persevers John 8.32 If ye continue in my word then are ye my Disciples 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 indeed and in truth For howsoever that which is false and (t) Nemo personam diu sustinere potest cito in raturam suam recidu â—â— quibus veritas non subest Seneca counterfeit alters and changes at every turn yet Truth is uniform and like it self or rather like unto him whose name is I am Exod. 3.14 I am the Lord and change not Mal. 3.6 And may fitly apply and take up the Motto of that Renowned Queen Semper eadem as being one and the same for ever Secondly The name of Christian as a diminutive in respect of Christ The name of Christian as a diminutive in respect of Christ shewes a disparity shewes a disparitiy betwixt Christ and Christians For though therebe a conformitie and resemblance yet is it not a similitude of equality but of proportion and that joyned with an infinite disparity and disproportion in three respects 1. A threesold disparity betwixt Christ and Christians A Disparity of Nature 2. A Disparity of Power 3. A Disparity of Grace First There is a disparity of nature Christ is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God and man in one Person A disparity of nature But as for the highest and best of Christians he is but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a meer bare man The Popes Parasites indeed hold him forth unto the world as a Petty God a mortal or rather an immortal God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And whereas Christ is God manifested in the flesh God and Man making up the same Hypostasy the Pope is (u) Nec Deus nec homo Papa Gratian. neither God nor Man in the Canon Law and so a professed Antichrist in his nature Secondly There is a disparity of power betwixt Christ and Christians A disparity of power All power is given unto me in Heaven and Earth Matth. 28.18 there is no mortal man may assume the like without blasphemous arrogance and presumption And yet he who hath the name of Blasphemy written in his forehead and exalts himself not onely above all that is called God but above God himself He it is who wears a three-fold crown and challenges a three-fold power unto himself in Heaven Earth and Purgatory where Christ hath no Authority Thirdly there is a disparity of Grace betwixt Christ and Christians Disparity of grace Christ was full of Grace 1 John 1.14 Christians are full too but with a vast and wide difference the fulnesse of Christ is Plenitudo Fontis the fulness of a Fountain that is both Repletive and filling of his own person and is known by the name of Plentifulness And diffusive and communicative of it self to us and passes under the name of bountifulness Of whose fulness we all receive grace for grace Joh. 1.16 The fulness of a Christian is Plenitudo vasis The fulness of a scant and narrow vessel Christ had the spirit dealt out unto him Not by measure Joh. 3.34 A Christian likewise hath it dealt out unto him but it is only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A measure of Faith Rom. 12.3 In all which there is an infinite disparity and disproportion betwixt Christ and Christians insomuch as John the Baptist who had not a greater born of women was very shie and jealous of usurping his name who will not give his glory unto another And he confessed and denied not but confessed I am not the Christ Joh. 1.20 And doubtless the Jesuites have a great deal to answer for their grand Sacriledge and robbery in this respect who not content with the common name of Christians stile themselves Jesuites from Jesus by way of eminency and perfection as if they meant to make him but dimidiatum Mediatorem a half Mediator and themselves coparceners and parcel Saviours in the work of our redemption but they who love the Lord Jesus in sincerity must take heed and beware of the Jesuites Qui cum Jesu itis non itis cum Jesuitis The second general part of the Text concerns the manner of our conversion and that by way of perswasion so Agrippa bespeaks Saint Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thou perswadest The second part of the Text. There are two strong Forts and Holds in mans nature The manner of our conversion Perswades Two strong holds in mans nature and those reared and raised up in the prime powers and faculties 1. In the mind and understanding 2. In the will and affections First in the mind there are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imaginations and thoughts In the mind and understanding and these are cast down by the conviction of the judgement Secondly in the will there are corrupt lusts and sinful habits In the Will and Affections and God casts down and casts out these by the perswasion of the heart God perswades men to become Christians he doth not necessitate and compel them whether they will or no. No man can come unto me unless the Father draw him Joh. 6.44 And yet this atraction to Christ is not by force and violence as a Bear is drawn to the stake but as a sheep is drawn to a green bough allured by delight and pleasure This is a kind of drawing Trahit sna quemque voluptas Those whom Christ draws he draws (x) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysostom Si Poetae dicere licuit trahit sua quemque voluptas non necessitas sed voluptas non obligatio sed delectatio quanto fortius nos dicere debemus trahi hominem ad Christum Ramum viridem ostendis ovi trahis illam Nuces puero demonstrantur trahitur quod currit trahitur Amando trahitur sine laesione corporis trahitur cordis vinculo trahitur August Tract 26. in Evang. secund Johan willingly with cords of a man and bonds of love Hos 11.4 Christ breaks not into the heart by a spiritual Burglary but he opens the doors of the heart as he did the doors of the house where his Disciples were assembled after his Resurrection He comes into the heart as he did to the house 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Joh. 20.19 Which being shut before he caused them to flie open He speaks to these doors of the heart in a powerful and effectual manner Lift up your heads O ye gates and be ye lift up ye everlasting doors and the King of glory shall come in Psal 24.7 The conversion of a sinner is not only facilitated but effected by perswasion of the heart God perswades Japhet to dwell in the Tents of Shem Gen. 9.27 God allures his Church and speaks comfortably to her Hos 2.14 He beseeches men in the mouth of his Ministers 2 Cor. 5.20 This is most connatural unto the will which is far more easily led then drawn Apud Reges etiam quae pro sunt ita tamen ut delectent suadend a sunt Seneca And it is verified of it what the Heathen man hath
gape and thrust out their Tongues against profession and purity it self And because all is not gold that glisters they from hence take occasion to reject and condemn the most orient and shining colour of the purest gold Needs must it be as a racking pain and torture yea as the torments of Hell to God's faithful Servants The word signifies no less and so it proved unto just Lot 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Pet. 2 8 He racked and tortured and tormented his righteous soul in Sodome as if he had been in Hell it self in seeing and hearing their unlawful deeds And where shall we find a Lot either without his Sodome or without racking the joynts of his soul with inward grief and sorrow To hear the blasphemy of the common multitude in every street which makes their ears to tingle who by their cursed oaths in each Fair and Market crucifie the Lord of life the second time open his wounds cause his blood to stream forth a fresh yea rend and tear asunder his sacred Body Like unto a company of Blood-hounds or Hellhounds rather having seized upon a poor Hare which they soon dispatch and pull one joynt from another That the lascivious and lustful livers should defile the Temples of the Holy Spirit and make the members of Christ the members of an Harlot That the voluptuous and sensual Glutton the swinish Drunkard should ordinarily abuse the good creatures of God to riot and excesse making their bodies no other then (n) Cribra ciborum potuum Senec. Colanders and strainers for meats and drinks meer graves to bury both the creatures and themselves alive and even dig their Graves with their Teeth And who is there among the people of God that doth seriously consider and lay to heart their calamity that they are even constrained not onely to breath in the same open air but to abide in the same Church with such men or beasts rather and renews not this sad and mournful complaint of David Woe is me that I remain in Meshech and have my habitation in the Tents of Kedar How should this inflame the hearts of the faithful with an uncessant and unsatisfied desire of removing out of this world of exchanging the company of wicked and ungodly for the Spirits of just and perfect men the Society of Saints and Angels How should this provoke and excite them to a vehement and earnest longing of being Members in the Church Triumphant and of sharing in the accomplishment of that promise Cant 4.8 Come with me from Lebanon my spouse even with me from Lebanon and look from the Top of Amana from the Top of Shenir and Hermon from the Dens of the Lyons and from the mountains of the Leopards A threefold promise that Christ passes unto his Church 1. Of Delivery 2. Of Victory 3. Of Safety 1. A promise of delivery out of the world Lebanon which is a part of it being put for the whole 2. A promise of victory whereby the Church shall be exalted upon the Tops of the highest Hills and shall triumphantly look upon her vanquisht enemies that shall be trodden under feet 3. A promise of safety from Lyons and Leopards cruel and blood-thirsty men and from dissembling and coloured Hypocrites that have as many contrary forms and guises as a Leopards skin hath spots Saint Austin reports of his mother Monica that having discoursed and reasoned together of the joys of Heaven she being ravished with the consideration of them sent forth this ejaculation as a Harbinger to Heaven before her (o) August Conf. lib. 9. cap. 10. Fili quantum ad me attinet nuliâ jam re delector in hac vitâ Quid hic faciam adhuc cur hîc sim nescio I am delighted with nothing of this life And what do I and why am I here Hieron Epist And Saint Hierom relates of the Monks in Egypt that when they heard any mention of the Kingdom of Christ and of the glory of the life to come they all stole a secret sigh and lifting up their eyes to Heaven repeated the words of the Psalmist Psal 55.6 Quis dabit mihi pennas sicut columbae O that I had the wings of a Dove then would I flee away and be at rest And why should not the meditation of this worlds misery in regard of the association of the godly with the wicked beget in us the same desire that the apprehension of the glory of Heaven wrought in them why should it not move us to flie to Heaven not with the wings of a Dove but with our ardent wishes and devout affections which are the wings of the Soul Why should we not long after the end of the world when Christ will gather out of his Kingdome all things that offend and them that doe iniquity When he will pluck up these Tares by the roots which till then must of necessity grow together And this is the fourth point that falls in course 4. The Temporal prosperity and felicity of good and bad They both grow alike The Fourth Proposition The things of this life are neither morally good nor evil but of an indifferent and middle nature and indifferently dispensed to all sorts of men Vt nec mala turpiter evitentur That neither the crosses thereof should be abhorred as sins wherein thebest of God's Servants have their greatest share and portion Nec bona cupâ—dius appetantur Nor the comforts thereof too too eagerly desired and coveted whereof the most profane wicked are proprietaries and possessors Sometimes God pours forth with a liberal hand and heaps those external blessings in an abundant incasure upon the heads of the righteous as he did upon (p) Constantinum Imperatorem tantis teirenis implevit muneribus quanta optare nullus auderet August de Civ Dei lib. 5. c. 25. Constantine the great so that it is the height of boldness and presumption for any man to pray for the like It is the expression of St. Austin And yet for the most part the men of the world who have their portion in this life as the Psalmist describes them surpass and outstrip the godly in this respect The Tares stand boult-upright with an high and a lofty Top when as the good corn hangs down the head and is bowed to the ground I have seen the wicked strong and spreading himself like a green Bay Tree It is David's observation Psal 37.35 Tanquam arbor indigena virens as Junius renders it out of the original As a Tree that grows out of the soyl of the earth of its own accord whereof the earth is the natural mother and so more indulgent in affording it plenty of juyce and moisture Then unto those whereof she is an hard or unkind stepmother and planted by the hand of another This resemblance we find in nature and we need not seek far for the like in the course of the world even as in the structure of a house the chimney is designed to
nimirum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 qui salutem dedit He saves who gives life to the Dead Secondly Salvation is a Dignity and high Priviledge in the several degrees and steps of it 1. In the inchoation and beginning 2. In the consummation and perfection First Salvation is a dignity and high priviledge in the inchoation and beginning of it A dignity and high priviledge The foundation whereof is laid in this world but the roof set up in another Who hath saved and called us with an holy calling 2 Tim. 1 9. Salvation and calling go hand in hand In the inchoation and beginning and effectual vocation is the first fruits the earnest the Livery and seizin of our salvation This day is salvation come to thy house saith Christ to Zachous Luke 19.9 That man who is not saved in this life by receiving Christ into his heart as Zacheus into his house shall never be saved in another by being received into those eternal habitations Secondly In the consummation perfection Salvation is a dignity and high priviledge in the consummation and perfection An aggregation of all good a confluence and affluence of all comforts and contentments The making us free Denizons of the new Hierusalem the possessors of the highest Heavens the linking us in society with Saints and Angels the beatifical vision of God and divine transformation into the image of his glory Salvation is one of Saint Paul's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Cor. 12.4 It is all we can conceive and utter and all we cannot conceive and utter coelum non patitur hyperbolem the highest hyperbole cannot reach the highest Heaven We can never speak enough or too much of it As therefore Gregory Nyssen treating on the Preface in the Lords Prayer Our Father which art in Heaven wisht himself wings wherewith to mount and fly a pitch proportionable to the height of the Argument So were there need of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 winged words in preaching of salvation to soar a loft according to the sublimity of the matter And as Hierom reports of the Monks in Egypt that when they heard any mention of the Kingdom of Heaven and of the glory of the world to come they all stole a secret sigh and lifting up their eyes to Heaven repeated the words of the Psalmist Psal 55.6 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Naz. Orat. 17. Quis dabit mihi pennas sicut columbe Oh that I had the wings of a Dove then would I fly and be at rest Even so the devour meditation of that great salvation presented and held forth in the Text should work as vehement a desire in us to flye unto Heaven not with the wings of a Dove but with the most ardent affections and extatical raptures which are the wings of the soul that so we may have a full fruition and enjoyment of it Thus have you heard the specification and appropriation of the object and what it is We must work out our own salvation But least I should seem to leave so mysterious and sublime a point so excellent and so necessary a Truth like unto Ezekiels dry bones without life and breath Give me leave to prophesie to these dry bones and breath upon them once more with the spirit of Application And to collect and gather from hence a threefold Corollary and Conclusion 1. By way of supposition 2. A threefold Corollary or conclusion By way of inference 3. By way of exhortation First seeing it is salvation that is here recommended by the Apostle First by way of supposition as the reward of our obedience And salvation is an immunity and freedom from the state of sin and misery We may from hence observe That all men by nature are at a loss and in a destitute and desperate condition For as the Apostle reasons the case 2 Cor. 5 14. We thus judge that if Christ died for all then were all dead Had not we been dead in trespasse and sins there had been no outward cause or motive reason in the object That the Captain of our Salvation and Lord of Life should purchase our life with the price of his own death had not we been the lost Sheep and the lost Groat in the Parable there had been no need for Christ to go after that which is lost and to seek diligently till he find it This was the end of his coming into the world as himself professes Luke 19.10 The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost Salvation necessarily presupposes and implies a loss on our part sins guilt and a just obligation to wrath to come And as we are lost in our selves so must we find our selves to be such in our own apprehension We must be deeply sensible and throughly convinced of our woe and wretchedness we must hunger and thirst after Christ's righteousness and even look and long for his salvation Being ready to sink into the bottomless gulf of dispair each one in his own person must cry out with Saint Peter Matth. 14.31 Lord save me Being tempested upon the Sea of God's fierce wrath and the ship of our souls well neer covered and overwhelmed with the stormy waves of his indignation we must go unto Christ awake him with the importunity of our prayers and say in the language of Christ's Disciples Matth. c. 8. v. 25. Lord save us we perish Secondly If it be a Christians task and charge to work out his salvation A second Corrollary by way of inference Then may we from hence deduct and infer That it is lawful to doe good out of hope of reward as an incentive of desire and duty and a spur unto diligence An Argument that God propounds and holds forth in the School of Christianity Even as prudent Schoolmasters are wont to train up and draw on their younger Scholars with fair and gentle promises Pueris dant crustula blandi Doctores elementa velint ut discere prima Horat. Serm. lib. 1. Satyr 1. * Licet omnium consensu in operibus temporalibus spectare temporalem finem ut pharmacum sumerigratia sanitate arare serere spe fructus percipiendi currere vel decertare in stadio causa chrinendae victoriae Cur igitur non liceat in opere spirituali in cursu certamine ab ipso Deo proposito ad pramium supernae vocationis attendere Bellarm. de Justit lib. 5. cap. 8. It is not only lawful but laudable and in some sort necessary to have respect and reference to the fruition of our own happinesse as the guerdon of our labours even as he that runs in a race hath his eye full fixed on the Garland and the most generous souldier in the hottest shock the most fierce and fiery encounter hath his thoughts prepossessed and swallowed up in the hope of victory For salvation being the End of our operation as Saint Peter speaks of it 1 Pet. 1.9 Receiving the end of your faith the