Philosopher in his Rhetoriques saith that men raised from the Dunghill to great fortunes and riches have commonly all the vices of rich men and more And now that we may open this malady we will search and inquire the cause of it and see what it is that lifts up the mind to this dangerous pitch what it is that swells and puffs us up and makes us grossos grossi cordis as Parisiensis most properly though barbarously speaketh that makes the heart of man grosser and greater than it self as in Italy they have long time had an art to feed up a foul 'till they make the Liver bigger than the body What is there in Christianity that naturally can have this operation We confess it is from heaven heavenly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Synesius speaks deriving its pedegree from God We read of rich glorious promises of royal prerogatives of truth and peace and mercy which came by Jesus Christ But all these are like the Physitians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to purge and cleanse us from the gross and corrupt humours rather than full diet to feed us up to that bulk that we are not able to weild and move ourselves in any order The Gospel is from heaven but we are of the earth earthy These Prerogatives are grants not rewards And Truth and Mercy are not the work of our hands but the purchase of our Saviour Quantò magìs lumen gratiae respicimus the more stedfastly we look upon the throne of grace Tantò magìs nos ipsos reprehèndimus sayth the devout Schoolman The more light we have the more we see our own wants and impotency and so become the more vile in our own eyes Let 2 Pet. 1. 5 6. us joyn Virtue with Faith and with Virtue Knowledg and with Knowledg Temperance and with Temperance Patience yet none of these not all these of their own nature can produce any such effect as to make us be in love with our selves or to raise us to that height as to overlook not only our selves but our brethren Were these virtues truly ours or being ours did they appear to us in their own native shapes they would discover unto us that the way to happiness is as the eye of a needle through which it is impossible for men of gross and overgrown conceits to enter The cause then of this disease is not in the Gospel or in the Riches of the Gospel but in our selves who are willing to be deceived and in the Devil who is totius erroris artifex as Tertullian calls him the forges of all error and deceit For as God whose very essenee is Goodness doth in mercy manifest that Goodness out of Sin it self So the Devil who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Wicked one abuseth Good unto evil and when he cannot drive us to dispair by reason of our sin he takes another course and makes us presume upon conceit of our righteousness Take Virtue in its own shape and it seems to call for fear and trembling and to bespeak us to be careful and watchful that we forfeit not so fair an estate for false riches But take it as from the Devils forge and then contrary to its own nature it helps to blind and hoodwink us that we see not the danger we are in how that not only the way but our feet are slippery It unfortunately occasions its own ruine whilst we with Nero in Tacitus spend riotously upon presumption of treasure The Schools teach us that Evil could not subsist if it were not founded in Good How true this is in general I discuss not but experience makes it plain that not only that Good which but appears so which smiles upon us in an alluring pleasure or glitters in a piece of Gold or cringeth to us in his knee that honours us but also verum plenum bonum as St. Augustine calleth it that which is fully and truly Good not only pretious Promises and high Prerogatives which of themselves cannot make us good but Piety and Patience and Holiness do swell and puff us up That Good which makes us good which names us good is that by which we are made evil And all this proceeds from our own wilful error and mistake for Pride is the daughter of Ignorance sayth Theodoret. Were we not deceived with false visions and apparitions it were impossible that either our eye should be haughty or our neck stiff The Philosopher will tell us that objects present themselves unto us like those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Mathematical bodies which have many sides and they who see one side think all are like it or the very same We see the Gospel ex uno situ but on one side or as Seneca speaks ex adverso on the wrong side We see it pictured in glory but not in vengeance It appears to us in a shape of mercy not as it carries fire before it to consume us We behold Christ as a Saviour not as a Lords We entertain Prerogatives as prerogatives and no more and never look on the other side where the obligation is drawn We comtemplate Virtues as the work of our own hands but are blind to those imperfections which they bear in their very forehead Nay our Sins present themselves before us but colour'd and painted over with the prerogatives of mercy and forgiveness We consider our selves as Branches grafted in but cannot see the Tu excidêris that we may be cut off We consider our strength not our weakness But could we totum rerum conceptum exhaurire take-in the whole conceipt of our wayes and apprehend our actions in their full being and essence without those unnatural shadows and glosses our minds would be as even as the Sea when no wind troubles it and not raise those bubbles which are lost in the making nor those raging waves which foam out nothing but our shame But being thus lightned of our burden by error every puff of wind lifts us up above our sins above the mutability of our nature above ourselves and above God himself A Prerogative which is but a breath an appearance of Virtue which is but a shadow our own conceits which are vainty set us in our altitude where the hand of Mercy cannot reach us but a hand of Vengeance hovers over us which when it strikes tumbles us headlong into an amazing pit of horror and leaves us strugling with our distracted thoughts under the terrors of the Law of Death and of Desperation Will you see then spiritual Pride in its full shape and likeness You must then conceive it blind yet of perfect sight deaf but of a quick ear deceiving and being deceived happy and most miserable quick to see the least appearance of goodness but blind to the horror of sin a continual listning to the promises and prerogatives of the Gospel but deaf to the Thunder of the Law it s own parasite happy in conceit but indeed most miserable entitling us to heaven when
to the haven where we would be And we have winds from every point the prayers of the whole Church to drive us We have already shewed you what may raise our hope and confidence when we pray even the name of Father For what will not a father give to his children But we must now present God in his Majesty to strike us with fear that so our Fear may temper our Hope that it be not too saucy and familiar and our Hope may warm and comfort our Fear that it be not too chill and cold and end in Despair I dare speak to God because he is our Father but I speak in trembling because of his Majesty because he is in heaven And these two make a glorious mixture There be many things which in themselves may be hurtful yet being tempered and mixt together are very cordial and wholesome Fear and Hope which in their excess are as deleterial as poyson being compounded and mingled may be an antidote Fear bridles my Hope that I do not presume and Hope upholds my Fear that I do not despair Fear qualifies my Hope and Hope my Fear Hope encourageth us to speak Fear composeth our language Hope runs to God as a Father Fear moderateth her pace because he is in heaven We are too ready to call him Father to frame unto our selves a facile and easie God a God that will welcome us upon any terms but we must remember also that he is in heaven a God of state and magnificence qui solet difficilem habere januam whose gates open not streight at the sound of Pater noster Deum non esse perfunctoriè salutandum as Pythagoras speaks that God will not be spoken to in the by and passage but requires that our addresses unto him be accurate with fear and reverence Hope and Fear Love and Reverence Boldness and Amazement Confusion and Confidence these are the wings on which our Devotion is carried and towres up a loft till it rest in the bosome of our Father which is in heaven And now let us lift-up our eyes to the hills from whence cometh our salvation even to the throne of God and seat of his Majesty but not to make too curious a search how God is in heaven but with reverence rather to stand at distance and put-on humility equal to our administration not to come near and touch this mount for fear we be struck through with a dart Nunquam verecundiores esse debemus quam cùm de Diis agitur saith Aristotle in Seneca Modesty never better becomes us then when we speak of God We enter Temples with a composed countenance vultum submittimus togam adducimus we cast down our looks we gather our garments together and every gesture is an argument of our reverence Where the object is so glorious our eyes must needs dazle Gods Essence and Perfection is higher then heaven what canst thou do deeper than hell what canst thou know The measure thereof is longer than the earth and broader than the Sea Job 11. 8 9. What line wilt thou use De Deo vel verum dicere periculum We dangerously mistake our selves even when we speak the truth of God That God is that he is infinite and imcomprehensible 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even our Fye will teach us and the very law of Nature manifest But how he is in heaven he is on the earth how every-where no mortal Eye can discern no Reason demonstrate If we could perchance utter it yet we could not understand it saith Nazianzene Crat. 34. if we had been ravisht with St. Paul into the Third heaven yet we could not utter it Indeed it is most true what Tertullian urgeth against Hermogenes Alium Deum facit quem aliter cognoscit He maketh another God who conceives of him otherwise then as he is But no river can rise higher than its spring and fountain nor can we raise our knowledge above that light which is afforded us God is infinite and the most certain kdowledge we have is that he iâ— infinite The light which we have is but lightning which is sudden and not permanent enough to draw us after him because we conceive something of him and enough to strike us with admiration because we conceive so little It fares with us in the pursuit of these profound mysteries as with those who labor in rich mines When we digg too deep we meet with poysonous damps and foggs instead of treasure when we labor above we find less metal but more safety Dangerous it is for a weak brain to wade too far into the doings of the Most high We are most safely eloquent concerning his secrets when we are silent How great God is What is his measure and essence and How it is in any place or every place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Basile as it is not safe to ask so it is impossible to answer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 My sheep hear my voice saith Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 THEY HEAR saith he not DISPUTE Yet how have men attempted to fly without wings and wade in those depths which are unfordable to dispute of Gods Essense his Immensity his Ubiquity of the Nature of Angels of their Motion of their Locality nay de loquutione Angelorum of their Language and how that they communicate their minds one to another When we ask them how the Body of Christ is seated in the Eucharist they will tell us that it â—s there as the Spirits and glorified Bodies are in the place which they possess Tertius è caelo cecidit Cato Have these men lately descended like a second Paul out of the third heaven and from thence made this discovery By what means could they attain to this knowledge What light have they in Scripture to direct them to the knowledge of the manner of location and site which Spirits and glorified Bodies have St Paul hath long since past his censure upon them They thrust themselves into things they have not seen and upon a false shew of knowledge abuse easie hearers and of things they know not adventure to speak they care not what The Philosopher will tell us that men who neglect their private affairs are commonly over-busie in the examining of publick proceedings They will teach Kings how to rule and Judges how to determine and are well skilled in every mans duty but their own The same befalls us in our pursuit of divine knowledge Did every man walk according to that measure of knowledge he hath we should not be so busily to find out more light to walk by Did we adde to our faith virtue and to our knowledge temperance we should not multiply questions so fast which vanish into nothing and when they make most noyse do nothing but sound quae animum non faciunt quià non habent which can give us no light and spirit because they have it not Did we enter that effectual door which lyeth open unto us our Curiosity would not
will our heavenly Father forgive us ours Et qui ad tam magnum tonitruum non expergiscitur non dormit sed mortuus est saith St. Augustine He that awakes not out of his pleasant dream of Revenge at this thunder is not asleep but dead For He will not forgive you is the same with this He will damn you with those malicious Spirits the Devil and his Angels and He will forgive you is equivalent to this He will receive you into his Kingdom to his seat of mercy and glory We may say then that Meekness is necessary as a cause to this effect as a virtue destined to this end at least causa sine qua non a cause so far as that without it there is no remission of sins For though I have faith to remove mountains and have all Knowledge yet if I have not Meekness there is no hope of heaven Or it is causa removens prohibens a cause in as much as it removes those hindrances which stand between us and the Mercy of God For how can I appear before the Father of compassion with a heart spotted and stained with the gall of bitterness How can I stand before the Mercy-seat with my hands full of blood And thus Meekness is a cause of Forgiveness and may be said to produce this effect because though it have no positive causality yet without it mercy will not be obteined Blessedness is joyned to Meekness as in a chain which hath more links and If you shall forgive your enemies my Father will forgive you doth not shew what is sufficient but what is necessarily required to the expiation of sin and the inheritance of heaven Again by Meekness we resemble him who is a God that blotteth out transgressions When we are angry we are like unto the beasts that perish yea we are as the raging waves of the Sea foming out our own shame But when we yield to our brother's infirmity and forgive him we are as Gods Thirdly This virtue is seldom I may say never alone but it supposeth Faith which is sigillum bonorum operum the seal to every good work to make it current and authentick yea and all that fair retinue of Virtues which as Handmaids wait upon Faith and make her known to the world For he whose mind is so subact as to bear another mans burthen and to lift himself up upon the ruins of himself and create virtue out of injury and contempt cannot be far from the Kingdom of heaven nor destitute of those sacrifices wherewith God is well pleased And this I say though it be not necessary yet is very probable For these to be Covetous to be Luxurious to be Wanton and to be Meek cannot lodge in the same breast For we see Prodigality as well as Covetousness is a whetstone to our Anger and makes it keen and sharp And the Wanton will as soon quarrel for his Whore as the Miser for his Purse But Meekness believeth all things hopeth all things beareth all things and doth nothing unseemly For the mind of the Meek is like the Heavens above Semper illîc serenum est there is continual serenity and a perpetual day there It is as Wax fit to receive any impression or character of goodness and retein it a fit object for Gods benefits to work upon ready to melt at the light of his countenance and to yield at the lifting up of his hammer And therefore In the last place this Meekness and Readiness to forgive maketh us more capable of the Gospel of Christ and those other Precepts which it doth contain and so fits and prepareth and qualifieth us for this Blessedness for this great benefit of Remission of sins For he that is ready to forgive all injuries will be as ready to be poor very forward to go to the house of mourning merciful a peace-maker one that may be reviled and persecuted and so rightly qualified for those Beatitudes And he who can suffer an injury will hardly do one whereas they commonly are most impatient of wrongs who make least conscience of offering them qui irascuntur quia irascuntur who play the wantons and are angry with their brother for no other reason but because they are pleased to be angry Now the Oratour will tell us that Nullus rationi magìs obstat affectus there is no affection which is so great an enemy to Reason as Anger For Sorrow and Fear and Hope and the rest make an assault and lay hard at us but anger as a whirlwind overwhelms us at once I may be stricken with Fear and yet hearken to that counsel which will dispel it I may hang down my head with Sorrow and yet be capable of those comforts which may lift it up again for every one is not as Rahel that would not be comforted but we deal with Angry men as we do with men overcome with drink never give them counsel till the fit be over For fairly to be speak a man thus transported is to as much purpose as to bid the Sea go back or to chide the Winds And as the Reason and Judgment are dimmed and obscured with that mist which sudden Anger casts so are they also by that which they call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a lasting or abiding Anger which is the forge or alembick of Revenge and works it by degrees And till this be dispelled and scattered there is no room for the Doctrine of the Gospel which breaths nothing but meekness and forgiveness Disce sed ira cadat naso To be angry and To learn are at as great a distance as To be in motion and To stand still He that fills his thoughts with Revenge can leave no room for the Precepts of that Master who was led to the slaughter as a sheep But the Meek man is like him is a Sheep his Sheep and will soon hear his voice draw nearer and nearer unto him and by Meekness learn Purity and those other virtues which will bring him into the arms of his Saviour and the Kingdom of Heaven And thus you see how necessary a virtue Meekness is for the Church and for every part of it for every Christian to entitle him to the inheritance of the earth as the earth is taken for that new earth Rev. 21. 1. the Earth not of living dying men but that Earth where we shall live for ever that state of happiness which like the Earth shall stand fast for ever For what is Meekness but a pregustation and fore-taste of that quiet and peaceable estate which is no where to be found but at the right hand and in the presence of God That as God who is slow to anger and full of goodness and mercy is properly and naturally in a constant and immoveable state of bliss so Christians who by divine grace and assistance raise themselves up to this height and pitch as to look down from a quiet mind as from heaven upon all the injuries and reproaches which shall
a seducer fruit which was poison a will which was irregular and the command he made his ruine And now he who affected to become like unto God doth desire also to make God like to himself he who would be made a God maketh God a man and bringeth him in as guilty of the transgression And so he added to his guilt by defending it ut culpa ejus atrocior fieret discussa quà m fuit perpetrata saith the Father His sin was greater being excused than it was when first committed To exalt it to the highest we may well call it Blasphemy For as we may blaspheme by giving that to the Creature which is proper to God so may we also by attributing that to God which is the Creatures only To worship an Angel or a Saint is contumelious to God to make God an Angel is blasphemy what is it then to make him a Man what is it to make him a Sinner I know nothing that Adam could call his own but the transgression There is some truth in the TU DEDISTI for his Wife God had given him So Paradise was God's gift and his Body God had created him But if we bring-in his Sin then TU DEDISTI is blasphemy For God gave him not that nay God could not give it him but he must father it who was the father of us all To recollect all and lay before you these bella tectoriola these excuses in brief What if the Woman gave it The Man was stronger then the Woman and Lord over her What though it were a Gift He had will to refuse it his hands were not bound nor his feet put into fetters there was no chain of necessity to force him But then it was but an Apple and what was all the fruit in Paradise to the loss of his obedience What was the Devil's promise to God's threatning how unjust and cruel was he to his wife in transferring the fault upon her Lastly how blasphemous was he against God in imputing his very gift unto him as the only cause of his sin If the Woman seduce him must it be with a Gift If a Gift will prevail must it be no more then an Apple Must an Inscription a Promise a Lie deceive him and must he buy the false hope of eternity with the certain loss of Paradise If he sin with Eve why is he unwilling to be punished with Eve And why doth he dispute with God and darken counsel by words without knowledg We may well cry out Adam where art thou In a thicket Job 38. 2. amongst the trees nay amongst the leaves For all excuses are so even leaves nay not so good shelter as leaves for they do not cover but betray us Adam increaseth his shame by endeavouring to hide it Mulier quam dedisti is not an excuse but an accusation And now I wish that the leaves of those trees among which Adam hid himself had cast their shadow only upon him But we may say as St. Ambrose doth of the storie of Naboth and Ahab Adami historia tempore vetus est usu quotidiana This historie of Adam is as antient as the World but is fresh in practice and still revived by the sons of Adam We may therefore be as bold to discover our own nakedness as we have been to pluck our first father from behind the bush We have all sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression and we are as ready to excuse sin as to commit it that we may seem to take this at least from Adam as Pelagius thought we do all other defects only by imitation Do we only excuse our sin No Many times we defend it by the Gospel and even sanctifie it by the doctrine of Christ himself Superstition we commend for Reverence prophaneness for Christian liberty indiscretion for Zeal will-worship for Obedience Nay doth not Rebellion come towards us under the grave habit of Religion with a Sword in one hand and a Bible in the other as if God himself had decreed to set up these men of Belial against his own ordinance and the word of God were powerful not to demolish imaginations but Kingdoms The Oratour telleth us that honesta verba moribus perdidimus by our evil manners we have lost the proper and native signification of many good and honest words so have we also almost lost the knowledg of our Sins in words in borrowed titles and assumptitious names And hence it cometh to pass that neither our Virtues are as they appear nor our Vices appear to us as they are but we look upon our defects without grief and applaud our false virtues with joy our feigned Temperance our adulterate Charity our mock-Fasts our superficial Mortification our spurious Humility our irregular Devotion our Pharisaical Zelé our Obedience with a sword drawn and ready to strike Nor are we content alone to be deceived but we affect it sub nomine religionis famulamur errori we talk of God but worship our own imaginations sub velamento nominis Christi adversus nomen Christi militamus we fight against Christ even under his own colours This disease of Adam's runs through each vein and passage of our soul by which we are still unlike ourselves like Adam indeed in Paradise but then when he was in the thicket and like unto him out of the thicket but with an excuse in his mouth We may observe that many things in themselves not commendable do yet help to make up our defects and one vice serveth to set out another Impudence promoteth Ignorance For do we not see many whose boldness is the greatest part of their learning and whose confidence is taken for judgment and wisdome Good God! what cannot a brow of brass a sad countenance and a forced deportment do This Quintilian maketh one reason why amongst the vulgar sort Ignorance many times beareth the bell and is more amiable and gratious than Knowledg And may we not in like manner think that that peace and quietness we have at home in our own breasts and that approbation we gain abroad is due not alwaies to our virtue but oft-times to our whorish and impudent looks not to that constant tenour and equality of life which Reason prescribeth but to this art of apologizing to our manifold evasions and excuses which if we look nearer upon them are of a fouler aspect then those sins they colour and commend To come close home therefore we will stay a little and draw the parallel and shew the similitude that is betwixt Adam and his sons We shall still find a Mulier dedit to be our plea as well as his Some Woman something weaker then our selves overthroweth us and then is taken-in for an excuse Omnes homines vitiis nostris favemus quod propriâ facimus voluntate ad naturae referimus necessitatem saith Hierom to Amandus We all favour ourselves and our vices too and what we do willingly we account as done out of necessity of nature
but to speak an hour to be a Hearer but to come to Church to be a Bishop but to put on a mitre to be a King but to wear a crown And this is to disesteem and undervalew these duties This is to be officiperdae in this sense also to destroy our work before we begin it For what place can our work have amongst those thoughts which stifle it and where the birth is so sudden and immature how can it chuse but prove an abortive I cannot conceive but that our Saviour could have performed the work he came about without this preamble or preparation but yet in honor to this great work he would first step aside and not suddenly enter upon it but by degrees first retire and fast and pray and then work miracles To teach us that a Christian is not made up in haste that no good work will beget it self between our fingers nor come towards us unless we fit and prepare our selves to meet it And yet some there be who are willing to think that this is more then needs that it is in the greatest profession that is as it was in the Cirque-shews amongst the Romans Odiosa circensibus pompa that as there so in this all pomp and shew and preparation is in vain that the sooner they enter upon it the more dextrous they shall be in the performance Divines as Nazianzene terms them of a day old made up ut è luto statua assoon as you can make a statue of clay No desart that they will go to no cell that they will retire to no secession that they will make but presently upon the work they enter leap into the Pulpit and there they stir and make a noyse semper agentibus similes like unto those who are alwaies busie or indeed rather like unto those spirits in minerals that Cornelius Agrippa speaks of which digg and cleanse and sever the metals but when men come to view their work they find nothing is done With these men there are no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 no prefaces no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nothing to be learnt first All with them is the Work no study or preparations All is working of miracles And indeed one great miracle they work Docent antequam discunt They teach that which they never learnt and their skill and art is so teach men that they shall be more ignorant then before Our Saviour here is led by the Spirit into the wilderness to prepare him for his work but these will not prepare themselves because they pretend they are led by the Spirit Nor is this evil of yesterday or which befalls the weakest only but the Devil hath used it in all ages as an engine to undermine this good work What men are not able to manage for want of due consideration to bring in the Spirit as a supply Tertullian was as wise a man as the Church had any but being not able to prove the corporeity of the Soul he flyeth to Revelation in his book De Anima Non per â—stimationem sed revelationem We cannot make this good by judgment but by revelation Post Joannem quoque prophetiam meruimus consequi We have our Revelations as well as St. John Our sister Priscilla hath plenty of them she hath her traunces in the Church and converseth with Angels and with God himself and can discern the hearts and inward thoughts of man St. Hierom speaking of a Monk in his time thus describes him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There is start up a man who hath exactly learnt all knowledge without a teacher full of the spirit his own master who like a Carneades can dispute both for and against the truth who needs no preparation but can do what he will and when he will But this is not the Spirits manner of Leading for he leads us by degrees and by a certain method For even so he led our Saviour first into the wilderness and then to his work And though his leading of the Apostles were extraordinary yet even them he commands to stay at Jerusalem and to expect his coming And although their determinations were subscribed to with a VISUM EST SPIRITUI SANCTO It seemeth Good to the holy Ghost yet they conferred one with another met together in councel and did deliberate before they did determine Nor did they once imagine that they had the Spirit in a string or could command him when they pleased or call him down to help them in their work sedendo votis by sitting still and doing nothing that he would fly down unto them and sit upon them though they slept Much less can we imagine that he will wait upon our spirit and humor and when we have cripled and disenabled our selves for any service of his in a moment anoint and supple our joynts and make us active for the highest calling when we have put our selves into prison even thrown our selves into the dark and loathsome dungeon of Ignorance that he will come to us as the Angel did to Peter Acts 12. and smite us on the side and raise us up and bid us arise up quickly and go on an ambassage which we do not know go set our hands to his plough which are a great deal fitter for another Certainly to be a Disciple of Christ is a greater work then to cast our garment about us to take up the habit of a Minister No we must be led into some secret and solitary place there to fast and pray to fit and prepare our selves for the work which we have to do there to taste how sweet the word of God is to ruminate and chaw upon it as it were and digest it to fasten it to our very soul and make it a part of us and by daily meditation so to profit that all the mysteries of Faith and precepts of Holiness may be as vessels are in a well-ordered family ready at hand to be used upon any occasion Now this we may imagine to be the work of the Spirit alone and so it is but of the Spirit leading us into the desart placing us on the mount of Contemplation there by long study and industry to learn confusa disterminare hiantia cogere sparsu colligere to separare those things which are confused and mixt together to separate Fear from Despair and Confidence from Presumption to draw and unite those things together which are severed as Faith and good Works Knowledge and Practice and to joyn together those Texts which bid us rejoyce with them which bid us mourn those which command our Zeal with those which exact our Meekness Et diligentia pietas adhibenda est saith St. Augustine alterâ fiat ut quaerentes inveniamus alterâ ut scire mereamur We must make use both of our Diligence and Piety by the one we find when we seek by the other we are filled both to seek and find Unless we follow the Spirit in this his Leading we have no reason to
Devil But if I forget not I have spoken of this heretofore and chased it away as a phansie of the Devils creating and the invention of a sick distempered brain All that we will now say to those who doubt whether there be such a person or no which set upon our Saviour in the wilderness and every day renews his assaults against us is that his conceit can proceed from no other cause then a strong delusion of the Devil who they conceive to be nothing but like Aesops Fox and Lyon and Wolf which carry their Moral along with them and till that be made are nothing but tales And whilst they say there is no Devil it may be truly said to them that they have a Devil That there is such a person we may draw an argument from his name here 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For what is a name but a signification of the nature of that thing which it doth express And he is called here not a Spirit or the Tempter as he is verse 3. but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Devil from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies to Accuse to Defame to Publish infamous reports to Be the mint where slanders are coyned or else Credulously to receive them and pass them from hand to hand as current coyn to Please himself at the fall of another as the people of Rome used to delight and clap their hands at the fall of a Sword-player in the Theater He hath other names as the Evil spirit the Wicked one the Prince that rules in the ayr the God of this world But as Quintilian speaks Omnia verba alicubi sunt optima Words have their weight as they are placed And here when he was to tempt our Saviour DIABOLUS the Devil was the fittest name for him For indeed every tentation is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a kind of accusation and the Devil tempts us that he may accuse us and accuses us when he tempts us He is saith Augustine the accuser of the Saints and knowing what Judge he is to appear before into what Court he is to bring his bills of accusation even into the Court of that God who cannot be deceived though he be the father of lyes yet he strives to make his bills true by making us sin Quia falsa contra nos non potest dicere quaerit vera quae dicat ideo tentat ut habeat quae dicat Because he cannot lay to our charge those sins which we did not commit he incites us to sin that he may lay it to our charge He accuseth God to us which is his Tentation and then he accuseth us unto God which makes him a compleat Devil And as St. Hierome shuts up his whole discourse against Jovinian with a Caveat Cave JOVINIANI nomen quod ab idolo derivatum est Beware of the name of Jovinian which is derived from an Idole from Jupiter so will I begin mine Cave DIABOLI nomen Beware of the Devils name Beware of accusing and defaming thy brethren Remember the Devils name that thou be not like him Remember that when thou hast drawn a false accusation against thy brother thou hast drawn out a true one against thy self which the Devil will be ready to take up and present before the Tribunal of God And now that we may make some use of his name we will shew you 1. that he is an Accuser 2. the Motives or Causes which move him to be so and 3. lastly we will apply all to our selves and parallel our defamations with his as proceeding from the same root of bitterness and so learn to detest them For the first as Christ is an Advocate pleading for Man so the Devil is an Accuser pleading against him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 first walking with us that we may sin and then accusing us for sinning First accusing God to us which is the cause of all sin and then accusing us to God which is the cause of all punishment Omnia agens accusatorio spiritu as Livy speaks of Appius in all his proceedings breathing forth malice and railing accusations And first because all sin proceeds from error in judgment at least in the practick faculty of the soul Nam si homo poterit intelligere Divina potest facere saith Lactantius for if man could rightly understand the things of God he might easily do them But our practick determinations are sooner vitiated and corrupted then our speculative conclusions because those present Truth and Goodness these Truth alone the Devil instills his poyson and infects the Understanding with an evil report of God And though we cannot deny God or his attributes yet we seldome sin but we say in our hearts There is no God Here in this Chapter the Devil doth excaecare providentiam Dei strive to put out the very eye of Gods Providence that he might shake Christs Faith as it were and drive him to distrust He accuseth his Wisdome in our retirement and secret sins and that with some scorn Tush God doth not see it nor is there knowledge in the most High He accuseth his Justice and puts stout words into our mouths when we deny our obedience It is in vain to serve the Lord and what profit is there that we have kept his ordinances He defames his Mercy when remembring our sins we fall under them as a burden too heavy for us and as if God had forgotten to be merciful He roars loud against his very Power in the mouth of a Rabshakeh and would perswade the Israelites that to say God should deliver them was nothing else but to deliver themselves up to famine and thirst He casts his venome upon all the Divine Attributes and makes them the inducements to sin which are the strongest motives to goodness He never presents God to us as he is but in several forms and all such as may drive us from one attribute to run us on another He presents him without an eye that we may do what we list without a hand that we may trust in a hand of flesh without an Ear that our blasphemies may be loud He makes us favorable interpreters of him before we sin and unjust judges of him when we have sinned He makes him a Libertine to the presumptuous and a Novatian to the despairing sinner being a lyar in all whose every breath is a defamation Nulla apud eum turpis ratio vincendi as was said of King Philip He is not ashamed of any lye that may lead us from the truth And as he defameth God unto us so in every sin almost he accuses us unto our selves In the heat of our Zeal he accuseth us of Madness that we may be remiss and in our Meekness he chargeth us with Folly that we may learn to be angry In our Justice he calls us tyrants that we may yield it up unto unnecessary Pity and in our Compassion he urgeth the want of Justice that to put on the New man we may put of
God as it were He puts on Righteousness as a breast-plate and a helmet of Salvation on his head he puts on the garments of Vengeance as a garment and was clad with Zeal as a cloak Isa 59. 17. Nuditas notat Diabolum saith the Father Nakedness is a mark of the Devil We never read of his cloathing Stript he was of his Angels wings of his eminent Perfection And our first parents he stripped in Paradise of that rich robe of original Justice and left them so naked that they were even ashamed of themselves and sewed fig-leaves together to make them aprons And us he strippeth every day and leaves us nothing but fair pretences and false excuses to shelter u◠scarce so good a covert as their fig-leaves We read of Belshazzar that he was weighed in the balance and Dan. 5. 27. was found minus habens too light wanting something And in the next verse PERES his kingdom is divided from him At the entrance of the King here the guest that was found to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not having somthing that he should have was thrust out of doors and cast into utter darkness Christ gives not to wilfull bankrupts No HABENTI DADITUR To him Matth. 25 29. that hath it shall be given and he shall have abundance and vestitus supervestietur he that is clothed already shall be clothed-upon with a robe or immortality 2 Cor. 5. 4. But every garment fits not a Christian Every garment is not worth the keeping There is strange apparel and the Prophet tells us Zeph. 1. 8. who they were that wore it v. 5. even they that worshipt the host of heaven on the house-tops and swore by Malcham that leaped on the threshold and filled their masters houses with violence and deceit A garment fitter for Micah in his house of gods fitter for Judas or Barabbas at a plot of treason or an insurrection than for a true Disciple of Christ This is not the wedding-garment We must then take a true pattern to make it by or else fitted we shall not be And where can we take it better than from Christ himself Summa religionis est imitari quem colis saith the Father It is the sum of Religion all the piety we have to imitate him whom we worship to be Christiformes to keep our selves in a uniformity and conformity to Christ Sic oculos sic ille manus sic ora ferebat Thus He lookt thus He did thus was He apparrelled Now what was Christs apparrel The Prophet will tell us that it was glorious that he was Isa 63. 1. formosus in stola very richly arrayed and St. Mark that he had a white garment Chap 9. 3. whiter than any Fuller could make it And St. John tells us of his retinue that they were clothed in white linnen white and clean Look into Rev. 19. 8. Christs wardrobe and you find no torn or ragged apparel No old things are done away The robe of Righteousness the garment of Innocency 2 Cor. 5. 17. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the spotless coat of Temperance and Chastity these Christ had and with these he went about doing good Out of this wardrobe must we make up our wedding-garment We must saith the Apostle put on the Lord Jesus Christ put him on all his Righteousness his Obedience Rom. 13. 14. his Love his Patience We must be conformable to Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to proportion In the Rule of our Obedience we must not wear a garment of our own phansying an irregular unprescribed devotion In the Ends of it to glorifie God on the earth and in the Parts of it not John 17. 4. a parcel garment It must fit every part it must be universal The Schoolman must be speculum Christi a Looking-glass reflecting Christ's graces upon himself presenting to him his own image in all righteousness and holiness We will not say with Fastus Socinus that Christ was married to his Church only to this end that Christ came into the world non ad satisfactionem sed exemplum not to be the way to life but to cut one out not to pay down our accounts but to teach us an art of thrift to be able to pay them our selves not to be a sacrifice for sin but an ensample of godly life A most horrid blasphemy But this we may say That Christs fulfilling the Law was not to that end that we should break it That he satisfied not by death but for those who would be conformable to his death Phil. 3. 10. That he dyed not for Traytours and Rebels That he marryed not to the Church sealing it with his bloud to let in Ruffians and Fools and men of Belial to the wedding to let in those that will rip up his wounds and cast his bloud in the dust and trample it under their feet No he that cometh to him must know that he is and that he is a lover of righteousness He that cometh to him must come not with spotted garments his Soul defiled with luxury not with torn garments his Soul divided and pulled in pieces by Envy and Malice his Reason distracted and his Affections scattered and blown abroad his Love on the World his Hatred on Goodness his Anger on good Counsel and his Desires on Vanity but with a garment of the Bridegrooms spinning even Righteousness Obedience and Sanctity of conversation And thus the Fathers make it up Charitas est vestis nuptialis saith Gregory and so saith Augustine Hierome composeth it of Christ's Precepts Others bring in gratiam Spiritûs Sancti the gracious effects of the Spirit Basil on Psal 9. tells us it is Faith Vestiri in Christo est fidem habere In this variety there is no difference He that taketh in Charity leaves not out Faith as a ragg fit to be flung to the dung-hill and he that entertains Faith shuts not Charity out of doors Methinks the disputation held up this day in the world with that eagerness and heat is uncharitable Whether should have the precedency Faith or Good works Whether is the better piece to put into a Garment and as uncharitable so unnecessary Why should I question which is the best piece when the want of either spoils the garment When both reflect upon each other by a mutual dependance what talk we then of priority Heat furthers Motion and Motion encreaseth Heat Faith begins Good Works Good works elevate and quicken and exalt our Faith give it growth as it were promote and further it not in the act of Justification but in the Knowledge of God in the Contemplation of his Majesty and Goodness in the dilating and enlargement of our Love and Devotion Faith is the mother of Good works and Good works the nurse of Faith Can you separate Light from a burning Taper or Brightness from the Flame Then may you divide Faith and Charity A good Work without Faith is but a worthless action
but what mens prejudice shall cast upon them I will yet increase upon you and grow a little bolder and so draw all this to our present purpose You who come hither to receive that food which must nourish you up to eternal life and in the strength of which you must walk forward to perfection ought not so you have the food you come for to stand too much upon circumstance or the manner how it is divided to you St. Paul tells us that some preach Christ out of envy some of good will some not sincerely others Phil. 1. 15-18 of love What then Notwithstanding every way whether in pretense or in truth Christ is preached and I therein saith he do rejoyce yea and will rejoyce Beloved whether Christ be preached by publick reading or by Sermons whether in the Pulpit or at the Desk whether with eloquence or plainness of speech are things in themselves almost not considerable So the truth be preached we may say with the Apostle Herein we do rejoyce yea and will rejoyce My brethren saith St. James have not the faith of Jesus with respect of persons I may add not in respect of place or any other circumstance Lactantius will tell us that this was the main cause that the Gospel of Christ found not that entertainment amongst the Philosophers and wise men of this world which otherwise it would have found Nemo rem veritate ponderabat sed ornatu No man weighed the Gospel by the truth which it carried with it but by those complements and ornaments of speech which it wanted Many now-adayes Wonder and complain that so much preaching hath begot so little knowledge so little amendment and though Doctrine drop as the rain and wholsom instruction distill as the dew yet many who profess Christianity remain like Gedeons fleece dry when there is dew on all the ground besides them Many reasons may be given but I perswade my self the chief is this We come to hear the word of God as men come to fairs not to buy but to look about us to see fashions to hear some novelty or some curious discourse Some come indeed to buy to profit but they find not the ware they look for they hear not that Doctrine they come to be informed in and so return home empty with no other purchase then the loss of time and I fear of their souls St. Hilary in one of his books de Trinitate reports of some so obstinate and so obdurate in errour that they would not so much as hear any reasons which might be brought against it for fear of being convinced And St. Hierome complains of the hereticks of his time Quis haereticorum non despicit ecclesiasticos Who is there amongst the hereticks that doth not slight the instructions of the orthodox St. Basil calls them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 men who could sit down and deliberate and build up some new opinion which by no care of the Church could be afterwards demolished We are not now beloved to deal with Hereticks but with some men even as perverse and obstinate as they whose mark also it is dogmata patrum contemnere to despise the instructions of their Governors who will give ear to no truth but out of the Pulpit nor out of that holy place neither unless some Prophet of their own cry aloud from thence and lift up his voice like a trumpet Why this Exercise if you so please to call it is changed both in respect of the place and of the manner from the Pulpit to the Desk from a popular Sermon to a Catechistical Lecture I need yield no other reason but the command of those whom it especially concerns It is enough for me ex praescripto agere as near as I can to observe what they enjoyn and as it is in the proverb quem mater amictum dedit solicitè custodire to keep my self to that form which the Church hath prescribed And yet I see no reason that any should complain of change For what difference between this place and the other I know they who deny it to the Altar can attribute no holiness to the Pulpit And I am sure every Sermon is or should be a Catechism Which is nothing else but institutio vivâ voce an instruction by word of mouth Yet though I can give you no reason for this so scarce markable change yet I will crave leave of them to give you my conjecture Perhaps they have just cause to stand in some jealousie and fear lest the overvaluing of Sermons hath brought the price and estimation of Scripture so often read in this place to fall that there is a conceit too much taken up That Faith doth so naturally grow from Sermons that it cannot possibly be the effect of any other teaching That the doctrine which conveys this saving knowledge never breaths so comfortably as from that place That it cannot have its true stamp and character but at this mint If it be tendred in any other place Truth it self doth either want of its weight or is but counterfeit Now by this what gold what pearls what treasure what riches of knowledge are we deprived of How do we tye-up and confine the blessed Spirit who is as various in his wayes of entrance as in his operation sometimes passing through the Ear sometimes piercing the Eye nay sometimes felt and tasted who breaths in any ayr in any coast He that never heard Aristotle may yet we see by reading of his books gain that knowledge which may stile him a Philosopher And why do we search the Scriptures and read them in our closets if Sermons only be the means of our Salvation Faith is nothing else but a voluntary assent to any truth for the authority of him who speaks it And in sacris in this our holy Faith though we acknowledge no Author but God himself yet there be many motives and inducements which may strengthen us in the apprehension of that truth which we believe and to which we have given up our assent Now why this may not be done by disputations by friendly intercourse by letters by familiar conversation by instruction at any time in any place as well as by Sermons and in the Pulpit is so far beyond the conceit of any reasonable man that it may justly be thought a wonder that any man can be so unreasonable as to think the contrary I do not prejudice this holy custome of speaking out of the Pulpit to the people but yet I think it will be a hard task for any man that shall take it upon him to prove by Scripture that teaching is confined to that place For as it is plain that our Saviour and the Apostles went into the Synagogues and there expounded Moses and the Prophets so it is as plain that wheresoever our Saviour and the Apostles opened the will of God whither it were in the Temple or in Synagogues or in private houses or by the way-side whither to one or
many upon what time soever in what place soever upon what occasion soever they did truly and properly preach When our Saviour conferred with Nicodemus by night with the woman of Samaria at the well with his Disciples on the way when he reproved the Pharisee at his table when he spake to the people out of the ship when Philip taught the Eunuch in the chariot when Paul went teaching from house to house what did they then but preach and discharge their Ministerial Duty Not the Pulpit not the Synagogue alone but the House the Well the Table the Ship the Chariot every place was a Pulpit every occasion a Text and every good lesson a Sermon Nay further yet if I should say this teaching by private and single conference were the more useful of the two I perswade my self I have reason ready to come in and second me This indeed is more solemn and it costs us many times more pains and labor than you are easily sensible of But how oft do we cast our seed upon the rocks how oft do our words perish in the ayr wherein they were sown How little of that we speak is understood How unwilling are men to conceive further of things than they do already Or can we here in general so effectually urge and press things home as we may in private conference Who hath so learned that which the Orator commends temperare vires suas ad intellectum audientis descendere so to temper himself and take from his own strength and descend to the capacity of the meanest as that he can assure himself that he is understood throughly of his Auditory though his discourse be never so plain It fares with many hearers of Sermons as it doth with small and narrow-mouth'd vessels either we pour too fast and so much runs by or else too much and so much runs over This we may deplore but cannot so easily help when every man takes upon him to be as skilfull as his teacher it being the common disease of all mankind malle dedicisse quà m discere rather to pretend to skill already purchased than to be willing to learn any thing at all Now this may be one reason why men are still left in darkness and ignorance in the midst of so much light and so frequent instructions For here we speak to you from above indeed but so that you that sit under can raise your thoughts and censures above us can erect a tribunal and arraign and condemn every word we speak But in private conference we may chance to urge your modesty and plainly shew you that absurdity which you must needs run upon unless you yield Here you give us the hearing but there we may be bold to demand satisfaction Many other reasons may be given why men do not rightly judge of things Isidore hath given us three The first is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because of the narrow compass of mens capacities which cannot be enlarged by our general and popular discourses which unless they please the ears like those sports which children make in the water with square stones are drowned in the very making There needeth much time and many attempts and particular administrations to redeem men from such an infirmity and we shall find it a harder matter to strive with men of weak abilities than with seven wise men who can render a reason Unto these we must rather be as Nurses than Physicians We must submittere nos ad mensuram discentium manum dando gradum minuendo submit our selves to their capacities by lending our hand by lessning our steps to keep them in equipage with us till they come to fuller growth The second is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because of our sloth and neglect Venit ignavia ea mihi tempestas fuit saith he in the Poet Sloth came upon me and that was the tempest which spoiled me of all my crop And Sloth as it hath been an enemy to all the humane Arts and Sciences so hath it been to the knowledge of Divine truth and left it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Aelian speaks of painting in its cradle and swathing-bands For what other cause can there be of mens weakness in these dayes when so frequent teaching takes from men all pretense of weakness and ignorance Num aliud agimus docendo vos quà m nè semper docendi sitis For what is the end of all this labour and pain in teaching you but that you might at length not need a teacher You will say all men have not the same readiness of apprehension nor can every man make a Divine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is not for the vulgar to propose their opinion and defend it It is true but yet St. Peter requires thus much at every Christians hands When he is askt to be able to give a reason of the faith that is in him And if men were half so diligent in pursuit of the truth as they are in managing their own affairs if men would try as many conclusions for knowledge as they do to atchieve riches and honor we should have small reason to complain of the ignorance of the times Quisque in Dei causa facere potest quod in sua facit Every man may do that for his soul which he doth for his body And I see no reason but he that can learn to drive a bargain for his advantage may as well learn both to know and defend the truth The last reason Isidore gives is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Because our minds are prae-occupated and taken-up before with such opinions which we have taken-up upon trust and have given sudden credence to because they sort well and comply with our particular humour Not that Opinion can arise from our natural constitutions but because we are ready judicium tradere affectibus to forfeit our Judgments and deliver up our Reason and Belief captive to our own Affections The Schools tell us Affectiones facilè faciunt opiniones that our Affections will easily draw on our Opinion to close with that which presents a pleasing shape and outside to them And hence it comes many times that a man may have strong evidence for one opinion and yet for some ends he hath secretly adhered to another Desire of pomp and glory will build up that Monarchy in the Church which the evidence of Scripture lays level with the ground and Love of freedom and to be uncontroull'd will help the factious to set up an Anarchy Every man almost makes his Opinion follow his Passion against that proof and evidence which should correct and settle both Now these and whatsoever other hinderances there can be named which stand in our light that we cannot behold objects in their own likeness as they are are more likely to be removed by Reading or private Conference or plain Catechistical instruction which comes nearest to them than by those general Discourses which in respect of the most find both their birth
bound the Understanding also to regulate our Affections to set limits to our very Thoughts which flow from the heart to keep us from Error as well as from Sin For as the Will must turn it self from all evil ut non consentiat that it no way incline to consent unto it so is there a tye upon the Understanding to avoid error ut non assentiat that it yield not assent to it As the Will is bound to perform its act so is the Understanding also The Will is bound to will that which is good the Understanding to know and believe those things which are the objects of our Faith and Knowledge so that it is as well a sin to believe a lye in matters of Faith as to break a commandment If there were no law to the Understanding then were it lawful for every man to believe and think as he please and that opinion would pass for current That every man may be saved in that Religion and Sect which he believes to be good and true And then how hath the Church of Christ been mistaken in passing such heavy censures upon Hereticks and Infidels We have a saying indeed in St. Bernard Nihil ardet in inferno praeter propriam voluntatem That nothing of us makes fuel for the fire of hell but our Will and that men are punisht only for the stubbornness and disobedience of their Will and if we examine it we shall find it true enough though at the first appearance it beareth some shew of opposition to the truth For the Will receives the first wound and maim And it is most certain we could never erre dangerously if we were not willing to be deceived The complaint is put-up in Scripture They will not understand Not that the acts of the Understanding depend on the Will which are rather natural than arbitrary for it is not in our power not to apprehend things in those shapes in which they present themselves but because we wilfully refuse the means to clear doubts we will not see that which is most naked and visible we seek no guide we follow no direction nay perhaps against our own consciences we dissent from that which inwardly will we nill we we do acknowledge And as the errors of the Understanding so all the extravagancies of the Affections are originally from the Will It was the Stoicks error to disgrace the Affections as evil Christianity hath made the weapons of righteousness to fight the battels of this great King My Anger may be a sword my Love a banner my Hope a staff my Fear a buckler All the weaknesses of our Soul the errors of our Understanding and the rebellions of our Affections are from the Will From hence are wars and fightings Is the Understanding dark The cloud is from the Will That my Anger rageth my Love burneth my Fear despaireth my Grief is impatient my Joy mad is from the Will From this treasury blows the wind which makes the wicked like the Isa 57. 20. troubled sea which cannot rest whose waters cast up mire and dirt And now you see that the Kingdom of Christ consists principally in subduing of the will When that yields the Understanding is straight as wax to receive the impressions of Truth and the Affections as so many gentle gales to carry us to the haven where we would be This is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Chrysostom calls it principale animae as St. Ambrose the commanding leading and principal part of the Heart If Christ hath taken possession of this he hath taken the whole heart and is Lord of all Fight saith the 1 King 22. 31 King of Syria neither with small nor great save only with the King of Israel If he faâ—l in battel the whole army is overthrown Will you have it plainly thus There be these three parts as it were in the Heart or Soul of man Reason Will and Appetite Reason necessarily inclines to things reasonable and the Sensitive appetite follows the conduct of Sense For it is an axiome in the Schools Unaquaeque virtus expeditior est ad proprium actum Every power of the soul tends naturally to its proper act and operation Our Reason is quick to discourse and our Sense carries us to sensual objects And these two are at a kind of war and variance in man and strive which shall have the supremacy They are as two extreams and the Will in the midst as it were to decide the controversie When Sense hath over whelmed Reason then Sin begins to reign and the Devil to triumph But when through Christ that strenghtheneth us our Will takes Reason's part and treads the Appetite under her feet then the adverse faction is swallowed up in victory Christ is all in all and VENIT REGNUM DEI the Kingdome of God is within us I now proceed further to unfold the nature of the Kingdome of God It is REGNUM TUUM thy Kingdome Which puts a difference betwixt this and other Kingdoms Christ rules and reigneth as a King in his Church But as his Kingdome is not of this world so is it of a divers form and complexion from the Kingdoms of the world We pray Let thy Kingdome come Which points out a peculiar Kingdome a Kingdome by it self And if we put it in the Scales with the Kingdoms of the earth and weigh them together they will be all found too light whether we respect the Laws by which this Kingdome is governed or the Virtue and Power it hath or its large Compass or the Riches it abounds with or its Duration the Laws unquestionable indispensable the Power universal the Circuit as large as the world the Riches everlasting and its Continuance for ever To speak something of these in their order First in the Kingdome of Christ and his Laws neither People nor Senate nor Wise-men nor Judges has any hand They were made in Senatu Soliloquio as Rupertus speaks in that Senate and Solitariness where there are divers yet but one Three Persons and but one God Secondly there is a difference in the Laws themselves These are pure and undefiled exact and perfect and such as tend to perfection and so were none that ever the heathen Legislatours enacted What speak we of the Laws of heathen men and strangers from the Commonwealth of Israel The Law of Moses though it had nothing unlawful or dishonest yet conteined many precepts concerning things which in themselves were neither good nor evil as Sacrificing of beasts Circumcision exact Rest on their Sabboath forbidding of divers meats But the Laws of the Gospel and of the Kingdome of Christ command those duties which had they not been tendred in that high commanding form yet in their own nature were most just and fit to be done Not to circumcise the flesh but the heart Not to cease from labor but from that which is unlawful Not to sacrifice the bloud and fat of beasts but our selves Not to abstein from certain meats but to
in intimis essentiae naked as they are in themselves not drest-up and coloured-over and refined by the Senses we would loath these smiling enemies and the more because they smile Ipsum vocabulum nos admonere potest The very word TENTATION may admonish us to be shy and wary of them For what is a Tentation but a heave a tryal an experiment to overthrow us But so it is that we are commonly the greatest strangers at home that we are willing to believe that we are of the earth earthly and like the Horse and Mule which have no understanding lower and viler than those Tentations which do but knock nay but shew themselves and are welcomed as friends Rarum est ut satìs se quisque vereatur It is a very rare thing for men to fear and reverence themselves 〈◊〉 give that honour to themselves which they do to the whip nay to the frown of a Superiour These many times curb and restrain us when we are making forward to unlawful pleasures they seal-up our lips they bind our hands they put-in their Veto and we dare not touch or tast or handle But 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our Reason which should be as an Emperour and commander over us is slighted and neglected and esteemed not worth the harkning-to To which if we gave that due reverence which we owe dimittamus licet paedagogum there were no need at all of any outward restraint And as we take no great pains in the study of Our selves so do we as little trouble our selves to sift and examine those Tentations which make towards us but judge of them by their outside look upon them and are taken with a look And as the Romans observed of the barbarous Nations that being utterly ignorant of the art of Engining when they were besieged and shut-up they would stand still and look upon the enemy working in the mine not understanding quò illa pertinerent quae ex longinquo instruebantur what it meant or wherefore those things were prepared which they saw afar off at distance till the enemy came so near as to blow them up and destroy them So do we behold Tentations with a careless and regardless eye as if we knew not what they meant and so suffer them to work-on to steal nearer and nearer upon us till they enter our souls and dwell there and take full possession of us That we may therefore be the more ready and skilful to apply these two Remedies we will add a third which we at first also proposed the Knowledge and serious Consideration of God himself For quantò magìs appropinquat Deo cogitatio nostra tantò praecellentior ejus nobis videtur majestas the nearer we draw unto God and the greater our knowledge is of him the more are we taken and amazed with his beauty and the glorious raies of his Majesty in comparison of which all the Beauty in the world is but deformity all the Pleasure of the world loathsomness all the Glory of the world but as vanity as nothing Now by the knowledge of God I do not understand that imperfect and weak apprehension of him which even they may have who understand his precepts and give assent unto them that they are just and holy but yet through their corrupt and wicked conversation cannot be induced to believe his promises and by virtue and force obey his commands as the Apostle speaks of the Heathen that they knew God but did not glorifie him as God For as Ignorance of God brought-forth Rom. 1. 21. those Lusts of concupiscence in the Heathen so the like Lusts as greedily affected by Christians breed not Ignorance onely but also a Denial of God and of Holiness without which no man can ever see God But a sad and serious Consideration of Gods Majesty and Goodness may transform the Soul into the similitude and likeness of God For true Knowledge is a kind of assimilation of the mind to that which it apprehends And as there is imprinted in the organ of every Sense a likeness of that object which it doth receive so is there also in the Understanding an impression made which if it be not wiped out and defaced by impertinent deviations and wandrings by the frequent admittance of contrary objects will work in us a conformity to the nature and purity of that God which we behold with wonder that we may converse here on earth as so many mortal Gods that as God is present every where and yet receiveth no contagion from any place present with the wicked yet is Justice it self present with the adulterer yet is Purity it self tunc maximè magnus cùm homini pusillus tunc maximè optimus cùm homini non bonus tunc maximè unus cùm homini duo aut plures then most eminently great when he seems least unto man then especially best when we least feel him so then most one when we conceive of him as of two or more in his anger and in his mercy â—â— his blessings and in his curses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unchangeably one and the same So we may learn to be in the world and yet be no more spotted of the world than if we were out of the world to hear its musick yet not hearken to see its allurements and not be allured to walk in the midst of its tentations yet remain untoucht whether it fawn or frown smile or threaten amidst all its changes and varieties to abide still the same This is indeed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be made like unto God Every article of our faith leads us to some operative virtue and by the Knowledge of God we grow-up to be like him If I believe he is GOD I must fall down and worship him What he commands must be my law and I must fulfil it His Omnipotency both comforts and affrights me His Justice drives me from Presumption and his Mercy from Despair If I do not make use of him as far as he is pleased to open and reveal himself though I fall down before him and worship him yet I deny him or at best mistake him Alium enim Deum facit quem aliter cognoscit saith Tertullian He makes him another God who conceives of him otherwise than he is who calls him Just yet so live â—s if he were not so who acknowledgeth him to be the Holy one of Israel and yet leaves him for Uncleanness to be the Fountain of all blessings and yet heweth to himself broken cisterns and trusteth in the Creature *** Certainly the greater Gods Love the hotter his Anger Etiam Amor laesus irasci solet For even Love it self if you chafe and provoke it too much will wax angry And he that is jealous over us for oâ—â— good if we offend him and charge him will be jealous against us to our destruction To conclude then The consideration of these three the All-sufficiency and Providence of God his Omniscience and his Jealousie if it be serious as
which are uncertain are with great curiosity searcht into and those which are dark and obscure for any light we have past finding out are the subject of every discourse and have set mens pens and tongues a working Although even this Curiosity is from the Evil one which is alwayes as far from Knowledge as it is eager to enquire and seeks for that which cannot be sound and so passeth by those certa in paucis as Tertullian saith that which lyes naked and open in our way seeks for many things and so neglects those few which are necessary For the Devil in this is like the Lapwing which flutters and is most busie and hovers over that place which is most remote from its nest He cryes Here is Christ and there is Christ Here the truth is to be found and There it is to be found where no sign of footstep not the least shadow of it appears I will not mention these That which hath made Error a God to reign and rule amongst men by the Devils chymistry hath been attracted and wrought out of the Truth it self That worship is due unto God is not only a fundamental truth in Divinity but a principle in Nature and here it should rest But by the policie of Satan it hath been drawn to his Saints to Pictures to Statues to the Cross of Christ nay to the very Representation of it And men have learnt sub nomine religionis famulari errori as the Fathers in the third Councel of Toledo speak of the people of Spain to submit and wait upon Error under the habit of Religion and the name of Catholick and Orthodox Again if we look into the world we shall find that nothing deceives men more nothing doth more mischief amongst men then the thought that those things must needs please God which we do with a good mind and with an ardent affection and zeal and love to Religion This guilds over Murder and Covertousness and Idolatry and Sedition and all those evils which rent and wound the Church of Christ and many times pull Common-wealths in pieces Murder hath no voice Covetousness is no sin Faction is zeal for the Lord of Hosts If we can comfort our selues that we mean well and have set up the glory of God in our phansie only as a mark and when we cast an eye upon that with Jehu we drive on furiously We steal an ox to make a sacrifice we grind the face of the poor that we may afterwards build an Hospital and are very wicked all the dayes of our life that we may leave some sign of our good meaning when we are dead And this is but a sophisme a cheat put upon us by the Deceiver For though an evil intention will make an action evil yet a good one will not make an evil action good 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bonum ex causâ integra There must be a concurrence of all requisites to render an action or a person good but the absence of any one serveth to denominate them evil A bad action then and a good intention cannot well be joyned together And as ill will the Profession of Christ and a profane life the Christian and the Knave sort together the one commanding as a Law and prohibition against the other and the Christian being as a judge to condemn the Knave And yet the Devils art it is to make them friends and bring them together Though we do those things which strike at the very life and soul of Christianity yet we perswade our selves we are good Christians Though we thirst after bloud and suck-in the world though we cheat our neighbour as cunningly as the Devil doth us though we breath nothing but revenge and speak nothing but swords though we know no language but that of the Horsleach Give Give though as Tertullian spake of the heathen Gods there be many honester men in hell than our selves yet we are Saints and we alone We have made Grace not the helper but the abolisher of Nature and placed it not above Reason but against it we are so full of Grace that we have lost our Honesty our tongues are set on fire by hell and yet Anathema to that Angel who shall speak against us And this is our composition and medley as if you should bind a Sermon and a Play-book together There is another fallacie of Satan yet fallacia Divisionis by which we divide and separate those things which should be joyned together as Faith and Good works Hearing and Doing Knowledge and Practice And these two though they seem to stand at distance and be opposite one to the other yet they alwayes meet For he that is ready to joyn those things which he should separate and keep asunder will be as active to separate those things which God hath put together We are hearers of the word but hearers only the only that makes a division We have faith that we have by which we are able to remove mountains even all our sins out of our way but where is that Meekness that Humility that Piety which should demonstrate our Faith and conclude that we are Christians Certainty of salvation we all challenge but we give little diligence to make our election sure Faith may seem to be as easie a duty as Hearing which begets it and to apply the merits of our Saviour and the promises of the Gospel as easie as a Thought the work of the brain and phansie for who may not conceive and say to himself that Christ is his God and his Lord Even this is one of Satans tentations to bring in the Application of Christs merits before Repentance from dead works By this craft and subtilty it is that we thus hover aloft on the wing of contemplation that we so lose our selves in one duty that we do not appear in the other not descend to work-out our salvation and busie our selves in those actions upon the performance of which the Promises will apply themselves and Christ present himself unto us in his full beauty that we may taste how gracious he is and with comfort feel him to be our Lord and our God And therefore to resolve this fallacy we must be solicitous to preserve these duties in integritaâ—e totâ solida solid and entire For he that hath one without the other hath in effect neither Valde singula virtus destituitur si non una alii virtus virtuti suffragetur Every virtue is naked and desolate if it have not the company and aid of all What is my Hearing if I be dead to Good works What is my Faith if Malice make me worse then an Infidel What is my Assurance if Unrepentance cancel it Therefore those things which God hath joyned together let no man put asunder I will but mention one Stratagem more and so conclude It is the Devils policy when he cannot throw us into Hell at once to bring us on by degrees and by lesser sins to make way and