read in vers 13. For Brethren ye have been called unto liberty only use not your liberty for an occasion to the flesh In which words we may observe these two things 1. An assertion of the liberty wherein the Gospel of Christ hath placed us Ye have been called unto liberty 2. A caution against the abuse of this liberty Only use not your liberty for an occasion to the flesh 1. The former of these the liberty wherein the Gospel hath placed us might be represented in more particulars than the time will allow me to consider and therefore I shall confine my self to those two special instance of it which are much considered in the Epistle 1. Liberty from the numerous precepts wherewith the Law perplexed the Jews in things indifferent in themselves 2. And then relaxation of the rigour of the penal Sanction of the Law 1. The former instance of Christian Liberty is far greater than is usually taken notice of as will appear if we consider that there was scarce any one instance of Life and Action Religious Moral Civil or Natural wherein the Law given by Moses did not scrupulously charge and oblige the Conscience The Jewish Writers reckon six hundred and thirteen Precepts in Moses his Law most of which were meer restrictions of that liberty which natural Religion nay which Christianity it self allows It would tire your patience to hear a Catalogue of all these positive institutions and therefore I shall only remark a few particulars in several kinds 1. And first of all their solemn and publick worship of God chiefly consisted in gifts and sacrifices which they might not offer in any place which they should judge the most convenient but at the place which God should chuse which afterwards proved to be Jerusalem Every adult or grown man was here to appear thrice in the year and none to appear empty handed none to make his address to God without a sacrifice for acceptance a burnt-offering and a peace-offering besides a sacrifice for expiation in the cases wherein the Law required it which cases were exceeding numerous These sacrifices were to be free from blemish and these blemishes were very many and so were the several rules prescribed in offering killing and consuming every sacrifice made to God all which things rendred Gods service under the Law a far more nice and scrupulous thing than Christianity now makes it 2. Next to the several rites of worship enjoyned the Jews by Moses his Law I might instance in the scrupulous precepts which much perplexed their moral actions for there were few moral duties which were not nicely circumscribed and punctually determined in point of circumstance The several dues of the Priests and Levites their very Charities to the poor were so determined in point of time so circumstantiated in point of place so scrupulously limited and prescribed as made it hard to avoid offence in the greatest heed and observation as will appear from several instances which I shall hereafter mention to you 3. Nor were they thus perplexed and disciplined with abundance of nice and scrupulous Laws in the worship of God and morality only but in all their other affairs also 1. They could not so much as build a house but after a certain form and maner with Battlements added to the roof Deut. 22.8 They might not dwell in the house they had built at least as they interpret Moses without certain Schedules of the Law affixed to the gates and parts of their doors Deut. 6.9 Their houses were subject to disease that is to say to the Plague of Leprosie as well as themselves to be pulled down where they were not cured and in case of cure to be purged and cleansed by divers rites and expiations Levit. 14. 2. They were not without restraint of Law in the cloaths wherewith they covered themselves They might not put on any garment of linnen and woollen wove together they were to edge their cloaths with fringes they were as themselves expound the Law to wear certain Schedules of the Law upon their foreheads and their arms which are stiled Phylacteries in the Gospel Matt. 23. 3. Their meat and the preparation of it were bounded with far more numerous Laws than any thing which I have yet mentioned It would be infinite to give an account of the several kinds of living creatures the flesh whereof were by the Law judged unclean and the blood and tallow of the clean yea the flesh it self in several cases might not be eaten upon pain of death 4. Nor was the preparation of their food any freer from the scruple of Law than their food it self They might not join divers kind of Creatures as an Ox and an Ass in the same yoke They might not set their Orchards or Vineyards with divers kind of plants together nor eat of the fruit of the three first years nor of the fourth but at Jerusalem They were forbidden to sow their fields with several kinds or sorts of seed nor might they either plow or sow either in the seventh or fiftieth year They could not reap where they had sowed nor gather the fruits where they had planted without the observation of such rules as were troublesom at least in point of circumstance A corner of the field Olive-yard and Vineyard was not to be reaped or gathered at all but left behind them for the poor they might not glean where they did reap or gather the fruits either in their fields or their plantations They might not stoop to take up any little quantity of what might chanceably fall in gathering If they had forgotten a sheaf of Corn they might not return again to fetch it Such were the scruples which encumbered them in their very Charities to the poor After they had gathered in their fruits they might not apply them to their use before they had separated divers portions for other uses First a portion to be carried up to the Temple and there presented before the Altar Then another portion for the Priests to be given to them in the Country neither of which was to be less than a sixtieth part of all their fruits by the Decree of their wise men Then a first Tythe to be given to the Levite then another Tythe two years together to be carried to Jerusalem in kind or value and there spent and the third year given to the poor of the Land After all this whensoever they kneaded a mass of dough a part must be separated for the Priest Whensoever they killed of the herd or flock the Priest was to have his share in that It would be endless to reckon up all particulars in this kind The general account is thus stated by the Jews the Poor had nine several gifts allotted them by a standing Law three in the Field four in the Vineyard two in Plantations of other kinds besides the second Tythe every third year the Levites had the Tythe of all the fruits that were considerable the Priests had four and
reason is because our Saviour in his following discourse in this Chapter takes no notice of matter of history or prediction but only of matter of Law and Precept 2. And then further as the Law and the Prophets signifie the precepts delivered in the Books of the Old Testament so when our Lord assures his hearers that he came not to destroy those precepts his meaning is that he did not come to thwart or oppose or contradict them or any thing which God designed in them for so is the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taken in several places of the Scripture 3. And lastly when he further adds that he came to fulfil those precepts his sense necessarily must be this that he came to advance and improve or accomplish whatsoever God intended in them Having now sufficiently cleared the sense of the words before us I shall proceed to shew the truth of the several parts contained in them 1. And first of all of the negative part I am not come to destroy the Law or the Prophets 2. And secondly of that which is affirmative But I am come to fulfil them In my discourse on both which parts it will be convenient to consider the several kinds of Laws or Precepts given to the Jews Moral Ceremonial and Judicial apart or severally by themselves 1. And to begin with the negative part plain it is 1. In the first place That our Lord did no way contradict any moral precept of the Law but left his followers under perpetual obligations to obey all precepts of that kind All things saith he whatsoever you would that men should do to you do ye even so to them for this is the Law and the Prophets Matt. 7.12 Where we find him confirming that general rule which the Law and Prophets had delivered touching our duty towards our neighbours and consequently setling all particular acts of duty which the moral Law required toward them by the confirmation of that rule The same is done as to our duties both to God and man Matt. 22.37 39. where he establishes and approves the two great commands of the Law that we love God with all our heart and with all our mind and that we love our neighbour as our selves whereunto he presently adds these words on these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets These were the things which the Law and Prophets aimed at in all their precepts and exhortations and these hath Christ confirmed and ratified but no way prejudiced by the Gospel I say not now how much more holy rules of life our Lord hath given in several cases than were given by the Law or Prophets of that I shall give an account anon all that I now observe unto you is that an addition of higher precepts of obedience was no destruction or violation of those that were not so high as they but really an improvement of them just as the growth of a child to a man is no destruction but an improvement of the person or as a greater degree of vertues includes but doth not destroy the less from whence I conclude that although our Lord hath added perfecter rules of holiness than the Law or the Prophets had delivered yet he did not destroy them by so doing but further improved what they designed But the great difficulty doth not lie in reconcileing our Saviours words I came not to destroy the Law or the Prophets with what he did as to the moral part of the Law but with what befel its other branches namely the ceremonial and judicial both which parts fell to the ground after his coming into the World and what he did and suffered in it and yet in truth he did not destroy either of them in the sense wherein destruction is taken in these words that is to say he did not oppose or contradict them or otherwise behave himself toward them than was suitable to the mind and will of the Law-giver 2. He did not violate much less oppose any precept of the ceremonial Law but caused the Law it self to cease not by any opposition to it but by removeing all occasion of any further use of it as the Laws of war are not violated but cease and take no place in peace He introduced that very thing which the ceremonial Law designed the introduced the life and substance of those things which were foreshadowed in that Law and so he made it cease and vanish not by opposing or contradicting but by accomplishing the end of it as it will further appear to you when I shall shew how he fufilled it 3. Nor lastly did our Lord destroy that is violate or contradict the judicial part of Moses his Law namely the Law of the Jewish State for that Law fell of it self in the Jewish Common-wealth when the City of Jerusalem was destroyed when the generality of the people were carried away into captivity when the whole Government was dissolved and the Country became a Roman Province there was an end of that Common-wealth and so an end of those Laws whereby that Common-wealth was governed For the Laws of the Jewish Common-wealth were not given save only to the people of the Jews nor were they designed to continue longer than the Common-wealth it self continued so that when this was once dissolved those also fell of their own accord without any violation offered unto them by our Saviour from all which several considerations it plainly appears that he did not come to destroy or opose the Law or the Prophets or any precept contained in them and that he did not behave himself to either of them as one that came to oppose or thwart them So careful was he to give no scandal to create no real offence to the Jews by contradicting in any precepts moral ceremonial or judicial which the Law or the Prophets had established 2. Having shewed the truth of the negative part of our Saviours words which is that he came not into the World to destroy either the Law or the Prophets let us now proceed to give an account of the other part wherein he affirms that he came to fulfil them that is as I have before explained it to improve and accomplish what they contained and what was mainly designed in them And here proceeding in that method which I have used in the former part 1. I first observe that our blessed Lord fulfilled the moral part of the Law by giving stricter rules of holiness than either Moses or the Prophets had formerly given unto the Jews according to the received sense amongst the best of their Interpreters and no doubt in several cases stricter than Moses himself design'd and this is the sense wherein St Chrysostom and Tertullian and divers others of the ancient Christians affirm our Saviour to have fulfilled the moral Law as well as by personal obedience to it They teach that he filled up those vacuities that Moses had left in moral duties because the Jews were not able to bear them
which we partake in that Sacrament 1 Con. 10.17 We are all partakers of that one bread and that the Cup of which we drink and thus believing we do not give Divine worship unto the Elements in the Sacrament But they in absolute contradiction both unto Scripture and unto Reason and unto four of their five Senses believe that after Consecration there is no bread but the natural flesh of Christ's body no wine but his very natural blood Upon which account they pay a Divine worship to them worship that which is not God that which is really bread and wine To all these things I might now add the Superstition of their Devotions their Prayers for delivering departed Souls out of that place they call Purgatory a place that is of their own making for gaining Wealth unto their Church Their Pilgrimages to the Tombs of Saints an infinite Mass of Rites and Ceremonies for which things they have no precept in the Scripture no example either there or in the primitive Ages of Christianity Rites which obscure and burden Religion with a numberless heap of Superstitions contrary to the very nature to the simplicity of Christianity From matter of Worship pass we on to matter of common life and action 1. As it relates to moral Duty 2. And also unto Civil Society 1. And for the former our Church declares that true repentance is absolutely necessary to gain the remission and pardon of sin We also affirm that reformation is the best and most essential part of true repentance We do not pretend to any power to give Absolution to any person who doth not practise such repentance that is to say who doth not truly reform himself in life and action in case life be continued to him or in real purpose and resolution in an effectual change of heart We make no pretence to an Authority of giving Indulgences and Remissions or of admitting any Penances and Commutations for the Expiation of the sin where the sin is still continued in Whereas they of the Church of Rome give Absolution to Attrition that is to the meer fear of Hell and these two things namely Attrition and Absolution they judge sufficient to Salvation They admit of Penances and Commutations for the Expiation of mens sins and by these means teach their Followers to hope for remission of the punishment although they retain the sin it self And lest the Penance should seem burthensom and too severe they can give Indulgence for that too to them that will be at the cost to buy it By all which means they make the Precepts of the Gospel the Laws of Christ of no effect make it needless to obey them unless a man have a mind unto it and to do more than what is needful 2. For Civil Society 't is well known how many there are in the Church of Rome who do affirm that it is not needful to discharge a promise to a Heretick and all are Hereticks in their account who make profession of Christianity and do not communicate with their Church We know there was safe conduct promised to John Hus and Jerom of Prague to the Council of Conslance and how that promise was performed The promise was broken and the men burnt and so indeed they justified their Doctrine by their practice They exempt the Clergy from the Authority of secular Power till they be surrendred thereunto by their Superiors in the Church and they surrender them when they please and when they please they do not Upon which account many Villanies many Murders have been committed in the State to the infinite scandal of Religion It was complained in the sixth year of King Henry the Second that there have been above an hundred man slaughters committed by the then Clergy since the beginning of his Reign But that which is of the vilest consequence in this point is that they affirm that the Popes of Rome have power to depose Kings and Princes and that pursuant to this Doctrine they have excommunicated and deposed lawful Princes in several places and given their Kingdoms and Dominions to other persons that there are infinite numbers of Authors who defend and justifie this Doctrine that these are countenanced by a Council that is to say the fourth Lateran which they themselves call a General Council For it is there expresly said that in case a Prince does not purge his Country from heretical pravity in the space of a year after admonition so to do by the Metropolitan and his Comprovincials then this be signified to the Pope that he may deprive him of all Authority terram ejus exponat Catholicis occupandam expose his Country to be possessed and seized by Catholicks In direct pursuance of which Doctrine private persons have stab'd Princes and have been commended and applauded by the Pope himself for so doing For so it was in the case of Henry the Third of France These are the Doctrines of the Church of Rome relating unto Civil Society what ours are I need not say We owne our selves obliged to do good to all men and that although we have not obliged our selves thereto by any particular promise to them much more discharg'd our faith to all We owne the King to be supreme in his own dominions and that there is no power in any to depose him And to conclude we owne the truth of S. Peter's words and that in the very fullest sense Honour or as the margent reads it esteem all men love the Brotherhood fear God honour the King 1 Pet. 2.17 We owne all to be oblig'd to submit to every ordinance of man for the Lords sake whether it be to the King as supreme or to Governours as sent by him for the punishment of evil doers I have here given you an account of some of the most material differences between us and the Church of Rome in point of faith and worship and manners and should now perswade you to stand fast in all these things as they are taught in this Church not suffering your selves to be abased by vain Sophistry of deceivers If they ask you where our Church was before Luther ask you again where theirs was before the fourth Laterane Council nay before that of Trent it self For sure it is there was never any Church before those Councils that did in all things teach and practise as the Church of Rome at this present time Tell them our Church that is a Church wherein the same faith and worship the same obedience to Gods commands were taught and required which are now taught and required in ours were many ages before theirs Such a Church there was assoon as there was a Christian Church such a Church planted by Christ himself such a Church propagated by his Apostles such a Church for several hundred years for several ages after that Afterwards there arose a time of darkness upon the face of the Christian world in that darkness many errours crept into the Church many corruptions in worship
his affections and corrects exorbitant heat and passion and powerfully moves and inclines the Soul to sobriety patience and humility So is the third disease of the mind its vanity in useless speculations together with the effects hereof perfectly cured by sound judgment in things excellent and worthy knowledge 2. Add hereunto in the second place that the same judgment is a constant guide and faithful monitor to all our duties in every instance of life and action 1. A guide it is that points out the way to life eternal through all the varieties and uncertainties that perplex the minds and pervert the practices of them that want it a guide it is that doth not stoop to groundless dictates that is not frighted with bold Anathema's nor yet misled by soft perswasions by fair pretences or shews of Piety no mans confidence shall amuse it no mans zeal impose upon it If it be said loe here is Christ here an unerring way to life If it be said on the other hand no he is not there but here there is nothing but imposture under the name of infallibility nothing but Vanity and Superstition under a mask of external piety But here is the spirit of Jesus Christ here is his Doctrine truly preached here are his ordinances pure and entire without humane mixtures and inventions he that hath clear and stable judgment in the things the Apostle stiles excellent knows what to believe and what to practice in the midst of all this noise and clamour He is not put upon demurrs first to doubt and then to put off and delay his duty till interest passion or example till the hopes or fears of the present world prejudice and beguile his judgment much less by a mistaken zeal to pursue a crime instead of a duty and think he is doing God service when he is violating Gods Laws breaking the peace of a Church or State or censuring those whom he ought to honour Such is the singular help we have from the approbation of things excellent from stable judgment in all these things It is a constant guide unto us to shew us what our duties are in every instance of life and action 2. Nor is it only a ready guide but a faithful monitor to these duties for judgment inform'd by practical truth is one and the same thing with conscience and conscience is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 conscience is a domestick God conscience is Gods vicegerent in us which both declares our duties to us and powerfully presses us to obedience No man offends it but wounds himself no man follows it but finds content in so doing whence that practice of St Paul recorded in his own words Acts 24.16 Herein do I exercise my self to have always a conscience void of offence toward God and toward men And certainly did we take a survey of all the several considerations that recommend our duties to us and then so six these considerations in our thoughts as to turn them into a stable judgment this would so confirm and strengthen us in the choice and practice of what is good as that neither the hopes nor fears the charms nor dreads of the present World should move us to a wilful sin Let a man consider that his duties are made to be so by the Laws of God who having made us out of nothing hath made himself our Sovereign Lord by so doing and being so hath all Authority to command us Let him consider that these Laws are good and excellent in themselves as highly tending to the welfare both of Societies and single persons Let him consider with what variety of application God recommends our duties to us how he exhorts invites and intreats how he expostulates and reasons with us how he upbraids and chides our folly in many places of the Scripture Let him consider what he hath done and what he hath promised to do hereafter that he may perswade us to obedience that he hath given his Son to die for us to redeem us both from sin and punishment and promised his grace to assist obedience and eternal happiness to reward it And having considered all these things and digested the consideration of them into a firm and setled judgment can we imagine that such a judgment shall not perswade a free choice and ready practice of every thing thus recommended to him Especially if he shall further consider what are the principles within himself and what the temptations also without that urge him to reject his duty and what unhappy and sad effects attend the wilful rejection of it The principles within that corrupt our choice and practice too are as St John himself hath told us 1 John 2.16 the lust of the flesh the lust of the eyes and the pride of life sensuality covetousness and ambition infatuations as well as sins and torments as well as infatuations especially in their effects and issues in the cares and Envyings and Animosities which they kindle upon the minds of men The temptations that move these vain desires are bodily pleasures secular riches and the esteem of vain men for none but such can value a proud ambitious person These are the things even these which are not satisfactions to the mind of the meanest man in the World these which bring regrets and pangs cares and anxieties death and misery along with them that tempt us to forsake our duties These are the things that offer themselves in recompence for the loss of innocence the loss of holiness and true righteousness the very Image of God himself These are the things that offer themselves in recompence for the loss of peace of Conscience of Gods favour and the care of his good providence over us Nay these are the things that present themselves in exchange for our immortal Souls the loss whereof cannot be made up by gaining the whole world it self for what shall it profit a man saith our Saviour if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul or what shall a man give in exchange for his Soul Mark 8.36 37. So then let a man take an exact survey of all that recommends his duty and of all that moves him to forsake it and then compare them both together and the comparison will be thus On one hand there is the law of God who hath all Authority to command him on the other his own extravagant passions urging him to forsake that Law on one hand behold all the vertues all the graces of Christianity that is to say all the perfections of humane nature on the other all its sins and follies all its degeneracies and decays on one hand there are stable joys peace of Conscience peace with God and assurance of his grace and favour on the ther muddy and fleeting pleasures mixt with abundance of regrets on the one hand clear and setled hopes of future life and immortality on the other want of these hopes nay the fears and dreads of eternal misery Now when a man makes
this comparison when he clearly discerns and firmly judges of all these things as this comparison represents them when he applies this judgment to every instance of life and action is it not an effectual principle to restrain him from every wilful sin to urge and press him to every duty will he chuse what is no way recommended and refuse what is represented to him under all the motives to choice and practice No man chuses or doth amiss but he that is ignorant or forgetful either in the nature of good and evil or in the effects and issues of them If there be nothing of this in the case let the charms of the world entice to evil he knows they are deceits and vanities and cannot believe what he knows is false nor be cheated by what he doth not believe Let the dreads and calamities of the world encomber and perplex his duties he reckons as the Apostle speaks that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us Rom. 8.18 This gives him courage strength and patience and makes him chuse afflicted innocence rather than guilty and short prosperity Insomuch that all the great examples of the highest and the noblest vertues all these victories over the world and all its troubles and adversities that are recorded in Sacred History all the great things that have been done all the great things that have been suffered for the advancement of Truth and Piety have sprung from a setled resolution grounded upon stable judgment never to vary from Gods will and the way to everlasting happiness So Moses esteemed the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Aegypt Heb. 11.16 So Christ himself for that joy that was set before him endured the Cross despising the shame and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God Heb. 12.2 And so did his first and faithful followers for the securing of their innocence and the rewards thereunto belonging patiently endure all their sufferings as knowing that their light affliction which was but for a moment wrought for them a far more exceeding and an eternal weight of glory 2 Cor. 4.17 Thus is the approbation of things excellent that is a clear and stable judgment in all the duties of the Gospel as there declared and recommended not only a perfect cure and remedy of all the diseases of our minds to wit Ignorance Doubt and Vanity but also a constant guide and monitor in the whole course of our lives in the World Which being so 2. Let us now consider what are the means of attaining to it the second head before propounded 1. And here I shall not need to say that since every good and perfect gift is from above and cometh down from the Father of lights Jam. 1.17 it must be sought of God by prayer Men may be rich and great and powerful meerly by the permission of Providence by practices not allow'd by God by fraud and injury and oppression But no man is wise unto salvation but by the special grace of God nor doth he give this special grace but where it is diligently sought of him which was the reason why St Paul so often puts it into his Prayers that God would bless men with this wisdom So he prays for Timothy that God would give him understanding in all things 2 Tim. 2.7 for the Ephesians That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ the Father of glory would give unto them the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him Eph. 1.17 for the Colossians that they might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding Col. 1.9 and lastly for the Philippians here that there love might abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment that they might approve the things that are excellent from all which prayers to God for wisdom for sound judgment in all our duties as represented in the Gospel we learn that it is the gift of God and to be sought by fervent Prayer especially seeing that God hath promised to give his spirit to them that ask him and that in a promise confirmed by an argument drawn from common and known experience for so is that Luke 11.13 If ye then being evil know how to give good gifts to your Children how much more shall your heavenly Father give his Holy Spirit to them that ask him 2. Nor shall I need to put you in mind that to our Prayers for the illumination of Gods grace something of industry must be joyned in the study both our of duties themselves and the motives that recommend them to us And yet in truth both these things are partly so written upon our hearts and since the revelation of the Gospel so expresly declared to us that we need not weary or waste our bodies nor vex and torment our understanding to gain the knowledge of either of them We need not now as St. Paul tells us say in our hearts who shall ascend into Heaven That is to bring down Christ from above to reveal the mind of God to us Or who shall descend into the deep that is to bring up Christ again from the dead that he may confirm that Revelation both these things are already done so that now as the Apostle adds Rom. 10.8 9. The word is high thee even in thy mouth and in thy heart that is the word of faith which we preach that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead thou shalt be saved Where we see the Apostle takes it for granted that he that firmly believed the Gospel could scarce fail in the very practice much less in the knowledge and approbation of what is necessary to salvation so clearly are all our duties revealed and so effectually recommended in the Gospel 3. So that what is now mainly requisite to gain a clear and stable judgment in the good and perfect will of God is so much antecedent probity so much sincerity towards God as that we are willing to do his will when it shall be made known unto us and wonder not that this should be requisite for the gaining of stable judgment in it for this is no more than the very belief that there is a God may produce in every man so believing If a man have nothing of inclination to do Gods will when he shall know it why should God reveal it to him or supposing what is so indeed that he hath revealed it in the Gospel yet how unapt a man is to believe what he is resolved not to practise and what if believed and not practised will be a perpetual anguish to him How easie is it in this case when the interests of powerful lusts and passions bribe and corrupt the understanding for a man to prevaricate with himself and baffle and cheat his own mind But where there