Disciples stood compassed in that bright Cloud exspecting some miraculous event of so Heavenly a Vision when suddenly they might hear a voice sounding out of that Cloud saying This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased hear him They need not be told whose that voice was the place the matter evinced it No Angel in Heaven could or durst have said so How gladly doth Peter afterwards recount it For he received from God the Father honour and glory when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory This is my beloved Son c. It was onely the eare that was here taught not the eye As of Horeb so of Sinai so of Tabor might God say Ye saw no shape nor image in that day that the Lord spake unto you He that knows our proneness to idolatry avoids those occasions which we might take to abuse our own fansies Twice hath God spoken these words to his own Son from Heaven once in his Baptisme and now again in his Transfiguration Here not without some oppositive comparison not Moses not Elias but This. Moses and Elias were Servants this a Son Moses and Elias were sons but of grace and choice this is that Son the Son by nature Other sons are beloved as of favour and free election this is The Beloved as in the unitie of his essence Others are so beloved that he is pleased with themselves this so beloved that in and for him he is pleased with mankinde As the relation betwixt the Father and the Son is infinite so is the Love We measure the intention of Love by the extention the love that rests in the person affected alone is but streight true Love descends like Aaron's Ointment from the head to the skirts to children friends allyes O incomprehensible large love of God the Father to the Son that for his sake he is pleased with the World O perfect and happy complacence Out of Christ there is nothing but enmity betwixt God and the Soul in him there can be nothing but peace When the beams are met in one center they do not only heat but burn Our weak love is diffused to many God hath some the world more and therein wives children friends but this infinite love of God hath all the beams of it united in one onely Object the Son of his Love Neither doth he love any thing but in the participation of his Love in the derivation from it O God let me be found in Christ and how canst thou but be pleased with me This one voice proclaimes Christ at once the Son of God the Reconciler of the world the Doctor and Law-giver of his Church As the Son of God he is essentially interessed in his Love as he is the Reconciler of the world in whom God is well pleased he doth most justly challenge our love and adherence as he is the Doctor and Law-giver he doth justly challenge our audience our obedience Even so Lord teach us to hear and obey thee as our Teacher to love thee and believe in thee as our Reconciler and as the eternal Son of thy Father to adore thee The light caused wonder in the Disciples but the voice astonishment They are all falne down upon their faces Who can blame a mortal man to be thus affected with the voice of his Maker Yet this word was but plausible and hortatory O God how shall flesh and blood be other then swallowed up with the horror of thy dreadful sentence of death The Lion shall roar who shall not be afraid How shall those that have slighted the sweet voice of thine invitations call to the rocks to hide them from the terror of thy Judgments The God of mercies pities our infirmities I do not hear our Saviour say Ye lay sleeping one while upon the earth now ye lye astonished Ye could neither wake to see nor stand to hear now lye still and tremble But he graciously touches and comforts them Arise fear not That voice which shall once raise them up out of the earth might well raise them up from it That hand which by the least touch restored sight lims life might well restore the spirits of the dismaied O Saviour let that soveraign hand of thine touch us when we lye in the trances of our griefs in the bed of our securities in the grave of our sins and we shall arise They looking up saw no man save Jesus alone and that doubtless in his wonted form All was now gone Moses Elias the Cloud the Voice the Glory Tabor it self cannot be long blessed with that Divine light and those shining guests Heaven will not allow to earth any long continuance of Glory Only above is constant happiness to be look'd for and injoyed where we shall ever see our Saviour in his unchangeable brightness where the light shall never be either clouded or varied Moses and Elias are gone only Christ is left The glory of the Law and the Prophets was but temporary yea momentany that onely Christ may remain to us intire and conspicuous They came but to give testimony to Christ when that is done they are vanished Neither could these raised Disciples finde any miss of Moses and Elias when they had Christ still with them Had Jesus been gone and left either Moses or Elias or both in the Mount with his Disciples that presence though glorious could not have comforted them Now that they are gone and he is left they cannot be capable of discomfort O Saviour it matters not who is away whiles thou art with us Thou art God all-sufficient what can we want when we want not thee Thy presence shall make Tabor it self an Heaven yea Hell it self cannot make us miserable with the fruition of thee The Woman taken in Adultery WHat a busie life was this of Christs He spent the night in the mount of Olives the day in the Temple whereas the night is for a retired repose the day for company His retiredness was for prayer his companiableness was for preaching All night he watches in the Mount all the morning he preaches in the Temple It was not for pleasure that he was here upon earth his whole time was penal and toilsome How do we resemble him if his life were all pain and labour ours all pastime He found no such fair success the day before The multitude was divided in their opinion of him messengers were sent and suborned to apprehend him yet he returns to the Temple It is for the sluggard or the coward to plead a Lion in the way upon the calling of God we must overlook and contemn all the spight and opposition of men Even after an ill harvest we must sow and after denials we must woe for God This Sun of Righteousness prevents that other and shines early with wholesome doctrines upon the Soules of his hearers The Auditory is both thronged and attentive Yet not all with the same intentions If the people came to learn the Scribes and
forsaking Here thou wouldst knowingly delay whether for the greatning of the Miracle or for the strengthning of thy Disciples Faith Hadst thou gone sooner and prevented the death who had known whether strength of Nature and not thy miraculous power had done it Hadst thou overtaken his death by this quickning visitation who had known whether this had been only some â—ualm or extasy and not a perfect dissolution Now this large gap of time makes thy work both certain and glorious And what a clear proof was this beforehand to thy Disciples that thou wert able to accomplish thine own Resurrection on the third day who wert able to raise up Lazarus on the fourth The more difficult the work should be the more need it had of an omnipotent confirmation He that was Lord of our times and his own can now when he found it seasonable say Let us goe into Judaea again Why left he it before was it not upon the heady violence of his enemies Lo the stones of the Jews drove him thence the love of Lazarus and the care of his Divine glory drew him back thither We may we must be wise as serpents for our own preservation we must be careless of danger when God cals us to the hazard It is far from God's purpose to give us leave so farre to respect our selves as that we should neglect him Let Judaea be all snares all crosses O Saviour when thou callest us we must put our lives into our hands and follow thee thither This journey thou hast purposed and contrived but what needest thou to acquaint thy Disciples with thine intent Where didst thou ever besides here make them of counsel with thy voyages Neither didst thou say How think you if I goe but Let us goe Was it for that thou who knewest thine own strength knewest also their weakness Thou wert resolute they were timorous they were sensible enough of their late peril and fearful of more there was need to fore-arm them with an exspectation of the worst and preparation for it Surprisal with evils may indanger the best constancy The heart is apt to fail when it findes it self intrapped in a suddain mischief The Disciples were dearly affected to Lazarus they had learned to love where their Master loved yet now when our Saviour speaks of returning to that region of peril they pull him by the sleeve and put him in minde of the violence offered unto him Master the Jews of late sought to stone thee and goest thou thither again No less then thrice in the fore going Chapter did the Jews lift up their hands to murder him by a cruel lapidation Whence was this rage and bloody attempt of theirs Onely for that he taught them the truth concerning his Divine nature and gave himself the just style of the Son of God How subject carnal hearts are to be impatient of Heavenly verityes Nothing can so much fret that malignant spirit which rules in those breasts as that Christ should have his own If we be persecuted for his Truth we do but suffer with him with whom we shall once reign However the Disciples pleaded for their Masters safety yet they aimed at their own they well knew their danger was inwrapped in his It is but a cleanly colour that they put upon their own fear This is held but a weak and base Passion each one would be glad to put off the opinion of it from himself and to set the best face upon his own impotency Thus white-livered men that shrink and shift from the Cross will not want fair pretences to evade it One pleads the peril of many dependants another the disfurnishing the Church of succeeding abettors each will have some plausible excuse for his sound skin What errour did not our Saviour rectifie in his followers Even that fear which they would have dissembled is graciously dispelled by the just consideration of a sure and inevitable Providence Are there not twelve hours in the day which are duely set and proceed regularly for the direction of all the motions and actions of men So in this course of mine which I must run on earth there is a set and determined time wherein I must work and doe my Fathers will The Sun that guides these houres is the determinate counsel of my Father and his calling to the execution of my charge whiles I follow that I cannot miscarry no more then a man can miss his known way at high noon this while in vain are either your disswasions or the attempts of enemies they cannot hurt ye cannot divert me The journey then holds to Judaea his attendants shall be made acquainted with the occasion He that had formerly denied the deadliness of Lazarus his sickness would not suddenly confess his death neither yet would he altogether conceal it so will he therefore confess it as that he will shadow it out in a borrowed expression Lazarus our friend sleepeth What a sweet title is here both of death and of Lazarus Death is a sleep Lazarus is our friend Lo he saies not my friend but ours to draw them first into a gracious familiarity and communion of friendship with himself for what doth this import but Ye are my friends and Lazarus is both my friend and yours Our friend Oh meek and merciful Saviour that disdainest not to stoop so low as that whiles thou thoughtest it no robbery to be equall unto God thou thoughtest it no disparagement to match thy self with weak and wretched men Our friend Lazarus There is a kinde of parity in Friendship There may be Love where is the most inequality but friendship supposes pairs yet the Son of God saies of the sons of men Our friend Lazarus Oh what an high and happy condition is this for mortal men to aspire unto that the God of Heaven should not be ashamed to own them for friends Neither saith he now abruptly Lazarus our friend is dead but Lazarus our friend sleepeth O Saviour none can know the estate of life or death so well as thou that art the Lord of both It is enough that thou tellest us death is no other then sleep that which was wont to pass for the cozen of death is now it self All this while we have mistaken the case of our dissolution we took it for an enemy it proves a friend there is pleasure in that wherein we supposed horror Who is affraid after the weary toiles of the day to take his rest by night or what is more refreshing to the spent traveller then a sweet sleep It is our infidelity our impreparation that makes death any other then advantage Even so Lord when thou seest I have toiled enough let me sleep in peace and when thou seest I have slept enough awake me as thou didst thy Lazarus But I goe to awake him Thou saidst not Let us goe to awake him those whom thou wilt allow companions of thy way thou wilt not allow partners of thy work they may be witnesses they cannot
be actors None can awake Lazarus out of this sleep but he that made Lazarus Every mouse or gnat can raise us up from that other sleep none but an Omnipotent power from this This sleep is not without a dissolution Who can command the Soul to come down and meet the body or command the body to piece with it self and rise up to the Soul but the God that created both It is our comfort and assurance O Lord against the terrors of death and tenacity of the grave that our Resurrection depends upon none but thine Omnipotence Who can blame the Disciples if they were loath to return to Judaea Their last entertainment was such as might justly dishearten them Were this as literally taken all the reason of our Saviours purpose of so perilous a voyage they argued not amiss If he sleep he shall doe well Sleep in sickness is a good sign of Recovery For extremity of pain barres our rest when Nature therefore finds so much respiration she justly hopes for better terms Yet it doth not alwaies follow If he sleep he shall doe well How many have dyed in Lethargies how many have lost in sleep what they would not have forgone waking Adam slept and lost his rib Sampson slept and lost 〈◊〉 strength Saul slept and lost his weapon Ishbosheth and Holofeâ—â—â— slept and lost their heads In ordinary course it holds well here they mistook and erred The misconstruction of the words of Christ led them into an unseasonable and erroneous suggestion Nothing can be more dangerous then to take the speeches of Christ according to the sound of the Letter one errour will be sure to draw on more and if the first be never so slight the last may be important Wherefore are words but to express meanings why do we speak but to be understood Since then our Saviour saw himself not rightly construed he delivers himself planly Lazarus is dead Such is thy manner O thou eternal Word of thy Father in all thy sacred expressions Thine own mouth is thy best commentary what thou hast more obscurely said in one passage thou interpretest more clearly in another Thou art the Sun which givest us that light whereby we see thy self But how modestly dost thou discover thy Deity to thy Disciples not upon the first mention of Lazarus his death instantly professing thy Power and will of his resuscitation but contenting thy self only to intimate thy Omniscience in that thou couldst in that absence and distance know and report his departure they shall gather the rest and cannot chuse but think We serve a Master that knows all things and he that knows all things can doe all things The absence of our Saviour from the death-bed of Lazarus was not casual but voluntary yea he is not only willing with it but glad of it I am glad for your sakes that I was not there How contrary may the affections of Christ and ours be and yet be both good The two worthy Sisters were much grieved at our Saviours absence as doubting it might savour of some neglect Christ was glad of it for the advantage of his Disciples Faith I cannot blame them that they were thus sorry I cannot but bless him that he was thus glad The gain of their Faith in so Divine a Miracle was more then could be countervailed by their momentany sorrow God and we are not alike affected with the same events He laughs where we mourn he is angry where we are pleased The difference of the affections arises from the difference of the Objects which Christ and they apprehend in the same occurrence Why are the Sisters sorrowful because upon Christ absence Lazarus died Why was Jesus glad he was not there for the benefit which he saw would accrew to their Faith There is much variety of prospect in every act according to the several intentions and issues thereof yea even in the very same eyes The father sees his son combating in a Duel for his Country he sees blows and wounds on the one side he sees renown and victory on the other he grieves at the wounds he rejoyces in the Honour Thus doth God in all our Afflictions he sees our teares and hears our groans and pities us but withall he looks upon our Patience our Faith our Crown and is glad that we are afflicted O God why should not we conform our diet unto thine When we ly in pain and extremity we cannot but droop under it but do we finde our selves increased in true Mortification in Patience in Hope in a constant relyance on thy Mercies Why are we not more joyed in this then dejected with the other since the least grain of the increase of Grace is more worth then can be equalled with whole pounds of bodily vexation O strange consequence Lazarus is dead nevertheless Let us goe unto him Must they not needs think What should we doe with a dead man What should separate if death cannot Even those whom we loved dearliest we avoid once dead now we lay them aside under the board and thence send them out of our houses to their grave Neither hath Death more horrour in it then noisomeness and if we could intreat our eyes to endure the horrid aspect of Death in the face we loved yet can we perswade our sent to like that smell 〈◊〉 arises up from their corruption Oh love stronger then Death Behold here a friend whom the very Grave cannot sever Even those that write the longest and most passionate dates of their amity subscribe but your friend till death and if the ordinary strain of humane friendship will stretch yet a little further it is but to the brim of the grave thither a friend may follow us and see us bestowed in this house of our Age but there he leaves us to our worms and dust But for thee O Saviour the grave-stone the earth the coffin are no bounders of thy dear respects even after death and burial and corruption thou art graciously affected to those thou lovest Besides the Soul whereof thou saiest not Let us goe to it but Let it come to us there is still a gracious regard to that dust which was and shall be a part of an undoubted member of that mystical body whereof thou art the Head Heaven and earth yields no such friend but thy self O make me ever ambitious of this Love of thine and ever unquiet till I feel my self possessed of thee In the mouth of a mere man this word had been incongruous Lazarus is dead yet let us goe to him in thine O almighty Saviour it was not more loving then seasonable since I may justly say of thee thou hast more to doe with the dead then with the living for both they are infinitely more and have more inward communion with thee and thou with them Death cannot hinder either our passage to thee or thy return to us I joy to think the time is coming when thou shalt come to every of our graves
and seek to my window in the hardest Frost There is no triall of Friendship but Adversity He that is not ashamed of my bonds not daunted with my checks not aliened with my disgrace is a Friend for me One dram of that mans Love is worth a world of false and inconstant formality XXXIV Upon the sight of a Flie burning it self in the Candle WIse Solomon sayes the Light is a pleasant thing and so certainly it is but there is no true outward Light which proceeds not from Fire The light of that fire then is not more pleasing then the fire of that light is dangerous and that pleasure doth not more draw on our sight then that danger forbids our approach How foolish is this Flie that in a love and admiration of this light will know no distance but puts it self heedlesly into that flame wherein it perishes How many bouts it fetcht every one nearer then other ere it made this last venture and now that mercilesse fire taking no notice of the affection of an over-fond Client hath suddenly consumed it Thus doe those bold busie Spirits who will needs draw too near unto that inaccessible light and look into things too wonderfull for them So long do they hover about the secret Counsels of the Almighty till the wings of their presumptuous conceits be scorched and their daring Curiosity hath paid them with everlasting destruction O Lord let me be blessed with the knowledge of what thou hast revealed let me content my self to adore thy Divine Wisdome in what thou hast not revealed so let me enjoy thy Light that I may avoid thy Fire XXXV Upon the â—ight of a Lark flying up HOw nimbly doth that little Lark mount up singing towards Heaven in a right line whereas the Hawk which is stronger of body swifter of wing towres up by many graduall compasses to his highest pitch That bulk of body and length of wing hinders a direct ascent and requires the help both of aire and scope to advance his flight whiles that small bird cuts the aire without resistance and needs no outward furtherance of her motion It is no otherwise with the Souls of men in flying up to their Heaven some are hindred by those powers which would seem helps to their soaring up thither great Wit deep Judgement quick Apprehension send men about with no small labour for the recovery of their own incumbrance whiles the good affections of plain and simple souls raise them up immediatly to the fruition of God Why should we be proud of that which may slacken our way to Glory why should we be disheartned with the small measure of that the very want whereof may as the heart may be affected facilitate our way to Happiness XXXVI Upon the singing of the Birds in a Spring morning HOw chearfully do these little Birds chirp and sing out of the naturall joy they conceive at the approach of the Sun and entrance of the Spring as if their life had departed and returned with those glorious and comfortable beams No otherwise is the penitent and faithfull Soul affected to the true Sun of Righteousnesse the Father of lights When he hides his face it is troubled and silently mourns away that sad Winter of Affliction when he returns in his presence is the fulnesse of joy no Song is chearfull enough to welcome him O thou who art the God of all consolation make my heart sensible of the sweet comforts of thy gracious presence and let my mouth ever shew forth thy praise XXXVII Upon a Coal covered with Ashes NOthing appears in this heap but dead Ashes here is neither light nor smoak nor heat and yet when I stir up these embers to the bottome there are found some living gleeds which do but contain fire and are apt to propagate it Many a Christians breast is like this hearth no life of Grace appears there for the time either to his owne sense or to the apprehension of others whiles the season of Temptation lasteth all seems cold and dead yet still at the worst there is a secret coal from the Altar of Heaven rak'd up in their bosome which upon the gracious motions of the Almighty doth both bewray some remainders of that Divine fire and is easily raised to a perfect flame Nothing is more dangerous then to judge by appearances Why should I deject my self or censure others for the utter extinction of that Spirit which doth but hide it self in the Soul for a glorious advantage XXXVIII Upon the sight of a Blackmore LOE there is a man whose hue shews him to be far from home his very skin bewrays his Climate it is night in his face whiles it is day in ours What a difference there is in men both in their fashion and colour and yet all Children of one Father Neither is there lesse variety in their insides their Dispositions Judgements Opinions differ as much as their Shapes and Complexions That which is Beauty to one is Deformity to another We should be look'd upon in this mans Country with no lesse wonder and strange coynesse then he is here our Whitenesse would passe there for an unpleasing indigestion of form Outward Beauty is more in the eye of the beholder then in the face that is seen in every Colour that is fair which pleaseth The very Spouse of Christ can say I am black but comely This is our colour Spiritually yet the eye of our gracious God and Saviour can see that Beauty in us wherewith he is delighted The true Moses marries a Black-more Christ his Church It is not for us to regard the skin but the Soul If that be innocent pure holy the blots of an out-side cannot set us off from the love of him who hath said Behold thou art fair my Sister my Spouse if that be foul and black it is not in the power of an Angelicall brightnesse of our hide to make us other then a loathsome eye-sore to the Almighty O God make my inside lovely to thee I know that beauty will hold whiles weather casualty age disease may deforme the outer man and marre both colour and feature XXXIX Upon the small Stars in the Galaxie or milkie Circle in the Firmament WHat a clear lightsomnesse there is in yonder Circle of the Heaven above the rest What can we suppose the reason of it but that the light of many smaller Stars is united there and causes that constant brightness And yet those small Stars are not discerned whiles the splendor which ariseth from them is so notably remarkable In this lower Heaven of ours many a man is made conspicuous by his good qualities and deserts but I most admire the Humility and Grace of those whose Vertues and Merits are usefully visible whiles their Persons are obscure It is secretly glorious for a man to shine unseen Doubtlesse it is the height that makes those Stars so small and invisible were they lower they would be seen more There is no true