originally aspected But a Platonick year were any such possible would sooner be spent I suppose than these wise men agree among themselves when and what time this great Revolution will be finished This atempt therefore as rash and vain so ridiculous also The Modern Jews and Talmudists seem to go upon better grounds and with them some of the Fathers as Lactantius and others these all resolve the former for certain the latter in a strong opinion upon six thousand years for the worlds continuance two thousand under the Law of Nature two thousand under that of Moses and two thousand under the Gospel of Grace And that these once expired the son of man then comes without fail in the glory of the Father And the truth is they have some shews of reason and pretty congruities to countenance their divinations Some of the Rabbies by their Cabal learning have found this out even in the first verse of Genesis where Alpha the first of the Hebrew Alphabet and the Numerical letter that denotes the number of thousand is just as they observe six times written That so the worlds Age and dissolution might be mysteriously read in the very front and forehead of the worlds Creation which in the Creation it self and the manner of it is they suppose much more legible as farther typed out and more fully discovered For in six days it pleased God to create the Heaven and the Earth and all that is therein and on the seventh day he rested And to shew that this concerned mans continuance of Travel in this world God afterwards commanded him also six days to labour and to observe the seventh for a Sabbath the figure of Eternal rest in the Heavens now mille anni coram Deo sicut dies una A thousand years with the Lord are but as one day one day therefore in signification here as a thousand years And the self same they would have yet farther insinuated in the first Patriots and Progenitors of this new-born world Generis humani satores the first storers of the Earth with Mankind six succeded one another in order and then died Adam Seth Enos Cainan Mahalaleel and Jared but Enoch the seventh from Adam was translated taken up to walk with God as the type and figure of all his Children To these others add divers other sutable instances That the Ark of Noah the Type of the Militant Church floated six Months on the Waters and that in the seventh it rested on the mountain That Moses six days was in the Cloud and in the seventh was called unto the prefence of the Lord. That Jerico the figure of this world as being opposed unto Jerusalem the type of that to come being six days compassed by the command of God in the seventh fell utterly and ruined which happened too just as the Israelites were going off the Wilderness to possess their promised Land Some more yet there are to this purpose but of another strain and fetcht something farther There be that fish for it out of the sixscore years given to the old world for amendment before the coming of the Flood which though in that regard literally meant yet in a mystery these say they do design as many great years or years Mosaical and Jubilar every one whereof contained fifty of the common and ordinary and then fifty drawn on six-score every score producing a thousand the product that results from the whole must needs be just six thousand years the general space they conceive for the repentance of the whole world before the coming of the second deluge diluvium ignis that deluge of Fire The same these Men collect likewife from the life of Moses who lived precisely a hundred and twenty years forty years in the Court of Pharaoh which answers as they would have it unto two thousand years under Nature forty years in the Desart with Jethro keeping Sheep on the backside of Horeb which responds unto two thousand under the Law given in that Mountain and forty years in the wilderness governing the people of God and leading them on unto their Land of rest which design the other two thousand under the conduct and Kingdom of Christ our Lord who when these shall be once elapsed and spent will come again and deliver up the Kingdom unto his Father So some But Lactantius and others otherwise That he shall come indeed at the end of six thousand years but the end for all that is not yet For he shall spend they suppose a thousand years in a kingdom of Righteousness upon Earth as a spiritual Sabbath from sin which first kept they shall then pass into that great and eternal Sabbath of Glory even for ever These may be pretty Speculations to say no worse of them but they cannot conclude any thing They are little better than what that learned man tearms them Commenta quibus malignus ille humana detinet ingenia something indeed they have of wit much of curiosity but of certainty nothing at all For suppose the conjecture true were six thousand years as they would have it the full period of the Worlds age yet what could certainly be discovered from thence when the different Calculators themselves are at a fault or rather an unrecoverable loss concerning the just age of the world and how much of it is spent already But what need such computations Excellently St. Austin Omnium de hac re calculantiuâ— digitos ... quiescere jubet qui ait non oft vestruni noscere c. He raps all Accountants on the fingers and commands them to cease who says it is not for you to know the times and the seasons which the Father hath put in his own power What the Son of God with such a check refused to reveal why should any other the sons of men dare presume to search or think to discover But such are the cross and preposterous ways of perverse Mortals ever attempting to know where they are enjoyned to be ignorant and there for the most affecting ignorance where God most requires their knowledge Otherwise we might find other computations much fitter to be busyed in forbear counting of the Times and think rather upon that Redde rationem Vilicationis how we may make up our own Accounts against that day which when all calculations are ended will notwithstanding steal upon the world undescryed like a Thief saith our Saviour in the night when men least dream of it overtake even these busie Calculators as the Enemy did Archimedes drawing his Circles for prevention in the dust and not suffer him to finish his diagrams nor These peradventure their Computations For as it was in the days of Noah men eat and drank and married securely until the Flood came and carried all away So saith he himself will it be at the coming of the Son of man who will come as a sweeping deluge indeed yea much more unresistable For he shall come in power and Majesty and great glory even in
most admiration is begotten only with a look by mere aspect and intuition as the Fathers speak and the Scriptures intimate and therefore who shall declare These and many other the like high and inexplicable mysteries of this wonderful generation the Apostle seems not to express but to shadow as well as he might when he terms him the brightness of his Fathers glory and the express image of his Person Heb. i. 3. For though these words cannot reach home to the thing yet others more apt and significant may not be found For brightness is ever coeval with the thing that is bright if bright in it self the brightness of the Sun is neither before nor after but fully as ancient as that Sun that begat it and so begat it as it doth not cease still to beget it For it is not produced once for all but is generated perpetually and generated not of two but of one only who can communicate it to other things and yet lose none of it himself Excellently therefore the brightness of his glory and as fully the express image of his person to shew as far as may be shown the manner of his generation by sight and intuition For the images which we behold when we look on our selves in a glass are of all others the most exact and perfect Now God himself is his own mirrour wherein beholding and comprehending himself he produceth the most express and absolute image of himself So that the Divine intellect of the Father reflecting inwards and fully conceiving his own perfection doth at once both conceive and bring forth his own and only Son the substantial and essential picture of himself And therefore no thought here of Mother or Matrimony nor imperfection or inquination but he is begotten after a pure clean chast high and sublime manner as the beam from the Sun as the image from the glass as being the brightness of his Fathers glory and the ingraven Character of his person Though neither of these can fully express it for it is wonderful and therefore to our ears cannot be uttered it is singular and therefore hath no example for how should the imperfect Creature every way square with the absolute perfection of the Creatour And therefore let us adore in Soul and believe it in heart but lay our hand on our lips and not think to utter it in words whereof when we have spoken yea and thought all that we can we must shut up all with the Prophets Admiration who shall declare And this shall suffice for the non-declaration of his Divine birth and generation we now pass on to his humane the subject of this days Solemnity and therefore the chief theam of this hours discourse but a theam every way beset also with so many Pearls of highest admiration as we may well say of it as of the other Quis enarrabit Nay in some things it may seem something stranger than his other generation For that God should be born of God though we can no way apprehend it yet in reason it carries some Correspondence and proportion But that God should be born again and born of a woman hath such an infinite disparity that unless it had been foreshewn by such illustrious prophecies and confirmed by so many and great miracles it had exceeded not only reason but even all belief Well therefore did S. Paul term it a mystery and a great mystery and great too without controversie without controversie great is the mystery of Godliness God manifested in the flesh 1 Tim. iii. God in the flesh a great mystery indeed yea how many great mysteries are there in it The Antient of days is become a swadled Child and he who was the Son of God without a Mother now made the Son of a woman without a Father a woman that is at once both a Mother and a Maid conceiving and bearing a Son and yet a Virgin in and after both conception and birth Nay more the Mother of her own Maker and so the daughter of her Son as he the Son of his own daughter No marvel therefore that at this admirable birth of his he had marvail and admiration it self given him for his name for his first To us a Child is born and to us a Son is given the principality shall be upon his shoulders and you shall call his name Wonderful Isa. ix wonderful and full of wonders as in other things so especially in his birth and generation and therefore Quis enarrabit Wise Solomon having with all his skill and diligence searched into the depths and profundities of Nature after all his travel could find out no new thing under the Sun but that you may know a greater than Solomon is here our Saviour this day together with himself brought many new things you see into the world which the Sun never saw before nor ever shall see again A new birth new man new person new Heavens new Earth a new Creation for all had need of renewing and all things in him are made new Ecce nova jam facta sunt omnia behold all things are become new saith the Apostle All things but wretched men that regarding it not grew old in their Sins but shall receive a punishment hereafter that shall never grow old in it self because it shall never be ended And therefore Quis Yet that we may declare it as far as we can or at least declare how far it is above all declaration we will in their order briefly touch upon these circumstances of his birth and generation Who it is that is born of whom and in what manner and where he was born For there is newness and strangeness in them all not fully to be declarable And first who or what he is that is born And what is he an ordinary man as we our selves are one of the rout one of the vulgar A Man indeed he was and when he was at the lowest and worst Pilate could term him so ecce homo behold the Man but yet no ordinary Man he was a King too and a King born where is he that is born king of the Jews say the Wisemen of the East Nay no petty King no King of the Jews alone he shall have the Nations too for his inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for his possessions saith God in the Psalm And therefore an universal Monarch And yet higher for I will make him my first-born higher than the Kings of the earth higher indeed even the high God that is King both of Heaven and Earth and therefore his name shall be called Wonderful and mighty counsellor and Deus fortâ—s the strong God pater aeternus the everlasting Father saith my Prophet in the place but now quoted And it is worth the observing in the beginning of the verse A child is born and a son is given towards the end this weak child is the mighty God this young Son is the everlasting Father for the Son of God is our
and all other the sordid Factors that truck and traffick between them truss't up on an instant in a third fardle and as nasty as any of the other All indeed and many more the like fit Faggots and Fuel for those devouring but not consuming flames Their time is come and thither they must to receive the just recompence of their ways for that is the end of Christs coming who now comes for general Retribution and due reward unto all Et tunc reddet unicuique c. And then shall he reward c. The Then here was omitted in the division but may not be so in our discourse for there seems to be an Emphasis a strong Accent on it on this particle of time 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and then he shall render unto every man according to his works And sure it is something well yet a comfortable hearing to those that have clear bosoms that yet there is a Then in store a time that will come at last when every one shall receive a reward according to his works Here on earth the Babel of confusion where all things are mixed and blended togetherâ— no mans works can well be discerned or judged of by the reward he receiveth The reward of the righteous sometimes happens to the wicked saith Solomon and the reward of the wicked is sometimes given to the righteous No man can know either good or evil by all that is before him Some rare examples indeed there now and then fall out when evil men are filled with their own devices and made to eat the fruits of their own planting As I have done saith Adonibezeck unto others so God hath requiâ—ed me and so he requites many more hangs them up sometimes like Haman on their own Gallows or buries them in the pit which themselves have digged This God sometimes doth that we may know his providence sleepeth not even for the present Yet this he doth but seldom saith St. Augustine that we may consider there is a day of judgement to come and the nearer that day approacheth the more rare and seldom are exhibited such remarkable examples The indignation of the Almighty that was wont in former Ages to follow notorious wickedness at the heels with as notable and exemplary revenge now in these latter times the day of final accounts draws nigh on seems to slacken the pace and come leisurely after at a distance God inhibiting as it were the inferiour Courts of his Justice upon earth against the approach of the great day of his general visitation in the Clouds In the mean time because it is mans day this he permits men for the most part unto themselves steers the line of his providence suffers them to run on at pleasure in their own courses and men thus permitted to themselves are oftentimes sure but ill Judges and worse rewarders of their brethren For the malevolent and malignant world prone to calumniate the noblest actions doth usually reward men not according to their works but it s own malignancy It is not judgment but fancy and faction that now adays gives a sutable censure on all mens ways and actions But it is little material for benefacere male audire Regium est That of the Poet is most true and will be ever virtutem praesentem odimus envy never fails to attend on present vertue urit enim fulgore suo and the more eminent it is the more it provokes unto envy but yet that which follows is true also sublatam ex oculis quaerimus invidi future times when it is gone will do it right and reward it with honour But however if they do not yet it is but fit that virtue should be put to the true Test and give proof of her sincerity Every man can easily pursue those attempts that are seconded with vulgar applause but to go on with courage though met in the face and followed at the heels with storms of reproaches and unsavory calumniations in this case non se subducere nimbo not to decline those showers run to every bush for shelter but to bear up manfully notwithstanding into the very eye of the wind and weather Hoc demum est pietas hoc quoque fortis amor this is virtue indeed true and approved love unto God and goodness removed utterly from the danger of those by-respects of Pride and vain-glory the cruel Widwifes of Egypt appointed by the infernal Pharaoh to stifle and smother the Children of the Israelites in the very day of their birth No matter therefore how it goes here with men that judge secundùm faciem according to appearance as St. John speaks or rather sometimes without any appearance at all That which is the stay and solid comfort of every man is within him in his own bosome where he is assured his work is with his God that judgeth righteous judgment and will have his time at last to make all things manifest and reveal the secrets of all hearts when smotherâ—d righteousness shall break forth as the light and just dealing as the noon day For as Solomon rightly he that ponders the heart doth consider it and he that keepeth thy Soul doth know it and he it is that shall reward every man according to his works In the mean time that of the Apostle is seasonable Patientes estote fraâ—res usque in adventum dominis be ye patient â—â—til the coming of the Lord for when he doth come then every mans works shall appear and then indeed he will reward every man according to his works But what is not the reward given until then not until the coming of the Lord A reward sure there is even in the present life but it lies secret in the Conscience a greater reward unto the separated Soul after death yet the fulness of reward I conceive though I contend with no man not until the day of resurrection In the mean time the departed Soul lives it doth not die to be raised again like the body as the Socinian would have it nor yet sleep out the time in a Tâ—ance as others affirm but this is certain the Soulâ— of the righteous are in the hand of God so saith the Wise man yea more they are thus far blessed that die in the Lord far they rest from their labours so saith the Spirit nay farther yet they are in refrigerio in a joyful freshing with Abraham so saith the Paâ—able of Laâ—â—â—â—â—â— yea in a Paradise of delight so saith Christ unto the good Thief upon the Cross. And therefore where-ever they are be the place what or where it will Abrahams bosom or Paradise or under the Altar there they are undoubtedly where the glory of Chirst shines unto then and on them with full assurance of the like glory shortly to be rewealed and wherre with themselves shall be indeâ—ssibly invested In the presentation and contemplation whereof miâ—abili quadam volupt ate afficiunt up 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Their affections saith Gregory Nazianzeâ— even 〈◊〉 with marvellous
delight which can be no less than a Paradise of pleasure unto them But yet that they now are already in that happy place or in the actual fruition of that full happiness and glory which shall hereafter give them the fulness of their reward this the Scriptures do not seem to teach nor the Eatheâ— to affirmâ— but a great consnt of both may he rather sound to the contrary Of those that departed this life before the coming of Christ our Lord in the flesh or his going away again and ascending into the highest Heavens 〈…〉 as the Apostle speaks unto the Hebrews that of the same Apostle may not be denied All these died and received not the promises but behold them a far off And that very beholding holding was their refreshing it seems in that place of rest where they lay after death as it were at anchor in a calm and quiet Harbour free from those winds and tempests wherewith they were beaten whilst they stood off at Sea in the painful Navigation of this life for so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek and sinus in the Latine may import and so Theophylact doth expound Abrahams Bay as well as Abrahams Bosome But yet though at rest they as yet saith he received not the promises and he gives his reason for it too God having provided some better thing for us that they without us should not be made perfect Which reason too will serve for all others that died since the Ascension of our Saviour For as it was not convenient they should be made perfect without us so neither that we our selves should be made perfect without the rest of our brethren If any were so who sooner than the Souls of those Saints and Martyrs that refused not even death for Christ and his Gospel And yet even these are arrayed only in white Robes as Candidati and ready drest in their wedding apparrel for the marriage of the Lamb but are willed withal to rest a while until their fellow servants and the rest of their brethren to be slain likewise should be fulfilled also That so all might be perfected together and by three degrees according to the three estates of life death and judgment draw on unto the fulness of that perfection as having a good hopâ— in life infallible assurance in death and plenary possession at the resurrection In life here we walk by Faith we see not God In the estate after death we see him but afar off as the Apostle speaks but at the Resurrection face to face Here in this world we lie as cripples in Solomons Porch but cured by the name of Jesus death carrieth us into the body of the Temple where we are leaping for joy exulting and praising God but the day of Christ will draw the Veil lead us into the Holy of Holies where God himself dwells between the Cherubins Lastly now upon earth we are Militant Pugnatoâ—es wrestlers and warriours in death we are declared Victours and Conquerors but in the resurrection triumphant and crowned even with that Crown of Righteousness which the Lord the just Judge will give saith St. Paul in die illo in that day laid up indeed before as he there speaks but not before that day it seems to be given but then it shall for then he shall reward c. The like on the other side may well be conceived of the wicked their Souls asâ— soon as departed enter into sorrows and torments the worm that shall never die begins presently to feed upon them but drench'd it seems as yet they are not in that lake of fire which shall never be quenched and will be the fulness of their reward The Devils themselves are not yet there and therefore are bold to say unto our Saviour Art thou come to torment us aâ—te tempâ—â— before our time A set time sure there is appointed for that In the interim as the Crown is reserved for the Righteous so these and all their Adherents are reserved it seems unto that day which shall give them the full accomplishment of their sorrows So St. Jude Reserved in chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day This they all know and cannot without horrour think of it They believe therefore saith St. James and tremble And so likewise all other the Spirits lewd and diabolical people they understand their final and fearful doom already on which their condemning thoughts do perpetually feed not without infinite regret indignation and fury and so though locally seated in Hell yet as yet scalding there and burning only in the flames that arise from their own bosoms But when that great day shall once come and the Son of Man appear in his glory then shall that old Dragon the deceiver with all those apostate people whom he hath deceived and are not written in the Book of the Lamb be thrown into that Lake burning with fire and brimstone Yea death and Hell too shall be cast into that Lake Hell to shew that all they who are now there in custody shall then be thrown into that Lake as into the Center tower-ward and Dungeon of that fearful Prison And death too to signify their immortality there in a perpetual dying life and everlasting living death even for ever and ever And death and Hell were cast into that Lake of fire For now the time of full Retribution is come this is the great day of reward and there is no other To that then let us pass with my Text from the time to the reward it self Then he shall reward c. This word of Reward seems to stick in the Jaws of many men at least to come forth fumbling between their Teeth as if they did not very well like it But whether they like it or no so the Scriptures often speak and accordingly we must be content to receive them The truth is there are extreams in this point as in most others lyable unto dispute and controversy and Verity like Virtue lies in the golden mean between both For some are wholly and totally all for reward and no Grace unless it be a stock of Grace whereby they may condignly merit the reward Others again can away with no Reward at all but will have all of meer Grace when the truth consists in a mixture compounded of both neither totally grace nor meerly reward but merces gratiosa a gracious Reward And that not only in regard of the Grace first given but of the work too it self that is to be rewarded The former take Heaven to be as fully merited by the works of the Righteous as Hell is deserved by the sins of the wicked The latter suppose Heaven to be meerly a free gift and in the consequences of their Positions make Hell as free a Collation as the Kingdom of Heaven Both seem to be equally out and not much unequally to share both truth and errour between them For thus much I conceive is clear and
not then a Carnal presence but a Spiritual that doth link and associate unto Christ. To make up our union with him it is not needful that his humane nature should be drawn down from Heaven or that his body should be every where present on Earth as the Ubiquitaries affirm or that the Bread in the Sacrament should be transubstantiate into his body as the Papists imagin His dwelling in us is by his Spirit and his union with us is spiritual So himself in the same place where he speaks of eating his flesh and drinking his blood doth interpret himself the flesh profiteth nothing the words that I speak are spirit and life And his Spirit it is not his body that shall give life unto the Spirit when the body shall perish If Christ c. This touch shall suffice for the condition I proceed to the substance of the Text. The Body is dead It contains as I said an admonition of our frailty corruption and death and comforts against death It is but the body that is dead the Spirit is life First of our corruption and frailry The body is dead That we all tend unto death we all know but the Apostle's speech is more remarkable he says not the body is subject to death but by a more significant phrase of speech he presseth it homer The body is dead There is a difference between a mortal body and a dead body Adams body before the fall was mortal in some sort that is subject to a possibility of dying but now after the fall our bodies are so mortal as they are subject to a necessity of dying yea if we'll here with the Apostle esteem of death by the beginning and seisure of it they are dead already The forerunners and harbingers of death dolours infirmities and heavy diseases have seised already on our bodies and marked them out as lodgings which shortly must be the habitation of their Master But how near this manner of speech draws unto true propriety they best conceive who best understand how that malediction of God and curse of the Law The day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt die the death was fulfilled If God spared not the Angels when they waxed proud will he spare thee who art but a putrifying worm Ille intumuit in coelo erga in sterquilinio he was puft up in Heaven and therefore was cast down from the place of his habitation and if I wax proud lying on a dunghil shall I not be cast down into Hell So often therefore as corrupt nature stirreth up the heart to pride because of youth and health beauty and strength and the like perfections of the body let this consideration humble thee that though these are fair and beauti ful flowers yet they cannot but suddenly wither because the root from whence they sprung is corrupt and rotten and even dead already Neither is it more available to the cutting down of arrogance and pride than to teach us Temperance and sobriety What availeth it to pamper that Carcase of thine with excess of delicate feeding which is possessed by death already If Men took the tenth part of that care to present their spirit holy and without blame unto the Lord which they take to make their bodies fair and beautiful in the eyes of Men they might in short time make a greater improvement in Religion and Virtue than they have done But herein is their folly they make fat the flesh with precious things which within few days the worms shall devour but never care to beautify the Soul with holy and virtuous actions which shortly is to be presented to God Let us therefore refrain from the immoderate cherishing this proud and dead flesh meats are ordained for the belly and the belly for meats but God will destroy them both 1 Cor. vi 13. I might inlarge this point almost infinitely for the benefit of this consideration is not confined unto Humility Sobriety and Temperance or any particular virtues but it 's universal restraining from all evil and inciting powerfully unto all virtue and goodness Nihil sic revocat bominem à peccato quà m frequens mortis meditatio saith St. Aug. nothing can so recall a Man from his evil ways as the frequent meditation of death especially if he consider as the certainty of death so the uncertain time of his death and the unchangeable estate of everlasting misery if he die in his sins Would to God we were wise thoroughly to apprehend and apply this unto our own Souls It is strange that there is nothing so well known nothing of greater benefit and yet nothing so little regarded What a Prodigy is it that sinful Men should carry about their death in their bosoms and in every vein of their Bodies and yet scarce admit a thought of their mortality into their minds but live here as if they verily thought they should never die If we had no Religion yet reason would teach us that our strength is not the strength of stones and yet them even the drops of water weareth nor our sinews of Brass and Iron as Job speaks and yet these the rust and canker consumeth but a vapour but a smoak which the Sun soon drieth or the wind driveth away It was wittily said of Epictetus the Philosopher who going forth one day and seeing a Woman weeping that had broken her Pitcher and the next day meeting another Woman that had lost her Son Heri vidi fragilem frangi hodie video mortalem mori Yesterday saith he I saw a brittle thing broken and to day I see a mortal Man die And what difference of frailty between these two surely none unless Man be the frailer of the two For as St. Austin hath it Take the brittlest veslel of earth or glass and keep it safe from outward violence and it may last many thousand of years but take a Man of the most pure complexion of the strongest constitution and keep him as safe as thou canst he hath that within his own bowels and bones that will bring him to his end Nay I hear some say saith the same Father that such a one hath the Plague or the Pleurisie and therefore sure he will die but we may rather say such a one liveth and therefore sure he will die for diverse have had these Diseases and did not die of them but never any Man lived that did not die The Consumption of the Liver is the messenger of Death the Consumption of the Lungs the Minister of Death the Consumption of the marrow and moisture the very Mother of Death and yet many have had these Diseases and not died of them But there is another kind of Consumption which could never yet be cured it is the Consumption of the days the common Disease of all Mankind David saw it and spake of it when he said my days are consumed like smoke Psal. cii yea the Philosopher saw it and could say of it quicquid praeteritum est temporis mors