Selected quad for the lemma: heart_n
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A30126
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Infirmity inducing to conformity, or, A scourge for impudent usurpers, and a cordiall for impotent Christians preached not long since in St. Peter's the Poore ... and in St. Pancras Church-yard when it could not be admitted into the church, July 8, 1649 / by Peter Bales ...
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Bales, Peter, 1547-1610?
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1650
(1650)
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Wing B549; ESTC R3551
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29,358
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39
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noble stock Yea they are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Of the blood-Royall in a spirituall sense For God is their Father Christ their elder Brother the Holy Ghost their Comforter the Church their Mother Heaven their inheritance and Regeneration their Evidence yet are they Offenders in many things and this they doe in humility and sincerity of heart acknowledge In many things saith Saint James We doe offend I an Apostle and you Professors even we who are called justified sanctified and redeemed by the pretious blood of Jesus Christ That the deare Children of God both Ministers and People have been are and shall be Offenders in many things even to the world's end not onely my Text but other places of holy Scripture doe sufficiently declare Was not Noah a man beloved of the Lord and a Preacher of righteousnesse yet was he not inebriated with his owne wine Vino captus qui diluvium fugerat saith Saint Ambrose He was freed from a deluge of water and drowned in a deluge of wine Gen. 9.21 Had not Lot his Epithete of Just Just Lot 1 Pet. 2.7 8. And was not he vexed at the uncleanly conversation of the wicked And did not he see the Sodomites burnt with fire for their lusts yet did not he doe wickedly and being delivered burne with incest Joseph sinned in swearing By the life of Phardoh Gen 42.15 Aaron sinned in making the golden Calfe for the Israelites to worship Exod. 32.21 And he and Miriam sinned in murmuring against Moses Numb 12.7 8. The Prophet Jonah transgressed in flying from Joppe to Tharsus and in justifying his unjust anger for the Gourd Moses though the Servant of the Lord and the meekest Man upon the earth offended in unbelief and anger Numb 20.12 16.15 The Prophet David was a man according to God's owne heart 1 Sam. 13.14 and in the state of regeneration yet his heart was uncleane Psal 51.10 and he fell into the sinne of adultery hypocrisie murther and ambition 2 Sam. 11. 24. Salomon the wisest Man upon the earth committed folly Job the patientest yet not altogether to be excused of impatience nor Elias of passion nor the Sonnes of Zebedee of ambition nor Peter and Barnabas of dissimulation Gal. 2. No nor the blessed Virgin her self of vain-glory Saint Peter was couragious yet pusilanimous Confident yet Diffident so faithfull that Christ built his Church upon his Faith yet denied and that with execration his Lord and gracious Redeemer nay all Christ's Disciples though at one time they forsook all to follow him yet at another time they all forsooke him and fled But why should I thus discover my Father's nakednesse rather indeed would I goe backward and cover the same with the mantle of my pity Yet let us not be too lavish in pitying them For God hath caused their infirmities to be recorded First to let us understand that both they and we have one and the same God who was alwaies offended with sinne were the Persons that wrought it never so great or glorious Secondly to let us know that both they and we have one and the same Physician to cure us of all our maladies viz the immaculate Lamb Christ Jesus who saveth his People from their sinnes Mat. 1.21 Thirdly and lastly to teach us circumspection and cautelousnesse to flie from sinne as from a Scrpent and to say to it as Pharach said to Moses See that thou see my face no more or as Abraham to Lot If thou go on the right hand I will goe on the left or if thou go on the left hand I will go on the right For if the deare Children of God who have gone before us both in time and in the graces of the Spirit beare such reproach by reason their corruptions are registred what shall we sustaine who live in a brighter Age and upon whom the ends of the world are come But alas so base is our nature that sinne will be a Jebusite it will be a constant guest to our house though it sitteth not in the chiefest room it is bred in the bone and it will not out of the flesh untill Joseph's bones be carried out of Aegypt i. e. untill we be out of this world As Israel could not passe to Canaan but through the Desart of Zin so we must not look to passe to our spirituall Canaan but through the wildernesse of sinne Sinnes are like Rebels that not onely revolt but also keep castle against their Soveraigne from whence they are not easily removed Aristotle tells us of three things that doe acquire wisdome viz Nature Learning and Exercise Sure I am not these but God's free grace can make us avoid sinne Philosophers are of opinion that if the inferiour spheres were not governed and stayed by the highest the swiftnesse of their motion would quickly fire the world So I may very well hold that if the affections of God's dearest Children were not moderated by the guidance of his holy Spirit they would run so farre into sinne as to precipitate their soules into the black gulfe of eternall destruction for our reason is no better than treason and our affections are no better than infections We cannot truely say of our selves as Isidore too boldly of himselfe For fourty yeares space saith he I found not in my selfe any sinne no not so much as in thought anger or any inordinate desire or as Alexander de Hales of Bonaventure His life was so upright saith he that Adam seemed not to have sinned in him No no my Brethren look upon a Christian at the best whilst he liveth in this world and you may well compare him unto the Arke of the Covanant which was but a cubit and half high an imperfect measure by this you may know his stature adde what you will it will be but a cubit and an half Perfectly imperfect was he when he began imperfectly perfect when he ends in all his actions Therefore as we doe offend in many things let us in humility and sincerity of heart acknowledge and confesse the same as Saint James in my Text In many things we doe offend This hath been the constant practise of God's beloved ones What is man saith Eliphaz that he should be cleane and he that is borne of woman that he should be just Behold God found no stedfastnesse in his Saints yea the heavens are not cleane in his sight Job 15.14 15. Therefore Job acknowledgeth his failings Job 7.20 and when he came to plead with God for his uprightnesse did abhorre himselfe and repented in dust and ashes Job 42.6 Nehemiah maketh a large confession of his own and the Peoples sinnes Nehem. 9.5 6 7. So Ezra and Daniel in the behalf of the People confesse that justice belongeth to God but shame and confusion to themselves Ezra 9.5 6 7. Dan. 9.6 7. Salomon hath his Booke of Acknowledgment viz Ecclesiastes David confesseth his folly in numbering the People saying I have sinned exceedingly in that I have done therefore now
meeknesse Are we therefore in any adversity distresse or calamity either in respect of health wealth friends freedome good-name nay life it selfe Let us I beseech you say with the holy Church Mic. 7.9 I will beare the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against him Nay seeing affliction brings us home to God let us come home unto yea into our selves and possesse our foules with patience which as Tertullian speakes is animarum anima the soule of soules for as we possesse our bodies by our soules so we possesse our soules by patience Yea Beloved as we all offend in many things set us all be obedient in this one thing viz To runne with patience the race that is set before us looking towards Jesus the Author and Finisher of our faith For In many things we offend all But is this the height of our terrene perfection and the summity of our earthly glory to have our coate of Or and our conversation Sable to be graced with the Title of Saints and to be disgraced with the Tract of Malefactours to be all endowed with integrity and yet all to be brim-full of infirmity Oh then Qualis imitatio nostra How should our imitation be qualified Greg Naz in his panegyricall Oration in the behalfe of Saint Basit saith that his Parishioners so dearly and truly affected and so wonderfully admired him for his virtues as every one's care and vigilancy was unanimously to imitate whatsoever was in him And Diodorus Siculus lib. 5. declares that the Ethiopians would imitate their Princes even in their naturall defects and mutilations Would God my fellow-subjects of England that cry up Christianity so highly indeed none can doe more would imitate the virtues or rather excellent graces of their unparallelled gracious Soveraigne Yet know that Humanum est errare and In many things we offend all Let us not therefore draw the infirmities and deformities of others in lively colours and pourtray their comely feature in dead Let not others evill actions become a copy for us to write after but as Saint Austin doth counsell us saying Si quid boni à nobis est imitandum si quid mali à nobis est fugiendum If we see any good in other men let us imitate them in that if any evill let us shun and avoyd them in that Agreeable hereunto is that counsell of Saint Paul 1 Cor. 11.1 Be ye Followers of me saith he as I am of Christ i. e. So farre forth as I follow Christ so farre forth doe ye follow me and no further for I have my frailties and imperfections and the best of us that are Ministers are but men and subject to the like passions with you If a man should finde a piece of gold covered over with dirt will he possesse himselfe of the dirt and throw away the gold A Scholler that hath a copy set him which is well penned but somewhat defaced with certaine blots in imitating the copy will he imitate the blots As therefore the Pilot lookes to the Northerne Starre to bring him to his wished Part so let our eies be set upon the good actions of our brethren for our imitation to bring us to the Haven of eternall happinesse For In many things we offend all Againe Are all in this sad predicamentall relation Vbi Timor Tremor Where is our Feare and Dread It is proper to God saith Aristotle to doe what he will to man to doe what he can But now the World is turned copsy-turvy God doth what he can and man what he will Every man will be a law of liberty unto himselfe and that which should be unto him for his wealth he makes an occasion of falling yea of violent rushing into sinne as the Horse into the battle Most men will sweare nay shall their oathes drop out of their mouthes like Joab's sword out of his sheath Rather they will send them forth like a flock of birds hundreds together because Joseph swore by the life of Pharaoh They will wallow in the stinking puddle of drunkennesse and sensuality because Noah was overtaken with his owne Wine They will robbe and plunder and levell the estates of their brethren because the Israelites though by an especiall warrant from God for their good service robb'd the Ethnick Egyptians They will account uncleannesse to be but a veniall sinne because David committed adultery They say not we doe but we will offend like unto Cesar's jacta est alea fall backe fall edge we will persist in our sinnes Or like Catiline who when he had fired the City of Rome with his conspiracies had no more grace then to say Incendium meum ruinâ extinguam I will quench the fire I have kindled with a finall ruine I will adde worse to evill thirst to drunkennesse and leave the successe of my wicked and ungracious actions to the extreamest adventures Is not this a witting wilfull and presumptuous offending Surely this not a stumbling and a falling into sin for Praeventio dici non potest saith Saint Jerome cùm quid praemeditatò fit That man cannot be said to be prevented who doth any thing upon serious premeditation And shall we sinne that grace may abound God forbid If we goe into sinne as Sisera into Jacl's Tent it will smite us to the earth If we allow our selves any one sinne as taking encouragement from the infirmities of the Saints God will blot us out of the Booke of life If we suffer our sinnes to come one on the neck of another like the Messengers of Job our punishments must needs follow like the plagues of Egypt If we thinke to please God in pleasing our perverse nature the anger of the Lord will smoke in fury against us therefore Let therefore the fallings of the Saints be our rising their sinnes our motives to amendment of life and their transgressions make us more watchfull over our waies more suspicious of our weaknesse and more forward to flee to God for his assistance in the way to Heaven If this be done to the green tree what to the dry If to the best what to the bad If God suffers his deare Children to fall into sinne let us looke narrowly to our selves and walke cautelously and circumspectly in all our waies and as much as lyeth in us shun all occasions of evill yea let us worke out our salvation with feare and trembling and pray to our gracious God with the heart and words of David Psal 19. Keepe thy Servant from presumptuous sinnes lest they get the dominion over men so shall I be undefiled and innocent from the great offence For In many things we offend all Moreover are we all found guilty before God's Tribunall of justice Vbi fiducia nostra where is our faith and confidence Why doe not we flie to his seat of mercy when we doe approach that with true faith and repentance we shall assuredly obtaine the free pardon and forgivenesse of all our sinnes Our teares of contrition by