Rome is well acquainted with and therefore she breaks down the bounds pulls down the limits hides the lines dammeth up the Kings high-way She pulls out thy eyes and there she leads thee in a way indeed but not of Truth in a by-path in a way leading out of the way The way of Truth it cannot be For veritas nihil erubescit nisi solummodò abscondi Truth blusheth at nothing but to be hid But I must walk their way and not know whether it be a way or no. Though I doubt yet I must not dare to question it but must still walk on and put it to the adventure If Idolatry and Superstition and blind Obedience will saint a man then I am sure to be a Saint in heaven That Church reacheth forth unto thee a cup and sayes it is of the water of life when indeed it is but poison She hath an open breast and a motherly affection she shews thee a milky way but which neither Christ nor his Apostles ever trod in No tracking of them but by bloud She shews thee an easie way a sensual way made passable by Indulgences and Pardons and private Masses and Supererogation only thou must walk in it without offense to the Church of Rome Thus like those Physicians Sidonius speaks of officiosè occidit she will kill thee with good words like some kind of Serpents she will sting thee and thou shalt dance when thou art stung she will flatter thee to thy destruction and thou shalt perish as it were in a dream Beloved what shall we do then We will pray to God with Paul to guide our journey with David to make our way upright We will say as Israel said to Sihon King of the Amorites We will neither turn aside into the fields nor into the vinyards Numb 21. 22. neither drink of the waters of the wells We will neither walk in those specious pleasing wayes nor taste of the Wine which that Harlot hath mingled nor draw water out of those Wells which they have digged unto themselves but we will go in the Kings high-way even in that way wherein the Apostles the Prophets the blessed Martyrs the holy Saints all our Forefathers by the light of Scripture have gone before us The second Rule of our Christian Imitation is That we strive to imitate the best Stultissimum est non optimum quemque proponere saith Pliny It is great folly not to propose alwaies the best patern And Elige Catonem saith Seneca Chuse a Cato a prime eminent man by whose autority thy secret thoughts may be more holy the very memory of whom may compose thy manners whom not only to see but to think of will be a help to the reformation of thy life Dost thou live with any in whom the good gifts and graces of God are shining and resplendent who are strict and exact and so retein the precepts of God in memory that they forget them not in their works Then as St. James saith Take the Prophets for example so I say Take these for an ensample lodge them in the closet of thy heart confer with their virtuous actions and study them And if at any time the Devil and the World put thee upon those actions which might make thee to forget thy copy then take it into thy hands and look it over again and as St. Cyprian would often call for Tertullians works with a Da magistrum Give me my master so do thou Da praeceptores Give me the instructing examples of these good men let them alwaies be before my eyes let them be a second rule by which I may correct my life and manners Let me not loose this help which God hath granted me of Imitation But Beloved here beware we must that we mistake not the Goats for the Sheep the left hand for the right that we weigh not Goodness by the number of Professors For it is the Devils policie to make us think that the most are the best and so he shuts us out of the little flock and thrusts us into the folds of Goats and thus we deceive our selves Plerique ducimur non ad rationem sed ad similitudinem We are not guided by Reason but let her slip and so are carried away as it were in a throng non quà eundum sed quà itur not indeed whither we should go but whither the many-headed multitude lead us Therefore thou must take this as a Rule Multitudo argumentum mali No surer argument that men are evil then that they are many The City of the Lord is not so peopled as the City of the World which the Devil hath erected neither is Heaven so full as Hell nor are there so many Saints as there are Devils not so many chosen as there are past-by not somany good examples as there be bad ones We undervalue true professors we make their Paucitie a blemish whereas our Saviour tells us his flock is little a lily amongst the thorns and when God commands us Exod. 23. as in this so in all actions not to follow a multitude in evil And this in our Christian Imitation we must observe in respect of our selves We must be careful too in respect of others And since God hath made Imitation such a help to our Salvation we must strive to be guides and lights unto our weaker brethren not an ignis fatuus or lambens a fat and foggy meteor to lead them out of the way but stellae micantes bright and glistering stars to lead them to Christ And this in the first place concerneth the Ministers and Messengers of God It is St. Paul's charge to Timothy even before the holy Angels that he should keep himself unblamable before all men Valentinian's to his Bishops that they should vitâ verbo gubernare govern the Church both with their life and with their doctrine and as Nazianzene spake of Basil they should have thunder in their words and lightning in their deeds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 speaking and doing Not like Lucian's Apothecary who sold Medicines for the Cough when he and all his houshold were infected with it nor like those Physicians Nazianzene speaketh of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 laying their hands to cure the wounds of others whilst themselves were full of sores But striving to come forth glorious and wholsome examples that they humble not those with their life whom they have raised up with their doctrine Considering that sin doth not only shew but teach it self And what a heavy doom will reach them if they beat down those with a bad whom they should raise up and set a walking with a good example But Beloved I here mistake my Auditory and speak to this Congregation as if I were amongst an assembly of Levites And yet I know too and I need not fear to speak it that it is an argument of a wicked and profane heart of a sensual love of the world that no doctrine now-adayes is more acceptable then that by
ever with the Lord in his everlasting Habitations I have done with the first Point the Possibility of the Doctrine That we must arm our selves with courage and resolution against common calamities I proceed now to the second That it is an argument of great folly not to do so What is Folly but a mistake of things a mistake of their nature and of their end Not only a privative ignorance which may be in children and simple men but as the Hebrew Doctors call it a possessive ignorance possessing us with false opinions of things making us run counter to that light which Wisdome holdeth forth placing pleasure upon that which bringeth no delight and horror upon that which rightly considered hath no terror at all transforming a Devil into an Angel of light and turning Light it self into Darkness making the signs of Gods favor arguments of his wrath calling Afflictions and Calamities which are the instructions of a Father the blows of an Enemy and if Calamities be whips making them Scorpions An unwise man saith the Psalmist knoweth it not and a fool doth not consider it He doth not consider either the nature of these signs or the end for which they are sent but is led by likeness and opinion The natural man perceiveth not the things of Gods spirit but they 1 Cor. 2. 14. are foolishness unto him as the words of fools which signifie nothing And therefore he puts what sense and meaning he please upon them an interpreter the worst of a thousand And so he finds not evils but makes them makes them the mothers of his sorrow which might be the helpers of his joy When Reason and Religion are thrust out of the chair the Passions full soon take their room and dictate heavy things Then either Fear shakes us or Hope makes us mad either Grief pulls us down or Joy transports us One is afraid where no fear is as the Psalmist speaks another is struck dead at the sight of a statue and to some even Joy it self hath been as fatal as a thunderbolt All is from Opinion the mistress of fools which makes the shaking of a leaf as terrible as an earth-quake makes Poverty more sad the Plague more infectious Famine and the Sword more killing then they are It is not the tooth of Envy it is my Phansie bows me It is not the reproach of an Enemy hurts me It was but a word and Opinion hath turned it into a stone It is not an army of Sorrows it is my own Phansie overthrows me What St. Ambrose speaks of Poverty is true of all those evils which are so terrible to flesh and bloud Non naturae paupertas sed opinionis vis est Poverty as men call it is but a phansie there is no such thing indeed It is but a figment an Idole Men first framed it and set it up and trembled before it As some Naturalists tell us that the Rainbow is oculi opus a thing framed only by the eye because there are no such colours on the cloud as we see so this difference of Rich and Poor of Honorable and Dishonorable of Wars and Peace of Sorrow and Joy is but a creature of the Eye Did we not think the Souldier tremble we had disarmed him Did we not think Calamities grievous we might rejoyce in them Did not our Folly make these Signs terrible we might then look up and lift up our heads We read of Smyndenides the Sybanite that he was so extreamly dainty that he would grow weary at the sight of another mans labour and therefore when he sometimes saw a man labouring and painfully digging he began to faint and pant and desired to be removed Quà m inclementer fodicat saith he What a cruel and merciless digger is this So it is with us Our delicate and tender education our familiarity with the vanities of this world have betrayed our Reason to our Sensual parts so that we startle at every unusual object tremble at every apparition make War and Famine and Persecution more terrible then they are sink under those signs and warnings from heaven at which we should look up and lift up our heads This our way uttereth our foolishness as the Psalmist speaks For is it not a great folly to create evils to multiply evils to discolour that which was sent for our good and make it evil to make that which speaketh peace and comfort unto us a messenger of Death Let us now consider the Lets and Impedimens or the Reasons why our hearts fail us at such sights as these I shall at this time only remove a pretended one having formerly at large upon another Text Matth. 24. 25. spoken of Self-love and Want of Faith which are real and true hindrances of Christian Courage The main pretense we make for our pusillanimity and cowardise is our natural Weakness which we derived from our first parents and brought with us into the world For thus we lay every burden upon our fore-fathers shoulders and Adam is arraigned every day as guilty of every defect of every sin which is committed in the world HOMOSUM I am a man the child of Adam born under wrath is the common apology of the men of this world when they fall into those sins which by watching over themselves they might and which in duty they are bound to avoid As we fell in Adam so Adam falls in us falls under fears and sorrows and calamities unto the end of the world And if we observe it this is so common a plea and so stoutly and resolvedly stood to as if men did rather boast of it then bemoan it and did rather make use of it as a comfort after sin then fear it as a burden pressing and inclining to it For the best excuse they have the best plea they make is that they are the children of Adam I deny not that we drew this Weakness from our first parents I leave it not after Baptisme as subsistent by it self but bound to the center of the earth with the Manichee nor washt to nothing in the Font with Pelagius But yet and it will be worth your observation I take it to be a matter of difficulty to judge of what strength it is I fear we make it stronger then it is and I am sure a Christian is bound by that religion which he professes to encounter and tame and crucifie it For take us in our infancy not altered à puris naturalibus from that which we were made and then we do not understand our selves much less the Weakness of our nature And then take us in our years of discretion before we can come to discover it Custome and Education if good hath much abated if evil hath much improved the force of it and our Sloth or Cowardise hath made it strong A strange thing it is to see little children in their tender years prompt and witty to villany as if they had gone to School to it in their mothers womb and this
continue in Sin because Grace aboundeth Peace is as the Sun which with its beams quickneth and Rom. 6. 1. refresheth and enlightneth all Things But we may play the wantons in this Sun and turn the Peace of God into wantonness and this first and free overture of Peace may make us dull and heavy and careless in entertaining it God's Alpha may be our Omega his first may be our last his early morning blessings his day-spring from on high may not win a good look from us not be thought of till our declining dayes till our Sun be ready to set And this will be to look upon Gods offer of Peace ex adverso situ on the wrong side Rather let us run and meet and kiss Peace woo and embrace and marry it at the first displaying of its beauty Let God's first and our first his offer and our acceptance meet in the same moment of time For why should it being the first thing that God doeth be the last thing that we Think of Let us remember that Mercy rejoyceth and triumpheth over Judgment but only in this life when Peace is offered As Mercy hath her day of Triumph here so Justice will have her day too when that Peace which we now refuse will fight against us To day if you will hear his voice to day you may hear it But if that day be once shut up God will speak no more When Jacob awaked out of that pleasant sleep in which he had seen a ladder reaching unto Heaven and Angels ascending and descending on it he cries Gen. 25. 17. out How terrible is this place On which place a Father tells us that he did stupere propter magnam misericordiam Dei that he was amaz'd and affraid at that great mercy of God which was shewn unto him And indeed Gods overtures of Mercy and Peace have their terror as well as his Judgments there is mercy and Peace with God that he may be feared In this life of ours Psal 130. 4. which is but as a dream in respect of that beatifical vision we shall have of God hereafter we see a Ladder as it were reaching up to Heaven and all Gods blessings and promises as so many Angels ascending and descending upon it And God is in the midst of them for we may find Heaven in these Et quà m terribìlis How terrible is this place Here is Templum Spiritûs the Temple of the Holy Ghost for by these he instructs us Here is Ara Misericordiae an altar of Mercy And what doth God require at our hands but to offer up ourselves a living sacrifice holy and acceptable unto him even upon this altar of his Mercy When he speaks to say thy servant heareth to follow Peace at the first sight of it to rise at the first call We may indeed fly from Gods Justice to his Mercy But if we fly from his Mercy if we reject Peace what asylum what sanctuary can we find It is Peace Fly not from it It is offered first Make speed haste and stay not stay not with any fading vanity from that Peace which makes way for Glory and Honour and everlasting Peace The Seventeenth SERMON PART II. Luk. X. 5 6. And into whatsoever House ye enter first say Peace be to this House And if the Son of peace be there your Peace shall rest upon it if not it shall turn to you again THE Salutation hath already sounded in your ears Peace be to this House even all manner of Peace but especially the Peace of the Gospel the Peace of the Prince of Peace that Peace which passeth all understanding This the Disciples of Christ here do breath forth in every place to bring along with them to every House And this is to be done 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the first place it being the method of our Saviour first to offer terms of Peace not to question us before he invites us not to war against us till we have renounced peace not to strike us as enemies till we cast him from us and will not be his Friends This have we dilated upon at large Now this Peace is a great benefit This Salutation is worth our best welcome and acceptation Peace be unto this House is that which in a manner builds the house it is the foundation of the foundation that which makes it compact and at unity with it self Yet that befalls this Peace which doth all other benefits of God Like to the Sum and Rain it shines and falls both upon good and bad sometimes upon unthankful persons who when God speaks of Peace are bent to war and somettmes upon those who sing prayses to the God of Peace for evermore Sometimes it falls upon a Son of Peace whose heart is fitted and prepared who listneth and harkens after it and there it rests and multiplies and brings forth the fruits of Peace in all righteousness and holiness The Text sayth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it shall rest upon him as upon its proper place Sometimes it falls upon a stubborn and perverse heart a heart hardned against Peace and then it seems to fall away and be lost because it finds no entertainment nor rest there But yet though it fall here it is not lost For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it shall turn back again to those who sent it And this is the high prerogative of this Peace it will either rest or return This is the crown and rejoycing of all those who bring glad tidings of Peace their PAX DO MUI HUIC their Salutation can not be lost It is but first saying Peace be to this House And if the Son of Peace be there your Peace shall rest upon it if not it shall turn to you again In these words are discovered to the Disciples First two sorts of men they should meet with in the discharge of their duty some that were sons of peace others that were not Secondly the nature or property of the Saluation On the one sort it will rest from the other it will return And that the Publishers may not think it lost it will return to them again For we may consider 1 a Prediction that their Salutation though it be Peace will not find welcome with all but only with the sons of Peace 2 an Encouragement that for all this they may not be affraid of their Message affraid to say Peace be to this House For whither it rest or not return it will to them again Upon the sons of Peace it will rest and so rest as not to leave them and if it meet with those on whom it cannot rest it will look back and return to the Disciples again But for our more plain and orderly proceeding and for your better instruction we will draw up all and bound our discourse within the compass of these three positions 1 That as at the first preaching of the Gospel so alwaies there will be this difference of Good and Evil of Sons of Peace
rest and sleep as ours quasi per quasdam ferias as the Father speaks as by so many daies of vocation and rest but every moment they observe things and every moment draw new conclusions and every moment collect and infer one thing out of another Besides as Tertullian tells us momento ubique sunt their motion and apprehension is swift and sudden Totus mundus illis locus unus est The whole world is to them but as one place and what is done in every place they soon know in any place We do not meet them as Hippocentaurs but we meet them as Tyrants We cannot say we have seen the Devil in the shape of a Fox but yet we are not ignorant of his wiles and crafty enterprises And though his hand be invisible when he smites us for he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an incorporeal hangman as Chrysostom calls him yet we may feel him in our impatience and falling from God What speak we of the possession of our body when it is too manifest that he possesses our soul For do we see a man with a mouth like a sepulchre and a tongue like a rasor with a talking eye and a restless hand starting at the motion of every leaf drooping at the least breath of affliction amazed at the sight of white and red colour stooping at every clod of earth transported at every turn of his eye afraid where no fear is mourning for the absence of that which will hurt him and rejoycing at that stoln bread which will be as gravel between his teeth Do we see him sometimes fall into the water and sometimes into the fire sometimes cold and stupid and anon active and furious we may well conclude and account him as one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of those who are possest with a Devil That he insinuates himself into the Soul of Man that being of so subtile an essence he works upon the Spirits by inflaming or cooling upon the Phansie by strange representations making it a wanton and on the Understanding by presenting of false light and sending-in strong illusions it is plain and evident and we need not doubt But the manner how he worketh is even as invisible as himself and therefore it were a great vanity to enquire after it Stultum est calumniam in eo inquisitionis intendere in quo comprehendi quod quaeritur per naturam suam non potest saith Hilary It is a great folly to run-on in the pursuit of the knowledge of that which before we set forth we know we cannot attain And therefore saith the Father Nemo ex me scire quaerat quod me nescire scio nisi fortè ut nescire discat quod sciri non posse sciendum est Let no man desire to know of me that which I know I cannot know unless peradventure he would learn to be ignorant of that which he must know he cannot but be ignorant Let others define and determine and set-down what manner they please we may rest upon that of St. Augustine Facilius est in alterius definitione videre quod non probem quà m quicquam bene definiendo explicare In this point it is easier to refute anothers opinion than to establish our own and to shew that the Devil doth not work thus than plainly to set-down and say Thus he works It is enough for us to know that as God is a friend so the Devil is an enemy as God inspires good thoughts so the Devil inspireth evil that he can both smite the body and wound the soul that he hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Basil speaks divers and various operations and can alter with the occasion that he knows in what breast to kindle Lust into what heart to pour the venom of Envy whom to cast-down with Sorrow and whom to deceive with Joy that his snares are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of many shapes and forms which he useth to draw-on that sin to which he sees man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 most inclinable and prone and gives every man poyson in that which he best loves as Agrippina did to Claudius her husband in Mushromes Now to proceed The Reasons why the Devil thus greedily thirsts after the ruine and destruction of Mankind are derived from his Hatred to God and his Envy to Man His first wish which threw him down from heaven was To be a God and being fallen he wished in the next place that there should be no God at all willing to abolish that Majesty which he could not attain Odium timor spirat saith Tertullian Hatred is the very breath of Fear We never begin to hate God till we haâ—e committed something for which we have reason to fear him And the Devil being now in chains of everlasting darkness doth hate that Light which he cannot see And because God himself is at that infinite distance from him that his Malice cannot reach him he is at enmity with whatsoever hath being and essence and conservation from God or is answerable and agreeable to his will but especially with Man because God hath past a gracious decree to save him and put him in a fair possibility of the inheriâ—â—nce of that heaven from whence he was thrown down He manifests his hâ—â—â—ed to God in hating his Image which he doth labour to deface now blurring it with Luxury anon with Pride and every day bespotting it with the world striving to destroy that new-creature which Christ hath purchast with his bloud just as some Traitours have used to stab their Prince in his picture or as the poor man in Quintilian who not able to wreak his anger on the person of his rich and powerful enemy did solace himself in whipping his statue And as the Devils Hatred to God so his Envy to Man enrageth him For through envy of the Devil came sin into the world It is Bernards opinion that Man was created to supply the defect of Angels in heaven and to repair that breach which their fall had made in the celestial Jerusalem But most probable nay without question it is that the Devil with his hellish troop are therefore so fiery and hot against us because they see and are verily perswaded that those men whom they cannot withdraw from obedience to God shall by the power of Christ be raised to that height of glory from which he and his Angels were cast-down and shall in a manner supply their place in heaven whilst they lay bound in chains of everlasting darkness And therefore though he gave Man a fall in Paradise yet he still envieth his hope as Timagenes was grieved when he saw Rome on fire because he knew it would be built-up fairer than it was before it was burnt Quoniam emulari non licet nunc invidet as he speaks in Plautus Because he cannot emulate us in our rise he envies us and that happiness which he cannot make the object of his Hope he makes the object of his Malice as they who are tumbled
yet take it patiently God will in a manner take this as a courtesie from us as St. Peter implyes 1 Pet. 2. 20. You need not wonder then why our Saviour bids his Disciples be exceeding glad at their afflictions why Peter and John went away rejoycing when they suffered for the Name of Jesus Why St. Paul was so far from fearing it that he long'd for his dissolution Why the Primitive Christians did so much court and admire danger ruin and destruction for thus we glorifie God and thus he glorifies us again in accounting us worthy and admitting us to suffer for his sake that as the Apostle says At last we may receive the peaceable fruits of Righteousness Besides if good men were not opprest we could not have so fair an opportunity to exercise our Charity I confess we should pity those whom their own folly hath brought into Calamity whom Lust and Ryot have cast upon the Bed of Sickness or whom Pride and Vanity have impoverished and thrown into Prison But whom the Zeal of Gods house hath eaten up and consumed whom strictness of Conscience hath brought low and diminished who is poor only because he durst not be rich for fear of doing ill this is such an Object of Charity as a man would travel the world to find out were there not too many nearer home Our formerly religious Ancestors have run to Jerusalem to view the pretended Reliques of our Saviour whether true or no and thought it worth a pilgrimage to fetch a piece of the wood he suffered on though perhaps it were a chip of the next Block whereas in sheltring the afflicted we bring Christ himself into our Houses for he acknowledges whatsoever is done to his poor suffering Members is done to himself It was one of the promises Christ made to his Disciples that they should alwayes have the poor amongst them Matth. 26. to assure us we should never want an opportunity to exercise that most powerful vertue of Charity which can lay so many obligations upon God to hear us to pardon us and to reward us both with the blessings of this and a better life so that if you will but consider how much your own Interest does engage you to help and assist the oppressed you will scarce find in your hearts to call that Liberality which benefits the Giver more than the Receiver but rather confess by dispersing thus you shew greater Charity to your selves then to others For where can you place your money more securely then when you make God your Debter or how can you lay out what you have to greater advantage then by purchasing Heaven with it one would think to build Churches to the honour of God is a most high piece of Devotion Melius est hoc facere says St. Jerome quà m repositis opibus incubare 't is better indeed to bestow our wealth thus then keep it by only to look upon The Holy Father speaks slightly of this kind of Charity in respect of that which relieves the poor and values one single Alms well placed as a greater Munificence farr then the erecting of the most stately Cathedral For as St. Chrysostome argues upon the same subject to build Christ a magnificent Palace and at the same time suffer him himself in his poor Members to wander up and down for want of a lodging to offer to his Church a Golden Chalice and deny him a Cup of cold water to cover his Altars with the richest furniture whilst he himself goes about naked is just as if you should see a man almost starv'd with cold and hunger and then instead of feeding and cloathing him you should set up a Golden Statue to his honor and let him pine with hunger though the other be commendable yet certainly this expresses our Piety most when we supply the wants of the Necessitous and give the poor and needy a good occasion to bless God and trust to his Providence hereafter because thus we build up a Living Temple which in the Apostles phrase is Every true and sincere Christian How much more then should you feed your Minister who so often has fed you who for your sakes has with St. Paul dyed daily by venturing himself every hour and by standing continually with his brest quite open to receive every clap of Thunder that came against him So that though he be not a Martyr yet he is a Confessor who is next to a Martyr because he was ready to dye in this good Cause though he be yet alive and God preserve him so therefore in common Gratitude you ought to assist him now in his distress seeing his Zeal to keep you stead fast in the true Faith has brought him into it Methinks I say you should a little consider him now at parting for the Question is not now whether Tythes be due Jure Divino or whether the Law of the Gospel as well as the Law of Moses require you to give such a measure and proportion to your Minister but I ask you now whether you will give a man a cup of cold water in the name of a Prophet Whether you think your selves bound in conscience not to let him starve at your doors as useless whom you have praised and admired so much this will be Charity indeed then you will give whereas before you did but pay But on the other side to say there goes a good Preacher 't is pity he hath nothing to live on to give him the wall or your hat in the street and then be glad in your hearts you are past by him to drink his health at your full Tables whil'st he is ready to perish for hunger to bring him to your very door in a complement and then turn him out is the same piece of Charity as the Apostle mentions as if one should say to the hungry get a good meal or to the naked put on your cloaths when he hath none left to cover him and be sure what you give give to God rather then to the man And be not like the Ravens who fed Elijah that knew not what glorious thing it was to feed a Prophet Secondly No man asks this Question Why does the way of the wicked prosper but upon a false presumption of his own Righteousness because as he conceives he does not deserve what persecution is laid upon him and whosoever he be complains thus if God should lay his sins in order before him proceeding from his evil thoughts to his evil actions from his sins of ignorance to his sins of malice and despight against God would rather think it reasonable to charge Gods Mercy as too remiss then his Justice as too severe Why does God suffer the wicked to distress the Righteous The Supposition is notoriously false there hath not happened such a Case since the world began If for any ends of his own God would afflict a righteous man he could not possibly find one to exercise this power upon Perhaps you did never
do not rage against the Sinner and that whilst we strike at one we do not wound both Our Anger must be not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not an hatred of the person but a detestation of the sin A hard subtlety indeed it is to distinguish things thus confounded and blended together Facile est atque proclive saith St. Augustine malos odisse quia mali sunt rarum autem pium eosdem ipsos diligere quia homines sunt It is an easie thing to hate evil men because they are evil but to love them as they are men this is a rare and pious thing And therefore we must be wary that our Anger be not too hot and extreme against the actions of others for fear least at last we transpose it upon the men themselves Timon that great hater of mankind made this his apology That he hated evil men because they were evil and all others because they did not hate them He thought it a sin not to be angry with those who did commit sin But Christianity begets no Timons but Children like unto the Son of God who though he knew no sin yet was content to lay down his life for sinners There is no man so evil but hath some good thing to commend him though it break not out as being clouded and darkned with much corruption Therefore Christian Meekness is very wary and doth not think there is nothing else but evil where she often sees it And though she cannot nourish a good opinion of the man to think him good yet she will a charitable hope that he may be so And as those who seek for treasure give not over by reason of clay and mire so long as there is any hope to speed so doth not Meekness slack her hand and cast off her industry though it be spent on the most polluted soul ad quaedam sana in quorum delectatione acquiescat per tolerantiam perducatur Many for want of this Meekness destroy the work of God Dum ita objurgant quasi oderint whilst they reprove their brother as if they hated him and upbraid rather then reprehend him They make it their virtue rixari cùm soeculo to chide the times and manners They suppose they are bound to hate sinners and will be just rather in shewing mercy to their beast then to their brother Away with him away with him from the earth is quickly said but is commonly breathed from a soul as much stained and polluted as his is whom we suppose to be sick to death What Tertullian spake is most true In Majestatis reos publicos hostes omnis homo miles est Against traytors and publick enemies every man is a Souldier And it is as true that every one that is of strength to pull a soul out of the fire is when his brother sins a Priest also and may nay is bound to rebuke him but he must be careful that his counsel and advise be the dictates of his Love not of his gall and bitterness that he take God himself for a patern qui non homines odit sed vitia who never hated men whom he made but Sin which being God he could not make The Prophet David puts it up in the manner of a question unto God himself Do not I hate them O Lord that hate thee and am not I grieved with Psal 139. 21 22. those which rise up against thee and presently gives himself the answer I hate them with a perfect hatred I count them mine enemies Quid est illud PERFECTO ODIO saith St. Augustine What is that the Prophet means by perfect hatred No more then this He hated the vices in them not the men How then will this perfect Hatred and the Love of our enemies subsist together To wit by this That we hate this in them that they are wicked and love this in them that they are men The 109 Psalm is a Psalm of cursing There we find such fearful imprecations that a true Christian must needs tremble but to hear them read St. Chrysostom in his very first words upon that Psalm saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that will take this Psalm into his hands had need be discreet Whether it be a Prophesie or a collection of bitter imprecations is not much material In the Gospel there is no such gift of Prophesie nor liberty of cursing granted He that foretells his brothers ruine is a Prophet also of his own and he that curseth his brother secretly in his heart though it be for sin hath committed that sin which will bring a heavy curse upon himself I know it hath been used in the Church and it hath been thought a heavy curse to say DEUS LAUDUM upon any man which is the very first words and title of that Psalm A common thing it was in France saith Calvin if any man had an enemy that molested him to hire with a sum of money a Monk or a Franciscane every day to repeat this Psalm A Gentlewoman of great note procured one of that Fraternity to use that very form of imprecation against her only Son So dangerous are the examples even of the Saints of God which we are too ready to follow when they are ill and when they are good and warrantable as ready to mistake them Si David cur non ego If David that Saint of God that man after Gods own heart did fill his Psalm with Imprecations why may not we also set our Prayers to the same tune and curse our enemies with a DEUS LAUDUM I will grant we may when as we find such a roll of curses under the Law we find also such another under the Gospel If the Proverb will suffer the Jew but to creep into Mount Ebal sure Christianity should be a sense to keep a Christian from coming near it I cannot conceive but that God doth exact this duty in far greater measure from a Christian then from a Jew For though this precept in equity bound the Jews as well as us yet God who dispensed with them hath not done that favor unto us who have received far greater from him but requires this duty of Meekness from us in the highest degree If he demanded of the Jew an Omer he will exact from us Christians an Ephah For conclusion then and to make some use of that which hath been spoken Let us not go in the waies of the Gentiles nor in theirs who are so fully bent against those who are not of the same opinion that in the prosecution they forget they are men and that there is any such virtue as Meekness that like Hannibal cannot live without an enemy or like those ancient Spaniards in Justine are so out of love with concord that they swell at the very name that have no other reason or inducement to quarrel but to quarrel and think Religion consists in words of gall and acts of vengeance that Clamor is Zeal and Fury
otherwise Virtues then as they are exemplary because these Divine virtues which are essential to him must be exemplary to us We must make him the rule of Goodness in all our actions we must be just to observe the Law valiant to keep down our passions temperate to conform our wills to the rule of Reason and wise to our salvation But there is no virtue that makes us more resemble God then this the Apostle here exhorts the Ephesians to and that is Mercy For although all virtues are in the highest degree nay above all degrees most perfect in him yet in respect of his creatures none is so resplendent as Mercy If thou callst him Health I understand thee saith St. Augustine because he gives it thee If thou call'st him thy Refuge it is true because thou fliest unto him If thou saist he is thy Strength it is because he makes thee strong But if thou namest his Mercy thou hast named all for whatsoever thou art thou art by his mercy His Goodness is infinite and looks over all even his Justice hath a relish of it It is extended unto the very damned for their torments are not so great as God could inflict or as they deserve And in respect of us it exceeds his Justice For his Justice hath a proportional object to work upon we being children of wrath and worthy of punishment but his Mercy hath none at all we deserve not to fly to its sanctuary to be covered under its wings When we lay weltring in our bloud there could no reason be given why God should take any of us out He did it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. James because he would There were none then that could have interceded and pleaded for us as the Elders did for the Centurion They are worthy that thou Luke 7. shouldst do this for them Mercy is the Queen and Empress of Gods Virtues It is the bond and knot which unites Heaven and Earth that by which we hold all our titles our title to be Men our title to the name of Christian our title to the profession of Christianity our title to Earth our title to Heaven I could loose my self in this Paradise I could build a Tabernacle upon this Mount Tabor I could still look upon this Mercy-seat Even to speak of it is great light But from the contemplation of God's Mercy I must descend lower and lead you to the imitation of it and with the Apostle here exhort you to be followers of God to forgive one another to walk in love even as Christ loved us and when God reacheth out his hand of mercy to you not to draw in yours to your brother And here I see three paths as it were to follow God in three things required to this Imitation 1. the Act of Imitation it self 2. That this Act be performed ex studio imitandi out of a love of God's Mercy and a desire to imitate him 3. A Conformity of the act of imitation to the patern followed In the first place then as God forgiveth us so we must forgive our enemies It will not be enough to have Gods Mercies on our tongues or to speak of them with admiration with joy to go over the bridge and then pull it up to our brother We account him not a good Painter who can only commend a Picture and not use the Pencil himself to draw a line Neither is he fit to be governour of a ship that having past a tempest doth only praise the Pilate but scarce knows the Rudder himself Good God! what a soloecisme in Christianity is it to have a cruel heart and a tongue speaking nothing but Mercies to be in the gall of bitterness and most devilishly malicious and yet to cry out Taste and see how gracious the Lord is Hierome censureth Virgil for his Foelix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas for calling him happy that knew the cause of things Apparet ipsum ignorâsse quod laudat He was ignorant and knew not that happiness which he commended So these merciless Patrons of Mercy ignorant quod laudant they praise they know not what They talk of Forgiveness and cloth themselves with malice Their tongue is smooth and their heart is rugged They speak in a still voice but in their breast is thunder Their words are more soft then butter but they think of swords In the second place as we must forgive so Gods Mercy must be the motive we must do it ex studio imitandi out of a desire to imitate God Not out of propension of nature out of meekness of disposition For we cannot say the child doth imitate his father in eating because eating is natural Not out of a Stoical affectation contumeliam contumeliae facere to think it revenge enough to beat off an injury with a witty jest Not out of love of peace and fear of trouble Nor lastly out of necessity therefore to forgive because thou canst not revenge Quod necessitas facit depretiat ipsa For as he told the Emperour that wearied Cruelty is not Clemency so an inability or an impossibility of revenge is not Mercy A Lion though within the grates is a Lion still as fierce as wild as ravinous as before and a Bear is a Bear still still greedy of blood though without a tooth without a paw Thou sayst thou doest forgive thy enemy with all thy heart But O quà m cuperes tibi ungues esse thou wantest but fangs thou wantest but ability to revenge If the lines were loosed and thy teeth sharp thou wouldst grinde thine enemy to powder thou wouldst triumph in thy revenge thou wouldst shew what thy Forgiveness was Though a wall be placed between thee and thy enemy that thy Artillery cannot reach him and thou canst not be revenged yet voto jugulasti as St. Hierome speaketh thou hast performed it in thy wish And thus to forgive Beloved is so far from following God that we run away from him God forgives not because he is not able to destroy thee No as Caesar once spake and nobly too Facilius est facere quà m dicere It was easier for him to be revenged than to talk of it So did not Gods Mercy restrain him he could with a word destroy the whole World He hath a Sword and Fire and a Quiver a glittering Sword a Sword that shall eat flesh and a Fire kindled in his wrath that shall burn unto the bottom of hell and a Quiver full of arrowes of arrowes that shall drink bloud yet he will in mercy sheath Deut. 31. his Sword he will quench his fire he will hide his arrowes in his Quiver that when we feel the operation of the sweet influence of his Mercy within our selves we may also with an upright and sincere heart derive it to our brother Lastly we must conform our Imitation to the Patern He with one act of mercy wipes out all scores so must we When he forgives our sins he is said to
and Preferments in the Kingdome of Christ Let us not fit Religion to our carnal desires but lay them down at the foot of Religion Make not Christianity to lacquey it after the World but let Christianity swallow up the World in victory Let us clip the wing of our Ambition and the more beware of it because it carries with it the shape and shew of Virtue For as we are told in Philosophy In habentibus symbolum facilior transmutatio amongst the Elements those two which have a quality common to both are easiliest changed one into the other so above all Vices we are most apt to fall into those which have some symbolizing quality some face and countenance of Goodness which are better drest and better clothed and bespeak us in the name of Virtue it self like a strumpet in a matrons stool Let us shun this as a most dangerous rock against which many a vessel of burden after a prosperous voyage hath dasht and sunk By Desire of honor and vain glory it comes to pass that many goodly and specious monuments which were dedicated rather to Honor then to God have destroyed and ruined their Founders who like unfortunate mothers have brought forth beautiful issues but themselves have dyed in the birth of them They have proved but like the ropes of silk and daggers of gold which Heliogabalus prepared to stab and strangle himself withall adding pretiosiorem mortem suam esse debere that his death ought to be more costly then other mens and they have served to no other end but this ut cariùs pereant that the workers of them might dye with greater state then other men and might fall to the lowest pit as the sword-players did in the Theater with noyse and applause I have spoken of the Occasion of the Question and of the Persons who put it Come we now in the last place to the Question it self Who is the greatest in the kingdome of heaven The Disciples here were mistaken in terminis in the very terms of their Question For neither is Greatness that which they supposed nor the Kingdome of heaven of that nature as to admit of that Greatness which their phansie had set up For by the Kingdome of heaven is meant in Scripture not the Kingdome of Glory but the Kingdome of Grace by which Christ sits and rules in the hearts of his Saints When John the Baptist preacht Repentance he told the Jews that the Kingdome of heaven is at hand When our Saviour tells us that it is like seed sowen in good ground like a net cast into the sea like a pearl like a treasure hid in the field what else can he mean but his Kingdome of Grace on earth not his Kingdome of Glory in heaven So that for the Disciples to ask Who is greatest in this kingdome was to shape out the Church of God by the World Much like to that which we read in Lucian of Priams young son who being taken up into heaven is brought-in calling for milk and cheese and such country cates as were his wonted food on earth For in the Kingdome of Grace that is in the Congregation of Gods Saints and the elect Members of Christ there is no such difference of degrees as Ambition taught the Disciples to imagine Not that we deny Order and Government in the Church of God No without these his Church could not subsist but would be like Aristotles army without discipline 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an unprofitable rout To this end Christ gave Apostles and Teachers and Pastors for the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the body of Christ His Teachers call us his Governors direct us to this Kingdome But the Disciples being brought up in the world thought of that Greatness which they saw did bear the sway amongst men Much like the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who thought that God bare the shape of a Man because they read in Scripture of his Feet and Hands and Eyes and the like But that it was not so in Christs Kingdome may appear by our Saviour's Answer to the Question For he takes a Child and tells them that if they will be of his Kingdome they must be like unto it By which he choaks and kills in them all conceit of Ambition and Greatness For as Plato most truly said that those that dye do find a state of things beyond all expectation diverse from that which they left behind so when we are dead to the World and true Citizens of the Kingdome of Christ we shall find there is neither Jew nor Greek neither bond nor free neither male nor female but all are one in Christ Gal. 3. 28. Jesus God looks not what bloud runs in thy veins he observes not thy Heraldry If Greatness could have purchased heaven Lazarus had been in hell and Dives in Abrahams bosome Earl and Knight and Peasant are tearms of distinction on earth in the Kingdome of heaven there is no such distinction Faith makes us all one in Christ and the Crown of glory shall be set upon the head of him that grindeth at the mill as well as upon his that sitteth on the throne Christ requires 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the nobility of the Soul and he is the greatest in his Kingdome who hath the true and inward worth of Honesty and Sanctity of life though in this world he lye buried in obscurity and silence Here Lazarus may be richer then Dives the beggar higher then the King and a Child the least is greatest in this Kingdome A main difference we may see between this Kingdome and the Kingdomes of the world if we compare them First the Subjects of this Kingdome are unknown to any but to God himself The foundation of the Lord standeth sure saith the Apostle 2 Tim. 2. 19. having this seal The Lord knowes who are his And if they be unknown who then can range them into orders and degrees Secondly of this Kingdome there is no end Thirdly the seat of this Kingdome is the hearts of the faithful Cathedram habet in Coelo qui domat corda His chair is in heaven that rules the hearts of the sons of men here on earth This earth that is this body of clay hath God given to the sons of men to the Princes of the earth under whose government we live But our Heaven our better part our inward and spiritual man he reserves to himself Kings and Princes can restrain the outward man and moderate our outward actions by their laws and edicts Illa se jactat in aulâ Aeolus Thus far can they go They can tye our Hands and Tongues and they can go no further For to set up an imperial throne in our Understandings and our Wills belongs to Christ alone He teacheth the lame to go and the blind to see and recovers the dry hand He makes us active in this Kingdome of Grace Lastly as their Subjects and Seat are different so are
be lost it never was true Faith as St. Hierome speaketh of Charity Tell me not of Saul's annointing of Judas's Apostleship of Balaam's prophetick spirit Tell me not of those who are in the Church but not of the Church who like the Pharisees have the Law written on their freinges Religion on the outside when the Devil is in their heart For Judas was but a traytor lurking under the title of a Disciple Sub alterius habitu alteri militavit He wore Christs livery but was the Devils servant Saul was amongst the Prophets but never received a Prophets reward And Balaam blessed the people from God but he died not the death of the righteous There may be some gifts of the Spirit where the Spirit never truly was There may be a beam of grace a shew of godliness where the power thereof is denyed And Faith in him may seem to be dead where it never had true life or being So Nazianzene speaking of those who forsook the colours under which they had formerly fought says they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 men which negligently and for fashions sake handled matters of Religion having an Hosanna in their mouth when a Crucifige was in their heart like Meteors which either being drawn up by the heat of the Sun or lifted up by some puff of wind into the air there for a while they remain and draw mens eyes to behold them till at last they go out and infect it But true Faith is like the Sun which is not therefore not at all because a cloud hath overcast it or like the Moon it waxeth and waneth but still receives some light from the Sun The Papists and Arminians in this point as Augustine spake of Hereticks of the same stamp should have rather our prayers then our dispute and will sooner be recalled by our devotion then yield to the strength of our reason But if there be any infant in religion which is not yet grown up to this truth whose earthly thoughts cannot reach to the height of this heavenly mystery if he will not believe God in the book of his Words he may see and read a resemblance of it in the book of his Works Come Christian look upon the Tree In the winter it is stripped of its fruit and leaves nipped by the frost covered with snow so that it seems to be withered and dead and fit only to be cast into the fire Say then May not Faith be where Sin and the filth of the Flesh hath oppressed it Can a winter of affliction dead it Or shall we think that man whose Works alwaies speak not his Faith whose light sometimes shines dimly before men to be in the shadow of death and only fit fuel for hell-fire No this were to wrong our Charity as well as our Faith to make the way to hell broader then it is to enlarge the kingdome of Satan to undervalue the gift of Grace to mistrust the promise of God and to make him a liar like unto our selves What if we be weak and feeble What if the arm of flesh cannot uphold us Yet God directeth us in our paths and is as tender-hearted to us as a nurse to her child when she teacheth it to go sometimes leading and guiding us by his mercy sometimes catching if we slip and if we fall hastily pulling us up again and snatching us to his embraces Hear this and leap for joy you who are members of Christs mystical body You may fall but you shall rise again Your names are written in the Book of Life and neither the malice nor the policy of Satan can blot them out God hath made a league with you and you may be sure he will be as good as his word He hath married himself to you for ever and then you need not fear a divorce He hath written his law in the midst of your heart and the Devil shall never rase it out He hath put his fear into you and such and so great a fear as St. Augustine speaks that you shall alwaies adhere unto him that shall make you fly Sin as a Serpent and if it chance to bite and sting you shall make you look up to that brasen Serpent lifted up and you shall be healed If you be tempted he will give the issue Only thou must so be confident that you presume not 1 Cor. 10. so fear that you despair not Faith and Fear together make a blessed mixture Fear being as the lungs and Faith as the heart which will get an heat and over-heat as one speaketh if by Fear as by cool air it be not tempered If then Faith uphold thy Fear and Fear temper thy Faith though thou take many a fall by the way yet at last thou shalt come to thy journeys end Though the Devil shake thy Faith yet God will protect it Though he for a while steal away this precious Jewel the joy of thy salvation yet God will restore it Which is my second part the Person whose act it is Restore thou It is not the tongue of an Angel can comfort David The Prophet might awake him but raise him up he could not Nathans Parable had been but as a Proverb of the dust and his Thou art the man had sooner forced a frown then a tear from a King had not Gods Spirit fitted his heart had not the holy Ghost been the Interpreter For it is not so with the Heart as it is with the Eye The Eye indeed cannot make light nor colours yet it can open it self and receive them but the Heart neither can produce this Joy neither can it open it self to receive it But God must pulsare aperire knock and open take away the bars and open the doors of it and purge and cleanse it He must write in it the forgiveness of sins and shine upon it with the light of his countenance or else the weight of Sin will still oppress it This Joy ariseth out of the forgiveness of our sins Now such is the nature of Sin that though actus transit yet reatus manet as Lombard speaks Sin no longer is then it is a committing but the guilt of Sin still remains like a blazing star which though it self be extinct yet leaves its infection behind it For to rise from sin is not only to cease from the act of sinning but to repair our former estate not only to be rid of the disease but to enjoy our former health Now in sin as Aquinas saith there are two things peccati macula and poenae reatus the Blot and Stain of sin which doth darken the lustre of Grace And we who made this stain can blot it out again It is lost labour to wash our selves Can we Leopards lick out our own spots Can we purge our selves with hyssope and be clean Can we wash our black and polluted souls and make them whiter than snow And for the Guilt and Punishment due to sin we all stand quaking at God's Tribunal
heart is stone enough to beat it back no soul so stubborn as to resist it neither height nor depth nor the Devil nor Sin it self can evacuate it The Recipiatis is unavoidable and the in vanum impossible And every man is a St. Paul a priviledged person not sweetly water'd with abundance but violently driven on with a torrent and inundation of Grace We must therefore find out another sense of the word Although for ought that can be said the Exhortation may concern us in this sense also and teach us to hear when God speaks to open when he knocks not to be deaf to his thunder nor to hide our selves from his lightning nor to quench the spirit nor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to resist and fall cross with Acts 7. 51. the holy Ghost But in the Scripture two words we find by which the Graces of God are expressed There is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here in the Text and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 spiritual gifts Plainly there are more common and necessary Graces which 1 Cor. 12. concur to sanctification of life to uprightness and common honesty And there are peculiar graces as Quickness of Will Depth of Understanding Skill in languages or supernatural as gifts of Tongues gifts of Healing of Miracles of Prophesie and the like These are not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 rather gifts then graces and are distributed but to certain persons in such measure as seems best to Gods Wisdome Why men are not as strong as Samson or as learned as Solomon why they prophesie not as Jeremy and work not miracles as Paul all this is from God But why men are not righteous as Noah devout as David zealous as Elias we must find the cause in our selves and not lay the defect on God Now the Grace in the Text is none of all these but is that gratia Evangelii the Grace of reconciliation by Christ the Doctrine of the Gospel which Christ commanded to be preached to all Nations And in this sense it is most frequently used in holy Scripture in the Epistles of St. Paul where we so often find it placed in opposition to the Works of the Law This is it which he so oft commends unto us This is it which he here exhorts us to receive This is it for the propagation of which he was in afflictions necessities distresses in stripes in prisons in labors in tumults which are a part of the catalogue of his sufferings in this Chapter And this is not only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a grace and a gift too without which all other gifts and graces aut nihil sunt aut nihil prosunt deserve not that name Strength is but weakness Learning is but folly Prophesies are but dreams Miracles are sluggish all are not worth the receiving or are received 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in vain Shall I say it is a greater gift then that robe of Righteousness with which God clothed Adam in Paradise It so far exceeds it that we dare not compare them There is a MULTO MAGIS set upon it by St. Paul Rom. 5. 15. and a NON SIC Not as the offense so is the free gift The Loss not so great as the Recovery Nay cui Angelorum What speak we of Adam To whom of the Angels did God give such a gift What a glory would we count it out of Nothing to be made an Angel a Seraphim By this gift by the Grace of Christ we are raised from Sin above the perfection and beauty of any created substance whatsoever above the Hierarchy of Angels and Archangels A Christian as he is united to Christ is above the Seraphims For take the substance of a Seraphim by it self and compare it to a Man reconciled to God by this Grace and the difference will be as great as between a Picture and a Man An Artificer may draw his own Picture but he can only express his likeness his color his lineaments he cannot represent his better part his Soul which constitutes and makes him what he is Take all the creatures of the Universe and they are but weak and faint shadows and adumbrations of Divine perfection God is not so exprest by an Angel as by a Christian who is his lively image as the Son is the image of his Father by a kind of fellowship and communication of nature The Creature represents God as a Statue doth the Emperor but a Christian as the Son his Father between whom there is not only likeness but identity and a participation of the same nature For by this gift by these promises we are made partakers of the Divine nature saith St. Peter ◠Pet. 1. 4. And as a Father takes more delight to look upon his Son then upon his Picture and Figure so God looks more graciously upon a Christian then upon any created essence then upon the nature of Angels He that gave the Gift he that was the Gift pray for us John 17. 21 22. that we may be all one and as his Father is in him and he in his Father so we may be one in them as they are one This is the Gift by which God did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Apostle gather together and re-establish the decay'd nature of Man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith St. Chrysostome knit and joyn together Heaven and Earth And as Christ spake of John Baptist Matth. 11. 14. Hic est Elias si vultis recipere He shall be Elias to you if you will receive him so Haec est gratia Dei The Gospel the Reconciliation made by Christ is the Grace of God if we will receive it Which is my next part And what is a Gift if it be not received Like a mess of pottage on a dead mans grave like Light to the blind like musick to the deaf The dead man feeds not the blind man sees not the deaf man hears not What were all the beauty of the Firmament if there were no eye to descry it What is the Grace of God without Faith The Receiving of it is it which makes it a Grace indeed which makes it Gospel If it be not received it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in vain An unbelieving heart turneth this bread into gravel this honey into gall and as much as in him lyes doth not only crucifie but annihilate the Lord of Life We usually compare Faith to a Hand which is reached forth to receive this Gift Without a Hand a Jewel is a trifle and the treasure of both the Indies is nothing and without Faith the Gospel is but Christus cum suâ fabulâ as the Heathen spake in reproach but a fable or relation And therefore an absolute necessity there is that we receive it For without this receipt all other receipts are not worth the casting up Our Understanding receives light to mislead her our Will power to overthrow her our Afflictions which are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
apparitions that shall go before his second coming to the end that when they come we may not be dismayed and affrighted at the sight but may entertain them as Angels which bring us good tidings of good things that we may look upon them as Objects of joy rather then of amazement that they may not dead our spirits or change our countenances or trouble our joynts or make us hold down our heads like a bullrush but rowse up our hearts and fill us with joy and make us to say This is the day which the Lord hath made a day of exaltation and redemption a day of jubilee and triumph and so look up and lift up our heads And here methinks I see in my Text a strange conjunction of Night and Day of Brightness and Darkness of Terror and Joy or a chain made up as it were of these three links Terror Exultation and Redemption Yet they will well hang together if Redemption be the middle link For in this they meet and are friends Redemption being that which turns the Night into Day maketh affliction joyful and puts a bright and lovely colour upon Horror it self When these things come to pass Why these things are terrible It is true yet lift up your heads But how can we lift up our heads in this day of terror in this day of vengeance in this day of gloominess and darkness Can we behold this sight and live Yes we may The next words are quick and operative of power to lift up our heads and to exalt our horn and strength as the horn of an Unicorne and make us stand strong against all these terrors Look up lift up your heads for your redemption draweth nigh Not to detein you longer by way of Preface Four things there are which in these words that I have read are most remarkable 1. The Persons unto whom these words are uttered in the particle Your Lift up your heads 2. What things they are of which our Saviour here speaks in the first words of the Text Now when these things begin to come to pass 3. The Behaviour which our Saviour commends unto us in these words Look up lift up your heads 4. Last of all the Reason or Encouragement words of life and power to raise us from all faintness of heart and dullness of spirit For your redemption draweth nigh I have formerly upon another Text spoken of the two first points the Persons to whom and the Things whereof our Saviour here speaketh Before I come to the third point the Behaviour prescribed to be observed by them who see the signs foretold in this Chapter come to pass it will not be amiss a little to consider whence it comes to pass that in the late declining age of the world so great disorder distemper and confusion have their place And it shall yield us some lessons for our instruction And first of all it may seem to be Natural and that it cannot be otherwise For our common experience tells us that all things are apt to breed somewhat by which themselves are ruin'd How many Plants do we see which breed that worm which eats out their very heart We see the body of Man let it be never so carefully so precisely ordered yet at length it grows foul and every day gathers matter of weakness and disease which at first occasioning a general disproportion in the parts must at the last of necessity draw after it the ruin and dissolution of the whole It may then seem to fall out in this great body of the World as it doth in this lesser body of ours By its own distemper it is the cause of its own ruin For the things here mentioned by our Saviour are nothing else but the diseases of the old decaying World The failing of light in the Sun and Moon what is it but the blindness of the World an imperfection very incident to Age. Tumults in the Sea and Waters what are they but the distemper of superfluous humors which abound in Age Wars and rumors of wars are but the falling out of the prime qualities in the union and harmony of which the very being of the creature did consist It is observed by the Wise Libidinosa intemperans adolescentia effoetum corpus tradit senectuti Youth riotously and luxuriously and lewdly spent delivers up to old age an exhaust and juyceless and diseased body Do we not every day see many strong and able young men fade away upon the sudden even in the flower of their age and soon become subject to impotency and diseases and untimely death These commonly are the issues of riot luxury and intemperance Nor can it be otherwise Therefore we cannot but expect that the World should be exceedingly diseased in its old decaying age whose youthful dayes and not only those but all other parts of its age have been spent in so much intemperance and disorder Scarcely had the World come to any growth and ripeness but that it grew to that height of distemper that there was no way to purge it but by a general Floud purgati baptisma mundi as St. Hierome calls it in which as it were in the Baptism its former sins were done away And after that scarcely had three hundred years past but a general disease of Idolatry over-spread and seized on all well-near Abraham and his Family excepted Yet after this once more it pleased God to take the cure into his hands by sending his Son our Saviour Jesus Christ the great Physician and Bishop of our souls But what of all this After all this was done tantorum impensis operum by so much cost and so much care his Physick did not work as it should and little in comparison was gained upon the World For the Many of us we are still the sons of our fathers Therefore we have just cause of fear that God will not make many more tryals upon us or bestow his pains so oft in vain Christ is the last Priest and the last Physician that did stand upon the earth and if we will not hear him what remains there or what can remain but a fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the world Ephraim is turned unto Idols let him alone I will spend no more labor in Hos 4. vain upon him Thus as Physicians when they find the disease incurable let the diseased go on unto his end so God having now as it were tryed his skill in vain having invited all and seeing so few come having spoken to all and so few hear having poured out his Sons bloud to purge the World and seeing so few cleansed for ought we know and it is very probable hath now resolv'd the World shall go unto its end which in so great a body cannot be without the disorder and confusion our blessed Saviour here speaketh of But you may peradventure take this for a speculation and no more and I have urged it no further then as a
and diametrically opposed Frustrà is placed è regione point blanck to the Magistrate For the Apostle lays it down 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he puts a Non a negation between them He speaks it positively and he speaks it destructively 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he beareth not the sword in vain The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Duty and the Power the Office and the Definition the same That which should be so is so and it is impossible it should be otherwise say the Civilians For at this distance these tearms naturally stand But when we read a corrupt Judge a perjured Jurer a false Witness we have conciliated them and made up the contradiction These terms naturally stand at a distance we must then find out something to keep them so to exclude this Frustrà to safeguard the Magistrate that he bear not the sword in vain And we need not look far For it is the first thing we should look upon and the Philosopher pointeth it out to us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to propose an end Non agitur officium nisi intendatur finis say the Schools I stir not in my duty if this move me not and I faint and sink under my duty if this Continue not that motion And down falls the Sword with a Frustrà upon it if this uphold it not I am but Man and my actions must look out of themselves and beyond themselves I have not my compleatness my perfection my beatitude within my self and therefore I must take aim at something without my self to enfeoff and entitle me to it Now the Magistrate hath divers ends laid before him First that first and architectonical end the Glory of God and then that which leads to that the Peace of the Church and that which procures that the Preservation of Justice and that which begins that the proper work of Justice it self to stand in the midst between two opposite sides till he have drawn them together and made them one to keep an equality even in inequality to use the Sword not only rescindendo peccatori to cut off the wicked but communi dividundo to give Mephibosheth his own lands to divide to every man his own possessions Then the NON FRUSTRA is upon the Magistrate as well as upon the Sword when the Law is not only the edge of this Sword but flabellum justitiae a fan to blow and kindle up Justice in the breast of the Magistrate that it may warm and comfort the oppressed but to the wicked become 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a consuming fire When he layeth not these ends aside and instead thereof placeth others for the Glory of God some accession and addition of Honor to himself for the good of the Commonwealth the filling of his Coffers for the Peace of the Church the avoiding of a frown for the right of the oppressed his own private conveniencies and for the Truth Mammon There are many ends you see but that is most pertinent to our present purpose which the Apostle sets down in this Chapter Terror to the wicked Security of the good Justice on both sides And first the Magistrate like God himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 governs us by that which is adverse to us curbeth the transgressor by the execution of poenal laws which St. Basil calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a purging cleansing refining fire even of that other fire which when it breaks forth is Lust Adultery Murder Sedition Theft or what else may set the Church and Commonwealth in a combustion And in the next place this end hath its end too For no Magistrate doth simply will the affliction and torture of the offender or punish only to shew his autority but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He hath an end for that too His Power rests not in the evil of punishment but looks further to the good of amendment and to the good of example not to the taking off heads but piercing of hearts not to binding of hands but limiting of wills not to the trouble of the sinner but the peace of the Commonwealth This is the very end of Punishment to destroy that proclivity and proneness to sin which every evil action begets in the very committing of it Lay the whip upon the fools back and slumber is not so pleasant bring him to the post and he unfolds his arms Set up the Gibbet the Gallants sword sticks in his scabberd exact the mulct and he hath lost the grace of his speech and half his Gentility Let the sword be brandisht and Sin is not so impudent but croucheth and mantleth her self and dares not step forth before the Sun and the people Gird then the sword upon the thigh O most mighty You who are invested with this power remember the end Remember you were placed with a Sword hostire iniquitatem in a hostile manner to pursue the wicked to run after the oppressor and break his jaw and take the prey out of his mouth to destroy this Wolf to chase away the Asp the poisonous heretick to cut off the hands of Sacriledge to pierce through the spotted Leopard And in doing this you perform the other part You defend and safegard the innocent The death of one murderer may save a thousand lives and the destruction of one traiterous Jesuite as many souls Qui malos punit bonos laudat The Correction of the evil is the Commendation nay it is the buckler the castle the defense of the good And it may prove too the Conversion of the wicked The bloud of one Wolf may work an alteration and change of another the Leopard may come to dwell with the Kid the Wolf may feed quietly with the Lamb the Lion may eat straw like an Ox and the Asp play with a Child Isa 11. The poenal Statutes are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 copies and samplers and a Judge must do as a Painter doth saith Plato follow and imitate his forms and draughts Where the Law is drawn in lines of bloud he must not lay on colours of oyl Where the Law shews the offender in chains he must not present him at liberty Where it frowns he must not draw a smile nor Timanthes like draw a veil as not able to express that frown No he must take his proportions and postures from the Law Oppression must be portrayed with its teeth out Murder pale and wounded to death Idleness whipt the common Barretter with papers in his hat He must similem pingere not a Man for a Beast not a Dog for a Lion not a Fox for a Wolf not Manslaughter for Murder not Usury for Extorsion not Deceit for Oppression not a sum of daily incursion for a devouring one He must not depose and degrade a gallant boystrous sin and put it in a lower rank to escape unpunished with a multitude The neglect hereof brings in not only a frustrà but a nocivum with it It is hurtful and
poison of the excuse But Adam's last words Gen. 41. 4. are lost in the former as the lean and ill-favoured Kine in Pharaoh's dream ate up the fat ones Deny indeed the fact he could not For as God had built him up in his own image and likeness so he had raised up within him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a natural tribunal his Conscience and made him thus far a God unto himself as not only to discern evil from good but also to search the very inwards of his own heart 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. saith St. Chrysostome all men of what rank soever though they sit not in the throne of justice though they be not Judges and Magistrates though they have no executioners nor prisoners nor gives nor bolts yet they judge and condemn Sin in themselves and others and that by the common principles of Discourse and Reason and by that secret verdict and sentence which every man carrieth in his own breast The first man that condemneth a Sinner is a Sinner himself Se judice nemo nocens absolvitur in himself he beareth about him a Court and Seat of justice from which no appeal lieth His reason is his judge his Conscience is his accuser himself his own prisoner The terrours of an afflicted Conscience hang him up and crucifie him every day though no forreign autority arrest him For as the shadow followeth the body saith Basil so doth Sin the Soul and whithersoever we go it presenteth it self before us No sooner do we reach out our hand to the Apple no sooner is our eye full of the adulteress 2 Pet. 2. 14. Jam. 1. 15. no sooner hath Lust conceived and brought forth Sin but presently verberamur tacito cogitationis nostrae opprobrio as St Ambrose speaketh our own thoughts are as whips and scorpions to scourge us our conscience striketh us with amazement and horrour when no man pursueth us she plougheth up our soul and maketh deep furrows there laniatus ictus as the Historian speaketh stripes and wounds when no other hand is lift up against us But as Judges would see more clearly and judge more uprightly if they were not blinded with a bribe so would the Conscience speak more plainly if we did not teach her broken and imperfect language to pronounce Sibboleth for Shibboleth to leave out some letter some aspiration Judg. 12. 6. some cicumstance in sin But to speak truth the Conscience cannot but speak out to the offender and tell him roundly that he hath broken God's law But as we will not hearken to Reason when she would restrain us from sin so we slight her when she checketh us for committing it we neither give ear to her counsel before we eat nor to her reproof after we have eaten we observe her neither as a friend nor as an enemy Adam's conscience told him he had broken the command had eaten of the forbidden fruit and must die but the shame of what he had done and the fear of what would follow made him as deaf to his conscience after his fall as he was before as unwilling to acknowledg his sin as to prevent it and therefore he seeketh to palliate and colour over what he could not deny he faltreth in his language and instead of a confession rendreth nothing but an excuse an excuse which indeed is nothing Now to dissect and examine the Excuse We shall find that Adam dealeth like an unskilful Phisitian qui pro morbo extinguit hominem He removeth not the disease but destroyeth himself and by applying a remedy worse than the disease maketh the disease incurable His Apologie upbraideth him and he condemneth himself with his excuse For first MULIER DEDIT The woman gave it me weigh it as we please is an aggravation of his sin We may measure Sin by the tentation It is alway the greatest when the tentation is least A great sin it would have been to have eaten of the forbidden fruit though an Angel had given it what is it then when it is the Woman that giveth it Why should the Woman prevail over the Man the weaker over the stronger vessel He was made her head and was to rule over her His Duty saith St. Chrysostome was not only to have refused the woman's offer but also to have shewed her the greatness of the sin and to have kept her from eating not only to have saved himself but to have plucked her also out of the fire But for Strength to yield to Weakness for the Head to be directed by the Body for him to put himself in subjection who ought to command for him to follow to evil who should lead to good was to invert the order which God had constituted What a shame do we count it for a man of perfect limbs to be beaten by a criple for a son of Anak to be chased by a grashopper for Xerxes 's army which drank up the sea to be beaten out of Greece by three hundred Spartains Certainly he deserveth not power who betrayeth it to Weakness The VVoman gave it me then was a deep aggravation of the Man's transgression Again it is but The VVoman gave it And a gift as we commonly say may be either taken or refused and so it is in our power whether it shall be a gift or no. Had the man been unwilling to have received the Woman could have given him nothing Nunquid obsecravit num disseruit num decepit saith the Father Did she besiege him with her intreaties did she use the battery of discourse did she cunningly undermine him with a fallacie No it is but dedit she only gave it him The Orator will tell us Necessitas est magnum humanae infirmitatis patrocinium that Necessity is the best Plea that humane weakness hath for the misery that befalleth us But it is too common a thing as Tertulian saith licentiam usurpare praetextu necessitatis to make Necessity a pretense for our liberty and licentiousness in sinning At this door enter-in Covetousness Intemperance Revenge Pride which we might easily keep out even with one of our fingers Nusquam est necessitas nusquam violentia sed electio voluntas Here was no necessity no violence It is but DEDIT she gave it him and he was willing to receive it Oh how are the mighty fallen in the midst of the battel how is Adam fallen in the midst of his strength He who had the Graces of God encompassing him about as a ring who had his Understanding richly adorn'd and his Will obedient to his Understanding who had an harmonie in his Affections and an Heaven in his Soul who had the Angels for his guardians and God for his strength who was himself a kind of God upon earth and had dominion over all the creatures surrendreth up all at the sight of a gift a gift which he might have refused and which he was bound to refuse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Plato de Log. proverb
of satisfaction from his fulness that filleth all in all filleth all in every Good man filleth the Mind with light the Will with holy affections and the Body with an obsequious inclinableness and obedience to the Will and makes the whole man a Temple to himself full of light of peace of glory so filleth it that it is satisfied as with marrow and fatness with all satiety of joy The Chaldee Paraphrase brings it home to my Text satisfied with marrow and fatness that is with thy Law that is with that which is Good And thus we may draw an argument from the nature of Goodness which the nearer it carryeth us to the fountain of Goodness the more satisfaction it brings with it and the fuller is our Cup. Inebriabuntur ab ubertate domûs tuae saith the Psalmist They shall be overcome and even intoxicated with this cup. Without God we cannot be happy in heaven it self nay without him there could be no heaven and with him we shall enjoy what we can desire even in the lowest pit Nihil illi satis est cui non sufficit Deus We can never be satisfied till we rest in the greatest Good and Goodness lays us in his very bosome nay in his heart We never find our selves and all things but in him And as we draw an argument from Piety so may we draw another from the Love of it and therefore amamus amorem nostrum saith Augustine we do not only love Goodness but even the Love with which we embrace it and delight in both And this satisfaction proceeds not only from that which is good but from our hearty affection to it Goodness shines upon us and kindles our Love and as there is a glory in goodness so there is in our Love For Joy and Satisfaction is a resultancy from Love for our delight is to have and do what we love That which we love is also the joy of our heart If Love be as the Sun Joy and Satisfaction are as the beams that stream from it If Love fill the heart it will heave and work it self out and break forth in joy Gaudium de amore say the Schools our Satisfaction is the off-spring of Love and issueth from it and bears its shape and likeness For as our Love is such is our Joy If our Love be kindled from heaven our Joy will be also from the heaven heavenly and resemble that of the Angels But if it be placed on things below on that which is transitory on that which will not satisfie it will be also transitory and unsatisfying What is the satisfaction of a Worldling a thief may break through and steal it away What is the satisfaction of the Ambitious a frown will chase it away What is the satisfaction of the Wanton burnt and consumed in his lust The adulterer waiteth for the twilight the twilight cometh and to night sin is as a purchase but to morrow it is rottenness to his bones and dulness to his understanding to night it is the horn of beauty and to morrow a fury Goe compass about the world and what satisfaction can you find Draw all its beauty and honor and riches together and all is but ingens fabula magnum mendacium a long tale and a huge lye and Satisfaction and Joy may seem to be exhaled out of these as noysome vapours are out of the earth to be seen a while and then to be nothing or which is worse to gather into a cloud and dissolve in tears of sorrow and bitterness Ever as our Love and Desire is such is our Satisfaction One argument we take more à minori ad majus to perswade us to this Truth If the bare opinion of Piety in those who are not yet made perfect satisfie though it be but for a while then Piety it self will satisfie much more If the shadow if a weak representation of Virtue and Piety will refresh us what will it do when it shines upon us in perfection of beauty If one good act which is but the shell and outside of Goodness in them who rather approve than love it if one good thought one good word one good action lift us up how will a habit of goodness exalt us If I say the shadow hath this operation what hath the substance the thing it self If the giving a Cup of cold water will raise and settle content in us how will that Heart be filled with joy which is sacrificed to its Maker We may if we please discover this in our selves What feel we in our Heart when our Hand hath reached out a peny Doth it not make a kind of melody there doth it not so fill us that it is ready to break out at the lips What hear you when you give good counsil doth it not echo back again upon you When you have heard two Sermons on the Lords-day do you not tell your selves you have sanctified the Sabbath When you have received a Prophet though in your own name do you not look for a Prophets reward See what a paradise one leafe of the Tree of life may make for all these may be but leaves what a glorious structure may be raised upon a Thought And if Error if Opinion may work some satisfaction then Truth may much more If a Dream may enlighten us what will a Revelation from God himself do And if the embracing of a cloud do so much please us How shall we be transported when we shall find our Juno even Goodness it self in our arms If a form of Godliness then much more Godliness in its full power will fill and satisfie us Run to and fro through Jerusalem go about the streets thereof muster up together all that name the Lord Jesus and you shall find that every man is full every man almost is satisfied few drooping and hanging down the Head In our Health we comfort our selves and on our bed of Sickness we send for comforters and as miserable comforters as they are we are willing to hear them and a little opiate Divinity a few good words the name of JESUS doth settle and satisfie us There be very few Rachels that will not be comforted We run from that which is good and sit down in the shadow of it we wound our Conscience and then stain it over again we break the whole Law and one sigh is satisfaction nay we break the Law and perswade our selves we have kept it any perswasion is satisfaction We break one Law and satisfie our selves in the misinterpretation of another and so break it when we think we have kept it Industry is commanded and that must countenance our love of the world Zeal is commended and that must raise a faction Truth must be defended and that must beat up a drum It is not women only but men that are never to seek for an excuse and that is satisfaction Every man posts to destruction yet every man would seem to be on the wing to heaven Every man
is sick yet every man is well Every man is empty yet every man is full We tread the paths that lead to destruction and yet we are in the way to happiness Where is the shaking and the trembling spirit where is the broken heart where are those prickings at the heart or who puts up the question What shall I do to be Acts. 2. 37. saved Every man is satisfied and if it were true we might conclude every man is good For whatsoever the promises be most men are bold to make this the conclusion and though they have raised a tempest conclude in peace And it is a great deal more common to infer what pleaseth us and what may serve for satisfaction though it be upon a gross mistake and oftener then upon a truth And thus we assure our selves of happiness upon no better evidence then that which flesh and bloud and the love of our selves are ready to bring in and satisfie our selves with false hope of life when we are full of malice envy and uncleanness of which we are told that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdome of heaven Gal. 5 21. And what satisfaction is this a Satisfaction without a warrant a Satisfaction which we our selves only have subscribed to with hands full of bloud a Satisfaction which is but a cheat but a delusion presenting us nothing but a reward when we are condemned already filling us with hopes of bliss when we are in the mouth of destruction That which is Satisfaction indeed hath no other basis to stand on then Piety and conformity of our works words and thoughts to the will of God And then it is as mount Sion which cannot be removed it stands firm for it is built upon God himself If thou raise it upon Phansie thou buildest in the ayr If thou lay it upon Gods eternal Decree in thy election that will slide from thee and let the fall into hell for that concerns thee not unless thou be good but another decree contrary to that which thy neglect of piety hath drawn thee under belongs unto thee because thou wouldst not know what belongs to thy peace and what might bring Satisfaction Wilt thou lay it on the infinite Mercy of God that will cover a multitude of sins but not those sins which are thy only satisfaction that will distill as dew but not on the hairy scalp of him that goeth on in his sins And though she triumph over Justice yet here she yields and calls it in to double vengeance upon thee because thou wert an enemy to Mercy which first shewed thee the way to be satisfied and now turns from thee and will not hear when thou callest to her to satisfie thee being out of the way If thou wilt have Mercy crown thee thou must be merciful to thy self If thou wilt make thy election sure thou must do it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it is supplyed in some copies by piety that is by faith and good works For Goodness is that and that alone which satisfies us which fills us with joy and peace in the holy Ghost and for which God will satisfie us with his likeness and fill us with glory in the life to come And so we pass to that which we proposed in the second place and it was this 2. It is the prerogative of Goodness and Piety to be alone in this work Nothing can satisfie us but Piety and our transforming our selves by the Rom. 12. 2. renewing of our mind and shaping our thoughts words and actions to the will of God For first Satisfaction is but a name on earth as St. Paul speaks of Idols we know it is nothing in the world The earth and all that therein is cannot yield it the round world and they that dwell therein could never find it And as God spake to Moses Thou heardst a voice but sawest no shape so Satisfaction which flows from God alone in this resembles him The voice of it hath sounded in our ears but as for the shape and substance of the thing it self we have seen none But as the world having heard of God but not knowing him aright sought him in stocks and stones in birds and creeping things so men having heard of Satisfaction which can be found no where but in God by a kind of Idolatry against God have sought it in the creature in Beauty which fades whilst we look upon it in Riches which have wings and fly away in Honour which is but a blast and not in me but in him that gives it In these it can no more be found then the very nature of God himself These conceits and notions of Satisfaction do universally pass amongst men Now as that general consent and voice of all nations That there was a God though they erre not knowing where to seek him yet is a fair proof that there is a God and as the same general consent of men that God is to be worshipt though they mistook the manner of it yet proves certainly that there is some form of worship acceptable to Him so this oecumenical conceit of satisfaction to be had which hath thus overspread and possest the heads of all men cannot be in vain but is an evidence that there is some good that will satisfie that hath a contenting quality and in which we may set up our rest Only vain men who have their mind in their eyes and not in their hearts as Augustine speaketh have been willing to mistake to tread the waters and to walk upon the wind to trust to that and to make that their mount Sion which slides away from them and gives no rest to their souls Rest to our souls we never find till with the Dove we return to the Ark to the Church of Christ where our tongues are made God's glory and our hands the instruments of righteousness wherein that Piety and Goodness dwelleth which alone can satisfie For secondly such is the nature and quality of the soul that it is not fashioned nor proportioned to the things of this world What is a wedge of gold what is beauty what is a Crown to a soul This being an immortal and spiritual substance can be satisfied with nothing but what is wrought in it by the Spirit of God with Holiness and Piety which being as immortal and spiritual as the soul is most apt to assimilate and fill and satisfie it Will I eat saith God of himself the flesh of bulls or drink the bloud of goats Can God take any delight therein It is not the sacrifice but the heart which being offered up brings a sweet savor unto him without this sacrifice is an abomination And so what is a feast a banquet of wine the sound of a viol the whole world to a soul which must needs check it self when in condescention to the flesh it takes part in that delight they bring Will ye spend these upon it as the Babylonians did their sheep
his baits to catch it When we hide it in sloth and idleness we hide it in a grave which he digged to bury it When we think to save it we loose it But when we hide it in Christ when we do Deum per Christum colere worship God through Jesus Christ our Lord when we rely on his power in Christ which is the foundation of all Christian Religion then our life having put off the old Adam is clothed with righteousness and is in a manner divine our mortal hath put on immortality and having hid our sins and weakness in Christ the image of God brightly shines forth in every action and the life of Jesus is made manifest in our mortal flesh so that our life with 2 Cor. 1. 11. him and his life in our mortal flesh in our weekness in our infirmities arms us against all assaults and makes us more then conquerors Now in the last place Christ 's help we need not doubt of if we be not wanting unto our selves For we have not such an high Priest who will not help us But which is one and the chief end of his Tentation who is merciful and faithful and was tempted that he might succour them which are tempted He hath not only Power for so he may have and not shew it but also Will and Propension Desire and diligent Care to hold them up that are set upon for the tryal of their faith Indeed Mercy without Power can beget a good wish but no more and Power without Mercy will neither strengthen a weak knee nor heal a broken heart But Mercy and Power together will work a miracle will hold us up when we are ready to fall will give legs to the lame and eyes to the blind and strength to the weak will make a fiery fornace a bath make a rack a bed will keep us the same men amidst the changes and armies of sorrows will moderate our sorrows when they are great that they be not long and when they are of continuance will call the evils that are as if they were not will uphold us against the terrors of Death and when he soundeth his retreat and takes us off from the field by Death will receive us to glory And this Compassion and Mercy though it were coeternal with Christ as God yet as Man he learnt it by his sufferings saith the Apostle Hebr. 5. 8. For the way indeed to know anothers misery is to be first sensible of our own For we commonly see that men who are softly and delicately brought up have hearts of flint If Dives be clothed in purple and fare deliciously every day it is no marvail to see him less merciful then his Doggs when Lazarus was at his door But you may say Could Christ who was the Son of God forget to be merciful or was he now to learn it as a new lesson who by his wisdome made the heavens because his mercy endureth for ever No He saw Joseph in the stocks Job on the dung-hill and the Mariners in the tempest He heard the sighs and complaints of the poor he numbred all their tears and had compassion on his afflicted ones even as a father hath on his only child But then before he emptied himself and took upon him the form of a servant sicut miseriam expertus Phil. 2. 7. non erat ita nec misericordiam experimento novit as he had no acquaintance with sorrow so neither had he any experimental knowledge of mercy and compassion In his sufferings he had tryal of misery and learn't to be merciful His own Hunger moved him to work that miracle of the Loaves For it is said in the Text He had compassion on the multitude His Poverty made him an Orator for the poor and he beggs with them and his Compassion melted him into tears at the sight of Jerusalem When he became a man of sorrows he became also a man of compassion And yet his experience of sorrow added in truth nothing to his knowledge But it rowseth our confidence to approach with boldness near unto him who by his miserable experience is brought nearer to us and hath thus reconciled us in the body 1 Cor. 21. 12. of his flesh For he that suffered for us hath compassion on us and suffers and is tempted with us even to the end of the world He was on the cross with St. Peter on the block with St. Paul in the fire with the Martyrs He in his members is still destitute afflicted tormented Would you take a view of Christ You may look upon him in your own souls take him in a groan mark him in a sigh behold him bleeding in the gashes of a wounded spirit Or to make him an object more sensible you may see him every day begging at your doors Christ learnt this Compassion in our flesh saith the Apostle Inasmuch as the children are partakers of flesh and bloud he also himself Hebr. 2. 14. likewise took part of the same and in our Flesh he was hungry was spit upon was whipped was nayled to the cross And all these were as it were so many parts of that discipline which taught him to be merciful to be merciful to them who are tempted by famine in that he was hungry to be merciful to them who are tempted by riches because he was poor to be merciful to them who tremble at disgrace because he was whipt and to be merciful to them who will not yet will suffer for him who refuse and yet chuse tremble and venture are afraid and yet dye for him because as Man he found Death a bitter cup and would have had it pass from him Who in the dayes of his flesh offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears for mortal men for weak men for sinners for those whose life is a warfare Pertinacissimè durant quae discimus experientiâ This experimental knowledge is rooted in Christ is sixt and cannot now be removed no more then his natural knowledge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Philosopher Experience is a kind of collection and multiplication of remembrances the issue and child of memory Usus me genuit mater peperit Memoria It proceedeth from the memory of many particulars And this experience Christ had And as the Apostle tells us he learnt so the Prophet tell us he was acquainted with our griefs and carried our sorrowes about with him even from his birth from his cradle to his cross By his fasting and tentation by his agony and bloudy sweat by his precious death and burial He remembers us in famine and tentation in our agony and bloudy sweat and all the penance we do upon our selves for sin He remembers us in the hour of death and in our grave and will remember us at the day of Judgment As a father pitieth his children so he pities us Psal 103. 13. and the reason is given verse 14. For he knoweth our frame he remembreth we are
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Cujacius adds out out of the Basilicae not to men asleep And can we then think that that Knowledge which is saving which must make us happy is of so easie purchase that it will be sown in every ground or as the Devils Tares will grow up whilst we sleep There is indeed that relation that sympathy betwixt the Soul of man and the Truth that there is between the Seed and the Ground but if it be not tilled and manured if not cultivated and prepared it will yield never an ear of corn but bring forth bryars and thorns But we leave this and pass to the third which is Method and orderly proceeding in the wayes of our calling As in all Sciences so in the businesses of Christianity we must not think to huddle up matters hand over head as we please Nemo vellus portat ad fullonem no man carries his fleece to the Fuller first before it be spun out and woven Si te titillat clericatûs desiderium saith St. Hierome If thou hast a kind of spiritual itch and be tickled with a desire of being a Preacher if thou thinkest the nearest way to heaven is to go up into the Pulpit yet at least discas quod possis docere learn that first which thou mayest after teach and think there is a pair of stairs unto Knowledge as well as into the Pulpit and that thither thou must ascend by steps and by degrees Learn it by thy Sermon if any thing may be learnt out of it that as thou dividest thy Text and thou handlest each part in its order so thou must divide the parts of thy life and spend them upon those particulars which will promote thy knowledge Sunt gradus multi per quos ad domum Veritatis ascenditur saith Lactantius There be certain steps and degrees by which we ascend into the house of Truth and we must pass step by step unto it For she will admit of no guests who will leap over the wall but of those onely who come orderly and mannerly in She looks down as it were upon us and observes how we come towards her If we are upon the wing or leap up two or three steps at once she shuts her door and turns her back upon us To see him a Master of a Ship in the Adriatick Sea who could never rule a cock-boat in a fish-pond him a Captain who was never yet a Souldier and him a teacher who is to learn is a strange kind of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an immethodical disorderly proceeding which is used in the world and what can the issue be but a Shipwrack a Defeat gross Ignorance and Confusion The last is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exercise and practice of truths in that order in which we learnt there This is of singular use to drive them home as a nayl is by the masters of the assemblies to make them enter the soul and the spirit the joynts and the marrow to do something by way of preparation which may bear some affinity and correspondence with the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the chief work we have to do Our preparations must not be like to those prefaces and proems which the old Orators used to frame and lay by them to serve for any tract or oration but it must be such as will fit and joyn it self to the work and be one entire piece You see our Saviour here makes use of Solitude and Fasting and Prayer and what more agreeable then these to the work which he had to do which was indeed to go about doing good and then to suffer death for the sin of the world which was now no paradise but a wilderness It is a sign of a happy progress when our preparation is a kind of type and presage of our work when our rising is fair when the beholder may say He is much given to meditation it is like he will be a Divine He is gone into the wilderness he hath retired himself sure he hath some great work in hand But the event is most unprosperous when Idleness and Ignorance are made the key of the Scripture when Darkness must usher in the Light and Belial be a fore-runner to God No work ends well which begins not well which is taken in hand without due preparation When we have taken any great work upon us it will be good for us to follow our Saviours method first retire from the world and go out into the wilderness first fast and pray and then work miracles And so much be spoken of the first reason of our Saviours Secession his Preparation to his work The second is That he might be fitter for Prayer In monte orationi adhaeret miracula in urbibus exercet For Prayer he chuseth the mountain for his Works the city He prayed all night saith the Father and wrought his miracles in the day Our Saviour often retired as we find in Scripture and for this end And when he gives us directions for Prayer one is Enter into thy chamber into thy closet Shut thy door Hide thy self for a little Isa 26. 20. time Which are works pointing out to those things which must be done without noise Every good work requires the whole man a soul divided and taken from the world but especially Prayer which is ascensus mentis in Deum a kind of an ascent of the mind unto God SURSUM CORDA Lift up your hearts They are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mystical words But how can we lift up a heart of flesh It is much it should ascend having such a weight upon it as the Body having an Eve which cannot alwaies be closed an Ear which cannot ever be shut but when the weight of Sin hangs upon it when it is clog'd with impertinent thoughts how should it ascend Nunc creberrimè in oratione mea aut per porticus deambulo aut de faenore computo saith St. Hierome Now many times it falls out in my prayer that I do nothing less then pray I cry for Mercy but the thought of Judgment is loud I pray for chastity when lustful thoughts sport in my heart I walk I talk I fight I dispute I tell money in my prayer and indeed I do but say my prayers Therefore intention of mind is most necessary to Prayer which is torn and distracted if it be not fastned on God alone 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is thought to be an Apostolical Constitution Be thou not double-minded in thy prayer Let not one thought stifle another the thought of the world quench the desire of a blessing Let not thy wandring imaginations contradict thy Prayers Let not thy Devotion be stained with bloud or polluted with lust or spotted with the world Quomodo te à Deo audiri postulas saith Cyprian cùm teipsum non audis How canst thou hope to be heard of God when thou dost not hear thy self how canst thou expect that he should understand thee when thou canst not tell
spake of Philosophy is as true of Religion and Devotion Fuit aliquando simplicior inter minora peccantes When men were truly devout there was no contention but this one Who should be most devour All the noise was in their Temples little in their Schools All men then did joyn together with one heart and mind in prayer and not as now fly asunder and stand at distance and then give laws to one another or which is worse in their hearts denounce a curse against those who will not follow their example that is set the countenance tune the voice roll the eye pray at adventure and in all things do as they do or which is equivalent to a curse esteem them at best but meer moral men would they were so good but unsanctified men and void of saving Grace and so nourish that venome and malice in their hearts against their Brethren which certainly cannot lodge in the same room with true Devotion and leave them only fit to act a prayer And then what a Roscius is a Pharisee Beloved Prayer was a Duty but is become a Probleme and men who cannot gain the reputation of Wise but by doing that for which they deserve another name and title have been bold to put it to the question When and How and In what manner we may pray as if this Form came short which our Saviour hath prescribed have lookt upon all other Forms and this of Christs by which they were made as upon a stone of offense and out of it have struck the fire of Contention Nihil tam sanctum quod non inveniat sacrilegum There is nothing so sacred so set apart which a profane hand dare not touch and violate no Manna which may not be loathed nothing so profitable to advance piety which may not be trod under foot If you cast a pearl to a Swine he will turn upon you and rent you if he can A set-Form That is a chain and binds the holy Ghost to an Ink-horn Meditation without which we will not speak to our fellow mortal That stints the blessed Spirit It is their own language They bring Sermons and Prayers of Gods own making because they themselves takes no pains in framing them Multa sunt sic digna revinci nè gravitate adorentur saith Tertullian Many exceptions may be taken which are not worth the excepting against and many are so ridiculous that to be serious and earnest in confuting of them were to honour them too much We cannot but pity the men because we are Christians otherwise we could not but make them the object of our laughter We have probability enough to induce us to believe that some of those who have so startled at a Form would for the very same reason have complained had there been none at all For he that looks for a fault will be sure to find one or if he do not find will make one They would have been as hot and angry had the Church been naked as they are now they see her glorious in all her embroydery Ceremony or no Ceremony Form or no Form all is one to him whose custome whose nature whose advantage it is to be contentious What no reverence in the Church of Christ as lyable to exceptions as What too much What turn the cock and let it run one would think more obnoxious to censure then by meditation to draw waters out of the fountain the Word of God What speak we know not what Such an accusation in all reason should sooner raise a tempest then to pray after that manner which our best Master hath taught us When it concerns us to be angry every shadow is a monster every thing is out of order every thing nothing is a fault I have not been so particular as I should because we live among fanatick spirits with men who as David speaketh are soon set on fire who can themselves at pleasure libel the whole world yet put on the malice of a Fiend and clothe themselves with vengeance at the sound of the most gentle reprehension Imbecilla loedi se putant si tangantur You must not lay a finger upon that which is weak If you but touch them they are inraged and will pursue you as a murderer Yet we may take leave to consider what degrees and approaches the Arch-Enemy of the Church and Religion hath made to overthrow all Devotion and to digg up Christianity by the roots First men are offended with Ceremony though as ancient as the Church it self and at last cry down Duty First no Kneeling at the Sacrament and then no Sacrament at all First no Witnesses at the Font and then no Baptism First no Ordination and then no Minister and he is the best Preacher who hath no calling though he be fitter to handle the Flayl then the Bible First no Adorning of Churches and presently they speak it plainly A Barn a Stable is as good as a Church And so it may be for such cattle as they First no set-Form of Prayer and within a while they will teach Christ himself how to pray Thus Error multiplyes it self and striking over-hastily at that which is deemed Superstition leaves that untoucht and wounds Religion it self and swallows up the Truth in victory in the unadvised and heedless pursuit of an error This is an evil humor and works upon every matter it meets with and when it hath laid all desolate before it it will at last gnaw upon it self as in the bag of Snakes in Epiphanius the greatest Snake eat up the lesser and at last half of himself For we commonly see that they that strike at whatsoever other men set up are at last as active to destroy the work of their own hands and they who quarrel with every thing do at last fall out with themselves Oh what pity is it that Religion and Piety should be thus toyed withal that men should play the wanton with those heavenly advantages which should be as staves to uphold them here on earth and as wings to carry them up to heaven that there should be so much noise and business about that Duty which requireth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the quietness the tranquility the stillness of the soul that Praying should become begging indeed I mean as Begging is now-a-dayes an art and trade that all Devotion should be lost in shews that men should hate Ceremony and yet be so much Papists as they are that they should cry Down with Babylon even to the ground and yet build up a Babel in themselves But beloved we have not so learned Christ Therefore let us lay hold on better things and such as accompany Piety that Piety which brings with it salvation Let us not be afraid of a good duty because it hath fallen into evil hands Let us not leave off to pray in that Form which our Saviour hath taught us or in any other Form which is conformable to that because some men love to play the wantons and
as their argument It is plain we must not understand here Moses 's Heaven the Ayr for the Firmament but St. Pauls third Heaven This is the City of the great King the City of the living God the Psal 48. 2. Hebr. 12. 22. Hebr 1 10. 1 Tim. 6 16. Psal 103. 19. heavenly Jerusalem a City which hath foundations whose builder and maker is God Here our Father dwelleth in light inaccessible unconceivable Here he keepeth his glorious residence and here he hath prepared his throne Here he keepeth his glorious residence and here he hath prepared his throne Here thousand thousands minister unto him and ten thousand times ten thousand stand Dan. 7. 9. before him Here he still sheweth the brightness of his countenance and to all eternity communicateth himself to all his blessed Angels and Saints Beloved the consideration of this stately Palace of the King of Kings should fill our hearts with humility and devotion and make us put-up our petitions at the throne of Grace with all reverence and adoration Is our Father Psal 104. 1. Gen. 18. 27. in heaven clothed with honor and majesty Then let us who are but dust and ashes vile earth and miserable sinners when we make our approaches to this great and dreadful God not be rude and rash and inconsiderate vainly multiplying Dan. 9 4. words before him without knowledge and using empty and heartless repetitions but let us first recollect our thoughts compose our affections bring our minds into a heavenly frame take to our selves words fit to Hos 14. 2. express the desires of our souls and then let us worship and bow down and Psal 95. 6. kneel before the Lord our Maker and let us pour forth our prayers into the bosome of our heavenly Father our Tongue all the whiâ—e speaking nothing but what the Heart enditeth This counsel the Preacher giveth us Be not rash with thy mouth and let not thine heart be hasty to utter any thing before Eccl. 5. 2. God For God is in heaven and thou upon earth therefore let thy words be few Again is our Father in heaven Then our heart may be glad and our Psal 16. 9 10. glory rejoyce and our flesh also rest in hope God will not leave us in the grave nor suffer us to live for ever under corruption but in due time we shall be brought out of that bonaage into a glorious liberty and be admitted into those Rom. 8. 21 happy mansions in our Fathers house He will have his children like unto John 14. 2 3. himself Therefore we may be assured that as now he guideth us with his counsel Psal 73. 25. so he will afterwards receive us into glory Our elder Brother who is gone before and hath by his ascension opened the gate of Heaven and prepared a place for us will come again at the end of the world and awake us John 14. 3. Psal 17. 15. Mat. 25. 21 23. 1 John 3. 2. 1 Cor. 15. 49. out of our beds of dâ—st and receive us unto himself that we may enter into the joy of our Lord for ever behold his face see him as he is be satisfied with his likeness and as we have born the image of the earthy so bear the image of the heavenly And now Beloved having this hope in us let us purifie our 1 John 3. 3. selves even as our Father which is in heaven is pure While we remain here below and pass through this valley of Tears let us ever and anon lift up our Psal 84. 6. Psal 121. 1. Isa 57. 15. eyes unto the hills even to that high and holy place wherein dwelleth that high and lofty One who inhabiteth eternity yet not boldly to gaze and busily to pry within the veil For Heaven is too high and bright an object for our Eye to discern and discover for our Tongue to discourse and dispute of But SURSUM CORDA Let us look up to heaven that we may learn not to mind earthly things but to set our affections on those things which are above to Col. 3. 2. have our conversation in heaven and our heart there where our everlasting Phil. 3. 20. Matth. 6. 21. treasure is Let us still wish and long and breathe and pant to mount that holy hill and often with the Spirit and the Bride say Come Come Lord Rev. 22. 17 20 Jesus come quickly and sigh devoutly with the Psalmist When shall we come Psal 42. 2. and appear before God And in the mean time let us sweeten and lighten those many tribulations we must pass through with the sober and holy contemplation Acts 14. 22. of that far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory of the fulness of joy 2 Cor. 4. 17. that is in Gods presence and of those pleasures for evermore that are at the Psal 16. 11. right hand of OUR FATHER WHICH IS IN HEAVEN To whom with the Son and the Holy Ghost be all honor and glory now and ever Amen The Two and Thirtieth SERMON PART IV. MATTH VI. 9. Hallowed be thy Name WE have past the Preface or Frontis-piece and must now take a view of the Building the Petitions themselves We find a needless difference raised concerning the number of them Some have made seven Petitions and have compared them to the seven Stars in heaven to the seven golden Candlesticks to the seven Planets to the river Nilus which as Seneca tells us per septena ostia in mare effunditur ex his quodcunque elegeris mare est is divided into seven streams and every stream is an Ocean Others have fitted them to the seven Gifts of the Spirit Those we will not call with A. Gellius nugalia or with Seneca ineptias toyes and trifles but we may truly say Aliquid habent ingenii nihil cordis Some shew of wit we may perhaps descry in them but not any great savor or relish of sense and judgment What perfection there can be in one number more than in another or what mystery in the number of seven I leave it to their inquiry who have time and leasure perscrutari interrogare latebras numerorum as the Father speaks to search and dive into the secrets of Numbers who by their art and skill can digg the ayr and find precious metal there where we of duller apprehension can find no such treasure I confess men of great wits have thus delighted themselves numeros ad unquem excutere to sift and winnow Numbers but all the memorial of their labor was but chaff The number of Fourty for Christ after his Resurrection staid so long upon earth they have divided into four Denaries and those four they have paralleld with the four parts of the World into which the sound of the Gospel should go The number of Ten they have consecrated in the Law and the number of Seven in the holy Ghost Perfecta lex in Denario numero
our Good non sunt unius animi cannot harbor in the same heart at once Nor doth God require of them an actual and perpetual intention of his Glory but as the Schools speak an habitual Thou mayest pray to his glory when thy thoughts are busie and reflect upon thy own want We see an arrow flyes to the mark by the force of that hand out of which it was sent and he that travels on the way may go forward in his journey though he divert his thoughts sometimes upon some occurences in the way and do not alwayes fix them on the place to which he is going So when thy Will and Affections are quickned and enlivened with the love of Gods Glory every action and prayer will carry with it a savor and relish of that fountain from whence they spring An Artificer doth not alwayes think of the end why he builds a house but his intention on his work sometimes comes in between and makes him forget his end And though he make a thousand pieces yet he still retains his Art saith Basil So though thou canst not make this main Intention of Gods Glory keep time with thy Devotion nor send up every thought thus incenst and perfumed yet the smell of thy sacrifice shall come before God because it is breathed forth of that heart which is Gloriae ara an Altar dedicated wholly to the glory of God Thy ear must be to keep it as thy Heart with all diligence to nourish and strengthen it that if it seem to sleep yet it may not dy in thee to barricado thy heart against all contrary and heterogeneous imaginations all wandring cogitations which as Jacob may take his first-born by the heel and afterwards supplant and robb it of its birth-right For these thoughts will borrow no life from thy first intention of Gods Glory but the intention of Gods Glory will be lost and dye in these thoughts We pass forward to that which we proposed in the second place That spiritual blessings must have the first place in our prayers Holiness and Obedience must go before our daily bread the spiritual Manna which nourisheth us up unto eternal life before 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the things of this present life or that bread which upholds us but for a span of time A doctrine as most plain so most necessary for these times in which mens hearts are so set on gain and temporal respects that heaven finds but little room in their thoughts and so care for the Body as if they knew not whether they had any Soul or no Of his mind in Plautus who professed if he were to sacrifice to Jupiter yet si quid lucri esset if gain and filthy lucre presented it self before him he would rem divinam deserere instantly run from the Altar and leave his sacrifice Epictetus the Stoick observed that there were daily sacrifices brought to the Temples of the Gods for wealth for honors for victory but none ever offered up for a good mind And Seneca tells us Turpissima vota diis insusurrant that men were wont to whisper dishonest desires into the ears of the Gods si quis autem admoverit aurem conticescunt but if any stood near them to hearken they were presently silent Were the hearts of many men anatomized and opened we should find Riches and Content deeply rooted in the very center but Holiness and Obedience and Honesty of conversation written in faint and fading characters in superficie in the very surface and outside of the heart Villam malumus quà m coelum We had rather have a Farm a Cottage than Paradise and three lives in that than eternity in heaven We had rather be rich than good mighty than just And talk what you will of sanctifying Gods Name we had rather make our selves one of advancing his Kingdom we had rather reign as Kings of fulfilling Gods Will we will do our own of the Bread of life Give us this day our daily Bread But thus to pray is not to pray 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 after that manner which Christ here taught but a strange 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 want of method in our Devotion Our Love is seen in our language For those things which most affect us we love to talk of we use to dream of and our thoughts are restless in the pursuit of them It was observed in Alexander as a kind of prophesie and presage of his many conquests quòd nihil humile aut puerile sciscitaretur that he speaking with the Persian Ambassadors askt no childish or vain question sed aut viarum longitudinem aut itinerum modos but of the length of the wayes and the distance of places of the Persian King and of his Court A man saith the Wise-man is known by his speech and a Christian by his prayers I could be copious in this argument but purposely forbear because it is so common a place Only to set your Devotion on fire and raise it to things above may you please to consider Temporal goods 1. not satisfactory 2. as an hindrance to the improvement of Spiritual Do but consult your own Reason and that will tell you that the Mind of man is unsatiable in this life Who ever yet brought all his ends and purposes about and rested there Possideas quantum rapuit Hero Let a man possess what Craft and unlawful Policy can entitle him to Let him be Lord of all that lyes in the bosome of the earth and in the bosome of the Sea Let him as Solomon did even study how to give himself all delight imaginable yet with all this cost with all this pains and travel he is as far from what he lookt for as when he first set out Now as God having made the Understanding an eye hath made the whole Universe for its object so having placed a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an infinite desire in the soul hath proportioned something to allay it Which since these temporal things cannot do it is evident that heaven and spiritual blessings are those things which alone can satisfie this infinite appetite Put them both in the Scales and there is no comparison You may as well measure Time by Aeternity and weigh a little sand on the shore with the whole Ocean Again as they do not satisfie so are they an hinderance to our improvement in spiritual wealth Alter de lucro cogitat alter de honore putat quòd eum Deus possit audire One thinks of Gain when he prays for Godliness another of Honor when he talks of Heaven We may call this Prayer if we will but most certain it is that God never hears it nor any prayer which is not made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Isidore speaks with diligence Which leads us to that which we proposed in the third place That when we pray Hallowed be thy Name we do not simply pray that God will do it without us but that he will supply us with those means and helps
have us to wait upon him at distance When he teacheth us to call him FATHER he seems to call us too near to him that we go not too far but when he commands us to say Thy will be done he teacheth us like Servants to know our place that we come not too near nor be too familiar with him I will yet add one reason more and that from Christ himself who was now come into the world not to do his own will but the will of him that sent him This will be now declares to all the world Which was but darkly seen before wrapt up in types hid in visions vailed in the ceremonies of the Law but now it is made manifest to all the world So that we may find a kind of triumph in this Form the acclamations of Love and Joy FIAT Thy will be done For as Job said Shall we receive good things at the hands of God and not evil so on the contrary shall we set a FIAT set our seal to the evils which God sends and not to the good news to the voice of his thunder when he scatters his enemies and not to the voice of his Angel which proclaims peace The Redemption of mankind by the comming of Christ was praecipua pars providentiae the fairest piece in which the Providence of God shewed it self decreed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before the foundations of the world were laid This FIAT then Thy will be done is he voice of Faith and Obedience and Gratitude The Grammarians tell us there be some words which will not fit a Tragedy and Donatus had a conceit Si ferrum nominetur in comaedia transit in tragoediam That but to name a Sword in a Comedy were enough to fright it into a Tragedy But these words will serve and fit both fit us on our good dayes and fit us on our bad fit us in our sorrow and in our joy in the house of mourning and at a triumph as fit for us the first comming of Christ as for the second But this is not all For this flows but from a decree of God what he would do on the earth and what he would do for us And this might awake the most sullen Ingratitude We are all willing to set a FIAT to those decrees which are made for our good Will God send his Son His will be done Here a FIAT hath not enough of the wing and therefore the gloss which our Heart gives is Oh Lord make no long tarrying But besides this as Christ came to do his Fathers will so he came to teach us his will also Certainly to think otherwise is a most dangerous error For what is it but to make the Gospel of Christ to be the Gospel of sinful man nay the Gospel of the Devil What is it but to poyson the many wholsome precepts we find there This shuts up the FIAT within the compass of the absolute Decree and our Petition is no more then this That God would be as good as his word and fulfill those promises on us which he made before the foundations of the world were laid Gods Promises are like his Threats conditional If thou believe I will give unto thee eternal life If thou overcome thou shalt be crowned Is it not good news to the heavy-laden that by comming to Christ he may be eased to the rich that he may make such friends of Mammon as may at last receive him into everlasting habitations to the captive that he may shake his shackles off and to every Christian that if he will but fight he shall purchase a Kingdome The Gospel is not the less Gospel because it conteins precepts and laws Evangelical Laws is no contradiction at all Will you hear our Saviour speak like a Law-giver This is my commandment And You shall be my Disciples if you do what I command you Will you see him in his robes as a Judge Behold him in flaming fire taking vengeance on them 2 Thess 1. 8. that know not God And who are they Even those that obey not the Gospel of Christ And how shall they be judged According to my Gospel Rom. 2. 16. saith St. Paul We need not stand longer on this point But if they will not grant us this we will yet increase further upon them and shew this Petition to be most proper to the Gospel For it is not only This is my commandment but A new commandment give I unto you For though at sundry John 13. 34. times and in divers manners God had revealed his Will to our Fathers by the Prophets yet in these last dayes he hath spoken by his Son more plainly and more fully expressing his will then ever heretofore and after which he will never speak again For the Grace of God is made manifest by the 2 Tim. 1. 10. appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ who hath abolisht death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel And as it is his last Will so it removes those indulgences and dispensations which were granted under the Law and which stood as a thick cloud before the eyes of the Jews that they could not fully and clearly discern the full purport of his Will Hac ratione munit nos Christus adversus Diaboli latitudines saith Tertullian The opening of Gods Will by Christ is as a fense to keep us from those latitudes and exspatiations and extravagancies and shews us yet a more excellent way discovering unto us the danger of those sins which heretofore under the Law went under that name The Jews were Gods peculiar people and to them he gave his statutes and his testimonies but yet he did not expect that perfection from a Jew which he doth from a Christian Our Saviour doth not only clear the Law from those corrupt glosses with which the Jewish Doctors had infected it but also ampliavit expanxit legem totam retro vetustatem as Tertullian speaketh Who hath believed our report and to whom is the arm of the Lord Isa 53. 1. revealed saith the Prophet Some report the Prophets made but not all nor were they fully heard It is the Will of God that we deny our selves that we take up our cross that we use this world as if we used it not living in the world but out of the world non exercentes quod nati sumus not being what indeed we are Where find we these lessons this his Will but in the Gospel A vain attempt it is to draw them into the Decalogue by force by I know not what Analogie by long and far-fetcht deductions For by the same art I may contract all the ten Commandments into one No man commits a sin but ipso facto in some proportioned sense he hath set up another God which is only forbid in the first Commandment We use not to commit those secrets to every messenger which we do to our son Nor did the Prophets the Messengers of Christ know
his works which beholds Omnipotencie in the creation of the world which sees a world of miracles in Man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a great world in a little one which hears God in his thunder considers who is Father of the Rain and who begets the drops of the Dew out Job 38. of whose womb the Ice came Meditation is that spiritual rumination that chewing of the cudd which brings and calls back all the works of God ab intestino memoriae ad os cogitationis from the bowels and stomach of the Memory as St. Augustine speaks to the mouth of the Thoughts that there we may feed upon them with fresh delight and make them comfortable and wholsome to our souls which prepareth us contrà omnia fidei excidia as Hilary speaketh against all those temptations which are dangerous and deleterial to our Faith We cannot doubt but that he who delights in what God hath done hath also surrendred his will to God and said from his very heart Let the will of God be done Nazianzene in Orat. 39. yet adds another and that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an holy emulation to work great works to be Gods unto our selves Not to create a new world but the help of Gods grace to create new hearts in our selves to bind and fetter the common enemy of mankind to open the windows of goals and wash our sins with the tears of our repentance to strike those rocks our stony hearts that the waters of contrition may gush forth in a holy consideration of Gods Immensity and Power to gain to our selves with St. Paul a kind of Omnisciency to have all knowledge and a kind of Omnipotency 1 Cor. 13. 2. through Christ who strengthneth us to be able to do all things And by Phil. 4. 13. these by falling down in a reverent Admiration of what God hath wrought by our continual Praises and Gratulations and Hallelujahs by walking every day about the gallery of our souls and viewing with delight those many pictures and various representations of his wonderful works by a holy Aemulation to work something in our own souls which may resemble what he hath wrought in the world by recounting with our selves that that great God did not make us thus wonderfully to be his miracles and to do trifles by these as by so many faithful interpreters we best acknowledge and express our conformity to Gods Absolute Will We pass now to shew what conformity we owe to the Natural Will of God which we call voluntatem desiderii inclinationis his Will of Desire and Inclination his Prime and Antecedent Will by which he desires the happiness of all mankind and administers all the means to bring them to it And here I can conceive no difficulty at all but if Gods Natural Will be to have all men saved then certainly the same mind should be in us 1 Tim. 2. 4. which is in God and we should pray that all men may be saved Shall God will it and we not pray for it Shall the cataracts of Gods Mercy and Goodness stand wide open and we quite shut up the passage of our Devotion Is it impossible that God naturally should will the damnation of any man and is it possible that we should think there be some men for whom we ought not to pray I have read the Catalogues of old Heresies written by St. Augustine and Philastrius and I find some of them to be such ridiculous phansies such intellectual meteors that I have much wondred those Worthies would once stain their papers with them or take such pains to deliver them to posterity Methinks they should have destroyed those monsters in their birth and not have graced them so much as to have told after-ages that they ever were or had so much as being in the Church But I do not remember that there is any one of them of so monstrous a shape as this That it is not lawful to pray for the salvation of all men This sure was reserved for these after-ages to attend upon its mis-shapen damm that ill-begotten phansie of the absolute Decree of Reprobation I could not once conceive that any should delight in so killing a phansie which quite cutteth off all hope of salvation from some men and leaves them in a far worse case than the Gadarenes Hoggs For the Devils entring into Luke 8. them presently carried them into the sea and drowned them and so left them but according to this doctrine some men are prepared on purpose by God to be an habitation of devils and to dwell with devils for ever But these severe men who cut off all hope of life from some and with it the prayers of the Church are all Sheep themselves pure and innocent so sure of their salvation that I can find small reason they have to pray for it but that they may neglect this duty as well as they do others as necessary upon this presumptuous ground But why may not we pray for all 1 Tim. 2. 6. men as well as Christ give himself a price for all And is it not commanded that prayers and intercessions should be made for all men Which if we 1 Tim. 2. 1. neglect that judgment which we have laid at other mens doors will be brought home at last unto our own Besides Gods Will they say of damning men is secret and if it be unlawful to pray for that which he is resolved not to do a great part of our devotion must needs expire and the incense of those many prayers of the Saints cannot send up any pleasant savour who begg those things at his hands which his will was never to reach forth and give To Faith the number of the elect appears but small but to Charity the Church is large and copious and she sees none which is not or may not be a member thereof It may be said perhaps that I erre when I pray that all may be saved Be it so but it is an error of my Charity and therefore a most necessary error For it is the very property of Charity thus to erre And it is not a lye but a commendable office and acceptable in Gods sight in my prayers to wish the eternal happiness of him who perhaps shall be for ever miserable These holy mistakes of Charity shall never be imputed nor be numbred amongst my sins of Ignorance For he that errs not thus he that hopes not the best he can of every man he sees wants something yet and comes short of a good Christian Christianum est errare It is the part of every Christian and a singular duty thus to erre The reason is manifest For there is no heart so much stone which God cannot malleate and out of which he cannot raise a child unto Abraham Sin may reign in our mortal bodies ad mortem to make us lyable to death and it may reign ad difficultatem that it will be very difficult to shake
to its reward in the next life Weigh them together and they will prove very light What is a pebble to a diamond the transitory wealth of this world to the treasures of heaven long life to eternity And these we shall have for what we give to the poor by way of exchange And what greater increase can our money bring us in Fac cùm tuis opibus ut unam nubeculam excites saith the Father Try if with all thy wealth thou canst raise a cloud as big as a mans hand but by giving it away thou mayest do greater works than that Thou mayst open the windows of heaven It cannot turn the night into day but being cast away it will be thy harbinger to prepare a place for thee there where there is no night at all I have fallen you see upon a common subject and did intend once to have balked it or but to have toucht upon it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the way For things common and ordinary do lose their price and credit amongst men and the palate of many hearers is grown so dainty that to speak to them of so common and vulgar a lesson as this seems to be is as if you should set before them cramben bis coctam or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some cold course or ordinary diet the Gibeonites mouldy bread like she Jews Manna which their souls abhorred because it was so common But to take away this error I have learnt to call no useful doctrine common or trivial and that things common and plain are most excellent yea therefore most common and plain because they are most excellent The Jews were wont to give out the books of holy Scripture respectively to the abilities of men Some few were permitted to the vulgar the rest were lockt up to be read only by the learned But this lesson admits no such restraint but lyes equally open to the use of both Besides methinketh the Church of Christ is much degenerated from what it was in ancient times and this word NOSTER generally now-a-dayes mistaken as if it only gave us entry and possession and then stood as a fense about our wealth to keep our brethren off The primitive Christians I am sure did never so understand it and therefore to feed others who were in want was their daily Bread If I should relate unto you the stories of some ancient Saints I fear their Charity and Bounty to the poor though wondred at by all would be followed by none Some it may be would not spare to censure and condemn it as excessive But is it not safer in performing of duties to exceed then to come short Is it not strange that some of them should be more willing to give all they had to the poor then we are to part with our superfluities that they should be so compassionate and liberal in times of tryal and persecution and we so hard-hearted and close-handed in dayes of peace and plenty that Charity which was so hot and active in winter should grow so cold in summer Their alms were hearty and real ours are good words without deeds Depart in peace Be ye warmed and filled or we say Satis est James 2. 16. si corde Deus suspiciatur as the Gnosticks in Tertullian If Religion and Charity be shut up in the heart it is enough outward expressions and ceremonies are needless We read Scriptures for no other purpose but to cull out certain thrifty Texts to pretend unto our Covetousness and Distrust as that Charity begins from it self that He is worse than an Infidel that provides not for his family But as for those other Scriptures that perswade us to be open-handed To lend looking for nothing again Having two coats to part with him that hath none these we can gently pass by as Meteors and airy Speculations and with some shuffling and shifting interpretations remove them out of the way We read that when Amasa wounded 2 Sam. 20. 12 13. by Joab lay in the way wallowing in his bloud the people that followed Joab stood still as they came to Amasa till he was removed out of the way It falls out so with men willing to be Christians and yet unwilling to leave the thriving courses which are common in the world When in their pursuit of gain they meet with these places of Scripture Go sell all thou hast and give to the poor Cast thy bread upon the waters He that forsaketh not all he hath cannot be my Disciple and the like cannot but be much amused start and stand still as it were at Amasa's body Now they who have been the authors of certain mollifying paraphrases and distinctions and restrictions have removed these harsher places of Scripture as it were Amasa's body shut up the fountain of Liberality and made the way clear and open to all our covetous desires We have lately a learned Discourse put into our hands written by Salmasius in defense of Usury But for all I can perceive the best argument he brings is ab incommodo drawn from those inconveniences which will necessarily follow if Usury be not admitted But for my self I confess I have not as yet attain'd to that skill to know how to ground a Truth upon Conveniencie For it is natural to Truth to meet with inconvenience And Martin Luther will tell us Allegatio inconvenientis non tollit argumenta That to alledge inconveniences is not the way to answer arguments nor to build up a conclusion But the reason why I mention Salmasius's book is a strong position I find there and one ground of his Discourse is this Alii mores alia vita esse debuit ecclesiae liberae oppressae That it is not necessary that the practice and piety of the Church then in persecution and now at this day flourishing should be the same That then it was in vain to be careful in gathering of wealth when the enemy stood before their eyes ready to rob and spoil them That our Saviour then especially commended Poverty and Contempt of riches as that which would best consist and comply with the Gospel and Christianity Willing I am to yield him thus much That in respect of outward Government to bring our Church now flourishing in peace back to the same state she was in under persecution is neither necessary nor possible It is as vain an attempt saith Castellio as to bring the Autumn back to the Spring or to make the Spring in Autumn at all times to sow and at all times to reap But in respect of inward Sanctity Piety and Contempt of the world it is the duty of every Christian in this latter age not only to resemble our Fore-fathers and to be like the first Christians but if it be possible to exceed them Lay not up treasures here on earth Care not for the morrow Sell all that you have and give to the poor and many other precepts of the like leaven hath our Saviour delivered us in the Gospel
kill me and when I have recovered one malady I may be thrown down by another Habet hoc solicitudo quòd omnia necessaria putet True Care and Solicitude thinks nothing done till all be done and is afraid that the least distemper may be as dangerous as a disease FORGIVE US OUR SINS Who knows the danger of the least sin and will not make the gloss himself Forgive us them all and make his Repentance hold analogy with the Mercy of God which doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 make a perfect and universal cure In medicines for the body that may be good for the Head which is not for the Heart and that may be soveraign for the Stone which hath no virtue in easing the Gout But the Mercy of God is like his Power in this ita magna in magnis ut non sit minor in minimis equal and like it self in the purging and remission of the greatest and smallest sins Upon our repentance he blotteth out all our sins and transgressions whether they be devoratoriae salutis those which till they be forgiven take away all hope of salvation or quotidianae incursionis those which every day by subreption steal upon us or modica media delicta as Tertullian those sins of a middle nature which are not to be reckoned amongst those of daily incursion nec tamen culmen tenent and yet do not reach the highest pitch of impiety I cannot but acknowledge that it is necessary to distinguish of sins And it is no Logical deduction which the Church of Rome hath made That because we make all sins in their own nature mortal we therefore make them all equal Yet in our repentance and devotion it will be one part of our spiritual wisdom minima pro maximis cavere to consider our least sins as if they were of the greatest magnitude to think there is danger not only in Murder but in an angry thought that not only our burning Lusts but a very spark may consume us vel atomos numerare and to number up the very atomes of sins For though those ordinary sins which steal upon us unseen and slip by us insensibly do not digg up Charity by the very root yet certainly they proceed from no other fountain than a defect and want of Charity which if it were as perfect and consummate as it ought to be would arm us against the assault of these thieves which steal in by night And more wisdom it is etiam quae tuta sunt pertimescere to be jealous of that which will not hurt us and to think that a fault which is none than to say of these sins as Lot did of Zoar Are they not little ones and my soul shall live or to sit down with the resolution of the Casuists in almost the same case Modicum pro nihilo est A small sin is in esteem as good as none at all For by thus slighting them sins multiply and gather strength numero vincunt what they want in bulk they supply in number and overwhelm thee if not as great yet as many Small expenses saith Aristotle if frequent overthrow a family And it is but a fallacie to think if the particulars be small the sum will be so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Great is not therefore small because it consists of many littles And the great Oratour will tell us that that neglect which endangers a Common-wealth is not streight seen in particular actions and miscarriages but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the conclusion and event at last And St. Augustine hath observed of these small sins Quantò minora tantò crebriora Because they be less we presume the oftner to commit them I know there is no man when he puts up this Petition doth except any the least sin but would have them all buried in the bottom of the Sea Yet we must not think it is enough to ask forgiveness but we must be also watchful to observe them and take these brats and dash them against the stones For even these brats if we play and sport with them will prove at last mighty Gyants sons of Anak which will fight against us to keep us out of Canaan St. Augustine lib. 2. De Civit. Dei tells us that this is a daily prayer and that it will blot out quotidiana peccata our ordinary and daily sins sine quibus in hac vita non vivitur as he speaks in his Enchiridion without which the severest man doth not pass his life and for common steps DIMITTE NOBIS PECCATA this common prayer Forgive us our trespasses may suffice But yet he tells us withal Quia fiunt peccata ideo dicitur non ut ideo fiant quia dicitur That this is said and we are taught thus to pray because we through infirmity fall into these sins but we must not fall into these sins because we are taught thus to pray For as there were some in his time who mistaking this very Petition thought that they might persist in any sin so they forgave their brother and were bountiful to the poor and needy that with a piece of money they might redeem their adulteries and uncleanness and satisfie for the sins of the greatest magnitude So if it went once for true that to breathe out these words would scatter our daily sins before the wind and quite abolish them men would be very apt at last to be too favourable interpreters of God and to think he takes no notice of those idle words for which he hath threatned to bring us into judgment and we should sin and pray and pray and sin and carry this Petition with us to ease us of these sins as some foolish women in Chrysostoms time did certain pieces of gold of Alexander the Great to cure the head-ach And this is non tam morbo laborare quà m remedio to be sick not so much of our disease as of the remedy which being skilfully applyed is indeed an antidote but taken as a charm or spell proves as dangerous as the disease which it was to remove and makes that mortal which of it self might have been purged out with ease I will say no more but with the Father Objurgemus nostra phantasmata tam nugatorios ludos de spectaculo mentis ejiciamus Let us check and chide our phansies when they catch at such shadows as these and cast out such trifling slights out of our minds and learn to pray for the forgiveness of these sins and also to strive against them to watch our hands and set a seal to our lips to observe each thought as it enters lest when we have purged the hand and the tongue and all the members of our body by delighting in thoughts because they are but thoughts we do at last lupanar in palatio constituere erect a stews in the very palace of the soul Let us remember that we pray for the forgiveness of these sins as we do of all the rest with a resolution
of our lives joyn these two Petitions together When our sins are forgiven Let us pray and labor too that we be not led into tentation And that for many reasons which we must duly weigh and consider as we tender the welfare and salvation of our souls First Remission and Forgiveness as it nullifies former sins so doth it multiply those that follow as it takes away the guilt from the one so it adds unto the guilt of the other and makes Sin over-sinful We are now Children and must not speak our former dialect words cloathed about with Death but our language and voice must be Abba Father and every action such a one as a Father may look upon and be well pleased And this first word of our Nativity as Cyprian speaks Our Father which art in heaven is as a remembrance to put us in mind that we have renounced all carnality and know only our Father which is in heaven Reatus impii pium nomen saith Salvian A good name is part of the guilt of a wicked man Our Religion which we profess will accuse us and that relation which we have to God will condemn us Plutarch said well I had rather a great deal men should say there were no such man as Plutarch than that they should say there was one Plutarch that would eat up his children as soon as they were born as the Poets speak of Saturn And better it were that it should be said we were no Christians than that we were Christians ready to devour one another Christians but adulterers Christians but malitious the children of God with the teeth of a Lion delighting in those sins which we abjure and every day committing that for which we beg pardon every day This consideration was it I suppose that caused divers Christians to do what some of the Fathers have condemned defer their Baptism And when they were baptized what a multitude of ceremonies did they use what prayers what geniculations what fastings what watchings First they breathed upon them thrice and thrice bad Satan avoid that Christ might enter Secondly they exorcised them that the evil Spirit might depart and give place Then they gave them salt that their putrid sins might be cleansed Then they touched their nostrils and their ears They anointed their breasts and their shoulders They anointed their head and covered it They put upon them white apparel They laid their hands upon them that they might receive the grace of the Spirit Of all which we may say as Hilary doth of Types Plus significant quà m agunt They had more signification than virtue or power and were intimations what piety is required of them who have given up their names unto Christ how foul Sin appears in him that is washed and how dangerous it is after reconcilement Now as in the conversation of men we cannot easily judge where Love is true and where it is feigned by a smile or by fair language or by the complement of the tongue or hand and therefore some opportunity some danger must offer it self by the undertaking of which our friendship is tryed as Gold is in the fire so we cannot judge of Repentance that it is true by an exterminated countenance by the beating of the breast by the hanging down of the head no not by our sighs and groans by our tears and prayers by our ingemination of DIMITTE NOBIS Lord Forgive us which many times are no better than so many complements with God than the flattery of our lips and hands But when temptations rush-in upon us when they threaten in afflictions when they smile upon us in the pleasures of the world then it will appear whether that which was in voto in our desires were also in affectu in our resolution And if we bear not this tryal we have no reason to be too confident of our Pardon Again if we sue for pardon of sin and then sin afresh we become more inclinable to sin then we were before It is more easie to abstein from the pleasures of Sin before we have tasted them then it will be afterwards as its harder to remain a widow then to continue a virgin harder not to look back toward Sodom after one hath left it then it would have been to have kept out of it at first That which is once done hath some affinity with that which is done often and that which is done often is near to that which is done alwayes God indeed in Scripture is said to harden mens hearts and some be very forward to urge those Texts yet Induration is the proper and natural effect of continuance in sin For every man saith Basil is shaped and formed and configured as it were to the common actions of his life whether they be good or evil Long continuance in sin causeth that which Theodoret calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a reverberating heart an heart which is as marble to all the threatnings and promises of God it worketh in the sinner that difficulty and inability of resisting tentations that he becomes even a devil to himself and will fall without them And this may seem to fall as a just judgment of God on those who fix their eyes so steddily upon the Mercy-seat that they quite forget the two Tables who are all for the REMITTE but not at all for the NE INDUCAS very earnest for Remission of sins but faint and backward in resisting Tentations I will not deliver it as a positive truth but it is good for us to cast an eye of jealousie upon it as if it were so That there may be a measure of sins which being once full God will expect no longer a certain period of time when he will neither comfort us with his Mercy nor assist us with his Grace but deliver us up to Satan to his buffetings and siftings to his craft and malice deliver us up to Sin and to the Occasions of Sin that having held-out his hand all the day as the Prophet speaks he will now call them in again and as we mockt his patience laugh at our calamity Prov. 1. It is a sign of a pious mind to fear sometimes where no fear is and even in plano in the plainest way to suppose there may be a block to stumble at If it be not true it is a wholsome meditation to think the measure of our sin is so near full that the next sin we commit may fill it that there is a Rubicon set as to Caesar which if thou pass thou art proclaimed a Traitor a river Kidron as to Shimei which if thou go over thou shalt dye thy bloud shall 2 Kings 2. 37. be upon thine own head Now is the acceptable hour now is the day of salvation 2 Cor. 6. 2. and if thou art so dazled with the beauty of Mercy that thou canst not see death in a Tentation horror upon Sin to morrow will be too late And here in the last place as the case stands
must both smart together I went-out by thy Ears and Eyes and Hands and wandred abroad after forbidden objects and now being returned home I find my self naked It is evident then that the Senses of the Body are the Windows of the Soul and that through them Tentations make their entrance into the inward man Why do men disbelieve and impugn the word of God but because they measure Divine things by humane Sense and Experience Thus did Mahometism get a side presently and overflow the greater part of the world because it brought with it a carnal Paradise an eternity of Lusts and such promises as flattered the Sense to blindfold the Reason that it might not see its absurdities For the Turk destitute of truth and so not able to judge aright of Gods favours in this life casting an eye on the worldly miseries of Christians and puffed-up with his own victories condemneth the faith of Christ as displeasing to God because by reason of afflictions it is so unto the Flesh and preferreth and magnifieth his own for no other reason but that it is more attempered to the Sense and answerable to the desires of the Flesh The Atheist who hath no Religion at all no God but his own right hand and his arm no Deity but Policy is carried with the same respects to deny and despise the Providence of God For being earthly minded and even buried alive in the contemplation of the things of this world and seeing the wicked flourish as a green bay-tree and Innocence clothed with shame brought to the stake and the rack concludeth there is no God and derides his Patience and Justice because his Providence waiteth not upon his desires governs not the world as he would have it and is wanting sometime to his expectation Nay beloved how many are there of us who draw-out our Religion by this model and if Religion will not condescend and meet with our sensual Desires draw them up and mix and temper them with our Religion and if we do not find Religion fit to our humor we make one Christianity of it self is a severe and simple Religion and doth so little favour our fleshly part that it commands us to mortifie and kill it and yet how by degrees hath it been brought to joyn and conform it self to our Sense which lets-in those tentations which are the very seed out of which many monstrous errors are ingendred Of a severe Religion we have made it a sportful Religion an easie Religion a gaudy and pompous Religion of a doing active Religion a heavy Religion of a bountiful Religion we have made it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a cheap and thriving Religion For from our Senses and fleshly desires have those corruptions and mixtures crept into Religion which carry with them a near likeness and resemblance to them Ambition hath brought-in her addition or defalcation and Covetousness hers and Wantonness hers and the Love of pleasures hath cast-in her poyson and all these have left their very mark and character in the doctrines of men Nor can I attribute it to any thing more than to this that we do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 take our Senses from the world and sanctifie and consecrate them to God One would think indeed that Ambition and Covetousness and Sensuality were of a quite contrary strain and not competible with those more speculative errors For what can the Love of money or honor do to the stating of a question in Divinity But by the art and craft of the Devil these have been made tentations to error have been as the Popes claim runs infallible far more potent with us than an oecumenical Councel For these tentations of the World and the Flesh first strike the Sense with delight which by the help of the Phansie doth soon enflame the Affections and the Affections will soon build-up an opinion The Love of honor makes the Judgment follow it to that height and pitch which it hath markt-out My Love of money will gloss that Blessing which our Saviour hath annext to Poverty of spirit My Factions humor will strike at the very life and heart of Religion in the name of Religion and God himself and destroy Christianity for excessive love of Christ Every humor will venture upon any falshood which is like it There is nothing within the compass of our Sensual appetites which we are not ready to embrace and believe it to be true because we wish it so being advantageous and conducible to the end which we have proposed and set-up to our selves When Christians did revocare mentem à sensibus take and withdraw their Hand from those objects which were busie with the Sense when they were within themselves and framed their lives to the simplicity and plainness of the Gospel there was scarce the name of Heretick heard amongst them no contentions no exsecrations no thundring-out excommunications against one another But within a while this simplicity abated and the doctrine of Faith was made to give attendance on sensual humours that did pollute it Therefore the Heathen to make the Christians let go their hold and fall off from the acknowledgment of the truth did use the Devils method and laid before them temporal contentments and the sweetness of life Their common forms were CONSULE TIBI MISERERE TUI Have a care of your self Pity your self NOLI ANIMAM TUAM PERDERE Destroy not your own life They made large promises of honours riches and preferment And these Tertullian calls devillish suggestions But when they could not thus prevail when these shining and glorious tentations could not shake or move them then Tormenta carcer ungulae Stridénsque flammis larina Atque ipsa poenarum ultima Mors then torments were threatned the Hook and the Whip and the last of punishments Death it self And as Tentations inter ento the soul by the Senses so they look-out by the Eye Facies intentionum omnium speculum saith Tertullian The face is the glass wherein you may see the very intentions of the mind Anger Sorrow Joy Fear and Shame which are the affections of the heart appear in the countenance Why art thou wroth and why is thy countenance Gen. 4. 6. fallen saith God to Cain When Esau was well pleased with Jacob Jacob tells him I have seen thy face as the face of God Habitus mentis in corporis Gen. 33. 10. statu cernitur saith St. Ambrose You may view the state of the soul in the outward man and see how she changes and alters by those outward motions and impressions which she makes in the body When the Soul of man liketh the object and apprehendeth it under the shew of good she kindleth and moveth her self to attain her desire and withal incenseth the spirits which warm the bloud enlarge the heart and diffuse themselves to embrace that good which is either in the approach or present And when she seeth evil which she cannot decline she staggereth and sinketh for fear which
quencheth the spirits cooleth the bloud closeth and contracteth the heart At one object it leapeth for joy at another is cold and dead Thus by these gates of Sin as Gregory calls them do those Tentations enter which will soon overthrow the state and peace of the mind Aâ—dâ—â—it auris intentionem inflexit c. saith St. Ambrose He did but hearken and lost a good intention he did but look and his mind was overthrown but smell and his thought perisht but taste the lip of the harlot and he devoured a sin but touch and he was all on fire Now as Tentations work by the Sensitive part upon the Rational so in the last place they have a diverse operation according to mens several Constitutions and Complexions In some they soon prevail in others by degrees and in some not at all For every man is not equally inclined to every sin This stayeth the eye of one which another will not look on And this our own uncharitable censures of each other may teach us For â—e see that this man blesseth himself and wonders how such a one could commit such a sin and the other wondreth no less that he or any one else should commit the contrary Therefore the Devil who knows how we 〈◊〉 elemented and composed hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Macarius di 〈…〉 s inventions divers back-doors by which he may slip and return at pleasure and if his first bait be distastful come again and present another which will fit our taste and palate He applyeth himself to every mans humor and complexion Omnium discutit consuetudinem ventilat curas scrutatur affectus saith Leo He examines every mans customary behaviour he marks where we place our care and solicitude he searcheth our affections and observeth our constitution and enters with such forces as we are not willing to withstand with a Sword which a Cholerick person will snatch at with Beauty which the Wanton at first sight will fall down and adore with Honour which the Ambitious will fly to with Riches which the Covetous will dig for He knows whom to inflame with lust whom to incite to luxury whom to pour the poyson of envy into whom to cast down with sorrow whom to deceive with joy whom to amaze with fear whom to seduce with admiration And he so fits his temptations that something about us something within us our very natural temper and constitution may quicken and promote the activity of those tentations which may destroy us Again that we may conclude as their operation is either farthered or slacked by the several tempers and complexions of men so is it by many outward circumstances of Time at one time a birth-right for a mess of pottage at another not receive a drove of cattle but say I have enough my Brother Of Place Not look upon that bait in publick which I will devour in my closet be very attentive at Church and as busie a knave in my shop And lastly of humane Laws which are many times more powerful against Sin then the Laws of the Eternal God whence it comes to pass that we resist temptations to the greatest sins as Murder Adultery and the rest of those which are the grosser and of the highest nature because they are hung round with curses and the Magistrate stands by and if we yield he lays the whip upon our backs or draws his sword and destroys us but those lesser sins secret and speculative sins Wanton thoughts Idle words and the like we scarce take notice of because there is no penal statute to repress them And we are ready to say of every such sin as Lot did of Zoar Is it not a little one and my soul shall live For as Tentations work by the Sense so are we led by it We fear that Power which is seen more than that Omnipotency which is invisible we fear Man more than God and the shaking of his whip more than the scorpions of a Deity and therefore we fly greater sins and run into less prevail against the Anakim and are beat with a grashopper For though Tentations make their entrance by pleasing and flattering the Sense and being admitted are polished and decked-up with glory and so presented to the nobler faculties though this be their natural operation and common way of working yet they work differently and unequally according to that variety which is observable in the tempers and constitutions of men and by outward circumstances of Time and Place or the like are either hindered or advanced in their operation And this may suffice to discover the Manner how Tentations work upon the Soul I should now proceed and enquire when Tentations prevail with us and overcome us But having upon another Text Matth. xxiv 42. handled this point at large and shewn that though the Sense and Phansie receive the object which is the tentation and that with some delight yet it may be without sin yea though our natural temper incline to it and raise in us some kind of desire yet if we stand upon our guard and watch and keep it within the limits that God hath set us we shall be so far from sinning that our obedience will be the greater these things having been there fully treated of I will now pass-over Only this I add That there may be yet more than an Inclination There may be a kind of Desire a sudden motion of the mind which may at unawares strike through the heart of man but yet not so entangle it as to procure the assent of the Will may but shew it self and vanish like lighning may be extinguisht in the very flash Now that this is not truly and properly a sin we may gather from the very nature of Sin to the committing of which these two things concur 1. an Assent of the Will 2. a Power in man to avoid it **** We think of it to hate it and by thinking love it We must therefore give them no line but curb and restrain them at the first not only shun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the work but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Philosopher speaks the causes and beginnings which may produce it chase away 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Justine Martyr speaks the first smoke the first inclination of our sensual appetite and when tentations offer and present themselves not revile and embrace them say we would and we would not but to give them a peremptory denyal by our serious distast of them and that detestation which may take these brats of Satan and dash them against the rock Nemo sic negantem iterum rogat When we have given them such a denyal a denyal with anger and indignation they will keep a distance and not suddenly come so near as to solicite us to sin But if we first give them admittance and then take pleasure in them it is a sign we will make them our friends and companions nay it is a sign that we have made them our