Ottoman Empire some beginning it at the yeer 73. and drawing it on to conclude in the yeer 1073. when Hildebrand began to Tyrannize in the Church To let passe these since no man is able to reconcile them we can not but wonder that so grosse an errour should spread so far in the first and best times of the Church as to finde entertainment with so many but lesse wonder that it is reviv'd and foster'd by so many in ours who have lesse learning but more art to misinterpret and wrest the Scriptures â—o their own Damnation For what can they finde in this text to make them kings no more then many of them can finde in themselves to make them Saints And here is no mention of all the Saints but of Martyrs alone who were beheaded for the witnesse of Jesus v. 4. But we may say of this book of the Revelation as Aristotle spake of his books of Physick that it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it is publisht and not publisht publisht but not for every man to fasten what sense he please upon it though we cannot deny but some few of latter times and so few as but enough to make up a number have by their multiplicity of reading and subtil diligence of observation and by a dextrous comparing those particulars which are registred in story with those things which are but darkly revealed or plainly revealed to Saint John but not so plain to us have raised us such probabilities that we may look up them with favour and satisfaction 'till we see some fairer evidence appear some more happy conjectures brought forth which may impair and lessen hat credit which as yet for ought that hath been seen they well deserve But this is not every mans work 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every mans eye is not so quick and piercing to see at such distance and we see since so many men have taken the courage and been bold to play the interpreters of their dark Prophesies they have shaped out what fancies they please and instead of unfolding Revelations have presented vs with nothing but dreams as so many divers moralls to one fable and fo for two witnesses we have a cloud for one Beast almost as many as be in the Forrest and for one Antichrist every man that displeaseth us But let men interpret the thousand yeers how they please Our Saviour calls it an errour an errour that strikes at the very heart of Christianity which promiseth no riches nor power nor pleasure but that which is proportioned to those vertues and spiritual duties of which it consists For in the Resurrection neither do they marry Wives nor are married we may adde neither are there high nor love neither rich nor poor but all are one in Christ Jesus and his words are plain enough Quaedam sic digna revinci ne gravitate adorentur Tert. adv Valentin John 18. my Kingdom is not of this World I should scarce have vouchsafed to mention an errour so grosse and which carries absurdity in the very face of it but that we have seen this monster drest up and brought abroad and magnified in this latter age and in our own times which as they abound with iniquity so they do with errors which to study to confute were to honor them too much who make their â—…ual appetite a key to open Revelations and to please and satisfie that are well content here to build their Tabernacle and stay on earth a thousand yeers amongst those pleasing objects which our Religion bids us to contemn and to be so long absent from that joy and peace which is past understanding Their Heaven is as their vertues are ful of drosse earth and but a poor and imperfect resemblance of that which is so indeed and their conceit as carnal as themselves which Christianity and even common reason abhors For look upon them and you shall behold them full of debate envy malice covetousnesse ambition minding earthly things and so fancy a reward like unto themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 like embraceth like as mire is more pleasing to swine then the waters of Jordan and it is no wonder to hear them so loud and earnest for riches and pleasure and a temporal Kingdom who have so weak a title to and so little hope of any other But God forbid that our Lord should come and flesh and blood prescribe the manner for then in how many several shapes must he appear in he must come to the covetous and fill his cofers to the wanton and build him a Seraglio to the ambitious and crown him no his advent shal be like himself he shal come in power majesty in a form answerable to his Laws Government and as al things were gatherd together in him Eph. 1.10,22 which are in Heaven and which are in earth and God hath put all things under his feet so he shall come unto all to Angels to the Creature to men And 1. he may well be said to come unto the Angels For he is the head of all Principalitie and Power colos 2.10 as at his first coming he confirmed them in their happy estate of obedience which we beleeve as probable though we have no plain evidence of Scripture for it so at his second he shall more fully shew that to them that which they desired to look into 1 Pet. 1.17 as Saint Peter speaks give them a clearer vision of God and increase the joy of the good as he shall the torments of evil Angels For if they sang for joy at his Birth what Hosannas and Hallelujahs will they sound forth when they attend him with a shout if they were so taken with his humility how will they be ravisht with his Glory and if there by joy in Heaven for one sinner that repents how will that joy be exalted when those repentant sinners shall be made like unto the Angels when they shall be of the same Quire and sing the same song glory and honour to him that sitteth upon the Throne and to this Lord for Evermore Secondly he comes unto the Creatures to redeem them from bondage for the desire of the Creature is for this day of his coming Rom. 8.19,22 for even the whole Creation groaneth with us also but when he comes they shall be reformed into a better estate 2 Pet. 3.13 there shall be new Heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousnesse Now the Creature is subjecta vanitati subject to vanity not onely to change and mutability but to be instrumental to evil purposes to rush into the battle with us to run upon the Angels sword to be our drudges and our Parasites to be the hire of a whore and the price of blood They groan as it were and travaile in pain under these abuses and therefore desire to be deliverd not out of any rational desire but a natural inclination which is in every thing to preserve it self in its best
and increasing our faith that it may be more apprehensive more operative more lively that it may even spring in our hearts at the mention of Christ at this representation of his body and blood as the babe did in Elizabeths womb at the Virgin Mary's salutation For our Faith as it may have its increasings and improvements so it may have its decreasings and failings may be weakned by the daily incursions which the world and the devil make upon it by presenting objects of Terror to daunt and enfeeble it objects of delight to slumber and charm it It may be weakned by the daily avocations and common actions of our life that we may not cleave so close unto Christ not eye him with that intention not love him with that fervour not obey him with that cheerfulnesse which we should but be in a disposition ready to fall off and let go our hold of him And therefore as we must at all times stir it up and actuate it so especially in our approaches to the Lords table for in this doth our preparation to it in this doth the benefit and power of the Sacrament principally consist for here doth our Saviour as it were again present himself to us opens him wounds shewes us his hand and his side speaks to us as he did to Thomas reach hither your fingers and behold my hands and reach hither your hands and thrust them into my sides take eat this is my body and be not faithlesse but believing here shake off that chilness that restivenesse that acedie that wearinesse that faintnesse of your faith here warm and actuate and quicken it that it may be a working fighting conquering faith For thus to do it is to do this in remembrance of him Secondly It takes in repentance by which we doe most truly remember Christ remember his birth and are born againe for repentance is our new birth remember his Circumcision and circumcise our hearts for repentance is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the great circumcision saith Epiphanius goe about with him doing good for repentance is our obedience remember him on his Crosse for repentance setteth up a Crosse in imitation of his and lifts us up upon it stretcheth and dilates all the powers of our soule peirceth our hearts and so crucifies the flesh and the affections and lusts thereof Our repentance if it be true is an imitation of Christs suffering a revenge upon our selves for what the Jewes did to him the proper issue and effect to his love for what Christ worketh in us he first works upon us makes us see and feele and handle his love that we may be active in those duties of love which by his command and ensample we owe to him and in him to our brethren He dyed to be a propitiation for our sinnes that is that he might make sinne to cease for so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 implyes gives us strength by repentance quite to extinguish and abolish sinne Thus if we repent thus if we doe we doe it in remembrance of him And this we are to doe but then especially when we prepare our selves and make our addresses to Christs Table for though repentance be the fruit of a due examination of our selves yet we may and must examine our repentance it self and the time to doe it is now now thou art to renew thy Covenant and so must also renew thy repentance In the Feast of the Atonement the Lord tells his people Lev. 23.27 you shall keep it and he that doth not afflict his soul shall be cut off This is a day for it and in this day thou must doe it This is the season to ransack thy soule to see how many graines of hypocrisie were left behind in thy former repentance what hollowness was in thy groanes what coldnesse in thy devotion to see what advantage Satan hath since taken what ground he hath won in thy soule and then in remembrance of Christs love set afresh to the work of mortification wound thy heart deeper lay on surer blowes empty thy self of thy self of all that rust and rubbish which thy self-love left behind and then stir up those graces in thee which through inadvertency and carelessnesse lye raked up as in the ashes in a word refine every vertue quicken every grace intend thy will exalt thy faith draw neerer to Christ and so renew thy Covenant and sit down at his Table and thus if thou doe it thou dost it in remembrance of him I might here take in the whole traine the whole Circle and Crown of Christian graces and virtues and draw them together and shut them within the compasse of this one word remembrance for it will comprehend them all knowledge obedience love sincerity thankfulnesse from whence the Sacrament hath its name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 my last payment and peace offering for he that truly believes and repents as he is sick of sinne so is he sick of love of that love which in the Sacrament is sealed and confirmed to us is full of saving knowledge is ever bowing to Christs scepter is sincere and like himself in all his wayes will meditate of it day and night will drive it ab animo in habitum as Tertull. speaks from the mind to the motions and actions of his body from the conscience into the outward man till it appeare in liberall hands in righteous lips and in attentive eares will breath forth nothing but devotion but prayers and Hallelujahs glory honour and praise for this his love and so become as the picture and image and face of Christ reflecting all his favours and graces back upon him as a Pillar engraven with Gods lovingkindnesses a Memoriall of Gods goodnesse thankfully set up for ever and thus to doe it is to doe it in remembrance of him And to conclude thus if we doe it if we thus remember him he will also remember us remember us and set us as seales upon his heart and signets on his right hand remember us as his peculiar treasure and as our remembrance of him takes up all the duty of a Christian so doth his remembrance of us comprehend all the benefits of a Saviour our love of him and his love to us are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 will be as matter and fuell to nourish and uphold this remembrance between us for ever Nazian or 17. we shall remember him in humility and obedience and he shall remember us in love and power we shall remember him on earth and he shall remember us in heaven and prepare a place for us he shall remember our affliction and uphold us he shall remember our prayers and make them effectuall our almes and make them a pleasing sacrifice he shall remember our failings and settle and establish us our teares and turn them into joy he shall remember all that we do or suffer all but our sinnes those he hath buried in his grave for ever And now we are drawing neere to his table
shewed thee O man what is good and wilt thou not believe him fath is the substance of things not seen and though they be not seen yet they are evident the Meanes evident and the End as evident as the Meanes In our sad and sober thoughts when we talk like speculative men as evident as what is open to the eye But such an evidence we have which a covetous man would soon lay hold on for a title to a faire inheritance and the ambitious for an assignment of some great place for if such a record had been transmitted to posterity if the Scripture which conveighs this Good had entailed some rich Mannor or Lordship upon them it should have then found an easie belief and been Gospel a sure word of prophecy unquestionable undoubtable like the decrees of the Medes and Persians which must stand fast for ever and cannot be altered for too many there be who had rather have their names in a good leaf then in the book of life and this is the reason why we are so ignorant of that which is good indeed and so great clerks in that which is calted good but by the worst why we are so dull and indocile in apprehending that wisdome which is from above and so wise and witty to our own damnation why we do but darkly see this Good which is so plainly shewed unto us What shall we say then nay what saith the Scripture Awake thou that sleepest in sloth and idlenesse thou that sleepest in a tempest in the midst of thy unruly and turbulent passions arise from the grave and sepulchre wherein thy sloth hath intomb'd thee arise from the dead from that nasty charnel-house of rotten bones where so many vitious habits have shut thee up break up thy monument cast aside every weight and every sinne that presseth down and rise up and be but a man improve thy reason to thy best advantage and this Good shall shine upon thee with all its beames and brightnesse and Christ shall give thee light if not to see things to come to satisfy thy curiosity yet to see things to come which shall fill thy soul as with marrow and fatnesse if not to know the uncertain yet certain wayes of Gods providence yet to know the certain and infallible way to blisse if not to know things too high for thee yet to know that which shall exalt thee to heavenly places in Christ Jesus He hath shewn thee O man what is Good doest thou see it doest thou believe it thou shalt see greater things then these thou shalt see what thou doest believe enjoy what thou doest but hope for thou shalt see God who hath shewed thee this Good that thou mightest see him thou shalt then have a more exact knowledg of his wayes and providence a fuller taste of his love and goodnesse a clearer sight of his beauty and majesty and with all his Angels and all his Saints behold his glory for evermore Thus much of this Good as it is an object to be lookt on we shall in the next place consider it as a Law Quid requirit what doth the Lord require HONI â—…T QVI MAL Y PENSE The Three and Twentieth SERMON PART III. MICAH 6.8 He hath shewed thee O man what is good and what doth the Lord require of thee but to doe justly c. HE hath shewed thee O man what is good what it is thou wert made for even that which is fitted and proportioned to thy soul that which is lovely and amiable and so a fit object to look on that which will fill and satisfy the soul and turn the greatest evil the world can lay as a stone of offence in our way into good and raise it self upon it to its highest pitch of glory and this he hath made plain and manifest drawn out in so visible a character that thou mayest run and read it And thus far we have already brought you We must yet lead you further even to the foot of mount Sinai what doth the Lord require of thee which is as the publication of it and making it a law For with the thunder and the lightning and the sound of the Trumpet and the voice of words this voice was heard I am the Lord. Thus saith the Lord It is the Prophets Warrant or Commission I the Lord have spoken it is a seal to the Law By this every word shall stand by this every Law is of force It is a word of power and command and authority for he that can doe what he will may also require what he will in heaven or in earth So then If he be the Lord he may require it and in this one word in this Monosyllable all power in heaven and in earth is contained For in calling him Lord he assignes unto him an absolute will which must be the rule of our will and of all the actions which are the effects and works of our will and issue from it as from their first principle and mover And this his will is attended 1. with Power 2. with Wisdome 3. with Love 1. By his power he made us 2. he protects and preserves us and from this issues his legislative power 3. as by his Wisdome he made us so by the same wisdome he gives us such a Law which shall sweetly and certainly lead us to that End for which he made us And last of all his Love it is to the work of his own hands thus to lead us And all these are shut up in this one word Lord. And let us view and consider these and so look upon them as to draw down their influence and vertue into our souls which may work that obedience in us which this Lord requires and will reward And 1. Quid requirit Dominus what doth the Lord require It is the Lord requires it and I need not trouble you with a recitall of those places of Scripture where God is called the Lord. For if the Scripture be as the Heaven this is a Star of the greatest magnitude and spreads its beams of Majesty and power in the eyes of all men and to require is the very form of a Law I will I require if power speak It is a law It will be more apposite and agreeable to our purpose that we may the more willingly embrace and entertain this Good which is publisht as a law to look upon this word Lord as it expresses the Majesty and greatnesse of God for he is therefore said to be the Lord because he is omnipotent and can do all things that he will He is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Nazianzen a vast and boundlesse Ocean of essence and he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a boundlesse and infinite sea of power Take the highest pitch of Dominion and Lordship that our imagination can reach yet it falls short of his who is Lord of Lords to whom all earthly Majesty must vaile and at whose feet all Princes lay down their Crowns
Humility the exinanition of the Son of God could raise us And we may observe in the 7th of Esay God bids Ahaz ask a sign not onely è coelo from Heaven but è terra from the earth beneath è profundis from the lowest depth quia utrumque copulavit it is S. Basils note upon that place because at the Union of the Godhead with our Nature there was a neere Conjunction with Heaven and Earth A sign from Heaven is a great Grace but we would have a sign from earth too and here we have it Factus similis he was made like unto his Brethren 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a God amongst Men a God on the Earth is a signe indeed And therefore in the next place as he is Deus de patre God of his Father so he is Homo de matre Man of his Mother the Son of God and the Son of Mary Will you have a sign here it is a signe to be adored and a sign to be wondred at and a sign to be spoken against saith old Simeon a sign è profundis we may say from the deep abyss of his mercy Ecce expectat nasci sua membra quae fecit Behold the Heavens are the work of his fingers yet he suffered himself to be fashioned in the womb of a Virgin took of Man what he abounds with to be Born and Dye digested into members knit together with sinewes built up with bones covered with our flesh inveloped with skin raised up to the perfect similitude nay drawn down to the low condition of his Creature he would be any thing but sin to redeem him from Sin and save him and descend so low as the Grave and as Hell it self to raise him to a capability and hope of Heaven and Immortality Mira 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a wonderfull condescention a wonderfull fall from his Throne to the Womb from his dwelling place on high to dwell in the Flesh from his Angels Gloria in Excelsis Glory be to God on high to the Shepherds vidimus in praesepi we have seen him in the Cratch from the Seraphins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Holy Holy Holy to the Jewes bitter Sarcasme Come down from the Crosse from riding on the Cherubin to the hanging on the Tet Mirabilis descensus this was a wonderfull descent nor could we think God could do it but that we know he can do more than we can think Where was that hand that made and fashioned us that meated the Heavens and measured out the Waters that weighed the Mountains in scales where was that voyce which thundered from Heaven that mighty voyce which broke the Cedars of Libanus where was that God that was from everlasting Doe we not stand at gaze and put on wonder Doe we not tremble to say it and yet to say it as we should is Salvation Latuit in Humilitate majestas That Majesty lay hid in Humility that Power was in Frailty That Hand in the Crotch and in the Clouts that Voyce in an Infant not able to speak 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Naz. Nazianz. orat 38. The God of Spirits was incarnate he that was invisible was seen he that could not be touched handled we have seen with our eyes we have heard him our hands have handled him saith S. John He that was from everlasting had a beginning he that was the Son of God Factus similis made the Son of Man like unto his Brethren We cannot put on too much caution and reverence when we speak of God De Deo vel seriò loqui periculosum ne fortè Deo indigna loquamur Our tongue will be as the pen of a ready writer and run too fast if feare do not hold it and it is very dangerous to speak of that Majesty which is at such an infinite distance from us that it is far safer to adore than discourse of it the Christian world hath been too daring and bold with him to speak of him what they please and then to teach him to speak to make a language of their owne and say it is his although the words be such as were never heard from Heaven nor can be found in the Book of the Generation of Jesus Christ If we be his Disciples when we speak to him or of him let us use his own words for then he will better understand us and we shall better understand one another for when we set up a Mint of our own and take to our selves the royalty of coynage whatsoever we work out we send abroad as current though the character and stamp present more of our own Image than his when we will be over-witty commonly we are over-seen God is made like unto Men if the words were not his we should not dare to speak them but this is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the submission and minoration of Christ and if he will descend so low if he will take our likeness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he takes it in good part Naz. 16. â—b and is well pleased to learn these words from us because they are his own Like a man a man of sorrowes a worm and no man a despised rejected man he will have us call him so he hath put it into our Creed and counts it no disparagement He set a time for it and when the Appointed time came he was made like unto us and all Generations may speak it to his glory to the end of the world Before he appeared darkly wrapped up in Types veyled in Dreames beheld in Visions that he appeares in the likenesse of our Flesh that he appeares and speaks and suffers in our Flesh is the high prerogative of the Gospel And here he publisheth himself in every way of representation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in our Image or likenesse in the forme of a servant our very picture a living picture a picture drawn out to life indeed such a picture as one man is of another 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by way of Comparison for how hath he spread and dilated himself by a world of comparisons He is a Shepherd to guide and feed us a Captaine to leade us a Prophet to teach us he is a Priest and he is the Sacrifice for us he is Bread to strengthen us he is a vine to refresh us he is a Lamb that we may be meek he is a Lyon that we may be valiant he is a Worm that we may be patient he is a Doore to let us in and the way through which we passe into life he is any thing that will make us like him sinne and error and the Devil hath not appeared in more shapes to deceive and destroy us then Christ hath to save us Lastly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by his exemplary virtues and those raised to such a high pitch of perfection that neither the cursed Heretiques nor the miscreant Turk nor the Devil himself could reach and blemish it never was righteousnesse in his verticall point but in him where it
the hazard of their own soules and of that which should be as deare to them the peace of the Church Be not then too inquisitive to find out the manner of this union for the holy Father seales up thy lips that thou mayst not once think of Asking the question Just Mart. and tells thee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that thou art not like to meet with an answer and what greater folly can there be then to attempt to do that which cannot be done or to search for that which is past finding out or to be ever a beginning and never make an end Search the scriptures for they are they that testifie of him testifie that he was God blessed for evermore that that word which was Godw as also made flesh that he was the Son of God and the Sonne of man the manner how the two Natures are united is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil ib. unsearchable unfoordable and the knowledge of it if our narrow understandings could receive it would not adde one haire to our stature and growth in Grace that he is God and man that the two Natures are united in one person who is thy Saviour and mediator is enough for thee to know and to rayse thy nature up to him Take the words as they lye in their Native purity and simplicity and not as they are hammered and beat out and stampt by every hand by those who will be Fathers not Interpreters of Scripture and beget what sense they please and present it not as their own but as a child of God Then Lo here is Christ and there is Christ this is Christ and that is Christ thou shalt see many images and characters of him but not one that is like him an imperfect Christ a half Christ a created Christ a fancied Christ a Christ that is not the Son of God and a Christ that is not the Son of Man and thus be rowled up and down in uncertainties and left to the poore and miserable comfort of Conjecture in that which so far as it concerns us is so plain and easie to be known Doe thoughts arise in thy heart do doubts and difficulties beset thee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Justin Martyr thy Faith is the solution and will soon quit thee of them and cast them by thy Faith not assumed or insinuated into thee or brought in as thy vices may be by thy education but raised upon a holy hill a sure foundation the plain and expresse Word of God and upheld and strengthned by the Spirit Christian dost thou believe Thou hast then seen thy God in the Flesh from Eternity yet born Invisible yet seen Immense and circumscribed Immortall yet dying the Lord of life and Crucified God and man Christ Jesus Amaze not thy self with an inordinate feare of undervaluing thy Saviour wrong not his love and call it thy Reverence why should thoughts arise in thy Heart his power is not the lesse because his mercy is great nor doth his infinite love shadow or detract from his Majesty for see He counts it no disparagement to be seen in our flesh nor to be at any losse by being thus like us our Apostle tells us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there was a Decorum in it and it behoved him to be like unto his Brethren Debuit It behoved him That Christ was made like unto us is the joy of this Feast but that he ought to be is the wonder and extasy of our joy that he would descend is mercy but that he must is our astonishment Oportet and Debet are binding termes and words of Duty Had our Apostle said It behoved us that he should be made like unto us it had found an easy belief the debuit had been placed in loco suo in its proper place on a sweating brow on dust and putrefaction on the face of a captive All will say it Behoved us much but to put a Debet upon the Son of God to make it a Decorum a beseeming thing for him to become Flesh to be made like unto us to set a Rubie in Clay a Diamond in Brasse a Chrysolet in baser Metall and say it is placed well there to worry the Lambs for the Wolf to take the Master by the throat for the Debt of a Prodigall and with an Oportet to say it should be so to give a gift and call it a Debt is not out usuall language on earth on Earth it is not but in Heaven it is the proper Dialect fixed up in Capitall letters on the Mercy Seat the joy of this Feast the Angels Antheme Salvator Natus a Saviour is born and if he will be a Saviour an Undertaker a Surety such is the Nature of Fidejussion and Suretiship debet he must it behoveth him as deeply engaged as the party whose surety he is And let us look on the aptnesse of the meanes and we shall soon find that this Foolishnesse of God as the Apostle calls it is wiser than men and this weaknesse of God is stronger than men 1 Cor. 1.25 that the oportet is right set For medio existente conjunguntur extrema if you will have extremes to meet you must have a middle line to draw them together and behold here they meet and are made unum one Ephes 2.14 saith the Apostle the proprieties of either Nature being entire and yet meeting and concentring themselves as it were in one person Majesty puts on Humility Power Infirmity Eternity Mortality by the one he dyes for us by the other he riseth again by the one he suffers as Man by the other he conquers as God in them both he perfects and consummates the great work of our redemption And this Debuit reacheth home to each part of my Text to Christ as God The same hand that made the vessell when it was broken and so broken that there was not one sherd left to fetch water at any pit to repaire and set it together again that it may receive and contain the water of life ut qui fecit nos reficeret that our Creation and Salvation should be wrought by the same hand and turned about upon the same wheele Next we may set the debuit upon his person and he is media persona a middle person and the office will best fit him even the office of a Mediator and then as he is the Son of God who is the Image of the Father and most proper it may seem to him to repair that Image which was defaced and well neere lost in us For we had not onely blemished this Image but set the Devils face and superscription upon Gods coyne for Righteousnesse there was Sin for Purity Pollution for Beauty Deformity for Rectitude Perversenesse for the Man a Beast scarce any thing left by which he might know us venit filius ut iterum signet the Son comes and with his blood revives again the first character marks us with his owne signature imprints the Graces of
and that there is no such pleasing variety of colours there as we see so the pomp and riches glory of this world are of themselves nothing but are the work of our opinion and the creations of our fancy have no worth nor price but what our lusts and desires set upon them luxuria his pretium fecit 't is our luxury which hath raised the market and made them valuable and in esteem which of themselves have nothing to commend them and set them off My covetousnesse makes that which is but earth a God my ambition makes that which is but aire as heaven and my wantonnesse walks in the midst of pleasures as in a Paradise there is no such thing as Riches and Poverty Honour and Peasantry Trouble and pleasure but we have made them and we make the distinction there are no such plants grow up in this world of themselves but we set them and water them and they spread themselves and cast a shadow and we walk in this shadow and delight or disquiet our selves in vain Diogenes was a King in his tub when great Alexander was but a Slave in the world which he conquered how many heroick persons lie in chains whilest folly and basenesse walk at large and no doubt there have been many who have looked through the paint of the pleasures of this life and beheld them as monsters and then made it their pleasure and triumph to contemn them And yet we will not quite exclude and shut out riches and the things of this world from the summe for with Christ they are something and they are then most valuable when for his sake we can fling them away for it is he alone that can make Riches a gift and Poverty a gift Honour a gift and Dishonour a gift Pleasure a gift and Trouble a gift Life a gift and Death a gift by his power they are reconciled and drawn together and are but one and the same thing for if wee look up into heaven there we shall see them in a neer conjunction even the poor Lazar in the rich mans bosom In the night there is no difference to the eye between a Pearl and a Pibble-stone between the choicest beauty and most abhorred deformity In the night the deceitfulnesse of riches and the glory of affliction lie hid and are not seen or in a contrary shape in the false shape of terrour where it is not or glory where it is not to be found but when the light of Christs countenance shines upon them then they are seen as they are and we behold so much deceitfulnesse in the one that we dare not trust them and so much hope and advantage in the other that we begin to rejoyce in them and so make them both conducible to that end for which he was delivered and our convoyes to happiness All things is of a large compasse large enough to take in the whole world but then it is the world transformed altered the world conquered by Faith the world in subjection to Christ All things are ours when we are Christs for there is a Civil Dominion and right to these things and this we have jure creationis by right of Creation for the earth is the Lords and he hath given it to the sons of men and there is an Evangelical Dominion not the power of having them but the power of using them to his glory that they may be a Gift and this we have jure adoptionis by right of Adoption as the sons of God begotten in Christ Christ came not into the world to purchase it for us or enstate us in it he did not suffer that we might be wanton nor was poor that we might be rich nor was brought to the dust of death that we might be set in high places such a Messias did the Jewes look for and such a Messias doe some Christians worse than the Jewes frame to themselves and in his name they beat their fellow-servants and strip them deceive and defraud them because they fancy themselves to be his in whom there was found no guile and they are in the world as the mad Athenian was on the shore every ship every house every Lordship is theirs and indeed they have as fair a title to their brothers estate as they have to the kingdome of Heaven for they have nothing to shew for either I remember in 2 Corinth 4.4 S. Paul calls the Divel the God of this world and these in effect make him the Saviour of the world for as if he had been lifted up and nailed to the Crosse for them to him every knee doth bow nor will they receive the true Messias but in this shape for thus they conceive him giving gifts unto men not spirituall but temporall not the Graces of the Spirit Humility Meeknesse and Contentednesse but Silver and Gold dividing Inheritances removing of Land-marks giving to Ziba Mephibosheths land making not Saints but Kings upon the earth and thus they of the Church of Rome have set it down for a positive truth that all civil Dominion is founded in Grace that is in Christ a Doctrine which brings with it a Pick-lock and a Sword and gives men power to defraud or spoyle whom they please and to take from them that which is theirs either by fraud or by violence and to do both in the name and power of Christ But let no man make his charter larger than it is and in the Gospel we finde none of such an extent which may reach to every man to every corner of the earth which may measure out the world and put into our hands any part of it that either our wit or our power can take in for Christ never drew any such conveyance the Gospel brought no such tidings but when labour and industry have brought them in sets a seal imprints a blessing on them sanctifies them unto us by the Word and by Prayer and so makes them ours our servants to minister unto and our friends to promote and lift us forward into everlasting habitations Our Charter is large enough and we need not interline it with those Glosses which the Flesh and the love of the World will soon suggest with Christ we have all things which work to that end for which he was delivered we have his commands which are the pledges of his love for he gave us them that he might give us more that he might give us a Crown we have his promises of immortality and eternall life Faciet hoc nam qui promisit est potens he shall do it for he is able to perform it with him every word shall stand he hath given us faith for that is the gift of God to apprehend and receive them and hope to lift us up unto them He hath given us his Pastors to teach us that is scarce looked upon as a gift but then he hath given us his Angels to minister unto us and he hath given us his Spirit fills us
with his Grace if we will receive it which will make his commands which are now grievous easie his Promises which are rich profitable which may carry us on in a regular and peaceable course of piety and obedience which is our Angel which is our God and we call it Grace All these things we have with Christ and the Apostle doth not onely tell us that God doth give us them but to put it out of doubt puts up a quomodo non challenges as it were the whole world to shew how it should be otherwise How will he not with him give us all things And this question addes energy and weight and emphasis and makes the position more positive the affirmation more strong and the truth of it more perswasive and convincing shall he not give us all things It is impossible but he should more possible for a City upon a hill to be hid than for him to hide his favour from us more possible for Heaven to sink into Hell or Hell to raise it self up to his Mercy-seat than for him to with-hold any thing from them to whom he hath given his Son Impossible 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as most inconvenient as that which is against his Wisdome Naz. Or. 36. his Justice his Goodnesse and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as abhorrent to his will to deny us any thing In brief if the Earth be not as Iron the Heavens cannot be as Brasse God cannot but give when we are fit to receive and in Christ we are made capable and when he is given all things are given with him nay more than all things more than we can desire more than we can conceive when he descends Mercy descends with him in a ful shower of Blessings to make our Souls as the Paradise of God to quicken our Faith to rouze up our Hope and in this Light in this Assurance in this Heaven we are bold with S. Paul to put up the question against all Doubts all Feares all Temptations that may assault us He that sparede not his own Son but delivered him up for us all how shall he not with him give us all things The Conclusion And now we have passed up every step and degree of this scale and ladder of love and seen Christ delivered and nailed to the Crosse and from thence he looks down and speaks to us to the end of the world Crux patientis fuit Cathedra docentis the Crosse on which he suffered was the Chaire of his profession and from this Chair we are taught Humility constant Patience and perfect Obedience an exact art and method of living well drawn out in severall lines so that what was ambitiously said of Homer that if all Sciences were lost they may be found in him may most truly be said of his Crosse and Passion that if all the characters of Innocency Humility Obedience Love had been lost they might here be found in libro vitae agni in the Book of the Life nay of the Death of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the World yet now nailed to the Crosse Let us then with Love and Reverence look upon him whothus looks upon us put on our Crucified Jesus that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Chrys every Vertue his Humility his Patience his Obedience and so bear about with us the dying of our Lord and draw the picture of a Crucified Saviour in our selves To this end was he delivered up for us to this end we must receive him that we may glorifie God as he hath glorified him on earth for Gods Glory and our Salvation are twisted together and wrought as it were in the same thred are linked together in the same bond of Peace I will deliver thee and thou shalt glorifie me Thus it runs and it runs on evenly in a stream of love Oh how must it needs delight him to see his Gift prosper in our hands to see us delivering up our selves to him who was thus delivered for us to see his purchase those who were bought with this price made his peculiar people Lift then up the gates of your souls that this King of Glory may come in If you seek Salvation you must seek the glory of God and if you seek the glory of God you shall find it in your Salvation Thou may'st cry loe here it is or loe there it is but here it is found The Jew may seek salvation in the Law the Superstitious in Ceremony and bodily exercise the Zelot in the Fire and in the Whirlwind the phantastick lazy Christian in a Thought in a Dream and the profane Libertine in Hell it self Then then alone we find it when we meet it in conjunction with the glory of God which shines most gloriously in a Crucified Christ and an Obedient Christian made conformable to him and so bearing about in him the markes of the LORD JESUS To conclude then Since God hath delivered up his Son for us all and with him given us all things let us open our hearts and receive him that is Believe in his name that is be faithfull to him that is love him and keep his Commandements which is our conformity to his Death and then he will give us what will he give us he will heap gift upon gift give us power to become the Sons of God Let us receive him take in Christ take him in his Shame in his Sorrow in his Agony take him hanging on the Crosse take him and take a pattern by him that as he was so we may be troubled for our sins that we may mingle our Teares with his Blood drag our Sin to the Bar accuse and condemn it revile and spit in its Face at the fairest presentment it can make and then naile it to the Crosse that it may languish and faint by degrees and give up the Ghost and die in us and then lye down in peace in his Grave and expect a glorious Resurrection to eternall life where we shall receive Christ not in Humility but in Glory and with him all his Riches and Abundance all his glorious Promises even Glory and Immortality and Eternall life HONI â—…T QVI MAL Y PENSE A SERMON Preached on Easter-Day REV. 1.18 I am he that liveth and was dead and behold I live for evermore Amen and have the keyes of Hell and of Death WE do not ask of whom speaketh S. John this or who is he that speaks it for we have his character drawn out in lively colours in the verses going before my Text. The Divine calls him a voyce ver 12. when he meanes the man who spake it I turned to see the voyce that spoke with me and in the next verse tells us he was like to the Son of man in the midst of the seven golden Candlesticks governing his Church setting his Tabernacle amongst men not abhorring to walk amongst them and to be their God Leâ— 26.11,12 that they might be his people Will ye see his Robes
him Non pareo Deo sed assentior ex antmo illum non quia necesse est sequor saith the Heathen Sencca I do not onely obey God and do what he would have me but I am of his minde and whatsoever is done in Heaven and earth is done as I would have it The world is never out of frame with me I see nothing but order and Harmony no disturbance no crossnes in the course of things for that wisdome which is the worker of all things is more moving them any mâ—…on Wisd 7. and passeth and goeth through them all reacheth from one end to another mightily and draws every motion and action of men to that end in which if we could see them we should wonder and cry out so so thus we would have it The stubornest knee may be made to bow and Obedience may be constrained Balaam obeyed God but it was against his will but the true Israelite doth it with joy and readinesse and though it be a blow counts it as a favour For he that gave it hath taught him an art Psal 115.3 to make it so Goa doth whatsoever he will in Heaven and in Earth saith the Psalmist God wills it and doth it and when â—is done our will must bow before it and we must say with old Ele Faciat quod bonum in oculis let him do what he will Take the will of God in those several wayes the Scripture and the light of reason hath discovered it to us and in every kinde we must subscribe and vvhat he doth vve must vvill and vvhat he vvill suffer must seem good in our eyes and there is voluntas naturalis inclinationis aesiderti that desire and inclination which naturally was in him to work and wish the good of his Creature which is the proper and natural effect of his goodnesse for he Created us for our good and his Glory and there is another will voluntas Pâ—aecâ—pti the Law and Ordinance vvhich he hath laid upon his Creature vvhich is every vvhere in Scripture called his will for as he Ordained his Creature for good so he made known unto it the means by vvhich it should attain to that good for vvhich it vvas at first Ordained Now vve cannot but yeeld in these for can therebe any Question made vvhether vve vvil set a fiat and subscribe to our ovvn good It is strange that any man should be unwilling that God should love him unwilling to be happy or loath that way which so great love hath designed to bring him to this end The number is but few of those that do this will but t is the voice of the whole Christian World that this will should be done But there is yet further as we may observe voluntas accasionata a secondary and Consequent will in God not natural but occasioned and to which he is in a manner constrained The severity of God the miseries and afflictions of this life induration of will-ful and stubborn sinners eternal paines laid up in the World to come are the effects of this occasioned will Besides this there is voluntas permissionis his permissive will by which he doth give way so far as he thinks good to the intents and actions of evil men He doth not command them He doth not secretly suggest them nor doth he incline the Agents to them nor incline the Philistines to invade that Land which is none of theirs but by his infinite praescience foreseeing all actions and events possible determines for reasons best known to himself to give way to such actions which he saw would be done if he gave way and to these two we cannot but yeeld unlesse we will deny him to be God for if we beleeve him just or wise we cannot but say Fiat let him do what he will let him be angry and let him carry on his anger in what wayes and by what means he please He is our Father O Foelicem cui Deus dignatur irasci Teâ—tul and loves us and if we vvill be enemies to our selves he doth but an act of Justice and of mercy if he use the rod vvhat though he give line to vvicked men to do that vvhich his soul hates to suffer that to be done vvhich he forbids He permits all the evil that is done in the World if he did not permit it it could not be done and if he did not permit evil Obedience vvere but a name for vvhat praise is it not to do that vvhich I cannot do vvhatsoever evil he suffers his Wisdome is alvvayes present vvith him for he is Wisdome it self and can dravv that evil vvhich he but suffers to be done and make it serve to the Advancement of that good vvhich he vvill do he vvill make it as the hand of justice to punish offendors and execute his vvill and make it as his rod or Discipline to teach sinners in the way if vve could once subdue our vvills to that vvill of his vvhich is visible in his precepts if vve could ansvver love vvith love and love him and keep his Commandments vve should have no such aversnesse from the other tvvo no such dislike if he do vvhat he is forced to do or permit that to be done which he hath condemned already If we do whatsoever he commands us and be his friends what is it to us though he binde the sweet influences of the Pleiades Job 38.31 Deut. 28.3 Job 38.38 or loose the bonds of Orion though he make the Heavens as brasse and the Earth as iron though the clods cleave fast together and the clouds distil not upon them what is it to us if he beat down his own Temples when the tower of Babel reacheth up to Heaven if the black darknesse be in Goshen and the Egyptians have light if fools sport and triumph in their folly and the whip be laid on the back of the innocent what is it to us how or where he casts about his Hail-stones and coals of fire Si Fractus illabatur Orbis Impavidos ferient ruinae Horat. â—d In all these sad and dismal events in these judgements which fall crosse with our judgement and as the eye of flesh looks upon them to the minde of God himself in all these perplexities these riddles of providence the friend of God is still his friend and favours nay applauds whatsoever he doth or is pleased to suffer to be done which he would not suffer did not his Justice and Wisdome require it which is able to make the most crooked paths straight to fill every valley and level every mountain to work good out of evil and so make all those seeming extuberancies that which to us seem'd disorder and confusion that which our ignorance wondered at smooth and plain and even at the last Dominus est it is the Lord when that word is heard let every mouth be stopt or let it declare his Glory amongst the Nations and his wonders among the people at
Trades-man it will buy and sell with thee Art thou a Schollar it will study with thee if thou go into the Vineyard it will beare the heat of the day with thee till the Evening and then pay thee thy wages if thou sell it will oversee thy weights and measures If we bargaine it will remember us that wee defraud not one another for this Counsell was given to the Thessalonians who were most of them men of Trade 1 Thess 4.6 and Merchants VVhen we speak he bids us cast away lying And thus doth Christian Religion spread its beames through every corner of the Earth shining upon us at every turne and every motion 5. Ephes 25. waiting upon us in every condition of life keeping every man within the bounds of his Calling and Honesty and whilst we follow this light walk within these bounds stretch not as Saint Paul speakes 2 Cor. 10.14 Beyond measure beyond our line wee may be truly said to walke in Christ Vse And therefore to make some use of this Let us not deceive our selves and think we never walk in Christ but when we walk to Church to heare some Newes of him that when we have shut him out of our Houses and shops wee shall be sure to meet with him againe at Church that we never serve him but in his own House we have some reason to feare we never serve him worse never Walk lesse then when we walk so farre And certainly if the End be better and more Noble then the means to the End then our Even and upright motion in our severall conditions must needs have the preheminence For here in the Church we are called but there we work in the Vineyard Here we take out our lesson there we con it here we receive rules to guide us there we practice them Here Christ is formed in us there he is manifested as it were in our flesh in our outward Actions In a word here we are taught to goe there we walk in Christ Oh then let us not so perversly Honour Christ as to dishonour him or think that he that passed through the contumelies of our nature as Tert speaks and was made like unto his brethren should disdaine to be with us and walk with us in our Calling be it never so meane That Christ is disgraced when we call him into our counting-Houses or our Shops that we do not walk in Christ when we sweat in our calling You know what Saint John Baptist said to the Souldier and the Publican and certainly Luk. 3.14 if the Publican in his custome-House if the Souldier with his sword in his hand may walk in Christ I know no calling so meane no trade so low as to be excluded It was a witlesse and groundless Etymon which he gave who said they were called mechanick Arts quia intellectus in iis quodammodo moechatur because the understanding in these manual trades seems to adulterate and pollute it self for nothing can pollute a foul but sin and dishonesty and the soul is then most pure when passing as it were through these earthy and carnall affaires she orders them aright but receives nothing that is earthy or carnall from them retaining still in the midst of these imployments her native and proper spirituality In the third of Gen. Adam himself is set to till the ground at the 6. Noah is a Ship-wright at the 24. you shall see Rebeccah with Bracelets indeed on her armes but with a Pitcher on her shoulder In the 6 of the Judges Gideon receives his Commission to be Captaine of Israel whilst the flayle was in his hand And where did our Saviour call the Disciples but as they were mending their Netts And to take off this imputation himself descended to a Trade was obedient to his Parents Iustin Martyr saies Coll cum Tryph. Judae◠he made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ploughs and yoakes Be our calling what it will we then walk truly in Christ when we walk honestry in it Nor only our attention our sighes our groans our often mentioning his Name but our silence our honesty our Industry may make us Christian peripatetiques Let us then in the name of Christ and Religion abide in our particular calling be it whatsoever Providence hath placed us in high or low rich or poore let us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 abide in it against all Temptations whatsoever beare them beare up against them by his power keep a good Conscience against the flatteries of the world and the loving and bitter menaces of Poverty in his Name rise up early and lye downe late in his Name cast out those evil Spirits those false suggestions which might hinder us in our walke and so presse forward in a constant and uninterrupted Motion never shaken nor changed with the manifold changes and chances of this sading World and then we shall bee not onely Christs servants but his Companions and friends he will call us so and then when Christ thus goes along with us in all our wayes when we walke on Earth but by this light from Heaven we may assure our selves by thus walking wee walke in Christ We passe now from the Duty To walk in Christ to the manner How we must walke in him or the Rule by which we must regulate our motion sicut accepistis we must so walk as wee have received Him Second Generall part As you have received him so walke in him that is since you have received him walk in him and in this sense we may take it Rest not in the outward Profession think not that you are onely vessells to receive him but channells or conduits through which he must be conveyed even through every veine through every faculty of your soul and every member of your bodyes and so be made visible in the actions of your life To receive him and not to walk in him will but swell and enlarge the burden of our Accounts as to receive any good from him and not to use it to that end for which it was given is the worst evill that can befall us Many receive him because he comes with so much beauty that they cannot refuse him because they are convinced That he is fairer then the children of men and most worthy to be received For not onely out of the mouthes of babes and Sucklings but out of the mouthes of wicked men hath God ordeined strength and wisedom is justified not onely of her friends but of her Enemies Many receive him as it were in a throng applaud Christianity dare not refuse it lest the multitude of those they live with should confute and silence them Si nomen Christi in tanta Gloriâ non esset tot professores Christisancti Ecclesia non haberet Greg. Hom. 3 2. in Evang. saith Greg. If the name of Christ were not so high and glorious in the world the Church would fall short in her number of Professors whereof many make but a proffer at christianity
Crucified his death for sinne with our Death to it his Resurrection with our Justification For he bore our sins that he might cast them away He shed his blood to melt our Hearts and he dyed that we might live and turn unto the Lord and he rose againe for our Justification and to gaine Authority to the doctrine of Repentance Our convertimini our Turne is the best Commentary on the consummatum est it is Finished for that his last Breath breathed it into the world we may say It is wrapt up in the Inscription Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jewes for in him even when he hung upon the Crosse were all the Treasuries of Wisdome and Knowledge hid 2 Coloss 3. In him Justice and Mercy are at Peace for to reconcile us unto God he reconciled them one to another The hand of Mercy was lifted up ready to seale our Pardon we were in our Blood and her voice was Live we were miserable and she was ready to relieve us our heart was sick and her bowells yearn'd but then Justice held up the Sword ready to latch in our sides God loves his Creature whom he made but hates the sinner whom he could not make and he must and yet is unwilling to strike If Justice had prevail'd Mercy had been but as the morning Dew and soon vaâ—…sh'd before this raging heat and if Mercy had swallowed up Justice in victory his hatred of sinne and fearfull menaces against it had been but bruta fulmina and had portended nothing Deus purgari homines à peccato maxime cupit ideoque agere poenitentiam jubet Lact. l. 6. c. 24. had been void and of no effect If he had been extreme to marke what is done amisse men had sinned more and more because there could be no hope of Pardon and if his Mercy had seal'd an absolute Pardon men would have walked delicately and sported in their Evill wayes because there could be no feare of punishment And therefore his wisedome drew them together and reconciled them both in Christs propitiatory Sacrifice and our Duty of Repentance the one freeing us from the Guilt the other from the Dominion of sinne and so both are satisfy'd Justice layes downe the sword and Mercy shines in perfection of Beauty God hates sinne but he sees it condemned in the flesh of his Sonne and fought against by every member he hath sees it punisht in him and sees it every day punisht in every repentant sinner that Turnes from his evill wayes beholds the Sacrifice on the Cross and beholds the Sacrifice of a broken Heart and for the sweet savour of the one accepts the other and is at rest his death for sinne procures our Pardon and our death to sinne sues it out Christ suffers for sinne we turne from it his satisfaction at once wipes out the guilt and penalty our Repentance by degrees Tert. de anima c. 1. destroyes sinne it self Haec est sapientia de scholâ caeli This is the method of Heaven this is that Wisedome which is from above Thus it takes away the sinnes of the world And now wisedome is compleat Justice is satisfyed and Mercy triumphs God is glorified man is saved and the Angels rejoyce Tert de poenit c. 8. Heus tu peccator bono animo sis vides ubi de tuo reditu gaudeatur saith Tert. Take comfort sinnner thou seest what joy there is in heaven for thy returne what musick there is in a Turne which begins on earth but reaches up and fills the highest Heavens A repentant sinner is as a glass or rather Gods own renewed Image on which God delights to look for there he beholds his wisedome his Justice his mercy and what wonders they have wrought Behold the shepherd of our souls see what lies upon his shoulders you would think a poor Sheep that was lost nay but he leads sinne and Death and the Devill in Triumph and thou mayst see the very brightnesse of his Glory the fairest and most expresse Image of these Three his most glorious Attributes which are not onely visible but speake unto us to follow this heavenly Method His wisedome instructs us his Iustice calls upon us and Mercy Eloquent mercy bespeaks us a whole Trinity of Attributes are instant and urgent with us To Turne à viis malis from our evill wayes And this is the Authority I may say the Majesty of Repentance for it hath these Three Gods Wisedome and Iustice and Mercy to seale and ratify it to make it Authentique The 2. part Turn ye Turn ye We come now to the dictum it self and it being Gods and it being Gods we must well weigh and ponder it and we shall find it comprehends the Duty of Repentance in its full latitude For as sin is nothing else but aversio à Creatore and conversio ad creaturam and aversion and Turning from God and an inordinate conversion and application of the soul to the Creature so by our Repentance we doe referre pedem start back and alter our course worke and withdraw our selves a viis malis from evill waies and Turne to the Lord by cleaving to his Lawes which are the minde of the Lord and having our feet enlarged run the way of his Commandements We see a streight line drawne out at length is of all lines the weakest and the further and further you draw it the weaker and weaker it is nor can it be strengthened but by being redoubled and bow'd and brought back againe towards its first point Eccles 7.20 The Wise man will tell us That God at first made man upright that is simple and single and syncere bound him as it were to one point but he sought out many Inventions mingled himself and Ingendered with Divers extravagant Conceits and so ran out not in one but many lines now drawne out to that object now to another still running further and further sometimes on the flesh and sometimes on the world now on Idolatry and anon on Oppression and so at a sad Distance from him in whom he should have dwelt and rested as in his Center and therefore God seeing him gone so farr seeing him weak and feeble wound and Turned about by the Activity of the Devill and sway of the Flesh and not willing to loose him ordained Repentance as a remedy as the Instrument to bend and bow him back again that he might recover and gain strength and subsistencie in his former and proper place to draw him back from those Objects in which he was lost and so carry him on forward to the Rock out of which he was hewed whilst he is yet in viis malis in his evill wayes all is out of Tune and Order for the Devil who doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost Hom. de poenitent invert the order of things placeth shame upon repentance and boldness and senlessness upon sinne but Repentance is a perfect Methodist upon our Turne we see the danger we plaid
and Hell is Hell Virtue is Virtue and vice is vice to the Understanding nor can it appeare otherwise for in these we cannot be deceived what Reason can that be which teacheth us to Act against Reason Esau knew well enough that it was a sinne to kill his Brother but his Reason taught him to expect his Fathers Funerall Ahab knew it was a crying sinne to take Naboths Vineyard from him by violence and therefore hee would have paid down money for it and his painted Queene knew as much but that the best way to take possession of his Vineyard was to dispossess him of his life and the surest way to that was to make him a Blasphemer that was the effect and product of Reason and Discourse which is the best servant when the Will is Right and the worst when shee is irregular Reason may seek out many Inventions for Evill and shee may discover many helps and Advantages to promote that which is good she may draw out the method which leads to both find out opportunities bring in Encouragements and Provocations to both but Reason never yet call'd Evill good or Good evill 2 Thess 3.2 for then it is not Reason the Apostle hath joyn'd both together 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if they be wicked they are unreasonable and absur'd for they doe that which Reason abhorres and condemnes at the first presentment So that the will you see is origo boni mali is the prinipall cause of Good and Evill That I will not understand when I cannot but understand is from the will that the Judge is blind when he sees well enough what is just and what is unjust is not from the Bribe but the Will That my feare shakes me my Anger enflames me my Love Transports me my sorrow casts me downe and my joy makes me mad That my Reason is Instrumentall and Active against it self That my Passions rage and are unruly is from my will which being fastened to its Object drawes all the Powers of the Soul after it And therefore if the will Turne all these will Turne with it Turne to their proper offices and Functions The Understanding will be all Light and the Affections will be all Peace for the proper Act of every Faculty is its Peace when the Understanding contemplates that Truth which perfects it it rests upon it and dwells there as upon a holy Hill But when it busies it self in those which hold no proportion with it as the gathering of Wealth the raysing of a Name the finding out pleasures when it is a Steward and Purveyor for the Sense it is restlesse and unquiet now finds out this way anon another and by by disapproves them both and contradicts it self in every motion When our Affections are levell'd on that Affectiones ordinatae sunt virtutes Gers for which they were given us they lose their name and wee call them Virtues but when they fly out after every impertinent Object they fly out in infinitum and are never at their end and rest place Love on the things of this VVorld and what a troublesome Tumultuous Passion is it tiring it self with its own Hast and wasting and consuming it selfe with its owne Heat but place it on Piety and there it is as in its Heaven and the more it spends of it self the more it is increased Let your Anger kindle against an Enemy and it is a Fury that Torments two at once but derive it and lay it on your sin and there it sits as a Magistrate on a Tribunall to worke your Peace That sorrow which wee cast away upon Temporall losses is a Disease which must be cured by Time but our sorrow for sinne is a Cure it self is a second Baptisme washes away the Causes of that Evill and dyes with it and rises up againe in Comfort That joy which is rays'd out of Riches and Pleasure is rais'd as a Meteor out of dung and is whiffed up and downe by every winde and Breath but if it follow the Health and Harmony the good Constitution of the Soule it is as cleare and pure and constant as the Heavens themselves and may be carried about in a lasting and continued Gyre but is still the same And this Turne the Affections will have if the will Turne then they Turne their face another way from Bethaven to Bethel from Ebal to Garazin from the Mount of Curses to the Holy Hill We cannot Think that in this our Turne the Powers of the Soul are pull'd to pieces that our Affections are plucked up by the roots That our Love is Annihilated our Anger destroyed our Zeal quencht By my Turne I am not dissolved but better built I have new Affections and yet the same now dead and impotent to evill but vigorous and active in Good my steps are altered not my Feet my Affections cut off the Character is chang'd but not the Book That sorrow which covered my face for the losse of my Friend is now a Thicker and Darker cloud about it because of my sinne That hope which stoop'd so low as the Earth as the mortall and fading vanities of the world is now on the wing raising it selfe as high as Heaven That Zeale which drove Saint Paul upon the very pricks to persecute the Church did after lead him to the block to be crown'd with Martyrdome If the Will be Turned that is captivated and subdued to that Will of God which is the Rule of all our Actions it becomes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Shop and Work-house of Virtuous and Religious Actions and the Understanding and Affections are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fellow-workers with it ready to forward and Compleat the Turne Saint Bernard tells us that nothing doth Burne in Hell but our will and 't is as true Nothing doth reigne in Heaven but the will In it are the wells of Salvation and in it are the waters of Bitterness in it is Tophet and in it is Paradise Aug. Hom. 8. Totum habet qui bonam habet voluntatem saith Austin he hath runne through all the Hardship and Exercises of Repentance who hath not changed his opinion or improv'd his knowledge but alter'd his will for the Turne of the will supposeth the rest but the rest doe not necessitate this when this is wrought all is done that is The Soul is enlightened purged renewed hath its Regeneration and new Creation in a word when the Will is turn'd the soul is saved The Old man is a New Creature and this New Creature changes no more but holds up the Turne till he be Turn'd to Dust and raysed againe and then made like unto the Angels THE SIXTH SERMON PART II. EZEKIEL 33.11 Turne ye Turne ye from your evill wayes c. This Turn is a Turn of the whole man of his understanding his affections nay of his senses of the eye and the ear from vanity of the tast from forbidden fruit of the touch from that which it must not handle a
World thus to play with danger To seek Death first in the Errors of ourlife and then when we have run out our Course when Death is ready to devour us to look faintly back upon light For the Endeavors of a man that hath wearyed himself in sinne can be but weak and faint like the Appetite of a dying man who can but think of meat and loath it The later we Turne the lesse able we be to Turne the further we stray the lesse willing shall we be to look back For sinne gathers strength by delay devotes us unto it self gaines a dominion Over us holds us as it were in Chaines and will not soon suffer us to slip out of its power when the will hath captivated it self under sinne a wish a sigh a Thought is but a vaine thing nor have they strength enough to deliver us One Act begets another and that a Third many make up a habit and evill Habits hold us back with some violence What mind what motion what Inclination can a man that is drown'd in sensuality have to God who is a Spirit A man that is buried in the Earth for so every Covetous man is to God who sitteth in the highest heavens He that delights in the breath of Fools to the Honor of a Saint Here the further we go the more we are In That which is done once hath some affinity to that which is done often and that which is done alwayes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1. Rhet. c. 11. saith Aristotle when an arme or Limbe is broke it may have any motion but that which was naturall to it and if wee doe not speedily proceed to cure it will be a more difficult 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to set it in its right place againe that it may performe its natural functions now in sinne there is a deordination of the will there is a luxation of that faculty hence weakness seiseth upon the will and if we neglect the first opportunity if we doe not rectifie her betimes and turne her back againe and bend her to the rule it will be more and more infeebled every day move more irregularly and like a disordered clock point to any figure but that which should shew the Houre and make known the time of the day Wee may read this truth in Aged men saith Saint Basil Orat. ad Ditescentes when their body is worne out with Age and there is a generall declination of their strength and vigour the mind hath a malignant influence on the body as the body in their blood and youth had upon the mind and being made wanton and bold with the Custome of sinne heightens and enflames their frozen and decay'd parts to the pursuit of pleasures past though they can never overtake them nor see them but in Essigie in their Image or Picture which they draw themselves They now call to minde the sinnes of their youth with delight and act them over againe when they cannot Act them as youthfull as when they first committed them They have milk they thinke in their Breasts and marrow in their bones they periwigg their Age with wanton behaviour Their Age is Threescore and Ten when their speech and will is but Twenty They boast of what they cannot Act and would be more sinfull if they could and are so because they would It is a sad contemplation how we startled at sinne in our youth and how we ventured by degrees and engaged our selves how fearfull we were at first how indifferent afterwards how familiar within a while and then how we were setled and hardened in it at the last what a Devill sinne was and what a Saint it is become What a Serpent it was and how now we play with it we usually say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist Ibid. Custome is a second Nature and indeed it follows and imitates naturall motion It is weake in the beginning stronger in the Progresse but most strong and violent towards the end Transit in violentiam voluntas antiqua That which we will often we will with eagernesse and violence Our first on-set in sinne is with feare and Reluctation wee then venture further and proceed with lesse regret we move forwards with delight Delight continues the motion and makes it customary and Custome at last drives and bindes us to it as to our Center vitia insolentiora renascuntur saith Seneca Sin growes more insolent by degrees first flatters then commands after enslaves and then betrays us First gains consent afterwards works delight at last 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a shamelesness in sinne Jere. 6.15 Were they ashamed They were not ashamed nay 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nihil magis in naturâ suâ laudare se dicebat quam ut ip sius verbo utar 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Suet. Caligula a senselesnesse and stupidity in sinne and Caligula's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a stubbornnesse and perverseness of disposition which will not let us Turne from sinne For by neglecting a timely remedy vitia mores fiunt Our evill wayes become our manners and common deportment and we look upon them as upon that which becomes us upon an unlawfull Act as upon that which we ought to do Nay peccatum lex sinne which is the Transgression of the Law is made a Law it self Saint Austin in his Confessions calls it so Lex peccati est violentia consuetudinis That Law of sinne which carries us with that violence to sinne is nothing else but the force of long Custome and Continuance in sinne For sinne by Custome gaines a Kingdome in our soules and having taken her seat and Throne there Lex alia in membris meis repugnavit legi mentiâ—… 〈◊〉 Româ— Lex n. peccati est violentia consuetudinis quâ trahitur tenetur etiam invitus animus eo merito quo in eam volens illabitur Aug. l. 8. Confess c. 5. promulges Lawes If she say Goe we goe and if she say Doe this we doe it Surge inquit Avaritia she commands the Miser to rise up early and lie downe late and eate the bread of sorrow she sets the Adulterer on fire makes him vile and base in his owne eyes whilst he counts it his greatest honor and preferrment to be a slave to his Strumpet She drawes the Revengers sword she feeds the intemperate with poyson And she commands not as a Tyrant but having gain'd Dominion over us she findes us willing subjects shee Holds us Captive and we call our Captivity our liberty Her poyson is as the poyson of the Aspick she bites us and we smile and Die and Feele it not 2. The danger of delay in respect of God Secondly It is dangerous in respect of God himself whose call we regard not whose counsels we reject whose patience we dally with whose Judgements we slight to whom we wantonly turn the back when he calls after us to seek his sace and so tread that mercy under foot which should save us
for which it was held First we consult Secondly we settle and establish our Consultations and last of all we gaine a Constancy and perseverance in those Actions which our Consultations have engaged and encouraged us in and all these three we owe to Feare Did we not Feare we should not Consult did not Feare urge and drive us on we should not determine and when this breath departeth our Counsells fall and all our Thoughts perish Present Christ unto us in all his beauty with his Spicy cheeks and Curled locks with hony under his Tongue as he is described in the Canticles present him as a Jesus and we grow too familiar with him Present him on the Mount at his Sermon and perhaps we will give him the hearing Present him as a Rock and we see a hole to run into sooner then a Foundation to lay that on which is like him and we run on with ease in our evill wayes having such a friend such an indulgent Saviour alwaies in our Eye but present him descending with a shout and with the Trump of God and then we begin to remember that for all these Evill wayes we shall be brought into Judgement Our Counsells shift as the wind blowes and upon better motion and riper consideration we are ready to alter our Decrees For these three follow close upon each other pallemus horrescimus Circumspicimus Plin. Epist. saith Pliny first Feare strikes us pale then puts into a fitt of Trembling at last wheeles us about to fee and consider the danger we are in this consideration follows us nor can we shake it off longiorisque timoris causa Timor est this wind increaseth as it goes drives us to consultation carries us on to determine and by a continued force binds and fastens us to our Counsells And therefore Aquinas tells us that our Turne proceeds from the feare of punishment tanquam à primo motu as from that which first sets it a moving for though true Repentance be the gift of God yet fear works that Disposition in us by which we Turne when God doth Turne us The Feare of punishment restraines us from sin in the restraint a hope of Pardon shewes it self upon this hope we build up strengthen our Resolution and at last see the horror of sin not in the punishment but in the sin hate our folly more then the whip and our evill wayes more then Death it self which we call a Filial feare which hath more of love then feare and yet doth not shut out this Feare quite for a good sonne may feare the Anger of a good Father and thus God is pleas'd to condescend to our weakness and accept this as our reasonable service at our hands though our chiefest motive to serve him at first were nothing else but a flash from the Quare moriemini nothing else but a feare of Death For in the last place Bas in Psal 32. this is a principall effect of the feare of punishment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Basil as it brings us to Consultation so is it a faire Introduction to Piety it self Feare takes us by the hand and is a Schoolmaster unto us and when Feare hath well disciplin'd and Catechised us then love takes us in hand and perfects our Conversion so that we may seem to goe from Feare to Love as from a School to an Universitie In the 28. of Genesis at the Twelfth verse Jacob sees a Ladder set upon the Earth and the Top of it reaching up to heaven and we may observe that Jacob makes Feare the first step of the ladder for when he awakes as in an extasie he cryes out Quam terribilis iste locus how dreadfull is this place verse 17. so that feare is as it were the first rung and step of the Ladder and God on the top and Angels Ascending and Descending Love and Zeal and many Graces between Think what we please disgrace it if we will and fasten to it the badge of slavery and servility it is a blessed thing thus to feare the first step to happiness and one step helps us up to another and so by degrees we are brought ad culme Sionis to the top of the Ladder to the Top of perfection to God Himself whose Majesty first wounds us with feare and then gently bindes us up and makes us to love him who leads us through this darkness through this dread and terror into so great light makes us Tremble first that we may at last be as mount Sion and stand fast and firme for ever We now passe and rise one step higher to take a view of this feare of punishment not onely as usefull but lawfull and commanded not under the Law alone but under the Gospel as a motive to Turne us from sinne and as a motive to strengthen and uphold us in the wayes of Righteousnesse not onely as a restraint from sionne but as a preservative of Holiness and as a help and furtherance unto us in our progresse in the wayes of perfection And here it may seem a thing most unbefitting a Christian who should be led rather then drawn Plat. l. de Rep. and not a Christian alone but any moral man and therefore Plato calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an illiberal and base disposition to be banisht the School of morality and our great master in Philosophie makes punishment one of the three things that belong to slaves as the whip doth saith Solomon to the fooles back for to be forced into goodnesse to be frighted into health argues a disposition which little sets by Health or goodnesse it self But behold a greater then Plato and Aristotle our best master the Prince of Peace and love himselfe strives to awake and stirre up this kind of feare in us tells us of Hell and everlasting Darkness of a Flaming Fire of weeping and gnashing of Teeth presents his Father the Father of Mercies with a Thunder-bolt in his hand with Power to kill both body and soul shews us our sinne in a Deaths Head and in the fire of Hell as if the way to avoid sinne were to feare Death and Hell ad if we could once be brought to feare to die we should not die at all Many glorious things are spoken even of this feare The Philosopher calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basan Ps 31. Tert. de poenit c. 6. the bridle of our Nature Saint Basil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the bridle of our lusts Tertullian Instrumentum poenitentiae an Instrument to worke out Repentance Pachomius placeth it supra decem millia paedagogorum makes it the best Schoolmaster of ten Thousand Harken to the Trumpet of the Gospel be attentive to the Apostles voice what found more frequent then that of Terror able to shake and divide a soul from its sinne Had Marcion seen our Saviour with a whip in his hand Had he heard him cursing the Figg-tree and by that example punishing our sterility had he weigh'd the
therefore have need of this kind of remedy as much need certainly as our first Parents had in Paradise who before they took the forbidden fruit might have seen Death written and engraved on the Tree and had they observ'd it as they ought to have done had not forfeited the Garden for one Apple had this Feare walked along with them before the coole of the Day before the rushing wind they had not heard it nor hid themselves from God in a word had they Feared they had not fell for they fell with this Thought that they should not fall that they should not die at all Imperfection though it be to Feare yet 't is such an Imperfection that leads to perfection Imperfection though it be to Feare yet I am sure it is a greater Imperfection to sin and not to feare It might be wished perhapps that we were tyed and knit unto our God quibusdam internis commerciis as the devout School-man speaks with those inward ligaments of Love and Joy and Admiration that we had a kind of familiar acquaintance and intercourse with him That as our Almes and Prayers and fasting came up before him to shew him what we do on earth so there were no imper fection in us but that God might approach so nigh unto us with the fulness of Joy to tell us what he is preparing for us that neither the Feare of Hell nor the Hope of Heaven and our Salvation but the Love of God and Goodnesse were the only cause of our cleaving to him That we might love God because he is God and hate sinne because it is sinne and for no other reason that we might with Saint Paul wish the increase of Gods Glory though with that heavy condition of our own Reprobation But this is such an Heroick spirit to which every man cannot rise though he may at last rise as high as Heaven this is such a condition which we can hardly hope for whilst we are in the flesh we are in the body not out of the body we struggle with doubts and difficulties Ignorance and Infirmity are our Companions in our way and in this our state of Imperfection contenti simus hoc Catone Dictum Augusti cum hortaretur ferenda esse praesentia qualiacunque sunt Suet. Octav. August c. 87. we must be content to use such means and Helpes as the Law-giver himself will allow of and not cast off fear upon a Fancy that our Love is perfect for this savours more of an Imaginary Metaphysicall subtility of a kind of extaticall affectation of Piety then the plaine and solid knowledge of Christian Religion but continue our Obedience and carry on our perseverance with the Remembrance of our last end with this consideration That as under the Law there was a curse pronounced to them that fulfill it not so under the Gospel there is a flaming fire to take vengeance of them that obey it not 2. Thess 1.8 It was a good censure of Tully which he gave of Cato in one of his Epistles Thou canst not saith he to his friend love and Honor Cato more then I doe but yet this I observe in him optimo animo utens summâ fide nocet interdum Reip. he doth endammage the Common-wealth but with an Honest mind and great Fidelity l. 2. ad Attic. ep 1. for he gives sentence as if he lived in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Platonis non in faece Romuli in Plato's Common-wealth and not in the dreggs and Rascaltry of Romulus And we may passe the same censure on these seraphical Perfectionists who will have all done out of pure Love nothing out of Feare They remember not that they are in fraece Adami the off-spring of an Arch-Rebell that their father was an Amorite and their mother an Hittite and that the want of this Feare threw them from that state of Integrity in which they were created and by that out of Paradise and so with great ostentation of love hinder the Progresse of Piety and setting up to themselves an Idaea of Perfection take off our Feare which should be as the hand to wind up the Plummet which should continue the motion of our Obedience the best we can say of them is summâ fide pio animo nocent Ecclesiae If their mind be pious and answer the great shew they make then with a Pious mind they wrong and trouble the Church of Christ For suppose I were a Paul and did love Christ as Cato did Virtue because I could no otherwise Nunquam recte fecit ut faces videretur sed quià aliter facere non poterat Vell. ratere l. 2. Hist suppose I did feare sinne more then Hell and had rather be damned then commit it suppose that every thought word and worke were Amoris foetus the issues of my Love yet I must not upon a speciall favour build a general Doctrine and because love is best make Feare unlawfull make it sinne to feare that punishment the Feare of which might keep me from sinne for this were in Saint Pauls phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to put a stumbling-block in our Brothers way with my love to overthrow his feare that so at last both Feare and Love may fall to the ground for is there any that will fear sinne for punishment if it be a sinne to Feare What 's the language of the world now we heare of nothing but filiall feare and it were a good hearing if they would understand themselves for this doth not exclude the other but is upheld by it we are as sure of happinesse as we are of Death but are more perswaded of the Truth of the one then of the other more sure to goe to heaven then to die and yet Death is the gate which must let us in we are already partakers of an Angelicall Estate we prolong our life in our own Thoughts to a kind of Eternity and yet can feare nothing we challenge a kind of familiarity with God and yet are willing to stay yet a while longer from him we sport with his Thunder and play with his Hayl-stones and Coales of fire we entertain him as the Roman Gentleman did the Emperor Augustus Macrobius in Saturnal coenâ parcâ quasi quotidianâ with course and Ordinary fare as Saul in the 15. of the first of Sam. with the vile and refuse not with the fatlings and best of the sheep and Oxen Did we dread his Majesty or think he were Jupiter vindex a God of Revenge with a Thunder-bolt in his hand we should not be thus bold with him but feare that in wrath and Indignation he should reply as Augustus did Non putaram me tibi fuisse tam familiarem I did not think I had made my self so familiar with my Creature I know the Schools distinguish between a servile and Initial and a Filial feare there is a Feare by which we feare not the fault but the punishment and a feare which feareth the punishment
sorry if we die He looks down upon us calls after us he exhorts and rebukes and even weepes over us as our Saviour did over Jerusalem and if we die we cannot think that he that is life it self should kill us If we must die why doth he yet complaine why doth he expostulate for if the Decree be come forth if we be lost already why doth he yet call after us how can a desire or command breath in those coasts which the power of an absolute will hath laid waste already if he hath decreed we should die he cannot desire we should live but rather the Contrary that his Decree be not void and of no effect otherwise to passe sentence an irrevocable sentence of Death and then bid us live is to look for liberty and freedome in Necessity for a sufficient effect from an unsufficient cause to command and desire that which himself had made impossible to ask a Dead man why he doth not live and to speak to a carcasse and bid it walk Indeed by some this why will you die is made but sancta simulatio but a kind of holy dissimulation so that God with them sets up man as a marke and then sticks his deadly arrows in his sides and after askes him why he will die And why may he not saith one with the same liberty Damne a soul as a Hunter kills a Deere a bloody instance as if an immortall soul which Christ set at a greater rate then the World it self nay then his own most pretious Blood were in his sight of no more valew then a Beast and God were a mighty Nimrod and did destroy mens souls for delight and pleasure Thus though they dare not call God the Author of sinne for who is so sinfull that could hear and not Anathematize it yet others and those no children in understanding think it a Conclusion that will naturally and necessarily follow upon such bloody premises and they are more encouraged by those ill-boding words which have dropt from their quills For say some vocat ut induret He calls them to no other end but that he may harden them he hardens them that he may destroy them He exhorts them to turn that they may not Turn◠He asks them why they will die that they may run on in their evill wayes even upon Death it self when they break his command they fulfill his will and 't is his pleasure they should sinne 't is his pleasure they should die and when he calls upon them not to sinne when he asks them why they will die he doth but Dissemble for they are dead already Horribili decreto by that horrible antecedaneous Decree of Reprobation And now tell me If we admit of this What 's become of the expostulation what use is there of the obtestation why doth he yet ask why will ye Die I called it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a reason unanswerable but if this Fancy this Interpretation take place it is no reason at all why will ye die the Answer is ready and what other answer can a poore praecondemned soul make Domine Deus tu nosti Lord God thou knowest Thou condemnest us before thou mad'st us Thou didst Destroy us before we were and if we die Even so Good Lord For it is thy good pleasure Fato volvimur it is our Destiny or rather Est deus in nobis not a stoicall fate but thy right hand and thy strong irresistible Arme hath destroyed us and so the expostulation is answered and the Quare mortemini is nothing else but mortui estis why will ye die that 's the Text the Glosse is you are dead already But in the Second place That this expostulation is true and Hearty may be seen in the very Nature of God who is Truth it self who hath but one property and Quality saith Trismegistus and that is Goodness and therefore cannot bid us live when he intends to kill us For consider God before man had fallen from him by sin and disobedience and we shall see nothing but the works of his Goodnesse and Love The heavens were the workes of his Fingers Basil Hem. in Famem sicci◠he created Angels and men he spake the word and all was done 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Basil what necessity was there that he should thus break forth into Action who compell'd him who perswaded him who was his Counsellor He was All-sufficient and stood in need of nothing l. 4. c. 28. non quasi Indigens plasmavit Adam saith Irenaeus it was not out of any indigencie or Defect in himself that he made Adam after his Image He was all to himself before he made any thing nor could millions of Worlds have added to him What was it to him that there were Angels made or Seraphin or Cherubin he gain'd not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Athena Legatio pro Christianis said Aristotle for there could be no Accession nothing to heighten his perfection Did he make the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Athenagor as calls it as an Instrument to make him Musick Did he cloth the Lilies and dresse up Nature in various colours to delight himself or could he not reigne without man saith Mirandula God hath a most free and powerfull and immutable will and therefore it was not necessary for him to work or to begin to work but when he would for he might both will and not will the Creation of all Things without any change of his will but it pleased him out of his goodness thus to break forth into Action will you know the cause saith the Sceptique why he made world Sext. Emperic adv Mathemat pag. 327. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He was good Nihil ineptius saith one quam cogitare Deum nihil agentem There is nothing more vaine then to conceive that God could be idle or doing of nothing and were it not for his Goodnesse we could hardly conceive him ad extrà agentem working any thing out of himself who was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All-sufficient 1 Tim. 1.11 and Blessed for evermore infinitely happy though he had never created the Heaven and the Earth though there had neither been Angel or man to worship him but he did all these things because he was good Bonitas saith Tertul. otium sui non patitur hinc censetur Tert. adv Marcion l. 2. si agatur Goodness is an Active and restlesse quality and it is not when it is Idle it cannot containe it self in it self and by his Goodness he made man made him for his Glory and so to be partaker of his happiness placed him here on earth to raise him up to Heaven made him a living soul ut in vitâ hac compararet vitam that in this short and Transitory life he might fit himself for an Abiding City and in this moment work out Aeternity Thus of Himself God is good nor can any evill proceed from him if he frowne we first move him
if he be angry we have provoked him if he come in a Tempest we have rais'd it if he be a consuming fire we have kindled it we force him to be what he would not be we make him Thunder who is all Light Tert. advers Marc. l. 2. c. 11. Bonitas ingenita severitas Accidens Alteram sibi alteram rei Deus praestitit saith the Father his goodnesse is Naturall his severity in respect of its Act Accidentall for God may be severe and yet not punish for he strikes not till we provoke him his Justice and severity are the same as everlasting as himself though he never speak in his wrath nor draw his sword If there were no Hell yet were he just and if there were no Abrahams Bosome yet were he Good if there were neither Angel nor men he were still the Lord blessed for evermore in a word he had been just though he had never been Angry he had been mercifull though man had not been miscrable he had been the same God just and good and mercifull though sin had not entred in by Adam nor Death by sinne God is active in Good and not in Evill he cannot doe what he doth detest and hate he cannot Decree Ordaine or further that which is most contrary to him he doth not kill me before all time and then in time aske me why I will die He doth not Condemne me first and then make a Law that I may break it He doth not blow out my Candle and then punish me for being in the dark That the conviction of a sinner should be the onely end of his Exhortations and Expostulations cannot consist with that Goodness which God is who when he comes to punish Isai 28.21 sacit opus non suum saith the Prophet doth not his owne worke doth a strange work a strange Act an Act that is forced from him a worke which he would not doe And as he doth not will our Death so doth he not desire to manifest his Glory in it which as our Death proceeds from his secondary and occasion'd will For God saith Aquinas seeks not the manifestation of his Glory Aquin. 2.2 q. 132. art 1. for his own but for our sakes His glory as his Wisdome and Justice and Power is with him alwayes as eternall as himself no Quire of Angels can improve no raging Devil can diminish his Glory which in the midst of all the Hallelujahs of Seraphin and Cherubin in the midst of all the Blasphemies of men and Devills is still the same and his first will is to see it in his Image in the conformity of our wills to his where it strives in the perfection of Beauty rather then when it is decay'd and defaced rather then in a Damned Spirit rather in that Saint he would have made then in that Reprobate and cursed soul which he was forced to throw into the lowest pit and so to receive his Glory is that which he would not have which he was willing to begin on Earth and then have made it perfect and compleat in the highest Heavens Tert. ibid. Exinde admortem sed ante ad vitam The sentence of Death was pronounced against man almost as soon as he was man but he was first created to life we are punished for being evill but we were first commanded to be good his first will is That we glorify him in our Bodies and in our soules but if we frustrate his loving expectation here then he rowseth himself up as a mighty man and will be avenged of us and work his Glory out of that which dishonor'd him and write it with our blood In the multitude of the People Prov. 14.28 is the Glory of a King saith the wisest of Kings and more Glory if they be obedient to his laws then if they rebell and rise up against him That Common-wealth is more glorious where every man fills his place then where the Prisons are filled with Theeves and Traytors and men of Belial and though the Justice and wisedome of the King may be seen in these yet 't is more resplendent in those on whom the Law hath more Power then the sword In Heaven is the glory of God best seen and his delight is in it to see it in the Church of the First-borne and in the soules of just men made perfect it is now indeed his will which primarily was not his will to see it in the Divel and his Angels For God is best pleased to see his Creature man to answer to that patteâ—e which he hath set up to be what he should be and what he intended And as every Artificer glories in his work when he sees it finish't according to the rule and that Idea which he had drawne in his minde and as we use to look upon the work of our hands or witts with that favour and complacency we doe upon our Children when they are like us so doth God upon man when he appeares in that shape and forme of Obedience which he prescrib'd for then the Glory of God is carried along in the continued streame and course of all our Actions breaks forth and is seen in every worke of our Hands is the Eccho of every word we speak the result of every Thought that begat that word and it is Musick in his eares which he had rather heare then the weeping and howling of the Damned which he will now heare though the time was when he us'd all fitting meanes to prevent it even the same meanes by which he raised those who now glorify him in the Highest Heaven God then is no way willing we should die not by his Naturall will which is his prime and antecedent will for Death cannot issue from the Fountaine of Life and by this will was the Creature made in the beginning and by this preserved ever since by this are administred all the meanes to bring it to that perfection and happiness for which it was first made for the goodness of God it was which first gave a being to man and then adopted him in speâ—… regâ—…i design'd him for immortality and gave him a Law by the fulfilling of which he might have a Tast of that Joy and Happinesse which he from all Eternity possest And therefore secondly not voluntate praecepti not by his will exprest in his command in his precepts and Laws For under Christ this will of his is the onely destroyer of Death and being kept and observ'd swallows it up in victory for how can Death touch him who is made like unto the living Lord or how should Hell receive him whose conversation is in heaven Ezek. 16. â—1 13.21 If we do them we shall even live in them saith the Prophet and he repeats it often as if Life were as inseparable from them as it is from the living God himself by which as he is life in himself so to man whom he had made he brought life and immortality to light
to die because they will not Turne I will give you a remarkable instance and out of Mr. Calvin Quintinus Cont. Libertin And yet his own followers use the â—am words bring the same Lexis and Apply them as the Libertines did vide Piscat Aphorismos the Father of the Libertines as Calvin himself calls him as he rides in company by the way lights upon a man slaine and lying in his goare and one asking who did this bloody deed he readily replies I am he that did it if thou desire to know it and art thou such a Villaine saith the party againe to doe such an Act I did it not my self saith he but it was God that did it And being askt againe whether we may impute to God those hainous sinnes which in Justice he will and doth so severely punish So it is said he Thou didst it and I did it and God did it for what thou or I do God doth and what God doth that thou and I do for we are in him and he in us he worketh in us he worketh all in all Quintanus is long since dead but his error dyed not with him Fataliter constiâ—utam est quando quantâ—perè unusquisque nostrum pietatem colere vel non colere 〈◊〉 Piscator ad â—uplicat Vorstij p. 2â—8 for it is the policy of our common Enemy to remove our Eye as farre as he can from the Command and he cannot set it at a greater distance then by fixing it on Eternity that so whilst we think upon the Decree we may quite forget the Command and never fly from Death because for ought we know we are kill'd already never doe our Duty because God doth whatsoever he will in Heaven and in Earth never strive to be better then wee are because God is all in All. Let us then walk on in a middle way and neither flatter nor afflict our selves with the thought of what God may doe or what he hath done from all Eternity let us not busy our selves in the fruitlesse study of the Book of Life which no man in Heaven or in Earth is able to open and look into but only the Lyon of the Tribe of Judah Revel 5.3,5 in that Book saith Saint Basil Comment in 10. c. Isai no names are written but of them that Repent Let us not seek what God Decrees which we cannot find out but hearken to what he Commands which is nigh us even in our mouthes The Book of Life is shut and sealed up but he hath opened many other Books to us and bids us sit downe and read them The Book of his Works of which the Creatures are the leaves and the Characters the Goodnesse and Power and Glory of God and the Book of his Words the Book of the Generation of JESVS CHRIST to be known and read of all men and if these Words be written in thy Heart thy name is also written in the Book of Life And the Book of thy Conscience for the information of which all the Books in the world were made and if thou read and study this with care and diligence and an impartiall eye and then find there no Bill or Indictment against thee then thou maist have confidence towards God that he never past any Decree or Sentence of Death against thee and that thou art ordained to Life This is the true method of a Christian mans studies not to look too stedfastly backward upon Aeternity but to look down upon our selves and ponder and direct our paths and then look forward to eternity of Blisse For Conclusion we read of the Philosopher Thales that lifting up his eyes to observe the Course of the Starres he fell into the water which gave the occasion to a Damsell called Thressa of an ingenious and bitter scoffe That he who was so busy to see what was done in Heaven could not observe what was even before his feet and it is as true of them who are so bold and forward in the Contemplation of Gods Eternall Decree many times they fall dangerously into those Errours which swallow them up they are too bold with God and so negligent of themselves Talke more what he does or hath done or may doe then do what they should are so much in Heaven and to so little purpose that they lose it But the Apostles method is sure to use diligence to make our Election sure and so read the Decree in our Obedience and syncere conversation and if we can perswade our selves that our Names are written in the Book of Life yet so to behave our selves so to work on with Feare and Trembling as if it were yet to be done as it was told the Philosopher that he might have seen the figure of the Starres in the water but could not see the water in the starres All the knowledge we can gaine of the Decree is from our selves it is written in heaven and the Characters we read it by on Earth are Faith and Repentance if we beleeve and repent then God speaks to us from heaven and tells us we shall not die If we be dead to sinne and alive to Righteousnesse we are enrolled and our names are written in the book of Life here here alone is the Decree legible and if our eye faile not in the one it cannot be deceived in the other If we love Christ and keep his Commandements we are in the number of Elect and were chosen from all Eternity Be not then cast downe and dejected in thy self with what God hath done or may do by his absolute Power for thou maist build upon it He never saved an Impenitent nor will ever cast away a Repentant sinner Behold he calls to thee now by his Prophet Quare morieris Why wilt thou die didst thou ever heare from him or from any Prophet a morieris that thou shalt die or a Mortuus es that thou art dead already Thou hast his Prayers his intreaties and besseechings Expandit manus he spreads forth his hands all the day long Thou hast his wishes Oh that thou wert wise so wise as to look upon the moriemini to consider thy last end Thou hast his Covenant Deut. 23.29 which he sware to our fore-fathers Abraham and his seed for ever His Comminations his obtesTations his expostulations thou mayest read but didst thou ever read the book of life Look on the moriemini look on the deaths head in the Text look not into the book of life thou hast other care that lies upon thee thou hast other businesse to do thou hast an understanding to adorn a will to watch over affections to bridle the flesh to crucifie temptations to struggle with the devil to encounter Think then of thy duty not of the decree and the syncere performance of the duty will seal the decree and seal thee up to the day of redemption It is a good rule which Martin Luther gives us Dimitte Scripturam ubi obscura est tene ubi certa
Novatian de cib Judacicis and those Birds of prey ut Israelitae murdareatur pecora culpatasunt to sanctifie and cleanse his people he blames the Beasts as unclean which they could not be of themselves because he made them and laies a Blemish upon his other Creatures to keep them underfiled and for to keep our Idolatry he busied them in those many ceremonies 1 a. 1 ae which he ordeined for that end ne vacaret Idololatriae servire saith Aquin. that they might not have the least leisure to be Idolaters So that to draw up all they might learn from the Law they might learn from the Priest they might learn from the Sacrifice they might learn from each Ceremony they might learn from men and they might learn from beasts to Turn from their evil ways Isal 5.4 and God might well cry out Quid facerem quod non fecerim what could I have done that I have not done and speak to them in his grief and wrath and indignation Quare c. why will ye die Oh House O house of Israel But to passe from the Synagogue to the Church which excells merito fidei et majoris scientiae in respect of a clearer faith and larger knowledge to come to the time of Reformation Heb. 9.10 in which all things which pertain to the full happinesse of Gods people was to be raised to their last height and perfection to look into the Law of liberty which lets usnot loose in our own evil wayes but makes us most free by restraining and tying us up and withholding us from those sins which the Law of Moses did not punish and here Why will ye die if it were before an obtestation it is now a bitter Sarcasme as bitter as death it self It is here improved and drove home a minori ad majus by the Apostle himself for if that which should be abolisht was glorious 2 Cor. 3 11. much more shall that which remaines whose fruit is everlasling be glorious And again If they escaped not who resused him who spake on earth from mount Sinai by his Angel Acts. 7.38 how shall not we escape if we turn away from him who spake from Heaven by his Son For the Church is a house but far more glorious built upon the Foundation of the Apostles and Prophets Jesus Christ himself being the head corner stone in whom all the building coupled together groweth into a Temple of the Lord. Colos 2.20.21 the whole world besides are but rubbage as bones scattered at the graves mouth The Church is compact knit and united into a house and in this house is the Armory of God ubi mille clipei armatura fortium where are a thousand Bucklers and all the weapons of the mighty to keep off death the helmet of Salvation the sword of the Spirit and the shield of Faith to quench all the Fiery Darts of Satan as they be delivered into our hands Eph. 6. And as it is a House Eph. 3.5 so is it a Familie of Christ of whom all the Family of heaven and earth is named who is M 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the great Master of the Houshold For as the Pythagorean fitting and shaping out a Familie by his Lute required 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the integrity of all the parts as it were the set number of the strings 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an apt composing and joyning them together as it were the Tuning of the instrument and lastly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a skilful touch which makes the harmony So in the Church if we take it in its latitude there be Saints Angels and Archangels if we contract it to the Militant as we usually take it there be some Apostles some Pastors some Prophets some Teachers Eph. 4. there be some to be Taught and some to teach some to be governed and some to rule which makes up the integrity of the parts and then these are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Apostle coupled and and knit together by every joynt by the bond of charity which is the coupling and uniting vertue as Prosper calls it by the unity of faith by their agreement in holinesse having one faith one Baptisme one Lord and at last every string being toucht in its right place begets a harmony which is delightful both to heaven and earth For when I name the Church I doe not meane the stones and building some indeed would bring it downe to this to stand for nothing but the walls but I suppose a subordination of parts which was never yet questioned in the Church but by those who would make it as invisible as their Charity Not the foot to see and the eye to walke and the Tongue to heare and the Eare to speake not all Apostles not all Prophets not all Teachers but as the Apostle sayes it shall be at the Resurrection Every man in his own Order Naz. Or. 25. For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Order is our security and safe-guard in a rout every man is a Child of Death every throat open to the Knife but when an Army is drawn out by Art and skill all hands are active for the Victory Inequality indeed of persons is the ground of disunion and discord but Order draws and works advantage out of Inequality it self when every man keeps his station the common Souldier hath his Interest in the victory as well as the Commander and when wee walke orderly every man in his owne place wee walk hand in Hand to Heaven and Happinesse together For further yet In the Church of God there is not onely a union an Order but as it is in our Creed a Communion ef parts The glorious Angels as ministring Spirits are sent to guard us and no doubt doe many and great services for us though we perceive it not The blessed Saints departed though we may not pray for them yet may pray for us though we heare it not and though the Church be scattered in its Members through all the parts of the world yet their hearts meet in the same God Every man prayes for himself and every man prayes for every man Quodest Omnium esi singulorum that which is all mens is every mans and that which is every mans belongs unto the whole For though we cannot speak in those high Termes of the Church as the Church of Rome doth of her self yet we cannot but blesse God and count it a great favour and priviledge that we are filii Ecclesiae as the Father speaks Children of the Church think of our selves as in a place of safety and advantage where we may find protection against Death it self Wee cannot speak loud with the Cardinal si Catholicus quisquam labitur in peccatum and Bellarm praefar ad Controv If a Catholique fall into a sinne suppose it Theft or Adultery yet in that Church he walketh not in Darkness but may see many helps to salvation by which he may soon quit
one thing is seen and another Thing done where the Christian suffers and Rejoyces is east downe and promoted falls by the sword to rise to Eternity where Glory lies hid in Disgrace Advantage in losse Increase in Diminution and life in Death Ecclesia in attonito a Church shining in the midst of all the blackness and darkness and Terrors of the world For again As when Common-wealths are in their best estate and flourish every man fits under his own Vine and Figtree every one walkes in his owne Calling The Schollar studies the Merchant Trafficks the Tradesman sells The Husbandman Tills and Ploughs the Ground so the time of persecution to the True Church to that Body which is made up of those who are borne after the spirit is a Day of Salvation 1 Tim. 6.22 a Day to work in her Calling for hereunto you were called saith the Apostle where she sits under the shadow of Gods wings where she studies patience and Christian Resolution where she ploughs up the Fallow ground and sowes the seeds of Righteousnesse where she Trafficks for the rich Pearle and buyes it with her blood where every Member Acts in its proper place by the virtue and to the Honour of the Head But this you may say is True if we take the Church as Invisible made up of sheep onely as a Collection of Saints To speak truly Charity builds up no other Church for all she beholds are either so or in a possibility of having that Honor though the Eye of Faith can see but a small number to make up that Body But take the Church under what Notion you please yet it will be easy to observe that Persecution may enlarge her Territories Increase her number and make her more visible then she was when the weather was faire and no cloud or Darkness hung over her that when her branches were lopt off she spread the more That when her members were dispers'd there were more gathered to her when they were drove about the world they carried that sweet smelling favour about them which drew in multitudes to follow them That in their flight they begat many Children unto Christ insomuch Crudelitas vestra illecebra est Sectae Tert. Ap. c. L. saith Saint Hierom That una vox totius mundi Christus Christ was become the Language of the whole world Plures efficimur quoties metimur when Christians are drove about the world and when they are drove out of the World they multiply so that we may conclude That so farre are all the Graces and beauty of the Church from raising any Priviledge to exempt her from persecution that they are rather Occasions and Provocations to raise one and make Persecution it self a Priviledge For in the last place As it was then so is it now And he doth not say It may be so or It is by Chance but Ita est so it is by the Providence of God Providentia ratio ordinis rerum ad Fiem Aquin. which consists and is seen in the well Ordering and bringing of every Motion and Action of man to a right End which commonly runnes in a contrary Course to that which Flesh and blood Humane Infirmity would find out Eternity and mortality Majesty and Dust and Ashes wisedome and Ignorance steere not the same course nor are they bound to the same point My wayes are not your wayes Is 55.8 nor my thoughts yours saith God by his Prophet to a foolish Nation who in extremity of folly would be wiser then God Mine are not as yours not such uncertaine such vaine such contradictory and deceitfull Thoughts but as farre removed from yours as Heaven is from the Earth And as he hath made the Heaven 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Basil as a vaile of his Divine Majesty so in all his proceedings and Operations upon man Deus tum maximè magnus cum homini pusiltus tum maximè optimus cum homini non bonus Tert. l. 2. adv Marcion c. 2. he is Deus sub velo a God under a vaile Hidden but yet seene In a dark Character but read not toucht but felt Mercifull when he seems angry Just when in outward appearance he favours Oppression then shadowing us under his wing when we think he Thunders against us The same yesterday in the calme and to day in the storme then raising his Church as high as Heaven when we tremble and imagine he hath opened the Gates of Hell to devour her whilst we stand at distance and gaze and wonder at his Counsells and dispositions and understand them not Were flesh and blood to build a Church we should draw our lines out in a pleasant place It should not be as a House subject to the winds and weather but some house of pleasure a Seraglio a Royall Palace It should not be in Egypt or Babylon but in the Fortunate Ilands or in Paradise Our Lily should be set farre enough from the Thornes For we would goe to Heaven without any Ifs or And 's without any buts or difficulties we would be eased but not weary we would be saved but not beleeve or beleeve but not suffer we would heare God but not in the Whirlwind Enter into his Kingdome but not with Tribulation That is would have God neither provident nor Just nor Wise that is which is a sad Interpretation would have no God at all But Gods method is best and is drawne out by his manifold Wisedome Eph. 3.10 nor could it possibly be otherwise Honorem operis fructus excusat For that is Method and Order with him which we take to be confusion and that which we call persecution is his Art his way of making of Saints de perverso auxiliatur raysing us by those evills Tertul. Scorpiac c. 5. we labour under and as in his manifold Wisedome he redeemed mankind so the manner and method of working out our Salvation is from the same Wisedome and Providence which as it set an Oportet upon Christ to suffer for us so it set an Oportet upon the Church to have a Fellowship in his Sufferings Act. 14.22 We must through many Afflictions be consecrated be made perfect and so enter into the Kingdome of Heaven Nor Indeed Take us as we are polluted and uncleane could we enter any other way not enter into the New Heavens but purg'd and refin'd and transform'd by these into a new Creature Cured by diseases heal'd by Bruises rais'd by our Fall and made more spirituall by the contradiction of those who are borne after the flesh more Isaacs then before for the many Ismaels so that it is not onely agreeable to the wisedome of God but convenient to the weaknesse of man God could not save us we could not be saved any other way Oportet we must go this way Nay Datum est Philip. 1.29 it is a Gift It is given not onely to beleeve but to suffer a Gift for which heaven it self is Given and it is a
Church which was shut up within the narrow confines of Judea now under the Gospel is as large as the world it self The Invitation is to all and all may come They may come who are yet without and they might have come who are bound hand and foot and cannot come The Gate was once open to them but now 't is shut Persa Gothus Judus Philosophantur saith Saint Hierom the Persian and the Goth and the Indian and Egyptian are subjects under this Lord Barbarisme it self bows before him and hath chang'd her Harsh notes into the sweet melody of the Cross There was dew onely upon the Fleece the people of the Jews but now that fleece is dry and there is dew upon all the earth The Gospel saith our Saviour must be Preached to all Nations and when the Holy Ghost descended to seale and confirme the Laws of this Lord Act. 2,6 there were present at this great sealing or Confirmation some saith the Text of all Nations under Heaven that did heare 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the wonderfull things of God every one in his owne language so that the Gospel might seem to have been Preached throughout the world before the Apostles did stirr a foot from Jerusalem But here we may observe that Christ who hath jus ad omnem terram hath not in strictnesse of speech jus in omni Terrâ The right and propriety is his for ever but he doth not take possession of it all at once but successively and by parts It is as easy for him to illuminate all the world at once as the least nook and corner of it but this Sonne of Righteousness spreads his beames gloriously Joh. 11.1 but is not seen of all because of the Interposition of mens sinnes who exclude themselves from the Beames thereof This true light came into the world but the world received him not but yet what our sensuality will not suffer him to doe at once he doth by degrees and passeth on and gaineth ground That so successively he may bee seen and known of all the world But suppose men shook off their Allegiance as too many the greatest part of the world the greatest part of Christendome doe suppose there were none found that will bow before him which will never be suppose they Crucify him againe yet is he still our King and our Lord the King and Lord of all the world such an universall falling a way and forsaking him would not take away from him his Dominion nor remove him from the right hand of God and strip him of his Power If all the world were Infidells yet he were a Lord still and his Power as large and irresistible as ever For his Royalty depends not on the Duty and fidelity of his subjects if it did his Dominion would be indeed but of a very narrow Compasse the sheep not so many as the Goates his flock but little Indeed he could have no right at all if it could be taken from him Neither deceit nor violence can take away a right no man can lose his right till he forfeit it which was impossible for this supreame Lord to doe All the Contradictions of all the men in the world cannot weaken his Title or contract his Power If all should forsake him if all should send this Message to him Nolumus hunc regnare Luk. 19.14 we will not have thee Reign over us yet in all this scorn and contempt in this open Rebellion and Contradiction of sinners he is still the Lord and as he favours those subjects who come in willingly whom he guides with his staffe so he hath a rod of Iron to bruise his Enemies and this Lord shall command and at his command his servants and Executioners shall take those his Enemies who would not have him reign over them and slay them before his face He will not use his Power to force and dragg them by violence to his service but if they refuse his help abuse the means which he offers them and turn his grace into wantonness then will he shew himself a King and his anger will be more terrible then the roaring of a Lion They shall feele him to be a Lord when 't will be too late to call him so when they shall weep and curse and gnash with their teeth and Howle under that Power which might have saved them for the same Power opens the gates of heaven and of Hell In his hand is a Cup saith the Psalmist Psal 75.8 and in his hand is a reward and when he comes to Judge he brings them both along with him the same Power brings Life and Death as Fabius did Peace or Warre to the Carthagenians in the lap of his Garment and which he will he powres out upon us and in both is still our Lord when faith failes and Charity waxeth cold and the world is set on wickedness when there be more Antichrists then Christians he is our Lord yesterday and to day and the same for ever Heb. 13.8 4 And in the last place as the Dominion of our Lord is the largest that ever was so is most lasting and shall never be destroyed and shall break to pieces and destroy all the Kingdomes of the Earth but it self shall stand fast for ever no violence shall shake it Dan. 2.44 no craft shall undermine it no Time wast it but Christ shall remaine our Lord for ever The Apostle indeed speaks of an end of delivering up his Kingdome and of Subjection 'T is true there shall be an end 1 Cor. 15.24 but 't is when hee hath delivered up his Kingdome and hee shall deliver up his Kingdome but not till he hath put down all Authority Finis hic defectio non est nec Traditio Amissio nec subjectio infirmitas saith Hilary This end is no fayling This delivery no losse this Subjection is no weakness nor Infirmity Regnum Regnans tradet He shall deliver up his Power and yet be still a Lord. Take Nazianzens Interpretation and then this subjection is nothing else but the fulfilling of his Fathers will Orat. 36. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he in his 36. Oration which he made against the Arrians Take others and by Christ is meant his Church which in Computation is but one Person vvith Christ and when His Church is perfected then doth he deliver up his Power and Dominion But let us but observe the manner of the ending of this Kingdome and the Fayling and Period of others and we shall gaine light enough to guide us in the midst of all these doubts and difficulties For other Kingdoms are undermined by craft and shaken by the madness of the People who shun the whip and are beaten with Scorpions cast off one yoak and put on a heavier as the young men in Livy complain'd either Kingdoms are chang'd and alter'd as it pleaseth those who are victorious whose right hand is their God but the Power of this Lord is then and
be who have subscribed to the venturus est that the Lord will come who have little reason to hope for his coming How many beleeve hee will come and bring his reward with him and yet strike off their own Charriot wheels and drive but heavily towards it how many beleeve there is a Judge to come and wish there were none Faith Saving Faith Hope Hope that will not make ashamed cannot dwell in the heart till Charity hath taken up a roome but when she is diffusa in cordibus shed and spread abroad in our Hearts then they are in Conjunction and meet together and kisse each other Faith is a Foundation and on it our love raiseth it self as high as heaven in all the severall branches and parts of it Because I beleeve I love and when my love is reall and perfect my hope springs up and blooms and flourishes my Faith sees the object my Love imbraceth it and the means unto it and my Hope layes hold of it and even takes possession of it And therefore this venturus est This coming of the Lord is a Threat and not a promise if they meet not If Faith work not by Love and both together raise not a Hope venturus est he will come is a Thunder-bolt And thus as it lookes upon Faith and Hope so it calls for our Charity For whether we will or no whether we beleeve or no whether we hope or no veniet he will certainly come but when we love him then we love also his appearance and his coming and our Love is a subscription to his Promise 2 Tim. 4.8 by which we truly Testify our consent and sympathize with him and say Amen to his Promise That he will come we eccho it back againe unto him Even so come Lord Jesus For that of Faith may be in a manner forc'd That of Hope may be groundless but this of Love is a free and voluntary subscription Though I I know he will come yet I shall be unwilling he should come upon me as an Enemy that he should come to me when I sit in the Chair of the Scornfull or lie in the bed of Lust or am wallowing in the mire or weltring in my own blood or washing my feet in the blood of my Brethren for can any condemned person hope for the day of Execution But when I love him and bow before him when I have improv'd his Talent and brought my self to that Temper and Constitution that I am of the same mind with this Lord and partaker of his divine Nature then Faith openeth and displayeth her self and Hope towreth up as high as the right Hand of God and would bring him down never at rest never at an end but panting after him till he doe come crying out with the soules under the Altar How long Lord How long How long is the very breathing and language of Hope Then Substantia mea apud te Psal 62.5 as the vulgar reads that of the Psalmist my expectation my substance my being is with the Lord and I doe not onely subscribe to the veniet to his coming because he hath Decreed and resolved upon it but because I can make an hearty Acknowledgement that the will of the Lord is just and good and I assent not of Necessity but of a willing mind and I am not onely willing but long for it and as he Testifies these Things and confirmes this Article of his coming with this last word etiam venio surely I come so shall I be able truely to Answer Even so come Lord Jesus come quickly The End of his Coming And now venturus est the Lord will come and you may see the Necessity of his coming in the End of his coming for qualis Dominus talis adventus as his Dominion is such is his Coming his Kingdome spirituall and his coming to punish sinne and reward Obedience to make us either Prisoners in Darkness or Kings and Priests to reigne with him and offer up spirituall Sacrifices for evermore He comes not to answer the Disciples question to restore the Kingdom to Israel for his Kingdome is not such a one as they dreamt of nor to place the Mother of Zebedees Children the one at his right Hand and the other at his left nor to bring the Lawyer to his Table to eat bread with him in his Kingdome These carnall conceits might suite well with the Synagogue which lookt upon nothing but the Basket and yet to bring in this Error the Jews as they killed the Prophets so must they also abolish their Prophecies which speak plainely of a King of no shape or beauty Esai 53.2 Zech. 9.9 Isa 9.6 of his first coming in lowlinesse and poverty of a Prince of Peace and not of warr of the Increase of whose Government there shall be no end Nor doth he come to lead the Chiliast the Dreamer of a Thousand yeares of Temporall Happiness on Earth into a Mahometicall Paradise of all Corporall Contentments That after the Resurrection the Elect and even a Reprobate may think or callhim self so may reigne with Christ a thousand years in all state and Pomp and in the Affluence of all those Pleasures which this Lord hath taught them to renounce A conceit which ill becomes Christians who must look for a better and more enduring substance who are strangers and Pilgrims Heb. 10.34 Heb. 11.13 and not Kings on earth whose Conversation is in heaven and whose whole life must be a going out of the World why should we be commanded and that upon paine of eternall separation from this our Lord to weane our selves from the World and every thing in the World if the same Lord Think these flatteries of our worser part these pleasures which we must loath a fitt and proportionable reward for the labour of our Faith and Charity which is done in the Inward man can he forbid us to touch and Tast these Things and then glut us with them because we did not Touch them and can it now change its Nature and be made a Recompence of those Virtues which were as the wings on which we did fly away and so kept our selves untoucht unspotted of this Evill But they urge Scripture for it and so they soon may for it is soon misunderstood soon misapplyed It is written they say in the 20. of the Revel at the 6. v. that the Saints shall reign with Christ a thousand yeers shall reign with Christ is evidence faire enough to raise those spirits which are too high or rather too low already 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 no sooner is the word read but the crown is on To let passe the divers interpretations of that place some making the number to be definite some to be indefinite some beginning the thousand yeers with the persecution of Christ and ending it in Antichrist others beginning it with the reign of Constantine when Christianity did most flourish and ending it at the first rising of the
the Judgement of the world Thus we judge others and thus we judge our selves so byass'd with the Flesh that for the most we passe wide of the Truth Others are not to us nor are we to our selves what we are but the work of our own hands made up in the world and with the help of the world for the wisdome of this world is our Spirit and Genius that rayses every Thought dictates all our words begetteth all our Actions and by it as by our God we live and move and have our being And now since judgment is thus corrupted in the world even Justice requires it Et veniet Dominus qui malè judicata rejudicabit the Lord will come and give judgement against all these crooked and perverse Judgements and shall lay Righteousness to the Plummet Is 28.17 and with his oreath sweep away the refuge of lyes and shall judge and passe another manner of sentence upon us and others then we doe in this world Then shall we be told which we would never believe though we have had some Grudgings and whisperings some half Informations within us which the love of this world did soon silence and suppress Then shall he speake to us in his displeasure Aliud est judicium Christi aliud anguli Susurrorum Hier. and though we have talk'd of him all the day long tell us we forgot him If we set up a golden Image he shall call us Idolaters though we intended it not and when we build up the Sepulchres of the Prophets and flatter our selves and accuse our Fore-fathers tell us we are as great murderers as they and thus find us guilty of that which we protest against and haters of that which we think we love and lovers of that which we think we detest and take us from behind the bush from every lurking hole from all shelter of excuse take us from our Rock our Rock of Ayre on which we were built and dash our presumptuous Assurance to Nothing Nor can a sigh or a groane or a loud profession a Fast or long Prayers corrupt this Lord or alter his sentence but he shall judge as he knows who knows more of us then we are willing to take notice of and is greater the our Conscience which we shrink and dilate at pleasure and fit to every purpose and knoweth all things and shall judge us not by our Pretence our Intent or forc'd Imagination but secundum Evangelium according to his Gospel veniet he shall come when all is thus out of Order to set all at Right and strait again And this is the end of his coming The Third Particular Non nostis Horam You know not the Hour And now being well assured that he will come we are yet to seek and are ready with the Disciples to Ask When will these things be and what hour will he come veniet come he will Et hocsatis est aut nescio quid satis sit as P. Varus spake upon another occasion this is enough or we cannot see what is enough But nothing is enough to those who have no mind nor Heart to make use of that which is enough to them enough is too much for they look upon it as if 't were nothing and therefore Christ doth not feed and nourish this thriftless and unprofitable Humor but bridles and checks it puts in his veto his prohibition not to search after more then is Enough Non nostis Horam you know not the hour is all the Answer which he who best knows what 't is fit for us to know will afford our Curiosity For what is that we doe not desire to know Sen. devit Beat. c. 32. Curiosum nobis Natura dedit ingenium saith the Philosopher Nature it self may seem to have imprinted this itch of Curiosity in our very mindes and witts made them inquisitive given them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an eye which never sleepes never rests upon one Object but passeth by that and gazeth after another That he will come is not enough for our busy but idle curiosity to know we seek further yet to know that which cannot be known the Time and very hour of his coming The mind of man is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Enormi otiosae curiositati tanâ—aâ—… decrit dis ere quantum â—buerit inquiâ—ere Terr de Anima c. ult restless in perpetuall motion It walkes through the Earth sometimes looks upon that which delights it sometimes that which grieves it stays and dwells too long upon both and misinterprets them to her own Impoverishing and disadvantage perruâ—pit Coeli munimenta saith Seneca it breaks through the very Gates of Heaven and there busily pryes after the Nature of Angels and of God himself but see it not Enters the Holy of Holies and there is venturing into the Closet of his secrets and there is lost lost in the search of those Things of Times and Seasons which are past finding out and are therefore set at such a distance that we may not send so much as a Thought after them which if they could be known yet could not advantage us It was a good Commendation which Tacitus gives of Agricola retinuit quod est difficulimum in sapientiâ modum In vita Agricolae He did what is difficult for man to doe bound and moderate himself in the pursuit of knowledge and desired to know no more then that which might be of use and profitable to him which wisdom of his had it gain'd so much credit as to prevaile with the sonnes of men which would be thought the Children of Wisedome they had then laid out the precious Treasure of their Time on that alone which did concern them and not prodigally mispent it on that which is impertinent in seeking that which did fly from them when they were most intentive and Eager in their search If this Moderation had been observed There be Thousand questions which had never been rais d Thousand Oâ—inions which had never been broacht Thousands of errors which had never shew'd their heads to disturb the Peace of the Church to obstruct and hinder us in those wayes of Obedience which alone without this impertinent turning our eye and looking aside will carry us in a strait and even course unto our end Why should I pride my self in the Finding out a new conclusion when t is my greatest and my onely glory to be a New Creature why should I take such paines to reconcile Opinions which are Contrary my businese is to still the Contradictions of my mind those Counsells and desires which every day thwart and oppose one another what profit is it to refute other mens errours whilst I approve and love and Hugg my owne What purchase were it to find out the very Antichrist and to be able to say This is the man All that is required of me is to be a Christian what if I were assured the Pope was the Beast I sought for he appeared in as
eyes for our advantage that by the doubtful and pendulous expectation of the hour our faith might be put to the trial whether it be a languishing dead faith or fides armata a faith in armes Tert. de Anima c. 33. and upon its watch ut semper diem observemus dum semper ignoramus that whil'st we know not when 't will be it may present it self unto us every moment to affront and awe us in every motion and be as our task-master to over-see us and binde us to our duty that we may fulfill our work and work out our salvation with fear and trembling that our whole life may be as the vigils and Eve and the houre of his coming the first houre of an everlasting Holy-day Lastly there is no reason why it should be known neither in respect of the good nor of the evil for the good satis est illis credere it is enough for them that they beleeve they walk by faith saith the Apostle 2 Cor. 5.7 and in their way behold the promises and comminations of the he Lord and in them as in a glasse behold heaven and hell the horrour of the one and the glory of the other and this sight of the object which they have by the eye of faith is as powerful to work in them obedience as if Heaven it self should fly open and discover all unto them to the true beleever Christus venturus Christ to come and Christ now coming in the clouds are in effect but one object for Faith sees plainly the one in the other the last hour in the first the World at an end in the prediction But to Evil and wicked men to men who harden themselves in sin Jud. Ep. v. 10. no evidence is cleer enough and light it self is darknesse what they naturally know and what they can preach unto themselves in that thy corrupt themselves and give their senses leave to lead them to all uncleannesse whilst reason which should command is put behinde and never hearkned to are as bruit Beasts in spite of all they have of man within them and if they beleeve his coming and will not turn back and bow and obey their Reason they would remain the same beasts or worse though they knew the very hour of his coming After all those judgements Pharaoh was still the same after the rivers turned into blood after frogs and lice after the plague on man and beast after every plague which came thick as line upon line precept upon precept after all these the effect and conclusion was Exod. 10.27 Pharaoh hardned his heart was Pharaoh still the same Tyrant till he was drowned in the Red-sea Balaam though the Asse forbad his folly and the Angel forbad it though the sword was drawn against him and brandisht in his very face that he bowed on the ground and fell flat on his face yet he rose again and took courage to betray the Israelites to that sin with the Midianitish women which brought a curse vpon them and death upon himself for he was slain for it with the sword Exod. 31.8 what evidence can prevail with what terrour can move a wicked man hardned in his sin who knows well enough and can draw the picture of Christ coming and look upon it and study to forget it and then put on an ignorance of his own knowledge and though he know he will yet perswade himself he will not come and he that can thus stand out against his own knowledge in the one may be as daring and resolute in the other and venture on though Hell it self should open her mouth against him and breath vengeance in his face for howsoever we pretend ignorance yet the most of the sins which we commit we commit against our knowledge Tell the foolish man that the lips of the Harlot will bit like a Cockatrice he knows it well enough and yet will kisse them tell the intemperate that wine is a mocker he will taste though he know he shall be deceived the cruel oppressor will say and sigh it out that the Lord is his God and yet eat up his people as he eats bread who knows not that we must do to others as we would have others do to us and yet how many are there I may ask the question that make it good in practice who knows not what his duty is and that the wages of sin is death and yet how many seek it out and are willing to to travail with it though they die in the birth cannot the thought of judgement move us and will the knowledge of a certain houre awake us will the hardned sinner cleave to his sin though he know the Lord is coming and will he let it go and fling it from him if the set determined houre were upon record No 2 Tim. 3.13 they wax worse and worse saith the Apostle earth is a fairer place to them then Heaven it self nor will they part with one vanity nor bid the devil avoid though they knew the very houre I might say though they now saw him coming in the clouds For wilt not thou beleeve God when he comes as neer thee as in wisdom he can and his pure Essence and Infinite Majesty will suffer and art thou assured thou shalt believe him if he would please to come so neere as thy sick Fancy would draw him Indeed this is but aegri somnium the dreame of a sick and ill affected mind that complaines of want of Light when it shines in thy face for that Information which we so long for we cannot have or if we could it would work no more Miracles then that doth which we already have but leave us the same Lethargiques which we were in a word if his doctrine will not move us the Knowledge which hee will not Teach will have little force and though it were written in Capitall Letters at such a time and such a day and in such an Houre the Lord will come we should sleep on as securely as before and never awake from this Death in sinne till the last Trump To look once more upon the Non nostis horam Conclus and so conclude and we may learn even from our Ignorance of the Hour thus much That as his coming is uncertaine so it will be sudden as we cannot know when he will come so he will come when we doe not think on 't Tert. Apol. c. 33. cum Totius mundi motu cum horrore orbis cum planctu omnium si non Christianorum saith Tert. with the shaking of the whole world with the Horror and amazement of the Universe every man howling and lamenting but those few that little flock which did waite for his coming It is presented to us in three resemblances 1. Of Travell coming upon a Woman with Child 1 Thess 5.2,3 Luk. 21.35 2. Of a Thief in the night and 3ly Of a snare Now the Woman talks and is cheerfull now she layeth
of man whilst the stronger is left to watch work upon that part first which is easier to be seduced then the reason or will which must needs denie them admittance if they came and presented themselves in their own shape and were not first let in by the senses and Fancy and there coloured over and beautified and in this dresse sent up unto them Indeed the senses are meerly passive receive the object and no more the eye doth see and the eare hear and the hands feel and their work and office is transacted and thus if I be watchful I may see vanity and detest it I may hear blasphemy and abhor it I may touch and not be defiled but as the Prophet Jeremy speaks Death comes in at the windowes Jer. 9.21 and so by degrees enters into the palace of our mind and as the Civilians tell us possessio acquiritur etiamsi in angulo tantum ingrediamur we take possession of a house though we come but into a corner of it so through our negligence and unwarinesse many times nay most times it falls out that when the temptation hath gained an entrance at the eye or eare it presseth forward to the more retired and more active faculties and at last gains dominion over the whole man for from the senses it is transmitted to the Fancy which hath a Creating faculty to make what she pleaseth of what she list to put new forms and shapes upon objects to make gods of clay to make that delightful which in it self is grievous that desirable which is loathsome that fair and beautiful which is full of horror To-set up a Golden calf and say it as a good habentur phantasmata pro cognitis these shews and apparitions are taken for substances August lib. music c. 11. these airy phantasmes for well-grounded conclusions and the minde of man doth so apply it self unto them ut dum in his est cogitatio ea intellectu cerni arbitramur that what is but in the fancy and wrapped up in a thought is supposed to be seen by the eye of the understanding in the same shape what we think is so and with us in these our distempers opinion and knowledge are one and the same thing and this inflames and mads the affections that they forget their objects and look and run wilde another way our hatred is placed on that which we should love and our love on that which we should detest we feare that which we should embrace and we hope for that which we should feare we are angry with a Friend and well pleased with an enemy Now prophaness sounds better Hilar. in Psal 118. then a Hymne or Psalme of Thanksgiving a Fable is more welcome then the Oracles of God et blandior auri species quam hominis aut coeli aut lucis and a piece of Gold is a more glorious sight then man the Image of his Maker or the Heaven wherein he dwells or the Light it self so true is that of the Orator Quintil l. 10. c. 3. aliud agere mentem cogunt oculi by this meanes the eye diverts the mind of man from its proper work that it cannot attend and busy it self to discerne betwixt Good and evill and so watch and stand upon its Guard I call'd Tentations not only Occasions but Arguments but such Arguments which as I told you conclude not beget not knowledge but opinion prevail not with wise men but with fools who commonly for want of Circumspection entertain swallow down uncertain things for those which are certain that which is doubtful for that which is true They who have wisedome for their guide judge of things Arist Sophist Elench c. 12. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according as they are in themselves according to the Truth attempt nothing doe nothing upon Opinion or a bare appearance but before they make Choice doe weigh and examine the Object but uncautelous and unadvised men do but see and presently imbrace that which was most deformed in it self and had nothing to commend it self to them but the fucus and paint which themselves laid on Good God how friendly and familiar are we with that which pleaseth the eye and fancy Magna ista quia parvi sumus credinus Sen. Praef. ad N.Q. before the reason hath lookt upon it Take all the sinnes which we commit what better ground or Foundation have they on which they rise to that visible height then False opinion Our Ambition soares and mounts aloft with this thought as with a wing That Honor will make us as Gods Our Covetousness diggs and sweats with this assurance That Riches are the best Friend Our revenge is furious and bloody because we think That to suffer is Cowardise we runne after evills and study for a Curse for some glimpse or shew it hath of some great blessing And we doat on the earth which is fading and whose fashion passeth away for some resemblance we think it hath to Heaven and Eternity Et inambus phant asmatibus tanquam pictis epulis reficimur Aug de verâ Religi c. 51. and these vain imaginations These Dreames of Happinesse are but as a painted Banquet for as Junckets in a Picture may delight the eye but not fill the stomach so doe these sudden and weak conceptions tickle and please the fancy perhaps but bring leanness into the soul and leave it empty and poore And no marvail For when the sense is thus pleased when the fancy hath sported and plaid with that which delighted the sense the Affections grow unruly and reason is swallowed up in Victory so that God seemeth to be the enemy and the Devill a Friend bringing good news unto us and speaking pleasing Things to us such as are Musick to our eares whereas God seems to come in Thunder with Terror and command to drive us to our watch providing a knife for our throat shutting up the eye cutting off the right hand muzling up the mouth that it speake no Guile writing sad Characters upon that which our sense and Fancy had painted and drest up as Touch not Tast not Handle not Now that Temptations work thus by the sense and Enter and make their passage into the inward man is evident not onely in those grosser sinnes which turne the very soul it self into flesh nam wist a anima libidine fit Caro saith the Father for when the soul is polluted with lust it loseth its spirituality and is transubstantiated as it were into Flesh but it is seen in those which are more retired and inward to the Soul not onely in the Practice of our Life but the Errors of our Doctrin and on this ground Saint Paul puts Heresies into his black Catalogue Gal. 5.20 and numbers them amongst the works of the Flesh For if we look upon those who are the Authors and Fomentors of Error we shall find that they wilfully shut their eyes and eares against the Truth which offers it self
down this natural desire under the will of his Father and would drink that cup Maxima chsequii gloria est in eo quod aequi minus velit I'lin Paneg. which his humane nature trembled at not my will but thine be done Herein is obedience if a man doth the will of God even against his will that is his natural desire When my breasts are full of milk and my blood dances in my veines and my natural inclination is strong within me when beauty not onely tempts but sollicits and opportunity and the twilight favour me when my natural desire is eager and vehement when I thus would and might and will not then am I chast an Eunuch for the kingdom of Heaven when my choler would draw my sword and my reason locks it in my Scabbard then am I meek when I am brought to the trial of my faith and my fear would carry me away from that persecution which rageth against me for the truthes sake and I cleave to the truth and chase this fear away which would carry away me or awe and over-match it by the readinesse and strength of the spirit and resolve against those terrours which would shake me from my rock for I may fear and yet suffer then am I a Souldier of Christ when I am fastned to the stake and am made a spectacle to thousands to some a spectacle of pitty to others of reproach when I see the light the joy of the whole earth the Heavens above me and the land of the living where I was wont to walk when I see all the ceremony and pomp of persecution and death when the executioner is ready to put fire to my funeral pile when my flesh trembles and nature shrinks from that which will abolish it when in this fit of trepidation a conditional pardon is offered and I would yet will not receive it because even the saving letters that are in it are killing when the outward man would not be thus sacrificed and yet I offer him up then the crown is ready for me and the flame of fire in which I shall be reduced almost to nothing is my Chariot to carry my soul up to receive it I cannot say that this strife and contention is in all for the grace of Gods spirit may so settle and quiet it that it shall scarce be sensible but where it is sensible it is no signe that the tentation hath prevailed but rather a strong argument that we are not as yet lead and shut up in it but forcing a way and passage out of it that though the strong man thus come against us yet there is something in us stronger then he something opposite and contrary to the tentation which will not suffer it to come so neer as to shake our constancy or drive us from our resolution it may lay hard at us to make us leave our hold and to represse and keep it back to strengthen and lift up our selves that we do not fall is the effect of our watchfulnesse and Christian fortitude by which we are more then Conquerors To conclude this though the sense and fancy receive the object which is a tentation though our natural temper incline to it and raise in us a kinde of desire to it which is but a resultancy from the flesh yet if we stand upon our guard and watch we shall be so far from sinning that we shall raise that obedience upon it which makes a way to happinesse and the soul shall be sospes et fidei calore fervens inter tentamenta Diaboli Hieron Apronio as Saint Jer. speaks safe and sound vigorous and lively in the midst of all these tentations shall be undefiled of that object which is fair and unshaken of that which is terrible to the sense Put on then the whole armour of God stand upon your guard set up the spirit against the flesh the reason against your sense watch one eye with another your carnal eye with a spiritual eye your carnal ear with a spiritual ear check your fancy bound your inclination if the flesh be weake let the spirit be ready if one raise a liking or desire let the other work the miracle and cast it out and this is to work light out of darknesse good out of that which might have bin evil life out of that which might have been death this is indeed to watch And to this end that we may thus watch let us out of that which hath been said gather such rules and directions which may settle and confirm us in our watch and carry on our care and sollicitude unto the end that we may watch and so not enter into temptation And first we must study the temptations themselves so study them as to wipe off their paint to strike off their illecebrae and beauty to behold them in their proper and native colours and representations optimus Imperator Veger qui habet cognitas res hostium he is the best Commander the best Watch-man who knows his enemy and can see through his disguise and vizor through his counterfeit terrours and lying boasts and knowes what he is For indeed nothing can make tentations of any force but the opinion we have of them it is not poverty that afflicts me but the opinion that poverty is evil 't is not the evil it self but my own thoughts which deserve this ill at my hands I am afraid of it because I think it horrid and whilst I think I make it so It is not the blow of the tongue that can hurt me for 't is but a word 't is not a Thunderbolt and if it were yet the Stoick will tell us inhonestius est dejectione animi perire quam fulmine Senc. Na. Question It is not so great an evil nor so dishonorable to be struck with a Thunderbolt as to be kill'd with fear far worse that my fancy should wound me then the tongue of an enemy For what secret force can there be in a calumniating tongue to pierce through our very hearts and shake and disturb our minds we can hear it thunder and not be cast down but so improvident and cruel we are to our selves that a breath from malice or envy will lay us on the ground Non ex eo quod est fallimur sed ex eo quod non est we are not deceived with the realities but with the disguises and appearances of things which those shapes which we have given them we first make them idols and then fall down and worship them we carelessly take in the object and let our fancy loose to work and hammer and polish it as Poets do make gods of men and Seas of little Rivers and in this fair out-side in which we have drest them they do deceive us if we would look neerer into them if we would desire them involutas evolvere unsold and lay them open take them out of that gaudinesse in which they are wrapt they could not have
with feare and reverence he will remember us and draw neerer to us in these outward elements then superstition can feigne him beyond the fiction of transubstantiation and abundantly satisfy us with the fatnesse of his house feed us though not with his flesh yet with himself and move in us that we may grow up in him In a word He will remember us in heaven more truly then we can remember him on earth and distill his grace and blessings on us be ever with us and fill our hearts with rejoycing which will be a faire pledg of that solid pure and everlasting joy in the Highest Heavens And Lord remember us thus now thou art in thy kingdome HONI â—…T QVI MAL Y PENSE THE NINETEENTH SERMON 1 THES 4.11 And that you study to be quiet and to doe your own businesse and to work with your own hands as we have commanded you THe summe of religion Christianity is to do the will of God and this is the will of God even our Sanctification at the 3. v. of this chapter This is the whole duty of man and we may say of it as the Father doth of the Lords prayer quantum substringitur verbis Tertull. de orat tantum diffunditur sensibus though it be contracted and comprized in a word yet it poures forth it self in a Sea of matter and sense For this holinesse unto which God hath called us is but one virtue but of a large extent and compasse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but one virtue but is divided into many and stands as Queen in the midst of the circle and crown of all the graces and claimes an interest in them all hath patience to wait on her compassion to reach out her hand longanimity to sustain and this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this placability of mind and contentation in our own portion and lot to uphold her and keep her in an equall poyse and temper ever like unto her self that we may be holy in our faith and holy in our conversation with men without which though our faith could remove mountains yet we were not holy Tot ramos porrigit tot venas diffundit so rich is the substance of holinesse so many branches doth she reach forth so many veines doth she spread into and indeed all those virtues which commend us to God are as the branches and veins and Holinesse the bloud and juice to make them live I doe not intend to compare them one with the other because all are necessary and the neglect of any one doth frustrate all the rest and the Wise-man hath forbid us to ask Why this is better then that for every one of them in his due time and place is necessary It hath been the great mistake and fault of those who professe Christianity to shrink up its veines and lop off its branches contenting themselves with a partiall holinesse some have placed it in a sigh or sad look and calld it repentance others in the tongue and hand and calld it zeale others in the heart in a good intention and called it piety others have made it verbum adbreviatum a short word indeed and called it faith few have been solicitous and carefull to preserve it in integritate totâ solidâ solid and entire but vaunt and boast themselves as great proficients in Holinesse and yet never study to be quiet have little peace with others yet are at peace with themselves are very religious and very profane are very religious and very turbulent have the tongues of Angels but no hand at all to do their own businesse and to work in their calling And therefore we may observe that the Apostle in every Epistle almost takes paines to give a full and exact enumeration of every duty of our lives that the man of God may be perfect to every good work teacheth us not onely those domesticke and immanent vertues if I may so call them which are advantageous to our selves alone as faith and hope and the like which justifie that person onely in whom they dwell but emanant publick and omiliticall vertues of common conversation which are for the edification and good of others as patience meeknesse liberality and love of quietnesse and peace my faith saves none but my self my hope cannot raise my brother from despaire yet my faith is holy Jude 20. saith Saint Jude and my hope is a branch and vein of holinesse and issues from it But my patience my meeknesse my bounty my love and study of quietnesse and peace sibi parciores foris totae sunt Ambros exercise their act and empty themselves on others these link and unite men together in the bond of love in which they are one and move together as one build up one anothers faith cherish one anothers hope pardon one anothers injuries beare one anothers burden and so in this bond in this mutuall reciprocall discharge of all the duties and offices of holinesse are carried together to the same place of rest So that to holinesse of life more is required then to believe or hope or poure forth our soules or rather our words before God t is true this is the will of God but we must go farther even to perfection and love the brethren and study to be quiet for this also is the will of God and our Sanctification What is a sigh if my murmuring drown it what is my devotion if my impatience disturb it what is my faith if my malice make me worse then an infidell what are my prayers if the spirit of unquietnesse scatter them will we indeed please God and walk as we ought we must then as S. Peter exhorts adde to our faith virtue to our virtue knowledge to knowledge patience to patience brotherly kindnesse and to brotherly kindnesse love 2 Pet. 1.5.6 v. or as Saint Paul here commands not onely abstain from fornication from those vices which the worst of men are ready to fling a stone at but those gallant and heroick vices which shew themselves openly before the Sun and the people who look favourably and friendly on them and cry them up for zeale and religion even from all animosity and turbulent behaviour we must 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we must study to be quiet and be ambitious of it Thus our Apostle bespeaks the Thessalonians we beseech you brethren that you increase more and more and in the words of my text that you study to be quiet and do your own businesse and work with your own hands as we have commanded you In which words first a duty is proposed study to be quiet 2 ly the meanes promoting this duty are prescribed or causae producentes and conservantes the causes which bring it forward and hold it up laid down the first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to do our own businesse the 2. to work with our own hands the first shuts out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all pragmaticall curiosity and stretching beyond our line
ever was came not to destroy but to perfect nature not to blot out those common notions which we brought into the world with us but to make them more legible to improve them and so make them his Law and if we look upon them as not belonging to us we our selves cannot belong to the covenant of grace for even these duties are weaved in and made a part of the covenant and if we break the one we break the other and not onely if we believe not but if we live not peaceably if we stretch beyond our line if we labour not in our calling we shall not enter into his rest For these also are his Laws and these doth our blessed Apostle teach and command And to conclude such a power hath Christ left in his Church conferred it first on his Apostles and those who were to succeed and supply their place who were to speak after them in the person and in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ we will not dispute now what power it is it is sufficient to say it is not an Earthly but a Heavenly Power derived from Christ himself the Fountain and originall of all power whatsoever As Christs kingdom is not of this world so is not this power of that nature as to stand in need of an Army of Souldiers to defend and hold it up but is like to the object and matter it works upon spirituall a power to command to remember every man of his duty in the Church or Common-wealth for the Church and Common-wealth are two distinct but not contrary things and both powers were ordained to uphold and defend each other the civill power to exalt Religion and Religion to guard and fence the civill power and both should concur in this that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all Godlinesse and honesty Our commission is from heaven and we need no other power then his that sealed it and the virtue and Divinity of it shall then be made manifest when all earthly power shall cease and even Kings and they who did what they list shall tremble before it We see that power which is exercised here on earth though the glory of it dazle an eye of flesh yet sits heavy upon them who weare it we see it tortures them that delight in it eats up them that feed on 't eats up it self and driving all before it at last falls it self to the ground and falls as a milstone upon him that hath it and bruiseth him to pieces It is not such a power but I may be bold to say though it be lookt upon laught at despised by the men of this world yet is it a greater power than that which sometimes sets it up on high and sometimes makes it nothing and hath its end when it hath not its end for to publish our masters will to command in his name is all and though the command prove to some the savour of death unto death yet the power is still the same and doth never faile and if men were what they professe themselves Christians if they had any taste of the powers of the world to come they would more tremble at this then at the other be more afraid of a just reproof then a whip of an excommunication then a sword of the wrath of God which is yet scarce visible then of that which comes in fire and tempest to devour us for his favour or his wrath ever accompanies this power which draws his love neerer to them that obey it and poures forth his vengeance on them that resist it To conclude then look upon the command and honor the Apostle that brings it for the commands sake for his sake whose power and command it is A power there is proper and peculiar to them who are called to it and if the name of power may move envy for we see men fret at that which was ordeined for their good and so wast and exhale all their Religion till it be nothing if the name of power beare so harsh a sound we will give you leave to think it is not much materiall whether you call it so or no whether we speak in the imperative mood hoc fac do this upon your perill or onely positively point as with the finger this is to be done we will be any thing do any thing be as low as you please so we may raise you above the vanities of the world above that wantonnesse which stormes at that which was ordained for no other end but to lift you out of ruine into the highest heavens Our power and the command of Christ differ not so much but the one includes and upholds the other and if you did but once love the command you would never boggle at the name of power but blesse and honour him that brings it Oh that men were wise but so wise as not to be wiser then God as not to choose and fall in love with their own wayes as more certain and direct unto the end then Gods as not to preferre their own mazes and Labyrinths and uncertain gyrations drawn out by lust and fancy before those even and unerring paths found out by an infinite wisdome and discovered to us by a mercy as infinite oh that we could once work out and conquer the hardship of a command and then see the beauty of it and to what glory it leads us we should then receive an Apostle in the name of an Apostle and look upon the command though brought in an earthen vessell as upon heaven it self oh that we were once spirituall then those precepts which concern our conversation on earth would be laid hold on and embraced as from the Heaven Heavenly then should we be as quiet as the Heavens which are ever moving and ever at rest because ever in their own place then should we be as the Angels of Heaven who envy not one another malice not one another trouble not one another but every Angel knows his office and moves in his own order and our assiduous labour in our calling would be a resemblance of the readynesse of those blessed spirits who at the beck of Majesty have wings and haste to their duty who are ever moving and then in their highest exaltation when they are in their ministery In aword then should we every one sit under his own vine and figtree and no evill eye should look towards him no malice blast him no injury assault him no bold intrusion unsettle him but we should all rejoyce together the poore with the rich the weak with the strong the low with the high all blesse one another help one another guard one another and so in the name of the prince of peace walk peaceably together every one moving in his own place till we reach that peace which yet we do not understand but shall then fully enjoy to all Eternity The One and Twentieth SERMON PART I. MICAH v. 6. Wherewith shall I come
not 2ly Manifested and pointed out to as with a finger Indicavit tibi God by his Prophet hath shewed it 3ly Publisht and promulged as a law What doth the Lord require of thee and lastly charactered and drawne out in its principall parts 1. Justice and Honesty 2ly Mercy and Liberality 3ly Humility and sincerity of mind which is the Beauty and Glory of the rest and commends tem makes our Justice and Mercy shine in the full beauty of Holinesse when we are this and do this as with or Before the Lord. He hath shewed thee O man what is good c. These be the particulars we begin with the first That Piety and True Religion is here Termed Good in it self and for it self in opposition to the sacrifices and Ceremonies of the Law And first the Sacrifices and Ceremonious part of Gods worshp were good but ex instituto because God for some reason was pleased to institute and ordain them otherwise in themselves they were neither good nor evil They were before they were enjoyned and men offered them up 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Respons ad orthod in operib Justini martyris ad Interrog 83. not in reference to any command but out of a voluntary zeal and affection to the honour of God which they exprest and shewed forth in this especiall act in devoting that unto him which was with them of highest esteem as more due to the Giver of all things then to them for whose use they were given God did not command but did accept them for the zeal and affection of them who offered them up and he tells them so himselfe I speake not to your Fathers nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt concerning Burnt-offerings or sacrifice But this thing I commanded them saying Obey my voyce Jerem. 7.22,23 Secondly when they were commanded they were commanded not for any reall goodnesse there was naturally in them for what are Blood and smoke to the God of spirits but brought in for that good effect which the wisdome of God could work out of them which had nothing of Good in them nor which might commend them but the end for which they were ordained And therefore he commanded them not as desireable in themselves but by way of condescension submitting himself as it were to the present infirmity and condition of the Jews who were so strongly affected to this kind of worship Populum pronum Idololatriae ejusmodi officiis religioni suae voluit astringere saith Tertullian God put this command Tertullâ—…d v. Marcion l. 2. as it were a bridle into their mouths who were too prone to run out beyond their limits and that they might not offer unto Idols he confines and tyes them up to do it to him alone And so they were good but ex comparatione but by being compared with something that was worse If they will sacrifice it is better they sacrifice to God then to Devils better do this then worse better do that which had it not been commanded had been neither good nor evil then that which is absolutely evil better do that which God can beare with then that which he hates better they should be under the restraint and managing of an Indulgent hand then that they should run into those abominations which a Father cannot pardon and which will make a loving and tender God a consuming fire Thus they are Good being compared with something that is worse and being put into the scales together are valuable because they outweigh them Et quale est Bonum quod mali comparatio commendat saith Tertullian what good is that which were not so if the evil which it shuts out and with which it is compared did not commend it 3. That which is good in it self and its own nature is alwaies so piety and true Religion is older then the world for it is a part and beame of that wisdome which was with God from Everlasting and it shines forth from one end of the world to the other hath the same splendor and brightnesse when the fashion of the world changeth every day and binds alike all the men in the world and ends not but with it and in its effects continues when that shall be dissolved even to all eternity as it was breathed from God and flows from his eternall law so it is alwaies the same and remaines the same till it end in glory For this there is no consummatum est there is no end The vaile of the temple is rent in twaine the temple it self is buried in ruine and not a stone left upon a stone every Altar is throwne down the sacrifices and Ceremonies abolisht but quicquid condidit virtus coelum est That which is truely good is as lasting as the heavens heaven and earth may passe away but not one tittle of this good shall fall to the ground 4. These Ceremonies were confined to time and place you observe dayes and moneths saith the Apostle Gal. 4. yea and you obseve places too you say That Jerusalem is the place saith the woman of Samaria to our Saviour John 4. but that which is truely good and in it self is of that nature that time and place have no power or influence on it either to shrink it up and contract it or to bound or circumscribe it or to put a period to it and cut it off It is never out of season never out of its place Every day is the good mans holiday and his sacrifice may be offered up at any time It stayes not for the new moone or Sabbath day but is res omnium horarum may shew and display it self at any day in every houre of that day and every minute of that houre Ever yay every houre every minute is the good mans Sabbath and rest And as it is not tied to time no more is it to place All the ends of the world shall remember the Lord saith the Psalmist and this good in the Text may be set up in any part of it The Church is the place and the Market is the place and the Prison may be the place piet as in plate is sibi secretum facit Religion may build it self an oratory a chappel in the midst of the streets nay in a stews in Sodom it self for there Lot was and 't is the greatest commendation to be good amongst the worst Last of all This Ceremonious part of Religion was many times omitted many times dispensed with but this good which is here shewn admits no dispensation Circumcision was dispensed with sacrifice was dispensed with the Sabbath was dispencsed with but the true service of God was ever in force who ever was dispensed with in a morall and positive law who ever had this indulgence granted him to defraud or oppresse his brother to be cruell and unmercifull to him or to walk contrary to his God who ever was unjust on earth by a grant and prerogative from heaven Aliud
mixture of a Sacrificer and an Oppressor of a Christian and a Deceiver of a Faster and a Blood-thirsty man And as he was most enraged and impatient a◠Tertullian tells us to see the works of God brought into subjection under man who was made according to his image so is it his pride and glory to see man and Religion it self brought under these transitory things even made fervants and slaves unto them O! to this hater of God and man it is a kind of heaven in hell it self and in the midst of all his torment to see this man whom God created and redeemed to do him the greatest service in Christs livery to see him promote his Interest in the name of Christ and Religion to see him under his power and dominion most when he waits most diligently and officiously at the Altar of God The Pharisee was his beloved disciple when he was on his knees with a dissigured face These Jews here were his disciples who did run to the Altar but not from their evil waies who offered up the blood of beasts to God and of the innocent to him he that fasts and oppresses is his disciple for he gives God his body and the Devil his soule He that prayes much and cozens more is his disciples for he doth but flatter God and serves the enemy speaks to a God of truth with his lips but hearkens to the Father of lyes and deceit I may say the divel is the great Alchymist of the world to transelement the worst things to make them more passible to add a kind of esteeme and glory to them We do not meet with Counterfeit Iron or Copper but gold and precious stones these we sophisticate and when we cannot dig them out of the mine or take them from the rock we strive to work them by art out of Iron or Copper or glasse and call them gold and diamonds Thus doth the Devil raise and sublime the greatest impiety and gild it over with a sacrifice with a fast with devotion that it may appeare in glory and deceive if it were possible the very elect we see too many deceived with it who having no Religion themselves are yet ready to bowe down to its Image wheresoever they see it and so fix their eye and devotion upon it that they see not the theef the oppressor the Atheist who carries it along with him to destroy that of which it is the Image but take it for that which it represents as little children and fooles take pictures and puppets for men Is he unclean who sees that when he is at the Altar doth he defraud his brother who would say so that should see him on his knees hath he false weights and ballances It is impossible for you may see him every day in the temple are his feet swift to shed blood It cannot be for he fasteth often behold how he hangs down his head like a bulrush The veine of gold is deep in the earth and we cannot reach it but with sweat and industry true piety and that which is good is a more rare and precious thing then gold and the veines of it ly deep its originall is from heaven in Christ at a huge distance from our carnall desires and lusts and so requires great anxiety strong contention and mighty strivings to reconcile it to our wills This pearle is as it were in a far country and we must sell all to purchase it the whole man must lose and deny it self to search and find it out we must lay down all that we have our understandings our wills and affections at his feet that sells it And therefore that we may not trouble nor excruciate our selves too much that we may not ascend into heaven or go down into hell for it that we may not undergoe so much labour and endure so much torment in attaining it e take a shorter way and work and fashion something like unto it which is most contrary to it and transelement impiety it self and shadow it over with devotion and publish it to others and say within our selves this is it For what Seneca said of Philosophy is true of Religion Adeo res sacra est ut siquid illi simile sit etiam mendacium placeat It is so sacred and venerable a thing that we are pleased with its resemblance and that shall soone have its name that hath but its likenesse that shall be the true pearle which is but counterfeit and by this means all Religion is confined to the Altar and that shall consecrate that which is not good and make it appeare so That piety which came from the bosome of the Father and was conveighed to us by the wisdome of the Sonne must be shut up in outward worship in formality and Ceremony and shew and that which quite destroyes it and tramples it under our feet must go under that name and make us great on earth though it make us the least in the kingdome of heaven so that we shall have no place there but be tumbled down into the lowest pit As the Prophet Isaiah speaks in his first chapter Argentum nostrum versum est in scoriam our silver is become drosse our wine is mixt with water nay our best silver our most refined actions are drosse our wine is gall and bitternesse or as he speaks in another place c. 30. all our Righteousnesse and he means such formal counterfeit righteousnesse is as a menstruous cloth Again in the last place This formality and insincerity is most opposite to God who is a God of truth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unissimus a most single and uncompounded essence with whom there is no variablenesse nor shadow of changing saith Saint James no mixture nor composition of divers or contrary things His justice doth not thwart his mercy nor his mercy disarme his justice his providence doth not bind his power nor his power check his providence what he is he alwaies is like unto himself in all his waies Tertullian gives him these two proprieties Tert. de Bapt. c. 2. simplicitatem potestatem simplicity or uncompoundednesse and power He is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the singlenesse of all that are of a pure and single heart Dionrs de Divin Nomin and hence the strictest Christians in the first times were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Father viri singulares men that were one in themselves of a single heart who did strive and presse forward as far as mortality and their fraile condition would suffer them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the divine unity to be one in themselves as God is ever most one and unity it self For God who gave us our soul looks that we should restore it to him one and entire not contemplating heaven and wallowing in the mire not feeding on Ceremony and loathing of purity not busie at the Altar and more busie in the world The Civilians will tell us dicitur res non reddita
so resembles that God which breathed it into us For as Lactantius said God is not hungry that you need set him meat nor thirsty that you should poure out drink unto him he is not in the dark that you need light up candles And what is beauty what is the wedg of gold to the soul The one is from the earth earthy the other is from the Lord of heaven The world is the Lords and the world is the soules and all that therein is and to behold the creature and in the world as in a book to study and find out the Creator to contemplate his majesty his goodnesse his wisdome and to discover that happinesse which is prepared for it to behold the heavens the works of Gods hand and purchase a place there to converse with Seraphim and Cherubim This is the proper act of the soul for which it was made this this alone was proportioned to it And herein consists the excellency and very essence of Religion and the Good which is here shewed us in exalting the soul in drawing it back from mixing with the creature and in bringing it into subjection under God the first and onely good in uniting it to its proper object in making that which was the breath of God breath nothing but God the soul being as the matter and this Good here that is piety and religion the form the soul being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for so Plato calls matter the receptacle of this Good as the matter is of the form and never right and of a persect being till it receive it this good being as the seed and the soul the ground Math. 13. the matrix and the womb and there is a kind of sympathy between this good this immortall seed and the heart and mind of man as there is between seed and the womb of the earth for the soul no sooner sees it unclouded unvailed not disguised and made terrible by the intervention of things not truely good but upon a full manifestation she is taken as the bridegroome in the Canticles with its eye and beauty Heaven is a faire sight even in their eyes who tend to destruction so that there is a kind of neernesse and alliance between this good and those notions and principles which God imprinted in us at the first And therefore even nature it self had a glimpse a weak imperfect sight of this good and saw a further mark to aime at then this world in this span of time could set up Tertull. 2. de Finib whence Tully calls man a mortall God and Seneca tells us That by that which is best in man we go before other creatures Sen. ep 76. In homine quid optimumâ—ratio hac antecedit animalia deos sequitur but follow to joyne with that which is truely good by which we may be carried along to the fountain of good even God himself For again as this good here that is piety and religion beare a sympathy and correspondence with the mind of man so hath the soul of man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a formative quality a power to shape and fashion it and by the sweet influence and kindly aspect of Gods quickening grace to bring forth something of the same nature some heavenly creature the new man which is made up in holinesse and righteousnesse in Justice and mercy and humility which are the good in the text the beauty of which may beget and raise up that violence in us which may break open the gates of heaven beget a congregation of Saints of just and honest men a numerous posterity to Abraham of hospitall and mercifull men and an army of martyrs which shall in all humility lay down their lives for his sake that gave them and forsake all to joyne and adhere to this Good And now in the second place as it is fitted and proportioned to the soul of man so is it to every soul of man to all sorts and conditions of men it is fitted to the Jew and to the Gentile to the bond and to the free to the rich and to the poore to the scribe and to the Idiot to the young and to the aged no man so much a Jew no man such a bored slave no man such a Lazar none so dull and slow of understanding no such Barzillai which may not receive it Freedom and slavery circumcision and uncircumcision riches and poverty quicknesse and slownesse of understanding in respect of this Good of Piety and Religion are all alike Religion is no peculiar but the most common the most communicative thing that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The Law the Prophets Naz. Orat. 26. the Oracles Grace Faith Hope and Charity these saith Nazianzen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Ib. are common to all as common as the Sunne are the goods and possessions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not of the mightiest or the wisest but of those who are willing to receive them Nor were there any thing more unjust then our Faith and Religion saith he if it were entail'd onely on some few if God whose Property whose Nature it is to doe Good should dispense that Good most sparingly which doth most please him if he should shut it up as he doth Gold and other Metals in the bowels of the earth and seale a patent but to some few to find and dig it out if it should be left as the things of this world are in the uncertain and inequal hand of Chance or looking alike on all should withdraw and hide it self from the most or be unatchievable not to be attained to by some when it is bound up as it were in the bosome of others No the most excellent things are most common and offered and presented to all nothing is so common as this good and when other things fly from us and as we follow after them remove themselves farther off and mock our endeavours this is alwaies neere us shines upon us invites and solicits us to take it for our guide which will lead us in a certain and unerring course through the false shews and deceitfulnesse of this world through blacknesse and darknesse to the end for which we were made This Good is every mans good that will as Aquinas is said to have replyed to his sister when she askt him how she might be saved si velis if you are willing you may every covetous person is not rich every ambitious man hath not the highest place every student is not a great clerk but piety opens the gate to every man that knocks and he that will enters in and takes possession of her Fastidiosior est scientia quà m virtus paucorum est ut literati sint omnium ut bonì That which is best is most accessable and when other things Petrarch l. 7. Re. Fam. op 17. knowledge and wealth and honor are coy and keep a distance and when we have them are desultorious and ready in the midst of
that which is not good in it self good and profitable and advantageous to us view it well and consider it and you cannot but say it is wroth the shewing wroth the sight and worth the purchase though we lay down all that we are worth And now to proceed that you may fall in love with it and embrace it It is first laid open and naked and manifested unto you Iadicavit tibi He hath shewed the. 2ly publisht by open proclamation as a law which hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a forcing and necessitating power that if the cords of love will not draw you the bonds and force of a law may confine you to it 1. he shews it he hath shewed thee O man what is good 2ly he requires it he wills he commands it for what doth God require but this He hath shewed thee O man what is good and what doth the Lord require And first That which is truely good is open and manifest unto all God exposes and layes open puts it to sale and bids us come and buy It is a treasure and he hath unlockt it it is a pearle Math. 13. and he hath opened the casket It is his light and he hides it not under a bushel It is a rule by which we are to walk and being it concernes our conduct in our way it is easie and obvious and open to the weakest understanding sua fronte proponitur saith Tertullian it is presented to us without any mask or vaile For indeed it is the property of a rule to be so perspicuous otherwise it is not a rule but an Oracle or rather a snare to catch us for how shall we be able to embrace it if we cannot see it how shall we be able to do our duty if we know not what it is if the trumpet give an uncertain sound who shall prepare himself to battle saith Saint Paul If this good be clouded with darknesse and perplexities who shall gird up his loynes to make his approches and addresses to it 't is true indeed to draw neere to lay hold and joyne with it having no better retinue commonly then contempt and reproch then misery and affliction then persecution and death being compassed about with these terrors is a matter of difficulty in regard of our weaknesse and frailty which loves not to look upon beauty in such a dresse and that domestick war which is within us and that fight and contention which is between the flesh and the spirit and in this respect it is a narrow way and we must use a kind of violence upon our selves to work through it to our end but yet it is shewed and manifested and the knowledge of the way is not shut up and barricadoed but to those who are not willing to find it but run a contrary way by some false light which they had rather look upon and follow then that which leads them upon the pricks upon labour and sorrow and difficulty Whatsoever concernes a man is easie to be seen for it is as open as the day in other passages and dispensations of himself in other effects of his power and wisdome God is a God afar off but in this which concernes us he is neere at hand he is with us about us and within us In other things which will no whit advantage us to see he makes darknesse his pavilion round about him but in this he displayes his beams His way is in the whirlwind Nahum 1.3 and his footsteps are not known Ps 77.19 why he lifts up one on high and layes another in the dust why he now shines upon my tabernacle and anon beats upon it with his tempest why he placeth a man of Belial in the throne and sets the poore innocent man to grind at the mill why he passeth by a brothel-house and with his thunder beats down his own temple why he keepeth not a constant course in his works but to day passeth by us in a still voice and to morrow in an earthquake as it is far removed out of our ken and sight so to know it would not promote or forward us in our motion to happinesse we are the wiser that we do not know them for there is no greater folly in the world then for a mortall finite creature to discover such a mad ambition as to desire to know as much and be as wise as his creator This was my infirmity saith David I was even sick when I did think of it and he checketh himself for it Psal 77.11 Behold the world is my stage and here I must move by that light which he hath afforded me and not be put out of my part to a full shame by a bold and unseasonable contemplation of Gods proceedings not run out of my own wayes by gazing too boldly on his My businesse is to embrace this good and that will be my Angel to keep me in all my wayes that I dash not my foot against a stone against those perplext and crosse events which are those stones which we so hardly digest I cannot know why he lifteth up one and pulleth down another but if I cleave to this This will lift up my head even when I am down It is not fit I should know why the wicked prosper but by this light I see a serpent in their Paradise which will deceive and sting them to death why they prosper I cannot find out but he that seemes to hide himself comes so neere me as to tell me Their prosperity shall slay them Prov. 1.32 That their greatest happinesse is their greatest curse and if there be an hell on earth it is better then their heaven It is not convenient for me to know things to come quem mihi quem tibi sinem Dii dederint what will be my end and what will be theirs to know the number of their dayes how long they shall rage and I suffer these are like the secrets of great Princes and they may undoe us and therefore they are lockt up from us in the prescience and bosome of God and he keeps the key himself and will not shew them But cast thy burden upin him do thy duty exercise â—hy self in that which he hath shewen and then thon mayest lye down and rest upon this that their damnation sleepeth not that their rage shall not hurt thee and that thy patience shall crown thee In a word If it be evil and thou forseest it it may cast thee down too low and if it be good it may lift thee up too high and thy exaltation may be more dangerous then thy fall but Eschew Evil and follow that which is good and this will be a certain Prophesie and presage of a good end be it what it will whether it come to meet thee in the midst of rayes or of a tempest These things God will not shew thee because thy eye is too weak to receive them nor in the next place will he answer thy curiosity and determine every
it to name it is not to embrace it for all these may be in a man who hath the price in his hand but hath no heart to buy it and as the Philosopher said of those who were punisht after death in their carcasses Relicto cadavere abijt reus the body was left behind but the guilty person the Parricide was departed and gone So here is a lump of flesh but the man is gone nay dead and buried covered over with outward formalities with words and fancy This is not the man in the text and then no marvell if he cannot see this great sight The 3. is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Improbity of manners a mind immerst and drowned in all the filth and pollution of the world evil affected Acts 14.2 Corrupt Arislotle Eth. 6.5 Mâ—gnis sceleribus inâ—a naturae intereunt Sen. Cont. 2 Tim. 3.8 for wickednesse is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Philosopher and doth corrupt the very principles of nature and make that Candle as Solomon calls it which God hath lighted up in our hearts burn but dimly and as we read when the earth was without forme and void darknesse was upon the face of the deep so when the perturbations of our mind interpose themselves as the earth there is straight a darknesse over the soul An Evil eye cannot behold that which is good An eye full of Adulteries cannot discover the beauty of chastity A lustfull eye cannot see justice a Lofty eye can neither look upon mercy nor humility The love of honor makes the judgment follow it to that pitch and height which it hath set and markt out The love of money will glosse that blessing which our Saviour hath annext to poverty of spirit My factious humor will strike at the very life and heart of religion in the name of religion and God himself and destroy Christianity for the love of Christ Resist not the power In one age 't is glossed bound in with limitations and exceptions or rather let loose to run along with men of turbulent spirits against it self in another when the wind is turned 't is a plain text and needs no interpreter Bid the angry gallant bowe to his enemy he will count you a fool Bid the covetous sell all that he hath he will think you none of the wisest and pitty or scorn you Bid the wanton forsake that strumpet which he calls his mistresse and he will send you a challenge and for attempting to help him out of that deep ditch Prov. 23.27 will send you to your grave We may talk what we please of Marcion and Manes of hereticks and the devil as interpolators and corrupters of Scripture but it is the wickednesse of mens hearts that have cut and mangled it and made it what we please made it joyn and comply with that which it forbids and severely threatens Now to conclude this in the midst of so many passions and perturbations in the throng of so many vices and ill humors in this Chaos and confusion where is the man There is a body left behind inutile pondus an unweildly and unprofitable outside of a man the garment the picture or rather the shadow of a man and we may say of him as Jacob did when he saw Josephs coat It is my sonnes cout but evil beasts have devoured him Gen. 37.33 Here is the shape the garment the outside of a man but the man without doubt is rent in pieces distracted and torn asunder by the perturbations of his mind corrupted annihilated unmanned by his vices and there is nothing left but his coat his body his carcasse and the name of a man This is not the man and then no marvell if he do not see this great sight In his day whilest he was a man his reason not clouded his understanding not darkned in this his day it was shewed to him and it was faire and radiant but now all is night about him and 't is hid from his eye for if it be hid it is hid to them that perish to them that will perish 2 Cor. 4.3 He hath shewed thee O man The Good invites the man and the man cannot but look upon that which is Good Draw then thy soul out of prison take the man out of his grave draw him out of these clouds of sloth of passion of Prejudice and this good here Piety and Religion will be as the sunne when it shineth in its strength For conclusion then let us cleave fast to this good and uphold it in its native and proper purity against all externall rites Conclusion and empty formalities and in the next place against all the pomp of the world against that which we call good when it makes us evil I am almost ashamed to name this or make the comparison For what is wealth to righteousnesse what is policy to religion what is earth to heaven but I know not how men have been so vain as to attempt to draw them together and to shut up the world in this good or rather this good in the world to call down God from heaven not onely to partake of our flesh but our infirmities and sinnes and draw down that which is truely good and make it an assistant and auxiliary to that which is truely evil For how do mens countenance nay how doth their religion alter as they see or heare how the world doth go Now they are of this faction and then of that and anon of a third Now Protestants anon Brownists anon Papists anon but I cannot number the many religions and the no-religions but wheresoever they fasten they see it and say it is Good so that as it was observed of the Romans that before the corruption and decay of manners they would not entertain a servant or officer but of a perfect and goodly shape but afterwards when luxury and riot had prevailed and was in credit with them they diligently sought out and counted it a kind of elegancy and state to take into their retinue dwarfs and monsters and men of a prodigious appearance ludibria naturae those errors and mockeries of nature So hath it allso fallen out with Religion at the first â—ise and dawning of it men did lay hold on that faith alone which was once delivered to the saints and went about doing good but when this light had passed more degrees men began to play the wantons in it and to seek out divers inventions and this Good the doctrine of faith was made to give way to those sick and loathsome humors which did pollute and defile it and instead of following that which was shewed they set up something of their own to follow and countenance them in whatsoever they should undertake and then did look upon it alone and please and delight themselves in it although it was as different from the true pattern which was first shewed as a monster is from a man of perfect shape as Quintilian speaks of some professors of his art
live and dye with them and yet do onely take her mantle and vizor and in it walk on the whole course of their life here beating their fellow servants here defaming one and defrauding another and defaming him that they may defraud him they sharply inveigh against and lash the iniquities of the time they are severe Justiciaries and chastise all but themselves Ausonii Cupido Crucisixus as the wanton women in Ausonius did crucify Cupid on the wall sibi ignoscunt plectunt Deum they know well enough how to pardon themselves for fraud for lying for false weights and measures for covetousnesse and malice and the whole body of their Religion is made up in this to fling disgrace upon the name of dishonesty and so punish it but in a picture For conclusion then to avoid these rocks at which so many have been cast away and lost Let us first look up upon this light of nature and walk honestly as in the day and not after those blind guides the love of our selves and the glory of the world which will lead us on pleasantly for a while and at last slip from us and leave us in the dark there to lament and curse the folly of our waies For Riches and Honour and Pleasure are not naturall unto us but adventitious and accidentall and that which is naturall should be prevalent against all that is accidentall Accidentali praevalâ—t naturale c. 3. ff de Tutelis say the Civilians This Relation by Nature should be strong against all forraign Circumstances whatsoever And therefore it is but a busie folly a studious kind of iniquity to come and frame distinctions which may wipe out this relation and so leave us at loose with line enough to run out unto a liberty and priviledge of encroching on others by fraud or violence As the Persians in Xenophon taught their children that they might lye or not lye with a distinction lye loudly to their enemies so they remember to speak truth to their friends deceive a stranger and not an acquaintance and I feare we have too many such Persisians in this our Island and if they do not utter and dictate it yet their hearts speak it and their hands speake it and their practice proclaimes it to the whole world He is a stranger he is an enemy of another Religion of another Faction I may make what advantage I can upon him undermine and blow him up and thus the man the image of God the brother is quite lost And what is the issue of this Diabolicall coynage even the same which Xenophon there observed to be of the Persian education Their children saith he soone forgot the distinction and grew up at last to be so bold as to lye to their best friends And so it is with them who find it an easier thing to call themselves Religious then to make themselves honest who first begin with these proviso's and distinctions to practice injustice and with so much gravity and demurenesse to deceive their brethren and to be dishonest by a rule at last they fall down to an universall and promiscuous iniquity Friends brother they of the same family they of the same Sect and faction all are the same with them when they look for advantage no respect of persons when they look for Balaams wages every man then is a stranger an enemy or as strangely used as if he were and this is to put out the light of nature and so to go a whoring after our own inventions which once kindled by the love of this world are those false lights which lead us into that darknesse which Saint John speaks of He that thus handleth his brother 1 Iohn 2.19 walketh in darknesse and knoweth not whither he goeth because darknesse hath blinded his eyes that he cannot see a man in a man nor a brother in a brother a man in the same shape and built up of the same materialls a man of the same passions with himself And therefore by this light of Nature let us check and condemn our selves when any gall of bitternesse riseth in our hearts and allay or rather root it out with this consideration That it is most inhumane and unnaturall that we cannot nourish it in our breast and not fall from the honour of our Creation and leave off to be men How art thou fallen from heaven O Lucifer and cut down to the ground Es 14.12 and how art thou fallen O man whosoever thou art that doest unjustly that takest from another that which is his either by violence or deceit How art thou fallen from heaven for on earth there is no other heaven but that which Justice and Charity make How art thou fallen to hell it self nay to be an hell a place for these foul spirits malice and fraud to reign and riot in and to torment others and thy self How art thou fallen from conversing with Angels to wallow in blood from the glory of thy Creation to burning fire and blacknesse and darknesse and tempest O what a shame is it That a man thus created thus Elemented and composed should delight in fraud in violence and oppression should feed on that bread not which his father who made him did put into his hands but which craft did purloine or violence snatch from the hands of others who were not so wise or so strong as himself That this creature of love made by love and made to be Sociable should be as hot as a fiery furnace sending forth nothing but sulphur and stench That this honourable Creature should be a beast nay a devil to ensnare to accuse to deceive and destroy his brethren This is a sad aggravation but if the light of Nature be too dimme and cannot lead us out of the world and those winding and crooked paths which the love of it makes in it every day let us in the last place look up upon that clearer light that light which did spring from on high and hath visited us why should not our friends be more powerfull with us then our enemies why should not Grace be stronger then a temptation why should not the rich and glorious promises of the Gospel be more eloquent and perswasive then the solicitations of the flesh which is every moment drawing neerer to the dust or of the world which changeth every day and shall at last be burnt with fire why should they not have the power to purge and clense us from all unrighteousnesse why should we chuse rather to be raised and enrich'd here for a span of time by craft and power then to be crowned by Justice and Integrity for ever For this is the end for which this great light hath shined to lighten every man that is in the world that they may walk in the paths of righteousnesse It is a light that leads unto blisse but it will not go before an oppressor a theef an Impostor a Tyrant to lead them to it because they delight
wealth that we may be rich takes us out the raies that we may have light takes us from our selves that we may possesse our selves bids us depart from God that we may enjoy him This is Janitrix scholae Christi faith Bernard for when we bow and lye prostrate we are let in This is as Saint John Baptist to prepare the way to make every mountain low and the rough places plaine to depresse a lofty head and sink a haughty eye and beat down a swelling heart In a word this is the best Leveller in the world and there need none but this Wee see then in what humility consists in placing us where we should be at the footstool of God admiring his majesty and abhorring themselves distrusting our selves and relying on his wisdome bowing to him when he helps us and bowing to him when he strikes us denying ourselves surrendring our selves being nothing in our selves and all things in him Which will more plainly appeare in the extent of this duty which reacheth the whole man both body and soul It was the speech of Saint Austin Domine duo creasti alterum propete alterum prope nihil Lord thou hast made two things in the world one neere unto thy self divine and celestiall the soul the other vile and sordid next to nothing the body These are the parts which constitute and make us men the subject of sinne and therefore of humility Let not sinne reign in your mortall bodies Rom. 6.12 but let humility depose and pluck it from its throne Ind delinquit homo unde constat saith Tertullian from thence sinne is from whence we are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Nazianzen with our selves we fight against our selves we carry about with us those forces which beset us we are that Army which is in battell aray against us videas concurrere Bellum Atque virum Our enemies are domestick at home within us and a tumult must be laid where first 't was raised Between them both saith the same Father Naz. orat 8. there is a kind of warlike opposition and they doe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it were pitch their Tents one against the other when the body prevailes the soul is lost and when the body is at the lowest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then is the soul is high as heaven and when the soul is sick even bedrid with sinne then the body is most active as a wild Asse or wanton Heifer In both there is matter for humility to work on 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hesyc In both there are excrescences and extuberations to be lopt off and abated the body must he used as an enemy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Saint Paul I buffet it I beat it black and blew I handle it as a Rebell or profest enemy and it must be used as a servant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I hold it in subjection like a captive like a slave after conquest And the soul to be checked contracted and depressed in it self ne in multa diffluat that it spread not nor diffuse it self on variety of objects It must not be dimidiata humilitas an humility by halves but Holocaustum a whole burnt-offering both body and soul wasting and consuming all their drosse in this Holy Conflagration I know not how good duties are either shrunk up in the conveyance not drove home by the Masters of the Assembly or else taken into pieces in the performance Doth God proclaime a Fast See the head hangs down the look is changed you may read a Famine in the countenance and yet the Fast not kept Walk humbly with him So we will he shall have our knee our look he shall see us prostrate on the ground say some who are as proud on the ground as when they stood up He shall have the heart no knee of ours say others as proud as they If we can conceive an Humiliation and draw forth its picture but in our fancy nay if we can but say It is good to be humbled it is enough though it be a lye and we speak not what we think We are most humble when we least expresse it so full of contradictions is Hypocrisie and what a huge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and gulph is there between Hypocrisie and Humility so reaching at Impossibilities which may draw Pride and Humility together to be one and the same which yet are at greater distance one from the other then the Earth is from the Heaven And thus we divide Humility nay thus we divide our selves from our selves our soules from our bodies either our Humility is so spirituall that we cannot see it neither dropping at the eyes nor changing the countenance nor bowing the knees nor heare it in complaints and grones and roarings which were wont to be the language of humility or so corporeall that we see it all God hath his part and but a part and so hath none and then the conjecture is easie who hath it all But our selves include both neither is my Body my self nor my Soul my self but I am one made up of both the knot that tyes them both together and my Humility lasts no longer then whilst I am one of both Whilst then we are so let us give him both and first the Soule For there is no vice so dangerous or to which we are more subject then spirituall pride Other vices proceed from some defect in us or some sinfull imbecillity of nature but this many times ariseth out of our good parts Others fly from the presence of God this dares him to his face and makes even Ruine it self the Foundation of its Tabernacle Intestinum malum periculosius The more neere the evil cleaves to the soule the more dangerous it is the more inward the more fatall I may wean my self from the world and fling off vanity I may take off my soul from sensible objects I may deny my appetite I may shut up my eye I may bind my hands I may study pleasure so long till I truly understand it and know it is but madnesse and the world till I contemn it but Pride ultima exuitur is the last garment which we put off when we are naked we can keep her on and when we can be nothing we can be proud And therefore some have conceived humility to be placed in the soul as a Canopy covering and shadowing both the faculties binding and moderating the understanding and subduing the will and whilest they sit under humility they sit in state the understanding is crowned with raies and light and the will commands just things as from its Throne never imploys the eye or hand in any office for which the one should be pluckt out and the other cut off but are both in their highest exaltation being both now under the will of God Our understanding many times walks in things too high for it yet thinks she is above them and our will inclines and that too oft to things forbidden because they are so
blesse him and do our duties As I was with Moses so will I be with thee saith God to Joshuah Joshuah 5. Then God is with us when he strengthneth our hands when he shadows us under his wing when he poureth forth his graces upon us and then we walk with him when we bowe before him use all the faculties of our soules and move every member of our bodies as his and as in his sight when we devote our selves to him alone when our eye looks upon him as the eye of the handmaid on the eye of her mistress and by a strict and sincere obedience we follow him in all those waies which he hath appointed for us This I take to be the meaning of the words we shall draw all within the compasse of these considerations first That God hath an all-seeing eye That he sees all ad Nudum as the Schooles speak naked as they are surveys our Actions heares our words and searcheth the very inwards of the heart secondly That truly to believe this is the best preservative of the other two the best meanes to establish Justice and uphold Mercy in us to keep us in an even and unerring course of obedience for will any man offend his God in his very eye And in the third place we shall discover and point out those who do not thus walk with God but walk in the haughtinesse and deceitfulnesse of their hearts as if God had neither eye to see nor eare to heare nor hand to punish them that we may mark and avoid them and this shall serve for use and application What doth God require to walk humbly with thy God And first That we may walk humbly with our God this must be laid as a foundation to build upon as the primum movens as the which first sets us a walking and puts us into this carefull and humble posture That God is present every where and seeth and knoweth all things And here we must not make too curious and bold a disquisition concerning the manner how God is present every where and how he seeth all things It is enough for us to believe he doth so and not to seek to know that which he never told us and which indeed he cannot tell us because we cannot apprehend it for how can we receive that knowledge of which we are not capable we read That he filleth the earth and the heaven Jer. 23.24 That heaven is his Throne and the earth his footstoole Is 66.1 That he is higher then heaven and deeper then hell and longer then the earth and broader then the sea Job 11.7,8,9 That he is not far from every one of us That in him we live and move and have our being Acts 17.27,28 That his understanding is infinite Psal 147.5 That there is no creature which is not manifest in his sight that all things are naked to him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 open as the entrailes of a beast cut down in the back for sacrifice Heb. 4.13 That he looks down from heaven on the children of men Psal 142. That his eyes are open upon all their waies That neither they nor their Imquity are hid from his face hoc satis est dixisse Deo and this is enough for God to tell us and this is enough for us to know I dare be bold to say saith Saint Augustine Forsitan nec ipse Johannes dicit de Deo ut est Saint John was as an eagle and flew aloft to a higher pitch then the rest but could not soare so high as to bring us down a full relation and tell us what God is This is a message which no man can bring nor no man can heare He was a man inspired from God himself if he had not been inspired he could have said but little and being a man he could say no more They that walk in valleys and in low places see not much more ground then they tread they that are in deep wells see onely that part of the world which is over their heads but he that is on the top of some exceeding high mountain sees all the levell even the whole country which is about him So it stands betwixt us mortalls and our incomprehensible God we that live in this world are confined as it were into a valley or pit we see no more then the bounds which are set us will give us leave and that which our scant and narrow wisdome and providence foresees when the eye thereof is cleerest is ful of uncertainty as depending upon causes which may not work or if they do by the intervening of some crosse accident may faile But God who is that supreme and sublime light and by reason of his wonderfull nature so high exalted as from some exceeding high mountain sees all men at once all Actions all Casualties present and to come and with one cast of his eye measures them all This we are told and 't is enough for us that God hath told us so much that he is in heaven and yet not confined to that place that he is every where though we do not know how that he sees all things knows all things that he is Just and wise and Omnipotent and here we may walk with safety for the ground is firm under us upon this we may build up our selves in our Holy Faith upon this we may build up our Love which alwaies eyes him our honour to him which ever bowes before him our patience which beares every burden as if we saw him laying it on our feare to which every place is as mount Sinai where it trembles before him our hope which layes hold on him as if he were present in all the hardship we undergoe our obedience which alwaies works as in his eye to venture further is to venture as Peter did upon the Sea where we are sure to sink nor will Christ reach out his hand to help us but we shall be swallowed up in that depth which hath no bottome and be lost in that which is past finding out for this is the just punishment of our bold and too forward curiosity It works on busily and presseth forward with great earnestnesse to see it self defeated loseth that which it might grasp and findeth nothing It is enough for us to see the back parts of God that is as much as he is pleased to shew us and the want of this moderation hath occasioned many grosse errours in the Church of Christ for what can curiosity bring forth but monsters The Anomaei thought God as comprehensible as themselves and indeed upon a slender stock of knowledge we grow wanton and talk of God as we do of one another and no marvel that they who know not themselves should be so ignorant of God as to think to comprehend him Against these Saint Chrysostom wrote The Manichees confined him to a place and these Saint Austin confutes Others took upon them to qualifie and reforme this speech God is in every place
by changing the preposition In into Cum God is with every place Others conclude that the essence of God is most properly in heaven others have shut him up there and excluded his presence from this lower world The heaven they will tell you is his Throne but then is not the earth also his footstoole why may he not then be in earth as well as in heaven For the Argument is the very same nor must we conceive of God as we do of great Potentates whom we do not entertain in a Cottage but in a Palace nor can his Majesty gather soyl by intermingling it self with the things of the earth a most carnall conceit for the very Poet will tell us Tangere tangi nisi corpus nulla potest res That nothing but a body can be touch'd much lesse defiled We cannot think the Angel impaired his beauty by being in prison with Peter or in the den with Daniel unlesse we will say he was scorch't in the furnace when the three men did not so much as smell of the fire The heavens themselves are unclean in his sight saith Job c. 15. yet he remains saith the Father pure 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in a most wonderfull exuberance beyond all Hyperbole No pitch can defile him no sinne pollute him No deformity on earth can sully his beauty Our cursed oathes do even blast his name yet his name is the same the Holy of Holyes his eyes beheld us weltring in our blood yet they are ten thousand times brighter then the sunne and therefore he is truly called Actus primus an act or essence as free from contagion as composition We take perfection from him he receives no imperfection from us he sits in heaven yet his Majesty is not increased he walks on the earth yet his Majesty is not diminished he rides on the wings of the wind yet his Majesty and glory is still the same He is in darknesse makes darknesse a Pavillion round about him yet is light it self he is in our corrupt hearts yet is purity it self Nusquam est ubique est he is no where because no place can contain him he is every where because no body no place no substance whatsoever can exclude him And as he is present with us and about our paths so he sees and knows every motion and action of ours Our inclinations our thoughts when they are risen whilest they were arising before there was either object or opportunity to raise them or any temptation to draw them up He sees our habits our vices and virtues before we ventured on that action which did lead the way and begin them I know him saith God of Abraham Gen. 18.19 and that he will do Justice and Judgement He knows our dispositions And found some good thing in Jeroboams child 1 Kings 14.13 He sees all our actions long before they are done our thoughts before they are conceived our deliberations before we ask counsel and our counsels before they are fixt Of what large extent were many of the prophesies how many yeares how many crosse actions how many contingencies what numberlesse swarms of thoughts inconsistent and not understood and yet concurrent and introductory to that which was foretold came between the prophesie and the fullfilling of it yet God saw through all these and saw all these and how they were working to that end of which he was pleased to give the prophets a sight The prophet Daniel foretells the succession of the Monarchies the division of Alexanders kingdomes the ruine of the Jews and that so plainly that Prophyry a great enemy to the Christians to disgrace and put it off said That it was a discourse much like Lycophrons Cassandra written after the things were done and so publisht to caiol and deceive the people who are soon pleased so soon taken with a cheat Malè nôrunt Deum qui non putant illum posse quod non putant Tert. de Resurr Carn c. 38. saith Tertullian They have but little knowledge of God who do not think that he can do yea and doth know and see what they cannot think For he that made the eye shall not he see He that teacheth man knowledge shall not he know Psal 94.9,10 He that fashioneth the heart shall not he consider all our works Psal 33.15 He sees us when we fall down before him he sees us when we harden our faces and he sees us in our teares and he sees us in our blood and yet he remaines yesterday and to day and the same for ever For as it is an argument of his infinite perfection to understand all things so is it of his Judiciary and infinite power to see and know and observe those motions those offers those inclinations which are against his Law and by which we are said to fight against him I may know Adultery and yet be chast I may see malice and debate in the City and yet be peaceable I may heare blasphemy and yet tremble at Gods name For sinne doth not pollute as it is in the understanding but in the will not as it is known but as it is embraced and not by any physicall but a morall contagion which first infects the will alone If the bare knowledge of evil could pollute then he that makes himself an Eunuch for the kingdome of heaven may be an Adulterer and the Judge that sits to condemn the sinne may be a Parricide God then may be present every where and this is the poorest exception that can be made against it I have waved you see that more subtile and intricate disputes and there be too many for men are never weary of doing nothing that which hath been spoken is as plain as necessary and no man can take it as a thing out of his sphere and reach Let us passe to that which we proposed in the second place and for which we proposed this of the Omnipresence and Omniscience of God For the consideration of this is the best preservative of Mercy and Pillar to uphold Justice Septum Legis a fence a hedge set about the Law that no unclean beast be so bold to break in and come so neer as to touch it The Prophet David makes this use of it Psal 139.7 Quò ibo à spiritu whither shall I go from thy spirit or whither shall I fly from thy presence If I go into heaven thou art there If I make my bed in hell behold thou art there If I take the wings of the morning and fly to the uttermost parts of the Sea even there shalt thou find me out Now nothing can be more forcible to make us walk reverently and humbly with our God then a firm perswasion that God walks with us that he sees and observes us that whatever we do or think lyes open to the view and survey of that all-seeing eye For secresie is the nurse of sinne that is done often which is done without witnesse and done with more delight in
peccatoris praeter manus and hath all that makes a sinner but hands and though men see not our thoughts for this is a royall prerogative yet they are visible to his eye who is a spirit and they that look upon them as bare and naked thoughts and not as complete works finisht in the soul know not themselves nor the Nature of God and therefore canot be said to walk with him To conclude then These walk not with God and let us mark and avoid them The presumptuous daring sinner walks not with him but hides himself in this Atheisticall conceit that because man cannot punish God doth not see The hypocrite comes forth in a disguise and acts his part and because men applaud him thinks God is of their mind as the Pantomime in Seneca who observing the people well pleased with his dancing did every day go up into the Capitol and dance before Jupiter and was perswaded that he was also delighted in him The Apologizer runnes into the holes and burrowes of excuses and there he is safe for who shall see him The speculative sinner hides himself and all his thoughts in a thought is this thought that thoughts are so neer to nothing that they are invisible that sin is not sinfull till it speak with the tongue or act with the hand But the eye of God is brighter then the Sun and his eye-lids will try the children of men Psal 11. as the gold-smith trieth his gold in the fire and will find out the drosse which we do not see And if we will not walk with him but walk contrary unto him Levit. 26.22 He will also walk contrary unto us He will see us and not see us know us and not know us Hilar. l. 9. de Trin. Habemus nescientem Deum quod tamen non nescit saith Hilary God will seem not to know that which he doth know and his ignorance is not ignorance but a mystery For to them who walk not with him humbly the word will be at the last day I know you not and God will keep state and not know and acknowledge them This pure God will not know the unclean this God of truth will not know the dissembler this strong and mighty God will bring down the imperious offender this Light will examine thoughts and excuses will fly before it as the mist before the Sun But then The Lord knows the wayes of the Righteous saith the Psalmist and those that do justly and love mercy and walk as under his all-seeing eye with humility and reverence he will lead by the hand and go along with them and uphold and strengthen them in their walk and shadow them under his wing and when their walk is ended know them as he did Moses above all men and seeing his own marks upon them beholding in them though a weake yet the image of his Justice and his Mercy upon them he will spare them as a Father spareth his Son that serveh him he will know them and love them know them and receive them with an Euge well done good and faithfull servants you have embraced the Good which I shewed you done the thing which I required of you you have dealt Justly with your brethren and I will be Just in my promises you have shewed Mercy and Mercy shall crown you you have walked humbly with me I will now lift up your heads and you shall inherit the Kingdom which was prepared for you from the foundation of the world FINIS HONI â—…T QVI MAL Y PENSE A SERMON PREACHED AT THE FUNERALL OF THE RIGHT WORSHIPFULL Sir GEORGE VVHITMORE Knight Sometime Lord Mayor of the City of LONDON VVho departed this life Decemb. 12. 1654. At his house at Bawmes in MIDDLESEX PSAL. 119.19 I am a stranger in the earth hide not thy commandments from me THis Psalme is a Psalme of David so Saint Augustine and Hilary and others or gathered by him or out of him and it is nothing else but a Collection of Prayers and Praises a body of devout ejaculations which the Greek Fathers call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 lively sparkles breathed forth from a heart on fire and even sick with love and they fly so thick that observation can hardly take the order of them The method of devotion followes and keeps time with the motion of the heart which is as various and different as those impressions which joy or griefe feare or hope make in it which either contract and bind it up and then it struggles and labours within it self and conceives sighs and grones which cannot be expressed or breaks forth into complaints and strong supplications Take away the rebuke that I feare v. 39. Let thy tender mercies come unto me that I may live v. 77. and the like or else dilate and open it and then it leaps out of it self and breaths it self forth with exultation and triumph in songs of praise and Hallelujahs O Lord thou art my portion v. 57. O how I love thy Law v. 79. The Law of thy mouth is better unto me then thousands of gold and silver In this which I have read unto you and chosen as the fittest subject for this present occasion The heart having looked abroad having lookt out of it self and reflected back into it self drawes out in it selfe the picture of a stranger or a Pilgrime and having well lookt upon it with the serious eye of contemplation which is the heart of the heart and the soul of the soul having surveyed the place of its habitation how fraile and ruinous it is as a tent subject to the winds and beat upon by every storm and at last to be removed it goes out of it self and seeks for shelter under the shadow of Gods wing sends forth strong desires for supply and support in hoc inquilinatûs sui tempore as Tertullian speaks in this time of its sojourning and Pilgrimage and for that supply which is most answerable to the condition of a stranger upon earth and which may best conduct him to the place for which he was born and bound He asketh not for riches they have wings and will fly away and leave him in his walk or if they stay with him they will but mock and delude him and lead him out of his way not for honour that 's but a breath but aire and may breath upon him at one stage and at the next leave him but never forward him in his way not for delightfull vanities these are but ill companions and will lead him out of his way the best supply for a stranger here upon earth is from heaven from the place not where he sojournes but to which he is going the best convoy the will and commandments of God the word of God the best lantern to his feet for whilest these are in his eye and heart he shall passe by slippery places and not fall he shall passe through fire and water he shall walk upon the Lion and the Aspe he
in their dialect and language Accolae sumus peregrini we are strangers and Pilgrimes on the earth And so we passe from the person I King David and come to take a neerer view of his condition and quality I am a stranger on the earth We passe now from the King to the stranger and Pilgrime and yet we cannot passe from the one to the other for they are ever together for there is so neer a conjunction between them that though the one appeare in glory the other in dishonour the one sits on a Throne the other lyes in the dust yet they can never be put asunder nor separated the one from the other for he that is a King is but a Pilgrime and he that is a stranger was born and designed unto a Kingdome and a greater Kingdome then Davids was Thou hast made us unto our God Kings and Priests and we shall reigne upon the earth This is the song of Pilgrimes and they sing it to the Lamb in the fifth of the Revelation v. 10. The Kingdome of heaven is taken by violence and the violent take it by force Mat. 11.12 And these violent men are such as are Pilgrims and strangers to that place they travell endure many a storm many a fall and bruise in their way so that the immediate way to be a King is first to be a stranger in the earth Now that Man is naturally a stranger on the earth we have the Word of God written and the Word of God within us we have both the holy Scripture and right Reason to instruct us both these are as the voice of God and by these he speaks unto us and calls us by our name when he calls us strangers And first in the Old Testament the life of Man is every where almost term'd a pilgrimage so Jacob in the 47. of Genesis when Pharaoh asked him How long he hath lived in his answer doth as it were correct his language The dayes saith he not of my life but of my pilgrimage are an hundred and thirty years So that in the language of Jacob Life and Pilgrimage are all one The same is the language of the New Testament Whilst we are in the flesh Peregrinamur à Domino saith Saint Paul 2 Cor. 5.6 we are absent we are travellers we are wanderers from God but we are returning to him on our way pressing forward to our home And though we make haste out of the world yet as S. Bernard observes some savour some taste something that is from the earth earthy we shall carry about with us till we come to our journeys end Not onely they are strangers who with the Prodigall take their journey into a far countrey and cleave to every vanity there but they who are shaking them off every day yet look more then they should and like more then they should and are not yet made perfect Not onely they are strangers from God who are Aliens from the house of Israel but they who with the Patriarchs in the 11. to the Heb. confesse themselves strangers in the land which is allotted them and look for a City whose Foundation and Builder is God It is the observation of S. Hierome in his Epistle to Dardanus That the Saints in Scripture were no where called Inhabitatores terrae the inhabitants of the earth There is a woe saith he denounced against sinners in the eighth of the Revelation and under that name vae habitatoribus terrae woe to the Inhabitants of the earth And Saint Austin almost speaks the same where he puts this difference and distinction between them that the righteous can onely be said esse in Tabernaculo carnis to be in this tabernacle of the flesh to be there as the Angels are said by the schoolmen to be in uno loco quòd non sint in alio to be in one place because they are not in another but to be circumscribed no where and they are onely said to be on the earth because they are not yet in heaven but neverthelesse have their conversation there but the wicked do habitare in Tabernaculo carnis do dwell on earth and have their residence in it and may passe into a worse but never into a better place and these though they will not be strangers to it yet are strangers on the earth and passe away from that to which their soul was knit on which they fixed their hope and glutted their desires and raised their joy which was their heaven they passe away and fall from it and shall see it no more This then is the voice and language of Scripture and in the second place this even common reason may teach us which is the voice of God and is our God upon earth and should be in his stead and place to command and regulate us here and if we were not first lost in our selves if we were not strangers to our selves we should not seek for a place of rest in that world whose fashion every day changeth and which must at last with its work be burnt with fire For do we not see by this common light that the mind of man is a thing of infinite capacity and utterly insatiable and here on earth never receives full content content is that which all men have desired but never yet any did attain but still as one desire is satisfied another riseth and when we have all that we desired we will have more now we would have but this and when we have it it is nothing for our measures are enlarged by being filled Are you learned enough nay but there be yet more conclusions to be tried Are you ever wise enough If but once you be deceived you will complain that a thousand things which might have been observed have past your sight But are you ever rich enough The fool in the Gospel was not till his soul was fetched away nor Dives till he was in hell Nay are you not most miserably poor when you are most abundantly rich do you not want most when you have most or was ever your heart so much set on riches as when they did increase or hath the Ambitious any highest place any verticall point one world was not enough for Alexander and had there been as many as those Atomes of which Democritus made it up he would have wished after more Our appetite comes by eating and our desires are made keen and earnest by enjoying majora cupere ex his discimus the obtaining of something doth but prompt us to desire more And now to draw this to our present purpose If the things of this world be not able to satisfie us if never man yet found full content if nothing on earth can allay this infinite hunger of the soul which certainly was not imprinted in us in vain If we cannot find it here though we should double and treble Methusalems age If we cannot find it in the world though we should live to the end of it we cannot
think that the earth should be our country but that the things which we so highly esteem more then our life more then our soul are unnaturall and strangers to us and we unto them and we must turn our selves about and look towards something else which may meet and fill our desires which here find nothing to stay but every thing to enlarge them Here are delights that vanish and then shew their foulest side here are riches that makes us poor and honour that makes us slaves here are nothing but phantasmes and apparitions which will never fill us but feed the very hunger of our soules and increase it there in our country at our journeys end there is fulnesse of joy which alone can satisfie this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and infinite appetite and therefore the earth is but our stage to walk through heaven is our proper place and country and to this we are bound here we are but strangers si velimus accolae si nolimus acccolae if we will we may be strangers and if we will not but love to dwell and stay here yet we shall be strangers whether we will or no. And as we are so our abode here is that of strangers in another country as of those who are ever in their way and moving forwards never standing still but striving to go out of it and his whole motion and progresse is a leaving it behind him When Adam was Lord of all the world he was but a stranger in it for God made him naked in Paradise and withall gave him no sense of his nakednesse and the reason is given by Saint Basil that man might not be distracted and called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from meditation upon God that the care of his flesh might not steal away his mind from him that made him so that Adam was made a stranger when he was made the sole Emperour of the world But when he was fallen God clothes him with skins ut illum veluti morte quadam indueret saith Proclus in Epiphanius that he might clothe him as it were with death it self which was represented unto him in the skins of dead beasts that he might alwaies carry about with him the remembrance of it the most suitable garment that a stranger or Pilgrime can weare A stranger comes not to stay long in a place he is here as we say to day and gone to morrow so is man he flyeth as a post or rather as a shadow and continueth not Job 14. At an end as soone as a tale that is told and not so long remembred There may be many errours in his way but there is none in his end and which way soever he travels wheresoever he pitcheth his tent his journeyes end is the grave Tertull. 〈◊〉 Anima c. 50. Hoc stipulata est Dei vox hoc spopondit omne quod nascitur saith Tertullian this is the stipulation and bargain which God hath made with every soul and by being born we made a promise and obliged our selves to dye We are bound in a sure obligation and received our soules upon condition to resign them pure and unspotted of the world Would you know when we pay this debt we begin with our first breath and are paying it till we breathe out our last hoc quod loquor indè est whilest I speak and you heare we are paying part of the summe and whether this be our last payment we cannot tell I am dying whilest I am a speaking every breath I fetch to preserve life is a part taken from my life I am in a manner entombed already and every place I breathe in is a grave for in every place I moulder and consume away Suit vit Claud. Caes in every place I draw neerer and neerer to putrefaction We may say as those mariners who were to fight and dye did as they say'ld by Claudius the Emperour Morituri te salutant O Emperour dying men salute thee and so we passe by and salute one another not so much as living but as dying men and whilest I say good morrow I am neerer to my end and he to whom I wisht it is neerer to his one dying man blesseth and one dying man persecutes another that is one Pilgrime robs another In what relation soever we stand either as Kings or subjects of masters or servants of Fathers or children we are all Morituri but dying men all but strangers and pilgrims Comfort thou thy self then thou oppressed innocent 'T was a dying man that put the yoke about thy neck and why dost thou boast in mischief thou man of power In the midst of all thy triumphs and glories thou art but a dying man He that kisseth thy lips is but a dying man and he that strikes thee on the face is but a dying man The whole world is but a Colonie every age new planted with dying men with pilgrims and strangers This you will say is a common theme and argument and indeed so it is for what more common then death and yet as common as it is I know no lesson so much forgotten as this for who almost considers how he came into the world or how he shall goe out of it Ask the Wanton the Mammonist the Ambitious of their minute and they will call it Eternity Sol iste dies nos decipit c. The present the present time that deceives us and we draw that out to a lasting perpetuity which is past whilst we think on 't such a bewitching power hath the love of the world to make our minute eternity and eternity nothing and the day of our death as hard and difficult to our faith as our resurrection For though day unto day uttereth knowledge though the preacher open his mouth and the grave open hers and we every day see so many pilgrimes falling in though they who have been dead long ago and they who now dye speak unto us yet we can hardly be induced to believe that we are strangers but embrace the world and rivet our selves into it as if we should never part and we deny that which we cannot deny resolve on that which we cannot think will not be perswaded of that which we do believe or believe not that which we confesse but place immortality upon our mortal so live as if we should never dye And can we who thus every day enlarge our thoughts and hopes and let them out at length beyond our threescore yeares and ten measuring out Lordships building of Palaces anticipating pleasures and honours creating that which will never have a being and yet delighting in it as if we now had it in possession can we who love the world as that friend from which we would never part but lose all others for it can we who would have this to be the world without end and have scarce one thought left to reach at that which is so and to come can we who love and admire and pride our selves in
joyned with it which might produce such an effect and what need of any such Decree or Action to make them disobedient who refuse to hearken to their Father or to harden them whose sinne was now great before the Lord But we must conclude these two within the 34000. that were slain And now C 2.17 the delivering up the people in such a number to the sword may seem to prejudice and call in question the Justice of God what His people His own people cull'd out of the Nations of the earth must these fall by the sword of these Aliens these enemies to God that know not his Name shall not the Judge of all the earth do right yes he will for even in this Dominus est It is the Lord. For as the Lord once said to his people Es L. 1. where is the bill of your mothers divorcement whom I have put away so here he may ask were is that Bill and obligation which I made to protect you if there be any brought forth we shall finde it rather like a Bill of sale then the conveyance of an absolute Gist on the one side God promiseth something on his behalf on the other there is something required on ours Read the Covenant and contract between them they had his promise to be their God and they were the sons of promise Gal. 4. but then these promises were conditionall and in every conditionall promise there is an obligation and command I will be their God that is his promise and they shall be my people that 's their duty and if these meet not the promise is void and of none effect There is not a more true and naturall glosse upon this promise than that of Azariah in the Chronicles 2 Chron 15.2 Hear you men of Asa of all Judah and Benjamin The Lord is with you whilst you are with him and if you seek him he will be found of you but if you forsake him he will forsake you both must go together or both are lost for if they will be his people then his promise is firm being found in the eternall essence of God and so as constant and immutable as Himselfe but if they break his commandment and put it from them Then to be their God were not to be their God then to make good his promises were to vilisy and debauch them This were liberalitarem ejus mutare in servitutem Tertul. to turn his liberality into slavery prodigally to pour the Pretious oyl of his goodnesse into a vessell that could not hold it to protect and countenance a man of Belial because he bears the name of an Israelite And therefore in the 27. of Isaiah at the 11. verse where God upbraids his people of folly he presently cancells the bill and puts them out of his protection Therefore he that made them will not have mercy upon them he that sramed them will shew them no favour what though they be the people which he hath purchased yet he will take no care of his own purchase though they be his possession he will give them up he will not do what he promised and yet be Truth it self for if they do not their Duty he did not promise Though he made them though he formed them yet he will not own them but forsake and abhor his own work he will surrender them up and deliver them to Destruction Even here upon the forehead of a desolate and rejected Israelite we may set up this Inscription Dominus est It is the Lord. And now if we look up upon the Inscription Dorrinus est It is the Lord we may read and interpret it without a Guide and learn not to Trifle with God because he is our Lord not to mock him with our Hypocrisy and force in our profession to countenance our Sin to be worse then Philistines because we are Israelites to be his Enemies because we call our selves Gods people to be worse then Turks or Jews because we are Christians Oh the Happy times of the Infant Church when the Pagan could finde nothing amongst the Christians to accuse but their Name and then what Times are These when you can scarce see any thing commendable in the Christian but the Name you may call it if you please the dotage or blindnesse of the Church for the Temple of the Lord the Temple of the Lord The Israelite the Israelite The Christian the Christian the Protestant the Protestant This is the Musick with which most use to drive away the evil Spirit all sad and melancholy thoughts from their hearts but indeed saith Basil the Devil doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth daunce and leap for joy to hear it when he hears not withal the noise of our groanings of our prayers of our good works nor the Harmony of a well tuned and well composed life to go up to Heaven along with it Oh what pitty is it that God should place us in Paradice in a place of pleasure and safety and we forfeit it that he should measure out unto us as it were by the line a goodly Heritage and we pluck up our own hedges and lay our selves open to every Wild-Beast that he should make us his people and we force him to be our Enemy in a word that our Inheritance should begger us our security betray us and our royal prerogative undo us and further we carry not this consideration 2. We passe to the second particular and in the second place in so great a number as 34000 I may say in the whole Common-wealth of Israel for a Common-wealth may suffer in a far less Number we cannot doubt but some there were that fearred the Lord and shall there be as the Wise-man speaks 2 Eccle. 14. Horat. Gen. 18.23 the same event to the righteous and the wicked to the clean and him that sacrificeth not will God Incesto addere integrum will he destroy saith Abraham the righteous with the sinner This indeed is the depth of God and a great part of the world have been troubled at the very sight of it but yet if we behold it with that light which Scripture holds forth we shall finde it is not so unfordable but we shall make some passage through it For I if we could not make answer or render any reason yet this ought not to prejudice or call in question the justice of it especially with us men who are of Dull and slow understandings and when we have wearied our selves in searching out causes of natural things yet after all our sweat and oyle cannot attain so far as to know why the grasse which is under our feet is green rather then purple or of any other colour and therefore far below those Supernaturals and most unfit to search out those causes which God may seem to have lockt up in his own Brest God is the lord of all the earth Psal 90.4 and as the Prophet tells us a thousand years in his sight
are but as one day so in the case we now speak of a thousand a million a world of men are with him but as one man and when the Lord Chief Justice of Heaven and Earth shall sit to do judgement upon sinners what Caligula once wantonly wished to the people of Rome all the world before him have but as it were one neck and if it please him by that jus pleni Dominii by that full power and Dominion he hath over his creature A Platone dicitur Deus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vide Plutarch quaest convival l. 8. q. 2. He may as he welneer did in the Deluge strike it off at a blow His judgements are past finding out and therefore not to be questioned He is the great Geometrician of the World which made all things in number weight and measure and hath infinitely surpast all human inventions whatsoever and therefore we cannot do him less honour then Hiero King of Sicily did to Archimede the great Mathematician for when he saw the Engins which he made and the marvellous effects which they did produce he caused it to be proclaimed that whatsoever Archimede did after affirme how improbable soever it might seem yet should not once be called into question but be received and entertained as a truth Let the course of things be carried on as it will let death passe over the door of the Egyptian and smite the Israelite let Gods Thunder misse the house of Dagon and shiver his own Tabernacle yet God is just and true and every man a liar that dares but ask the question why doth He this Look over the whole Book of Job and you shall see how Job and his Friends are tost up and down on this great deep For it being put to the question why Job was thus fearfully handled his Friends ground themselves upon this conclusion that all affliction is for sin and so lay folly and hypocrisie to his charge and tell him roundly that the judgement of God had now found him out though he had been a close irrigular and with some art and cunning hid himself from the eye of the World but Job on the contrary as stoutly pleads and defends his innocencie his justice his liberality and could not attain to the sight of the cause for which Gods hand was so heavy on him why should his Friends urge him any more Job 30.32 or persecute him as God they dispute in vain for in their answers he sees nothing but lies At last when the controversie could have no issue C. 21.34 Deus è machina God himself comes down from Heaven and by asking one question puts an end to the rest Job 38.2 who is this that darkneth Counsel with words without knowledge condemns Iob and his Friends of ignorance and weaknesse in that they made so bold and dangerous attempt as to seek out a cause or call his judgement into question 2. It may be we may save the labor that we need not move the question or seek any reason at all for in these common calamities which befall a people it may be God doth provide for the Righteous and deliver him though we perceive it not Some examples in Scripture make this very probable the old World is not drowned till Noah be stript and in the Ark the shower of fire falls not on Sodom till Lot be escaped Daniel and his fellows though they go away into captivity with rebellious Judah yet their captivity is sweetned with honours and good respects in the Land into which they go and which was a kinde of leading captivity captive they had favour and were intreated as friends by their enemies who had invaded and spoiled them And may not God be the same upon the like occasions How many millions of righteous persons have been thus delivered whose names notwithstanding are no where recorded some things of no great worth are very famous in the world when many things of better worth lie altogether buried in obscurity caruerunt quia vale sacro because they found none who could or would transmit them to posterity Vixere fortes ante Agamemnona no doubt but before and since millions have made the like escapes though their memory lies rak'd up and buried in oblivion But then suppose the righteous do taste of the same cup of bitternesse with the wicked yet it hath not the same taste and relish to them both for calamity is not alwayes a whip Calamitas non est poena militia est minus Foe lix nor doth God alwayes punish them whom he delivers over to the sword to lose my goods or life is one thing and to be punisht another it is against the course of Gods providence and justice that innocency should come under the lash Gen 28.23 shall not the Judge of all the earth do right yes he shall and without any breach of his justice take away that breath of life which he breathed into our Nostrils though we had not sinned after the similitude of Adams transgression for he may do what he will with his own and take away our goods or lives from us when and how he pleaseth because he is Lord over them and we have nothing which we received not from his hands God is not alwayes angry when he strikes nor is every blow we feel given by God the avenger for he may strike as a Father and therefore these evils change their complexions and very natures with the subject upon whom they are wrought they are and have the blacknesse of darknesse in the one but are as Angels and messengers of light to the other and may lead the righteous through the valley of death into the land of the living when the wicked are hewen down by the sword to be fuel for the fire What though they both be joyned together in the same punishment as a Martyr and a Thief in the same chain August de civitate Dei l. 1. c. 8. yet manet dissimilitudo passorum in similitudine passionum though the penalties may seem alike yet the difference is great betwixt the patients though the world perhaps cannot distinguish them and death it self which is a key to open the gates of Hell to the one may be no the other what the Rabbles conceive it would have been to Adam had he not fallen but osculum pacis a kisse of peace a gentle and loving dismission into a better state to conclude this then a people a chosen people a people chosen out of this choice Gods servants and friends may be smitten Josiah may fall in the battle Daniel may be lead into Captivity John Baptist may lose his head and yet we may hold up our inscription Dominus est it is the Lord. And now let us but glance upon the inscription and so passe to the third particular and the first sight of it may strike a terror into us and make us afraid of those sins which bring these general judgements upon