calls upon the Abysse in fine this is a reason above all reason but that which being increate it self creates the reasons of men and Angels as short of it self as finite things are short of infinite as creatures are short of their Creatour The Apostle ends this verse with an extatical admiration of Gods incomprehensible Judgments and investigable wayes that is to say the counsels means works and reasons of his providence who alone can cull Good out of evil as he doth convincing all Nations of incredulity that thence he may make one the motive for his mercy towards the other as was said above 34. How are we lost in our judgments when we see the wicked prosper and the just afflicted when we value humane abilities which in sight of God are follies because we do not know the sense the mind of God in these his permissions nor how contemptible a thing the wisest man under the cope of heaven is in the sight of God of whom Zeno said well that the pastime or sport of God was man as if God made but a Tennis ball of man or of the wisdome of men tossing him up and down at pleasure to the wonderment of us poor mortalls Whence the Abysse of humane misery calls upon the Abysse of Divine mercy and as S. Augustine saith the Abyss of humane ignorance calls upon the Abyss of the Divine knowledge or science How well then doth the Apostle say who knowes the mind of God or who was ever of his Counsel that is as Isaias said Chap. 40. v. 13. who ever gave him counsel or who did he ever make acquainted with such counsel as he gave himself in all internall and external operations whence no man must dare to ask why leaving the Jewes he turned to the Gentiles or the like 35. This place is remarkable for it is not asked who ever gave God any thing but who hath first given him any thing which before he had not received from him that so he might be able to make God his debtour truly no man and for this reason S. Paul sayes well what have you that you have not received and if you have received it why do you glory as if it had not been received by you but were your own Yet such is God Almighty his mercy to mankind that even this impossibility in man to make God his debtour by giving him any thing that was not his own before doth not hinder man of the honour to have God a debtour to him But then we must understand this saying safely and take heed we make not God our debtour for any gift or loan of ours to him but meerly for his own promises to us and those his promises though he were graciously pleased to make them voluntarily unto us yet he binds himself by vertue of his own promise to be our debtour for the performance of his words unto us to which purpose St. Augustine spake home in these words upon this place of the Apostle Serm. 16. Pay unto us what thou doest owe us because we have done what thou hast bid us to do though even what we have done were thy deed too because thou didst help us to do it 36. And for further proof of this doctrine the Apostle proceeds saying of him by him in him are all things that is to say not onely the essence or beeing of every thing but also the operations thereof since the operations of creatures are likewise creatures too as well as the things themselves that do operate and so both have equal dependance on Almighty God so that all things are of him as of their first maker by him as by their directour disposer and perfectour in him as in vertue of his assistance they are made do operate and are conserved But St. Augustine and with him the torrent of Fathers observe that what is said to be of God is appropriated to the Father what by God is attributed to the Son and what in God is reporting to the holy Ghost that so to the whole sacred and undivided Trinity we may refer the honour and glory of all beeing and operation of creatures insomuch that even from the Apostles time the close of prayer was made in this sort Glory be to the Father Son and Holy Ghost and by the Councill of Nice was added thereunto as it was in the beginning and now and ever world without end Amen For though here be ground of distinguishing Persons yet there is none of dividing essences or natures and therefore the Apostle telling us here of our obligation to the Blessed Trinity concludes saying not to them but to him be glory for ever that is to the one only undivided God who is neverthelesse distinguished into three several Persons Father Son and Holy Ghost A very apt close for the Epistle on Trinity Sunday The Application 1. WE have hinted in the Illustration above at the deep design of holy Church in closing up the grand work of humane Redemption and the Octave of the holy Ghost with a Feast made sacred to the B. Trinity wherein our Faith seems to be chiefly and wholly exercised because there is nothing so hard in Christian doctrine as to believe the Trinity of the sacred Triunity Now we may presume to affirm further that albeit from Pentecost to Advent the main aym of Christian duty be the exercise of charity in producing frequent acts thereof neverthelesse it was fitting to begin the practice of charity with an act of Faith to shew the difference between our love of God on Earth and our love of him in Heaven for there Faith shall cease that Love may increase and be alone the Totall duty of the Blessed but here Faith must increase least Love decrease in us Hence it was not onely fit that this our first act of charity to day should be to God but that it should be also accompanied with the strongest act of Faith imaginable which is this we now produce in making profession we believe God to be Trine and One. 2. Now not to break the order of the service that I mean of charity the main imploy of every Christian between this and the holy time of Advent see how by way of commemoration at least of the first Sunday after Pentecost we have regard to such another Prayer and such another Gospel whereunto I have added here the Epistle also though not read in open service as do mainly point at charity so shall we see in their perusal anon when these proper to the day are done 3. And lastly least this Act of Charity we are now to exercise should be defective being an act of love to God alone without relation to our neighbour see how we are taught to perfect it as well with an act of hope as with an act of Faith since the main scope of holy Churches prayer to day is to declare so strong a Hope in her believing and in her loving God that she puts it as a hopeful
the vice of a persecuter which was in none but himself though more may be attributed to his doing as much in a lesse time as the rest did in longer space being he was last called With me that is laboureth with me and not as the Heretickes translate the grace which is with me or in me I not laboring my self but relying on the past labours of Christ thus vainly they but the holy Church understands the Apostle to mean his joynt labour with the grace of God The Application 1. St. Paul in this Epistle recapitulates the arguments by which he brought the Corinthians to believe the hardest point of Faith that then was agitated the resurrection of our Saviour for it was upon preaching that doctrine this Apostle was chiefly persecuted and for defence whereof he suffered martyrdome 2. But as we see this Epistle in the beginning requires that charity accompany the faith of this great mystery so in the close thereof humility attends on charity while S. Paul first calls himself an abortive and the least of the Apostles more one not worthy of that celebrated Name nor daring to ascribe unto himself the fruits of any his greatest labours but attributing all to the grace of God effectually operating in him all those things whereunto he thought himself did very poorly cooperate Thus must faith and humility accompany our charity in her now long march to Advent in all her way to Judgement it self 3. What can be the result of this mystery other then that which naturally followes the unexpected proof of the least expected and most unbelieved thing in all the world the Resurrection of our Saviour A joy no doubt ineffable in those that were his friends and had no hand in any of his sufferings and a confusion on the other side in all that had contributed unto his death a sorrow and a fear if not a deep despair indeed that their sinne of Deicide was sure enough unpardonable So should it be with us beloved who although we cannot kill our Christ again yet do attempt to crucifie him by the very least of many mortall sinnes that we commit against his heavenly Majesty notwithstanding our own conscience tells us we doe therein worse then ever did the Jewes for they pretended zeal in all they did whereas we know we sinne for want of zeal for want of love to him who died for love of us What remedy but that which holy Church to day hath found when we hear the Preachers tell us of the frights and feares the sadnesse and confusion of the Jewes in such a case that then We pray not onely as we did on Sunday last to have Gods mercy multiplyed but even powred out upon us as his precious bloud was powred upon the Jewes that by such a showre of mercy the sinnes our conscience fears may be pardoned and the favours we dare not aske may be granted for the reasons given in the preamble of the Prayer and in the end of the Illustration above The Gospel Mark c. 7. v. 31. 31 And again going out of the coasts of Tyre he came by Sidon to the sea of Galilee through the middest of the coast of Decapolis 32 And they bring to him one deaf and dumb and they besought him that he would impose his hands upon him 33 And taking him from the multitude apart he put his fingers into his eares and spitting touched his tongue 34 And looking up unto heaven he groaned and said to him Epheta which is be opened 35 And immediately his ears were opened and the string of his tongue was loosened and he spake right 36 And he commanded them not to tell any body but how much he commanded them so much the more a great deal did they publish it 37 And so much the more did they wonder saying He hath done all things well he hath made both the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak The Explication 31. THis literall narration of Christ going from coast to coast and by the Sea side alludeth to the change which grace maketh in those who follow the calling of Almighty God that they must leave their former customes and go by new coasts even rough and dangerous seas of persecution up mountains of dangers and difficulties to enjoy the quiet of a good conscience 32. By deaf understand mystically those who will not obey the commands of God and holy Church by dumbe those who will not praise Almighty God in their actions nor in their thoughts but like mutes spend their time in silencing Gods praises They ask him to lay his hands on them because they had experience he did use to cure the diseased by that means 33. He tooke him apart because this corporall cure alludes to the conversion of the soul and the best means of conversion to God is an aversion from the world a retyring from evill company By his fingers put into the deaf mans eares understand the holy Ghost opening the infidels understanding and making him believe the word of God when he hears it Besides the holy Ghost is often intimated by the finger of God as Ex. 8.19 alibi By spitting here is meant Christ his wetting his own finger with his own spittle so notes the Greek Text not that he did spit into the dumb mans mouth And Christ his spittle is not an unfit cure of dumbnesse since by the moisture of the tongue speech is much perfected and aridity is an impediment to speech Thus even God works miracles by the aptest instruments in nature for them 34. By his looking to heaven we are minded that from thence comes all the power we have to heare the word of God and to speak his praise By his groaning he showes how God seems to lament the miseries of those souls which are infected with the contagion of sin By his saying Epheta be thou open to the deaf ear he shewes himself to be God as curing by command 35. No marvel God commanding the cure was done but by his speaking right we are told the cure was perfectly done and not palliated And indeed then it is most evident Gods operation is perfect in us when it brings us from wrong to right from sick to sound but mystically when from sinners we are brought to be right perfected Saints and surely needs must he speak right whom God had cured of his dumbnesse Though some will have it hence that this man was not quite dumb but had onely a stammering in his speech or a weaknesse in that organ not suffering him to speak plain but to babble as children do that first learn to speak Yet by right speaking may here be well understood the cured mans speaking perfectly the praises of God and rightly glorifying his Divine Majesty thereby 36. The word command here is not to be taken strictly or arguing a precept but rather a request so there was no sin in breaking it but rather as S. Augustine insinuates a virtue and that obedience too for
they said in saying it and thence grew bold to undervalue it to call it dry and barren Prayer in respect of other Books especially the Manuell consisting indeed of many Prayers derived from the Primmer but more abounding with a greater number made by private persons Pious enough no doubt yet not of such avowed authority as those who made the Primmer Prayers Hence it was I thought no subject fitter to be written on than that which should at once expound the holy Writ and Churches Prayers with all the other parts thereof contained in the Primmer both being so profound and so mysterious as they are Know therefore Christian Reader first The Antiphons are ever such as have report unto the present time or season of the year they are made proper to by holy Church Know secondly they ever are some part of holy Writ appointed by the like Authority or for Epistle or for Gospell of the Day Yet to know this is not enough unlesse you further know the meaning of the word it self that an Antiphon imports as much as a pre-toning of a Tune to follow not unlike the Birds recording in the winter time the tunes they chirp and sing aloud in the summer to the praise of their Creator And hence it is the Chorists or masters of the Quire where holy Office is ever sung in open Churches that allow this happy liberty come up unto the Canon who begins the Psalme and in a low Tone give the Tune to him who takes it thus then sings aloud and leads the Quire after him all singing out the Psalme in loudest voice which was Antiphonized as above pre-toned I mean recorded or pre-tuned by the Chorists first of all Now that you see these Antiphons end here with a Versicle and Responsory as they doe in every Primmer this argues all the Prayers and other parts of holy Churches Service that doe follow are exercises as well of Neighbourly as of Love Divine and that no jar ought to intercede in tempo all affaires between those who are tyed up to a harmony and concordancy in the spirituall duty of good Christians whilst we must be ever ready to answer with a Responsory him that begins with a Versicle to incite us to priase Almighty God and to give a testimony we are at peace with one another before we dare presume to make our joynt petition to the Heavenly Majesty for our own and our neighbours necessities in the following Prayer But of this more anon when we shall say who first prefixt the Antiphons before the Psalmes and Prayers Please gentle Reader onely here to know that hence it was I took the Rise of writing in the Method I observe throughout this Book For since I found the self-same Antiphons that here you have in English to be in all the Primmers of the world in all the severall languages that say this holy Office every day even in the Breviaries of the Priests I did conclude those Antiphons were as Pretonings to the tune of the Mysticall musick of the holy Church that was to follow then when such an Antiphon was read or to speak more plainly these Antiphons did seeme to point out what the Duty was that then we should be at Namely that all the Children of the Church should put in execution the practice of that Doctrine which the Preacher then delivered in the Pulpits when or that Antiphon or else some other part of holy Writ in that dayes service was the Preachers Text. And that we might doe this the better we thought the following Prayer was fitly given to petition grace to doe it Hence I inferred those Prayers must needs extend to more than yet the word Collecta or Collect did import for that betokens onely the collection of the peoples suffrages put into the mouth of the officiating Priest in his own and their behalfs and begging Grace that what the Preachers tell them is their present duty they may execute Religiously But further yet we thought this Prayer this Collect following such an Antiphon and being the open musick which every Christian was to make that day in the ears of the Heavenly Majesty while their hearts were to sing what their lips did say must also keep the Tune of that Antiphon speak I mean to God in the same sense and be as an Epitome or Abstract of the holy Text from whence that Antiphon was taken must be in fine a kind of summe or Quintessence of all the Preaching parts of that dayes Service and must from thence assume the name of Collect as if collecting up in few lines the larger Lessons of the holy Text both in the Epistle and Gospel of that day This I confesse seemed hugely consonant to reason and if it could be made appear would render sure the Prayers of holy Church extreamly proper to the Times and Dayes they were appointed for extreamly reverential extreamly gratefull to the People To see thereby the sweet connexion in all the parts of holy Churches Service This this Beloved is the hard attempt of all the following Book wherein how happy I shall be I know not yet before I hear you say you see it is in some proportion done By the Illustrations of the Prayers shewing how they allude unto how they exhaust indeed the holy Texts both of the Epistle and Gospell of the Day By the Explications of the Sacred Texts shewing how piously safe they are when rightly understood how dangerous when heretically wrested to a contrary sense than in themselves they bear And by the Applications not onely shewing us how to apply the whole Service of the day to our instructions but how to apply indeed our selves to God by a godlinesse of life made sweet and easie to us by the said Applications Now because this sweet connexion of Parts in holy Service is a Jewell rendring the Church extreamly Beautifull in the sight of her sacred Spouse even ravishing the eyes of Men and Angels therefore I shall desire the Reader not to huddle ore this Book as reading it for Recreation but purely for Devotion which yet will recreate the more by how much the lesse thereof is read at once by how much the oftner the Reader turnes to see and to compare the Parts reporting unto one another which generally they doe when in the Print you see the letter to vary the Character to change for ever then the changed letter in the Glosse is part of either Prayer or holy Text to which it doth report and whereunto the Reader shall doe well to turn before he doe proceed to further Lecture that so comparing one place to another he may see the simpathy between the parts compared and seeing this may praise Almighty God in the beauty of his beautifull Spouse the holy Church whose very daily service is a kind of picture of her lovelinesse in the sight of his Heavenly Majesty I doe not undertake to say that all the Churches Prayers are of so deep a sense as
in this with a mighty authority of Fathers so 't is no weak assertion I hope of mine nor any ill-grounded recommends being thus supported O Beloved what an ineffable dignity doth this set upon these Prayers What an Emolument may we bring to our selves by saying them in such society What a vast Treasure of devotion shall we find wrapt up in them In fine what a supine negligence shall it be in us not to avail our selves of this devotion which without envie I may say is such as none that is vocall can equall it and which yet I have aymed to contrive into so short a method as shall not hinder us from any other pious exercises whatsoever onely let me beg this favour of our Sodality to ranke this way of prayer in the number of those duties towards Almighty God whereof it is truly said Mat. 23. ver 23. Haec oportet facere These things we ought to doe which yet shall nothing clash with what followes truly averrable of other Devotions to Et illa non omittere Those we need not omit for using these Not that I affirm we must of necessity say this Trinity of Prayer which here I have suggested to deserve the Title of good Christians or of Trinitarians as some from hence may call us but that I mean we must prefer the publike prayers of holy Church before all others whatsoever And truly since the first of these three Prayers will by this Book appear to bee an Abstract both of the Epistle and Gospel of the day rather than I shall attribute this devotion to my own Invention I will conceive it was the pristine practice of the Church because the very nature of the Piety is such as seems to draw its source from the better fountaines of devotion than any I can lay claim unto namely the zeals of the Antient Fathers of the Church True it is I can not positively say it was so but thus much I need not scruple to avouch That as the Epistles and Gospels are the expresse Doctrine of our blessed Saviour or of his Apostles as where S. Paul sayes Non Dominus sed ego Not our Lord but I c. 1 Cor. Chap. 7. so the Churches publike Prayers are the speciall Dictates of the Holy Ghost that is to say the avowed suggestions of that Holy Spirit which avowment our private praiers do want though whether the blessed spirit were resolv'd The holy Fathers who made these Publick Prayers should with reflection frame them suiteable to this Designe which I now draw them to that is more than I dare venture to affirme but certainly that holy Spirit did suggest unto the Pastors of the Church a stile so proper and so deep withall as might sound the lowest bottome of the Sea of holy Writ and so exhaust even the abstrusest sence thereof which whether I have alwayes done I know not but I beleive the meanest understanding will perceive I often make the Collect expresse the substance of the whole Epistle and Gospel of the day and where I come not home to this 't is rather that I see it not than that the Prayer extends no further or suits no better unto this Design suffice it now the door is open that stronger-sighted soules may see much farther into the Paradise of this Devotion than I have done and shew the world much rarer fruit therein To me the Honour is too much that I have made a great Attempt which is to render that Book sweet and easie wherein we may presume the Holy Ghost directed the Composers of it for the publick use of the Layety the Primmer I mean whose Prayers I hope henceforward will be found as sweet as they are sound and not so hard as to be laid aside for either barren or too deep to be understood by the common People The Hymmes whereof I conceive are lately made so smooth so eloquent and yet so easie too in the Manuell lately printed at Saint Omers that every one who can but read the English Tongue will find them very pleasing The Lessons I shall explicate in my second Tome of this Christian Sodality which I intend to Publish next following the like method as here I hold in this upon all the Feasts of our Lord as also upon those Festivals of his ever Blessed Mother the Virgin Mary those especially which allude to any Mystery of our Redemption As to the particular Feasts of other Saints I shall spare the labour to write upon them in this method but shall recommend them for daily Garnishing or Sawces to the Dishes added now and then as they occurre to the constant Table of the Churches Sundayes and weekly food out of the Epistles and Gospels of the Season First Because the Prayers we use to Saints are cheifly addrest to God by the merits of his sacred Son as in the close of every Prayer appeares ending still Through Jesus Christ our Lord Amen Secondly Because the particular honour we give to Saints must never interrupt the generall duty we owe to God at all times and upon all occasions Thirdly Because I find these Prayers have rather a Report to the Martyrologe or Stories of Saints lives and deaths than to the Epistle and Gospel of the day in regard one and the same Epistle and Gospel is common to divers Saints yet we may piously beleive those Saints whom then we serve have served God in their life time by being eminent in such perfections as the Epistles and Gospels read upon their Feasts doe recommend unto us all Neverthelesse I shall in my second Tome set out the Communion of Saints in such order as I intend to doe the Feasts of our Lord and of his sacred Mother that by this meanes the Layety may see in generall at least the severall Degrees of Saintity in Holy Church as those of Angels Apostles Martyrs Confessors Virgins and Widdowes whence they may easily distinguish the particular Proportion of every particular Saint as his or her Feast occurres in that line of Perfection which the common Glasse of Saintity shall represent As for the like regard I intend lastly in my second â—ome to add the Communion of Vigils the Embers and Rogation Dayes in this self-same method as these above because my third â—ome else of Lent will be too long if set forth after this manner there being six and thirty feriall Dayes in Lent besides the Sundayes already published in this first Tome and every day hath as well a particular Antiphon and Prayer as a particular Epistle and Gospel proper to it self whereof divers are very long besides those four long Gospels of the four Evangelists read all at length in Holy week which will swell this third Tome to a mighty bulk being done in this method where every verse is particularly gloss'd and by this meanes I shall render as much Scripture easie to the people as will occurre in the flux of the whole year which is the cheifest motive I have to give
Such as may prepare the way for Jesus Christ to come amongst us that by his coming we may deserve to serve Almighty God with purified Souls How purified By loving him and so deserving to be his Fathers Servants in a high degree indeed as fore-runners to his Sacred Son as Baptists as Angels sent before his face to prepare his wayes and consequently as men than whom greater did never arise amongst the sons of women Blessed God! to what a height of perfection doth holy Church invite her Children to day being but on Sunday last raised from their dead sleep their trance of Sin and yet no marvell for Christianity is in truth the summity or top of all perfection and of all Christians we know the Catholike to be Top and Top-gallant that is to say the highest of men which consequently so purifies their Souls as they become at least the lowest of Angels since in true morality the highest of the inferiour arrives to the perfection of the lowest of his Superiours whence we read of Saint John Baptist That he was an Angel sent before the face of Jesus Christ to prepare his wayes Luke 7. ver 27. Now lest this discourse seeme but gratuite and to have little or no connexion to the whole service of the day however we finde it genuine enough perhaps unto the Prayer see what Lessons of Purity and sanctity of Soules the Epistle gives us insisting altogether upon the highest of Sanctity mutuall peace and charity such as made the two most discordant people in the world united perfectly in one the Jew and Gentile who before they were in Christ united and had their hearts raised up to heavenly affections detested one another but once meeting both in the love of one God they became in Christ one Thing one Body of that undivided Church which hath the onely Son of God to be the head thereof our Saviour Jesus Christ Nay see further how this dayes Gospel makes of humane Soules thus raised up by mutuall love by having all one God and beleeving equally in the doctrine of his sacred Son Baptistick Saints and consequently spirits Angelicall whilst what is read to day of Saint John Baptist is spoken to us as either being or invited to be like him fore-runners to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ voices crying out in the desart of this world prepare the wayes of our Lord. O Christians O Catholicks at least remember we are now in holy Advent a time set out apart to prepare us for a worthy receiving of our Saviour at his Nativity into this world be it therefore spent as Saint John Baptist did imploy his dayes in pennance fasting praying in purifying of our Souls in raising mortall man up to the purity immortality and sanctity of Angels so shall we pray as all our Pastours preach to day which is I hope a sufficient adjusting of this dayes Prayer unto the following Epistle and Gospel of the day bidding us with one mind and one mouth glorifie God which then we doe when our practice and our Prayer is answerable to what our Pastors teach and preach unto us The Epistle ROM 15. ver 4. c. 4. VVHat things soever have been written to our learning they are written that by the patience and consolation of the Scriptures we may have hope 5. And the God of patience and of comfort give you to be of one mind towards one another according to Jesus Christ 6. That of one mind with one mouth you may glorifie God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ 7. For the which cause receive one another as Christ also hath received you unto the honour of God 8. For I say Christ Jesus to have been Minister of the Circumcision for the verity of God to confirm the promises of the Fathers 9. But the Gentiles to honour God for his mercy as it is written Therefore will I confesse to Thee in the Gentiles O Lord and will sing to thy name 10. And again he saith Rejoyce ye Gentiles with his people 11. And again Praise all ye Gentiles our Lord and magnifie him all ye people 12. And again Isaiah saith There shall be the root of Jesse and he that shall rise up to rule the Gentiles in him the Gentiles shall hope 13. And the God of hope replenish you with all joy and peace in believing that you may abound in hope and in the vertue of the holy Ghost The Explication 4. SAint Paul alludes here to what was written in the old Law and makes it all wholly and entirely to have been a lessen for our instruction at least though not a rule to our actions since the abrogation of it and if he say thus of the abrogated Law much more ought we to receive and read for our instructions all thâ—â— is written in the new Law which shall remain to the worlds end unaltered But he applyes this speech particularly now to what he said in the immediate verse before citing the Prophet Davids words Psal 68. The curses of those that curse Thee have fallen upon me making Christ speak these words as taking upon his own person the Curses and Sins of the people committed against his Heavenly Father to restore to God as it were his lost honour if we may so say by assuming these Curses to himself as also by his suffering to appease the Divine wrath and in this sense he applyes his speech to the Romanes that they might convert to their instructions and comfort this which in their behalf our Saviour took upon himself namely the guilt and burthen of the Gentiles Sins as well as those of the Jewes so to ingratiate them also to his heavenly Father By the patience and consolation of the â—criptures meant the patience they teach us in their singular examples thereof and the comfort they bring us in letting us see we may by following the said examples hope for the like rewards which now the Saints in Heaven have for so the last words of this verse import 5. The Apostle calls him the God of patience and of comfort because he is infinitely patient infinitely comforting and because his Vertues are not as in Man his Ornaments but his Essence so that he is patience it self comfort it self and more if we could more express Then we are most properly of one mind one towards another when we wish and do as well to others as to our selves According to Christ as Christ was to us and as he gave us command to be saying Love one another as I have loved you This is indeed absolute perfection and this is the true Badge of a perfect Christian 6. That of one minde with one mouth c. Then we do truly glorifie God when we conforme our selves in all things to his holy Will and this we can not all do unless all our mindes be one as he is in us all to that one effect of glorifying him so when one pretends God is glorified thus and another will not
deal of Sin and though it be a greater effect to remit sin of the Soul than to cure diseases of the Body yet this will not be miraculous as the other was and consequently if we ask a favour with like zeal as they did beg a Miracle surely we may hope to have it and truly not to ask it is not onely not to deserve it but to confound our selves knowing it is but Ask and Have with so good so puissant so merciful a God And thus we see again there is a deeper sense latent in the Prayers of holy Church than lazy Souls that will not meditate it out can easily retrive but once found out must needs prove hugely consonant unto the Epistle and Gospell of the day since holy Church gives us this Prayer for an abstract of her doctrine in the Pulpit that so we may unanimously and with one mouth honour God and whom he sent our Lord and Saviour Iesus Christ The Epistle ROM 12. ver 17. c. 17. TO no man rendring evill for evill providing good things not onely before God but before Man 18. If it may be as much as in you holding peace with all men 19. Not revenging your selves my dearest but give place unto wrath for it is written Revenge to me I will reward saith our Lord. 20. But if thine enemy hunger give him meat if he thirst give him drink for doing this thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head 21. Be not overcome of evill but overcome in good the evill The Explication 17. THis Epistle begins with the end of the seventeenth Verse the beginning being explicated in the last Sundayes Epistle nor is there any thing of moment can be said more than the Text it self speaks disswading us to render evill for evill but exhorting to provide as much good as we can to all men which Saint Bernard explicates as alluding to conversation and counselling it may be good both in the sight of God and Man saying We owe our Consciences to God our Fame to Man though perhaps this may be an addition of perfection to the former part of the Counsell as who should say we were not onely to avoid rendring evill for evill but rather instead of so doing to repay an ill turn done unto us with a good deed done by us to those that doe us hurt 18. And to that purpose the next Verse alludes saying If it may be for perhaps all the good we can doe will not gain upon our enemeis at least we must endeavour on our part there be no defect but that if possible we be at peace with all men as we desire God to be in peace with us and not to wage against us the warre of his wrath and fury since we offend him hourly and that infinitely more than any enemy we have can offend us 19. The Latine phrase is not defending your selves but because commonly the defense of Man against Man is made by way of Revenge therefore here the Apostles sense is extended thereunto as if what resistance we may make under the moderation of an unblamed defence must be sure to savour nothing of Revenge if we will hold the integrity of a good Christians reputation but instead of Revenging give place to wrath that is as some will have it to the Divine Wrath which is provoked in God against all those that doe injury to any one of his creatures as Princes take the wrong done to their Ministers for affronts to them and so revenge the same others say to be silent to depart when you are exasperated is to give place to wrath The last and best meaning is if your enemy begin to be angry oppose him not but let him go on till his anger be over and this as it is truly to give way or place to wrath so oftentimes it is the means to appease the fury of the Enemy who if resisted might increase in fury whereas not being opposed he cools within himself and so there is double way given both by the receiver of a wrong and by him that through the patience of the injured surceaseth to doe further injury by his further wrath and this way is sutable to that of our Saviour saying Luke 10. v. 29. If any strike your right cheek turn him your left rather than strike him again So this place thus given to wrath imports as much as a pardon given to our neighbours offence against us as we hope for pardon of our offences against God For thus we shall give way that the injurious words passing through our humane ears into our Christian hearts and there buried in the bowels of brotherly affection may die and be no more remembred than if they never had been heard by us or spoken by our enemy and lest we should say if neither I nor any friend else revenge my wrongs I shall never live in quiet therefore the Apostle knowing this was an objection obvious against him adds presently what is written Deut. 32. v. 35. Revenge to me I will reward as who should say Be not O Christians sollicitous how to redeeme your vexation for injuries unless you revenge them be it your part to receive all wrong patiently and leave it to God to right you let him revenge your quarrells he both can as omnipotent and will as just infallibly revenge your wrongs rather we should pitty those who fall into the hands of the living God for that is terrible as the Scripture sayes Heb. 10 3â— and wish they had not done us wrong to pull upon themselves so great a revenge 20 Contrariwise If thine enemy hunger give him meat c. which is advised Prov. 25. v. 21. as if we should like loving mothers feed our enemies as our children and the manner here expressed is like to that indeed which mothers or nurses use to little ones first giving them a bit of meat then a little drinke and so continue till the child covet no longer feeding and in very truth the fury of an enemie menacing our ruine is a kind of reducing himself from the state of a man to that of a little child void of reason stamping and staring for anger without cause since no man will anger a child This phrase of the Proverbs heaping coals of fire upon our enemies heads is variously explicated some thinke our patience to an implacable enemy makes him guilty of hell fire but this cannot stand with a sound sense if our patience bee to any such end though perhaps rather than be provoked our selves to impatience wee may permit our enemy to incurre that danger and so permissively cast coals of eternall fire upon his head The second sense therefore is better of those that say our patience causing an enemies blush is a kind of firing him with his own passions of fury and shame together but best of all they explicate this place who say we cast coals of charity upon an enemies head by our patient bearing his injuries and
when men were asleep his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way 26. And when the blade was shot up and had brought forth fruit then appeared also the Cockle 27. And the servants of the good man of the house coming said to him Sir didst not thou sow good seed in the field whence then hath it Cockle 28. And he said to them The Enemy-man hath done this And the servants said to him wilt thou we goe and gather it up 29. And he said No lest perhaps gathering up the cockle you may root up the wheat also together with it 30. Suffer both to grow untill the harvest and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers Gather up first the Cockle and binde it into bundles to burn but the Wheat gather ye into my barn The Application 24 THis thirteenth Chapter is wholly parabolicall and this other is the second parable insisting wholly upon cockle by stealth sowed over the Wheat after the husbandman had sowed his field with good seed where note the whole Parable alludes to the whole thing done not to the particular doer since if so the kingdome of heaven must not have bin likened to the man sowing but to the King of heaven which Kingdom in this place seems to be the Church of Christ as if by the sanctity thereof he did reign in continuall glory and here Christ makes himself the man sowing in his field that is to say in this world which is all one field of God the seed is the word of the eternall Father to his children the Church of Christ and therefore this Word is called good seed because it fructifies both to grace in this life and to glory in the next 25. By the men being asleep are here meant the Pastours of Gods Church being out of the Pulpit or out of sight of their people and parishioners or else our own remissness in vertue which is a kinde of sleep in that school where waking is alwayâ—s necessary insomuch that even when we sleep our hearts or soules must wake lest we be surprized by the never sleeping enemy who lyes at watch perpetually to devour us And the enemy mentioned in this place is indeed the common enemy to God and man the Devill whose Cockle over-sowed amongst the wheat of Christian doctrine is either Heresie of Doctrine or errours of life The first he sows when hee makes us wrest Scriptures to our private sense contrary to the Churches exposition The second when he tempts us to doe contrary to the rule of our actions set down by the Word of God and by his Preachers of that word unto us And his going away when this is done is his leaving us corrupted both in doctrine and manners as if wee had not received our taints in both from him but were by our selves forsooth assured we were in the right Note by cockle or zizania as the Scriptures call it is understood here heresie or infidelity in respect of true Faith as also vice and sin in respect of true vertue so that under cockle is meant all impure grain or weeds that mix with corn and choak it in the growth or growing with it make it unsavoury and by the ill mixture thereof intoxicate the brain with a vertiginous dizziness as heresie and sin doe the soul of man and indeed Christ in this place alludes to the Scribes and Pharisees corrupting with their false Doctrine those to whom hee had taught the truth perswading them he was a drunkard because he went to a wedding and turned water into Wine and a blasphemer because he abrogated the Law of Moses and made himself more than Abraham namely the Son of God 26. The reason why this Cockle was not to be distinguished from the wheat till both were grown up ready to pullulate into their severall fruits was because all plants in their first blade are green alike and most grains of corn are of like blade at least if they differ in blade they are not therefore weeds but may be good corn though thus differing yet when they come to fructifie then they are discerned and seen to be good or bad according to that of our Saviour Matth. 7.16 By their fruits yee shall know them who are good men and who bad 27. This Verse alludes to the Pastours of Gods Church complaining that whilst they sow his seed of truth in the pulpits they finde more cockle than corn when they come to reap their harvest that is to say if not more Hereticks than Catholikes at least more sinners than Saints but here it may not be amiss for these Pastors to reflect whether they doe indeed sow the same seed as Christ their master sowed whether they doe preach the same holy and saving doctrine or admit they doe this yet by a further disquisition they must see whether or no they have sown the seed of example or holy manners as well as of true doctrine for if not they wiâ—l be answereâ— not to have sown good seed since exemplarity of life is equally expected to fall from the hand of the Churcheâ— seeds-man as well as solidity of doctrine 28 The enemy man here imports the devill and by this answer there is a wâ—rd of comfort given to the Pastours while our Saviour sayes there may be weeds or cockle in the field of holy Church though there were never so good seed sown both of doctrine and of life by the Husbandmen the Preachers thereof and this by the Devil alwayes ploughing up a nâ—w some parcels of this field by temptations or fluctuations in mens mindes or by scattering his â—oul seed of sin over the ground newly sown with doctrine and vertue since it is not in the Pastors powers to prevent all evill though they themselves be never so good or shall never so well comply with their duties both in doctrine and manners as also he tels them they are not presently to pluck up ill weeds as soon as they appear but 29. As in this Verse appears Let them grow up both together corn and weeds lest whilest you pluck up the weeds you loosen the root of the corn growing neer un-unto it and so make it die for want of setled rooting since there is not so much malice in bad men but there is more grace in the good or at least a little good is able to overcome a great deal of bad because it proceeds from a more pâ—werful agent grace exceeding nature in activity and this was well observed by S. Augustine saying upon the first verse of the 54. Psalm Doe not thinke that evill men are gratis permitted in this world and that God cannot work good out of them since every wicked man therefore liveth that either himself may be corrected or that by him the good man may be exercised either in patience if the sinner disturbe him or in giving him example of vertue to follow To the like purpose speaks S. Gregory Hom. 35.
sacred son Christ Jesus at the day of Judgement to revenge his Fathers and his own wrongs done unto them by the sins of ungratefull and mis-believing men who notwithstanding they see Christ was raised from the dead will not yet believe him to bee the Messias and Saviour of the world from which revenge or wrath those who believe in Christ Jesus are delivered that is from the damnation due to their incredulity who believe not in him or to their evill lives who though they doe rightly believe yet live not according to the rule of Faith or doe not works answerable to their belief The Application 1. AS it is huge Reason we should fly to heaven for help in humane dangers according as wee were taught last Sunday so is it very reasonable we should practise what S. Paul exhorted the Thessalonians to whilest his Lesson to them is this day read to us Namely to be mindfull of the work of our Faith c for albeit Faith elevateth Reason to believe some things that are above Reason yet it bindeth us not to doe any thing either above or against Reason and so leaves us in all our thoughts and actions to be regulated by reason 2. Hence it is great Reason that we who now profess the same Faith with the Thessalonians doe persevere with them in the works of faith such as may render us able by our exemplar lives to convert all that we converse with as wâ— hear the Thessalonians did convert all those of Macedonia and of Achaia to the faith of Jesus Christ 3 Now because our actions commonly are such as our thoughts propend and lead us to it is fitting that to bee the better able to doe reason in all our actions we should admit of notâ—ing but reason into our thoughts and meditations since we are certain whatsoever can lay claim to Reason especially such â—s is elevated by Faith must needs be pleasing to almighty God According as we are taught in the Prayer above The Gospel MATTH 13. vers 31. 31. ANother Parable he proposed unto them saying The kingdome of heaven is like to mustard seed which a man tooke and sowed in his fiâ—ld 32. Which is the least surely of all seeds but when it is grown it is greater than all hearbs and is made a Tree so that the fowls of the aire come and dwell in the branches thereof 33. Another Parable he spake to them The kingdome of heaven is like to leaven which a a woman tooke and hid in three measures of meal untill the whole was leavened 34. All these things Jesus spake in Parables to the multitudes and without parables he did not speak to them 35. That it might be fâ—lfilled which was spoken by the Prophet saying I will open my mouth in parables I will utter things hidden from the foundation of the world Psal 77. v. 2. The Explication 31. OUr Saviour it seems at this time made profession to speak nothing but Parables so after he had as we heard last Sunday told them the Parable of the cockle amongst the corn here hee likens the Church to the least of grains a mustard seed sowed in a mans field that is to say scattered over the field of this world which is truly said a mans field in regard Christ who is God and man is Lord and master of this whole Universe and all over it hath planted this mustard seed his holy Church 32. And as in very truth a mustard seed is the least of all others so the Church of Christ was when first planted or sowed the least of all communities in the word But some conceive Christ himself to bee this mustard seed on whom grew as so many birds in their nests The Apostles Popes Bishops Pastours and Saints of all sorts and of both sexes Others will have the Church to be this mustard-seed little in it self at first now spread over all the world Others contend it is the Gospel of Christ his doctrine or the word of God that at first was onely sowed like mustard seed among the Jewes but now is diffused over the whole Universe In fine it avails little which of these we take the Parable is verified in them all and indeed they are all in a manner one and the same thing for all have root in Christ and are branches of him and the Analogie holds between the mustard seed and every one of these for who lesse than Christ who was the out-cast of men What Church lesse than the Primitive Church of Christ What Doctrine avowed by weaker men than his Disciples were and so consequently what word lesse than his which was exsibilated or hissed out of the world at first when it was said to be a scandall to the Jewes and a folly to the Gentiles 1 Cor. 1.23 to preach the Gospel of his resurrection And this is speciall between the word and mustard-seed that as in this seed there is a kinde of fierie quality so is the word of God as holy David sayd Psal 119. v. 140. Thy word is exceeding fierie that is servorous and hot inflaming hearts to the love of God and whereas the Text speaks of this seed growing to a tree it is indeed so in Syria where birds really build in the boughs thereof as all the members of Christ doe upon him as was abovesaid 33. This other parable of the Church or of her doctrine being like to leaven suites exceedingly therewith for as a litle leaven gives a relish to a whole batch of bread so the least Word of God hidden in mens hearts as leaven is in meal makes them rise into professions of Christian dutie and renders all their actions savourie both to God and man By the woman is here meant the Church which is the Spouse of Christ hiding the leaven of Christian doctrine in the three measures of meal that is to say in three parts of the World whereunto Christianity was then immediately designed namely Asia Africa and Europe for America hath been discovered but an hundred years agoe and whither formerly disjoyned from some one of these other three parts of the Earth by an interjected Sea as now it is we know not But this we conceive that these other three parts seemed to have been a division of the whole Earth into all the parts thereof when Noe divided the World between his three Sons assigning Asia to Sem Afirica to Cham and Europe to Japhet and this perhaps may be the literall allusion of the three measures of meal seasoned by the leaven of the Gospel Mystically Saint Ambrose applyes this leaven to the three parts of Man his spirit his life and his body or to his three appetites rationall Irascible and concupiscible So that by vertue of Gods holy Word Saint Hierome sayes in our reason we possesse prudence in our anger we lodge a holy hatred against Sin in our desires or concupiscencies we harbour a coveting of Vertue And all this in having these naturall appetites elevated to
the holy Altar not his reall body as we doe so the true sence of this place is that as they all did eat one figurative bread and had one faith in God so doe we but yet as their faith and food did not carry them all to Canaan so will not faith alone carâ—y us to heaven without good works 4. This verse is harder than the former in regard it will not be easy to shew how they drank of that rock that followed them unlesse we allow they drank of Christs bloud as well as we now doe since Christ is truely the rock that did follow them or came after them and issued out his pretious bloud for us really to drink againe Christ was a spiritual rock as here is said not a reall rock of stone for the true understanding therefore of this place we must know by spirituall rock is here understood a mysticall or typicall rock and such was the reall and naturall rock out of which Moses commanded water with a stroak of his rod and yet that reall rock was but a mystery type or figure of Christ and so in regard of that mystery is called here spirituall because it did praefigure the rock of Christ some therefore say with the Hebrewes that this rock did miraculously follow the children of Israel even to the land of Promise grounded in that text Numb 21. ver 16. Others conceive this to be verified by the water of the rock following the children of Israel at least till they came where plenty of more water was others think following them is veryfied by the obedience the rock shewed to issue out water once at Moses command so by follow they understand obey but this falls short of the gramatticall signification of the word follow so the true and genuine sence of the Apostle is that this rock as it was a type of Christ so the following of this rock is typicall and not reall Spiritual and not naturall as who should say Christ who corporally followed them many yeares after did spiritually now follow them that is in his sacred Deity or as he was God not man marched with them from the beginning to the end and so by his providence still supplyed them with water which was in effect to make the rock follow them so here Christ his divinity was the thing signified by the water out of the rock which did represent the same and to clear this sence the Apostle sayes in plaine termes the spirituall rock here meant by the material or natural rock was Christ Those are his words But the rock was Christ as who should say what we mean by this spirituall rock following them was Christ his divinity for his humanity was not then in being when spiritually he did follow them nor doth it urge against this truth what is further objected they did drink of this rock but the rock they drâ—nk of was the materiall rock therefore that material rock was not onely a type of the spirituall but was truely the spirituall rock since as the drink was materiall water so the rock must be the maâ—eriall rock for it is answered the water they drank was typicall because it was a figure of Christs Deity and so the materiality of both rock and water hinder not the spirituality of Type or Figure in them both To conclude the Allegory of this place holds thus Christ was this rock who was therefore sayd strucken by Moses because the Iewes were of the Mosaicall Synagogue who struck Christ to death by the Rod of the holy Crosse the bloud of which rock was satiating drink to the true believers and was water of contradiction to the Incredulous Iewes who will not believe in his deity and misbelieving hereticks that deny the reality of his blessed body and bloud in the Sacrament of the holy Altar by whose virtue we are carried through the desart of this world into the heavenly Land of Promise nor will it follow that therefore these words of Christ saying this is my body are to be understood as hereticks pretend This is a figure of my body as here we say this is a spiritual rock that signifies This is a figure of a spiritual rock because Christ doth not say this is a figure of my body or this is my body spiritually meant no but this is my body absolutely and really the same which shall be crucified for your sinns upon the crosse as it was indeed not onely figuratively but really besides the sixth verse of this Chapter cleares all doubt of this point saying in expresse termes These things were done as in a figure to us so here is a plaine profession of a figurative speech in the Apostle we find none such of any figurative speech of Christ when he said This is my body 5. This fifth verse confirmes what was said before That Faith alone without good works was not enough to bring the children of Israel into the Land of Promise and consequently much more are good works necessary to bring us to heaven lest as the greatest part of the Hebrew people perished in the desart so the greatest part of Christians be damned if they lead not lives answerable to their Faith and Religion The Application 1. FRom the first Sunday in Advent to the Nativity of our Saviour the Churches service represents the senility or decrepit age of Judaism weary of old expectation and longing for the coming of new hopes in Jesus Christ Yet to shew the Jews were dear to God he gave them a happy period a glorious Catastrophy in John the Baptist 2. From the Nativity to this Septuagesima Sunday the Holy Church hath fed us with the admirable doctrine of out Infantile Christianity beginning with the Infant Jesus and teaching us how to walk religiously as so many Infants and children of grace 3. From this day to the end of Lent the service runs upon another strain minding us of the forfeiture of our first Father Adam made of that Repose and Rest he was created in and of the toil and labour hee drew upon himself and his whole Posterity by his disobedience so the vicility or perfect man-hood of humane nature is the state wee are now taught to perfect And therefore this Epistle brings us into the school of vertue to day neither as decrepid men nor as new born Infants but as active youths all running of a race to win the Prize of heaven and this to verifie the curse imposed on our Father Adam of eating his bread in the sweat of his brows So that toyl and labour is wee see most justly inflicted on us for the punishment of sin and all the rest we can hope for must be by the meer mercy of our Lord who yet is ready to give us an eternall Rest in the next life for a short race here for a little labour taken to glorifie God by loving our own souls Say then beloved the Prayer above as the fittest Petition for the performance of our present
the genuine sense of the Apostle in this Text who by grace here understands both the generall benefit of all mankinds redemption or reconciliation to God by Christ his passion and the speciall concourse of holy grace which Christ hath merited for every particular man and which God consequently gives to every one that thereby hee may if he will not in vaine receive it make himselfe an effectuall partaker of the said passion of Christ by cooperating therewith towards his own Salvation whereas otherwise Christ his passion remaines onely sufficient but not effectuall or actually efficatious to every particular mans Salvation 2. This prophesie reports to the second person of the Blessed Trinity thus speaking to his heavenly Father Jsaias 49.8 in the accepted time of his Incarnation and in the saving day of his passion which wrought Salvation to the whole world and when the Apostle tells us that now this acceptable time this day of Salvation is come he meanes the whole time afforded man in this world from the houre of our Saviours Incarnation and passion to the very latter day of doome is all and every minute of it so acceptable so saving that no man can use any the least instant of it in vaine if he please to serve himselfe thereof but may in any time of his whole life in any instant of that whole time by a true conversion of his heart to God and by an aversion of it from sinne save his soule though it were huge presumption in any man that had enough to doe in all his life to overcome his vices and would be so supinely negligent as never to convert his Soule and the affections of his heart to God but at some posting minute when he could no longer injoy the liberty of sinne note also though this be the literall sense of Isaias above yet the mysticall of it is that holy Lent is singled out as the most acceptable time in all the year to work out our Salvation in because we have then the assistance of the whole Church joyntly prostrate with us in Prayer Fasting and Pennance so in case our own indeavours come short yet they may now be carryed on as some men are in crowds being borne up by others when they have no footing of their own to carry them along 3. Here the Apostle seemes to put so much force in the necessity of good life in Christians such as takes off all note of scandall or offence as if all the labour of the Priests were lost unlesse the people did live according to the doctrine of the Church according to the preaching of the Pastours for so he concludes as though their Ministery might be blamed and questioned whether of God or not if the people did not live vertuous lives and without offence because men would be apt to say they were fine teachers fine Masters indeed who breed up such sinfull Scholars as give offence to others 4. And lest the people might pretend it is in vaine for Priests to Preach good life unlesse they also lead the same the Apostle both for this reason and further to let them see they were seduced by following such Preachers as without ordination or Mission tooke upon them that Ministery and did perhaps speake well but doe ill themselves falls tacitly into an Encomiastick of himselfe and of all true Ministers of Gods holy word above what was due to false Ministers by exhorting the people to such good life as they might see example of in him and the rest of the Apostles and Disciples of Christ while he saies let us shew our selves like Ministers of God instructed ordained and sent by him to Preach and lead examples of good life not obtruded upon the world by man pretending Mission and ordination who had none indeed and therefore could not truly be called the Ministers of God as onely the Apostles and their legall successours are all this he means by those words let us live as the Ministers of God then he proceeds to tell the Signes and the Tokens of such or at least the effects commonly following all such true calling ordination or mission that it renders them capable of much patience and lest this vertue should seeme but narrowly communicated by God to his Apostles here is an ampliation of it to all Emergencies or occasions wherein commonly mens patiences are truly tried that so whiles it is not limited to any one occasion or circumstance but extended to all it may appeare to be a mark or an effect of a true Minister of God since it is his gift whose every work is perfect and from this very place to the end of this Epistle the Apostle runs on declaring the marks of a true Minister of God squaring out the excellency and perfection of an Apostolicall man and of his life so that little need more to be said for explaining the verses following now we know they all drive to this end and are spoken in this sense yet now and then I shall observe in each verse something particular when the sense is deeper then it may seem to be at first reading 5. Note in this verse the Apostle exhorts even in persecutions such as was expressed above to use voluntary Mortifications namely Watching and Fasting for they are seldom inflicted as punishments of our Persecutors though even in that sense the hunger of prisons and restless nights thereof caused by the unruly company commonly in such places may also have been glanced at as things the Apostle exhorts to bear patiently 6. Chastity is here of special regard because we see the Ministers of other Churches profess it is not to be of obligation nay they wil have it incompatible with humane Nature and no way possible to be prescribed to Priests or vowed by them So by this particular mark of Chastity the Apostle distinguisheth a true Priest from an usurper of Apostolical Mission and gives this as an eminent splendour in the Catholick Church abounding in many thousands of Priests and Religious persons of both Sexes vowing and most of them doubtless if not all keeping their Vow exactly Knowledge or Science is here of special remark too since it behoves all Priests not onely to know the common Principles of Christian Doctrine but further the genuine sense of holy Scriptures and deepest Mysteries of our Faith so to enable them upon all occasions to teach to preach and to instruct the ignorant By Sweetness is here understood Meekness that since they must meet with all rudeness in nature and know all the harshness of sinners they had need of this Vertue to make their Reprehensions upon occasions more efficacious by the mildness and sweetness wherewith they exhort to good and dehort from evil life 7. By the Vertue of God is here meant either the power whereby sometimes they work Miracles or that fortitude wherewith they run through all difficulties in the practice of Christian Perfection By the Armour of Justice on the right hand and on
any legall servitude imposed on man as punishment of his sins against God for this servitude tooke hold on the Individuals of humane nature not of the nature it selâ—e and since our Saviours Individuall person was one with that of God the second person of the Blessed Trinity he was not a Servant by any legall servitude falling on his person and so even his humane nature though servile as a creature was not yet servile as a sinfull man because he had not the least guilt of sinne in him and thus we see in captives humane nature is no slave though the man that is taken be made so when then we say humane nature was corrupted in Adam we doe mean every childe of Adam received a contagion or corruption from him and yet humane nature in the line of a creature to God was not corrupted so as to be a less perfect creature then it was before for that had been to corrupt the Essence not the Persons of mankinde whereas sin onely corrupted his State and not his Essence the Persons contracting Humane Nature and not the Nature of man it self for if so Christ being man made of that Humane Nature must have been corrupted in that nature at least which yet he was not By the Similitude of man in this verse we are to understand literally the external shape of man not the accidental or phantastical as the Hereticks said but the substantial and real shape though St. Augustine takes it here as for the predicament of habit which consists in Garments or Clothing and likens Christs Humanity to be as a Garment covering his Divinity or as Iron is made fiery or as Gold is made a Statue and even in that Sence the thing is as true as it is ingeniously expressed by St. Augustine By being made as man is not to say onely like man and not to be truly such but like here signifies to be so like as it is the very same as if a Statue should from a dead Stone be made move as a man moveth eat as a man eateth speak as a man speaketh why still by every one of these gradations the Statue becomes more like a man then it was before and when at last it had all the Faculties of a man it became as man indeed that is to say not onely like but really and truly man In this Sence our Saviour was said to be as man as if we said though he were truly God yet he did not appear to be so but appeared onely to be as man which truly he was as well as he was God 8. This humility was not an Act of God the Son to God the Father for so there is no commanding Power in the one over the other but of his Humanity both to his own Divine Person and to his heavenly Father too by dying on the Cross in vertue of this command Christ did humble himself as low as could be in regard no death was so vile and contemptible as that on the Cross was in the esteem of man in those days though since even for reverence no man is executed in that kinde so Christs Humility made this contempt become reverentiall 9. For the which Act of Humility and Obedience God hath exalted him his Humanity for his Deity could not be exalted and given him a name Here we are to note Calvins pervisity who took such a hatred against the Church for the Doctrine of merit that he hence denied Christ the honour of meriting this Exaltation by his Humiliation but says that for which is to be taken consecutively or consequently not causally as who should say after his Humility God rewarded him by exalting of him but not for his Humility or for the merit thereof which yet is an abominable Impiety and Heresie whereas we allow Christ by his Death not onely to have merited for mankind redemption whereof himself had no need who was from his first Conception Blessed by his Hypostatical Union but even for himself the Glory of his Body and the endowments of a glorious Body the highest place in Heaven above Saints and Angels nay the very setting at the right hand of God the Power to Judge all the world and the dominion over Heaven and Earth which were not onely due to him as united to his Deity but as merited by his Passion further he merited to have a name that is above all names and such a name it was when Christ was called God and the Son of God the name of the Messias so famous in this world lastly the name of Jesus and Redeemer of all mankinde which name though it were given him in circumcision yet it was not divulged to all the world till he was crucified so then he was truly said to have merited that name of Saviour and many times names are given to foretell what such men will merit before they dye thus was the Blessed Name of Jesus given to Christ foretelling how richly he would deserve to be called Saviour of the world 10 In the name of Jesus every knee shall bow because this name is greater then ever any other was for Jehovah which signified God creating and was the greatest that ever had before been heard of is not so great as God redeeming and that is meant by the name of Jesus whence the Church boldly says it had nothing availed us to be born unless to have been redeemed had made our birth availing to us So it is a greater abuse to blaspheme the name of Jesus then the name of God because God gave us more Grace and Benefit by our Redemption then he did by our Creation and Jesus includes both God and Saviour which God alone doth not whence the very Angels who were not redeemed bow their knees to the name of Iesus as convertible with that of God and therefore all mankinde hath much more reason so to do for the Devils they would refrain to honour it perhaps if they could but as it is they cannot since if no otherwise they must adore Man in the Person of God ever since Iesus took Humane Nature upon him 11. And every tongue not onely all Nations upon the Earth first or last shall confess that our Lord Iesus is in the Glory of his Father but every tongue of Angels and Devils as well as of Men and by saying he is in the glory of God the Father is understood more then that he sâ—tteth at his right hand namely that he is equal in Glory to God the Father since Iesus is not onely Man but joyntly God withal So that the summity or highest pitch of Iesus his praise is indeed this that the Man Iesus being God as well as Man is though as man much inferiour yet as God even equal to the Heavenly Father in Glory Power Majesty Goodness and all the other Attributes Divine which are given to Almighty God The Application 1. MOrtification Prayer and Alms-Deeds Perseverance in good Purposes The Fear of God and Holy Poverty were
inward spirit or inspiration of the holy Ghost revealing as it were to man internally this truth by a speciall favour of holy unction of whom it is said 2 Ep. Ioan. cap. c. 2. v. 20. 27. He shall teach all truth and that his unction teacheth us in all things 7. This for is a proper illative he having said before the Spirit bore testimony that Christ was verity since the Spirit is one of the three in heaven that give testimony beyond all exceptions namely Father Son and Holy Ghost which is the very spirit that is mentioned testifying as above in Christ his behalfe so the scope of this verse is that all the three persons of the Blessed Trinity give testimony to man and Angels of Christ his being the Messias the Son of God sent to redeeme the world The Father in his Baptisme and Transfiguration the Holy Ghost by comming downe upon him in the shape of a Dove and by comming as sent from heaven by him after his Ascension to confirme his Apostles in grace on Whitsunday the Feast of Pentecost and the word or second person abundantly in all the mysteries of his life and death and all these three are one not in essence and divine nature onely but even in their Testimonies of him they all concurre in one and the same Truth 8. Saint Iohn having cited three divine or increated testimonies of Christ his Deity addes also three created testimonies of the same Truth the spirit water and bloud which three to make a perfect Analogy between this double Trinity he sayes are all one meaning they have all one root the Sacred Deity in which they are sanctified The water represents the Father the Bloud the Son the Spirit the Holy Ghost for as water was the first principle of all sublunary things as in the first of Genesis the creation declared so is the Father the creator of all the world and as Christ by his own bloud saved us so his Holy Martyrs by their bloud give testimony of him as the Holy Ghost taught all truth to the Apostles and their successors so that Spirit of Truth in the Holy Church beares testimony of his infallible veracity by whose holy Spirit she remaines infallible Take then this created Trinity thus by Water Baptisme by Bloud Martyrdome by the Spirit the charity of God diffused in our hearts and these three are one in way of Testimony or testifying all one thing the Deity of Christ that he was true God as well as man So they are not one in nature as the increated Trinity is but in office or Testimony they are all one and the same yet may we say they are even in nature all one too if wee make the division thus that these three human testimonies were all one in Christ as he was man that is the water and bloud out of his side and the spirit his human soule which he dying gave up to testifie he was a true man and all these three may be said one as being severall parts that integrated one whole Christ 9. This verse begins with an argument of similitude importing if we beleeve men much more ought we to beleeve God not that it implyeth as if the Testimony that holy Church gives of truth were a humane Testimony onely but yet creditable even upon that account and undoubted upon an other that though men speak yet God dictates the Truth unto them and so the Doctrine of the Church is not onely the Doctrine nor Testimony of men but also of God assisting them and thence it makes human-Divines or Divine-Men so in short the sence of this verse is whither the created or increated Trinity bear testimony of Christ his Deity it is the testimony of God himselfe either being or working infallible Truth whence Saint Peter 2 Epist cap. 1. v. 21. Sayes well The holy men of God spake inspired with the holy Ghost * So were those signes when Christ suffered in the Sun Moone Rocks c. Signes of the creator speaking in the creatures 10. For many reasons this is true first because he hath a thing testified by God secondly the testimony of God about that thing for none but God could reveale that truth of Christ being the Sonne of God This was told Saint Peter and thence he was called by Christ Blessed Matth. c. 16. v. 17. thirdly because this testimony is faith it selfe the greatest gift of God lastly because by this gift of Faith a man is regenerate and made of the devils Son to be the Son of God The Priest asking first the baptized if he do beleeve Christ and that professed then baptizeth immediately The Application 1. THe Illustration upon this Prayer gives a great help to the present Application of this Text unto our best advantage according to intention of the Holy Church for seeing by the Paschal Feast we understand the vertues that were proper thereunto we must not exclude the magazine of vertues which men have been hoarding up since Advent but especially those in Lent towards making us more capable of the benefit of our Saviours Resurrection because it is no lesse vertue to conserve what we have gotten then it was to get the thing acquired and wee shall then best conserve those vertues when by frequent Acts thereof as occasion is administred we make them perfect in us and when our selves are perfected by them 2. Now to shew the Church observes a method in her services as the three Theologicall vertues Faith Hope and Charity are the maine roots of all Christianity and of all other vertues whatsoever therefore from this time till we come againe to Advent where we first began the Rules of Christianity there are three seasons set a part for these Three Theologicall vertues which are the three last misteries of humane Redemption the resurrection whereby we are to perfect our Faith the Ascension whereby we are to perfect our Hope and the comming of the Holy Ghost whereby we are to perfect our charity as shall be said at large of each when they occurr 3. Suffice it for the present that this Epistle in the front thereof and quite throughout commends unto us the exercise of our Faith as the most proper vertue now required at our hands since we see the mystery of the Resurrection was a thing so hard to be believed that it cost our Saviour forty dayes paines to make it good by frequent apparitians in divers places unto divers persons for he had else ascended up to heaven as soone as ever he arose from his grave had it not been matter of huge difficulty to make the world from thence beleeve that he was God as well as man because he was risen from the dead and that as he being man did rise againe so they should doe that were men too the good to everlasting Joy the bad to everlasting paine no marvell then our Faith in the Resurrection be call'd the victory which over comes the world in the sence of the
we did firmly believe he would not forbid us any pleasure but as knowing it were hurtful to us certainly we should refrain all forbidden things and embrace all that were commanded by him 3. As when our Saviour would have a Proof of Saint Peters love he bid him prove it by keeping his commands so if Christians will make it appear they are all of one Faith they must be consequently all of one minde they must all do as that one Faith teacheth them And what that is no tongue of men or Angels can better express then is declared in the Prayer above let us say it then beloved fervently and practice it faithfully so that we be right Believers true Lovers and happy Saints On the fifth Sunday after Easter The Antiphon John 16. v. 24. ASke and you shall have that your joy may be full For my Father loveth you because you have loved me and have beleeved Alleluja Vers Tarry with us O Lord Alleluja Resp For night draweth on Alleluja The Prayer O God from whom all good things doe proceed grant unto thy humble supplyants that we may thinke on those things which are Right thou inspiring us and thou governing us we may put the same in execution The Illustration WHat a home Prayer is here that rectifies at once all our Thoughts and Actions too at least beggs a rectitude in them all and no marvel for t is now Rogation week we enter into asking week in which the Holy Church appoints this Prayer it is that week when our Saviour bid his Apostles and in them us too ask what they could wish before he left them to work out that salvation which he is going to secure them of in Heaven according to their working And 't is a Petition large enough to all purposes for if we always think and do rightly we cannot fail of being saved nor will it clog our Saviour in his ascending up to Heaven that by this Petition all the world tye themselves fast about him since we know his own words When I shall be exalted from the earth I will draw all things to my self Joh. 12.32 Again it is no marvel since here we ask of God to inspire us to think on those things which are good that we first confess all good things proceed from him for indeed from our selves we know there cannot come any one good thought as little marvel it is that we begg he will govern us in putting our good thoughts in execution in doing the good which by his Grace we think to do for so little are the good deeds we do our own that it is both from God we are inspired to think of doing good and to put our good thoughts in execution And yet so good God is that he accepts as our works what he alone inables us to do When will man do this what master is there that doth not look for the profit and honour too of all the pains his servant takes whereas God gives us not onely the honour of our own labours but the profit also of his own pains taken in our behalfs whilest Heaven is given to man in consideration of the Death of Christ But we must see how this Prayer suits with the other parts of this days service and first with the Epistle of St. Iames truly it is so suitable that it exhausts it entirely while we pray we may not onely think well but do well also as St. James in the first verse of this Epistle bids us saying Be doers of the word of God not hearers onely and the like is of all the other Counsels given in this Epistle for as they are the inspirations of the holy Ghost so we pray to day we may be governed in the execution thereof As for the Gospel which is all of asking truly the Prayer is very pat to it which asks no less then all that can be wisht to save a soul namely always to think always to do well and surely this Petition is as the Gospel bids it should be in Christ his name when we ask it as professing Christ to be the very God from whom all good proceeds 1 Cor. 11.12 and when in that profession most pleasing to his heavenly Father we secure our selves of the grant that we demand since when the Apostles understood and believed Christ was God they rested satisfied that his recess from them to his heavenly Father was for their good and that by sending God the holy Ghost unto them they should be well repayed for the absence of God the Son since God who is every where cannot be absent any where and thus ends the Feast of Resurrection when the last Prayer proper thereunto is a leave taking of Christ risen from his Grave and a preparation to his ascending up to Heaven while we ask before he goes all we can want or wish when he is gone The Epistle Iac. 1. v. 22 c. 22 But be doers of the word and not hearers onely deceiving your selves 23 For if a man be a hearer of the word and not a doer he shall be compared to a man beholding the countenance of his Nativity in a Glass 24 For he considered himself and went his way and by and by forgat what an one he was 25 But hee that hath looked in the Law of perfect liberty and hath remained in it not made aforgetfull bearer hut a doer of the worke this man shall be Blessed in his deed 26 And if any man thinke himselfe to be religious not bridling his tongue but seducing his heart this mans religion is vaine 27 Religion cleane and unspotted with God and the Father is this to visite pupils and widdowes in their tribulation and to keepe himselfe unspotted from this world The Explication 22. HE alludes here to the ingrafted word mentioned in the verse before and by doers understands workers according to the exigence of the said word as working sanctity and perfection into your soules for that is the end of hearing Gods word to make it the motive and meanes of our perfection since Christ did not know better then he did doe nor did he teach more then himselfe did practise deceiving your selves that is saying Christ hath done enough for us we need onely now to hearken unto him to beleeve in him and be baptized by him for it is written such shal be he saved yes if they performe in deeds what they beleeve in their soules but to frequent the Churches meerely to heare Sermons and not to put in practice the Doctrine there delivered that is to seduce our selves for our Saviour gave nor his blessing to those onely that heard but to those that hearing kept his holy word obeyed his commands followed the counsel given them by their good Angels their ghostly Fathers or spiritual advisers These and onely these make the hearing of Gods word a blessing to them 23. By this comparison Saint Iames makes the word of God to be as a glass to a man
sanctity that any Christian can hope to arrive unto so sweetly doth holy Church adapt her Prayer unto the doctrine of her preachers that so the layity may in little carry away what the preachers deliver to them at large The Epistle 1 Pet. 3.8 8 Be ye all unanimous in Prayer having compassion lovers of the fraternity merciful modest humble 9 Not rendring evil for evil nor curse for curse but contrariwise blessing for unto this are you called that you may by inheritance possesse a Benediction 10 For he that will love life and see good dayes let him refrain his tongue from evil and his lips that they speak not guile 11 Let him decline from evil and do good let him enquire peace and follow it 12 Because the eyes of the Lord are upon the just and his eares are open unto their prayers but the countenance of the Lord upon them that do evill things 13 And who is he that can hurt you if you be emulatours of good 14 But and if you suffer for justice Blessed are ye And the fear of them fear ye not and be not troubled 15 But sanctifie our Lord Christ in your hearts The Explication 8. St. Peter here recapitulates some of the chief vertues which make a perfect Christian No marvel he begins with unanimity be it in prayer or otherwise in all common Actions because this vertue is radicated in the B. Trinity the ground of all Christianity for there the three distinct Persons are not onely all of one mind but of one essence too in imitation whereof Christians are taught to be all of one mind all ayming still in every action at the honour and glory of one onely God as the Angels do The Apostle puts compassion next to shew that each Christian should be as sensible of his neighbours sufferings as his own soul is sensible of the pain in any member of his own body This vertue flowes indeed from the former unanimity for where there is but one mind or soul as it were there must be one and the same sense or compassion And this vertue of compassion extends as well towards our being sensible of each good in our neighbour and zealous to imitate it as of any evil we see in him out of a zeal to remedy or cure the same So excellent is the unity of Christianity Hence also flowes the next vertue lovers of the fraternity to shew that the grace of our Religion teacheth us to imitate the perfection of nature so to love one another being Brothers in grace as we do that are Brothers in nature When we are bid Be merciful it is as if we were told our compassion must be even from the Bowels of our hearts Modesty and humility are well joyntly recommended together because they are indeed inseparable companions as it were and so in this exteriour vertue modesty rendring the whole person exteriourly gratefull and in her inseparable companion humility S. Peter closeth up his enumeration of vertues ending with humility because that is indeed both the basis and summity of all others for as it must be the first as captivating mans proud reason unto Faith so if it go not hand in hand up to the top of perfection with other vertues even with charity the Queen of them all that great Queen cannot stand fast in her throne but upon the feet of humility 9. S. Peter here forbids not the flowing of Justice or execution of just revenge when it is legal but onely private retaliation of evil for evil and exhorts that each private person blesse and not curse those which do him mischief because as the end of all our temporal evils is eternal Blisse so we must in hope of that for our selves Blesse those that do us evil O rare perfection of Christianity 10. By these three next verses taken out of Davids mouth S. Peter proveth that to repay evil for evil is our natures propension but bids us forbear as we will hope to have our own evil deeds towards God forgiven and the little good we do rewarded with eternal life called here seeing good dayes for those are chiefly good which shine with glory over our heads though the dayes of grace here are not deprived of that Epitheton too We are therefore bid refrain our tongues because when they be loose and unbridled that alone begets bad dayes unto us every one judging him to have a bad heart that hath a bad or an unbridled tongue and how can the lips of an ill tongue speak other then guilt when they betray the guiltinesse of their own heart 11. The declining evil and doing good is an abstract of all Christian duty and a perfect rule of Christian perfection 'T is reason to bid us seek peace and follow it as being the special gift of our Saviour which he brought with him from heaven at his birth and then the Angels bestowed it amongst us the holy Ghost did the like at his coming too and Christ at his going left it as his Farewel as hath been said before yet is not here unseasonably repeated 12. By the eye of our Lord understand the piercing knowledge of Almighty God whereby he sees into the secrets of all hearts and seeing them lovers of Justice heares all the prayers they make unto him and grants them all they ask By his Countenance understand here that displeasure he shews at the latter day unto the wicked when he pronounceth the sentence of damnation against them for how ever he doth not damne every man in his actual sin but differrs his justice till the latter day yet he looks on their iniquity that do sin with the same displeasing countenance as at the day of Judgement when it will be a greater torment to behold the displeasure of that countenance then to suffer hell fire O that we could in all Temptations to sin reflect on this Truth so should we avoid the fact that will merit this effect 13. A happy shield against evil to emulate vertue and goodnesse Emulation here imports a vehement zeal and fervour of soul towards vertue not a faint velleity or wish of it but a strong will and action too and so makes a strong shield not onely against all vice but even against all mischief for S. Austin sayes well no body is hurt but by himself by his own sin therefore if all men be emulatours of vertue they are sheltred from all evil or hurt from others And this one of the Churches prayers in Lent assures us of that no adversity shall hurt us if no iniquity dominear over us 14. Doubtlesse those are Blessed that suffer for justice since Jesus Christ who is verity it self hath numbered those among the Blessed nay among those who actually are possessed of heaven as if a patient suffering an unjust persecution here were a heaven to the sufferer even whilest he is in durance and as if God were not content to reward that kind of suffering with future Blisse but with
the devil therefore holy Church as strucken with an admiration at the wonder of it to see souls saved upon so huge an odds as three such enemies to one poor man or three millions to one rather considering every one of these three principall enemies have millions of instruments to damn a soul by and not knowing what else to attribute this unto then to the admirable Providence of Almighty God who hath so contrived that those whom he hath chosen to be his amongst the multitudes of men shall make their very dangers their security their very sinfull flesh the instrument of their saintity and salvation by the sole helping hand of charity Therefore I say it is the Churches prayer gives this prodigious work to the sole Providence of Almighty God and begs that by this never-failing Providence all lets to our salvation may be taken away and all helps possible afforded thereunto The Gospel Matt. 7. v. 15. c. 15 Take ye great heed of false prophets which come to you in the clothing of sheep but inwardly are ravening wolves 16 By their fruits you shall know them Do men gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles 17 Even so every good tree yieldeth good fruits and the evil tree yieldeth evil fruits 18. A good tree cannot yield evil fruits neither an evil tree yield good fruits 19 Every tree that yieldeth not good fruit shall be cut down and shall be cast into fire 20 Therefore by their fruits you shall know them 21 Not every one that saith unto me Lord Lord shall enter into the Kingdome of heaven but he that doth the will of my Father which is in heaven he shall enter into the Kingdome of heaven The Explication 15. BY false prophets are here understood any that undertake to teach or preach false doctrine By their coming unto us is understood they are not sent lawfully but pretend mission By the clothing of sheep is meant their false pretence of sanctity liberty of conscience expounding Scripture and the like whereas they inwardly are wolves that devour souls under pretext of saving them 16. Their fruits are commonly licentiousnesse of life obstinate heresie schisme from the true Church These the thorns of their pretended vines the thistles of their pretended fig-trees 17. That is to say a true prophet or teacher teacheth good doctrine and leads a good life a false teacheth bad lessons and liveth lewdly too 18. This is parabolically spoken in order to the will of man and so holds not ever but for the most part unlesse taken in the compounded sense that is a good will whilest it remains good cannot produce evil fruit though it may cease to be good and then produce evil 19. What is here said in the future tense is in the third chapter of S. Matthew spoken by the Greek Text in the Present tense as who should say every tree that yields not good fruit is presently cut down and cast into the fire as if it had cut it selfe downe and cast it selfe into the guilt of hell fire by mortall sinne And it is onely Gods infinite mercy that whilest we yield bad fruit whilest we sinne mortally we are not presently damned for so we deserve to be And in the same third chapter the hatchet is said to be placed at the root of the tree to cut it instantly down meaning Christ is come whose Law is ready to passe upon us whose sentence is ready to be pronounced upon every mortall sinne for then we are spiritually dead and after death judgement is instantly ready nay our own guilty consciences do even immediately pronounce our sentence of damnation unlesse God give us grace to repent and amend by producing good fruits again 20. If they live well and do good workes you may know they are true teachers if not they are false ones 21. See the modesty of our Saviour Christ who rather names his Fathers will then his own although they are alwayes both one and the same God and both equally produce the same effect of salvation if equally observed and obeyed But to the first part of this verse 't is not every one that calls upon God or undertakes to preach his word that is saved no he must bring forth the good fruit above required and what is that good fruit the will of God he must square himself and his actions thereunto and then he shall be saved by crying onely or knocking at heaven gates nay wee need not cry nor knock at all if we bring a key to open the doore if we have cast our own inordinate wills into the form of the will of God and so made unto our selves a key to open heaven gates withall to enter whensoever we die The Application 1. AS in the Epistle above Saint Paul bid the Laymen beware of their greatest internall enemies or evils their own flesh so in this Gospell Saint Matthew bids the same Lay-people take great heed of their most dangerous externall enemies the false Prophets meaning false Teachers and Preachers of Gods holy Word We are therefore as in the Illustration was observed by this dayes doctrine armed against all enemies whatsoever internall or externall by the prudence of holy Church collecting at once all the motives that may be to increase our love and charity to Almighty God in shewing us how his infinite Providence hath secured our way to Heaven by pointing out every danger that we can encounter in the way 2. And as the Lay-man hath no better guides to heaven then those that preach and teach the Word of God unto him that catechise and instruct him in the Principles of Christian Doctrine that offer sacrifice to God for him and administer the Sacraments of God unto him because with these guides it is he trusts his very soul so in regard there are that doe usurp this office of Prophets of Teachers and Preachers to the very bane poyson perdition and damnation of souls it was hugely necessary the divine Providence should arme us against this worst of evils by giving us a rule to know these impudent usurpers by these false Prophets from the true ones which knowledge we shall have by looking on the fruits of one and the other them that bring good fruit we are to follow them that bring forth bad to flie 3. Now because holy Church hath not made the Lay-man absolutely Judge in this particular therefore while her Doctours preaching on this Text give all the signes of true and false Prophets she contents her selfe the Lay-men have recourse to God Almighties Providence herein and that they onely follow those who make their works answerable to their Doctrine who doe as well as teach the will of God For as they onely are true lovers of him who keep his Commandements so such onely are to be the Lay-mens guides And to the end they may have such and may be freed from others They pray to day this may be an act of God Almighties speciall Providence over them
to cry out to God as children do to their Parents Abba that is to say Father O high dignity able to raise any loyal soul high towards so good a God 16. By the Spirit himself is here understood both Christ in whom alone we are said to live and also the holy Ghost whence the Greek text saith The Spirit giveth joynt testimony not onely testifies as the Latine Text hath to shew that however the Word and the Spirit make two persons of the B. Trinity yet they both are but one God with the eternal Father O how excellently are we assured of this happy filiation when both the heavenly Father looks on us as such and his eternal Son together with the holy Ghost testifie and avouch us so to be 17. This last verse tells us we are not onely sons of God but his heires also and not onely his heires but his coheires with Christ and indeed it is fitting Gods children should have a better birth right then the children of the world whereof commonly one onely is heire but here all are coheires of Christ at least The Application 1. THe Expositours upon the first word of this Epistle tell us it is by the tye of our Faith plighted of our promise and covenant made to God in holy Baptisme that Therefore we are debtours onely to the Spirit And with great reason since every man remaines a debtour onely for such bonds as he hath tyed and bound himself by to his creditours Now because God Almighty did foresee how apt a man would be to flatter himself that he was bound by the Law of Nature to pamper that flesh which he had received from his Natural Parents and consequently might loose his soul by so pampering of his body therefore he was mercifully pleased by making man enter into better bonds those of holy baptisme to cancell all his former debts to any creature whatsoever and to make him become new debtour only to that holy Spirit which was both his Creatour and so had more right in him then his fleshly Parents had and also his Regeneratour and so begot him to a spiritual life or being which his first begetters were not able to confer upon him 2. But S. Paul not content to tell us in this Epistle that we are onely debtours to the Spirit and the reason why because of the bond we entered into at holy baptisme of loving God above all things and of living wholly unto him proceeds to animate us towards the performance of this debt by shewing us the gallant effect thereof namely that it makes us as well the heires as sons of God and not heires onely but co-heires of Christ 3. Now in regard the Preachers office is to tell us how to pay this debt how to live spiritually and by so living to secure ourselves of this ineffable co-heiretage which office the Expositours upon this holy Text have at least in part supplyed therefore it remained onely that our holy Mother the Church should make us such a Prayer as might be most suitable to this doctrine and none so suiting it as that which begs our thoughts may be rightly such as suggest to operations answerable to our beeing spiritual altogether That so as it was a pure act of love in God to adopt us here his children in Grace we by re-loving him that is by living according to our better being may be yet further adopted his children in Glory and thus may be made the co-heires of Christ indeed Say now the Prayer above and see beloved if it be not most apposite to this holy purpose The Gospel Luk. 16.1 c. 1 And he said to his disciples There was a certain rich man that had a Bailiffe and he was ill-reported unto him as he that had wasted his goods 2 And he called him and said to him what hear I this of thee render account of thy Baili-ship for thou canst no more be Bailiffe 3 And the Bailiffe said within himself what shall I do because my Lord taketh away from me the Baili-ship digge I am not able to beg I am ashamed 4 I know what I will do that when I shall be removed from the Baili-ship they may receive me into their houses 5 Therefore calling together every one of his Lords debtours he said to the first how much doest thou owe my Lord 6 But he saith An hundred pipes of oyl And he said to him take thy bill and sit down quickly write fifty 7 After he said to another But thou how much dost thou owe who said An hundred quarters of wheat He said to him take thy bill and write eighty 8 And the Lord praised the Bailiffe of iniquity because he had done wisely For the children of this world are wiser then the children of light in their generation 9 And I say to you Make you friends of the Mammon of iniquity that when you fail they may receive you into the eternal Tabernacles The Explication 1. THis parable shewes that all Christians bear office of Trust in Gods Church and are onely to administer his goods not to waste or use them as their own and this is meant whether they have goods of nature or of grace they are to account for all to him And our accuser here mentioned is the devil who justly layes waste to our charge as well when we use not Gods gifts well as when we use them ill So still Christians must do good and not onely decline evil else they lye liable to the devils accusations 2. O how clement a Master do we serve how gently he rebukes when even in Justice he is bound to take an account of our perfidiousnesse Where he sayes now thou must not be longer Bailiffe is understood I cannot in justice let thee be longer in trust of my goods then whilest thou doest administer them faithfully An excellent lesson to keep us close to our duties 3. We see here the accusation is not false the Bailiffe pretends not that he confesseth his guilt when he asks what shall I do since he cannot hope for longer trust from his master This puts us in mind of our miserable condition at the latter account in respect whereof it followes there is no ability in us to labour amends by further service for then the time as well as the power of further labour is past and to beg relief of any other master is a shame to man that had so good a master of Almighty God whose favour he hath lost for ever 4. This verse shewes the Bailiffe had resolved with himself to cheat his master so to provide for himself by their means whom he had favoured to his masters prejudice 5. 6. 7. These verses need not explanation as shewing only how much he cheated his master of 8. Note the word Lord here is taken for the Bailiffes master not for our Saviour as some mistake it and truly the context proves as much for our Saviour undertakes to tell this story as in the
peace And here to shew the excesse of his grief he stops and sayes not what should follow to wit thou wouldest weep thy selfe as I doe now for thee thou wouldest weep to see what pains I have taken in my three years preaching of pennance to thee what more I am to take for thee whilest I die to save thee who wilt not be saved Yes all this sense runs through our Saviours soul and is genuinely taken out of this abrupt speech which because I see and thou dost not wilt not indeed therefore I weeep for thee O wretched city 43. This was to a title verified when Titus and the Romans laying seidge to Jerusalem after our Saviours death in three dayes space as Josephus writes built not onely Trenches but walls about them so as none could stirre out at any rate for relief whence mothers were fain to eat their own children So Josephus 44. So sensibly our Saviour speaks of this cities destruction that here he seems to exaggerate for it is not credible the Romans were either so curious or so idle as not to leave a stone upon a stone since there is now in that new city the old mount Calvary where many stones lay one upon the other So the meaning of this place is that the destruction of this city should be so great as if there had not been a stone left upon a stone within it whilest those that were left should be of no use nor profit By the time of the visitation understand this very time when our Saviour came a loving Messias to save this city and she would not receive him but plotted his death in requitall 45. See whither our Saviour goes as soon as he is entered the citie Into the Temple first to rectifie that which was out of order there So he first enters into our Temples into our souls when he adopts us to be his children It was not amisse to begin visibly to reform the visible abuses in the Temple especially since he see the hearts and souls of the high Priests would not be reformed by him 46. This was so palpable an abuse of the written word that none could question it and besides it was necessary to abolish open Sacriledge where there was to be established open Sanctity 47. To shew that thus Priests were to employ their times and their talents and not in secular companies or imployments at least not in merely secular but such as were mixed with Church duties The Application 1. HOw excellently wel doth holy Church follow her design in this Gospel which we perceive she had in the Epistle above For what else is meant by Jesus weeping over Jerusalem and foretelling her destruction but because she did to him while he marcht before her eyes as we have heard her children did to God while he mercifully led them through the red Sea and many other dangers out of Egypt into the land of promise What was their buying and selling in the Temple other then Idolatry to Mammon other then robbing God of that honour which they paid even in his own house unto his greatest enemy the devill For which you see our Saviour whipt them out of the Temple as was said in the Illustration above and not unnecessarily repeated here 2. O Catholick Christians how do we act this Jewish part how do we do our best to make our Jesus weep in Heaven if it were possible to see us Catholickes degenerate into the sordid actions of the Jewes What is it else to hear us murmure against our Lord for commanding us to he meeke and humble who have nothing in us but passion and pride who are with the Jewes ashamed of holy poverty while we clad our selves in nothing but gauderies more vainly farr then those whose Religion binds them not so strictly from such braveries as ours While instead of renouncing the vanity of the world we sell even God himself for hope of onely popular applause by frequenting the Church for vain respects to see and to be seen under pretence of praying there or of hearing the word of God which is to make Gods holy House a denne of thieves to rob him of his honour in that very place appointed onely for honouring and adoring of his holy Name 3. O how rarely well doth holy Church rebuke the Priests and Lay-men too in the Prayer she makes to day as an abstract of all the doctrine on those holy Texts when what so ever we do at other times she bids us while we pray at least refrain as is our duty to commit Idolatry to Fornicate to Tempt our Lord to murmure to swell with Pride to dissemble and to Simonize in holy Church For this were but to shut those sacred eares we praying doe pretend to open This were to aske unpleasing things to God not such as we are bid petition in the Prayer above pleasing to his heavenly Majesty On the tenth Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Matth. 18. v. 14. THis man went down to his house justified more then he for that every one who shall exalt himself shall be humbled and he who humbleth himself shall be exalted Vers Let my prayer O Lord c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer O God who doest manifest thy omnipotency most of all by pardoning and taking pittie multiply on us thy mercy that we running unto thy promises thou maist make us partakers of thy heavenly treasures The Illustration STrange that holy Church should teach us in this Prayer the omnipotency of God is most manifested by his pardoning and pittying of us True his goodnesse and his love is thereby most of all made manifest but his power or his omnipotency seems manifested more in his creating all things out of nothing in his governing the world created so as to make contrary natures combine all in one to the fulfilling of his holy will and pleasure and in his punishing offenders who if they could resist his power would never indure eternall damnation as all the devils and accursed souls in hell are forc'd to do But if we look more narrowly into the businesse we shall find Gods power most manifested in his pardoning and pitâ—ying offenders For as by their sinnes they relapse into a far worser nothing then that they were created out of first of all so to be recreated as often as they sinne is to keep in exercise Gods omnipotency every minute in a manner since they hardly passe a minute without a sinne and if this be mortall they as often disannull themselves as they sinne mortally and since in this case they cannot be re-made again but by the omnipotency of him who can make all things out of nothing this omnipotency being manifested by the pardon and pitty God Almighty doth afford a sinner thus relapsing it followes evidently that the said omnipotency is made most manifest by such pardon and pitty as God affords to sinfull souls Which pitty being an Act of mercy we had need petition that
himself onely shall he have the glory not in another 5 And every one shall bear his own burthen 6 And let him that is catechized in the word communicate to him that catechizeth him in all goods 7 Be not deceived God is not mocked for what things a man shall sow those also shall he reap 8 For any that soweth in his flesh of the flesh also shall reap corruption but he that soweth in the spirit of the spirit shall reap life everlasting 9 And doing good let us not fail for in due time we shall reap not failing 10 Therefore whilst we have time let us work good to all but especially to the domesticalls of faith The Explication 26. IF we have internall life of grace and justice let us walk justly according to the conduct of that grace and by no means look back to the wayes of Judaisme being as we are Christians but let us so farre decline from being vain-glorious as the Jews were that we even forbear the desire as well as the act thereof much lesse let us vaunt our selves to be better then others provoking them thereby to anger or envying if in any gift they excell us 1. Note S. Paul means here such faults as are casually and by frailty committed not those that are habituall or accustomary besides he glanceth here specially at frail relapses to Judaisme and such he commands the Galatians to instruct that is to reprehend gently and with lenitie not rigidly or severely as obstinate offenders ought to be reprehended so besides he makes not every one a reprehender of his brethren but those onely that are spirituall meaning Priests or Churchmen and such reprehension he will have to be in spirit also not in any vain way Note he falls from the plurall to the singular number left he had else seemed to accuse a whole community of frailty and of danger to be tempted which is indeed incident to single persons and not handsomely imputed to many 2. Here he comes to the plurall number again exhorting us to bear each others burthens whether they be of naturall disposition not agreeing with our own or whether they be diseases or afflictions laid upon our neighbour or lastly and chiefly even their sinnes we must bear indeed pardon conceal excuse and if we wil perfectly obey this counsell even do penance for them by our prayers fastings or alms and in so doing we shall fulfill the Law of Christ his command of loving one another This is my precept that you love one another as I have loved you Joh. 15.12 but he so loved us as he bore all our sinnes upon his back and therefore we must be content to help bear those of our neighbours to imitate the example of our Master 3. By something is here understood good virtuous or spiritual as who should say if any man doth not follow the precept above of bearing his brothers burthen let him never think he is or can be any thing in the sight of God Observe the text is so far from esteeming him for some body who is not sweet and gentle to his brother as he is not accounted so much as any thing in the sight of God but is truly as nothing in his eye and absolutely seduceth or cheateth himself if he conceiveth otherwise 4. In this verse we are exhorted to valew our selves onely as we can deserve to be esteemed by Almighty God where we all know we merit little or nothing and not as we may seem to be compared to others For what availes it a man to see another commit greater sins then himself if he commit sinne enough to damne him or at least to render him ungrateful to Almighty God And yet nothing more common then for us to flatter our selves that all is well at home if we see any greater evil in others then in our selves To seek our glory out of others ignominy is folly We shall never arrive to eternal glory in the next world if we do not contrive to be such here within our selves as may deserve the reward of eternal glory rather for our own good works then because others have greater bad ones to answer for then we 5. Note in the second verse above the Apostle meant the burthens of the living brethren in this he reports to those of the dead and in that sense we should each one carry his own burthen before the Tribunal of Christ at the later day as if our sins were then laid in a knapsack on our own backs and each man there to answer onely for his own unlesse he had made himself also guilty of others sins too and in such case they become his also The Reformers mis-understand this place when they alleadge it against purgatory and will therefore have it needlesse to ease our brethren in purgatory of their burthens by our prayers Alas they are chiefly then objects of our compassions and may yet find ease by the communion with the Church in prayer by partaking of the suffrages which the Saints afford them but at the later day it will not be so then is a time for justice not for mercy 6. Observe here the practise of catechizing or teaching Christian doctrine to be as ancient as from the primitive Church in the Apostles dayes Note that then also they who had the happinesse to receive the benefit of being catechized were exhorted to repend the spiritual courtesie by temporal rewards of relief to the Apostles Note lastly that catechizing was by word of mouth not by writing performed for it was indeed prohibited in those times to commit to writing the mysteries of faith lest the Infidels should profane them as they came to their view and yet now what huge force the Reformers put in the Scripture as if it alone availed and tradition were nothing worth whereas both together make up one perfect Record of Christian doctrine 7. This verse may either be refer'd to that immediate before or to the fourth above as who should say deceive not your selves by pretending excuses from relieving their temporal wants who afford you the spiritual helps of Christian doctrine so S. Augustine Theophylactus and S. Hierome expound this place or as more generally others expound it delude not your selves for you cannot cousen God by shaking off your burthens upon other mens shoulders you shall bear your own for God knowes which are yours and you cannot cousen him and thus it reports to the fifth verse as above let each one bear his own burthen So the metaphor imports that this life is a husbandry a time of sowing the next is that of reaping according as we have sowed here if good works then good reward if bad then punishment 8. This verse S. Hierome and the rest above interpret as they did that of the catechized as who should say if you sow the seed of almes to those that instruct you you shall reap the reward the Spirit that is heaven if you sow penury and relieve them not
therein Just thus it is with holy Churches preaching admit a million of people be assembled to one sole Preacher in the pulpit is his Sermon ever the worse because it dynts the soul of every hearer there and moves him so as if the Preacher knew the heart of every auditour he had whom yet he never saw in all his life nor knowes him now he sees him would any man condemn this Preacher No admire him rather and in him adore Almighty God who with one speech could touch the quick of every soul alive And so it is with holy Churches prayers the commoner they are the more peculiarly they touch each pious persons soul if rightly understood they seem to reach as far as all the preachers of the Church can scrue into a soul and farther too for who so sayes them with a zeal suitable to the Spirit whence they flow he like a river runs into the sea whence all the waters have their spring and is not lost although he beâ— not found but rather swells to be a sea of spirit while he falls out of his private devotions into the Ocean of the Churches prayer and sayes to himself Matt. 23.23 These things ought to be done and those things ought not to be omitted O Christians what a sovereign cure have we to day against the worst contagion in the Church the spirit of division of faction Say but this prayer devoutly read but the lessons of the other services of holy Church to day agreeable to this prayer and I shall hope to hear no more of faction in the Church of division in the house of the Holy Ghost of dissention among Roman Catholicks much lesse amongst the Priests of holy Church for in them it were a contagion worse then diabolical who as they are all Ministers of one onely God so should they all agree in one to guide the souls they are to govern in the spirit of peace and unity of love and charity which they shall never teach better then when they give example of it to their flocks The Epistle Ephes 4.1 1 I therefore prisoner in our Lord beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation in which you are called 2 With all humilitie and mildnesse with patience supporting one another in charity 3 Carefull to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace 4 One body and one spirit as you are called in one hope of your vocation 5 One Lord one Faith one Baptisme 6 One God and Father of all which is over all and by all and in us all 7 Who is blessed world without end Amen The Explication 1. THe cause why he beseecheth them is in regard they had the happinesse to be made of Gentiles Christians and so equall with the Jewes that were the chosen people of God He calls himself prisoner in our Lord because he was in prison for our Lord for teaching the faith of Christ Walking here is understood living Note the word Vocation is of speciall regard and so imports a speciall obligation they had to comply with their said vocation which was indeed their conversion from Gentilisme to Christianitie 2. This verse specifies the eminent marks of Christians from Gentiles the one proud harsh furious quarrelsome the other therefore humble milde patient loving that so it might appeare a religious change to come from one contrary to another Supporting each other imports bearing with each others infirmities In Charitie is to say by or with Charitie repending good for evil 3. By unitie of spirit is here meant unanimitie that is though in bodies divided yet in mind they should be one and make it their studie so to be thus to comply with the care thereof commended if not commanded also This verse is hugely against all schismaticall division in the Church receding from the common Doctrine to follow the fancies of private spirits By the word bond is understood removing private sense in point of religion for a bond imports a tie between parties and so abandons singularitie when it must binde many together in the peace of unanimitie 4. This verse is exhortatorie stirring up to be all as one body and one soul that as you are called to one hope of Heaven by this your vocation to Christianitie so you goe all thither as one man since the Church is properly called one civill man while all the Members of it are regulated by one Law of Christ by one holy Spirit And indeed Saint Paul useth a huge Art telling us we have all one hope namely Heaven thereby to make us tend all one way to the attaining thereof 5. One Lord Christ Jesus one Faith that which the Apostles preached one Baptisme that which is given in due matter and forme applied with due intention water accompanying these words I baptize thee in the Name of the Father and of the Sonne and of the Holy Ghost according as holy Church intendeth when this Sacrament is administred 6. In this verse the Apostle summes up all he said before As we have but one God who is our common Father so we must have but one spirit lest we degenerate from being his children who will own none but those that are one in him and one to one another all others are bastards and cannot be brothers because not begotten of him that knowes no division but consists of unitie and simplicitie No God is above all men by his Majestie and Deitie he is through all things by his power and efficacie in them penetrating and passing through them all as freely as we doe through the Aire in all things by his essence and being in us Christians by his grace which makes us be his children and by his glory which makes us be his heires Others understand by this triple division the Apostle means that God the Father is above us all by creation God the Sonne by redemption runs through us with the Sea of his passion God the Holy Ghost is in us all by his sanctifying grace The Application 1. SAint Paul being by his imprisonment separated from his Converts the Ephesians and desirous in litle to send them much counsell how they might walk worthy of the vocation in which they were called summes up here those virtues that are most necessary for new converted souls Humilitie as the foundation whereupon they must build their monuments of a blessed Eternitie in imitation of Almightie God who raised all the fabricke of humane salvation upon the Basis of his own abasement Mildnesse in testimony they were no more children of wrath and indignation but of their milde Redeemer and Saviour Jesus Christ A charitable Patience that is to say for love of God supporting bearing with one another as the onely means to keep themselves in favour with Almighty God whom they hourely much more exasperate then any man can do them And Unanimitie as the badge of perfect Christianitie testifying they are onely true lovers of one another who are right believers in Jesus Christ
identity or equality of love 40. Yes so they depend on these two as all the boughs and branches of a tree depend on the root thereof for the root of all the Law is love of God and of Gods creatures for Gods sake not otherwise hence even self-love is not lawfull but as directed to Gods honour and glory The three Laws of the first table are expressed by love of God the seven of the second table by love of our neighbour 41. This aggregation or assembly of them S. Maâ—k observes was in the Temple be it where it will this seems to assert the Doctour who was his first aggressour was either gone or at least satisfied and so silenced for now they all assault him as if they were not satisfied with him though the Doctour were and hence Jesus seems to ground his question in the following verse 42. Whereby in requitall of their tempting him by a subtile question in the Law which was the chief commandment he now undertakes to impart unto them a farre more subtile verity and more necessary instruction that so he might with good repay evil namely the truth of his being not onely Man but God not onely the sonne of David as they allowed him to be but even the Sonne of God the Messias who was expected to be the Redeemer and Saviour of the whole world and this he inferres upon them so as by force of argument out of Davids mouth out of the Scripture he makes them see clearly it must be so though they were too proud to confesse it No marvell they could not answer right to the question for when S. Peter Matth. 16. did answer the same question right our Saviour told him flesh and bloud had not revealed it but the heavenly Father who had not so illuminated these Pharisees as he did Peter 43. Observe while Christ makes in this verse a further inquiry it doth not inferre he denieth himself to be what they said truly that he was the sonne of David for so the Scripture told them clearly the Messias should be but he was willing to draw them on to a further knowledge that the Messias was also the Sonne of God and not onely the sonne of David and this out of Davids own mouth who in spirit by inspiration from heaven called him Lord a stile which fathers do not use to give unto their sonnes and that this was true he cites Davids words in the next verse saying 44. The Lord said to my Lord God said to the Messias to Jesus Christ by the instinct of the Holy Ghost who did indeed dictate unto David all the whole book of Psalms which runnes much upon the propheticall prediction of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ his coming and being the true Messias that was expected with so much fervour by the languishing world So by this quotation of the Scripture where David calls Christ his Lord they are brought to see evidently he must needs be more then his sonne else they had replied again which they neither did nor durst nor indeed could do as the last verse of this present Gospel shows By sitting at Gods right hand is clearly declared he is not onely Davids Lord but also the King of Kings and Lord of Lords true God as well as man placed above all the quiers of Angels in heaven and impowered at the day of judgement to come in Majesty trampling over all his enemies the world the devil and the flesh when he shall judge all flesh and all spirit too man and Angels and make his enemies truely his footstool when he tramples first upon them and lastly kicks them down to the pit of hell where the foot of his eternall power holds them everlastingly under him in pains and torments 45. It was time for Christ to close up the irrefragable force of his argument by shewing the Pharisees in this verse he being the Messias mentioned by the Royall Prophet was not onely Davids but Gods sonne also and whilst he inferres the greater out of Davids mouth he doth not deny the lesser though here he seems to ask how David could call his Lord his sonne when they themselves did see he must also be Davids and the whole worlds God Redeemer Judge and Saviour too 46. And their silence asserted in this verse to his inference argues their consent it was and must be true hence they were left at least to wonder at if not to believe confesse and love this undeniable truth for of these S. Augustine in his exposition upon the 109. Psalme cited by Christ sayes excellently well These proud Pharisees chose rather to burst with the pride of their swollen and sullen silence then to be taught by their humble acknowledgement confession S. Chrysostome upon the same place sayes They were struck dumb by the dart of this dead wound they had received from Christ convincing though not converting them So it often fares with Hereticks The Application 1. IT is not without designe that when the Epistle runnes wholly upon unity of spirit in the Church of Christ the Gospel is so full of example of disunion and division amongst the Doctours and Sages in the synagogue of the Jews for such were the Sadduces the Scribes and Pharisees And we may piously believe the designe of holy Church in this was to bid us beware of such spirits in our Doctours and Teachers for there is no greater plague no contagion more malignant then duplicity falsity and division in those who should cement us together by the concordancy of their doctrine and by the exemplarity of their lives 2. So when we hear the Sadduces Scribes and Pharisees pretending zeal to Christ and desirous to know which is the first and greatest commandment that of Love or that of Sacrifice we may imagine our charity though she were cleared out of the mist in her way last Sunday hath now a more malignant darknesse in her eyes an Eclipse a shade that hinders her of the sunnes influence upon her that is to say of the light of grace as if God were pleased a while to leave us to our selves to shew us that when he doth so we are darkened with the Eclipse of our judgements of our understandings as the Sadduces Scribes and Pharisees were when the force of sense was so strong in them they would not believe in the Deity of Christ because the mysteries of his doctrine were some of them above reason though never against it 3. But a farre greater Eclipse it is of grace amongst us when our Pastours our Teachers and Preachers seeking themselves and not Jesus Christ do erect Altar against Altar do bandy and contrast with one another out of self-seeking and so mislead their flocks and make them feed upon the sower and contagious fruits that grow in the eclipse of grace or that wither rather then grow that infect rather then nourish that poison rather then preserve us alive that damne indeed and do not save us that putrifie
instead of purifying our intentions of honouring as we ought to do one onely God when even under that pretence by the contagion of factious doctrine we Idolize to as many devils as mislead us in the wayes of faction and division For prevention whereof holy Church fitly prayes as above that our intentions may be purified by the unity thereof by intending Gods honour only in those services that are pretended done for Gods sake and not our own interest On the eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Matth. 9. v. 7. THe sick then of the palsie took up his bed in which he lay magnifying God and all the people which beheld it gave praise to God Vers Let my prayer c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer LEt O Lord the operation of thy mercy direct our hearts because without thee wee cannot please thee The Illustration IF any man doubt what is meant by the operation of our Lords mercy mentioned in this prayer S. Paul in the first verse of this daies Epistle will tell him it is the actual grace of God which the Apostle alwayes gives thanks for as being the cause of the Corinthians conversion of their being enriched in all things appertaining to Christian religion so as to want nothing but the revelation of Christ in glory whom already they beheld in grace as also of their perseverance without crime till the day of doom in that belief unto which by this grace they had been called This is the summ of the Epistle and undoubtedly this is the sense of the prayer begging that as by the operation of Christ his mercy the Corinthians became Christians so we that are by the same meanes of the same profession may by the same help have our hearts directed by the operation of our Saviours mercy towards us by the encrease of his grace within us And indeed that encrease is also properly the operation of his mercy too for the first gift thereof was rather the exhibition then the operation of his holy grace and yet to us it seems like an operation of it too within his own bowels and so as we said above the exhibition of it in our eyes is as the effect of his mercie upon himself but the encrease thereof is the operation of it upon us to whom it is exhibited so by the exhibition of this grace we become children of God and by the encrease thereof we grow to be his champions to live his Saints and die his Martyrs rather then renounce the Faith of Christ Thus we see the first clause of this Prayer hath exhausted the whole Epistle of the day Now that the Gospel should be by the close thereof exhausted too would seem strange if already stranger mysteries had not appeared in the mysterious prayers of holy Church And certain it was for the depth of their spirit that S. Gregory the great collects them all together into a book intituled of Sacraments that is to say of Mysteries as in the preface of this book was hinted not that the stile of Churches prayers is other then plain and easie but that the depth of their meaning is prodigious We have examples in the simple stile of Thomas à Kempis authour of the following of Christ the plainest and the deepest book that ever was written next to holy Writ the fullest of common places and yet the most home to every mans particular that reads it So it is with the Churches prayers they are in words simple and facil but in sense such as the deepest understanding may not be able to sound the bottome of them For instance see how the whole story of the Gospel is wound off by the onely close of this daies prayer if yet the former clause thereof were not appropriable thereunto For what imports the pressing into Jesus presence of the paralytick and those who from the houses top did drop him down into the room where Jesus was when they found not entrance any other way but an infinite faith they had of being cured by the least touch of his sacred person and this to satisfie our selves with the letter of the story not recurring as we might to the mystery thereof What I say means this passage else then a remonstrance of this paralyticks faith in Jesus Christ And who doth not see the close of this prayer excellently well allude to faith since we read that without faith it is impossible to please God Heb. 11.6 Do not we Christians then implicitely beg if not the gift which we have already at least the encrease of faith when we end this prayer with confessing We cannot without God please his Divine Majestie that is to say as without the gift of faith we can be no Christians at all so without the encrease thereof through the operation of Christ his mercy in us we cannot become good Christians such as by works of charity still encrease our faith in Jesus Christ and by that encrease deserve with the paralytick as well the remission of our sins as the cure of corporal diseases since without such remission we cannot please Almighty God and without him no such remission can be had that is without his mercy operate first upon him to pardon us and then upon us when pardoned to offend no more not that this operation of Gods mercy upon himself is any new act but ever is ever was and will be one and the same act in him seeming new to us by the new effects it produceth in us So every way is it an undoubted truth that without him we can no wayes please him And thus do we still adjust the prayers of holy Church unto the other service of the day The Epistle 1 Cor. 1. v. 4. 4 I give thanks to my God alwayes for you for the grace of God that is given you in Christ Jesus 5 That in all things you may be rich in him in all utterance and in all knowledge 6 As the testimony of Christ is confirmed in you 7 So that nothing is wanting to you in any grace expecting the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ 8 Who also will confirm you unto the end without crime in the day of the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ The Explication 4. IN these words S. Paul gives thanks to God incessant for the grace of Christ which was given to the Corinthians who thereby were made Christians An excellent lesson and ought to be frequently practised by us to acknowledge that our perseverance is a continuation of our vocation to Christianity 5. In all things appertaining to your religion Rich in him rich by him that doth enrich you every hour by preserving you in the same vocation he hath called you unto In all utterance in all your words whereby is preached this faith In all knowledge in all true spiritual understanding the doctrine of Christ as who should say I thank God that hath by mine and by Apollo's preaching afforded you all understanding and true sense
more then to undermine him and bring him within the compasse of high treason when I say we see this to be the drift of the Gospel on the Jews part and that our Saviour seeing the naughtiness of their thoughts asks them plainly why they play the hypocrites with him then I presume no man that can tell twenty will marvell to see this dayes Prayer beg fidelity and sincerity of heart in us Christians at least when we see the Pharisaick Jews are convinced of so grosse an infidelity and flattery even when they pretend forsooth a tenderness of conscience and when we hear our Saviour recommend the same fidelity which we petition for to day in commanding them faithfully to render that to Caesar which is Caesars and that to God which is Gods namely their pecuniary tribute to Caesar their religious sincerity to God and that especially when they pretend it as here the Pharisees did though they least intended it Let me therefore beloved beg it as a boon that you all say this Prayer to day with such sincerity of heart as may render it and you gratefull in God Almighties sight and hearing for then shall we pray most consonantly to what the Church doth preach to day and then shall we be sure such our petitions will be granted effectually which are made unto God faithfully and this assurance we have both from the Epistle Gospel and Prayer of this present Sunday A great content I confesse after the fear of so great a losse as we were like to be at for making good the grand design of our work which as yet comes fairly home when we might fear we had been farthest off The Epistle Phil. 1. v. 6. c. 6 We trust in God our Lord Jesus that he which hath begun in you a good work will perfect it unto the day of Christ Jesus 7 As it is reason for me this to think for you all for that I have you in heart and in my bands and in the defence and the confirmation of the Gospel all you to be partakers of my joy 8 For God is my witness how I covet you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ. 9 And this I pray that your charity may more and more abound in knowledge and in all understanding 10 That you may approve the better things that you may be sincere and without offence unto the day of Christ. 11 Replenished with the fruit of justice by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God The Explication 6. THe Apostle here speaks in the plural Number because he writes this Epistle as well in his companions name as his own in Timothies though afterwards himself being onely in Prison and not Timothy he speaks to them in his own person but directs his Epistle as from both to shew them that absent or present they are both of one mind The work he confides to have continued is their conversion By the day of Christ he means the day of Judgement which is that of his second coming the first being his birth-day 7. It is reason indeed for him to conside thus because as their conversion was by means of God his special grace so he presumes the same goodnesse of God will be continued which was begun in them and because he hopes their cooperation will not be wanting to persevere in the faith of Christ as it was not first to accept thereof Hence his charity makes him hope this of them with reason and his faith makes him presume the other of God towards them Yet not so that hence the Reformers can infer as they do out of this place that it is impossible for one who is once called by God and in grace ever to lose the same grace or vocation The Apostles words import no such thing onely a religious hope or confidence he hath they will indeed persevere as they have begun to love serve and honour Almighty God as his following words testifie in this Verse because he professeth here that he prayes continually for their perseverance which argues it is not a thing to be hoped but by endeavours and pains on our parts Nay Saint Paul so plainly speaks to this sense that he seems to say least their own endeavours towards this perseverance should not suffice he hath made it even his hearts desire besides and applies his personal sufferings to this end that God moved by his prayer and persecution may supply what is wanting in them towards perseverance by their own sole endeavours And it is Saint Augustines and the Churches doctrine indeed that justifying grace alone sufficeth not toward perseverance without new favours of more and more grace do inable us to persevere In the close of this verse the Apostle alludes to the hope he hath of Martyrdom for the defence of the faith of Christ against those who oppose it and the confirmation of it in those who have imbraced it And this he means by his joy whereof he prayes they may be made partakers 8. And that he doth thus pray he calls God to witness and doth this with such earnestnesse as if he were not himself happy enough to be in the bowels of Jesus Christ which is in his bosome in Heaven unlesse he might find these Philippians there also or as if his love to them and zeal of their salvations were such that he desired Jesus Christ should have them equally in his breast or bowels of affection with himself Both these senses this text will bear very well as also that by these words Saint Paul professeth he loves them so tenderly that he cannot expresse it otherwise then by saying it is even with the affection of Jesus Christ himself following Christ's instruction Joh. 13.34 Love one another as I have loved you 9. Here he prayeth for the superadded grace which above was said to be necessary to perseverance which is for their increase of charity where that abounds there is wanting neither knowledge of what is the true doctrine of the Church of Christ nor what is the true sense and meaning thereof since by this abundant charity we see the ignorant Apostles were so illuminated that they could and did penetrate into the genuine sense of the deepest mysteries of Christian faith and religion 10. This alludes to the sense as above in the former Verse that by their increase in love and charity they might be able to distinguish between the Apostles Christian and Simon Magus his Judaical and others heretical doctrine as finding that of Christianity the more powerfull and efficacious to salvation It seems by these words the Apostle thinks the pretended charity of hereticks is not sincere love and affection to God and their Neighbour but hath a mixture of hypocrisie in it and makes use of the name of Christ to cover the doctrine of those who indeed are opposite to him by saying this or that is Christ his doctrine which indeed is not so but proves upon a strict examine the sense and doctrine of
so have their names written in the book of life are predestinate and cannot choose but be saved But this is farre from the genuine sense of the Apostle who had before so much inculcated perseverance in good works as in this Epistle we have heard his meaning therefore must be that those who by Baptisme are first adopted children of God and by a holy life preserve their favour in the sight of God are at last written in the book of glory as at first they were in the book of grace as who should say he did exhort them that were first innocents to be at last Saints and so deserve to be finally inrolled Commanders of the heavenly Militia after they had been once listed souldiers of the militant Church of Christ The Application 1. THe doctrine of sincerity last Sunday inculcated is this day prosecuted by S. Paul to the Philippians and lest they should misunderstand him he tells them plainly he requires as sincere a Christianity in them as they found to be in himself while he makes his own rule of life their pattern and example to follow him by and doth not fear to fright them from their onely nominall Christianity by declaring those to be enemies to the Crosse of Christ who do not really sincerely take up the same and carry it as well as they pretend to do it who have not their conversation in heaven while they presume to hope their bodies shall go thither though their souls be wallowing here in the mire of flesh and bloud Finally lest they should be deterr'd from following S. Pauls Rule out of a despair of arriving to his perfection in Christianity which in those dayes was and still should be Synonyma with saintity he exhorts them at least to follow the examples of the two virtuous Matrones here set before their eyes Euodia and Syntiche as also those of his sincere companion though not an Apostle and of the rest of his Coadjutors in the propagation of the faith of Christ 2. Yes yes beloved 't is a holy sincerity that now our charity must bring along with her to her journeys end and therefore no marvell 't is two dayes together inculcated by holy Church nor can there be a greater sincerity then that to day before our eyes that of the Primitive Church and consequently that is it we should endeavour now to have indeed and not to fain for as we glory to be Christian Catholicks so we should endeavour to be as sincerely such as they from whom we are descended 3. And for as much as holy Church knows rightly well there is no saintity on earth free from iniquity no sincerity that is not waited on by some hypocrisie or other therefore while she preacheth perfection she prudently prayes for absolution especially now that she draws to the close of her annuall piety now that she brings her charity towards her journeys end lest vanity runne away with part of her holy labours For that is the safest step to saintity which tramples on iniquity treads it under foot those stand firmest in the grace of God that are alwayes begging new favours by asking pardon for old offences and they shew sincerity of their love to God who desire to cancell all their obligations to the devil who are not content with pardon for their guilt of sinne unlesse they may be loosened from the bands thereof from their affections unto sinne And for as much as charity is taught to march out of the field of this life with such a sincerity with such a sincere desire of saintity Therefore holy Church brings her towards her journeyes end now praying for it as above The Gospel Mat. 9. v. 18. c. 18 As he was speaking this unto them behold a certain Governour approched and adored him saying Lord my daughter is even now dead but come lay thy hand upon her and she shall live 19 And Jesus rising up followed him and his disciples 20 And behold a woman which was troubled with an issue of bloud twelve years came behind him and touched the hemme of his garment 21 For she said within her self If I shall touch onely his garment I shall be safe 22 But Jesus turning and seeing her said have a good heart daughter thy faith hath made thee safe And the woman became whole from that hour 23 And when Jesus was come into the house of the Governour and saw minstrels and the multitude keeping a stirre he said 24 Depart for the wench is not dead but sleepeth And they laughed him to scorn 25 And when the multitude was put forth he entred in and held her hand and the maid arose 26 And this bruit went forth into all that countrey The Explication 18. THat is as he was giving a reason why his disciples did not fast so rigorously as those of John the Baptist did and as also the Pharisees were wont to do which were onely voluntary and not legall fasts Then came in this Governour who was a chief officer in the Synagogue called Jairus which signifies Illuminatour or teacher of the people By Adoration is here literally meant falling at Christs feet which yet he did not do before news was brought him by his servants that now his daughter was dead lo then he believes firmly and in testimony thereof prostrates himself and in the very manner of his language saying now my daughter is dead he blames his not believing and asking help sooner but to make amends for his not hoping Christ could cure his sick daughter he invites him to go home and revive her though she now were dead not that he doubted but his power at a distance would suffice but that he had heard Christ was accustomed to touch those whom he healed in Capharnaam and this was on the sea coast of Galilee not farre from the same town famous for Christ his miracles 19. That this is the genuine sense of the verse above is gathered the rather from Christ his going immediately to undertake the cure even after the same manner namely by a touch of his sacred hand for we do not hear any rebuke given to Jairus for want of Faith but Christ resting satisfied his belief was full resolved to give him full satisfaction to his Faith and hope by reviving as was desired his dead daughter taking his disciples as witnesses to this his gracious condescending and working this miracle Yet this notwithstanding the Centurions Faith was above this of Jairus who onely asked a word saying Mat. 8.8 speak the word onely and held himself not worthy the honour of Christ his entring his house 20 21. 22. Note this woman was a Gentile and it wants not mystery to have the twelve yeares of her diseases continuation upon her here made mention of in regard it alludes to the twelve years age of Jairus daughter whom Christ was going to raise from death to life and thereby gives us to understand Christ by his ordaining to do those two miracles at