suffered on the Crosse to make good our comforts he was bound to purchase our freedome And here first of all the work of the day doth challenge at our hands matter of admiration it is a duty the Heavens are called upon upon a lesse occasion Hear O ye Heavens and be astonished O earth Who is there that hath any thing of Heaven in him let him obstupescere he amazed and wonder it is a wonder in all the particulars of it First to wonder at the hainousness of that sin the nature of which was such that it could no otherwise be expiated but thus That which threw Adam out of Paradise the Angels out of Heaven Saul from his Kingdome that at this day pulls down Families and Nations and Kingdomes that makes some Nations an hissing and reproch to others pray God it doth not serve us so That which doth tumble a Kingdome into the dust pray God it do not serve us so It made the Son of God to bleed and to cry My God my God why hast thou forsaken me Which of us in the strongest temptation to any sin that is remembring the price of it could chuse but be intreated to hold his hand Consider in the strongest temptation to any sin it was the price of my Saviours bloud And secondly this serves for matter of gratulation to be thankful for Christs love that he would thus suffer and that we despair not though we find it not in our Ware-houses in our Closets in our Chambers in our Chests in our Cupboards or the like outward things Potiphar looks upon Joseph and sees all things thrive under him and therefore he loves him so Laban for the same reason loves Jacob But here is Gods love that he gave himself for us that 's the second A third Instruction is for admiration of that obligation God hath cast upon thee He that could have gloryed in thy destruction that he should glory in thy salvation what canst thou do but rejoyce But to wonder is nothing if we go no farther Therefore in the fourth place here is matter of thanksgiving which is a duty for every Ordinance Every ordinary blessing it calls for a Trophee a Pillar an Altar a Song a Sacrifice a Chronicle so did David Moses and other servants of God What thanks doth he expect for this dayes deliverance If among the Heathen he that delivers his Countrey from any potent enemies had such applauses and acclamations mille annos vivat he that slew a thousand of our enemies may he live a thousand years may his name be precious a thousand years How can we pour out our hearts before God without giving thanks for this dayes deliverance Neither is admiration or gratulation sufficient unlesse we blesse our selves in this day in the apprehension of him that was this Preserver with reference to our sins the bloud of Christ hath a vertue to bind up the bleeding soul and to make the bones that were broken to rejoice Is not this a matter of admiration gratulation and consolation therefore in the fear of God these are the thoughts that belong to this day let your contemplations be upon what he did these contemplations would preserve us from the sense of temporal calamities When Jacob saw the Ladders and the Angels ascending and descending he said Haec est porta coeli this is the gate of Heaven The gate of Heaven It is well saith one that Heaven hath a gate it is well for Gods children that there is a Preserver that their hopes are above with him whose care is to preserve things perishing here below among so many destructions from those that cry to our Jerusalem Down with it down with it even to the ground There is one above who is the Preserver who doth never keep back his mercy but when things look most desperately upon earth when the enemies hope to take them at a disadvantage and to fall upon them when there is none to deliver them then if we call upon him with David saying Remember the dayes of old and thy great mercies unto me then it is for our comfort that after a time God will have mercy upon us When the night is at the darkest the day is neerest at hand When the throws of a woman in travel are the greatest her deliverance is neerest When Moses saw the children of Israel in the greatest danger Now stand saith he and see the glory of the Lord the enemy that now threatens you shall see him no more The earth mourned Lebanon was ashamed Bashan and Carmel have all lost their fruit now will I exalt my self As if he should say mans misery that 's my opportunity When things are at the worst with Gods children and his Church then will he shew himself a Preserver The comfort of Christs Crosse that 's comfort to a soul wounded with misery Is there any of you here this day that is at his Golgotha with his strong cryes to God in the sight of his sins and the terrors of Gods wrath at the sight of Gods justice Are any such here then behold consolation that his bloud this day shed if thou dost but conceive it if there be but a true apprehension in thee that that bloud was shed for thee 't is enough for thy salvation that thy price is paid for thee by his death on the Crosse when his arms were extended both wayes as well to the thief that despised as to the good thief and in that prayer he put up upon the Crosse for the worst of his enemies for them that nailed him the worst of men Father forgive them for they know not what they do Those that nail me that crucifie me even for them I pray It is very probable that when the good thief saw Christs mercy extend so far to the worst of men he reasons thus with himself What! is there mercy for these why not for me Though a thief yet not such a wretch as these are thus to crucifie my Saviour Lord remember me when thou comest into Paradise and remember in that prayer of Christ there is forgivenesse for thee and in those arms stretched out there is a receptacle for thee in that bloud that came out of his wounds there is cure for thee rather then thou shalt dye he will dye for thee But beloved to enlarge the merits of Christ longer you will think I spread this plaister too far in the mean time not knowing whether we have any part in him or no. We must understand the Mystery of Christ as well as the History there is something to be done by way of examination to examine what title we have to this Saviour Look upon thy own sins bleed for them as well as Christ bled for thee Christ doth not actually save all For the resolution of which I cannot give you a better answer then what I told you of the Israelites concerning the Brasen Serpent that which gave them a cure gives me a capacity of this
express * Si mihi sint centum linguae sint oraque centumâ— Fâ—rrâ—â— vox Which of you can tell me Oh my God saith Saint Austin Da mihi de misericordia c. Give me of thy mercy that I may speak of thee speak in me that I may speak of thee A work above any humane power to make any tolerable demonstration of had I as many tongues as there are stars Were there a Councel called of all the Angels in Heaven to consult of it and among them one chosen to declare it all their tongues understandings and imaginations infused into him had he all the learning and eloquence that ever was or can be attained were he to stand in my place at this time how should I see him gravell'd puzzell'd and faulter'd and founder'd and non-plust how should I hear him call for more tongues for more eloquence how should I hear him cry with Esay Quis enarrabit Who shall shew his works Should I not hear him cry out with Moses Ego sum puer I am a child with David This knowledge is too wonderful for me Whether I look upon the work of this day or upon God positively in the contrivance of it in the execution or subject with reference to the object the parties that it may concern or with reference to the work it self or with reference to the manner of working the condition from whence we were redeemed and the condition to which we were brought it is beyond human invention to give any tolerable description of it I think this matter will do better in application then in amplification * Ora mille fluentia melle If we look upon it first of all comparatively comparing it with other dayes and paralleling it with other preservers What are they other preservers and other saviours We know where to finde them Shall we piddle out the time with the preventions of the sufferings of particular men what need we make mention of the children of Israels deliverance out of Aegypt our own deliverance from the Spanish Invasion in Eighty eight or of the fifth of November I charge you as the Prophet Zachary speaks on another occasion not a word of them neither of Eighty eight nor the fifth of November We may parallel this dayes deliverance with the work of the Creation there Dixit factum est He did but speak and it was done here it cost many sweatings and drops of bloud this was the master-piece of Gods workmanship There God gave me to my self here himself to me There was the work of his finger here of his arm With a mighty and out-stretched arm hath he gotten himself the victory There he made me like unto himself here he makes himself like unto me There he made me but here he remade me this exceeds the whole Creation take the whole Creation of the world together either in the contrivance of it or in the execution of it In the contrivance had our Saviour gone no farther this day then to have devised the means how we might be restored it had been mercy enough but to call the depths of his Counsels to devise a way how to punish sin and to save the sinners to bestow Hell upon the sin and Heaven upon the sinner how to compound an infinite Justice and an infinite Mercy Had our Saviour gone no farther but found out the way and said Sons of men I see you are utterly lost and undone and I could wish that I could help you but I counsel you to do thus and thus see what you can do to appease my Fathers justice I should be very glad to see you do well and the like could all the Angels in Heaven have helpt us surely no But himself to be both the contriver and executor not onely to finde out the means but to be the means to call the depth of his Counsel together to save the man and damn the sin to send one to Hell and the other to Heaven Oh admirable Love Again consider who is the Preserver the subject that did it who would ever have looked to have him come down from Heaven Who would have thought that he would have clothed himself with the rags of our mortality and have come down who was the delight of Angels the darling of Heaven the beloved of his Father It is a greater humiliation then for the greatest Emperour in the world to become a worm or a fly or a grain of dust and all this for a creature so ill-deserving in whom there was neither beauty nor comelinesse or favour the things that make men favourable with Princes nay more when we were enemies and in the acts of hostility dead in trespasses and sins worms and no men yet he came to save us even us men It was the ground of a worthy meditation of a reverend Father concerning Sampsons being brought to so much misery for Dalilah Oh miserable Sampson saith he what made thee to spend thy dearest bloud for an harlot for Dalilah How can I sufficiently wonder at this mercy not for an harlot but for worse then an harlot for such wretches as we are and the keeping us from such a state and bringing us to such a state from such an estate an estate of sin when we lay not onely in pulvere but in sanguine in the dust yea in our own bloud not onely wounded but wounded to death yea dead was that all no pereuntes perishing Ezek. 16.6 9. children of perdition lost and the worst kind of lost too perditi in Dei favore lost in the favour of God perditi de benedictione Dei lost the blessing of God no hope of any thing but go you cursed was our next doom nay utterly lost and yet recovered by him out of that condition and into what a condition from all this miserable and lost condition we were recovered to our inheritance recovered from the state of enemies to the state of friends to the state of favorites of heirs of Heaven all these together didst thou do Oh merciful Preserver In the next place I come to the means by which he did preserve us and that by the destruction of him that was the preserver a preservation destructive to the preserver himself wherein there was a necessity for one to come from Heaven and he no lesse then the Son of God to stand in the place of man and endure that which he should have suffered for his sin and that such a suffering to speak one word of it that the whole Gospel is little more then a compendious Chronicle of the calamities that Christ endured in his life Should I but go along from his Cradle to his Crosse the time would fail me in all places nor only upon the Crosse but in the Garden yea in toto progressu c. in the whole course of his life in every action of it at the hand of every person he conversed withal every part of his life from the womb nay
in the womb he was accounted by his supposed father to be but a bastard in his Cradle cruelly dealt withal exiled banished into Egypt tumbled and tossed up and down tempted in the wildernesse by the Devil In all places in the Temple in the Pharisees house in the City in the Countrey in the wildernesse within and without abused by all sorts of men the Scribes and Pharisees the high Priests and Rulers and by the multitude of people he did suffer in every action Did he preach where had he his learning Did he eat and drink a man gluttonous and a wine-bibber Did he keep company a friend of Publicans and sinners Did he cast out Devils 't was censured to be by Belzebub the Prince of the Devils In his life in his death in all things and in his sufferings two things are remarkable First that he suffered alone he trod the wine-presse alone he suffered solus Secondly he suffered totus he suffered for his Preaching for his works of mercy that for which he should have been applauded The Disciple that before hugg'd his Master and lay in his arms now for haste left his shirt behinde him he ran so hard that he left his linnen garment Thomas that before would dye with Lazarus he is now gone The sons of Zebedee that forsooth could drink of the cup that he drank of they were far enough off not onely his friends on earth but his best friend in Heaven he suffered a terrible withdrawing of his countenance he sees him not as he was wont to be in his glorious Majesty yet still he cryes Deus meus My God his best friends on earth fled and his best friend in Heaven hid his face from him he suffered totus his head buffetted his face spitted on his hands nailed and his feet bored his side pierced his glorious temples crowned with thorns he led Captivity captive to whom we pray Lord enter not into Captivity with thy servant he to whom the Saints cry Holy Holy Holy Lord God of Hosts he to whom the blessed Spirits sing Hallelujahs to him that sits on the Throne upon him they cryed All Hail King of the Jews he that lashed the Nations with a rod of Iron to have his back beaten with a whip he suffered in all his outward senses What tastes he What sees he What hears he What smells he What feels he In all his faculties and members in his understanding the whole wrath of God in his memory what he was and what he had been in his judgment what strugling and irresolution Let this Cup passe and let it not passe he will have his will and he will not have his will he was astonished affrighted perplexed in an agony such an agony wherein he sweat drops of bloud of the reproches done to him if we consider ubi where He suffered at Jerusalem the stage of the world and where he did display all his works of mercy Quando at what time at the time of the Passeover at the concourse of most people that he might be a scorn to all and cum quibus with two thieves and between them both as the worst of the three and per quos by whom this was done by his own Countreymen those for whom this was done so gracelesse not so much as thanking him for what he did when he was at his last gasp upon the Cross beneath beneath him the Devil gaping for him on the one side a thief reviling him on the other none but a thief Hell wide open under him his friends flying from him round about him what sees he the earth trembling and quaking the rocks rending in pieces the mountains leaping the air thundering the clouds pouring down the Heavens as it were burning with lightning the Sun hiding his face as ashamed to see his Master so used at their hands for whom he thus suffered What hears he those that did it crying His bloud be upon us and our children and if there be any evil in us not to save us but to damn us when an Angel durst not shew his head or so much as peep out of Heaven upon him A preservation wrought by such a Saviour to free us from such a condition and bring us to such a condition by such a means he suffered both in body and soul I think I need not say more of it doth not this deserve to be prized as a great mercy But because the keeping of a Good Friday doth not consist so much by the making of a Tragical relation of his sufferings as it doth in something else this is not all that is to be done 'T is true our presenting him to your eyes is no more then needs but we must praise the Lord for his wondrous works Can we with the Israelites look up to this Brasen Serpent that it may cure our souls Here is an object of love of fear of joy of grief of affection and what not There is something of the solemnity lies in this to consider what God hath done for our souls I gave you a taste at the beginning how that Job after his sin comes home to the Preserver of men So this points us to the duty of the day and that is to make use of Christs sufferings and considering that Job in the midst of all his sufferings had his eye to the Preserver of men he deplored his sins and cast his eyes upon him I finde the holy Ghost more then once mentioning the duty of the day they shall look upon him whom they have pierced Zach. 12. and looking to the Author and Finisher of their faith Hebr. 12. looking with such eyes upon him as the lame man in the Gospel upon Paul and Barnabas to have some good from him Looking upon him as a Preserver as those Israelites did upon the Brasen Serpent to cure them not to wink with our eyes let no man think the work of a Good Friday to see him with our bodily eyes as the Papists in the sight of the Crucifix but the eyes we are to make use of are the eyes of our souls the beholding of Christ crucified in our thoughts Take him into your hearts and souls and there preserve him let him challenge a mansion room in thee thy whole heart Christ is to be made the sole object of this day if you celebrate his crucifying aright What kind of object Christ ought to be I will deliver in few words Our Saviour doth present himself as an object of the eye to behold him as an object of the ear as an object of trouble as an object of joy as an object of hope if upon our sin then he is an object of wonder an object of fear The motive of Christs sufferings it was his love the merit of Christs sufferings procures us pardon and the end of Christs sufferings was our salvation Give me leave to point my finger at each of these and that in a familiar way without danger of puzling our selves He