attributes he hath he is called the Spirit of Adoption Rom. 8.15 the Spirit of Faith 2 Cor. 4.13 the Spirit of Grace of Love of Joy of Zeale for where he worketh Grace is operative our Love is without dissimulation our Joy is like the joy of heaven as true though not so great our Faith a working faith and our Zeal a coale from the Altar kindled from his fire not mad and raging but according to knowledge he makes no shadowes but substances no pictures but realities no appearances but truths a Grace that makes us highly favoured a precious and holy Faith full and unspeakable Love ready to spend it self and zeal to consume us of a true existence being from the spirit of God who alone truly is but here the spirit of Truth yet the same spirit that planteth grace and faith in our hearts that begets our Faith cilates our Love works our Joy kindles our Zeal and adopts us in Regiam familiam into the Royall Family of the first-born in Heaven but now the spirit of Truth was more proper for to tell men perplext with doubts that were ever and anon and sometimes when they should not asking questions of such a Teacher was a seal to the promise a good assurance they should be well taught that no difficulty should be too hard no knowledge too high no mystery too dark and obscure for them but Omnis veritas all truth should be brought forth and unfolded to them and have the vayle taken from it and be laid open and naked to their understanding Let us then look up upon and worship this spirit of Truth as he thus presents and tenders himself unto us as he stands in opposition to two great enemies to Truth as 1. Dissimulation 2. Flattery and then as he is true in the lessons which he teacheth that we may pray for his Advent long for his coming and so receive him when he comes And first dissemble he doth not he cannot for dissimulation is a kind of cheat or jugling by which we cast a mist before mens eyes that they cannot see us it brings in the Divel in Samuel's mantle and an enemy in the smiles and smoothness of a friend it speakes the language of the Priest at Delphos playes in ambiguities promises life As to King 〈◊〉 who a 〈…〉 slew when death is neerest and bids us beware of a chariot when it means a sword No this spirit is an enemy to this because a spirit of truth and hates these in volucra dissimulationis this folding and involvednesse these clokes and coverts these crafty conveyances of our own desires to their end under the specious shew of intending good to others and they by whom he speaks are like him and speak the truth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Cor. 3.12 in the simplicity and godly sincerity of the spirit not in craftinesse not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 handling the Word of God deceitfully 2 Cor. 4.2 Eph. 4.14 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not in the slight of men throwing a Die what cast you would have them noting their Doctrine to men and the times that is not to men and the times but to their own ends telling them of Heaven Wisdom 1.5 when their thoughts are in their purse This holy spirit of Truth flies all such deceit and removes himself far from the thoughts which are without understanding and will not acquit a dissembler of his words there is nothing of the Divels method nothing of the Die or hand no windings nor turnings in what he teacheth but verus vera dicit being a spirit of truth he speaks the truth and nothing but he truth and for our behoof and advantage that we may believe it and build upon it and by his discipline raise our selves up to that end for which he is pleased to come and be our teacher And as he cannot dissemble so in the next place flatter us he cannot the inseparable mark and character of the evill spirit qui arridet ut saeviat who smiles upon us that he may rage against us lifts us up that he may cast us down whose exaltations are foiles whose favours are deceits whose smiles and kisses are wounds for flattery is as a glasse for a fool to look upon and so become more fool than before it is the fools eccho by which he hears himself at the rebound and thinks the wiseman spoke unto him and it proceeds from the father of lies not from the spirit of truth who is the same yesterday and to day and for ever who reproves drunkennesse though in a Noah adultery though in a David want of faith though in a Peter and layes our sins in order before us his precepts are plain his law is in thunder his threatnings earnest and vehement he calls Adam from behind the bush strikes Ananias dead for his hypocrisie and for lying to the holy Spirit deprives him of his own Thy excuse to him is a libell thy pretence fouler than thy sin thy false worship of him is blasphemy and thy form of godlinesse open impiety and where he enters the heart Sin which is the greatest errour the grossest lye removes it self heaves and pants to go out knocks at our breast and runs down at our eyes and we hear it speak in sighs and grones unspeakable and what was our delight becomes our torment In a word he is a spirit of truth and neither dissembles to decieve us nor flatters that we may deceive our selves but verus vera dicit being truth it self tells us what we shall find to be most true to keep us from the dangerous by-paths of errour and misprision in which we may lose our selves and be lost for ever And this appears is visible in those lessons and precepts which he gives which are so harmonious so consonant so agreeing with themselves and so consonant and agreeable to that Image after which we were made to fit and beautifie it when it is defaced and repaire it when it is decayed that so it may become in some proportion measure like unto him that made it for this spirit doth not set up one precept against another nor one text against another doth not disanul his promises in his threats nor check his threats with his promises doth not forbid all Feare in confidence nor shake our confidence when he bids us feare doth not set up meeknesse to abate our zeale nor kindles zeale to consume our meeknesse doth not teach Christian liberty to shake off obedience to Government nor prescribes obedience to infringe and weaken our Christian liberty This spirit is a spirit of truth and never different from himself never contradicts himself but is equall in all his wayes the same in that truth which pleaseth thee and that which pincheth thee in that which thou consentest to and that which thou runnâ—st from in that which will rayse thy spirit and that which will wound thy spirit And the reason why men who
a man that will not set forward in his journey for feare of some Lion some perillous Beast some horrible hardship in the way and this is true but not ad textum nor doth it reach Saint Iohns meaning which may be gathered out of the third Chapter and 16. verse where he makes it the duty of Christians to lay down their lives for the Brethren as Christ laid down his life for them and this we shall be ready to doe if our love be perfect cast off all feare and lay downe our lives for them For true love will suffer all things and is stronger then Death but love doth not cast out the feare of Gods wrath for this doth no whit impaire our love to him but is rather the means to improve it when we doe our duty we have no reason to feare his Anger but yet we must alwayes feare him that we may goe on and persevere unto the end he will not punish us for our Obedience and so we need not feare him but if we break it off he will punish us and this thought may strengthen and establish us in it Let us therefore Feare lest a promise being left us of entring into his rest any of us should come short of it Heb. 4.1 But we may draw an answer out of the words themselves as they lie in the Text for 't is true indeed Charity casteth out all feare but not simul semel not at once but by degrees As that waxeth our feare waines as that gathers strength our feare is infeebled perfecta foras mittit when our Love is perfect it casteth it out quite If our Sanctification were as total as it is universal were our obedience like that of the Angels and could never fail we should not then need the sight of Heaven to allure us or Gods Thunder to affright us but it being onely in part though in every part the best of Christians in this state of imperfection may look up upon the Moriemini make use of a Deaths-head and make Gods Promises and Threatnings as subordinate meanes to concurre with the principall as the Butteresses to help to support the building that it do not swerve whilst the foundation of love and Faith keep it that it do not sink For a strange thing it may seem that when with great zeal we cry down that perfection of degrees and admit of none but that of parts we should be so refin'd and sublimate as not to admit of the least tincture and admission of Feare Now in the next place as Feare may consist with love so it may with Faith and with Hope it self which seems to stand in oppositition with it For first Faith apprehends all the Attributes of God and eyes his threatnings as well as his Promises and God hath establisht and fenc'd in his Precepts with them both if he had not proposed them both as objects for our Faith why doth he yet complain why doth he yet threaten And if we will observe it we shall find some Impressions of Feare not onely in the Decalogue but in our Creed Iudicare vivos mortuos to judge both the quick and the dead are words which sound with terror and yet an Article of our Belief And we must not think it concerns us to beleeve it and no more Agenda and credenda are not at such a distance but that we may learne our Practiques in our Creed His Omnipotence both comforts and affrights me his Mercy keeps me from despaire and his Justice from presumption but then his coming to judge both the quick and the dead is my sollicitude my anxiety my feare Nor must we Imagine that because the Faith which gives assent to these Truths may be meerly Historical this Article concerns the justifyed Person no more then a bare Relation or a history for the Feare of Judgement is so farre from destroying Faith in the justifyed person that it may prove a soveraigne meanes to preserve it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bas in Ps 32. as Basil speaks to order and compose our Faith which is ready enough to take an unkind heat if feare did not coole and Temper it In Prosperity David is at his non movebor Ps 30.6 I shall never be moved Before the storme came Peter was so bold as to dare and challenge all the Temptations that could assault him Etsi omnes non ego although all men deny thee yet not I and was puzled Matth. 26. and fell back at two or three words from a silly Maid To keep us from such distempers it will be good to set Gods judgements alwayes before our eyes And as Faith so Hope which is as the blood of the soule to keep it in life and cheerfulness may be over-heated our Expectation may prove unsavoury if it be not season'd with some graines of this salt and Hope like strong wine may intoxicate and stupify our sense if as with water we doe not mixe and temper it with this Fear Psal 115.11 And therefore the Prophet David makes a rare composure of them both Timentes Confidite ye that Fear the Lord trust in the Lord as if where there were no fear there were no confidence and without feare there were a strange Ataxie and disorder in the soul and our hope would breath out it self and be no more Hope but presumption Navigamus saith Saint Hierom spei velo we hoyse up the sayles of Hope now if the sayles be too full there may be as much danger in the sayle as in a Rock and not onely a Temptation but our hope may wrack us Then our Hope Sayles on in an even Course when feare as a contrary wind shortens and stayes her then inter sinus scopulos Psal 115.11 Tert. de Idol c. ult she passeth by every Rock and by every reach tuta si cauta secura si sollicita safe if wary and secure if sollicitous To recollect all and conclude Thus may Feare temper our Love that it be not too bold our faith that it be not too forward and our hope that it be not too confident make our Love Reverent our Faith discreet and our hope cautelous that so we may goe on in a strait and even course with all the Riches and substance of our Faith from Virtue to Virtue from one degree of perfection to another I made Feare but a Buttresse Tert. de cult Foem c. 2. Tertullian calls it Fundamentum the Foundation of these three Theological Virtues Faith Hope and Charity and when is the Foundation most necessary not when the Timber is squaring and the walls rising but when it is Arched and vaulted and compact by its several contignations and made into an house Then not the Raine and the wind and the floods but if the Foundation be not sure mole suâ ruit it s own weight will shake and disjoynt and throw it downe Then when we are shap't and framed and built up to be Temples of the
within him In a word to love Mercy is to be in Heaven every man according as he purposeth in his heart let him give not grudgingly or of necessity for God loveth a cheerfull giver such a mercy is Gods Almoner here on earth and he loves and blesseth it follows it with his providence and his infinite Mercy shall crown it That gift which the Love of Mercy offereth up is onely fit to be laid up in the Treasury of the Almighty And now I have set before you Mercy in its full beauty in all its glory Conclusion you have seen her spreading her raies I might shew you her building of Hospitalls visiting the sick giving eyes to the blind raising of Temples pittying the stones breathing forth Oracles making the ignorant wise the sorrowfull merry leading the wandring man into his way I might have shewed you her sealing of Pardons but we could not shew you all these are the miracles of Mercy and they are wrought by the power of Christ in us and by us but by his power the fairest spectacle in the world Let us then look upon it and love it what is mercy when you need it is it not as the opening of the heavens unto you and shall it then bea punishment and hell unto you when your afflicted brethren call for it Is it so glorious abroad and shall it be of so foul an aspect as not to be thought worthy of entertainment at home shall it be a Jewel in every Cabinet but your own hearts Behold and lift up your eyes and you shall see objects enough for your Mercy to shine on If ever one depth called upon another the depth of calamity for the depth of our compassion if ever our bowells should move and sound now now is the time I remember that Chrysologus observes that God did on purpose lay Lazarus at the rich mans Gate quasi pietatis conflatorium as a forge to melt his stony heart Lazarus had as many mouthes to speak and move him to compassion as he had ulcers and wounds and how many such forges hath God set before us how many mouthes to beseech us how many wounds wide open which speak loud for our pity how many fires to melt us shall I shew you an ulcerous Lazar They are obvious to our eye we shall have them alwaies with us saith our Saviour and we have them almost in every place Shall I shew you men Stript and wounded and left half dead that may be seen in our lives as well as in the high waies between Jericho and Jerusalem Shall I shew you the teares drilling down the cheeks of the orphans and widdows shall I call you to heare the cry of the hire kept back by fraud or violence for that cryes to you for compassion as oppression doth to God for vengeance and it is a kind of oppression to deny it them Have you no compassion all ye that passe by and every day behold such sad spectacles as these shall I shew you Christ put again to open shame whipt and scorned and crucified and that which cannot be done to him in his person laid upon his Church shall I shew you him now upon the crosse and have you no regard all you that passe by shall I shew you the Church miserably torn in pieces shall I shew you Religion I would I could shew you such a sight for scarce so much as her forme is left what can I shew or what can move us when neither our own misery nor the common misery nor sinne nor death nor hell it self will move us If we were either good Men or good Citizens or good Christians our hearts would melt and gush forth at our eyes in Rivers of water If we were truly affected with peace we should be troubled at war If we did love the City we should mourn over it if we did delight in the prosperity of Israel her affliction would wound us if Religion were our care her decay would be our sorrow for that which we love and delight in must needs leave a mournfull heart behind it when it withdraws it self But private interest makes us regardlesse of the common and we do not pity Religion because we do not pitty our own soules but drink deep of the pleasures of this world enlarge our Territories fill our barnes make haste to be rich when our soul is ready to be taken from us and nothing but a rotten mouldring wall a body of flesh which will soon fall to the ground between us and hell I may well take off your eye from these sad and wofull spectacles it had been enough but to have shewn you Mercy for she is a cloud of witnesses a cloud of Arguments for her self and if we would but look upon her as we should there need no other Orator I beseech you look into your Lease look into your Covenant that Conveyance by which blisse and immortality are made over to you and you shall find that you hold all by this you hold it from the King of Kings and your quit-rent your acknowledgement for his great Mercy is your Mercy to others pay it down or you have made a forfeiture of all if you be Mercilesse all that labour as 't is called of charity is lost your loud profession your forced gravity your burning zeal your faith also is vain and you are yet in your sinnes For what are all these without Mercy but words and names and there is no name by which we can be saved but the name of Jesus Christ and all these Devotion Confession Abstinence Zeal Severity of life are as it were the letters of his name and I am sure Mercy is one and of a faire character and if we expunge and blot it out it is not his name Why boast we of our zeal without mercy it is a consuming fire 'T is true he that is not zealous doth not love but if my love be counterfeit what a false fire is my zeal and one mark of true zeal is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Naz. or 14. if it be kept within its bounds and mercy is the best watch we can set over it to confine and keep it in The Church of Christ is not placed under the Torrid Zone that these cooler and more temperate vertues may not dwell there if you will have your zeal burn kindly Ignis zeli ardere debet oleo misericordiae Aquâ—… de Eruditione princip l. 1. c. 15 16. it must not be set on fire by any earthy matter but from Heaven where is the Mercy-seat and which is the seat of Mercy if you will be burning lamps you must poure in oleum misericordiae the oyl of mercy as Bernard speaks if this oyl faile you will rather be Beacons then Lamps to put all round about you in Arms as we have seen in Germany and other places Men and Brethren I may speak to you of the Patriarch David who is dead and buried and though we
God upon us makes us current money and that his Father may know us and not cast us off for refuse silver shewes him his face Lastly it reacheth the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the assimilation it self and layes hold on that too made like he was and debuit he ought to be so to satisfie in the same nature which had offended carnem gestare propter meam carnem to take flesh for my flesh and a soul for my soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to purge and refine me in my own to wash and cleanse the corruption of my flesh in the immense Ocean of his Divinity and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in all things to be made like unto his Brethren Debuit looks on all his Godhead on his Person on his Assimilation God no Man or Angell The second person in Trinity not the Father or the holy Spirit made like unto his Brethren his bare naked Divinity though it might have saved us yet it was not so fit and at too great a distance for us Debuit slumbers every storm answers every doubt scatters our feares removes our jealousies and builds us up in our most holy faith Though he be God though he be the wisdome of God though he be the Son of God yet debuit he ought to be made like unto us to restore his Creature to exalt his Nature and in our own shape and likeness in our own flesh to pay down the price of our Redemption So then debuit fieri here is an aptnesse and conveniency but debet he ought vox ista importat necessitatem it behoved him implyes also a kind of necessity That God could be made like mortall man is a strange Contemplation but that he would is a rise and exaltation of that but debuit that he ought superexalteth that and sets it at a higher pitch but that he must be so that necessity in a manner brings him down were not his love as infinite as his power would stagger and amaze the strongest faith who would believe such a report But he speaks it himself and it was the fire of his love that kindled in him and then he spake it with his tongue oportet he must die and if die be born not onely is but would not would but ought not ought but of necessity must be made like unto his Brethren I say a strange contemplation it is for there need no such forcible tye no such chaine of necessity to hold him libere egit what he did he did freely nothing more free and voluntary more spontaneous then this his Assimilation for as if he had slacked his pace and delay'd his Fathers expectation and not come at the appointed period of time he suddenly cryes Lo I come in the volume of thy book it is written of me that I should doe thy will oh God Psal 40.7.8 vers he calls it his desire and he had it written in his heart T is true libere fecit this condescension this his assimilation was free and voluntary with more cheerfulnesse and earnestnesse undertaken by him then 't is received now by us it is our shame and sinne that we dare not compare them that he should be so willing to be like us and we should be so unwilling to be like him but if we look back upon the precontract which past between his Father and him we shall then see a Debuit a kind of necessity laid upon him our Saviour himself speaks it to his Blessed mother 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luke 2.49 I must go about my Fathers businesse we may measure his love by the Decree that is we cannot measure it for the decree is eternall before the foundation of the world was laid was this foundation laid an everlasting foundation to lay Gold and Silver upon all the rich precious Promises of the Gospel to lay our obedience and conformity to him upon and upon them both upon his love and our obedience raise our selves up to that eternity which he hath purchased and promised to all his Brethren that are made like unto him Infinite love eternall love that which the eye of Flesh may count a dishonour was his joy his perfection his love which put a Debuit upon him a necessity and brought him after a manner under the strict and peremptory Terms of an obligation under a necessity of being borne a Necessity of obedience a Necessity of dying Debuit taketh in all and presenteth them to our Admiration our joy our love our obedience and Gratitude 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 every way and in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his Brethren The application We have now run the full compasse of the Text and we find our Saviour in every point of it similem 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 like in all things and now to apply it If Christ be like unto us then we also ought to be like unto him and ought to have our Assimilation our Nativity by the way of Analogy and by the rules of proportion answerable to his For to this end was he made like unto us you will say That he may save us nay but that he may present us to his Father by the virtue of his assimilation made like unto him for without this he cannot save us Behold here am I and the Children which thou hast given me Holy as I am holy Just as I am just Humble as I was humble A man conformable to Christ is the glory of this Feast Father I will that they whom thou hast given me and he gives him none but those who are like him may be where I am Heaven hath received him and it will receive none but those who are like him not those that name him not those who set his name to their fraud to their malice to their perjury to their Oppression not those many Antichrists whose whole life is a contradiction to him All that he requires at our hands all our Gratitude all our duty is drawn together and consists in this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be like unto him To be like unto him why who would not be like unto him who would not be drawn after his similitude Like him we all would be in his Glory in his Transfiguration on mount Tabor oh by all meanes build us here a Tabernacle but like him in the cratch like him in the wildernesse like him in his daily converse with men like him in the High priests Hall like him in the Garden like him on the Crosse here we start back and are afraid of his countenance In humility in hunger in sweat in colours of Bloud few there be that would be thus drawn But if we will be his Brethren this is the copy we must take out these be our postures these our Colours bathed in his Bloud t is true but withall bathed in the waters of Affliction bathed in our own teares and bathed in our own Bloud we meet and cope with the Devil in this our
which is set to not of men or by men but divinâ manu by the hand of God Himself which drew the first copy and pattern For this is true Religion apud Deum patrem with God and the Father and as he gave witnesse to his Son from Heaven This is my beloved Son so doth he also to Christiain Religion of which he was the Author and Finisher Haec est This is it and in this I am well pleased Pure Religion and undefiled before God c. Let us now in order view these and these two To do Good and abstain from Evil our charity to others in the one and our charity to our selves in the last in being as those Dii benefici those Tutelar Gods to the Widows and Fatherlesse and those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to keep all evil from our selves I call the effentiall parts of Religion without which it can no more subsist then a man without a soul For as the body without the spirit is dead even so faith without works is dead also Not that we exclude Faith or Prayer or Hearing of the Word for without faith religion is but an empty name and it comes by hearing and is increased by devotion Faith is a foundation upon a Foundation for as Truth is the foundation of faith Amb. in Psal 118. so is faith the Foundation of an Holy Conversation in this we edifie our selves and in this we sustain and uphold others in this we stand and in this we raise up others From faith are the issues of life from this as from a fountain flow those waters of comfort which refresh the widow and fatherlesse and that water of separation Num. 31.23 which purifies us keeps us unspotted as white as snow But our Apostle mentions none of these and I will give you some reason at least a fair conjecture why he did not And first not Faith we see here where he tells us what Pure Religion is he doth not so much as name it for indeed it is the ground of the whole draught and portrayture of Religion and as we observe it in Pictures it is in shadow not exprest out yet seen supposed by Saint James writing not to Insiders but to those who had already given up their names unto Christ And it is like those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Mathematicks which Tully calls Iuitia Mathematicorum the beginnings and principles of that science which if we grant not we can make no further progresse in that science In the sixth to the Hebrews Saint Paul calls it a principle of the Doctrine of Christ and what necessity was there for my Apostle to commend that unto them which they already embraced to direct them in that in which they were perfect to urge that which they could not deny not deny nay of which they made their boast all the day long No Saint James is for Ostende mihi he doth not once doubt of their faith but is very carnest to force it out that it may evaporate and shew it self in their works of piety Then faith is a starre 2 Tim. 1.19 and when it streams out light and the beams are the works of charity Then faith is as a ship when Pure Religion is the rudder to steer and guide it that it dash not on a rock and ship-wrack Then faith is the soul of the soul when by its quickning and enlivening power we run the wayes of Christs commandments pure creduat pure ergo loquantur faith the Father Their belief is right therefore let their conversation be sincere no other conclusion can naturally be deduced from faith and of it self it can yeeld no other and this it will yeeld if you do not in a manner destroy it and spoyle it of its power and efficacy for what an unnaturall inconsequence is this I beleeve that Christ hath taught me to be mercifull as my heavenly Father is mercifull That charity hath the promise of the world to come Therefore I will shut up my bowels this I am sure is one part of our belief if it be not our Creed is most imperfect and yet such practicall conclusions doth our avarice and luxury draw Our faith is spread about the world but our charity is as a candle under a bushell the great errour and folly of this our age which can shew us multitudes of men and women which as the Apstle speaks are ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the Truth which have con'd their Creed by heart but have little skill or forgot their skill they have in the royall Law who cry up faith as the Jews did the Temple of the Lord and are very zealous for it yet suffer it to decay and waste till it be dead as my Apostle speaks cat out the very heart of it by a carelesse and prophane conversation as the Jews with their own hands did set fire on that Temple which they so much adored And this may be a second reason why he mentions not faith in his character of Religion for having every where preacht up the power and efficacy of faith men carnally minded did so fill their thoughts with the contemplation of that fundamentall vertue that they left no roomfor other vertues not so efficacious indeed to justifie a sinner yet as necessary as faith it self did commend extol the power of faith when it had none at all in them nay which is the most fatall miscarriage of all did make it an occasion Rom. 6.6 through which sinne revived which should have destroyed in them the whole body and juncture of sin it being common to men at last to fix and fettle their minds upon that object which is most often presented to their mindes as the Countrey peasant having heard much talk of the City of Rome began at last to think there was no other City but that If we look forward to the second Chapter of this Epistle we shall think this more then a conjecture for there he seems to take away from faith its saving attribute Numquid fides potest salvmn sacere Can faith save a man What an Heretick what a Papist would he be that should but put up this question in these our dayes wherein the sola justificat hath left faith alone in the work of our salvation and yet the question may be put up and the resolve on the negative may be true It cannot save him certainly that saith he hath faith and hath not works And thus though he dispute indeed against Simon the sorcerer and others as we may gather out of Irenaeus yet in appearance he levels his discourse against Paul the Apostle for not by works but by saith faith Saint Paul not by faith but by works saith Saint James and yet both are true the one speaking to the Jews who were all for the Law the other to those who were all for faith and to them who had buried all thought of good works in the
many woes he pronounced against sinners perhaps he would not have fallen into that impious conceit of two Gods for though the dispensation have not the same aspect under the Law as under the Gospel yet God is the same God still 2 Cor. 5.11 as terrible to sinners that will not Turne as when he thundred from Mount Sinai and if we will not know and understand these Terrors of the Lord if we make not this use of them to drive us unto Christ and to root and build us up in him the Gospel it self will be to us as the Law was to the Jews a killing Letter For again as Humane Laws so Christs precepts have their force and life from reward and punishment and to this end we finde not onely scripta supplicia those woes and menaces which are written in the Gospel but God hath imprinted a fear of punishment in the very hearts of men Esse aliquos manes subterranea regna Juvenal That there remained punishments after life for sin was acknowledged by the very Heathen and we may easily be perswaded that had not this natural domestick fear come in between the World had been far more wicked then it is we see many are very inclinable to deny that there is either Heaven or Hell and would believe it because they would have it so many would be Atheists if they could but a secret whisper haunts and pursues them This may be so there is an appointed time to die and after that judgement may come There can be no danger in obedience there may be in sinne and this though it do not make them good yet it restraines them from being worse quibus incentivum impunitas timor taedium freedom from punishment makes sin pleasant and delightsome and so makes it more sinful but the fear of punishment makes it irksome brings those reluctancies nd gnawings those rebukes of Conscience for without it there could be none at all till the whip is held up there is honey on the Harlots lips and we would taste them often but that they bite like a Cockatrice 1 Pet. 5.6 non timemus peccare timemus ardere it is no sin we so much startle at but Hell fire is too hot for us And therefore Saint Peter when he would work repentance and Humility in us placeth us under Gods hand Humble your selves under the mighty hand of God which expresseth his power his commanding Attribute his Omniscience findes us out his Wisdom accuseth us his Justice condemns us potentia punit but 't is his hand his power that punisheth us Psal 78.34 Take away his hand and who feareth his Justice or regardeth his wisdome or tarrieth for the twi-light to shun his alseeing eye but cum occidat when we are told that he can kill and destroy us then if ever we return and seek God Early Again as the fear of death may be as Physick to purge and cleanse our souls from the contagion of sin so it may be an Antidote and preservative against it it may raise me when I am fallen and it may supply me with strength that I fall not again It is a hand to lift me up and it is an hand to lead me when I am risen inter vada freta through all the dangers that attend me in my way as it is an introduction to piety Tract 1. in Psalm c. 8. so is it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Gr. Nyssen a watch a guard upon me to keep me that no temptation no scandal no stone of offence make me turn back again into my evil waies For we must not think that when we are Turned from our evill wayes we have left feare behind us no she may goe along with us in the wayes of Righteousnesse and whisper us in the eare that God is the Lord most worthy to be feared she is our Companion and she leaves us not nor can we shake her off till we are brought to our Journeys end Our love such as it is may well consist with Feare Chrysost l. 1. de compunct c. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with the Feare of Judgement Look upon the blessed Saints David a man after Gods own heart yet he had saith Chrysost the memory of Gods Judgements written in his very heart his thoughts were busied with it his Meditations fixt here and it forced from him à Domine nè in furore Correct me not O Lord in thy angeer nor chastise me in thy wrath Hezekiah one of the best of the Kings of Judah yet walkt in the bitterness of his soul did mourne like a Dove Isa 38.14 and chatter like a Crane Saint Paul builds up a Tribunal and calls all men to behold it Rom. 14.10 Wee shall all stand before the Judgement seat of Christ Saint Hierom had the last Trump alwayes sounding in his eares and declaring to Posterity the strictnesse of his life his Teares his fasting his solitarinesse confesses of himself Hier. 1. Tom. ep 141. Ille ego qui ob Gehennae metum tali me carcere damnaveram Scorpiorum tantum socius ferarum I that condemned my self to so straight a prison as to have no better companions then Scorpions and wild Beasts for fear of Hell and Judgement did all this and was not ashamed to acknowledge that not so much the love unto it nor the Author of it as the dread of Hell and punishment confin'd and kept him constant in the practise of it And what should I say more for the time would faile me to tell you of other Saints of God who through feare wrought Righteousness obtained Promises out of weakness were made strong Behold love in its highest elevation in its very Zenith behold it when it was stronger then Death look upon the Glorious Army of Martyrs they had tryall of cruell mockings and scouragings yea moreover of Bonds and Imprisonment they were stoned and slaine with the sword And greater love then this hath no man saith our Saviour then this that a man lay downe his life for his friend and yet Saint Ambrose upon the 118. Psalme will tell us that this great love was upheld and kept in life by this gale of wind by Feare That the feare of one Death was swallowed up in the feare of another the feare of a temporall ion the feare of an Eternal The bloody Pagans to weaken their faith Pont. Diac. vit Cypr. urged the feare of present Death Consule tibi Noli animam tuam perdere favour your self cast not away your life Reverence your age and these they thought suggestions strong enough to shake their Constancy and Resolution but the consideration of the wrath of God and eternall separation from him did strengthen and establish them what is my breath to Eternity what is the fire of Persecution to the fury of Gods wrath what is the rack to hell sic animas posuerunt and with these Thoughts they laid down their lives and were
mother of all those mishapen births those Monsters which walk about the world we dresse and deck up and give it a fair and glorious name and call it Humility which is saith Hilary the hardest and greatest work of our faith to which it is so unlike that it is the greatest enemy it hath and every day weakens and disenables it that it doth not work by charity but leaves us Captives to the world and sin which but for this conceit it would easily vanquish and tread down under our feet We may call it Humility but it is Pride a stubborn Humilitas maximum Fidei opus Hil. in Ps. 130. and insolent standing out with God that made us upon this foul and unjust pretense that he made us so humilitas sophistica saith Pet. Blasensis the humility of Hypocrites which at once bowes and pusheth out the horn in which we disgrace and condemn our selves that we may do what we please and speak evil of our selves that we may be worse Oh wretched men that we are we groan it out and there is musick in the sound which we hear and delight in and carry along in our minde and so become wretched indeed even those miserable sinners which will ever be so And shall we call this Humility Ep. ad Colos 2.18 if it be it is as the Apostle speaks a voluntary humility but in a worse sense he is the humblest man that doth his duty for that Humility which is commended to us in Scripture lets us up to heaven this which is is so Epidemical sinks us into the lowest pit that Humility bowes us down with sorrow this binds our hands with sloth that looks upon our imperfections past this makes way for more to come that ventures and condemns it self condemns it self and ventures further this runs out of the field and dare not look upon the enemy nec mirum si vincantur qui jam victi sunt and it is no marvail they should fall and perish whom their own so low and groundlesse opinion hath already overthrown For first though I deny not a derived weaknesse and from Adam though I leave it not after Baptisme as subsistent by it self or bound to the Center of the earth with the Manichee nor washt to nothing in the Font with others yet 't is easie to deceive our selves and to think it more contagious then it is more operative more destructive then it would be if we would shake off this conceit and rowse our selves and stand up against it ignavia nostr fortis est and it may be it is our sloth and Cowardize that makes it strong for certainly there must be more force then this hath to make us so wicked as many times we are and there be more promoters of the kingdom of Darknesse in us then that which we brought with us into the world Lord what a noise hath Original sin made amongst the sons of Adam and what ill use hath been made of it When this Lion roares all the Beasts of the Forrest tremble and yet are beasts still we hear of it and are astonisht and become worse and worse and yet there are but few that exactly know what it is when we are Infants we do not know that we are so no more then the Tree doth that it grows much lesse can we discover what poyson we brought with us into the world which as it is the nature of some kinde of poyson though it have no visible operation for the present may some years after break forth from the head to the foot in swellings and sores full of corruption and not be fully purged out to our lives end Again in the opening and dawning of our reason we have scarse so much light as to see our selves by and we understand little more then the rod which we soon forget and boldly venture upon the same fault for which we felt it and should count it a virtue and our bounden duty to do it but for the smart it brings with it which yet can work in us little conscience of guilt And then in our riper age our blood runs in our veines with more heat and we are active and strong to act over them with some sense and feeling which we learnt but imperfectly in our nonage which our Nurse pratled into us which servants read to us with a licentious tongue and wanton behaviour and many times we repeat and expresse those rudiments and principles of thrift which those who are set over us do commonly first teach and we shew our selves as perfect in them as those old Gray-headed Atheists that taught them These we take up betimes Wantonnesse Revenge love of the world and being used unto them they are no burdens and if at any time they wring us we have learnt so much at Church as to cast them off upon Adam to ease our selves with the remembrance of our natural weakness though we know not what it is nor have learnt it half so perfectly as we have done those other lessons which have no evil in them as we think but that which is of ancient extraction derived from the first evil that was ever seen under the Sun But then in our old age which is a complication and collection of all sins as well as diseases how should a dim eye discover it in the midst of so many evil habits wreathed and platted one within another covetousnesse wrought in with luxury and with luxury cruelty each thwarting and yet friendly complying the one with the other can we now say that these sins were thus multiplied and raised to such a height by the power and continued force of that fatal Legacie which our first Parents left us or was this the best crown wherewith our mothers crowned us in the day of our conception can we labour and toyl can we affect and study sin can we make it our businesse our ambition to walk in our evil wayes and say that we were put in them from the beginning and forced forward by the violent hand that first put us in Indeed the old man the old sinner is glad to heare of another Old man although he never intend to Crucifie him nor well understands what it is no more then the vulgar do Anti-christ which in their fancy is a Beast and hath horns The multitude of years though Age be talkative yet many times know no more of this primitive and so much famed evil then they who were but of yesterday For even they who have been brought up in Nob in the City and University of Priests have not all agreed in their discovery of this evil but have presented it in so many shapes that it will be hard to chuse and say this is the right this this it is I am sure their opinions and more then the sins can be which Original sin doth necessarily bring into act The Ana-Baptists in the dayes of our forefathers called it Somnium Augustini Saint Austins dream
earth and he is therefore absent and in a manner lies hid that this eye might finde him out For faith is a kinde of prospective or optick Instrument by which we see things afar off as if they were neer at hand things that are not yet as if they were turns venturus est into the present tense behold Christ not onely sitting at the right hand of God but as now already descending with a shout With this eye of faith I see new Heavens and a new earth a new face of every thing I see what a nothing that is which mortals sweat and fight for what a nothing the world is for I see it on fire I see righteousnesse peace and order constancy duration even whilst I walk in this shop of vanities this World of wickednesse this Chaos and confusion this seat of change I see honesty pittied scorn'd baffled honesty lifted up on high far above reproach or injury I see injustice powerful all conquering Triumphant injustice trembling before this Lord arraigned condemned flung down into the lowest pit there to be whipt with many stripes I see now the wisdom of men made foolishnesse and the foolishnesse of God wiser then men I see that restored which I saw lost I see the eye that was bored out in its prace again I see the plowed back with no furrow on it I see Herod in prison and John Baptist with his head on I see my goods restored before I lose them and I am in heaven before the blow is given in blisse when every eye doth pitty me and what is now left for the boasting Tyrant to do what can he take from me that is worth a thought what can he strip me of but that which I have laid down and left already behinde me will he have my goods the treasurie where they are kept is out of his reach will he take from me my good name T is written in the book of life or will he take my life my life he cannot For 't is hid with Christ in God This is sancta impudentia Fidei the holy boldnesse and confidence of faith to break through flesh and blood all difficulties whatsoever to draw down Heaven to earth and if the object be invisible to make it visible if it be at distance to make it present if the Lord say he will come to faith he is come already This operation faith will have if it be not dull'd and deaded by our sensuality for what faith is that which is not accompanied with these high apprehensions and resolutions equal to them what faith is that which leaves us weary of the truth and ashamed of our profession what faith is that which we are so ready at every frown to renounce shall I call that faith which cannot strike the Timbrel out of our hands nor the strumpet out of our armes That shews Christ coming to the Covetous yet leaves him digging in the earth to the ambitious and cannot stop him in his mount to the hypocrite and cannot strike off his mask to the Polititian and cannot make him wise unto Salvation that cannot make us displease our selves that cannot make us love our selves not awe an eye not binde a hand not silence a word not stifle a thought but leaves us with as little power and activity as they who have been dead long agoe although the venturus est the Doctrine of Christs second Advent sound as loud as the Trump shall do at the last day faith shall we call this or a weak and faint perswasion or a dream or an Echo from an hollow heart which when all the World proclaimes it venturus est he will come resounds it back again into the world a faith which can speak but not walk or work a faith which may dwell in the heart of an Hypocrite a murderer a Devil for all this he may beleeve or at least professe and yet be that liar that Antichrist which denies Jesus to be the Lord or that he ever came in the flesh or will come again to judge both the quick and the dead Secondly As it casts an Aspect upon our Faith so it doth upon hope which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the blood of our Faith saith Clemens Alexand. Paedag. 1. Tertul. advers Gnostic c. 6. without which it will grow faint and pale and languish oportet habere aliquem spei cumulum saith Tertul. and therefore this addition of Hope to Faith is necessary for if we had all Faith and had not hope this Faith would profit us nothing and faith without Hope may be in Hell as well as on the earth Beleeve who does not or at least say so but how many expect his coming how many are saved Heb. 10. the Apostle speaks of a fearfull looking for of Judgement indeed they who hope not for it who doe but talke of it and are unwilling to beleeve themselves may be said to look for it because they ought to doe it and his coming is as certain as if they did Truly and properly they cannot be said to expect it for how should that he in their expectation which is not so much as in their thought Hope will not raise it selfe upon every Faith nor is that Faith which the most of the world most depend on a fitt Basis for hope to build upon even he that despaires beleeves or else he could not despair for who will droop for fear of that veniet of that judgement which he is so willing to perswade himself will never come Foolish men that we are who hath bewitched us that we should glory in Faith an Hope and make them the subjects of our Songs and rejoycing when our Faith is but such a one as is Dead and our hope at last will make us ashamed when our Faith is the same which is in hell and our Hope will leave us with the Devil and his Angels a Faith worse then Infidelity and a hope more dangerous then despair a Faith when we doe not beleeve and a Hope when there is great reason wee should despaire and which will serve onely to adde to the number of our stripes yet this is the Faith this is the hope of the Hypocrite of the Formall Christian These are thy gods oh Israel 3. And therefore in the last place that we may joyne these two together Faith and Hope we must draw in that excellent gift of Charity which is Copulatrix virtus saith Cyprian the uniting coupling Virtue not onely of men but of these two Theologicall Virtues which will not meet together but in Love or if they do with so little truth and reality that they will rather disadvantage then help us for where Virtue is not the name is but an Accusation I told you before that hope doth Suppose Faith For we cannot hope for that which we doe not beleeve yet Faith such as it may be may shew it self and speak proud words when Charity is Thrust out of Doores and many there
God to remember him in his last Chap. v. 22. he interprets himself and pardon me according to the multitude of thy mercies when the Thief on the Crosse bespeaks Christ to remember him when he came into his kingdome he then beg'd a kingdome Indeed such a benefit deserves to be had in everlasting remembrance for what is a jewell of a rich price in the hands of a foole who hath no heart to receive and keep it what were all the glory of the Starres of the Sun and the Moon which he hath ordained if there were no eye to behold them How can seed be quickned if the womb of the earth receive it not or what a pearl is the Gospel if the heart be not the Cabinet what is Christ if he be not remembred We must then and upon this occasion especially open the register of our soul and enroll Christ there in deep and living characters For the memory is a preserver of that which she receives but then it is not enough for us to behold these glorious Phantasmes and carry them about with us as pretious Antidotes unlesse we bring them ab intestino memoriae ad os cogitationis as Saint Aust speaks from the inward part of the memory to the mouth and stomack of the cogitative faculty which is our spirituall rumination August cont Faust Manich. l. 6. c. 7. our chewing of the cud unlesse we do Colloqui cum fide hold a Colloquie within us and Catechize our faith and enquire whether we remember Christ as we should whether our faith be as strong our hop eas stedfast our charity as fervent as so great love requireth whether it be such a faith and such as hope and so intensive a charity as Christ and his love thus diffused abroad might beget whether Christ be hung up in this gallery of our soule onely as a picture or whether he be a Living Christ and dwelleth in us of a truth For the memory as it is the womb to forme and fashion Christ so it may yield good blood to nourish him and in this sence Plato solus in tanta gentium sylvâ in tanto sapientum prato dearum oblitus recordatus est Tertull de anim c. 24. that of Plato may be true 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we learn and are instructed by those notions which were formerly imprinted in our Memory we do conceive and are in travell as Saint Paul speakes with Christ till he be fully formed in us we work him out in Cogitatoria in the Elaboratory of our hearts When we have him in our thoughts and his precepts alwaies before our eyes as in a book which checkes us at every turn and by a frequent Contemplation of them draw our soules out of those encumbrances which many times involve and fetter them when we recollect our mind into it self and fasten it to this rock where it may rest as upon a holy hill from whence it may look down and behold every object in its proper shape look upon an injury as a benefit persecution as a blessing and see life in the face and countenance of death then and not till then we may be said to remember him For can he remember a meek Christ who will be angry without a cause can he remember a poore Christ that makes Mammon his God can he remember the Prince of Peace who is wholly bent to war can he remember Christ who is as ready to betray him as Judas and naile him to the Crosse as Pilat Better he were quite raced out of our memory then that we should thus set him there as a mark to be shot at then to be thus set up to be scorned and reviled and spit upon and Crucified again better never to have known him then to know and put him to shame And therefore if we will remember him we must contemplate him in his own sphere in that site and aspect which he looks upon us deliberare causas expendere well weigh and consider upon what termes and conditions we did first receive him and entertain him in our thoughts and memories and this will drive Christianity home make it enter into the soule and spirit fasten and rivet Christ into us and make him a part of us that his promises and precepts and the virtue of his death and passion may be in our memory as vessels are in a well-ordered family whence upon every occasion we may readily take them out for our use find a defence against every temptation a buckler for evey dart that so the love of Christ may swallow up all reluctancy in us in victory This gives us a true taste and relish of the sweetnesse of those blessings and benefits which we receive in the Sacrament For the sweetnesse of honey saith Basil is not known so well by the Philosophers discourse as by the taste which is a better and surer judge then the most subtile Naturalists no more are the benefits of Christ and his Gospel though uttered by the Tongue of men and Angels in the words which conveigh them as in a heart melted and transformed into the Love of Christ then in the mind of man when it is the same mind which is in Christ Jesus there he is remembred indeed there he is placed not as in the High Priests Hall to be mockt and derided and blasphemed but as in his throne in his heaven where he dispenseth his light his joy his glory such glory as no Eloquence is equall to no language can expresse not Saint Paul himself who was caught up into Paradise and tasted the sweetnesse of it and then tells us no more then this that they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the words were unspeakable words words which it was not possible for a man to utter which was in effect 2 Cor. 12.4 to tell us he did feele it but could not tell us what it was and thus to taste him is to remember him And first It takes in our faith I do not meane a dead and unactive faith for that leaves us dead and buried in a land of Oblivion never looking upon Christ or his benefits nor gathering any strength or virtue from him and no more considering this our High Priest then if he had never offered himself never satisfied never been but a faith that worketh by love a faith that followes Christ through every Period and stage and passage of his blessed oeconomy a faith that is a disciple and followes him whithersoever he goes looks upon him in time of prosperity and cloths him in the dayes of affliction forgets them remembring him in injuries and forgives them in death it self and makes him our Resurrection makes us one with him that we cannot think or speak or move that we cannot live nor dye without him Now the time of receiving the Sacrament of the receiving these pledges of his love and these pignora fidei these pledges of our faith is the time of actuating of quickning
cannot endure the check and restraint of a command which it breaks under that name the two greatest evils under the Sunne we are too wise and we are too willfull Now the pride of our will is quickly seen and therefore the more curable It shewes it self in the wild irregular motions of the outward man If lifts up the hand it moves the tongue it rowles the eye it paints it self upon the very countenance either in smiles or frownes either in cheerfulnesse or terror It is visible in each motion and there be Lawes to check and curb it that it may not be so troublesome and destructive as otherwise it would be but quae latent nocent The serpent at the heele an over-weening conceit of our own knowledge of our own perfections how invisible doth it enter us how deceitfully doth it flatter us how subtilly ensnare us Benè sapimus in causa nostra we are wise in our own cause we have dig'd deep and found the truth which others do but talk of we cannot be deceived and the thought that we cannot be deceived doth deceive us most Now we are rich now we are learned now we are wise now we reigne as kings and carry all before us we controll the weak with our power the ignorant with our knowledge the poore with our wealth the simple with our wisdome and confute our selves with our own arguments and are poore because we are so rich are deceived because we are so wise can do little because we can do so much and manifest our folly unto all men because we are so wise For whither will this high conceit of our selves lift us even above our selves besides our selves against our selves for wheresoever we stand we stand a contradiction to our selves and others and are as far from what we would set up as they are who would set up something else which is nothing like it We conceive the world is shaken and out of order and we put forth our hand to beare up the pillars of it We form Common-wealths we square out one by another and know the dimensions of neither We modell Churches draw out their Government that is make a coat for the moon we make a Church and clothe it with our fancy fit it with a government as with a garment which will never be put on or if it be The next power may pluck it off and leave it naked leave it nothing or put on some other which may be worne with more honour and safety to that power which put it on This is visible and open to the eye and that eye is but weak and dull which doth not see and observe it why should then our pride and self-conceit thus walk as in shadow as in a dreame why should we thus disquiet our selves in vaine and busie our selves and trouble others to build up that to which we can contribute no more then a poore feeble wish which hath not power enough to raise it to that desired height in which we would have it seen but will leave it where it was first set up an uselesse unregarded thing in our brain and imagination Christ and his Apostles did not leave the Church naked but fitted her with a garment which she wore for many ages in which there were scarce any that did stand up and say It did not become her and if we do not now like the fashion but sit down and invent another we do but teach and prompt others to do the like and so we shall have many more and none at all be ever chusing ever changing even to the end of the world This is it which hath divided Christians which have but one name and given them so many that it will cost us labour and study but to number them This rends the Church with Schisme for men that will not be confined are ever asking how they should be governed and they are busiest to question the present form of discipline who would have none and if you observe the behaviour of the Schismatick you may behold him walk as if he had the Urim and Thummim on his breast the breast-plate of judgement ever with him for by a thought which is but a look of the mind he discovers and determines all things so dangerous is this spirituall pride both to our selves and others Nor is the high conceit of our own perfections and holinesse lesse dangerous but most fatall to our selves For that he aven which we draw out in our fancy hath no more light and joy in it then the region of darknesse onely what is wanting in reality we supply with thought but to no more purpose then that souldier who having no other pillow to lay his head on but his head-piece that he might make it more easie filled it with chaffe We think our selves to be something as the Apostle speaks Gal. 6. and we are nothing and are deceived pride is but a thought and pride is folly now we are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more regular then the rule more exact then the Law Nazian more bright then light above the command not to believe us is infidelity not to obey us is a kind of rebellion not to admire us is profanenesse not to joyne with us is schisme not to subscribe to what we say is heresie We are and we alone we are as he that lyeth on the top of the mast and we sleep and dreame out the tempest we may be Adulterers Murderers Traytors and the Favourites of God we may be men after Gods own heart and yet do what his soul hateth All our sinnes are veniall though never so great our sinnes do not hurt but rather advantage us the greatest evil that is in us will turn to our good for our faith is stedfast our hope lively and our Election sure and to this height our imagination hath raised us and from this we fall and are lost for ever And therefore it will concern us to captivate both both our understanding and our will not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not to be over-wise not to be wise in our own conceits Rom. 12.16 not to be such Gnosticks not to seem to know what we do not nay sometimes not to seem to know what we do know and this will defend us from Errour and our Brethren from offence and then to subdue our will to our reason and the rule to subject our will against our naturall desire and inclination to the will of God ad nutum ejus nutu citiùs obedire to obey every beck of his as soon as the beck is given in the twinkling of an eye without deliberation or demur In a word not to doe what thou wouldst but to obey in what thou wouldst not and which the flesh shrinks from which is the crown and perfection of Obedience put on by the hand of Humility And this is the Humility of the Soule But is this enough No Psal 40. Tertull. de Pallio Corpus aptâ sti mihi
Die O House of Israel Why will ye die we may perhaps answer we are Dead already Haeret lateri lethalis Arundo The poyson'd and Deadly Dart is in our sides Adam sinned and we die Omnes eramus in illo uno cum ille unus nos omnes perdidit we were all in the loines of that one man Adam when that one man slew us all And this we are too ready to confesse that we are Borne in sinne nay we fall so low as to damne our selves before we were born which some may doe in Humility but most are well content it should be so well pleased in their Pedegree well pleased to be brought into the world in that filth and uncleannesse which God doth hate and make the unhappinesse of their Birth an Advocate to plead for those pollutions for those wilfull and Beloved sinnes which they fall into in the remaining part of their life as being the proper and naturall Issues of that weaknesse and Impotency with which we were sent into the world which is not True in every part for that weaknesse whatsoever it is can draw no such necessity upon us Licentiam usurpare praetexto necessitatis Tert. de cul Faem nor can be wrought into an Apology for sinne or an excuse for dying for to include and wrap up all our Actuall sinne in the folds of Originall weakeness is nothing else but to cancel our own Debts and Obligations and to put all upon our first Parents score and so make Adam guilty of the sinnes of the whole world Our naturall and Originall weakness I will not now call into question since it hath had such Grandees in our Church men of great Learning and Piety for its Nursing Fathers and that for many Centuries of yeares but yet I cannot see why it should be made a Cloak to cover our other Transgressions or why we should miscarry so often with an Eye cast back upon our first fall which is made ours but in another man nor any reason though it be a plant watered by the best Hands why men should be so delighted in it why they should lie downe and repose themselves under its shadow why they should be so willing to be weak and so unwilling to heare the contrary why men should take so much paines to make the way to happiness narrower and the way to death broader then it is In a word why we should thus magnify a Temptation and disparage our selves why we should make each Importunate object as powerfull and Irresistible as God himself and our selves as Idols even nothing in this world Magna pars humanarum querelarum non injusta modo materiâ Petrarch 1.3 R. S. c. 1. sed stulta est the world is full of complaints and excuses but the complaints which the world puts forth are for the most most unjust and void of that reason which should present and commend them For when our souls are pressed down and overcharged with sin when we feel the Gripes and Gnawings of our Conscience we commonly lay hold on these remedies which are worse then the discase and suborne an unseasonable and ill applied conceit of our own natural weaknesse which was more dangerous then the temptation as an excuse and comfort of our overthrow we fall and plead we were weak and fall more then seven times a day and hold up the same plea still till we fall into that place where we shall be muzled and speechlesse not able to say a word where our complaints wil end in curses in weeping and wailing Hierenym Amando and gnashing of teeth Omnes nostris vitijs favemus quod propriâ facimus voluntate ad naturae referimus necessitatem we are all tender and favourable to our own sins and because they pleased us when we committed them we are unwilling to revile them now but wipe off as much of their filth as we can because we resolve to commit them again and those transgressions which our lusts conceived and brought forth by the Midwifry of our will we remove as far as we can and lay them at the Door of Necessity and are ready to complain of God and Nature it self Now this Complaint against nature when we have sinned is most unjust For God and nature hath imprinted in our Soules those common principles of goodnesse as that good is to be embraced and evil to be abandond That we must do to others as we would be done to those practick notions those anticipations as the Stoicks call them of the minde Natura nos ad optimam mentem genuit Quint. l. 12. Inst c. and preparations against sin and death which if we did not wilfully stifle and choke might lift up our souls far above those depressions of self love and covetousnesse and those evils which destroy us quae ratio semel in universum vincit which reason with the help of Grace overcomes at once For reason doth not onely arm and prepare us against these inrodes and incursions against these as we think so violent assaults but when we are beat to the ground checks and upbraides us for our fall Indeed to look down upon our selves and then lift up our eyes to him from whom cometh our salvation is both the duty and security of the sons of Adam and when we watch over our selves and keep our hearts with diligence when we strive with our inclination and weaknesse as well as we do with the temptation then if we fall God remembers whereof we are made considers our condition that we are but men and though we fail his mercy endureth for ever but to think of our weaknesse and then to fall and because we came infirm and diseased into the world to kill our selves to seek out death in the errour of our life to dally and play with danger to be willing to joyn with the temptation at the first shew and approach as if we were made for no other end and then to complain of weaknesse is to charge God and nature foolishly and not onely to impute our sins to Adam but to God himself and thus we bankrupt our selves and complain we were born poor we criple our selves and then complain we are lame we deliver up our selves and fal willingly under the temptation and then pretend it was a son of Anack too strong for such Grashoppers as we we delight in sin we trade in sin we were brought up in it and we continue in it and make it our companion our friend with which we most familiarly converse and then comfort our selves and cast all the fault on our temper and constitution and the corruption of our nature and we attribute our full growth in sin to that seed of sin which we should have choked which had never shot up into the blade and born such evil fruit but that we manured and watered it and were more then willing that it should grow and multiply And this though it be a great sin as being the
dead but for the living this I say is all but some have stretched this word beyond its proper and naturall signification others and that a multitude do rest under the shadow of the word content themselves in the outward action do do it and no more which indeed is not to do it For though this word to doe be not of so large a signification as the Church of Rome hath drawn it out in that they might build an Altar and offer up Christ again which they say is to remember him yet is it not so scant and narrow as ignorance and prophanenesse make it verba non sono sed sensu sapiunt saith Hilary Hilar. advers Const Aug. we must not tie our selves to the sound but lay hold on the sense of the words and this word to do though it be lesse than the little cloud in the book of the Kings nothing neer so big as a mans hand yet if it be interpreted it will spread and be as large as heaven it self and containes within its sphere and compasse all those starres those graces and virtues which will entitle us to blisse by fitting and qualifying of us to do it for indeed non fit quod non fit legitimè that is not done which is not done as it should be those duties in Scripture which are shut up in a word are of a large and diffusive interpretation when God bids us heare he bids us obey when he bids us believe he bids us love when he awakes our understanding he commands our hand when he bids us do this he bids us perfect our work for hearing is not hearing without obedience faith is dead if it work not by charity and knowledge is but a dream without practice and we do not that which we do not as we should To do this then is not barely to take the Bread and eat it this Judas himself might do this he doth that doth it to his own damnation and therefore though it be not now common Bread and common Wine but consecrated and set apart for this holy use yet we must be careful that we attribute no more unto them than Christ the author doth we must not suffer our eyes to dazle at the outward Elements nor must we rest in the outward action for this were in a manner to transubstantiate the elements and bring the body and blood of Christ into them which nothing can do but faith and repentance this were to make the very action of receiving it opus privilegiatum as Gerson speaks to give it a greater prerogative than was ever granted out of the court of heaven This were to rest in the meanes as in the end and at once to magnifie and prophane it This were to take it as our first parents did the Apple That our eyes may be opened and then to see nothing but our own shame this were to eat and to be damned But this we shall not need to insist upon for it is sufficient to point out to it as to a thing to be done and that we may doe it besides the Authority and command and love of the Author we have all those Motives and inducements which use to stir us up and incite us unto action even then when our hands are folded and we are unwilling to move As 1. the fitnesse and applyablenesse of it to our present condition 2. the profit and advantage it may bring 3. the pleasure and delight it carryes along with it 4. the necessity of it which are as so many allurements and invitations as so many winds to drive us on and make us fly to it as the Doves to their windows And 1. it fitteth and complyeth as it were with our present condition blanditur nostrae infirmitati and even flatters and comforts and rowzeth up our weaknesse and infirmity as our Saviour speaks upon another occasion This voyce this institution came for our sake we walk by faith 2 Cor. 5.7 saith the Apostle hoc est nostrae insirmitatis saith the Father and this is a signe and an Argument of humane Infirmity that we walk by faith that God can come no neerer to us nor we to him that we see him onely with that eye which when it is clearest sees him but as in a glasse darkly And therefore as God sent Adam into the world and gave him adjutorium simile sibi a help convenient and meet for him Gen. 2. so doth he place us in his Church and affords us many helps meet for us and attempered to our frailty and humaue Infirmity He speaks to our Eare and he speaks to our eye he speaks in Thunder and he speaks in a still voyce he passeth his promise and seals and confirmes it he preaches to us by his word and he preaches to us by these Ocular sermons by visible Elements by water to purge us and by Bread and Wine to strengthen us in his grace and omits nothing that is meet and convenient for us When God told the people of Israel that he would no longer goe before them himself he withall tells them he would send his Angel which should sead them and when we are not capable of a neerer approach he sends his Angels his words his Apostles his Sacraments which like those ministring spirits minister for them who are heires of Salvation and not content with the generall declaration of his mind he addes unto it certaine seals and externall signes that we may even see and handle and taste the word of life and as it was said by Laban and Jacob when they made a Covenant Gen. 31.48 this stone shall be witnesse between us so God doth say to thy soule by these outward Elements This Covenant have I made with thee and this that thou seest shall witnesse between thee and me Doe thou look upon it and bring a bleeding renewed heart with thee and then Doe this and I will look upon it as upon the Raine-bow and remember my Covenant which was made in the bloud of my Sonne I thus frame and apply my self to thee in things familiar to thy sight that thou mayst draw neerer and neerer to that light which now thy mortall eye thy frailty and infirmity cannot attaine to And shall we not meet and embrace that help which is so fitted and proportioned to us Secondly profit is a lure and calls all men after it and if you ask with the Apostle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what profit is there we may answer with him much every manner of way For what is profit but the improvement of our estate the bettering of our condition as in the increase of Jacobs Cattell the doubling of Jobs sheep as when Davids sheep-hook was changed into a Scepter here was improvement and advantage And this we find in our spirituall addresses in our reverent accesse to this Table a great improvement in some thirty in some sixty in some an hundred fold a will intended a love exalted our hope increased our
faith quickened more earnestly looking on God more compassionately on our Brethren more light in our understanding more heat in our affections more constancy in our Patience every vitious inclination weakned every vertue rooted and establisht what is but brasse it refines into Gold raiseth the man the Earthy man to the participation of a Divine nature And shall we not be covetous of that which is so profitable and advantageous Thirdly Pleasure is attractiue is eloquent and pleads for admittance who will not doe that which brings so much delight and pleasure when 't is done and here in this action of worthy receiving it is not that short transitory Meteor the flattery and titillation of the outward man but that new heaven which reason and Religion create in the mind the joy of harvest as the Prophet speaks for here we reape in joy what we sow'd in teares the joy and triumph of a Conquerour for here we tread down our enemy under our feet the joy of a prisoner set at liberty for this is our Jubilee And such a joy the bloud of Christ if it be tasted and well digested must necessarily bring forth a pure refined spirituall heavenly joy 1 Pet. 1.7 pretious bloud saith Saint Peter and not to be shed for a trifle for that joy which is no better then madnesse and the blood of an Immaculate Lamb and not to be poured forth for a stained wavering fugitive joy for a joy as full of pollution as the world and the flesh from whence it sprung bring but a true taste with thee a soule purged from those vitious humors which vitiate and corrupt it and here is not onely Bread and Wine but living bread bread that putteth gladnesse into the heart more then Corn and Wine can Psalm 4. Here is Christ here is joy here is heaven it self And shall we not do that which fills the heart with so much joy in the doing it shall we not take and eat that which is so pleasant to the taste Last of all it is not onely convenient pleasant and profitable but it is necessary to doe it for if this Sacrament could have been well spared that men might have well kept the law of the inward man without it our Lord who came to beat down all the Rites and Ceremonies of the law would not have raised up this but he knew it necessary and therefore left it upon record as binding as a law and for ought we find nay without all doubt did never recall or dispense with it Do this is plain and do it often is plain enough but do it not or do it seldome is never read but he calls and commands us to his table to feed on the body and blood of Christ and in the strength of it to walk before him and be perfect that when our souls be run to decay when good habits are weakned and the graces of God discoloured and darkned in us when our knees are enfeebled and our hands hang down when our faculties begin to shrink and be parched as with the drought of summer we may come to this fountain and fill our cisternes and recover our former strength and beauty Our fault it is and a great one to be ever enquiring what binds and what is necessary and if necessity drive us not like dull beasts we will not mend our pace and are more led by Omri's statutes by humane laws then Christs institution when if we rightly weigh it whatsoever is convenient for us whatsoever may be advantageous to us in the service of our Lord should be as powerfull with us as if it came under the imperiall forme of a Law and what is convenient and fitted to us in such a case is also necessary for us in the same condition necessary I say if a more violent necessity come not to crosse and hinder it for when nothing is wanting but a will then a necessity lyes upon us and woe unto us if we do it not So now you have them all four and to conclude this if these will not quicken and move us to come we are dead in sin and have lost our taste Will convenience move us we talk much of it here it is a duty fitted and proportioned to our present condition Will profit move us and whom doth not profit adde a wing to lo here it is in this duty the due performance of which repayes all our cost and pain with interest Will pleasure move us and whom doth not pleasure transport here is joy here is paradise here is pleasure and there is none but it Last of all will necessity move us it is said that will drive us and if the rest be but gentle gales this is as a whirlewind behold here is necessity a duty as necessary as our own wants and the authority of our High Priest and King can make it who hath not onely commanded us to do it but to do it often which now offers it self to our consideration As often as you do it implyes a doing it often 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 includes a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and doth not leave it at large to our will and pleasure as an arbitrary thing to be taken up when our discretion shall appoint the time I will not be so bold as to prescribe how often nor is it necessary to be determined every mans want and necessity in this should be a law unto him and as oft as he finds his soule to droop and faint here he is to refresh it as oft as he feels the inward man to decay here to repair it as oft as he sees the temple of the holy Ghost to gather dust and filth here to sweep and purge it when his faith begins to faile here to confirm and strengthen it If we come like rude and unmannerly guests once is too often but if we purge and cleanse our hearts if our stomacks be clean if we come prepared for the feast often we may come but we cannot come too often Sic vive saith Saint Ambrose ut quotidiè mereare accipere Si quotidianus est cibus cur post annum sumis Amb. l. 6. de Sacram. c. 4. Cypr. ep 54. 69. so passe every day of thy life that thou mayst be fit to do it every day I will not urge nor bind you to the practice of the first Christians who received every day because in time of persecution as children appointed to dye they lookt upon every day as their last although Saint Cyprian will tell us they did it also in times of peace and Saint Austin calls it Quotidianum ministerium Dominici corporis Augustin ep 180. a dayly office and ministery The truth is the Sacrament is fit for every day but we are not every day fit for it and in this different variety of circumstances of time and the dispositions and qualifications of men every man must be his own judge and law-giver and yet the royall law binds him to