perfection from Peace And then but not before shall Ierusalem be built as a City that is at unity in it self when they that build Ierusalem are at unity first among themselves 31. Consider fourthly what heartning is given and what advantage to the Enemy abroad whilst there are fractions and distractions at home Per discordias civiles externi tollunt animos said the Historian once of old Rome And it was the complaint of our Countrey-man Gildas uttered long since with much grief concerning the state of this Island then embroiled in Civil Wars Fortis ad civilia bella infirma ad retundenda hostium tela That by how much more her valour and strength was spent upon her self in the managing of intestine and domestick broils the more she laid her self open to the incursions and out-rages of forreign Enemies The common Enemies to the truth of Religion are chiefly Atheism and Superstition Atheism opposing it in the fore-front and Superstition on both hands If either of which at any time get ground of us as whilst we wrangle God knoweth what they may do we may thank our own contentions for it most We may cherish causless jealousies and frame chimera's of other matters and causes out of our fancies or fears But the very truth is there is no such scandal to enemies of all sorts as are our home differences and chiefly those which make it the sadder business that are about indifferent things Alas whereto serveth all this ado about gestures and vestures and other outward rites and formalities that for such things as these are things in their own nature indifferent and never intended to be otherwise imposed than as matters of circumstance and order men should clamour against the times desert their ministerial functions and charges fly out of their own Country as out of Babylon stand at open defiance against lawful authority and sharpen their wits and tongues and pens with so much petulancy that I say not virulency as some have done to maintain their stiffness and obstinacy therein I say whereto sérveth all this but to give scandal to the Enemies of our Church and Religion 32. Scandal first to the Atheist Who till all men be of one Religion and agreed in every point thereof too which I doubt will never be whilst the world lasteth thinketh it the best wisdom to be of none and maketh it his best pastime to jeer at all Great scandal also secondly to the Romanist Who is not a little confirmed in his opinion of the Catholickness of the Roman Faith when he heareth so many of the things which have been and still are retained in the Church of England in common with the Church of Rome as they were transmitted both to them and us in a continued line of Succession from our godly and Orthodox forefathers who lived in the Ages next after Christ and his Apostles to be now inveighed against and decryed as Popish and Superstitious And when he seeth men pretending to piety purity and reformation more than others not contenting themselves with those just exceptions that had been formerly taken by the Church of England and her regular children against some erroneous Doctrines and forms of worship taught and practised in the Church of Rome and endeavoured to be unduly and by her sole Authority imposed upon other Churches to be so far transported with a spirit of Contradiction as that they care not so as they may but run far enough from Rome whither or how far they run although they should run themselves as too oft they do quite beyond the bounds of Truth Allegiance common reason and even common humanity too 33. But especially and thirdly great scandal to those of the separation Who must needs think very jollily of themselves and their own singular way when they shall find those very grounds whereon they have raised their Schism to be so stoutly pleaded for by some who are yet content to hold a kind of communion with us Truly I could wish it were sufficiently considered by those whom it so nearly concerneth for my own part I must confess I could never be able to comprehend it with what satisfaction to the conscience any man can hold those principles without the maintenance whereof there can be nothing colourably pretended for inconformity in point of Ceremony and Church-government and yet not admit of such conclusions naturally issuing thence as will necessarily enforce an utter separation Vae mundo saith our Saviour Woe unto the world because of offences It is one of the great trials wherewith it is the good pleasure of God to exercise the faith and patience of his servants whilst they live on the earth that there will be divisions and offences and they must abide it But vae homini though without repentance wo to the man by whom the occasion cometh Much have they to answer for the while that cannot keep themselves quiet when they ought and might but by restless provocations trouble both themselves and others to the great prejudice and grief of their brethren but advantage and rejoycing of the common Enemy 34. Thus much for the Thing it self Like-mindedness The conditions or Qualifications follow The former whereof concerneth the Persons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one toward another It noteth such an agreement as is both Universal and Mutual Universal first I doubt not but in the then Roman Church at the time when this Epistle was written the strong agreed well enough among themselves and were all alike-minded and so the weak among themselves all alike-minded too They all minded to despise these these all minded to judg them But that agreement was with those only of their own party and so a partial agreement which tended rather to the holding up of a Faction than to the making up of an Union It was an Universal agreement the Apostle desired and prayed for that the strong would be more compassionate to the Weak and the weak more charitable toward the Strong both Weak and Strong more patient and moderate and more respective either of other in all brotherly mutual condescensions 35. It is our fault too most an end We are partial to those on that side we take to beyond all reason ready to justifie those enterprises of theirs that look very suspiciously and to excuse or at least to extenuate their most palpable excesses and as ready on the other side to misconstrue the most justifiable actions of the adverse part but to aggravate to the utmost their smallest and most pardonable aberrations Thus do we sometimes both at once either of which alone is an abomination to the Lord justifie the guilty and condemn the innocent Whilst partial affections corrupt our judgments and will not suffer us to look upon the actions of our brethren with an equal and indifferent eye But let us beware of it by all means for so long as we give our selves to be carried away with partialities and prejudices we shall
confession of their own learned Writers depend upon unwritten Traditions more than upon the Scriptures True it is that for most of these they pretend to Scripture also but with so little colour at the best and with so little confidence at the last that when they are hard put to it they are forced to fly from that hold and to shelter themselves under their great Diana Tradition Take away that it is confessed that many of the chief Articles of their Faith nature vacillare videbuntur will seem even to totter and reel and have much ado to keep up For what else could we imagine should make them strive so much to debase the Scripture all they can denying it to be a Rule of Faith and charging it with imperfection obscurity uncertainty and many other defects and on the other side to magnifie Traditions as every way more absolute but meerly their consciousness that sundry of their Doctrines if they should be examined to the bottom would appear to have no sound foundation in the Written Word And then must we needs conclude from what hath been already delivered that they ought to be received or rather not to be received but rejected as the Doctrines and Commandments of men 14. Nor will their flying to Tradition help them in this Case or free them from Pharisaism but rather make the more against them For to omit that it hath been the usual course of false teachers when their Doctrines were found not to be Scripture-proof to fly to Tradition do but enquire a little into the Original and growth of Pharisaical Traditions and you shall find that one Egg is not more like another than the Papists and the Pharisees are alike in this matter When Sadoc or whosoever else was the first Author of the Sect of the Sadduces and his followers began to vent their pestilent and Atheistical Doctrines against the immortality of the Soul the resurrection of the Body and other like the best learned among the Iews the Pharisees especially opposed against them by arguments and collections drawn from the Scriptures The Sadduces finding themselves unable to hold argument with them as having two shrewd disadvantages but a little Learning and a bad cause had no other means to avoid the force of all their arguments than to hold them precisely to the letter of the Text without admitting any Exposition thereof or Collection therefrom Unless they could bring clear Text that should affirm totidem verbis what they denied they would not yield The Pharisees on the contrary refused as they had good cause to be tied to such unreasonable conditions but stood upon the meaning of the Scriptures as the Sadduces did upon the letter confirming the truth of their interpretations partly from Reason and partly from Tradition Not meaning by Tradition as yet any Doctrine other than what was already sufficiently contained in the Scriptures but meerly the Doctrine which had been in all ages constantly taught and received with an Universal consent among the People of God as consonant to the holy Scriptures and grounded thereon By this means though they could not satisfie the Sadduces as Hereticks and Sectaries commonly are obstinate yet so far they satisfied the generality of the People that they grew into very great esteem with them and within a while carried all before them the detestation of the Sadduces and of their loose Errors also conducing not a little thereunto And who now but the Pharisees and what now but Tradition In every Mans eye and mouth Things being at this pass any Wise Man may Judge how easie a matter it was for Men so reverenced as the Pharisees were to abuse the Credulity of the People and the interest they had in their good Opinion to their own advantage to make themselves Lords of the Peoples Faith and by little and little to bring into the Worship whatsoever Doctrines and observances they pleased and all under the acceptable name of the Traditions of the Elders And so they did winning continually upon the People by their cunning and shews of Religion and proceeding still more and more till the Iewish Worship by their means was grown to that height of superstition and formality as we see it was in our Saviours days Such was the beginning and such the rise of these Pharisaical Traditions 15. Popish Traditions also both came in and grew up just after the same manner The Orthodox Bishops and Doctors in the ancient Church being to maintain the Trinity of Persons in the Godhead the Consubstantiality of the Son with the Father the Hypostatical union of the two Natures in the Person of Christ the Divinity of the Holy Ghost and other like Articles of the Catholick Religion against the Arrians Eunomians Macedonians and other Hereticks for that the words Trinity Homoiision Hypostasis Procession c. which for the better expressing of the Catholick sence they were forced to use were not expresly to be found in the holy Scriptures had recourse therefore very often in their writings against the Hereticks of their times to the Tradition of the Church Whereby they meant not as the Papists would now wrest their words any unwritten Doctrine not contained in the Scriptures but the very Doctrine of the Scriptures themselves as they had been constantly understood and believed by all faithful Christians in the Catholick Church down from the Apostles times till the several present Ages wherein they lived This course of theirs of so serviceable and necessary use in those times gave the first occasion and after-rise to that heap of Errors and Superstitions which in process of time by the Power and Policy of the Bishop of Rome especially were introduced into the Christian Church under the specious name and colour of Catholick Traditions Thus have they trodden in the steps of their Forefathers the Pharisees and stand guilty even as they of the Superstition here condemned by our Saviour in teaching for Doctrines mens Precepts 16. But if the Church of Rome be cast how shall the Church of England be quit That symbolizeth so much with her in many of her Ceremonies and otherwise What are all our crossings and kneelings and duckings What Surplice and Ring and all those other Rites and Accoutrements that are used in or about the Publick Worship but so many Commandments of men For it cannot be made appear nor truly do I think was it ever endeavoured that God hath any where commanded them Indeed these things have been objected heretofore with clamour enough and the cry is of late revived again with more noise and malice than ever in a world of base and unworthy Pamphlets that like the Frogs of Aegypt croak in every corner of the Land And I pray God the suffering of them to multiply into such heaps do not cause the whole Land so to stink in his Nostrils that he grow weary of it and forsake us But I undertook to justifle the Church of
and power over the Creatures First if any shall oppose the legal Prohibitions of the Old Testament whereby some Creatures were forbidden the Iews pronounced by God himself unclean and decreed unlawful it should not trouble us For whatever the principal reasons were for which those prohibitions were then made unto them as there be divers reasons given thereof by Divines both ancient and modern certain it is they now concern not us The Church during her non-age and pupillage though she were Heir of all and had right to all yet was to be held under Tutors and Governours and to be trained up under the Law of Ceremonies as under a School master during the appointed time But When the fulness of the time appointed was come her wardship expired and livery sued out as it were by the coming and suffering of Christ in the flesh the Church was then to enter upon her full Royalties and no more to be burdened with those beggarly rudiments of legal observances The hand-writing of Ordinances was then blotted out and the muddy partition wall broken down and the legal impurity of the Creatures scowred off by the blood of Christ. They have little to do then but withal much to answer who by seeking to bring in Iudaism again into the Christian Church either in whole or in part do thereby as much as lieth in them though perhaps unawares to themselves yet indeed and in truth evacuate the Cross of Christ. In that large sheet of the Creatures which reacheth from Heaven to the Earth whatsoever we find we may freely kill and eat and use every other way to our comforts without scruple God having cleansed all we are not to call or esteem any thing common or unclean God having created all good we are to refuse nothing If any shall oppose secondly the seeming morality of some of these prohibitions as being given before the law of Ceremonies pressed from Moral Reasons and confirmed by Apostolical Constitution since upon which ground some would impose upon the Christian Church this as a perpetual yoke to abstain from blood Or thirdly the Prophanation which some Creatures have contracted by being used in the exercise of idolatrous Worship whereby they become Anathema and are to be held as execrable things as Achan's wedge was and the Brazen Serpent which Hezekiah stamped to powder upon which ground also some others have inferred an utter unlawfulness to use any thing in the Church which was abused in Popery by calling them Rags and Reliques of Idolatry neither this nor that ought to trouble us For although neither my aim which lieth another way nor the time will permit me now to give a just and full satisfying answer to the several Instances and their grounds yet the very words and weight of my Text do give us a clear resolution in the general and sufficient to rest our Consciences and our Iudgments and Practice upon that notwithstanding all pretensions of reason to the contrary yet these things for so much as they are still good ought not to be refused For the Apostle hath here laid a sure foundation and impregnable in that he groundeth the use upon the power and from the Goodness of the Creature inferreth the lawfulness of it Every Creature of God is good and nothing to be refused He concludeth it is therefore not to be refused because it is good So that look whatsoever Goodness there is in any Creature that is whatsoever natural power it hath which either immediately and of it self is or may by the improvement of human Art and Industry be taught to be of any use unto man for necessity nourishment service lawful delight or otherwise the Creature wherein such goodness or power is to be found may not be refused as upon tie of Conscience but that power and goodness it hath may lawfully be employed to those uses for which it is meet in regard thereof Ever provided we be careful to observe all those requisite conditions which must guide our Consciences and regulate our Practice in the use of all lawful and indifferent things They that teach otherwise lay burdens upon their own Consciences which they need not and upon the Consciences of their Brethren which they should not and are injurious to that liberty which the blessed Son of God hath purchased for his Church and which the blessed Spirit of God hath asserted in my Text. Injurious in the second place to this branch of our Christian liberty is the Church of Rome whom St. Paul in this passage hath branded with an indelible note of infamy inasmuch as those very Doctrines wherein he giveth instance as in Doctrines of Devils are the received Tenets and Conclusions of that Church Not to insist on other prejudices done to Christian liberty by the intolerable usurpation of the man of sin who exerciseth a spiritual Tyranny over mens Consciences as opposite to Evangelical liberty as Antichrist is to Christ let us but a little see how she hath fulfilled St. Paul's Prediction in teaching lying and devilish Doctrines and that with seared Consciences and in Hypocrisie in the two specialties mentioned in the next former Verse viz. forbidding to marry and commanding to abstain from Meats Marriage the holy Ordinance of God instituted in the place and estate of Innocency honoured by Christ's presence at Cana in Galilee the Seed-plot of the Church and the sole allowed remedy against Incontinency and burning lusts by the Apostle commended as honourable in all men and commanded in case of ustion to all men is yet by this purple strumpet forbidden and that sub mortali to Bishops Priests Deacons Sub deacons Monks Friars Nuns in a word to the whole Clergy as they extend that title both Secular and Regular Wherein besides the Devilishness of the Doctrine in contrarying the Ordinance of God and in denying men subject to sinful lusts the lawful remedy and so casting them upon a necessity of sinning see if they do not teach this lye with seared Consciences For with what Conscience can they make the same thing a Sacrament in the Lay and Sacrilege in the Clergy With what Conscience permit Stews and forbid Marriage With what Conscience alledge Scriptures for the single life of Priests and yet confess it to be an Ordinance only of Ecclesiastical and not of Divine right With what Conscience confess Fornication to be against the Law of God and Priests Marriage only against the Law of holy Church and yet make Marriage in a Priest a far fouler sin than Fornication or Incest With what Conscience exact a vow of Continency from Clerks by those Canons which defend their open Incontinency With what Conscience forbid lawful Marriages to some and yet by dispensation allow unlawful Marriages to others And is not the like also done in the other particular concerning Meats The Laws of that
Church forbidding some Orders of men some kinds of Meats perpetually and all men some Meats upon certain days and that not for civil Respects but with opinion of satisfaction yea merit yea and Supererogation too In which also besides the Devilishness of the Doctrine in corrupting the profitable and religious exercise of fasting and turning it into a superstitious observation of Days and Meats judge if they do not teach this Lye also as the former with seared Consciences For with what Conscience can they allow an ordinary Confessor to absolve for Murder Adultery Perjury and such petty crimes but reserve the great sin of eating flesh upon a Friday or Ember-day to the censure of a Penitentiary as being a matter beyond the power of an ordinary Priest to grant absolution for With what Conscience make the tasting of the coarsest flesh a breach of the Lent-fast and surfeiting upon the delicatest Fishes and Confections none With what Conscience forbid they such and such meats for the taming of the flesh when they allow those that are far more nutritive of the flesh and incentive of fleshly Lusts With what Conscience enjoyn such abstinence for a penance and then presently release it again for a Peny Indeed the Gloss upon the Canon that doth so hath a right worthy and a right wholesom note Note saith the Gloss That he who giveth a Peny to redeem his Fast though he give money for a speritual thing yet he doth not commit Simony because the Contract is made with God If these men had not seared up their Consciences would they not think you feel some check at the broaching of such ridiculous and inconsistent stuff as floweth from these two heads of Devilish Doctrines of forbidding to marry and commanding to abstain from Meats I deny not but the Bawds of that strumpet the Doctors of that Church have their colourable pretences wherewith to blanch over these errors else the Lyes would be palpable and they should not otherwise fill up the measure of their Apostasie according to the Apostles Prophecy in teaching these Lyes in Hypocrisie But the colours though never so artificially tempered and never so handsomly laid on are yet so thin that a steddy eye not bleared with prejudice may discern the Lye through them for all the Hypocrisie as might easily be shewn if my intended course led me that way and did not rather direct me to matter of more profitable and universal use Having therefore done with them it were good for us in the third place that we might know our own free-hold with better certainty and keep our selves within our due bounds to enquire a little what is the just extent of our Christian liberty unto the Creatures and what restraints it may admit A point very needful to be known for the resolution of many doubts in Conscience and for the cutting off of many questions and disputes in the Church which are of very noysom consequence for want of right information herein I have other matter also to entreat of and therefore since I may not allow this Enquiry so large a Discourse as it well deserveth I shall desire you to take into your Christian Consideration these Positions following The first Our Christian liberty extendeth to all the Creatures of God This ariseth clearly from what hath been already delivered and the testimonies of Scripture for it are express All things are pure All things are lawful All are yours elsewhere and here nothing to be refused The second Position Our Christian Liberty equally respecteth the using and the not using of any of God's Creatures There is no Creature but a Christian man by virtue of his Liberty as he may use it upon just occasion so he may also upon just cause refuse it All things are lawful for me saith St. Paul but I will not be brought under the power of any thing Where he established this Liberty in both the parts of it Liberty to use the Creatures or else they had not all been lawful for him and yet Liberty not to use them or else he had been under the power of some of them Whence it followeth that all the Creatures of God stand in the nature of things indifferent that is such as may indifferently be either used or not used according as the rules of godly discretion circumstances duly considered shall direct The third Position Our Christian Liberty for the using or not using of the Creature may without prejudice admit of some restraint in the outward practice of it Ab illicitis semper quandoque à licitis I think it is St. Gregory's A Christian must never do unlawful nor yet always lawful things St. Paul had liberty to eat flesh and he used that liberty and ate flesh yet he knew there might be some cases wherein to abridge himself of the use of that liberty so far as not to eat flesh whilst the world standeth But what those Restraints are and how far they may be admitted without prejudice done to that liberty that we may the better understand let us go on to The fourth Position Sobriety may and ought to restrain us in the outward practice of our Christian liberty For our Diet all Fish and Flesh and Fowl and Fruits and Spices are lawful for us as well as Bread and Herbs but may we therefore with thriftless prodigality and exquisite riot fare deliciously and sumptuously every day under pretence of Christian liberty Likewise for our Apparel all stuffs and colours the richest Silks and Furs and Dyes are as lawful for us as Cloth and Leather and Sheeps-russet Christian liberty extendeth as well to one as another But do we think that liberty will excuse our pride and vanity and excess if we tuffle it out in Silks and Scarlets or otherwise in stuff colour or fashion unsuitably to our Years Sex Calling Estate or Condition In all other things of like nature in our Buildings in our Furniture in our Retinues in our Disports in our Recreations in our Society in our Marriages in other things we ought as well to consider what in Christian Sobriety is meet for us to do as what in Christian liberty may be done Scarce is there any one thing wherein the Devil putteth slurs upon us more frequently yea and more dangerously too because unsuspected than in this very thing in making us take the uttermost of our freedom in the use of indifferent things It therefore concerneth us so much the more to keep a sober watch over our selves and souls in the use of God's good Creatures lest otherwise under the fair title and habit of Christian Liberty we yield our selves over to a carnal Licentiousness The fifth Position As Sobriety so Charity also may and ought to restrain us in the outward exercise of our Christian Liberty Charity I say both to our selves and others First to our selves for regular Charity beginneth there If we are to
it is this a very good one too viz. That when we are to try the Doctrines we should duly examine them whether they be according unto Godliness yea or no. Our Saviours direction for the discovery of false Prophets Mat. 7. is to this very purpose Ex fructibus Ye shall know them by their fruits Meaneth he it trow you of the fruits of their lives in their outward Conversation Verily no not only no nor principally neither perhaps not at all For Falshood is commonly set off by Hypocrisie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the next following verse here Shews of Sanctity and Purity pretensions of Religion and Reformation is the wool that the woolf wrappeth about him when he meaneth to do most mischief with least suspicion The Old Serpent sure is never so silly as to think his Ministers the Ministers of darkness should be able to draw in a considerable party into their communion should they appear in their dismal colours therefore he putteth them into a new dress before he sendeth them abroad disguising and transforming them as if they were the Ministers of righteousness and of the light Our Saviour therefore cannot mean the fruits of their lives so much if at all as the fruits of their Doctrines that is to say the necessary consequents of their Doctrines such Conclusions as naturally and by good and evident discourse do issue from their Doctrines And so understood it is a very useful Rule even in the Affirmative taking in other requisite conditions withal but in the Negative taken even alone and by it self it holdeth infallibly If what is spoken seem to be according to Godliness it is the better to like onward and the more likely to be true yet may it possibly be false for all that and therefore it will be needful to try it farther and to make use of other Criterions withal But if what is spoken upon examination appear to have any repugnancy with Godliness in any one branch or duty thereunto belonging we may be sure the words cannot be wholsom words It can be no heavenly Doctrine that teacheth men to be Earthly Sensual or Devilish or that tendeth to make men unjust in their dealings uncharitable in their censures undutiful to their superiors or any other way superstitious licentious or prophane 32. I note it not without much rejoycing and gratulating to us of this Church There are God knoweth a-foot in the Christian World Controversies more than a good many Decads Centuries Chiliads of novel Tenents brought in in this last Age which were never believed many of them scarce ever heard of in the Ancient Church by Sectaries of all sorts Now it is our great comfort blessed be God for it that the Doctrine established in the Church of England I mean the publick Doctrine for that is it we are to hold us to passing by private Opinions I say the publick Doctrine of our Church is such as is not justly chargeable with any Impiety contrarious to any part of that Duty we owe either to God or Man Oh that our Conversations were as free from exception as our Religion is Oh that we were sufficiently careful to preserve the honour and lustre of the Truth we profess by the correspondency of our lives and actions thereunto 33. And upon this point we dare boldly joyn issue with our clamourous adversaries on either hand Papists I mean and Disciplinarians Who do both so loudly but unjustly accuse us and our Religion they as carnal and licentious these as Popish and superstitious As Elijah once said to the Baalites that God that answereth by fire let him be God so may we say to either of both and when we have said it not fear to put it to a fair trial That Church whose Dostrine Confession and Worship is most according to Godliness let that be the Church As for our Accusers if there were no more to be instanced in but that one cursed position alone wherein notwithstanding their disagreements otherwise they both consent That lawful Soveraigns may be by their Subjects resisted and Arms taken up against them for the cause of Religion it were enough to make good the Challenge against them both Which is such a notorious piece of Ungodliness as no man that either feareth God or King as he ought to do can speak of or think of without detestation and is certainly if either St. Peter or St. Paul those two great Apostles understood themselves a branch rather of that other great mystery 2 Thes. 2. the mystery of Iniquity than of the great mystery here in the Text the mystery of Godliness There is not that point in Popery besides to my understanding that maketh it savour so strongly of Antichrist as this one dangerous and desperate point of Iesuitism doth Wherein yet those men that are ever bawling against our Ceremonies and Service as Antichristian do so deeply and wretchedly symbolize with them The Lord be judge between them and us whether our Service or their Doctrine be the more Antichristian 34. I have done with the former Inference for the trial of Doctrines there is another yet behind for the bettering of our lives For sith Christianity is a mystery of Godliness it concerneth every Christian man so to take the mystery along with him that he leave not Godliness behind That is whatsoever becometh of doubtful Controversies to look well to his life and to make conscience of practising that which without all Controversie is his Duty I know Controversies must be looked into and it were well if it were done by them and by them only whose Gifts and Callings serve for it For Truths must be maintained Errors must be refuted and the Mouths of gain-sayers must be stopped All this must be done it is true but it is as true when all this is done still the shortest cut to heaven is Faith and Godliness 35. I know not how better to draw my Sermon towards a conclusion than by observing how the great Preacher concludeth his Eccles. last After he had taken a large and exact survey of all the travels that are done under the Sun and found nothing in them but Vanity and Vexation of Spirit he telleth us at length that in multitude of Books and much reading we may sooner meet with weariness than satisfaction But saith he if you will hear the end of all here it is this is the Conclusion of the whole matter Fear God and keep his Commandments for this is the whole business of man upon which all his care and employment in this world should be spent So I say we may puzzle our selves in the pursuit of knowledg dive into the mysteries of all Arts and Sciences especially ingulph our selves deep in the studies of those three highest Professions of Physick Law and Divinity For Physick search into the Writings of Hippocrates Galen and the Methodists of Avicen and the Empyricks of Paracelsus and the Chymists for Law wrestle through the large bodies
to leave them a competence and in the hands of a God that would provide for all that kept innocence and trusted in his providence and protection which he had always found enough to make and keep him happy There was in his Diocess a Minister of almost his Age that had been of Lincoln Colledge when he left it who visited him often and always welcom because he was a Man of Innocence and open-heartedness This Minister asked the Bishop what Books he studied most when he laid the foundation of his great and clear Learning To which his Answer was That he declin'd reading many Books but what he did read were well chosen and read so often that he became very familiar with them and told him they were chiefly three Aristotle's Rhetorick Acquinas's Secunda Secundae and Tully but chiefly his Offices which he had not read over less than 20 times and could at this Age repeat without Book And told him also the learned Civilian Doctor Zouch who died lately had writ Elementa jurisprudentiâ—e which was a Book that he thought he could also say without Book and that no wise man could read it too often or love or commend it too much and he told him the study of these had been his toyl But for himself he always had a natural love to Genealogies and Heraldry and that when his thoughts were harassed with any perplext Studies he left off and turned to them as a recreation and that his very recreation had made him so perfect in them that he could in a very short time give an account of the Descent Arms and Antiquity of any Family of the Nobility or Gentry of this Nation Before I give an account of his last sickness I desire to tell the Reader that he was of a healthful constitution chearful and mild of an even temper very moderate in his diet and had had little sickness till some few years before his death but was then every Winter punish'd with a Diarrhed which left him not till warm weather return'd and remov'd it And this Distemper did as he grew elder seize him oftner and continue longer with him But though it weakned him yet it made him rather indispos'd than sick and did no way disable him from studying indeed too much In this decay of his strength but not of his memory or reason for this Distemper works not upon the understanding he made his last Will of which I shall give some account for confirmation of what hath been said and what I think convenient to be known before I declare his death and burial He did in his last Will give an account of his Faith and Perswasion in Point of Religion and Church-Government in these very words I Robert Sanderson Dr. of Divinity an unworthy Minister of Iesus Christ and by the providence of God Bishop of Lincoln being by the long continuance of an habitual distemper brought to a great bodily weakness and faintness of spirits but by the great mercy of God without any bodily pain otherwise or decay of understanding do make this my Will and Testament written all with my own hand revoking all former Wills by me heretofore made if any such shall be found First I commend my Soul into the hands of Almighty God as of a faithful Creator which I humbly beseech him mercifully to accept looking upon it not as it is in it self infinitely polluted with sin but as it is redeemed and purged with the precious blood of his only beloved Son and my most sweet Saviour Iesus Christ in confidence of whose merits and mediation alone it is that I cast my self upon the mercy of God for the pardon of my sins and the hopes of eternal life And here I do profess that as I have lived so I desire and by the grace of God resolve to dye in the Communion of the Catholick Church of Christ and a true Son of the Church of England which as it stands by Law established to be both in Doctrine and Worship agreable to the Word of God and in the most and most material Points of both conformable to the Faith and practice of the godly Churches of Christ in the primitïve and purer times I do firmly believe led so to not so much from the force of custom and education to which the greatest part of mankind owe their particular different perswasions in point of Religion as upon the clear evidence of truth and reason after a serious and unpartial examination of the grounds as well of Popery as Puritanism according to that measure of understanding and those opportunities which God hath afforded me and herein I am abundantly satisfied that the Schiâ—m which the Papists on the one hand and the Superstition which the Puritan on the other hand lay to our charge are very justly chargeable upon themselves respectively Wherefore I humbly beseech Almighty God the Father of Mercies to preserve the Church by his power and providence in peace truth and Godliness evermore to the worlds end which doubtless he will do if the wickedness and security of a sinful people and particularly those sins that are so rife and seem daily to increase among us of Unthankfulness Riot and Sacriledge do not tempt his patience to the contrary And I also farther humbly beseech him that it would please him to give unto our gracious Sovereign the Reverend Bishops and the Parliament timely to consider the great danger that visibly threatens this Church in point of Religion by the late great increase of Popery and in point of Revenue by sacrilegious enclosures and to provide such wholsom and effectual remedies as may prevent the same before it be too late And for a further manifestation of his humble thoughts and desires they may appear to the Reader by another part of his Will which follows As for my corruptible Body I bequeath it to the Earth whence it was taken to be decently buried in the Parish Church of Bugden towards the upper end of the Chancel upon the second or at the farthest the third day after my decease and that with as little Noise Pomp and Charge as may be without the invitation of any person how near soever related unto me other than the Inhabitants of Bugden without the unnecessary expence of Escutcheons Gloves Ribonds c. and without any Blacks to be hung any where in or about the House or Church other than a Pulpit-Cloth a Hearse-Cloth and a Mourning Gown for the Preacher whereof the former after my Body shall be interred to be given to the Preacher of the Funeral Sermon and the latter to the Curat of the Parish for the time being And my Will further is That the Funeral Sermon be preached by my own Houshold Chaplain containing some wholesome Discourse concerning Mortality the Resurrection of the Dead and the last Iudgment and that he shall have for his pains 5 l. upon condition that he speak nothing at all concerning my person either good or ill other
Books writ ex professo against the being of any original sin and that Adam by his fall transmitted some calamity only but no Crime to his Posterity the good old man was exceedingly troubled and bewailed the misery of those licentious times and seem'd to wonder save that the times were such that any should write or be permitted to publish any Error so contradictory to truth and the Doctrine of the Church of England established as he truly said by clear evidence of Scripture and the just and supreme power of this Nation both Sacred and Civil I name not the Books nor their Authors which are not unknown to learned men and I wish they had never been known because both the Doctrine and the unadvis'd Abettors of it are anâ— shall be to me Apocryphâ—l Another little story I must not pass in silence being an Argument of Dr. Sanderson's Piety great Ability and Judgment as a Casuist Discoursing with an honourable Person whose Piety I value more than his Nobility and Learning though both be great about a case of Conscience concerning Oaths and Vows their Nature and Obligation in which for some particular Reasons he then desired more fully to be inform'd I commended to him Dr. Sanderson's Book De Iuramento which having read with great satisfaction he ask'd me If I thought the Doctor could be induced to write Cases of Conscience if he might have an honorary Pension allow'd him to furnish him with Books for that purpose I told him I believe he would and in a Letter to the Doctor told him what great satisfaction that Honourable Person and many more had reaped by reading his Book De Iuramento and ask'd him whether he would be pleas'd for the benefit of the Church to write some Tract of Cases of Conscience He reply'd That he was glad that any had received any benefit by his Books and added further That if any future Tract of his could bring such benefit to any as we seem'd to say his former had done he would willingly though without any Pension set about that work Having received this answer that honourable Person before mention'd did by my hands return 50 l. to the good Doctor whose condition then as most good mens at that time were was but low and he presently revised finished and published that excellent Book De Conscientiâ A Book little in bulk but not so if we consider the benefit an intelligent Reader may receive by it For there are so many general Propositions concerning Conscience the Nature and Obligation of it explained and proved with such firm consequence and evidence of Reason that he who reads remembers and can with prudence pertinently apply them Hic nunc to particular Cases may by their light and help rationally resolve a thousand particular doubts and scruples of Conscience Here you may see the Charity of that honourable Person in promoting and the Piety and Industry of the good Doctor in performing that excellent work And here I shall add the Judgment of that learned and pious Prelate concerning a passage very pertinent to our present purpose When he was in Oxon and read his publick Lectures in the Schools as Regius Professor of Divinity and by the truth of his Positions and evidences of his Proofs gave great content and satisfaction to all his hearers especially in his clear Resolutions of all difficult Cases which occur'd in the Explication of the subject matter of his Lectures a Person of Quality yet alive privately ask'd him What course a young Divine should take in his Studies to enable him to be a good Casuist His answer was That a convenient understanding of the Learned Languages at least of Hebrew Greek Latin and a sufficient knowledge of Arts and Sciences presuppos'd There were two things in humane Literature a comprehension of which would be of very great use to enable a man to be a rational and able Casuist which otherwise was very difficult if not impossible 1. A convenient knowledge of Moral Philosophy especially that part of it which treats of the Nature of Humane Actions To know quid sit actus humanus spontaneus invitus mixtus unde habent bonitatem malitiam moralem an ex genere objecto vel ex circumstantiis How the variety of circumstances varies the goodness or evil of humane Actions How far knowledge and ignorance may aggravate or excuse increase or diminish the goodness or evil of our Actions For every Case of Conscience being only this Is this Action good or bad May I do it or may I not He who in these knows not how and whence humane Actions become morally good and evil never can in Hypothesi rationally and certainly determine whether this or that particular Action be so 2. The second thing which he said would be a great help and advantage to a Casuist was a convenient knowledge of the Nature and Obligation of Laws in general To know what a Law is what a natural and a Positive Law what 's required to the Latio dispensatio derogatio vel abrogatio legis what promulgation is antecedently required to the Obligation of any Positive Law what ignorance takes off the Obligation of a Law or does excuse diminish or aggravate the transgression For every Case of Conscience being only this Is this lawful for me or is it not and the Law the only Rule and Measure by which I must judg of the lawfulness or unlawfulness of any Action It evidently follows that he who in these knows not the Nature and Obligation of Laws never can be a good Casuist or rationally assure himself or others of the lawfulness or unlawfulness of Actions in particular This was the Judgment and good counsel of that learned and pious Prelate and having by long experience found the truth and benefit of it I conceive I could not without ingratitude to him and want of charity to others conceal it Pray pardon this rude and I fear impertinent Scrible which if nothing else may signifie thus much that I am willing to obey your Desires and am indeed London May 10. 1678. Your affectionate Friend Thomas Lincoln THE PREFACE TO THE READER HOW these Sermons will be looked upon if at all looked upon by the men of the Times is no very â—ard matter to conjecture I confess they are not A-la mode nor fitted to the Palate of those men who are resolved before-hand without tasting or trial to nauseate as unsavoury and unwholesome whatsoever shall be tendered unto them from the hand of an Episcopal Divine And therefore the republishing of them in this state of Church-affairs now the things so much contended for in some of them are worn out of date and thrown aside will be deemed at least a very unseasonable Undertaking to as much purpose perhaps it will be said as if a man would this year re-print an Almanack for the Last For the latter part of the Objection at the peril be it of those that had the hardiness
conscious to my self to have said any thing in the Papers now or at any time heretofore with my allowance published that may give just offence to or merit the hard censure of any sober dispassionate man and that if yet I must fall under some mis-censures it is not my case alone but of many others also wrapt with me in the same common guilt I shall therefore reduce my discourse herein ab hypothesi ad thesin and propose the Objections with my Answers thereunto though with some reflection upon my self in most of the particulars yet as laid against the generality of those mens Sermons Writings and other Discourses who according to the new style of late years taken among us go under the name of the Prelatical Party or Episcopal Divines § IV. The Objections are 1. That in their ordinary Sermons they take any small occasion but when they Preach at the Visitations where most of the Clergy of the Voisinage are convened set themselves purposely in their whole Discourse to let fly at their Godly Brethren who out of tenderness of Conscience dare not submit to some things endeavoured to be imposed upon them by the Prelates The Poor Puritan is sure to be paid home he must be brought under the lash and exposed to contempt and scorn at every publick meeting the Papists professed Enemies of our Church and Religion escaping in the mean while Scot-free seldom or never medled withal in any of their Sermons 2. Or if sometimes some little matter be done that way by some of them it is so little that it is to as little purpose rather for fashions sake ad faciendum Populum and to avoid suspicion than for any ill will they bear them Perhaps give them a light touch by the way a gentle rub as they pass along that shall do them no harm but their Brethren that profess the same Protestant Religion with them they handle with a rougher hand With Elder-guns and Paper-pellits they shoot at those but against these they play with Cannon-bullet 3. And all this anger but for Ceremonies Trifles even in their own esteem who plead hardest for them If they be indeed such Indifferent things as they confess them to be and would have the World believe they make no other account of them Why do they dote on them so extreamly themselves Why do they press them upon others with so much importunity Why do they quarrel with their brethren eternally about them 4. The truth is both We and They judge otherwise of them than as Indifferent things They think them necessary whatever they pretend or else they would not lay so much weight upon them And we hold them Popish Antichristian and superstitious or else we would not so stiffly refuse them 5. It is not therefore without cause that we suspect the Authors of such Sermons and Treatises as have come abroad in the defence of such trash to be Popishly-affected or at least to have been set on by some Popish Bishops or Chancellors though perhaps without any such intention in themselves on purpose to promote the Papal Interest here and to bring back the people of this Nation by degrees if not into the heart and within the Walls of Babylon yet at leastwise into the confines and within the view of it 6. Which as it appeareth otherwise to wit by their great willingness to allow such qualifications to sundry Doctrines taught in the Church of Rome and such interpretations to sundry taught in our Church as may bring them to the nearest agreement and their great endeavours to find out such Expedients as might best bring on a perfect reconciliation between the two Churches 7. So particularly in pressing with so much vehemency the observance of these Popish and Superstitious Ceremonies for which we cannot find nor do they offer to produce any either Command or Example in holy Scripture to warrant to our Consciences the use thereof 8. Which what is it else in effect than to deny the sufficiency of the Scripture to be a perfect Rule of Faith and Manners Which being one of the main Bulwarks of the Protestant Religion as it is differenced from the Roman is by these men and by this means undermined and betrayed ' § V. This is the sum and substance of the usual Censures and Objections of our Anti-Ceremonian Brethren so far as I have observed from their own speeches and writings which I have therefore set down as near as in so few words I could to their sence and for the most part in their own expressions Much of which having as I conceive received its answer before-hand in some passage or other of the ensuing Sermons might supercede me the labour of adding any more now Yet for so much as these answers lye dispersedly and not in one view I held it convenient as I have produced the Objections all together so to offer to the Reader an Answer to them all together and that in the same order as I have given them in Begging at his hands but this one very reasonable favour that he would do both himself and me so much right as not to pass his censure too haâ—tily and too severely upon any part of what is now presented to his view whether he like it or dislike it till he hath had the patience to read over the whole and allowed himself the freedom rightly and without prejudice to consider of it § VI. That which is said in the first place of their Godliness and Tenderness of Conscience is not much to the purpose as to the main business For first besides that all Parties pretend to Godliness ' Papists Anabaptists and who not even the late-sprung-up generation of Levellers whose Principles are so destructive of all that Order and Iustice by which publick societies are supported do yet style themselves as by a kind of peculiarity The Godly And that secondly it is the easiest thing in the world and nothing more common than for men to pretend Conscience when they are not minded to obey I do not believe thirdly though I am well perswaded of the godliness of many of them otherwise that the refusal of indifferent Ceremonies enjoyned by Lawful Authority is any part of their Godliness or any good fruit evidence or sign thereof But certain it is fourthly that the godliest men are men and know but in part and by the power of godliness in their hearts are no more secured from the possibility of falling into Error through Ignorance than from the possibility of falling into Sin through Infirmity And as for Tenderness of Conscience fifthly a most gracious blessed fruit of the holy Spirit of God where it is really and not in pretence only nor mistaken for sure it is no very tender Conscience though sometimes called so that straineth at a Gnat and swalloweth a Camel it is with it as with other tender things very subject to receive harm and soon put
necessity of yielding obedience thereunto wholly ceaseth and determineth and the things thereby commanded or prohibited return to their primitive and natural indifferency even in their Use also and in respect of us This is clearly our Opinion and men may easily so understand us if they will § XIV But their Opinion is that the things enjoyned are Popish and Superstitious and consequently unlawful to be used And this they render as the reason of their Non-conformity And the Reason were certainly good if the Opinion were true For the Popishness first unless we should sue out a Writ de finibus regendis it will be hard to find out a way how to bring this Controversie to an issue much less to an end the term hath been so strangely extended and the limits thereof if yet it have any so uncertain If they would be entreated to set bounds to what they mean by Popish and Popery by giving us a certain definition of it we should the sooner either come to some agreement or at least understand our selves and one another the better wherein and how far we disagreed In the mean time it is to me a wonder that if reason would not heretofore yet the sad experience of the ill consequents so visible of late time should not have taught them all this while to consider what infinite advantage they give to the Romish party to work upon weak and wavering souls by damning so many things under the name of Popery which may to their understandings be sufficiently evidenced Some to have been used by the ancient Christians long before Popery was hatched or but in the Egg and All to have nothing of Superstition or Popery in them unless every thing that is used in the Church of Rome become thereby Popish and Superstitious Nor what great advantage they give to our newer Sectaries to extend the name yet farther Who by the help of their New-Lights can discern Popery not only in the Ceremonies formerly under debate but even in the Churches and Pulpits wherein they used to Preach against Popery and the Bells wherewith they used to call the people together to hear them These are by some of them cry'd down as Popish with other things very many which their Presbyterian Brethren do yet both allow and practise though how long they will so do is uncertain if they go on with the Work of Reformation they have begun with as quick dispatch and at the rate they have done these last two seven years The having of God-fathers at Baptism Churching of Women Prayers at the burial of the dead Children asking their Parents blessing c. which whilome were held innocent are now by very many thrown aside as rags of Popery Nay are not some gone so far already as to cast into the same heap not only the ancient hymn Gloria Patri for the repeating whereof alone some have been deprived of all their livelihoods and the Apostles Creed but even the use of the Lords Prayer it self And what will ye do in the end thereof And what would you have us do in the mean time when you call hard upon us to leave our Popery and yet would never do us the favour to let us know what it is It were good therefore both for your own sakes that you may not rove in infinitum and in compassion to us that you would give us a perfect boundary of what is Popery now with some Prognostication or Ephemerides annexed if you please whereby to calculate what will be Popery seven years hence § XV. But to be serious and not to indulge my self too much merriment in so sad a business I believe all those men will be found much mistaken who either measure the Protestant Religion by an opposition to Popery or account all Popery that is taught or practised in the Church of Rome Our godly Fore-fathers to whom under God we owe the purity of our Religion and some of which laid down their lives for the defence of the same were sure of another mind if we may from what they did judge what they thought They had no purpose nor had they any warrant to sâ—t up a new Religion but to reform the Old by purging it from those Innovations which in tract of time some sooner some later had mingled with it and corrupted it both in the Doctrine and Worship According to this purpose they produced without constraint or precipitancy freely and advisedly as in peaceable times and brought their intentions to a happy end as by the result thereof contained in the Articles and Liturgy of our Church and the Prefaces thereunto doth fully appear From hence chiefly as I conceive we are to take our best scantling whereby to judge what is and what is not to be esteemed Popery All those Doctrines then held by the modern Church of Rome which are either contrary to the written Word of God or but super-added thereunto as necessary Points of Faith to be of all Christians believed under pain of damnation and all those Superstitions used in the worship of God which either are unlawful as being contrary to the Word or being not contrary and therefore arbitrary and indifferent are made Essentials and imposed as necessary parts of Worship these are as I take it the things whereunto the name of Popery doth properly and peculiarly belong But as for the Ceremonies used in the Church of Rome which the Church of England at the Reformation thought fit to retain not as Essential or necessary parts of Gods Service but only as accidental and mutable circumstances attending the same for order comliness and edification sake how these should deserve the name of Popish I so little understand that I profess I do not yet see any reason why if the Church had then thought fit to have retained some other of those which were then laid aside she might not have lawfully so done or why the things so retained should have been accounted Popish The plain truth is this The Church of England meant to make use of her liberty and the lawful power she had as all the Churches of Christ have or ought to have of ordering Ecclesiastical Affairs here yet to do it with so much prudence and moderation that the World might see by what was laid aside that she acknowledged no subjection to the See of Rome and by what was retained that she did not recede from the Church of Rome out of any spirit of contradiction but as necessitated thereunto for the maintenance of her just liberty The number of Ceremonies was also then very great and they thereby burdensome and so the number thought fit to be lessened But for the Choice which should be kept and which not that was wholly in her power and at her discretion Whereof though she were not bound so to do yet hath she given a clear and satisfactory account in one of the Prefaces usually prefixed before the Book of Common-Prayer § XVI Besides this of Popish they
obedience to these ceremonial Constitutions she hath no other purpose than to reduce all her Children to an orderly uniformity in the outward worship of God so far is she from seeking to draw any opinion either of divine necessity upon the Constitution or of effectual holiness upon the Ceremony And as for the prejudice which seemeth hereby to be given to Christian Liberty it is so slender a conceit that it seemeth to bewray in the Objectors desire not so much of satisfaction as cavil For first the liberty of a Christian to all indifferent things is in the Mind and Conscience and is then infringed when the conscience is bound and straitned by imposing upon it an opinion of doctrinal necessity But it is no wrong to the Liberty of a Christian mans conscience to bind him to outward observance for Orders sake and to impose upon him a necessity of Obedience Which one distinction of Doctrinal and Obediential Necessity well weighed and rightly applied is of it self sufficient to clear all doubts in this point For to make all restraint of the outward man in matters indifferent an impeachment of Christian Liberty what were it else but even to bring flat Anabaptism and Anarchy into the Church and to overthrow all bond of subjection and obedience to lawful Authority I beseech you consider wherein can the immediate power and Authority of Fathers Masters and other Rulers over their Inferiors consist or the due obedience of Inferiors be shewn towards them if not in these Indifferent and Arbitrary things For things absolutely necessary as commanded by God we are bound to do whether humane Authority require them or no and things absolutely unlawful as prohibited by God we are bound not to do whether humane Authority forbid them or no. There are none other things left then wherein to express properly the Obedience due to superior Authority than these Indifferent things And if a Father or Master have power to prescribe to his Child or Servant in indifferent things and such restraint be no way prejudicial to Christian liberty in them why should any man either deny the like power to Church-Governours to make Ecclesiastical Constitutions concerning indifferent things or interpret that power to the prejudice of Christian Liberty And again Secondly Men must understand that it is an error to think Ceremonies and Constitutions to be things merely indifferent I mean in the general For howsoever every particular Ceremony be indifferent and every particular Constitution arbitrary and alterable yet that there should be some Ceremonies it is necessary Necessitate absolutâ in as much as no outward work can be performed without Ceremonial Circumstances some or other and that there should be some Constitutions concerning them it is also necessary though not simply and absolutely as the former yet Ex hypothese and necessitate convenientiae Otherwise since some Ceremonies must needs be used every Parish nay every Man would have his own fashion by himself as his humour led him wherefore what other could be the issue but infinite distraction and unorderly confusion in the Church And again thirdly To return their weapon upon themselves if every restraint in indifferent things be injurious to Christian Liberty then themselves are injurious no less by their negative restraint from some Ceremonies Wear not Cross not Kneel not c. than they would have the World believe our Church is by her positive restraint unto the Ceremonies of wearing and crossing and kneeling c. Let indifferent men judge nay let themselves that are parties judge Whether is more injurious to Christian Liberty publick Authority by mature advice commanding what might be forborn or private spirits through humorous dislikes forbidding what may be used the whole Church imposing the use or a few Brethren requiring the forbearance of such things as are otherwise and in themselves equally indifferent for use or for forbearance But they say Our Church maketh greater matters of Ceremonies than thus and preferreth them even before the most necessary duties of Preaching and administring the Sacraments in as much as they are imposed upon Ministers under pain of Suspension and Deprivation from their Ministerial Functions and Charges First for actual Deprivation I take it unconforming Ministers have no great cause to complain Our Church it is well known hath not always used that rigor she might have done Where she hath been forced to proceed as far as Deprivation she hath ordinarily by her fair and slow and compassionate proceedings therein sufficiently manifested her unwillingness thereto and declared her self a Mother every way indulgent enough to such ill-nurtured Children as will not be ruled by her Secondly Those that are suspended or deprived suffer it but justly for their obstinacy and contempt For howsoever they would bear the World in hand that they are the only persecuted ones and that they suffered for their Consciences yet in truth they do but abuse the credulity of the simple therein and herein as in many other things jump with the Papists whom they would seem above all others most abhorrent from For as Seminary Priests and Iesuits give it out they are martyr'd for their Religion when the very truth is they are justly executed for their prodigious Treasons and felonious or treacherous Practices against lawful Princes and Estates So the Brethren pretend they are persecuted for their Consciences when indeed they are but justly censured for their obstinate and pertinacious contempt of lawful Authority For it is not the refusal of these Ceremonies they are deprived for otherwise than as the matter wherein they shew their contempt it is the Contempt it self which formerly and properly subjecteth them to just Ecclesiastical censure of Suspension or Deprivation And contempt of Authority though in the smallest matter deserveth no small punishment all Authority having been ever solicitous as it hath good reason above all things to vindicate and preserve it self from contempt by inflicting sharp punishments upon contemptuous persons in the smallest matters above all other sorts of offenders in any degree whatsoever Thus have we shewed and cleared the first and main difference betwixt the case of my Text and the case of our Church in regard of the matter the things whereabout they differed being every way indifferent ours not so And as the Matter so there is secondly much odds in the condition of the Persons The refusers in the Case of my Text being truly weak in the Faith as being but lately converted to the Christian Faith and not sufficiently instructed by the Church in the Doctrine and Use of Christian Liberty in things indifferent whereas with our refusers it is much otherwise First They are not new Proselytes but Men born and bred and brought up in the bosom of the Church yea many and the chiefest of them such as have taken upon them the calling of the Ministry and the charge of Souls
evil c. My aim at this present is to insist especially upon a Principle of practick Divinity which by joynt consent of Writers old and new Orthodox and Popish resulteth from the very body of this Verse and is of right good use to direct us in sundry difficulties which daily arise in vita communi in point of Conscience The Principle is this We must not do any evil that any good may come of it Yet there are besides this in the Text divers other inferior Observations not to be neglected With which I think it will not be amiss to begin and to dispatch them first briefly that so I may fall the sooner and stay the longer upon that which I mainly intend Observe first the Apostle's Method and substantial manner of proceeding how he cleareth all as he goeth how diligent he is and careful betimes to remove such cavils though he stept a little out of his way for it as might bring scandal to the Truth he had delivered When we Preach and instruct others we should not think it enough to deliver positive Truths but we should also take good care as near as we can to leave them clear and by prevention to stop the mouths of such as love to pick quarrels at the truth and to bark against the light It were good we would so far as our leisure and gifts will permit wisely forecast and prevent all Offence that might be taken at any part of God's Truth and be careful as not to broach any thing that is false through rashness errour or intemperance so not to betray any truth by ignorant handling or by superficial slight and unsatisfying answers But then especially concerneth it us to be most careful herein when we have to speak before such as we have some cause before hand to suspect to be through ignorance or weakness or custom or education or prejudice or partial affections or otherwise contrary minded unto or at leastwise not well perswaded of those Truths we are to teach If the ways be rough and knotty and the passengers be feeble joynted and dark-sighted it is but needful the Guides should remove as many blocks and stones out of the way as may be When we have gone as warily as we can to Work Cavillers if they list will take exceptions it is our part to see we give them no advantage lest we help to justifie the Principals by making our selves Accessories Those men are ill advised however zealous for the Truth that stir in controverted points and leave them worse than they found them A Stomach will not bear out a matter without strength and to encounter an adversary are required Shoulders as well as Gall. A good cause is never betrayed more than when it is prosecuted with much eagerness but little sufficiency This from the Method Observe secondly the Apostles manner of speech 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Translators render it As we are wrongfully blamed As we are slandered As we are slanderously reported And the word indeed from the Original importeth no more and so Writers both profane and sacred use it But yet in Scriptures by a specialty it most times signifieth the highest degree of Slander when we open our mouths against God and speak ill or amiss or unworthily of God that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and properly the sin we call Blasphemy And yet that very word of Blasphemy which for the most part referreth immediately to God the Apostle here useth when he speaketh of himself and other Christian Ministers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as we are slandered nay as we are blasphemed A slander or other wrong or contempt done to a Minister qua talis is a sin of an higher strain than the same done to a Common Christian. Not at all for his persons sake for so he is no more God's good creature than the other no more free from sins and infirmities and passions than the other But for his Calling's sake for so he is Gods Embassadour which the other is not and for his works sake for that is Gods Message which the others is not Personal Slanders and Contempts are to a Minister but as to another man because his person is but as another mans person But slanders and contempts done to him as a Minister that is with reference either to his Calling or Doctrine are much greater than to another man as reaching unto God himself whose person the Minister representeth in his Calling and whose errand the Minister delivereth in his Doctrine For Contempt S. Paul is express elsewhere He that despiseth despiseth not man but God And as for Slanders the very choice of the word in my Text inferreth as much The dignity of our Calling inhaunceth the sin and every slander against our regular Doctrines is more than a bare Calumny if no more at least petty blasphemy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as we are slandered as we are blasphemed That from the word Observe Thirdly the wrong done to the Apostle and to his Doctrine He was slanderously reported to have taught that which he never so much as thought and his Doctrine had many scandalous imputations fastened upon it whereof neither he nor it were guilty As we are slanderously reported and as some affirm that we say The best Truths are subject to mis-interpretation and there is not that Doctrine how firmly soever grounded how warily soever delivered whereon Calumny will not fasten and stick slanderous imputations Neither Iohn's Mourning nor Christ's piping can pass the Pikes but the one hath a Devil the other is a Glutton and a Wine-bibber Though Christ come to fulfil the Law yet there he will accuse him as a destroyer of the Law Matth. 5. And though he decide the question plainly for Caesar and that in the case of Tribute Matth. 22. Give unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's yet there be that charge him as if he spake against Caesar Iohn 19. and that in the very case of Tribute as if he forbad to give Tribute to Caesar Luk. 23. Now if they called the Master of the House Beelzebub how much more them of his Houshold If Christ's did not think we the Doctrine of his Ministers and his Servants could escape the stroke of mens tongues and be free from calumny and cavil How the Apostles were slandered as Seducers and Sectaries and vain Bablers and Hereticks and Broachers of new and false and pestilent Doctrines their Epistles and the Book of their Acts witness abundantly to us And for succeeding times read but the Apologies of Athenagoras and Tertullian and others and it will amaze you to see what Blasphemous and Seditious and Odious and Horrible Impieties were fathered upon the Ancient Christian Doctors and upon their Profession But our own experience goeth beyond all Sundry of the Doctors of our Church teach truly and agreeably to Scripture the effectual concurrence
of God's Will and Power with subordinate Agents in every and therefore even in sinful actions God's free Election of those whom he purposeth to save of his own grace without any motives in or from themselves the immutability of God's Love and Grace towards the Saints Elect and their certain perseverance therein unto Salvation the Iustification of sinners by the imputed righteousness of Christ apprehended and applyed unto them by a lively faith without the works of the Law These are sound and true and if rightly understood comfortable and right profitable Doctrines And yet they of the Church of Rome have the forehead I will not say to slander my Text alloweth more to blaspheme God and his Truth and the Ministers thereof for teaching them Bellarmine Gretser Maldonat and the Jesuits but none more than our own English Fugitives Bristow Stapleton Parsons Kellison and all the Rabble of that Crew freely spend their mouths in barking against us as if we made God the author of sin as if we would have men sin and be damned by a Stoical fatal necessity sin whether they will or no and be damned whether they deserve it or no as if we opened a gap to all licentiousness and profaneness let them believe it is no matter how they live Heaven is their own cock-sure as if we cryed down good works and condemned charity Slanders loud and false yet easily blown away with one single word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 These imputations upon us and our Doctrine are unjust but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let them that thus mis-report us know that without repentance their damnation will be just It would be time not ill spent to discover the grounds of this observation and to press the uses of it something fully But because my aim lyeth another way I can but point at them and pass If seldom Truth scape unslandered marvel not the reasons are evident On God's part on Man's part on the Devil's part God suffereth Man raiseth and the Devil furthereth these slanders against the Truth To begin ordine retrogrado and to take them backwards First on the Devil's part a kind of Contrariety and Antipathy betwixt him and it He being the Father of Lyes and Prince of darkness cannot away with the Truth and with the Light and therefore casteth up slanders as Fogs and Mists against the Truth to bely it and against the Light to darken it Secondly on Mans part And that partly in the understanding when the judgment either of it self weak or else weakned through precipitancy prejudice or otherwise is deceived with fallacies instead of substance and mistaketh seeming inferences for necessary and natural deductions Partly in the Will when men of corrupt minds set themselves purposely against the known truth and out of malicious wilfulness against the strong testimony of their own hearts slander it that so they may disgrace it and them that profess it Partly in the Affections when men overcome by carnal affections are content to cheat their own souls by giving such constructions to God's Truth as will for requital give largest allowance to their practices and so rather choose to crooken the Rule to their own bent than to level themselves and their affections and lives according to the Rule Thirdly on God's part who suffereth his own truth to be slandered and mistaken Partly in his Iustice as a fearful judgment upon wicked ones whereby their hard hearts become yet more hardened and their most just condemnation yet more just Partly in his goodness as a powerful fiery trial of true Doctors whose constancy and sincerity is the more approved with him and the more eminent with men if they flee not when the Wolf cometh but keep their standing and stoutly maintain God's Truth when it is deepliest slandered and hotly opposed And partly in his Wisdom as a rich occasion for those whom he hath gifted for it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to awaken their zeal to quicken up their industry to muster up their abilities to scour up their spiritual armour which else through dis-use might gather rust for the defence and for the rescue of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that precious truth whereof they are depositaries and wherewith he hath entrusted them These are the Grounds The Uses for instruction briefly are to teach and admonish every one of us that we be not either first so wickedly malicious as without apparent cause to raise any slander or secondly so foolishly credulous as without severe examination to believe any slander or thirdly so basely timorous as to flinch from any part of God's truth for any slander But I must not insist This from the slander Observe fourthly how peremptory the Apostle is in his censure against the slanderers or abusers of holy truths Whose damnation is just Some understand it with reference to the slanderers As we be slander ously reported and as some affirm that we say whose damnation is just that is their damnation is just who thus unjustly slander us Others understand it with reference to that ungodly resolution Let us do evil that good may come whose damnation is just that is their damnation is just for the evil they do who adventure to do any evil under whatsoever pretence of good to come of it Both expositions are good and I rather embrace both than prefer either I ever held it a kind of honest spiritual thirst where there are two sences given of one place both agreeable to the Analogy of Faith and Manners both so indifferently appliable to the words and scope of the place as that it is hard to say which was rather intended though there was but one intended yet to make use of both And so will we Take it the first way and the slanderer may read his doom in it Here is his wages and his portion and the meed and reward of his slander Damnation And it is a just reward He condemneth God's truth unjustly God condemneth him justly for it whose damnation is just If we be countable and we are countable at the day of Judgment for every idle word we speak though neither in it self false nor yet hurtful and prejudicial unto others what less than damnation can they expect that with much falsehood for the thing it self and infinite prejudice in respect of others blaspheme God and his holy Truth But if it be done on purpose and in malice to despight the Truth and the professors thereof I scarce know whether there be a greater sin or no. Maliciously to oppose the known Truth is by most Divines accounted a principal branch of that great unpardonable sin the sin against the holy Ghost by some the very sin it self I dare not say it is so nor yet that it is unpardonable or hath final impenitency necessarily attending it I would be loth to interclude the hope of
Multiplication not Division and by diffusion without waste As the seal maketh impression in the wáx and as fire conveyeth heat into Iron and as one candle tindeth a thousand all without loss of figure heat or light Had ever any man less knowledge or wit or learning by teaching of others had he not rather more The more wise the Preacher was the more he taught the people knowledge saith Solomon Eccles. 12. and certainly the more he taught them knowledge the more his own wisdom increased As the Widow's oil increased not in the Vessel but by pouring out and as the barley bread in the Gospel multiplied not in the whole loaf but by breaking and distributing and as the Grain bringeth increase not when it lyeth on a heap in the garner but by scattering upon the land so are these spiritual Graces best improved not by keeping them together but by distributing them abroad Tutius in credito quà m in sudario the talent gathereth nothing in the napkin unless it be rust and canker but travelling in the bank besides the good it doth as it passeth to and fro it ever returneth home with increase Thirdly our own unsufficiency to all offices and the need we have of other mens Gifts must enforce us to lend them the help and comfort of ours God hath so distributed the variety of his gifts with singular wisdom that there is no man so mean but his service may be useful to the greatest nor any man so eminent but he may sometimes stand in need of the meanest of his brethren of purpose that whilst each hath need of other each should help none should despise other As in a building the stones help one another every lower stone supporting the higher from falling to the ground and every higher stone saving the lower from taking wet and as in the body every member lendeth some supply to the rest and again receiveth supply from them so in the spiritual building and mystical body of the Church God hath so tempered the parts each having his use and each his defects that there should be no Schism in the body but that the members should have the same care one for another Such a consent there should be in the parts as was between the blind and lame man in the Epigram mutually covenanting the Blind to carry the Lame and the Lame to direct the Blind that so the Blind might find his way by the others Eyes and the Lame walk therein upon the other's Legs When a man is once come to that all-sufficiency in himself as he may truly say to the rest of his brethren I stand in no need of you let him then keep his gifts to himself but let him in the mean time remember he must employ them to the advantage of his master and to the benefit of his brother The manifestation of the spirit is given to every man to profit withal Surely then those men first of all run a course strangely exorbitant who instead of employing them to the profit bend those gifts they have received whether spiritual or temporal to the ruine and destruction of their brethren Instead of winning souls to Heaven with busie and cursed diligence compassing Sea and Land to draw Proselytes to the Devil and instead of raising up seed to their elder brother Christ seeking to make their brethren if it were possible ten times more the children of Hell than themselves Abusing their power to oppression their wealth to luxury their strength to drunkenness their wit to scoffing Atheism Prophaneness their learning to the maintenance of Heresie Idolatry Schism Novelty If there be a fearful woe due to those that use not their gifts profitably what woes may we think shall overtake them that so ungraciously abuse them But to leave these wretches be perswaded in the second place all you whom God hath made Stewards over his houshold and blessed your basket and your store to bring forth of your treasures things both new and old manifest the Spirit God hath given you so as may be most for the profit of your brethren The Spirit of God when he gave you wisdom and knowledge intended not so much the wisdom and the knowledge themselves as the manifestation of them or as it is in the next verse the Word of Wisdom and the Word of Knowledge as Christ also promised his Apostles to give them Os sapientiam a mouth and wisdom Alas what is wisdom without a mouth but as a pot of treasure hid in the ground which no man is the better for Wisdom that is hid and a treasure that is not seen what profit is in them both O then do not knit up your Masters talent in a Napkin smother not his light under a bushel pinch not his servants of their due provision put not up the Manna you have gathered till it stink and the worms consume it but above all squander not away your rich portions by riotous living Let not either sloth or envy or pride or pretended modesty or any other thing hinder you from labouring to discharge faithfully that trust and duty which God expecteth which the necessity of the Church challengeth which the measure of your gifts promiseth which the condition of your calling exacteth from you Remember the manifestation of the Spirit was given you to profit withal Thirdly since the end of all gifts is to profit aim most at those gifts that will profit most and endeavour so to frame those you have in the exercise of them as they may be likeliest to bring profit to those that shall partake of them Covet earnestly the best gifts saith my Apostle at the last verse of this Chapter and you have his Comment upon that Text in the first verse of the fourteenth Chapter Covet spiritual Gifts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but rather that ye may prophesie And by prophesying he meaneth the instruction of the Church and people of God in the needful doctrines of Faith towards God Repentance from dead works and new and holy Obedience It is one stratagem of the Arch enemy of mankind and when we know his wiles we may the better be able to defeat him by busying men of great and useful parts in by matters and things of lesser consequence to divert them from following that unum necessarium that which should be the main in all our endeavours the beating down of sin the planting of Faith and the reformation of manners Controversies I confess are necessary the tongues necessary Histories necessary Philosophy and the Arts necessary other Knowledge of all sorts necessary in the Church for Truth must be maintained Scripture-phrases opened Heresie confuted the mouths of Adversaries stopped Schisms and Novelties suppressed But when all is done Positive and Practick Divinity is it must bring us to Heaven that is it must poise our judgments settle our
consciences direct our lives mortifie our corruptions encrease our graces strengthen our comforts save our souls Hoc opus hoc studium there is no study to this none so well worth the labour as this none that can bring so much profit to others nor therefore so much glory to God nor therefore so much comfort to our own hearts as this This is a faithful saying and these things I will that thou affirm constantly saith S. Paul to Titus that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works these things are good and profitable unto men You cannot do more good unto the Church of God you cannot more profit the people of God by your gifts than by pressing effectually these two great points Faith and good Works These are good and profitable unto men I might here add other Inferences from this point as namely since the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every one of us chiefly for this end that we may profit the people with it that therefore fourthly in our preaching we should rather seek to profit our hearers though perhaps with sharp and unwelcome reproofs than to please them by flattering them in evil and that Fifthly we should more desire to bring profit unto them than to gain applause unto our selves and sundry other more besides these But I will neither add any more nor prosecute these any farther at this time but give place to other business God the Father of Lights and of Spirits endow every one of us in our Places and Callings with a competent measure of such Graces as in his wisdom and goodness he shall see needful and expedient for us and so direct our hearts and tongues and endeavours in the exercise and manifestation thereof that by his good blessing upon our labours we may be enabled to advance his Glory propagate his Truth benefit his Church discharge a good Conscience in the mean time and at the last make our account with comfort at the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ. To whom c. AD CLERUM The Fourth Sermon At a Metropolitical Visitation at Grantham Lincoln August 22 d. 1634. ROM XIV 23. For whatsoever is not of Faith is sin ONE remarkable difference among many other between Good and Evil is this That there must be a concurrence of all requisite conditions to make a thing good whereas to make a thing evil a single defect in any one condition alone will suffice Bonum ex causa integra Malum ex partiali If we propose not to our selves a right end or if we pitch not upon proper and convenient means for the attaining of that end or if we pursue not these means in a due manner or if we observe not exactly every material circumstance in the whole pursuit if we fail but in any one point the action though it should be in every other respect such as it ought to be by that one defect becometh wholly sinful Nay more not only a true and real but even a supposed and imaginary defect the bare opinion of unlawfulness is able to vitiate the most justifiable act and to turn it into sin I know there is nothing unclean of it self but to him that esteemeth any thing to be unclean to him it is unclean at the 14. verse of this Chapter Nay yet more not only a setled opinion that the thing we do is unlawful but the very suspension of our judgment and the doubtfulness of our minds whether we may lawfully do it or no maketh it sometimes unlawful to be done of us and if we do it sinful He that but doubteth is damned if he eat Because he eateth not of faith in the former part of this verse The ground whereof the Apostle delivereth in a short and full Aphorism and concludeth the whole Chapter with it in the words of the Text For whatsoever is not of Faith is sin Many excellent Instructions there are scattered throughout the whole Chapter most of them concerning the right use of that Liberty we have unto things of indifferent nature well worthy our Christian Consideration if we had time and leisure for them But this last Rule alone will find us work enough and therefore omitting the rest we will by Gods assistance with your patience presently fall in hand with this and intend it wholly in the Explication first and then in the Application of it For by how much it is of more profitable and universal use for the regulating of the common offices of life by so much is the mischief greater if it be and accordingly our care ought to be so much the greater that it be not either misunderstood or misapplyed Quod non ex fide peccatum that is the rule Whatsoever is not of faith is sin In the Explication of which words there would be little difficulty had not the ambiguity of the word Faith occasioned difference of interpretations and so left a way open to some misapprehensions Faith is verbum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as most other words are There be that have reckoned up more than twenty several significations of it in the Scriptures But I find three especially looked at by those who either purposely or occasionally have had to do with this Text each of which we shall examine in their Order First and most usually especially in the Apostolical writings the word Faith is used to signifie that Theological vertue or gracious habit whereby we embrace with our minds and affections the Lord Iesus Christ as the only begotten Son of God and alone Saviour of the World casting our selves wholly upon the mercy of God through his merits for remission and everlasting Salvation It is that which is commonly called a lively or justifying Faith whereunto are ascribed in holy Writ those many gracious effects of purifying the heart adoption justification life joy peace salvation c. Not as to their proper and primary cause but as to the instrument whereby we apprehend and apply Christ whose merits and spirit are the true causes of all those blessed effects And in this notion many of our later Divines seem to understand it in our present Text whilst they alledge it for the confirmation of this Position that All the works even the best works of Unbelievers are sins A position condemned indeed by the Trent Council and that under a curse taking it as I suppose in a wrong construction but not worthy of so heavy a censure if it be rightly understood according to the doctrine of our Church in the thirteenth Article of her Confession and according to the tenour of those Scriptures whereon that doctrine is grounded viz. Matth. 12. 33. Rom. 8. 8. Tit. 1. 15. Heb. 11. 6 c. Howbeit I take it with subjection of judgment that that Conclusion what truth soever it may have in it self hath yet no direct foundation in this Text. The Verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
〈◊〉 to believe and the Noun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 faith or belief are both of them found sundry times in this Chapter yet seem not to signifie in any place thereof either the Verb the Act or the Noun the habit of this saving or justifying Faith of which we now speak But being opposed every where and namely in this last verse unto doubtfulness of judgment concerning the lawfulness of some indifferent things must therefore needs be understood of such a perswasion of judgment concerning such lawfulness as is opposite to such doubting Which kind of Faith may be found in a meer heathen man who never having heard the least syllable of the mystery of Salvation by Christ may yet be assured out of clear evidence of reason that many of the things he doth are such as he may and ought to do And as it may be found in a meer heathen man so it may be wanting in a true believer who stedfastly resting upon the blood of Christ for his eternal redemption may yet through the strength of temptation sway of passion or other distemper or subreption incident to humane frailty do some particular act or acts of the lawfulness whereof he is not sufficiently perswaded The Apostle then here speaking of such a Faith as may be both found in an unbeliever and also wanting in a true believer it appeareth that by Faith he meaneth not that justifying Faith which maketh a true believer to differ from an unbeleiver but the word must be understood in some other notion Yet thus much I may add withal in the behalf of those worthy men that have alledged this Scripture for the purpose aforesaid to excuse them from the imputation of having at least wilfully handled the Word of God deceitfully First that thing it self being true and the words also sounding so much that way might easily enduce them to conceive that to be the very meaning And common equity will not that men should be presently condemned if they should sometimes confirm a point from a place of Scripture not altogether pertinent if yet they think it to be so especially so long as the substance of what they write is according to the analogy of Faith and Godliness Secondly that albeit these words in their most proper and immediate sense will not necessarily enforce that Conclusion yet it may seem deducible there-from with the help of some topical arguments and by more remote inferences as some learned men have endeavoured to shew not altogether improbable And Thirdly that they who interpret this Text as aforesaid are neither singular nor novel therein but walk in the same path which some of the ancient Fathers have trod before them The Rhemists themselves confess it of S. Augustine to whom they might have added also S. Prosper and whose authority alone is enough to stop their mouths for ever Leo Bishop of Rome who have all cited these words for the self same purpose But we are content for the reasons already shewn to let it pass as a collection impertinent and that I suppose is the worst that can be made of it There is a second acception of the word Faith put either for the whole system of that truth which God hath been pleased to reveal to his Church in the Scriptures of the old and new Testament or some part thereof or else 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the assent of the mind thereunto In which signification some conceiving the words of this Text to be meant do hence infer a false and dangerous conclusion which yet they would obtrude upon the Christian Church as an undoubted principle of truth That men are bound for every particular action they do to have direction and warrant from the written word of God or else they sin in the doing of it For say they faith must be grounded upon the word of God Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God Rom. 10. Where there is no Word then there can be no Faith and then by the Apostles doctrine that which is done without the Word to warrant it must needs be sin for whatsoever is not of Faith is sin This is their opinion and thus they would infer it I know not any piece of counterfeit Doctrine that hath passed so currently in the world with so little suspicion of falshood and so little open contradiction as this hath done One chief cause whereof I conjecture to be for that it seemeth to make very much for the honour and perfection of Gods sacred Law the fulness and sufficiency whereof none in the Christian Church but Papists or Atheists will deny In which respect the very questioning of it now will perhaps seem a strange novelty to many and occasion their mis-censures But as God himself so the Holy Word of God is so full of all requisite perfection that it needeth not to beg honour from an untruth Will you speak wickedly for God Or talk deceitfully for him I hold it very needful therefoe both for the vindicating of my Text from a common abuse and for the arming of all my brethren as well of the Clergy as Laity against a common and plausible errour that neither they teach it nor these receive it briefly and clearly to shew that the aforesaid opinion in such sort as some have proposed it and many have understood it for it is capable of a good interpretation wherein it may be allowed First is utterly devoid of Truth and Secondly draweth after it many dangerous consequents and evil effects and thirdly hath no good warrant from my present Text. The Opinion is that to do any thing at all without direction from the Scripture is unlawful and sinful Which if they would understand only of the substantials of Gods worship and of the exercises of spiritual and supernatural graces the assertion were true and sound but as they extend it to all the actions of common life whatsoever whether natural or civil even so far as to the taking up of a straw so it is altogether false and indefensible I marvel what warrant they that so teach have from the Scripture for that very doctrine or where they are commanded so to believe or teach One of their chiefest refuges is the Text we now have in hand but I shall anon drive them from this shelter The other places usually alledged speak only either of Divine and Supernatural truths to be believed or else of works of grace or worship to be performed as of necessity unto Salvation which is not to the point in issue For it is freely confessed that in things of such nature the holy Scripture is and so we are to account it a most absolute and sufficient direction Upon which ground we heartily reject all humane Traditions devised and intended as supplements to the Doctrine of Faith contained in the Bible and annexed as Codicils to the Holy Testament of Christ for to supply the
utterly unlawful which yet indeed is indifferent and so lawful is guilty of superstition as well as he that enjoineth a thing as absolutely necessary which yet indeed is but indifferent and so arbitrary They of the Church of Rome and some in our Church as they go upon quite contrary grounds yet both false so they run into quite contrary errors and both superstitious They decline too much on the left hand denying to the holy Scripture that perfection which of right it ought to have of containing all things appertaining to that supernatural doctrine of faith and holiness which God hath revealed to his Church for the attainment of everlasting salvation whereupon they would impose upon Christian people and that with an opinion of necessity many things which the Scriptures require not and that is a Superstition These wry too much on the right hand ascribing to the holy Scripture such a kind of perfection as it cannot have of being the sole director of all humane actions whatsoever whereupon they forbid unto Christian people and that under the name of sin sundry things which the holy Scripture condemneth not and that is a superstition too From which Superstition proceedeth in the second place uncharitable censuring as evermore they that are the most superstitious are the most supercilious No such severe censures of our blessed Saviours person and actions as the Superstitious Scribes and Pharisees were In this Chapter the special fault which the Apostle blameth in the weak ones who were somewhat superstitiously affected was their rash and uncharitable judging of their brethren And common and daily experience among our selves sheweth how freely some men spend their censures upon so many of their brethren as without scruple do any of those things which they upon false grounds have superstitiously condemned as utterly unlawful And then thirdly as unjust censurers are commonly entertained with scorn and contumely they that so liberally condemn their brethren of prophaneness are by them again as freely flouted for their preciseness and so whiles both parties please themselves in their own ways they cease not mutually to provoke and scandalize and exasperate the one the other pursuing their private spleens so far till they break out into open contentions and oppositions Thus it stood in the Roman Church when this Epistle was written They judged one another and despised one another to the great disturbance of the Churches Peace which gave occasion to our Apostle's whole discourse in this Chapter And how far the like censurings and despisings have imbittered the spirits and whetted both the tongues and pens of learned men one against another in our own Church the stirs that have been long since raised and are still upheld by the factious Opposers against our Ecclesiastical Constitutions Government and Ceremonies will not suffer us to be ignorant Most of which stirs I verily perswade my self had been long ere this either wholly buried in silence or at leastwise prettily well quieted if the weakness and danger of the error whereof we now speak had been more timely discovered and more fully and frequently made known to the world than it hath been Fourthly let that doctrine be once admitted and all humane authority will soon be despised The command of Parents Masters and Princes which many times require both secrecy and expedition shall be taken into slow deliberation and the Equity of them sifted by those that are bound to obey though they know no cause why so long as they know no cause to the contrary Delicata est obedientia quae transit in causae genus deliberativum It is a nice obedience in S. Bernard's judgment yea rather troublesome and odious that is over-curious in discussing the commands of superiours boggling at every thing that is enjoyned requiring a why for every wherefore and unwilling to stir until the unlawfulness and expediency of the thing commanded shall be demonstrated by some manifest reason or undoubted authority from the Scriptures Lastly the admitting of this doctrine would cast such a snare upon men of weak judgments but tender consciences as they should never be able to unwind themselves thereout again Mens daily occasions for themselves or friends and the necessities of common life require the doing of a thousand things within the compass of a few days for which it would puzzle the best Textman that liveth readily to bethink himself of a sentence in the Bible clear enough to satisfie a scrupulous conscience of the lawfulness and expediency of what he is about to do for which by hearkening to the rules of reason and discretion he might receive easie and speedy resolution In which cases if he should be bound to suspend his resolution and delay to do that which his own reason would tell him were presently needful to be done until he could haply call to mind some Precept or Example of Scripture for his warrant what stops would it make in the course of his whole life what languishings in the duties of his calling how would it fill him with doubts and irresolutions lead him into a maze of uncertainties entangle him in a world of woful perplexities and without the great mercy of God and better instruction plunge him irrecoverably into the gulph of despair Since the chief end of the publication of the Gospel is to comfort the hearts and to revive and refresh the spirits of God's people with the glad tidings of liberty from the spirit of bondage and fear and of gracious acceptance with their God to anoint them with the oyl of gladness giving them beauty for ashes and instead of sackcloth girding them with joy we may well suspect that doctrine not to be Evangelical which thus setteth the consciences of men upon the rack tortureth them with continual fears and perplexities and prepareth them thereby unto hellish despair These are the grievous effects and pernicious consequents that will follow upon their Opinion who hold That we must have warrant from the Scripture for every thing whatsoever we do not only in spiritual things wherein alone it is absolutely true nor yet only in other matters of weight though they be not spiritual for which perhaps there might be some colour but also in the common affairs of life even in the most sleight and trivial things Yet for that the Patrons of this Opinion build themselves as much upon the authority of this present Text as upon any other passage of Scripture whatsoever which is the reason why we have stood thus long upon the examination of it we are therefore in the next place to clear the Text from that their mis-interpretation The force of their collection standeth thus as you heard already that faith is ever grounded upon the word of God and that therefore whatsoever action is not grounded upon the word being it is not of faith by the Apostles rules here must needs be a sin Which collection
and he best knew his own meaning was of two sorts the leaven of Hypocrisie Luke 12. and the leaven of corrupt and superstitious doctrine Matth. 16. We read 1 Cor. 5. of a third sort and that is the leaven of maliciousness which also usually accompanieth the other two Where any of the three are in abundance but especially where they all meet and abound as in these Pharisees it is impossible by any care or cunning so to keep them hidden as not to bewray themselves upon occasion to an observing eye As you know it is the nature of leaven though it be hidden never so deep in a heap of Meal to work up to the top so that a Man may certainly know by the effects and be able to say that there it is In the story of this present Chapter the Pharisees discover all the three Malice Hypocrisie and Superstition Their Malice against Christ although it appeared sufficiently in this that their quarrelling his Disciples for eating with unwashen hands was with the intent to bring an odium upon him for not instructing them better yet he passeth it by without taking any special notice thereof It may be for that his own person was chiefly concerned in it But then the other two their Hypocrisie and Superstition in rejecting the Commandments of God for the setting up of their own Traditions because they trencht so near and deep upon the honour of God his heavenly Father he neither would nor could dissemble But themselves having given him the occaâ—ion by asking him the first question Why do thy Disciples transgress the tradition of the Elders he turneth the point of their own weapon full upon them again as it were by way of recrimination not without some sharpness Do you blame them for that But why then do you your selves also transgress the Commandment of God by your Tradition which is a far greater matter 2. That is their Charge verse 3 Which having made good by one instance taken from the fiâ—th Commandment more he might have brought but it needed not this one being so notorious and so convincing he thenceforth doubteth not to call them Hypocrites to their faces and to apply to them a passage out of the Prophet Isaias very pat to his purpose Wherein the Prophet charged the People of those times with the very same crimes both of them whereof these Pharisees are presently appealed to wit Hypocrisie and Superstition Hypocrisie in their Worship and Superstition in the Doctrine The Leaven whereof by how much more it swelled them in their own and the common Opinion making them to be highly esteemed among Men for their outward preciseness and semblances of Holiness by so much the more it sowred them towards Almighty God rendring the whole Lump of their so strict Religion abominable in his sight So true is that of our Saviour Luke 16. That which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God Their Hypocrisie he putteth home to them in the Verses before the Text Ye Hypocrites well did Isaias prophesie of you saying This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth and honoureth me with their lips but their heart is far from me That done he forgetteth not to remember them of their Superstition too continuing his allegation out of the Prophet still in the words of my Text But in vain they do worship me teaching for Doctrines the commandments of men 3. This later verse I have chosen to entreat of alone at this time for although Hypocrisie and corrupt teaching do often go together as in those Iews whom the Prophet long before reproved and in these Pharisees whom our Saviour here reproveth yet have I purposely severed this Verse from the former in the handling moved thereunto out of a double consideration First because Hypocrisie lurking more within we are not able to pronounce of it with such certainty neither if we were have we indeed any good Warrant so to do as we may of unsound Doctrines which lie more open to the view and are allowed to our examination Secondly and especially because hundreds of those my Brethren whom I cannot in reason excuse from symbolizing with the Pharisees in teaching for doctrines the commandments of men which is the fault reproved in this verse I cannot yet in charity and in my own thoughts but acquit from partaking with them in the measure at least of that their foul Hypocrisie wherewith they stand charged in the former verses The words themselves being one entire proposition to stand upon the curious dividing of them would be a matter of more ostentation than use and the truth thereof also when the meaning is once laid open will be so evident that I shall presume of your assent without spending much time in the proof The main of our business then upon the Text at this time must be Explication Application and Use. First the Explication of the Words then the Application of the Matter and lastly some Corollaries inferred therefrom for our Use. Which for your better understanding and remembrance I shall endeavour to do as plainly and orderly as I can 4. As for the Words first There are three things in them that desire Explication First what is meant by the commandments of men Secondly what it is to teach such commandments for doctrines Thirdly how and in what respect they that teach such doctrines may be said to worship God in vain For the first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Commandment properly and strictly taken is an affirmative precept requiring something to be done the contrary whereof is a Prohibition or negative precept forbidding the doing of something But in the Holy Scriptures as in our common speech also the word is usually so extended as to comprehend both Prohibitions also as well as Commandments properly so called The reason whereof is because Affirmatives and Negatives do for the most part mutually include and infer the one the other as in the present Case it is all one whether the Pharisees should command Men to wash before meat or forbid them to eat before they had washed We call the whole Decalogue the ten commandments though there be Negative precepts there as well as Affirmative yea more Negative than Affirmative And those Negatives Touch not taste not handle not are called the Commandments of men Col. 2. 12. Which place I note the rather because the appellation here used and cited out of Isa. 29. according to the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are not found any where else in the whole Testament besides in the relation of this story save in that one place only By the analogy of which places inasmuch as there is mention made in them all as well of Doctrines as of Commandments and that in some of them with the Conjunction Copulative between them we are warranted to bring within the extent of this word according to the general intention
and scope of our Saviour in this place Doctrinals as well as Morals that is to say as well those that prescribe unto our Iudgments what we are bound to believe or not to believe in matter of Opinion as those that prescribe unto our Consciences what we are bound to do or not to do in matter of Practice Although the special occasion whereupon our Saviour fell into this discourse against the Pharisees and the special instance whereby he convinceth them do withal shew that the Morals do more principally properly and directly fall under his particular intention and scope therein In the full extent of the word then all those prescriptions are to be taken for the Commandments of men wherein any thing is by humane Authority either enjoyned or forbidden to be believed or done especially to be done which God in his Holy Word hath not so enjoyned or forbidden Ionadab's command to the Rechabites that they should not drink Wine they nor their Sons for ever and the Pharisees tradition here that none should eat with unwashen hands were both the commandments of men 5. This is clear enough yea and good enough hitherto if there were no more in it but so For you must observe or else you quite mistake the Text and the whole drift of it that it is no part of our Saviours meaning absolutely and wholly to condemn all the Commandments of men For that were to cut the sinews of all Government and Order and to overturn Churches Kingdoms Corporations Families and all other both greater and lesser Societies of men none of all which can be upheld without some positive Laws and Sanctions of mans devising We do not therefore find that either Ionadab was blamed for commanding the Rechabites not to drink Wine or that they were blamed for observing his commandments therein But rather on the contrary that God well approved both of him and them yea and rewarded them for their obedience unto that command though it were a command but of mans devising and had no more than a bare humane Authority to warrant it And therefore those Men are very wide that vouch this Text against the Ecclesiastical Constitutions or Ceremonies with such confidence as if they were able with this one Engine to take them all off at a blow not considering that it is not barely the Commandments of men either materially or formally taken that is to say neither the things commanded by men nor yet mens commanding of them but it is the teaching of such Commandments for Doctrines that our Saviour here condemneth the Pharisees for What that is therefore we are next to enquire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 teaching for Doctrines the commandments of men 6. In the 29. of Isa. the substantives have a Conjunction Copulative between them in the Septuagint and they are read in the very same manner and order 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by St. Paul alluding thereunto in Col. 2. But in the Greek Text in all Copies extant both here and in Mark 7. where the same History is related they are put without the Conjunction by Apposition as the Grammarians call it The meaning is the same in both readings only this latter way it appeareth better and it is in effect this Whosoever shall endeavor to impose upon the judgments of Men in credendis or in point of faith any thing to be believed as a part of Gods holy truth or shall endeavour to impose upon the Consciences of men in agendis or in point of manners any thing to be observed as a part of Gods holy will which cannot be sufficiently evidenced so or so to be either by express Testimony of the written Word of God rightly understood and applyed or by clear natural and necessary deduction therefrom according to the Laws of true Logical discourse is guilty more or less of that Superstition our Saviour here condemneth in the Pharisees of teaching for doctrines the commandments of men 7. And a fault it is of a large comprehension It taketh in all additions whatsoever that are made to that absolute and all-sufficient Rule of Faith and manners which God hath left unto his Church in his written Word In what kind soever they are whether in Opinion Worship Ordinance Injunction Prohibition Promise or otherwise From what cause soever they proceed whether from Credulity Ignorance Education Partiality Hypocrisie Mis-govern'd Zeal Time-serving or any other For what end soever they may be done whether those ends be in truth intended or but in shew pretended say it be the glory of God the reformation of abuses the preventing of mischiefs or inconveniences the avoiding of scandals the maintenance of Christian liberty the furtherance of Piety or whatever else can be imagined If they have not a sufficient foundation in the sacred Text and yet shall be offered to be pressed upon our Iudgments or Consciences in the name of God and as his Word they are to be held as chaff fitter to be scattered before the Wind or cast out to the dunghil than to be hoarded up in the garners among the Wheat alas what is the chaff to the wheat or as Hay Wood or Stubble meeter to become fewel for the Oven or Hearth than to be coffered up in the Treasures among Gold and Silver and precious Stones And he that bringeth any such Doctrine with him let his Piety or parts be otherwise what they can be should he in either of both or even in both match not only the Holy Apostles of Christ but the ever blessed Angels in Heaven yet should we rather defie him as a Traytor for setting Gods stamp upon his own Bullion than receive him as his faithful Embassadour and salute him with an Anathema sooner than bid him God speed Especially if the Doctrine be apparently either false or ungrounded and yet positively and peremptorily delivered as if it were the undoubted word and will of God 8. I may not now descend to particulars But thus much it will concern us all to know in the General that whosoever teacheth any thing either to be absolutely unlawful which God hath not forbidden in his Word or to be absolutely necessary which God hath not required in his Word he teacheth for doctrines the commandments of men and so far forth playeth the Pharisees part in burthening the Consciences of Gods people with the superstitious fancies of his own brain But otherwise the enjoyning of something for a time which God hath not forbidden or the forbidding of something for a time which God hath not required by those that are endued with lawful Authority in any Ecclesiastical Political or Domestical Society so as the same be not done for Conscience sake towards God or with any Opinion of worship merit or operative holiness but meerly out of prudential considerations and for the reasons of order decency expedience or other like respects of conveniency and accomodation is a thing no ways justly chargeable with Pharisaism superstition or
to be cried down and condemned under the name of Will-worship nor doth it come within the compass of our Saviours reproof in this place If Ionadab had laid an obligation upon the Consciences of the Rechabites not to drink wine by telling them that for Conscience sake towards God they ought to abstain therefrom or if the Iewish Elders and Governors leaving the Consciences of the People free had only made a Law under some penalty for decency and cleanliness sake that no Man should sit down to Meat in publick with unwashen hands to my seeming had he then been guilty of this Pharisaical superstition and they free In brief then to conclude this Enquiry To lay an obligation either upon the judgements or consciences of Men in point of opinion or practice which God hath not laid that and nothing but that is to teach for doctrines the commandments of men 9. We have yet a third thing to be enquired of for the Explication of the words namely how and in what respect they that teach such Doctrines may be said to worship God in vain The Ambiguity of our English word Worship hath occasioned many Errors among Divines and mis-understandings of one anothers words and writings whereby the disputes and controversies about Worship are become of all other the most intricate and perplexed The Hebrews and the Greeks too have sundry words and those of distinct notions and significations which we in English for want of fitter expressions are fain to translate promiscuously by this one word Worship The Greek words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the word here used are all indifferently rendred worshipping Here according to the notion of the Greek word it properly signifieth the performance of some Religious or devout act with an intention to honour God thereby Whereby it appeareth that these Pharisees placed a great part of their Religion in the observation of these Traditions of mens divising and flattered themselves with this conceit That they did God a great deal of honour in so doing and that therefore he could not choose but be marvellous well pleased with them for so doing By long accustoming themselves to which like outward observances they had almost lost the vigor and soul of true Religion which consisteth in the inward Reverence and Devotion of the heart and had little other left than the bare carcase or empty outside thereof and that also patcht and pieced up for the most part with the devices and inventions of men 10. And this our Saviour now telleth them is Worship in vain He saith so indeed but hath he any Text for it The place he citeth is in Isa. 29. 13. where the words according to the Original run but thus Their fear towards me is taught by the precept of men but that it is vain the Prophet doth not there say He doth not say it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in those very words according to the Hebrew but the scope of the place importeth all that and more For God there threatneth to punish the People for such worship which he would not have done if he had been either pleased with it or honoured by it But the very word and all is so found even as our Saviour citeth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Septuagint there which being the most common and received Translation in those days was therefore for the most part followed by Christ and his Apostles in their quotations especially where it swerved not very much in sence from the Original Now a thing is said to be done in vain when it hath not that wished effect which the doer intended and expected Those Pharisees then intending by those superstitious Will-worships to honour God and hopeing to please him therewithal when their expectations should be so far frustrated that God should all on the contrary profess himself dishonoured and displeased thereby it must needs be acknowledged that this their Will-worship was all in vain Certainly God will reject what himself hath forbidden and he hath forbidden and that both frequently and with the severest interminations all manner of Will-worship of this kind and properly so called and all additions of Men unto his holy Word 11. In the several parts of the Text thus opened we may see the full meaning of the whole God will not approve of nor accept any Wit-worship or Will-worship forged or devised by Man with an Opinion as if it were a necessary part of Gods service nor allow of any Doctrine that tendeth to bind the Iudgments or Consciences of his people further than he hath thought fit himself to bind them by the expresses of his Word He will when time serveth root out every plant which is not of his own planting And when the day is come which shall declare by a fiery Trial every mans work of what sort it is the Gold and Silver and precious Stones shall abide the fire and the Workman that built with such good stuff shall receive a blessed reward But he that buildeth Wood or Hay or Stubble though by the great mercy of God he himself may pass through the fire and be saved with some difficulty so long as he holdeth fast the foundation which is Christ and his merits yet he shall suffer loss in his work however That shall be sure to burn and perish whatsoever becometh of him All that fear of God is but superstitious and vain that is taught by the Precepts and Commandments of men 12. From the Explication of the Text hitherto I come now to the Application of it Wherein I doubt not by Gods help but to make clear to the judgment of any Man that is not either uncapable through ignorance or fore-possessed with prejudice these three things First that the Papists are guilty of the Pharisaical Superstition and Will-worship here condemned Secondly that the Church of England and her regular and Obedient Children are not guilty of the same Thirdly that those Divines and others in the Church of England that so undutifully charge her therewithal are in truth themselves inexcusably guilty of that very Crime whereof they unjustly accuse her 13. First for the Papists That they are the right children and successors of the Pharisees no Man that rightly understandeth the Tenets of the Romish Church but will easily grant if he shall duly consider what a mass of humane Traditions both in point of belief and worship are imposed upon the judgments and consciences of all that may be suffered to live in the visible Communion of that Church and that with opinion of necessity and under pain of Damnation The Popes Supremacy Worshipping of Images Invocation of Saints and Angels the Propitiatory Sacrifice of the Mass Purgatory the seven Sacraments Transubstantiation Adoration of the Host Communion under one kind Private Masses forbidding Priests Marriage Monastical Vows Prayer in an unknown Tongue Auricular Confession All these and I know not how many more are such as even by the
England and her regular and obedient Children in this behalf and it will be expected I should do it If any of the Children of this Church in their too much hast have over-run their Mother that is have busied themselves and troubled others with putting forward new Rites and Ceremonies with scandal and without Law or by using her name without her leave for the serving of their own purposes have causlessly brought an evil suspicion upon her as some are blamed let them answer it as well as they can it is not my business now to plead for them but to vindicate the Church of England against another sort of men who have accused her of Superstition unjustly 17. Set both these aside and her defence is made in a word if we do but remember what hath been already delivered in the Explication of the Text to wit that it is not the commandments of men either Materially or Formally taken but the Opinion that we have of them and the teaching of them for Doctrines wherein Superstition properly consisteth Materially first There is no Superstition either in wearing or in not wearing a Surplice in kneeling or in not kneeling at the Communion in crossing or in not crossing an Infant newly Baptized even as there is no Superstition in washing or in not washing the hands before Meat So long as neither the one is done with an Opinion of necessity nor the other forborn out of the Opinion of unlawfulness For so long the Conscience standeth free The Apostle hath so resolved in the very like case that neither he that eateth is the worse for it nor he that eateth not the better for it A Man may eat and do it with a good Conscience too As in the present case at this time it is certain Christs Disciples did eat and washed not it cannot be doubted but at some time or other they washed before they eat Not for Conscience sake towards God either but even as they saw it fit and as the present occasion required and they might do both without supersition But if any man shall wear or kneel or cross with an Opinion of necessity and for Conscience sake towards God as if those parts of Gods Service wherein those Ceremonies are used in our Church could not be rightly performed without them yea althought the Church had not appointed them doubtless the use of those Ceremonies by reason of such his Opinion should be Superstition to him Because a man cannot be of that Opinion but he must believe it to be true Doctrine that such and such Ceremonies are of themselves necessary parts of Gods worship As on the contrary if any body should refuse to wear or kneel or cross out of an Opinion of their unlawfulness as if those Ceremonies did vitiate the whole act of that Worship whereunto they are applied I cannot see but upon the same ground and by reason of such his Opinion the refusal of those Ceremonies should be to him also Superstition Because a man cannot be of that Opinion but he must believe this to be true Doctrine that such and such Ceremonies are of themselves unlawful to be used in the Worship of God But the obedient Children of the Church of England having no such Opinion either of the necessity or unlawfulness of the said Ceremonies but holding them to be as indeed they are things in their own nature indifferent are even therefore free from Superstition in both the kinds aforesaid So then in the things commanded taken materially that is to say considered in themselves without respect to the Churches command there is no Superstition because there is nothing concerning them Doctrinally taught either the one way or the other 18. Now if we can as well clear these things taken also formally that is to say considered not in themselves but as they stand commanded by publick authority of the Church the whole business is done as to this point Nor is there in truth any great difficulty in it if we will but apprehend things aright For although the very commanding them do seem to bring with it a kind of necessity and to lay a tie upon the Conscience as that of St. Paul implieth both you must needs be subject and that for Conscience sake yet is not that any tie brought upon the Conscience de novo by such command of the Church only that tie that lay upon the Conscience before by virtue of that general Commandment of God of obeying the higher Powers in all their lawful commands is by that Commandment of the Church applied to that particular matter Even as it is in all Civil Constitutions and humane positive Laws whatsoever And the necessity also is but an obediential not a doctrinal necessity But the Text requireth a doctrinal necessity to make the thing done a vain and superstitious Worship Teaching for doctrines the commandments of men Which the Church of England in prescribing the aforesaid Ceremonies hath not done nor by her own grounds could do For look as the case standeth with private men for doing or refusing even so standeth the case with publick Governours for commanding or forbidding As therefore with private men it is not the bare doing or refusing of a thing as in discretion they shall see cause but the doing of it with an Opinion of necessity or the refusing of it with the Opinion of unlawfulness that maketh the action superstitious as hath been already shewed so with publick Governours it is not the commanding or forbidding of a mutable Ceremony as for the present they shall deem it fit for order decency or uniformities sake or such other like respects but the commanding of it with an opinion as if it were of perpetual necessity or the forbidding it with the like opinion as if it were simply unlawful that maketh the Constitution superstitious 19. Now I appeal to any man that hath not run on madly with the cry for company but endeavoured with the Spirit of Charity and Sobriety to satisfie his understanding herein if the Church of England both in the Preface before the Book of Common-Prayer and in the Articles of her Confession and in sundry passages in the Homilies occasionally and these Books are acknowledged her most Authentick Writings the two former especially and the just standard whereby to measure her whole Doctrine if I say she have not in them all and that in as plain and express terms as can be desired disclaimed all humane Traditions that are imposed upon the Consciences of Gods People either in point of Faith or Manners and declared to the world that she challenged no power to her self to order any thing by her own Authority but only in things indifferent and such as are not repugnant to the word of God and that her Constitutions are but for order comeliness and uniformity sake and not for Conscience sake towards God and that therefore any of those her Orders and Constitutions may be retained
abolished or altered from time to time and at all times as the Governours for the time being shall judge to serve best unto Edification What should I say more If men list to be contentious and will not be satisfied who can help it yet thus much I dare say more Let any Papist or Precisian in the world give instance but in any one single thing doctrinally maintained by the Church of England which he can with any colour of truth except against as a Commandment of men if we do not either shew good warrant for it from the written word of God which we doubt not but to be able to do and is most ad rem or else which is enough ad hominem for every single instance they shall bring return them ten of their own teaching every whit as liable to the same exception as that we will yield the Bucklers and confess her guilty 20. But now what will you say if after all this clamouring against English Popish Ceremonies as of late they have blazoned them they that keep all this ado prove in the end the guilty persons themselves I am much deceived if it do not clearly prove so if we either compare her Doctrine and theirs together or take a view of some of theirs by themselves First compare them a little which will also add some confirmation to the former point for the farther justifying of the Church of England in this behalf And for example and perspicuity sake let the instance be kneeling at the Communion there being the like reason of all the rest I pray you consider well the evidence weigh the grounds and observe the course held on both sides and then give sentence accordingly If as God hath given those our Church Governours power to determine of indifferent mutable circumstances and they using the liberty of the power given them have appointed kneeling rather than sitting or standing as judging it a gesture of greater reverence and well becoming our unworthiness but without any Opinion either of the necessity of that gesture or of the unlawfulness of the other two so God had given the like Power to these our Brethren and they using the liberty of that power had appointed sitting or standing rather than kneeling as judging either of them a more proper Table gesture than it yet without any Opinion of their necessity or of the unlawfulness of kneeling the case had then been alike of both These had been as free as they neither of them had been guilty of Superstition in teaching for Doctrines the Commandments of men because there was no doctrinal necessity whereby to bind the Consciences of Gods People on either side Again if as these say to their Proselytes peremptorily in effect thus you are bound in Conscience not to kneel it is an unlawful gesture a superstitious relique of Popery and carrieth with it a shrewd appearance of their idolatrous Bread-worship and therefore we charge you upon your Consciences not to kneel so our Church-Governours should say to the People peremptorily in effect thus you are bound in Conscience to kneel or else you prophane the holy Sacrament not discerning the Lords Body and therefore we charge you upon your Consciences to kneel the case of both had here also been alike Both alike guilty of Superstition in teaching for doctrines the commandments of men because by that doctrinal necessity as well the one sort as the other had laid a perpetual obligation upon the Consciences of men in a matter which God having not any where either commanded or forbidden hath therefore left free and indifferent But now taking the case as de facto it is without Ifs and And 's set the one against the other and make the comparison right and here it is Our Brethren having no publick authority given them to order what shall be done or not done in matters of external government do yet bind the Consciences of Gods people by teaching that which they thus forbid to be simply and in it self unlawful Our Governors on the contrary though having publick authority to prescribe in such matters do yet leave the Consciences of men at liberty without teaching that which they appoint to be of absolute necessity in it self This being species facti as the Civilians speak the even true state of the case say now I beseech you in good sooth and be not partial Quid Iuris at whose door lieth the Superstition The one side teaching no such doctrine but having authority do by virtue of that authority appoint the People to kneel The other side having no such authority but teaching a doctrine do by virtue of that doctrine charge the people not to kneel Whether of both sides may rightlier be said to teach for doctrines the Commandments of men Tu quum sis quod ego fortassis nequior 21. Their guilt herein will yet farther appear if leaving comparisons we take a view of some of their doctrines by themselves I say but some of them for how many hours would serve to reckon them all or who indeed even of themselves knoweth them all There are so many Covies of new doctrines sprung up ever and anon especially in these late times of connivance and licentiousness which by that they are well hatcht presently fly abroad the Country and are entertained by some or other for as good Divinity as if they were the undoubted Oracles of the Holy Ghost I dare not affirm it because I will not put my self to the trouble to prove it and because I heartily desire and wish I be deceived in it yet I cannot dissemble my fear that it is but too true by the proportion of what we almost dayly hear or see that within little more than this one twelvemonth last past there have been more false and superstitious doctrines vented in the Pulpits and Presses in England than have been in so open and daring a manner in the whole space of almost fourscore years before I mean since the first of Queen Elizabeth of blessed memory And to make good the former charge omitting sundry other their unwarrantable positions partly concerning Church-Government Orders and Ceremonies established by Law partly concerning sundry received customs in matters wholly or in part Ecclesiastical partly concerning the use of sundry pastimes and recreations partly concerning sundry usages and customs in vita communi in things meerly Civil and not sacred or Ecclefiastical the particulars whereof would amount to many scores if not hundreds I shall present unto your view a dozen only which I have selected from the rest of those that I have observed to have been most urged of late in Sermons and Pamphlets by which you may in part judge of the rest And they are these 22. 1. That the appointing of a set form of Prayer or Liturgy to be used in the Service of God is unlawful or Antichristian or that it is a straitning or limiting of the Holy Spirit of God 2. That it is not in
error and retracting it that you may build better then let it lie on still till a sorer fire catch it Better for any of us all whether in respect of our errours or sins to prevent the Lords judging of us by timely judging our selves than to slack the time till his judgment overtake us 27. The Second Use should be an Admonition to all my Brethren of the Ministry for the time to come and that in the Apostles words 1 Cor. 3. 10. Let every man take heed what he buildeth St. Paul himself was very careful this way not to deliver any thing to the People but what he had received from the Lord. The Prophets of the Lord still delivered their Messages with this Preface Haec dicit Dominus Yea that wretched Balaam though a false Prophet and covetous enough professed yet that if Balak would give him his house full of Silver and Gold he neither durst nor would go beyond the word of the Lord to do less or more There is a great proneness in us all to Idolize our own inventions Besides much Ignorance Hypocrisie and Partiality any of which may byass us awry Our Educations may lay such early anticipations upon our judgments or our Teachers or the Books we read or the Society we converse withal may leave such impressions therein as may fill them with prejudice not easily to be removed The golden mean is a hard thing to hit upon almost in any thing without some warping toward one of the extremes either on the right hand or on the left and without a great deal of wisdom and care seldom shall we seek to shun one extreme and not run a little too far towards the other if not quite into it In all which and sundry other respects we may soon fall into gross mistakes and errors if we do not take the more heed whilst we suspect no such thing by our selves but verily believe that all we do is out of pure zeal for Gods Glory and the love of his truth We had need of all the piety and learning and discretion and pains and prayers we have and all little enough without Gods blessing too yea and our own greater care too to keep us from running into Errors and from teaching for doctrines the commandments of men 28. The Third Use should be for Admonition also to all the people of God that they be not hasty to believe every Spirit but to try the Spirits especially when they see the spirits to disagree and clash one with another or find otherwise just cause of suspicion and that as the Beraeans did by the Scriptures Using withal all good subsidiary helps for the better understanding thereof especially those two as the principal the Rule of Right Reason and the known constant judgment and practice of the Universal Church That so they may fan away the Chaff from the Wheat and letting go the refuse hold fast that which is good To this end every man should especially beware that he do not suffer himself to be carried away with names nor to have any mans person either in hatred or admiration but embrace what is consonant to truth and reason though Iudas himself should preach it and reject what even an Angel from Heaven should teach if he have no other reason to induce him to believe it than that he teacheth it 29. The Fourth Use should be for Exhortation to the learneder sort of my Brethren to shew their faithfulness duty and true hearty affection to God and his Truth and Church by maintaining the simplicity of the Christian Faith and asserting the Doctrine of Christian Liberty against all corrupt mixtures of mens inventions and against all unlawful impositions of mens Commandments in any kind whatsoever If other men be zealous to set up their own errors shall we be remiss to hold up Gods Truth God having deposited it with us and committed it to our special trust how shall we be able to answer it to God and the World if we suffer it to be stollen out of the hearts of our people by our silence or neglect Like enough you shall incurr blame and censure enough for so doing as if you sought but your selves in it by seeking to please those that are in authority in hope to get preferment thereby But let none of these things discourage you if you shall not be able by the grace of God in some measure to despise the censures of rash and uncharitable men so long as you can approve your hearts and actions in the sight of God and to break through if need be far greater tryals and discouragements than these you are not worthy to be called the servants of Christ. 30. The last Use should be an humble Supplication to those that have in their hands the ordering of the great affairs of Church and State that they would in their goodness and wisdoms make some speedy and effectual provision to repress the exorbitant licenciousness of these times in Printing and Preaching every man what he list to the great dishonour of God scandal of the Reformed Religion fomenting of Superstition and Error and disturbance of the peace both of Church and Common-wealth Lest if way be still given thereunto those evil Spirits that this late connivence hath raised grow so fierce within a while that it will trouble all the power and wisdom of the Kingdom to conjure them handsomly down again But certainly since we find by late experience what wildness in some of the Lay-people what petulancy in some of the inferior Clergy what insolency in some both of the Laity and Clergy our Land is grown into since the reins of the Ecclesiastical Government have lain a little slack we cannot but see what need we have to desire and pray that the Ecclesiastical Government and Power may be timely setled in some such moderate and effectual way as that it may not be either too much abused by them that are to exercise it nor too much despised by those that must live under it In the mean time so long as things hang thus loose and unsetled I know not better how to represent unto you the present face of the times in some respects than in the words of the Prophet Ieremy The Prophets prophesie lies and the Priests get power into their hands by their means and my people love to have it so And what will you do in the end thereof 31. What the end of these insolencies will be God alone knoweth The increase of Profaneness Riot Oppression and all manner of wickedness on the one side and the growth of Error Novelty and Superstition on the other side are no good signs onward The Lord of his great mercy grant a better end thereunto than either these beginnings or proceedings hitherto portend or our sins deserve And the same Lord of his infinite goodness vouchsafe to dispel from us by the light of his Holy Spirit all blindness and hardness of
on your own time and suspendeth the judgments your sins have deserved for a space as here he did Ahab's upon his humiliation but be assured sooner or later vengeance will overtake you or yours for it You have Coveted an evil covetousness to your house and there hangeth a judgment over your house for it as rain in the clouds which perhaps in your sons perhaps in your grand-childs days sometime or other will come dashing down upon it and overwhelm it Think not the vision is for many descents to come De malè quaesitis vix gaudet tertius haeres seldom doth the third scarce ever the fourth generation pass before God visit the sins of the Fathers upon the Children if he do not in the very next generation In his sons days will I bring the evil upon his house Secondly if not only our own but our Fathers sins too may be shall be visited upon us how concerneth it us as to repent for our own so to lament also the sins of our forefathers and in our confessions and supplications to God sometimes to remember them that he may forget them and to set them before his face that he may cast them behind his back We have a good president for it in our publick Letany Remember not Lord our offences nor the offences of our forefathers A good and a profitable and a needful prayer it is and those men have not done well nor justly that have cavilled at it O that men would be wise according to sobriety and allow but just interpretations to things advisedly established rather than busie themselves nodum in scirpo to pick needless quarrels where they should not What unity would it bring to brethren what peace to the Church what joy to all good and wise men As to this particular God requireth of the Israelites in Lev. 26. that they should confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their Fathers David did so and Ieremy did so and Daniel did so in Psal. 106. in Ierem 3. in Dan. 9. And if David thought it a fit curse to pronounce against Iudas and such as he was in Psal. 109. Let the wickedness of his fathers be had in remembrance in the sight of the Lord and let not the sin of his mother be done away why may we not nay how ought we not to pray for the removal of this very curse from us as well as of any other curses The present age is rise of many enormous crying sins which call loud for a judgment upon the land and if God should bring upon us a right heavy one whereat all ears should tingle could we say other but that it were most just even for the sins of this present generation But if unto our own so many so great God should also add the sins of our forefathers the bloodshed and tyranny and grievous unnatural butcheries in the long times of the Civil wars and the universal Idolatries and superstitions covering the whole land in the longer and darker times of Popery and if as he sometimes threatned to bring upon the Iews of that one generation all the righteous blood that ever was shed upon the earth from the blood of the righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias the son of Barachias so he should bring the sins of our Ancestors for many generations past upon this generation of ours who could be able to abide it Now when the security of the times give us but too much cause to fear it and regions begin to look white towards the harvest is it not time for us with all humiliation of Soul and Body to cast down our selves and with all contention of voice and spirit to lift up our prayers and to say Remember not Lord our offences nor the offences of our forefathers neither take thou vengeance of our sins Spare us good Lord spare the people whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood and be not angry with us for ever Spare us good Lord Thirdly Since not only our fathers sins and our own but our Neighbours sins too aliquid malum propter vicinum malum but especially the sins of Princes and Governours delirant reges plectuntur Achivi may bring judgments upon us and enwrap us in their punishments it should teach every one of us to seek his own private in the common and publick good and to endeavour if but for our own security from punishment to awaken others from their security in sin How should we send up Supplications and prayers and intercessions for Kings and for all that are in authority that God would incline their hearts unto righteous courses and open their ears to wholesom counsels and strengthen their hands to just actions when but a sinful oversight in one of them may prove the overthrow of many thousands of us as David but by once numbring his people in the pride of his heart lessened their number at one clap threescore and ten thousand If Israel turn their backs upon their enemies up Ioshua and make search for the troubler of Israel firret out the thief and do execution upon him one Achan if but suffered is able to undo the whole host of Israel what mischief might he do if countenanced if allowed The hour I see hath overtaken me and I must end To wrap up all in a word then and conclude Thou that hast power over others suffer no sin in them by base connivence but punish it thou that hast charge of others suffer no sin in them by dull silence but rebuke it thou that hast any interest in or dealing with others suffer no sin upon them by easie allowance but distaste it thou that hast nothing else yet by thy charitable prayers for them and by constant example to them stop the course of sin in others further the growth of grace in others labour by all means as much as in thee lieth to draw others unto God lest their sins draw God's judgments upon themselves and thee This that thou mayest do and that I may do and that every one of us that feareth God and wisheth well to the Israel of God may do faithfully and discreetly in our several stations and callings let us all humbly beseech the Lord the God of all grace and wisdom for his Son Iesus sake by his holy Spirit to enable us To which blessed Trinity one only Wise Immortal Invisible Almighty most gracious and most glorious Lord and God be ascribed by every one of us the kingdom the power and the glory both now and for ever AD POPULUM The Fourth Sermon In St. Paul's Church London Nov. 4. 1621. 1 COR. VII 24. Brethren let every man wherein he is called therein abide with God IF flesh and blood be suffered to make the Gloss it is able to corrupt a right good Text. It easily turneth the doctrine of Gods grace into wantonness and as easily the doctrine of Christian liberty into
with God The clause was not added for nothing it teacheth thee also some duties First so to demean thy self in thy particular calling as that thou do nothing but what may stand with thy general calling Magistrate or Minister or Lawyer or Merchant or Artificer or whatsoever other thou art remember thou art withal a Christian. Pretend not the necessities of thy particular Calling to any breach of the least of those Laws of God which must rule thy general Calling God is the author of both Callings of thy general Calling and of thy particular Calling too Do not think he hath called thee to service in the one and to liberty in the other to Iustice in the one and to Cosenage in the other to Simplicity in the one and to Dissimulation in the other to Holiness in the one and to Prophaneness in the other in a word to an entire and universal Obedience in the one and to any kind or degree of Disobedience in the other It teacheth thee secondly not to ingulf thy self so wholly into the business of thy particular Calling as to abridg thy self of convenient opportunities so the exercise of those religious duties which thou art bound to perform by virtue of thy general calling as Prayer Confession Thanksgiving Meditation c. God alloweth thee to serve thy self but he commandeth thee to serve him too Be not thou so all for thy self as to forget him but as thou art ready to embrace that liberty which he hath given thee to serve thy self so make a conscience to perform those duties which he hath required of thee for his service Work and spare not but yet pray too or else work not Prayer is the means to procure a blessing upon thy labours from his hands who never faileth to serve them that never fail to serve him Did ever any man serve God for nought A man cannot have so comfortable assurance that he shall prosper in the affairs he taketh in hand by any other means as by making God the Alpha and Omega of his endeavours by beginning them in his name directing them to his Glory Neither is this a point of duty only in regard of Gods command or a point of wisdom only to make our labours successful but it is a point of Iustice too as due by way of Restitution We make bold with his day and dispence with some of that time which he hath sanctified unto his service for our own necessities it is equal we should allow him at least as much of ours as we borrow of his though it be for our necessities or lawful Comforts But if we rob him of some of his time as too often we do employing it in our own businesses without the warrant of a just necessity we are to know that it is theft yea theft in the highest degree sacrilege and that therefore we are bound at least as far as petty Thieves were in the Law to a four-fold restitution Abide in thy Calling by doing thine own part and labouring faithfully but yet so as God's part be not forgotten in serving him daily It teacheth thee thirdly to watch over the special sins of thy particular Calling Sins I mean not that cleave necessarily to the Calling for then the very Calling it self should be unlawful but sins unto the temptations whereof the condition of thy Calling layeth thee open more than it doth unto other sins or more than some other Callings would do unto the same sins and wherewith whilst thou art stirring about the businesses of thy Calling thou mayest be soonest overtaken if thou dost not heedfully watch over thy self and them The Magistrates sins Partiality and Injustice the Ministers sins Sloth and Flattery the Lawyers sins Maintenance and Collusion the Merchants sins Lying and Deceitfulness the Courtiers sins Ambition and Dissimulation the great Mans sins Pride and Oppression the Gentlemans sins Riot and Prodigality the Officers sins Bribery and Extortion the Countrymans sins Envy and Discontentedness the Servants sins Tale-bearing and Purloyning In every State and Condition of life there is a kind of opportunity to some special sin wherein if our watchfulness be not the greater mainly to oppose it and keep it out we cannot abide therein with God All that I have done all this while in my passage over this Scripture is but this I have proved the necessity of having a Calling laid down Directions for the choice and trial of our Callings and shewed what is required of us in the use of our Callings for the abiding therein with God And having thus dispatched my Message it is now time I should spare both your ears and my own sides God grant that every one of us may remember so much of what hath been taught as is needful for each of us and faithfully apply it unto our own Souls and Consciences and make a profitable and seasonable use of it in the whole course of our lives even for Jesus Christ his sake his blessed Son and our alone Saviour To whom c. AD POPULUM The Fifth Sermon At St. Paul's Cross London Nov. 21. 1624. 1 Tim. IV. 4. For every Creature of God is good and nothing to be refused if it be received with Thanksgiving OF that great and Universal Apostasie which should be in the Church through the tyranny and fraud of Antichrist there are elsewhere in the Scriptures more full scarce any where more plain Predictions than in this passage of St. Paul whereof my Text is a part The Quality of the Doctrines foretold Vers. 1. contrary to the Faith Erroneous Devillish Now the Spirit speaketh expresly that in the latter times some shall depart from the Faith giving heed to seducing Spirits and doctrines of Devils The Quality of the Doctors foretold verse 2. Liars Hypocritical Unconscionable Speaking lies in Hypocrisie having their consciences seared with a hot Iron But lest these generalities should seem not sufficiently distinctive each side charging other as commonly it hapneth where differences are about Religion with Apostasie and Error and Falshood and Hypocrisie the Apostle thought it needful to point out those Antichristian Doctors more distinctly by specifying some particulars of their devillish Doctrines For which purpose he giveth instance in two of their Doctrines whereof he maketh choice not as being simply the worst of all the rest though bad enough but as being more easily discernable than most of the rest viz. a Prohibition of Marriage and an injunction of Abstinence from certain meats Which particulars being so agreeable to the present Tenets of the Romish Synagogue do give even of themselves alone a strong suspicion that there is the seat of Antichrist But joyned unto the other Prophecies of St. Paul and St. Iohn in other places make it so unquestionable that they who will needs be so unreasonably charitable as to think the Pope is not Antichrist may at the least wonder as one saith well by what strange
temptations where this may fail We may deceive our selves then and thousands in the world do so deceive themselves if upon our abstaining from sins from which God with-holdeth us we presently conclude our selves to be in the state of grace and to have the power of godliness and the spirit of sanctification For between this restraining grace whereof we have now spoken and that renewing grace whereof we now speak there are sundry wide differences They differ first in their fountain Renewing Grace springeth from the special love of God towards those that are his in Christ Restraining Grace is a fruit of that general mercy of God whereof it is said in the Psalm that his mercy is over all his works They differ secondly in their extent both of Person Subject Object and Time For the Person Restraining Grace is common to good and bad Renewing Grace proper and peculiar to the Elect. For the Subject Restraining grace may bind one part or faculty of a man as the hand or tongue and leave another free as the heart or ear Renewing grace worketh upon All in some measure sanctifieth the whole man Body and soul and spirit with all the parts and faculties of each For the Object Renewing grace may with-hold a man from one sin and give him scope to another Restraining grace carrieth an equal and just respect to all Gods Commandments For the Time Restraining grace may tie us now and by and by unloose us Renewing grace holdeth out unto the end more or less and never leaveth us wholly destitute Thirdly they differ in their Ends. Restraining Grace is so intended chiefly for the good of humane society especially of the Church of God and of the members thereof as that indifferently it may or may not do good to the Receiver but Renewing Grace is especially intended for the Salvation of the Receiver though Ex consequenti it do good also unto others They differ fourthly and lastly in their Effects Renewing Grace mortifieth the corruption and subdueth it and diminisheth it as water quencheth fire by abating the heat but Restraining Grace only inhibiteth the exercise of the corruption for the time without any real diminution of it either in substance or quality as the fire wherein the three Children walked had as much heat in it at that very instant as it had before and after although by the greater power of God the natural power of it was then suspended from working upon them The Lions that spared Daniel were Lions still and had their ravenous disposition still albeit God stopped their mouths for that time that they should not hurt him but that there was no change made in their natural disposition appeareth by their entertainment of their next guests whom they devoured with all greediness breaking their bones before they came to the ground By these two instances and examples we may in some measure conceive of the nature and power of the restraining Grace of God in wicked men It bridleth the corruption that is in them for the time that it cannot break out and manacleth them in such sort that they do not shew forth the ungodly disposition of their heart but there is no real change wrought in them all the while their heart still remaining unsanctified and their natural corruption undiminished Whereas the renewing and sanctifying grace of God by a real change of a Lion maketh a Lamb altereth the natural disposition of the soul by draining out some of the corruption begetteth a new heart a new spirit new habits new qualities new dispositions new thoughts new desires maketh a new man in every part and faculty compleatly New Content not thy self then with a bare forbearance of sin so long as thy heart is not changed nor thy will changed nor thy affections changed but strive to become a new man to be transformed by the renewing of thy mind to hate sin to love God to wrestle against thy secret corruptions to take delight in holy duties to subdue thine understanding and will and affections to the obedience of Faith and Godliness So shalt thou not only be restrained from sinning against God as Abimelech here was but also be enabled as faithful Abraham was to please God and consequently assured with all the faithful children of Abraham to be preserved by the Almighty power of God through faith unto salvation Which Grace and Faith and Salvation the same Almighty God the God of Power and of Peace bestow upon us all here assembled With all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord both theirs and ours even for the same our Lord Jesus Christs sake his most dear Son and our blessed Saviour and Redeemer To which blessed Father and blessed Son with the blessed Spirit most holy blessed and glorious Trinity be ascribed by us and the whole Church all the Kingdom the Power and the Glory from this time forth and for ever Amen AD POPULUM The Seventh Sermon At St. Paul's Cross London May 6. 1632. 1 Pet. II. 16. As free and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness but as the servants of God THere is not any thing in the World more generally desired than Liberty nor scarce any thing more generally abused Insomuch as even that blessed liberty which the eternal Son of God hath purchased for his Spouse the Church and endowed her therewithal hath in no Age been free from Abuses whilst some have sinfully neglected their Christian liberty to their own prejudice and other some have as sinfully stood upon it to the prejudice of their brethren So hardly through Pride and Ignorance and other Corruptions that abound in us do we hit upon the golden mean either in this or almost in any thing else but easily swerve into the Vicious Extreams on both hands declining sometimes into the Defect and sometimes into the Excess The Apostles therefore especially St. Peter and St. Paul the two chiefest planters of the Churches endeavoured early to instruct believers in the true Doctrine and to direct them in the right use of their Christian liberty so often in their several Epistles as fit occasion was offered thereunto Which we may observe them to have done most frequently and fully in those Two Cases which being very common are therefore of the greater consequence viz. the case of Scandal and the case of Obedience And we may further observe concerning these Two Apostles that St. Paul usually toucheth upon this Argument of Liberty as it is to be exercised in the case of Scandal but St. Peter oftner as in the Case of Obedience Whereof on St. Peter's part I conceive the reason to be this That being the Apostle of the Circumcision and so having to deal most with the Iews who could not brook subjection but were of all Nations under heaven the most impatient of a foreign yoke he was therefore the more careful to deliver the
man by the light of Nature or strength of humane discourse should have been able to have found out that way which Almighty God hath appointed for our salvation if it had not pleased him to have made it known to the world by supernatural revelation The wisest Philosophers and learnedst Rabbies nor did nor could ever have dreamt of any such thing till God revealed it to his Church by his Prophets and Apostles This mystery was hid from Ages and from Generations nor did any of the Princes of this world know it in any of those Ages or Generations as it is now made manifest to us since God revealed it to us by his Spirit As our Apostle elsewhere speaketh 11. The Philosophers indeed saw a little dimly some of those truths that are more clearly revealed to us in the Scriptures They found in all men a great proâ—livity to Evil and an indisposition to Good but knew nothing at all either of the true Causes or of the right Remedies thereof Some apprehensions also they had of a Deity of the Creation of the World of a divine Providence of the Immortality of the Soul of a final Retribution to be awarded to all men by a divine justice according to the merit of their works and some other truths But those more high and mysterious points especially those two that of the Trinity of Persons in the Godhead and that of the Incarnation of the Son of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Greek Fathers use to call them together with those appendices of the latter the Redemption of the World the Iustification of a sinner the Resurrection of the body and the beatifical Vision of God and Christ in the Kingdom of Heaven not the least thought of any of these deep things of God ever came within them God not having revealed the same unto them 12. It is no thanks then to us that very children among us do believe and confess these high mysterious points whereof Plato and Aristotle and all the other grand Sophies among them were ignorant since we owe our whole knowledge herein not to our own natural sagacity or industry wherein they were beyond most of us but to divine and supernatural revelation For flesh and bloud hath not revealed them unto us but our Father which is in Heaven We see what they saw not not because our eyes are better than theirs but because God hath vouchsafed to us a better light than he did to them Which being an act of special grace ought therefore to be acknowledged with special thankfulness Our Saviour hath given us the example I thank thee O Father Lord of heaven and earth because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes Mat. 11. 25. 13. Truly much cause we have to bless the holy Name of God that he hath given us to be born of Christian Parents and to be bred up in the bosom of the Christian Church where we have been initiated into these Sacred Mysteries being catechised and instructed in the Doctrine of the Gospel out of the holy Scriptures even from our very Childhood as Timothy was But we are wretchedly unthankful to so good a God and extremely unworthy of so great a blessing if we murmur against our Governours and clamour against the Times because every thing is not point-wise just as we should have it or as we have fancied to our selves it should be Whereas were our hearts truly thankful although things should be really and in truth even ten times worse than now they are but in their conceit only yet so long as we may enjoy the Gospel in any though never so scant a measure and with any though never so hard conditions we should account it a benefit and mercy invaluable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so St. Paul esteemed it the very riches of the grace of God for he writeth According to the riches of his grace wherein he hath abounded towards us in all wisdom and prudence having made known to us the mystery of his will Eph. 1. If he had not made it known to us we had never known it aad that is the second Reason why a Mystery 14. There is yet a Third even because we are not able perfectly to comprehend it now it is revealed And this Reason will seâ—ch in the Quantum too For herein especially it is that this Mystery doth so far transcend all other Mysteries 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a great marvellous great Mystery In the search whereof Reason finding it self at a loss is forced to give it over in the plain field and to cry out O altitudo as being unable to reach the unfathomed depth thereof We believe and know and that with fulness of assurance that all these things are so as they are revealed in the holy Scriptures because the mouth of God who is Truth it self and cannot lie hath spoken them and our own Reason upon this ground teacheth us to submit ourselves and it to the obedience of Faith for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that so it is But then for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nichodemus his question How can these things be it is no more possible for our weak understanding to comprehend that than it is for the eyes of Bats or Owls to look stedfastly upon the body of the Sun when he shineth forth in his greatest strength The very Angels those holy and heavenly spirits have a desire saith St. Peter it is but a desire not any perfect ability and that but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 neither to peep a little into those incomprehensible Mysteries and then cover their faces with their wings and peep again and cover again as being not able to endure the fulness of that glorious lustre that shineth therein 15. God hath revealed himself and his good pleasure towards us in his holy Word sufficient to save our souls if we will believe but not to solve all our doubts if we will dispute The Scriptures being written for our sakes it was needful they should be fitted to our capacities and therefore the mysteries contained therein are set forth by such resemblances as we are capable of but far short of the nature and excellency of the things themselves The best knowledge we can have of them here is but per speculum and in aenigmate 1 Cor. 13. as it were in a glass and by way of riddle darkly both God teacheth us by the eye in his Creatures That is per speculum as it were by a glass and that but a divine one neither where we may read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some of the invisible things of God but written in small and out-worn Characters scarce legible by us He teacheth us also by the Ear in the preaching of his holy Word but that in aenigmate altogether by riddles dark riddles That there should be three distinct Persons in one Essence and
Mystery that driveth at all this must needs be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the highest degree the great mystery of Godliness That for the scope 27. Look now secondly at the parts and parcels the several pieces as it were whereof this mystery is made up those mentioned in this verse and the rest and you shall find that from each of them severally but how much more then from them altogether joyntly may be deduced sundry strong motives and perswasives unto Godliness Take the material parts of this Mystery the Incarnation Nativity Circumcision Baptism Temptation Preaching Life Death Burial Resurrection Ascension Intercession and Second coming of Christ. Or take if I may so call them the formal parts thereof our eternal Election before the World was our Vocation by the Preaching of the Gospel our Iustification by Faith in the merits of Christ our Sanctification by the Spirit of grace the stedfast Promises we have and hopes of future Glory and the rest It would be too long to vouch Texts for each particular but this I say of them all in general There is not one link in either of those two golden chains which doth not straitly tye up our hands tongues and hearts from doing evil draw us up effectually unto God and Christ and strongly oblige us to shew forth the power of his Grace upon our souls by expressing the power of Godliness in our lives and conversations That for the parts 28. Thirdly Christian Religion may be called the Mystery of Godliness in regard of its Conversation because Godliness is the best preserver of Christianity Roots and Fruits and Herbs which let alone and left to themselves would soon corrupt and putriâ—ie may being well condited with Sugar by a skilful Confectioner be preserved to continue for many years and be serviceable all the while So the best and surest means to preserve Christianity in its proper integrity and power from corrupting into Atheism or Heresie is to season it well with Grace as we do fresh meats with salt to keep them sweet and to be sure to keep the Conscience upright Holding the mysteries of faith in a pure Conscience saith our Apostle a little after at verse 9. of this Chapter and in the first Chapter of this Epistle vers 19. Holding faith and a good Conscience which latter some having put away concerning faith have made shipwrack Apostasie from the faith springeth most an end from Apostasie in manners And he that hath but a very little care how he liveth can have no very fast hold of what he believeth For when men grow once regardless of their Consciences good affections will soon languish and then will noysom lusts gather strength and cast up mud into the soul that the judgement cannot run clear Seldom is the head right where the heart is amiss A rotten heart will be ever and anon sending up evil thoughts into the mind as marish and fenny grounds do foggy mists into the air that both darken and corrupt it As a mans taste when some malignant humour affecteth the organ savoureth nothing aright but deemeth sweet things bitter and sowre things pleasant So where Avarice Ambition Malice Voluptuousness Vain-glory Sedition or any other domineering lust hath made it self master of the heart it will so blind and corrupt the judgment that it shall not be able to discern at any certainty good from evil or truth from falshood Wholsome therefore is St. Peters advice to add unto faith Vertue Vertue will not only keep it in life but at such a height of vigour also that it shall not easily either degenerate into Heresie or languish into Atheism 29. We see now three Reasons for which the Doctrine of Christianity may be called The mystery of Godliness because it first exacteth Godliness and secondly exciteth unto Godliness and is thirdly best preserved by Godliness From these Premisses I shall desire for our nearer instruction to infer but two things only the one for the trial of Doctrines the other for the bettering of our lives For the first St. Iohn would not have us over-forward to believe every spirit Every spirit doth he say Truly it is impossible we should unless we should believe flat contradictions Whilst one Spirit saith It is another Spirit saith It is not can a man believe the one and not disbelieve the other if he hear both Believe not every spirit then is as much in St. Iohn's meaning as if he had said Be not too hasty to Believe any Spirit especially where there appeareth some just cause of Suspicion but try it first whether it be a true spirit or a false Even as St. Paul biddeth us prove all things that having so done we may hold fast what upon trial proveth good and let the rest go 30. Now holy Scripture is certainly that Lapis Lydius that Test whereby this trial is to be made Ad legem ad testimonium when we have wrangled as long as we can hitherto we must come at last But sith all Sectaries pretend to Scripture Papists Anabaptists Disciplinarians All yea the Devil himself can vouch Texts to drive on a Temptation It were good therefore we knew how to make right applications of Scripture for the Trial of Doctrines that we do not mistake a false one for a true one Many profitable Rules for this purpose our Apostle affordeth us in sundry places One very good one we may gather from the words immediately before the Text wherein the Church of God is said to be the pillar and ground of truth The Collection thence is obvious that it would very much conduce to the guiding of our judgments aright in the examining of mens doctrines concerning either Faith or Manners wherein the Letter of Scripture is obscure or the meaning doubtful to inform our selves as well as we can in credendis what the received sence and in agendis what the constant usage and practice of the Church especially in the ancient times hath been concerning those matters and that to consider what conformity the Doctrines under trial hold with the principles upon which that their sence or practice in the Premisses was grounded The Iudgment and Practice of the Church ought to sway very much with every sober and wise man either of which whosoever neglecteth or but slighteth as too many do upon a very poor pretence that the mystery of iniquity began to work betimes runneth a great hazard of falling into many errors and Absurdities If he do not he may thank his good fortune more than his forecast and if he do he may thank none but himself for neglecting so good a guide 31. But this now mentioned Rule although it be of excellent use if it be rightly understood and prudently applied and therefore growing so near the Text I could not wholly baulk it without some notice taken of it it being not within the Text I press it no farther but come to another that springeth out of the very Text it self And
Yet that decency and expediency set aside no man can truly say that the doing of any of this is simply unlawful For why might not an English Minister if he were Prisoner in Turkey to make an escape disguise himself in such a habit as aforesaid which if it were simply unlawful rather than to do it he should dye a thousand deaths And why it should not be as lawful now for a Minister as it was once for an Apostle to work journey-work to make Shoes now as then to make Tents if it might stand with decency and expediency now as well as then let him that can shew a reason Let them look how they will answer it therefore that make it unlawful for Priests either to marry as some do or to be in commission of the peace as some others do as if either the state of Wedlock or the exercise of Temporal Iurisdiction were inconsistent with holy Orders When the maintainers of either Opinion shall shew good Text for what they teach the cause shall be yielded but till that be done they must pardon us if we appeal them both of Pharisaism in teaching for Doctrine mens Precepts So long as this Text stands in the Bible unexpunged All things are lawful for me if any man either from Rome or elsewhere nay if an Angel from Heaven should teach either of those things to be unlawful and bring no better proof for it than yet hath been done he must excuse me if I should not be very forward to believe him 36. Well you see the Apostle here extendeth our liberty very far in indifferent things without exception either of things or persons All things lawful and lawful for all men In the asserting of which liberty if in any thing I have spoken at this time I may seem to any man to have set open a wide gap to carnal licentiousness I must entreat at his hands one of these three things and the request is but reasonable Either First that all prejudice and partiality laid aside he would not judge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the appearance but according to right and truth and then I doubt not but all shall be well enough Or Secondly that he would consider whether these words of our Apostle taken by themselves alone do not seem to set open the gap as wide as I or any man else can stretch it Omnia licent All things are lawful for me Or that Thirdly he would at least-wise suspend his judgment till I shall have handled the latter clauses of my Text also wherein our liberty is restrained as it is here extended Then which may be ere long if God will he shall possibly find the gap if any such be sufficiently stopped up again to keep out all carnal licentiousness and other abuse of Christian Liberty whatsoever In the mean time and at all times God grant us all to have a right judgment and to keep a good conscience in all things AD AULAM. Sermon XII HAMPTON-COURT JULY 26. 1640. 1 Cor. 10. 23. But all things are not expedient But all things edifie not THe former Clause of the Verse here twice repeated All things are lawful for me containeth the Extension as these latter Clauses do the Limitation of that Liberty that God hath left us to things of indifferent Nature That Extension I have already handled and set our Christian Liberty there where according to the constant Doctrine of our Apostle I think it should stand From what I then delivered which I now repeat not plain it was that the Apostle extendeth our Liberty very far without exception either of Things or Persons All Things lawful and lawful for all men All the fear was lest by so asserting our liberty we might seem to set open a gap to carnal licentiousness Although there be no great cause for it in respect of the thing it self yet is not that fear altogether needless in regard of our Corruption who are apt to turn the very best things into abuse and Liberty as much as any thing Yet that fear need not much trouble us if we will but take these latter Clauses of the Verse also along with us as we ought to do Where we shall find the gap if any such were sufficiently made up again to keep out all carnal licentiousness and other abuse of Christian Liberty whatsoever 2. Of those Clauses we are now to speak But all things are not expedient But all things edifie not Wherein the Apostle having before extended our liberty in the power now restraineth it in the use and exercise of that power Concerning which I shall comprehend all I have to say in three Observations grounded all upon the Text. First That the Apostle establisheth the point of lawfulness before he meddle with that of expediency Secondly That he requireth we should have an eye to the expediency also of the things we do not resting upon their lawfulness alone And thirdly that he measureth the expediency of lawful things by their usefulness unto edification Of which in their order 3. And first Expediency in St. Paul's method supposeth lawfulness He taketh that for granted that the thing is lawful before he enter into any Enquiry whether it be expedient yea or no. For expediency is here brought in as a thing that must restrain and limit us in the exercise of that liberty which God hath otherwise allowed us but God hath not allowed us any liberty unto unlawful things And this Observation is of right good use for thence it will follow that when the unlawfulness of any thing is once made sufficiently to appear all farther enquiry into the expediency or inexpediency thereof must thenceforth utterly cease and determine No conjuncture of Circumstances whatsoever can make that expedient to be done at any time that is of it self and in the kind unlawful For a man to blaspheme the holy Name of God to sacrifice to Idols to give wrong sentence in Judgment by his power to oppress those that are not able to withstand him by subtilty to over-reach others in bargaining to take up arms offensive or defensive against a lawful Sovereign none of these and sundry other things of like nature being all of them simply and de toto genere unlawful may be done by any man at any time in any case upon any colour or pretension whatsoever the express Command of God himself only excepted as in the case of Abraham for sacrificing his Son Not for the avoiding of scandal not at the instance of any Friend or command of any Power upon earth nor for the maintenance of the Lives or Liberties either of our selves or others nor for the defence of Religion not for the preservation of a Church or State no nor yet if that could be imagined possible for the salvation of a Soul no not for the redemption of the whole world 4. I remember to have read long since a Story of one of the Popes but who the
licentiousness These Corinthians being yet but Carnal for the point of Liberty consulted it seemeth but too much with this cursed Gloss. Which taught them to interpret their Calling to the Christian Faith as an Exemption from the duties of all other callings as if their spiritual freedom in Christ had cancelled ipso facto all former obligations whether of Nature or Civility The Husband would put away his Wife the Servant disrespect his Master every other man break the bonds of relation to every other man and all under this pretence and upon this ground that Christ hath made them free In this passage of the Chapter the Apostle occasionally correcteth this errour principally indeed as the present Argument led him in the particular of Marriage but with a farther and more universal extent to all outward states and conditions of life The summ of his Doctrine this He that is yoked with a wife must not put her away but count her worthy of all love he that is bound to a Master must not despise him but count him worthy of all honour every other man that is tied in any relation to any other man must not neglect him but count him worthy of all good offices and civil respects suitable to his place and person though Shee or He or that other be Infidels and Unbelievers The Christian Calling doth not at all prejudice much less overthrow it rather establisheth and strengtheneth those interests that arise from natural relations or from voluntary contracts either domestical or civil betwixt Man and Man The general rule to this effect he conceiveth in the form of an Exhortation that every man notwithstanding his calling unto liberty in Christ abide in that station wherein God hath placed him contain himself within the bounds thereof and chearfully and contentedly undergo the duties that belong thereto vers 17. As God hath distributed to every man as the Lord hath called every one so let him walk And lest this Exhortation as it fareth with most other especially such as come in but upon the by as this doth should be slenderly regarded the more fully to commend it to their consideration and practice he repeateth it once again verse 20. Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he is called And now again once more in the words of this verse concluding therewith the whole discourse into which he had digressed Brethren let every man wherein he is called therein abide with God From which words I desire it may be no prejudice to my present discourse if I take occasion to entreat at this time of a very needful argument viz. concerning the Necessity Choice and Use of particular callings Which whilest I do if any shall blame me for shaking hands with my Text let such know First that it will not be very charitably done to pass a hard censure upon anothers labour no nor yet very providently for their own good to slight a profitable truth for some little seeming impertinency Secondly that the points proposed are indeed not impertinent the last of them which supposeth also the other two being the very substance of this Exhortation and all of them such as may without much violence be drawn from the very words themselves at leastwise if we may be allowed the liberty which is but reasonable to take in also the other two verses the 17. and the 20. in sence and for substance all one with this as anon in the several handlings of them in part will appear But howsoever Thirdly which Saint Bernard deemed a sufficient Apology for himself in a case of like nature Noverint me non tam intendisse c. let them know that in my choice of this Scripture my purpose was not so much to bind my self to the strict exposition of the Apostolical Text as to take occasion therefrom to deliver what I desired to speak and judged expedient for you to hear concerning 1. the Necessity 2. the Choice and 3. the Use of particular Callings Points if ever need to be taught and known certainly in these days most Wherein some habituated in idleness will not betake themselves to any Calling like a heavy jade that is good at bit and nought else These would be soundly spurred up and whipped on end Othersome through weakness do not make good choice of a fit Calling like a young unbroken thing that hath metal and is free but is ever wrying the wrong way These would be fairly checkt turned into the right way and guided with a steddy and skilful hand A third sort and I think the greatest through unsetledness or discontentedness or other untoward humour walk not soberly and uprightly and orderly in their Calling like an unruly Colt that will over hedge and ditch no ground will hold him no fence turn him These would be well fettered and side-hanckled for leaping The first sort are to be taught the Necessity of a Calling the second to be directed for the Choice of their Calling the third to be bounded and limited in the Exercise of their Calling Of which three in their order and of the First first the Necessity of a Calling The Scriptures speak of two kinds of Vocations or Callings the one ad Foedus the other ad Munus The usual known terms are the General and the Particular Calling Vocatio ad Foedus or the General Calling is that wherewith God calleth us either outwardly in the ministry of his Word or inwardly by the efficacy of his Spirit or joyntly by both to the faith and obedience of the Gospel and to the embracing of the Covenant of grace and of mercy and salvation by Jesus Christ. Which is therefore termed the General Calling not for that it is of larger extent than the other but because the thing whereunto we are thus called is one and the same and common to all that are called The same duties and the same promises and every way the same conditions Here is no difference in regard of Persons but One Lord one Faith one Baptism one Body and one Spirit even as we are all called in one hope of our Calling That 's the General Calling Vocatio ad Munus Our Particular Calling is that wherewith GOD enableth us and directeth us and putteth us on to some special course and condition of life wherein to employ our selves and to exercise the gifts he hath bestowed upon us to his glory and the benefit of our selves and others And it is therefore termed a Particular Calling not as if it concerned not all in general for we shall prove the contrary anon but because the thing whereunto men are thus called is not one and the same to all but differenced with much variety according to the quality of particular persons Alius sic alius verò sic Every man hath his proper gift of God one man on this manner another on that Here is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some called to be