edge on the temporal Sword though even in these it be a remedy to be last applied and more to be commended where it may not then where it may possibly be spared In other cases where the error lieth in the understanding although most commonly backed with obstinacy and perverseness in the will and affections the adverse parties in the Church have been too farre transported beyond their bounds and drawn too much blood from one another though both pretend the Lawes for their justification For who seeth not how little it doth savour of the spirit of Christ to hale young boyes and silly women and poor ignorant Tradesmen to the Funeral-Pile because they could not fathom the deep Mystery of transubstantiation or thought it not an acceptable sacrifice to devoure their God or found not Purgatory in the Scriptures or did not think it fit to invocate the Saints their Brethren when as the way lay open unto God their Father or durst not give that honour to a painted Crucifix which properly belonged to their crucified Saviour And on the other side it wants not reprehension amongst moderate men that Christians should be dragged unto the Scaffold for no other reason then taking sacred Orders from a forreign hand or treading on prohibited ground not being otherwise convicted by sufficient evidence either of practising against the State or labouring to seduce the Subjects from their natural duties The Christians of the Primitive Ages had lost the most effectual part of their Apologies if difference in Religion only had been a crime sufficient without further guilt to draw those fiery storms upon them under which they suffered And though I say not of these Lawes to which each parties do pretend for their justification that they are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 like unto Draco's Lawes of old which were written in blood yet one might say and say it without just offence that they were neither made nor executed within these Dominions but either when the Dragon was a chief Supporter of the Arms Imperiall or else on those unfortunate wretches who have since fallen in regionem Draconum into the place of Dragons as the Psalmist calls it Certain it is that by those bloody executions both sides have rather been confirmed then weakned and both have given advantage to the growth of Heresies Just as Sulpitius hath observed that by the execution of Priscillian which before I spoke of non tantùm non repressa est ejus haeresis sed propagata his Heresie was so farre from being suppressed that it grew the faster for the cutting Christs Sinite stands not here for nothing but shewes that till the time of the general Harvest there will be tares amongst the Wheat do we what we can Which leads me to my last particular to the condition of the Church here militant delivered in the Simul crescere in that the tares and Wheat are ordered to grow up together Of which and of the reasons of that intermixture I shall crave leave to insist a little and so commend you unto God Perplexae sunt istae duae Civitates in hoc seculo invicemque permistae It was the saying of St. Austin that the two Cities which he was to write of the City of the Lord and the City of Satan were so intermingled that there was little hope to see them separated till the day of Judgement The same may we affirm of the Church of Christ it is of such a mixt condition compounded so proportionably of the good and evil the Heretick and true Professor that neither of the two is likely to suppress the other till God take up the controversie in the day of doom And therefore not without good reason is the Church compared to a threshing-floore on which there is both wheat and chaffe and to a Fold wherein there are both Sheep and Goats and to a casting-net which being thrown into the Sea drew up all kind of Fishes whether good or bad and to an House in which there are not only vessels of honour as of gold and silver but also of dishonour and for unclean uses and in my Parable to a field wherein besides the good seed which the Lord had sowen Infelix lolium steriles dominantur avenae the enemy had sowed his tares And this is thought by some of good note and learning to be the chief intention of our Saviours Parable who tells us that he meant not by the Sinite so farre to patronize the Heretick or protect the wicked as to respit either of them from the censure of the Church or State under pretence of calling them to an account at the general Audit but to set forth the true condition of the Church here militant in which the wicked person and the righteous man are so intermingled that there is no perfection to be looked for in this present World and therefore very well said a modern Authour Docetur hic non quale sit officium nostrum aut magistratus aut Pastorum sed tantùm quae futura sit Ecclesiae conditio Christ doth not here inform the Minister or the Civil Magistrate or any private person what they are to do but onely represents unto his Disciples the true condition of his Church till the end of the World which can be never so reformed and purified but that some errors and corruptions will continue in it But whether it be so or not certain it is that such is the condition of the Church in this present World that it is subject to corruptions and never absolutely free from sin and error There is much drosse amongst her gold and although that her foundations be of precious stones yet there is wood and hay and stubble in the superstructure which are so intermingled made up together that nothing but a general fire can exactly part them I mean the fire of conflagration not of Popish Purgatory Were it not thus we need not pray for the Church militant but glory as in the triumphant And yet the Church is counted holy and called Catholick still this intermixture notwithstanding Catholick in regard of time place and persons in and by which the Gospel of our Saviour is professed and propagated Holy secundum nobiliores ejus partes in reference to the Saints departed and those who are most eminent in grace and piety And it is also called Ecclesia una one holy Catholick and Apostolick Church though part thereof be militant here upon the earth and part triumphant in the Heavens the same one Church both now and in the world to come The difference is that here it is imperfect mixt of good and bad there perfect and consisting of the righteous onely according to this determination of St. Austin eandam ipsam unam sanctam Ecclesiam nunc habere malos mixtos tunc non habituram For then and not till then as Hierome Augustine and others do expound the place shall Christ
be true and faithful members of the Church of God whether it be under the Law or under the Gospel shall all be drawn into one Synagogue or Congregation in the day of the Lord and all together with the holy Patriarchs before Moses time shall make up that one glorious Church which is entituled in the Scriptures Universalem Congregationem the general Assembly the Church of the first-born whose names are written in the Heavens We have the word thus used as in other places so in the 24. of St. Matthews Gospel where it is told us of these Angels 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 congregabunt electos that they shall gather the Elect out of every corner of the world i. e. that they shall gather them in sacram Synaxin in sanctam congregationem into an holy Congregation a religious Assembly So that the gathering of the Saints together in the day of Judgement is but a Translation of them from one Church to another or rather from that part of the same one Church which is here militant on the Earth to that which is triumphant in the Heaven of glories The Saints both here and there make but one Communion we praising God for manifesting his great power and Grace on them they praying unto God to send his choycest blessings of grace and mercy upon us The difference is no more then this that here it is exposed to disgrace and ignominy sorrows age have ploughed deep wrinkles on her face too many spots there are in her feasts of charity and sometimes she takes cold in her affections like the Church of Ephesus starting aside from her Redeemer like a broken bow but there shall Christ present her to himself a most glorious Church without spot or wrinkle and marry her to himself for ever Here we have Tares amongst the Wheat more Tares perhaps then Wheat in too many places but there shall be no place in Heaven but for Wheat alone no unclean thing shall enter into the new Hierusalem no Tares into the Barn of the heavenly Husbandman that was provided for the Wheat only and for none but that For so it followeth in the Text Congregate triticum in horreum meum Gather the Wheat into my Barn the place designed by all good Husbands for the disposing of the Wheat their best sort of grain Not in a Barn according to the literal sense we shall have too many Congregations held in Barns if this world go on but according to the mystical meaning In horreum meum into my Barn i. e. as he expounds himself in the 25. in gaudium Domini into the joy of the Lord regnum à constitutione mundi paratum the Kingdom prepared for the righteous from the foundations of the World i. e. as the Apostle tells us in requiem Domini into the rest of the Lord in civitatem Dei viventis the City of the living God So then it is a rest a joy a glorious City an eternall Kingdom and all of these may serve in part to set forth the condition of this heavenly dwelling A rest for them which die in the Lord in which they rest from all their labours And this sit of which St. Paul speaks in the 4th to the Hebrews There remains therefore a rest for the people of God a joy of so divine and sublime a nature that no tongue is able to express it nor heart so large as to conceive it for in his presence is the fulnesse of joy and at his right hand there is pleasure for evermore Et nunquam turbata quies gaudia fiâ—ma A City of pure Gold and as clear as Chrystal the Walls of Jasper-stone and the Gates of Pearl watered with the most pleasant Rivers of the waters of life according as it is described in the Revelation the man of God describing the full glories of the new Hierusalem in such a manner and by such materials as he conceived to be most estimable in the sight of men And finally a Kingdom an eternall Kingdom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Kingdom as it is called by way of excellency in which each true believer shall receive his Crown according to the eminency of his faith and piety a Crown of martyrdom for those who patiently submit themselves to the hands of the persecutors in maintenance of Gods Church and the true Religion a Crown of Virginity for those who subdue concupiscence and give no entertainment to prohibited lusts a Crown of chastity and fidelity for those who have faithfully kept the vow of wedlock and the bed of Marriage undefiled a Crown of charity for those who have exhausted their estates in the works of mercy and the acts of piety in founding Temples for the Lord or Hospitals for relief of the poor and needy and finally a Crown of righteousness for all those who walk unblameably in their Conversation before God and man When all the Monarchs of the Earth have laid down their Scepters at the feet of Christ God shall be still a King of Kings a King to speak the truth of none but Kings Rex Regum Dominus dominantium alwayes but most amply then Never was corn so housed so laid up before Thus as before we brought the Tares the worst sort of weeds unto the fire of condemnation so have we brought the Wheat the best kind of grain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Galen calls it to the barn of glory A grain which as it doth require a ground well tilled and cultivated so lieth it longest buried in the earth of any before it spring into a blade and being sprung into a Blade doth endure much hardness congealed sometimes with snow sometimes nipped with Frost before it grow into a stalk and when the stalk is grown the ear is formed it is exposed to many hazards drencht with unseasonable showres and scorched with as intemperate heats laid flat upon the ground by tempestuous winds some of the grains thereof being scattered by those blasts over all the field before t is brought into the Barn Ecce jam seges cana imbre corrumpitur grandine caeditur as Cecilius noted in the Dialogue And so t is also with the just with the righteous person He doth require much Husbandry great care and Tillage in fitting him to receive the seeds of faith and piety and lyeth long strugling in the womb of regeneration before he doth come forth a spiritual man and is renatus born again advanced unto the state of a man regenerate Multa tulit fecitque puer Much must be suffered and much done before it come to that there 's no question of it Suppose him brought so farre in his way to Heaven as that he hath received the Seal of his regeneration and adoption the testimony of the Spirit that he endeavoureth nothing more then the advancement of Gods glory and increase of piety shall he not be reviled and howted at like the Owl among the wanton birds forsaken by his old acquaintance
present her to himself a most glorious Church without spot or wrinkle and marry her to himself for ever Till that day come it is not to be hoped or looked for but that many Hypocrites false Teachers and licentious livers will couch themselves under the shelter of the Church and passe for members of it in the eye of men though not accounted such in the sight of God The eye of man can possibly discern no further then the outward shew and mark who joyn themselves to the Congregation to hear the Word of God and receive his Sacraments Dominus novit qui sunt sui the Lord knowes only who are his and who are those occulti intus whose hearts stand fast in his Commandements and carefully possess their souls in truth and holiness And yet some men there are as here hath been formerly who fancy to themselves a Church without spot or blemish and dream of such a field as contains no tares of such a house as hath no vessels but of honour sanctified and prepared for the Masters use And where they finde not such a Church they desert it instantly and cry Go out of her my people be not partakers of her sins The Cathari in the East the Donatists in the South the Novatians in the West which made one faction only though of several names were anciently of this opinion and set up Churches of their own of the new Edition for flattering themselves with a conceit of their own dear sanctity they thought themselves too pure and pious to joyn in any act of worship with more sober Christians and presently confined the Church which before was Catholick to their own private Conventicles and to them alone or intra partem Donati as they phrased it then Who have succeeded them of late both in their factions and their follies we all know too well The present ruptures in this State do declare most evidently that here is pars Donati now as before in Africa A frenzy which gave great offence to the ancient Fathers who laboured both by speech and pen to correct their insolencies and of such scandall to the Churches of the Reformation that Calvin though a rigid man did confute their dotages and publickly expose them to contempt and scorn The Ancients and the Moderns both have agreed on this that though the Church of Christ be imperfect alwayes and may sometimes be faulty also yet are not men rashly to separate themselves from her Communion and make a rupture for poor trifles in the Body mystical It argues little faith lesse charity saith renowned Cyprian if when we see some tares in the Church of God de Ecclesia ipsa recedamus we presently withdraw our selves and forsake her fellowship And here we might bring in St. Austin and almost all the ancient Writers to confirm this point but that they are of no authority with the captious Schismatick and now of late disclaimed by our neater Wits Therefore for further satisfaction to the stubborn Donatist let us behold the constitution of the Church in the Book of God and take a view of the chief types and fortunes of it to see if we can sinde such a spotless Church as they vainly dream of In Adams Family which was the first both type and Seminary of the Church of God there was one Cain a murderer that slew his Brother and in the Ark the next and perhaps the greatest a Cham which wretchedly betrayed the nakedness of his aged Father In Abrahams house there was an Ishmael which mocked at Isaac though the Heire and the Heire of promise In Isaac's a prophane Esau who made his belly his God and sold Heaven for a break-fast In Jacob's there was Simeon and Levi Brethren in evill besides a Reuben who defiled â—is old Fathers bed And in the Church of Israel when more large and populous how many were mad upon the worship of the golden Calf more mad in offering up their Children to the Idol Moloch thousands that bowed the knee to Baal ten thousands which did sacrifice in the Groves and prohibited places yet all this while a Church a true visible Church with which the Saints and Prophets joyned in Gods publick worship Let us next look upon the Gospel and we shall find that when the bounds thereof were so strait and narrow that there were few more visible members of it then the twelve Apostles yet amongst them there was a Judas which betrayed his Master When it began to spread and inlarge it self to the number of one hundred and twenty there were among them some half-Christians such as Nicodemus who durst not openly profess the Gospel but came unto the Lord by night and some false Christians such as Demas who out of an affection to the present world forsook both the Apostle and the Gospel too See them increased to such a multitude that they were fain to choose seven Deacons to assist the work and one of them will be that Nicolas the founder of the Nicolaitans whom the Lord abhorred Follow it out of Jewrie to Samaria and there we find a Simon Magus as formall a Professor as the best amongst them yet full of the gall of bitterness within Trace it in all its progress through Greece and Asia and we shall see the factiousness of the Corinthians the foolishness of the Galatians and six of the seven Asian Churches taxed with deadly sinne Good God! into what corner of the Earth can the Donatist run to finde a Church without corruption free from sin and error It must be sure into the old Utopia or the new Atlantis or some fools Paradise in Terra incognita which no Mapp takes notice of unless as Constantine once said unto Acesius a Novatian Bishop 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they can erect a Ladder of their own devising and so climb up unto the Heavens whilest they are here upon the Earth they have no such hopes God better knowes then we what he hath to do and he already hath determined of a Simul crescere that both the Tares and Wheat shall grow up together Nor wanted his eternal wisdom some especial reasons which might incline him thereunto First in relation to the wicked who owe their preservation chiefly to this intermixture For certainly the note is true Deum propter bonos sustinere malos That God gives many temporal blessings to ungodly men because they live so intermingled with his faithful servants and respites them sometimes from the hand of punishment not for their own but for the righteous persons sake amongst whom they dwell The Lord we know blessed Laban for the sake of Jacob and prospered the whole house of Potiphar out of the love he bare to Joseph If Sodom stood so long unpunished it was in part because of righteous Lot who sojourned with them and possibly it might have stood to this very day but certainly have
hill which shewes it self unto the eye of each beholder We may affirm thereof as doth St. Ambrose of the Sun deficere videtur sed non deficit the light thereof cannot be possibly extinguished although sometimes darkened Opprest sometimes it is as it hath been formerly by errors Heresies and false opinions supprest it cannot be for ever For magna veritas great is the truth and it prevaileth at the last however for a while obscured by mens subtile practises That Heresies shall arise St. Paul hath told us and he hath brought it in with an oportet oportet esse haereses in the Epistle And that there must be scandalls Christ himself hath told us and he hath told it too with a necesse est ut scandala veniant in the holy Gospel The reasons both of the oportâ—t and necesse we shall see hereafter when we shall come to scan those motives which might induce the Lord to permit these tares Sinite utraque crescere usque ad messem v. 30. Mean while it doth concern us to take special notice that as it pleased the Lord to give way to error and suffer sometimes heresies of an higher nature and sometimes false opinions of an inferior quality to take fast footing in his Church yet he did never suffer them to destroy his harvest but brought them at the last to apparuerunt The comfortable beams of truth dispersed and scoured away those Clouds of error wherewith the Church before was darkened and by the light thereof the foulness and deformity of falshood was made more notorious so that from hence two special Queres may be raised first why these tares or errors were so long concealed and secondly how they were at last revealed And first they were concealed as it were of purpose to let the Church take notice of her own condition how careless and how blinde she is in the things of God did not the eye of God watch over her and direct her goings Her carelesness we had before in dormirent homines when as we found her sleeping and regardless of the common enemy that time the tares were in their Sevit and no man would hold up his head to look unto the publick safety Her blindness we may note in this that being left unto her self she could not see them in crevisset when they put forth the leaf and the blade sprung up and that they did begin to spread abroad and justle with the truth for the preeminence If either no false Doctrines had been sowen at all or had they all been noted at the first peeping forth the Church might possibly impute it to her own great watchfulness pleaded some special priviledge of infallibility and so in time have fallen into presumption God therefore left her to her self that falling into sin and error and suffering both to grow upon her by her own remisseness she might ascribe her safety unto God alone whose eyes do neither sleep nor slumber The Church is then in most security when God watcheth over her when he that keepeth Israel hath his eye upon her Gods eye he being â—culus infinitus as the learned Gentile and totus oculus as the learned Father is her best defence Which if it be averted from her she walketh forthwith in darkness and the shadow of death subject to every rising error obnoxious to the practises of her subtile enemies And in this state she stands in this wretched state till he be pleased to shine upon her and blesse her with the light of his holy countenance the beames whereof discover every crooked way and bring them to apparuerunt to the publick view And to apparuerunt all must come every false Doctrine whatsoever there 's no doubt of that for Idem est non esse non apparere No Tenet is erroneous in respect of us till it appear to us to be so and till it doth appear to be so we may mistake it for a truth imbrace it for a tendry of the Catholick Church endeavour to promote it with our best affections and yet conceive our selves to be excusable in that it is amoris error not erroris amor In thâ—s regard our Fathers might be safe in the Church of Rome and may be now triumphant in the Church of Heaven though they believed those Doctrines which were therein taught or possibly maintained them with their best affections The errors of that Church were not then discovered nor brought to their apparuerunt and being taken or mistaken for sound Orthodox Tenets were by them followed and defended in their several stations So that we may affirm of them as once St. Peter of the Jewes novimus quia per ignorantiam fecerint we know that through ignorance they did it or if we know it not so clearly as St. Peter did yet we may charitably hope that it was no otherwise in those particular points and passages wherein we know not any thing unto the contrary He that makes any doubt of this what faith soever he pretends to shewes but little charity and makes no difference between an accidentall and a wilful blindness There are some errors in the Church like some Diseases in the body when they are easie to be cured they are hard to be known when they are easie to be known they are hard to cured but every error disease is of that condition that it must first be known the true quality thereof discovered or else it is impossible to prescribe a remedy But so it is not now with us nor any of our Masters in the Church of Rome as it was anciently with our fore-fathers in and of that Church Those errors which in former times were accounted truths or not accounted of as errors are now in the apparuerunt we see them plainly as they are and by comparing them with Scripture the true rule of faith are able to demonstrate the obliquity of those opinions and false Doctrines which they have thrust upon the Church in these latter ages And we may say of them in Tertullians Language Ipsa Doctrina eorum cum Apostolica comparata ex diversitate contrarietate sua pronunciabit neque Apostoli alicujus essâ— neque Apostolici The difference which appeares between the Doctrines of the Church of Rome delivered in the new Creed of Pope Pius quartus and those which were delivered once unto the Saints in the old Creed of the Apostles shewes plainly that they neither came from the Apostles nor any Apostolical Spirit so that in case we shut our eyes against the sacred beames of truth which now shine upon us or if they so long after the apparuerunt will not see those tares which are discovered to their hands both we and they are all 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 utterly uncapable of excuse in the sight of God If any man will be so obstinately wedded to his own opinion as to take up his Lodging in a Pest-house after he hath been made acquainted with the present danger
gift of continency is become more eminent in them that have it without reproch to them that want it The freedom which the Church hath given in the use of chastity makes the vertue greater no vertuous action being commendable if it be not voluntary And since the granting of this liberty in the point of marriage how many of each order hath this Church produced Bishops Priests and Deacons that have embraced the single life out of choyce not force with far more honour to themselves and greater lustre to the Church and a more gracious acceptance with Almighty God then if it were imposed upon them by a positive Law Of whom we may affirm with safety as did Minutius of some Christians in the primitive times perpetua virginitate fruuntur potiâ—s quà m gloriâ—ntur But of this â—are enough what is that comes next let it be the religious Worship ascribed unto the blessed Virgin which by a name distinct is in the Schools entituled hyperdulia being a kind of veneration inferior unto that of God but greater then may be communicated to the other Saints The Church in the beginning had been exercised with many Heresies touching the incarnation of our Lord and Saviour The Valentinians hold that he took not from her his humane nature but brought it with him from the Heavens with whom concurred Apollinaris and the Secundiani Nestorius on the other side affirmed that he who was born of her was the Sonne of Mary but by no meanes the Sonne of God and therefore he allowed not that she should be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Mother of God but only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Mother of Christ Helvidius and the Antidico-Maritan had a further reach and envied her the glorious title of the Virgin Mary affirming with like impudence and ignorance eam post Christum natum viro suo fuisse commixtam that after our Redeemers birth she was known by Joseph In which respects both to restore her to her rights and to depress those Hereticks that had so debased her the Fathers have conferred upon her many glorious attributes but yet no more then she deserved Hence is it that we finde the Titles of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mother of God perpetual Virgin Hence is it that St. Cyril a most zealous persecutor of the Nestorian faction calls her pretiosum totius orbis thesaurum c. the most rich Treasure of the World a Lamp that cannot be put out the Crown of Chastity and very Scepter of true Doctrine sceptrum rectae Doctrinae and not the Scepter of the Catholick Faith as our Rhemists render it Which honorarie attributes not being given nor possibly appliable to any of the other Saints in true antiquity as they proceeded then from a just necessity so were they afterwards continued without just offence For who could reasonably conceive but that a greater reverence must be due to her then any other of the Saints whom God had sanctified and set apart for so great a blessing as to be the Mother of her Saviour Hitherto omnia bene for what hurt in this what soul so dull in her devotions so cold in her affections to our Lord and Saviour as not to magnifie the Womb which bare him and blesse those papps that gave him suck Who could suspect that possibly there should be any tare in so fair a Field who could suppose that any warrantable honor done or tendred unto the Mother of our Lord as Elizabeth styled her did not redound unto the Sonne And certainly as long as those of Rome contained themselves within the limits of the ancient Fathers and that O quà m te memorem virgo their pious flourishes Rhetorical Apostrophes and devout Meditations went no higher then a Religious commemoration of her life and piety they did not more then what had warrant from the Scripture and the Angel Gabriel Benedicta tu mulieribus would have born all that nor had it done much hurt had they ventured further even to nec vox hominem sonat and made her somewhat more then mortal had they tarried there But when they could not stop in the full careire and would needs hold it out to the Dâ—a certè as Mantuan and Antonius in plain termes have done and to create her Queen of Heaven and call her by the name of Regina Coeli then drew they very neere to the old Idolaters mentioned in the Prophet Jeremy in case they did not go beyond them This that we may the better see and so discern withall what a tare it proved let us look next upon the fruits and we shall finde that there is nothing lesse in this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this Virgin-Worship if I may so call it then true Wheat indeed Let us but look upon the fruits and we shall see that Anselm gives this reason why Christ when he ascended into Heaven left his Mother here Ne curiae coelesti veniret in dubium c. for fear the Court of Heaven might have been distracted whom they should first go out to meet their Lord or their Lady that Bernardin Senensis one of her especial votaries doth not fear to say Mariam plura fecisse Deo quà m fecit Deus toti generi humano that she did more to Christ in being his Mother then Christ hath done to all Mankind in being their Saviour That Gabriel Biel a School-man of good note and credit hath shared the Government of the World betwixt God and her God keeping justice to himself miscricordia matri virgini concessa and left to her the free dispensing of his mercies That Petrus Damian tells us that when she mediates for any of her Supplicants with our Saviour Christ non rogat ut ancilla sed imperat ut domina she begs not of him as an Handmaid but commands as a Mistress that Bonaventure in composing of our Ladies Psalter hath applyed to her what ever was intended by the Holy Ghost for the advancement of the honour of our Lord and Saviour and finally that Bellarmine hath made no difference between the veneration due to her and that which doth of right belong unto Christ as man Add unto these their usage of the vulgar sort in point of practise saying so many Ave Maries for one single Pater Noster hearing so many Masses of our Lady and not one of Christs decking her Images with all cost and cunning that mans wit can reach when his poor Statues stand neglected as not worth the looking after These and the rest if we should add what could be imagined but that the Apostles were mistaken when they made the Creed and that it was not Jesus but the Virgin-Mother that suffered under Pontius Pilate was crucified dead and buried for the sin of man You see then what most monstrous tares have grown up in the Church of Rome under the new devise of Hyperdulia Let us next see what their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 carrieth
enemy His malice unto God doth consist much more in a continual purpose to resist his will then a power to hurt him non potestate laedendi sed voluntate resistendi as the Father hath it The mischiefs which he meanes to God are but like Arrowes shot against a Rock of Adamant which rebound back on him that shot them nihil illi valentes nocere sed sibi The hurt he doth is to himself in filling up the measure of his own iniquities and thereby adding to the weight of his just damnation Things not succeeding to his wish with Almighty God his next design is upon man With him he had a quarrel too at his first Creation It grieved him at the very heart to see poor man composed of such vile matter as dust and ashes adopted unto those celestiall glories whence himself was fallen and therefore he resolves to work him to the like Apostasie This onset he then gave and hath since continued endeavouring nothing more then the fall of man that he might triumph on his ruines For being alienated from the love of God he hath been labouring ever since the World began to fill mens mindes with false opinions touching God and to bring in strange forms of worship which the Lord abhors Et alienati à Deo inductis pravis religionibus non desinunt homines à Deo segregare as mine Author hath it Hence came the monstrous dotages of the antient Gentiles concerning God the infinite and innumerable multitude of the Gods themselves their most ridiculous and sometimes most obscene and filthy ceremonies at many of their publick Festivals their barbarous and unnatural sacrifices not of the flesh of strangers only as in Gaul Pontus Egypt yea and Rome it self but making their own Children passe through the fire to Moloch as amongst the Israelites If Socrates or any of the Learned and more noble souls oppose these manifest impieties and seek to vindicate and restore the true knowledge of God him he will first disgrace with the common people deprive him of his fame and substance and at last his life If Job or any pious and religious spirit live not according to the will of Satan and the wicked multitude him he will labour to accuse before God himself that getting him into his hands to spoyl and plague him to the utmost he may inforce him in the end to curse God and die So then we see the difference of the Devils enmity unto God and man To God he is an enemy affectu only in his minde and purpose to man an enemy affectu and effectu too not only seeking whom he may devoure but devouring many Thus deales he also with the Church with the united body of Gods chosen servants Christ had no sooner raised himself from the bonds of death and placed himself at the right hand of God in the heavenly places but presently the Woman the Church of God however cloathed with the Sunne and crowned with Starres was by the Great Dragon brought into distress and forced to flie into the Wilderness Nor was it long before there was a Warre in Heaven Michael and his Angels against the Devill and his angels And howsoever the Arch-angel had the better then and that the Dragon was cast out and vanquished to the great comfort of the Saints yet hath he never left to persecute and afflict the Church The case stands so between the Devil and the Church of God as it was once 'twixt Rome and Carthage Semper inter eos populos aut bellum aut belli praeparatio aut infida pax fuit as the Story hath it Either they were in open Warre or preparing for it or if at any time in peace it was a peace more dangerous then the Warre it self For in the infancy of the Church what persecutions did he raise against her what monstrous Heresies did he raise within her what havock did he make of the Saints of God what a red Sea did he create of the blood of Martyrs If that at any time his wretched Instruments grew weary of their own tyranny as sometimes they did he then prepares the way unto new afflictions by charging those poor innocent souls with incestuous mixtures and drinking the warm blood of a new slain Infant which were those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so oft confuted and retorted by the antient Fathers Nay when the Church was setled in a perfect peace by the hand of Constantine yet was it still infida pax a peace but ill observed by the treacherous enemie intent on all occasions watching all advantages if not to cut it down at once by open violence yet to supplant it at the last by his subtile practises This to perform he was to deal in other manner and by other instruments then before he did more like a cunning practiser then an open enemy Before we finde him styled inimicus simply or inimicus quispiam as Beza here But in this place he comes in with a speciall adjunct 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as in the Greek or inimicus homo in the vulgar Latine wherewith agree Castellio and Erasmus in their translations of the Text. Our English versions do somewhat differ in the point The Bishops Bible as they call it reads it a malicious man that of Geneva an envious man the Rhemists literally an enemy man All of them keep themselves unto the homo as well as to the inimicus except our last Translation therein following Beza But what the reason is why Homo should be superadded unto inimicus that 's not yet agreed on St. Hierome is of this opinion Diabolum propterea inimicum hominem appellari quod Deus esse desiit that Satan is here called inimicus homo because he left off to be God But this I can by no meanes like of the Devil in the height of his ambition aspired not to be God but like him It was not ero Deus but ero Deo similis that procured his downfall Lupoldus in his Book de vita Christi tells us that homo is here joyned to inimicus as Africanus was to Scipio to denotate that Conquest which he gains on man when he subjects him to his will Others conceit that he is therefore called inimicus homo to shew that correspondence and affinity which is between the Devil and the wicked man the Devill in this place being called a man and Judas in the sixth of John being called a Devil but these as I conceive it are but tricks of fancy and come not home unto the point For my part I should rather think that Satan is here called inimicus homo because in sowing of his tares he used the help of envious and malicious men whom he had fitted for that purpose When he first set upon the Church by violent and bloody persecutions he made use of Beasts The Tyrants all from Nero down to Dioclesian what were they else but Beares and Wolves and
separando eos à communione Ecclesiae by severing them from the Communion of the faithful The like saith Gorran also and some latter Writers others and those of more Antiquity but farre more eminency in the Church think rather that their meaning was to cut them off not only from the body of the Church but of all mankind to go against them with the Sword and destroy them utterly Chrysostom so conceives it saying that if they had gone on as they were resolved in prosecuting of the Heretick with fire and sword 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 blood-shed and warre must needs have followed over all the World Theophylact goes to work more plainly and tells us that the servants being offended at the growth of Heresies by consequence incensed against the Hereticks themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were of a minde to make quick work with them to rid them of the troubles of this wretched life and so to save the trouble of more tedious process To which of these two courses their zeal might bend them is in the next place to be considered I conceive the last And this I am induced to think by the Masters Answer who on the hearing of the Proposition returned a non for it is plain he had a negative voyce of which more hereafter He did not like of the intention and to dislike their purpose there had been no reason had their design been to proceed only by the Churches censures He that committed to the Church in St. Peters name the power and dispensation of the keyes intended not that they should serve for nothing but a dumb shew a sign and token only of a powerless Ministery And when he gave to his Apostles so direct a power of binding and retaining sins and giving over unto Satan the impenitent person think you his meaning was they shonld never use it If so St. Panl must needs be guilty of no small offence in dealing so severely with the man of Corinth and wonder 't was there was no relaxation sued for from the Court of Heaven in case of so severe and just a sentence And to what end serves Dic Ecclesiae if the poor Church have power to hear but not to censure or if upon the Churches censures none be so fit to be accounted either an Heathen or Publican as he who is intrusted by the Church to inflict the same Assuredly God would not disallow the course which himself prescribed or by removing from the Church the power of censure open a gapp to all impurity both of life and doctrine There was a time once in the Church of England I do not say it is so now wherein the censures of the Church under pretence or colour of some civill sanctions were either quite abolished or of no effect to the no small increase of vice because it nourished a presumption of impunity in vicious persons Of this old Father Latimer doth thus complain in a Sermon preached before King Edward Lechery saith he is used in England and such lechery as is used in no other place of the World And yet it is made a matter of sport a matter of nothing a laughing matter a trifle not to be passed on nor reformed Well I trust it will be amended one day and I hope to live to see it mended as old as I am And here I will make a suit to your Highnesse to restore unto the Church the Discipline of Christ in excommunicating such as be notable offenders Nor never devise any other way for no man is able to devise any better then that God hath done with excommunication to put them from the Congregation till they be confounded Therefore restore Christs Discipline for Excommunication and that shall be a meane both to pacifie Gods wrath and indignation and also that lesse abomination shall be used then in times past hath been and is at this day I speak this of a Conscience and I mean to move it of a will to your Grace and your Realm Bring into the Church of England the open Discipline of Excommunication that open sinners may be stricken withall So farre the very words of Father Latimer Let every one consider of them as he thinks most necessary perhaps the Sermon may be more effectuall with some kinde of men when one is raised up from the dead to preach unto them Besides this could not be the way which was intended by those servants if either we consider their Colligimus or the eradicetis of their Master in the following words The servants or the Church in them might have gone on to excommunication of the Heretick and the condemning of the Heresie without the least fear or imagination that by so doing eradicetur simul cum eis triticum the wheat the Lords good seed would be pulled up with them The censure of an Heretick doth rather strengthen then destroy the truth of Doctrine and he that doth correct a stubborn and impenitent sinner hindreth not but confirms the vertuous person in the way of godliness And for Colligimus that is we know a compound word as is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Original and doth not so much signifie a single gathering as a gathering up of all together and so the word is used in the following Verses It seemes the servants of my Text would have made short work and swept away these tares at once without more ado which howsoever it may be done sometimes in ore gladii which devoures all things where it is permitted to range at liberty yet is it seldom done if ever in gladio oris by Admonitions Excommunications or any other kind of spiritual punishments Non excommunicandam multitudinem was the rule of old The censures of the Church do only legere pick here and there a man out of many sinners by whose exemplary corrections others may beware of the like offences Tormenta paucorum sunt exempla omnium as my Authour hath it Colligere is none of hers in this sense and meaning And therefore here was no such meaning as to proceed by excommunication to bring these tares to be arraigned and tryed at the Churches Barre And being their meaning was not so their zeal though more remarkable was yet lesse warrantable A zeal like that of James and John the two Sonnes of Thunder Vis dicimus ut descendat ignis Wilt thou that fire come down from Heaven to destroy these miscreants No dealing with some zelots of both sides but by fire and faggot by the sword at least for which they have no warrant I am sure from either Text. Neither indeed do they which stand most on it fetch their grounds from hence or if they did how wretchedly would those grounds deceive them neither the Brethren there nor the servants here had any calling from the Lord to be the instruments of his vengeance The Apostles were ordained by Christ amongst other things to offer unto God the sacrifice of
of the assistance of those ministring Spirits in all the times of personal or publick dangers It 's true the apparition of the Angels in these latter times hath been very rare and God dealt very graciously with the sonnes of men that they come so seldom for being too many are so prone to give divine honours to the Images of the Saints departed how easily might they deceive themselves of their reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of Angels which was the fault of the Colossians and after the Heresie of those whom Epiphanius and St. Austin call Angelici did they appear unto us ordinarily in some visible glorious form But then it is as true withall one of the most eternal truths of holy Scripture That the Angel of the Lord encampeth about them that fear him and delivereth them Whether we see or see them not it comes all to one and so resolved by Clemens of Alexandria an old Christian Writer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Lord saith he doth still preserve us by the Ministry of his holy Angels though we behold them not in any visible shape as the Antients did When therefore and as often as we fall into any danger let us address our prayers to the Lord our God that he would please to give command unto his Angels to come in to help us that he would make our enemies like the chaffe before the wind and the Angel of the Lord scattering them and having so made known our desires unto him to look for their assistance accordingly This is warranted unto us in the words of Calvin Ut in periculis constituti à Deo petamus protectionem Angelorum confidamus eos ex mandato Dei praestò fore But behold a greater then Calvin here for we are warranted as much both by the Doctrine and the practice of the Church of England who teacheth us to pray and we pray accordingly That God who hath ordained and constituted the service of Angels and men in a wonderful order would mercifully grant that they which do him service in Heaven may by his appointmâ—nt succour and defend us upon the Eaâ—th as in the Collect for the day of St. Michael the Archangel But this is but a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the main design for though these temporal judgements and deliverances may come within the compass of the Harvest which is here mentioned yet is the Harvest chiefly meant of the general Judgement when all flesh shall be brought before Gods Tribunal and brought before it by the Ministry of the holy Angels who are the Reapers of my Text the Ministers or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of that dreadful Court. For proof whereof we need but look into the process of St. Matthewes Gospel in which we find That the Lord shall come to judgement riding on the Clouds with great power and glory accompanied with Angels and Archangels and the sound of the Trumpet So great a Judge coming to hold his grand Assises cannot be ushered in with lesse Pomp and Majesty And to what purpose serve those Angels Assuredly not only to fill up the Train to make the manner of his coming the more brave and glorious but for some other special and more weighty use And therefore when our Saviour hath informed us this That the Sonne of man shall come in his glory and all the holy Angels with him he tells us in the following words That before him shall all the Nations of the World be gathered Gathered together but by whom by these very Angels Then saith he shall he send his Angels with a great sound of a Trumpet and they shall gather together the Elect from the four winds from one end of Heaven unto the other What the Elect and none but they Not so These Reapers must root up the Tares as well as gather in the Wheat Our Saviours Exposition of the Text makes that clear enough where we shall find that at the end of the world the Sonne of man shall send forth his Angels and they shall gather out of his Kingdom all things that offend and them that do iniquity And in the Parable of the casting Net That the Angels shall come forth at the end of the World and sever the wicked from the just There are two sorts of men to be brought together the Elect and Reprobate two sorts of Grain which must be gathered by these Reapers but how they must be ordered being brought together and what the Angels have to do in execution of those orders we shall soon find by looking over the particulars of the second generall where we have first the condemnation of the wicked represented to us in three words Colligite Colligate Comburite Gather ye together first the Tares and bind them in bundles to burn them Of this next in order In Patrefamilias habemus quâ—d amemus imitemur There are four things remarkable in the Heavenly Husbandman as he is represented to us in this present Parable worthy of our applause and imitation His goodness first Seminando bona in that he sowed his field with the good seed only his patience next tolerando mala in suffering the Tares though otherwise a corrupt and adulterate seed to remain ungathered till the Harvest came In the next place we have his wisdom praecavendo pericula in taking such especial care to preserve his Wheat which doubtless had been subject to some notable mischief had he imbraced the other which his Servants made the imus colligimus of the 28. And last of all we have his justice reddendo secundum merita in giving unto every one as he had deserved according to the works which he hath wrought in the flesh whether good or bad Praemium Poena Reward and punishment have in all Ages been esteemed the Rule and measure not only of all Earthly Governments but the Heavenly also Who would endeavour piety and the works of vertue were there not some reward to allure him to it or rob his Genius of the dalliances of this present life and not give way unto the sensuality of his lusts and Appetite were there not punishments in store to affright him from it were not the punishments so grievous and of such eternity as farre surmount the sweetness of these sinful pleasures which in themselves are short and momentany and enjoyed only for a season The fear of punishment and Hell are of greatest efficacy to affright many a man from sin whom the love of God and godlinesse will hardly work on and well it were if the consideration of it would prevail so farre Of this the condemnation of the wicked I am first to speak the method of my Text doth invite me to it and the first word we meet with is Colligite gather ye together 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Greek Text hath it and that doth signifie such a kind of gathering as intimates a plucking up by the