation at the least Not any of those his maine workes are in them omitted If your pride were not greater then your skill we should haue a great deale lesse prating from you How shall the Reader beleeue your report of Fathers and their meanings when you neuer saw so much as the Creedes of the auncient Councels and yet pronounce so boldly of them as if you had perused them all but yesterday The great Nicene Creede maketh no mention of Christs death or buriall but saith He suffered and rose the third day The first generall Councell of Constantinople whose Creede was after vsed in the Church Seruice saith Christ suffered and was bâ—…ied and rose the third day omitting his crucifixion and death The great Councell of Aphrica and the generall Councell of Ephesus concurre with the Nicene and say he suffered and rose the third day What truth then is there in your words where you say they all doe euermore intend perfectly to set downe the Summe of Christs Redemption for vs not any of those his maine works are in them omitted Is the death of Christ none of his maine works for our Redemption finde you now that his buriall may be omitted and yet the Creede not be imperfect These things good Sir are implyed as consequent or antecedent to the parts expressed For if Christ did rise the third day he rose from the Graue where he had lien three daies and buried he was not before he was dead As also he rose not but from the dead Wherefore in his resurrection are both his death and his buriall comprised Besides he suffered vnto death Which things were all plainly proposed to the simple in their Creede called Aposto like but not in the Creedes concluded by the learned Pastours in their Councels The same course kept the Greeke and Latin Fathers sometimes expressing Christs death buriall and descent to hell sometimes omitting some of them as the cause required Epiphanius saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christ saith he speaking of the things as they were done is crucified buried he descended to the places vnder the earth in his Deitie and in his soule he leadeth Captiuitie Captiue and riseth the third day Vigilius Constat Dominum nostrum Iesum Christum sexta feria crucifixum ipsa die ad Infernum descendisse ipsa die in sepulâ—…hris iacuisse ipsa die Latroni dixisse hodie mecum eris in Paradiso It is certaine that our Lord Iesus Christ was crucified on the sixt day and that day descended to hell that day lay in the graue and that day said to the Theise This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise And declaring how this was verified in Christ ergo dicimuâ—… Dominum iacuisse in sepulchro sed in sola carne Dominum descendisse ad infernum sed in sola anima Then we say that the Lord lay in his graue but with his Body alone and descended to hell but with his Soule alone without his Body Howbeit to speake plainly your Thaddeus whom
the Garden and complained on the Crosse as if he were forsaken which things they thought vnfit for him that was God The Fathers to repell their heresie and to open this obscuritie insist plainly on these points that the Mediatour must be God as well as man and that the Godhead of Christ incarnate was impassible and could not suffer any violence or change but his manhood might and did suffer somethings in soule as feare and sorow and somethings in bodie as paines and death But generally when they speake of death they neuer intend as you doc the death of Christes soule as well as of his bodie but they meane plainly the death of the Crosse described by the Euangelists which is farre from the second death or the death of the damned c Defenc. pag. 111. li. 36. The very same doth Hilarie also where he sayth that this in Christ was Corporis vox The outcrie of his bodie he plainly meaneth it of his whole manhood the opposition being betweene it and his Godhead as the Scripture often doth If your authoritie be such that you may take bodie for soule and life for death where you will you may soone make a shew that the Fathers intend nothing against your doctrine but if you must proue it as well as say it then is it the most riotous and most ridiculous course that can be to take one contrarie for another for so you may proue darknesse to be light vice to be vertue falshood to be trueth and infidelitie to be faith What the Fathers taught touching the death of Christes soule when we come to the place we shall plainly see by their owne asserting and not by your peruerting in the meane time you were best bring stronger proofes than these that you will take the bodie for the soule if you meane to conclude any thing out of the Fathers for your croslegged doctrine d Trea. pag. 9. The Scripture often doth the like you say as you haue shewed in your Treatise There you haue childishly abused a number of Scriptures and yet no way prooued that any where the bodie signifieth the soule or standeth for the soule That the soule is a consequent to the bodie and the bodie likewise a consequent to the soule wheresoeuer The sâ—…ule is a câ—…nsequent to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but no part of it the Scripture speaketh of men liuing heere on earth is a sure and safe rule because no man heere liueth that doeth not consist of soule and bodie yet that is no proofe that what is attributed to the bodie must be verified of the soule much lesse that the one must be taken for the other Looke but to your owne examples where bodie is named e Rom. 6. Let not sinne reigne in your mortall bodies sayth the Apostle If here you will comprehend the soule vnder the name of the bodie you must grant in exact words that the soule is mortall which is an open heresie destroying the summe and effect of the Christian faith Againe f 1. Cor. 6. Euery sinne that a man doth is without the body but the fornicato-sinneth against his owne bodie If in this place the bodie conclude the soule then euery sinne saue fornication is without soule and body and consequently no sinne which is a doctrine a man would thinke meet for no Diuine The third instance which you bring hath not so grosse sequels but as plaine falshoods g Hebr. 10. Sacrifice and burnt offerings thou wouldest not but a bodie hâ—…st thou ordained me whereof the sacrifices offered by the Law were h Ibid. vers 1. shadowes Now did the bodies of beasts slaine or their bloud shed prefigure the Soule of Christ or the death of his bodie These be the places on which you build your vnsound obseruation that the Scripture doth often take the bodie for the soule which are so sensibly false that they need no Refuter But we reason of death which seuereth the soule from the bodie and therein to say the bodie must be taken for the soule is a very sincke of sottish absurdities and falsities For what can be more repugnant to trueth and sense than to take a dead bodie for a liuing soule and when they are so farre seuered by nature to say they must agree in name and the one be called the other Peruse now the Fathers which you would faine wrest to your purpose and see whether they doe not flatly contradict your deuice that the body in their speaches must be taken for the whole man and so the death of Christes body for the death as well of soule as of the body Epiphanius is the first that you would frustrate with your deuices and the first that shall conuince your falshood He saith the manhood of Christ spake these words Now seeing the deity together with the soule moouing to forsake his sacred body What death call you that where the soule moueth and forsaketh the body then in that complaint of Christs the thing forsaken was his body alone by the iudgement of Epiphanius and the deity i Epiph. contra 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 69. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 together with the soule did mooue 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to forsake that sacred body Which way doth this prooue the soule or the whole manhood of Christ to be forsaken when Epiphanius expresly saith the deity with the soule did mooue to forsake the body Hilarie is the next whom you would infect with your fansie but finding no words in him meet for your matter you are forced shamefully to misconster the body for the soule and the death of the one for the death of the other which is all the hold you haue in Hilarie though you lustily would beare out the rest with the copy of your countenance Notwithstanding Hilarie doth not only preuent but also refute your mistaking For in plaine words he saith k 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 10. Querela derelicti morientis infirmit as est traditio spirit us morientis excessio est The complaint of Christ that he was forsaken was the infirmity of one dying the yeelding vp his spirit was his departure hence when he died And againe Tradens spiritum mortuus est Christ died by deliuering vp his spirit Sepultus est Christus quia mortuus est mortuus autem est quia moriturus locutus est Deus Deus meus quare me dereliquisti Christ was buried because he was dead and ready to die he said My God my God why hast thou forsaken me So that Christes death when he spake those words was not past nor present but then to come as Hilarie noteth by the future tence and was the deliuering vp of his spirit into his fathers hands I trust you dare not defend that Christ in or after the deliuering vp of his spirit suffered the paines of hell or the second death and yet saith Hilarie those words Christ spake of his death that was to come Tertullian is the last whose words though
you mightily mistake mistranslate yet make they nothing for you but against you directly Writing against Praxeas that denied the Father and the Sonne to be two distinct persons and taught that the Father became sonne to himselfe l 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ca. 2. and was made man and crucisied after many proofes to shew the person of the sonne to be different from the person of the father he citeth those words of Christ on the crosse My God my God why hast thou forsaken me and saith m Ibid. ca. 30. hâ—…c vox carnis animae idest hominis non sermonis nec spiritus id est Dei propterea emissa est vt impassibilem Deum ostenderet qui sic filium dereliquit dum hominem eius trâ—…didit in mortem Caeterum non reliquit Pater Filium in cuius manibus Filius spiritum suum posuit Denique posuit statim obijt Spiritu enim manente in carne caro omnino mori non potest Ita relinqui a Patre fuit mori filio This voice of the flesh and soule that is of the man not of the word nor of the spirit that is not of God was therefore spoken to shew that God is impassible who so left his sonne whiles he deliuered his manhood to death Yet the Father did not altogether forsake the sonne into whose hands the sonne breathed out his spirit For he breathed it out and straighâ—…way died Whiles the spirit remained in the flesh the flesh could not die at all So that to be forsaken of the Father was in the sonne to die Here are the words of Tertullian in order as they stand Where it is euident that he affirmeth no death nor forsaking in Christ but only that when the spirit left the body His words are plaine The Father forsocke not the sonne into whose hands the sonne deposed his spirit For he laid it downe and died So to be forsaken of the Father was this for the sonne to die by laying downe his spirit or soule as before he prooueth Christ did Then suffered Christ no death of the soule since he died not till he breathed out his spirit into his fathers hands and other forsaking the sonne felt none then so to die by the separation of his soule from his body Now touching the voice of the soule and the flesh whereof Tertullian speaketh What forsaking 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of either he maketh three parts in man as the Apostle doth Thess 1 5. verse 23. the spirit the soule and the body and then the soule noteth the operations of life and sense which were to cease for the time by death or els he affirmeth this voice came from both soule and body because the soule was to be separated from her body by death as well as the body to be left dead both which are a kind of forsaking Other death he nameth none here then to die by breathing out the spirit And so long as the spirit abideth in the flesh the flesh he saith cannot die at all Christ therefore endured no death whiles his spirit did abide in his body and consequently no death of the soule and when he breathed out his spirit he straightway died which was the forsaking that he complained of in those words So that all your collections heere out of Tertullian are your additions to Tertullian and not so much as one of them to be found or fet from his text He speaketh not a word that Christ n Defenc. pag. suffered in both these parts from his father nor that this death or forsaking o li. 15. was ment of the flesh and of the 1 12. li. 20. soule as you falsly translate him And as for Tertullians confirming that p li. 26. heresie of Christes being no true naturall man except Christ suffered q li. 23. the stroke of Gods hand in his soule as the proper vengcance of sinne this is your blinde deuice absurdly foisted into Tertullian without any word or letter sounding that way r Defenc. pag. 112. li. 31. This dereliction of which he speaketh is more 〈◊〉 the separation of the soule and bodie euen the separation of the deitie from the whole manhood which is the death of the soule I speake nothing here but the Fathers words yea the Scriptures Your setting vnto Tertullian Tertullian nameth no death but of Christes bodie your owne sense is an impudent attempt and the weakest argument that can be when you tell vs he meaneth so though he speake not one word touching the death of the soule but as exactly as he can or should nameth the death of the bodie by this that he sayth Denique spiritum posuit statim obijt Spiritu enim manente in carne caro omnino mori non potest Christ layd downe his spirit and straightway died For whiles the spirit remained in the flesh the flesh could not die at all What was it to lay downe his spirit into his fathers hands as the Scripture speaketh of Christ on the crosse but to die the death of the body Those very words Tertullian here citeth and vseth and thereby prooueth the Father had not inwardly forsaken the sonne since the sonne by the manifest words of himselfe reported in the Euangelist commended and yeelded his spirit to his fathers hands So that against the death of the soule Tertullians words are pregnant for how did the soule die that was commended into Gods hands and other death Tertullian nameth nor meaneth none but only this Denique spiritum posuit statim obijt Christ laied downe his spirit into his fathers hands and straightway died As for your speaking nothing heere but the fathers and the Scriptures words beware you take not vp the Diuels trade to keepe their words and peruert their sense It is no great mastery to abuse mens words yea the word of God which all Hereticks haue euer drawen to their owne false and wicked purposes s Defenc. pag. 112. li. 34. Your owne place of Epiphanius saith that now his deity departed from his manhood So saith your owne Hilarie also Corporis vox contestata recedentis a se Dei dissidium So saith Ambrose clamauit homo diuinitat is separatione moriturus The man Christ did crie being about to die by the separation of his Godhead You alleage three places to this purpose and either corrupt or peruert all three most apparantly â—…piphanius saith that Christs deity TOGETHER WITH THE SOVLE departed from his sacred body which is as plaine a description of bodily death as may be vttered You leaue out the words TOGETHER WITH THE SOVLE as crossing your course and turne the body into the soule meaning by this corruption to load Epiphanius with a sense cleane contrarie to his owne Hilaries words spoken of Christes body you enlarge to the whole manhood of Christ and thence conclude directly against Hilaries meaning and words that the deity departed from both where as Hilarie professeth of Christ t Hilarius