my Brother in the integrity of my heart and innocency of my hands have I done this That is his Plea Now God replieth of which Reply letting pass the remainder in the next Verse which concerneth the time to come so much of it as is contained in this Verse hath reference to what was already done and past and it meeteth right with Abimelech's Answer Something he had done and something he had not done he had indeed taken Sarah into his House but he had not yet come near her For that which he had done in taking her he thought he had a just excuse and he pleadeth it he did not know her to be another mans Wife and therefore as to any intent of doing wrong to the Husband he was altogether innocent But for that which he had not done in not touching her because he took her into his house with an unchast purpose he passeth that over in silence and not so much as mentioneth it So that his Answer so far as it reached was just but because it reached not home it was not full And now Almighty God fitteth it with a Reply most convenient for such an Answer admitting his Plea so far as he alledged it for what he had done in taking Abraham's Wife having done it simply out of ignorance Yea I know thou didst this in the integrity of thine heart and withal supplying that which Abimelech had omitted for what he had not done in not touching her by assigning the true cause thereof viz. his powerful restraint For I also withheld thee from sinning against me therefore suffered I thee not to touch her In the whole Verse we may observe First the manner of the Revelation namely by what means it pleased God to convey to Abimelech the knowledge of so much of his Will as he thought good to acquaint him withal it was even the same whereby he had given him the first information at Verse 3. it was by a dream And God said unto him in a dream and then after the substance of the Reply whereof again the general parts are two The former an Admission of Abimelech's Plea or an Acknowledgment of the integrity of his heart so far as he alledged it in that which he had done Yea I know that thou didst it in the integrity of thine heart The latter an Instruction or Advertisement to Abimelech to take knowledge of Gods goodness unto and providence with him in that which he had not done it was God that over-held him from doing it For I also withheld thee from sinning against me therefore suffered I thee not to touch her By occasion of those first words of the Text And God said unto him in a dream if we should enter into some Enquiries concerning the nature and use of Divine Revelations in general and in particular of Dreams the Discourse as it would not be wholly impertinent so neither altogether unprofitable Concerning all which these several Conclusions might be easily made good First that God revealed himself and his Will frequently in old times especially before the sealing of the Scriptures-Canon in sundry manners as by Visions Prophecies Extasies Oracles and other supernatural means and namely and amongst the rest by Dreams Secondly that God imparted his Will by such kind of supernatural Revelations not only to the godly and faithful though to them most frequently and especially but sometimes also to Hypocrites within the Church as to Saul and others yea and sometimes even to Infidels too out of the Church as to Pharaoh Balaam Nebuchadnezzar c. and here to Abimelech Thirdly that since the Writings of the Prophets and Apostles were made up the Scripture-Canon sealed and the Christian Church by the preaching of the Gospel become Oecomenical Dreams and other supernatural Revelations as also other things of like nature as Miracles and whatsoever more immediate and extraordinary manifestations of the Will and Power of God have ceased to be of ordinary and familiar use so as now we ought rather to suspect delusion in them than to expect direction from them Fourthly that although God have now tied us to his holy written Word as unto a perpetual infallible Rule beyond which we may not expect and against which we may not admit any other direction as from God yet he hath no where abridged himself of the power and liberty even still to intimate unto the Sons of men the knowledge of his Will and the glory of his Might by Dreams Miracles or other like supernatural manifestations if at any time either in the want of the ordinary means of the Word Sacraments and Ministry or for the present necessities of his Church or of some part thereof on for some other just cause perhaps unknown to us he shall see it expedient so to do He hath prescribed us but he hath not limited himself Fifthly that because the Devil and wicked Spirits may suggest Dreams probably foretel future events foreseen in their causes and work many strange effects in Nature applicando activa passivis which because they are without the sphere of our comprehension may to our seeming have fair appearances of Divine Revelations or Miracles when they are nothing less for the avoiding of strong delusions in this kind it is not safe for us to give easie credit to Dreams Prophecies or Miracles as Divine until upon due trial there shall appear both in the End whereto they point us a direct tendance to the advancement of Gods Glory and in the Means also they propose us a conformity unto the revealed will of God in his written Word Sixthly that so to observe our ordinary Dreams as thereby to divine or foretâ—l of future contingents or to forecast therefrom good or ill-luck as we call it in the success of our affairs is a silly and groundless but withal an unwarranted and therefore an unlawful and therefore also a damnable Superstition Seventhly that there is yet to be made a lawful yea and a very profitable use even of our ordinary Dreams and of the observing thereof and that both in Physick and Divinity Not at all by foretelling particulars of things to come but by taking from them among other things some reasonable conjectures in the general of the present estate both of our Bodies and Souls Of our Bodies first For since the predominancy of Choler Blood Flegm and Melancholy as also the differences of strength and health and diseases and distempers either by diet or passion or otherwise do cause impressions of different forms in the fancy our ordinary dreams may be a good help to lead us into those discoveries both in time of health what our natural constitution complexion and temperature is and in times of sickness from the rankness and tyranny of which of the humours the malady springeth And as of our Bodies so of our Souls too For since our Dreams for the
transgress would yet have abhorred to have defiled himself knowingly by Adultery with another mans Wife although the man were but a stranger and the woman exceeding beautiful Certainly Abimelech shall one day rise up in judgment and condemn thy filthiness and injustice whosoever thou art that committest or causest another to commit Adultery Who knowing the judgment of God that they which do such things are worthy of death either dost the same things thy self or hast pleasure in them that do them or being in place and office to punish incontinent persons by easie commutations of publick penance for a private pecuniary mulct dost at once both beguilty thine own Conscience with fordid Bribery and embolden the Adulterer to commit that sin again without fear from which he hath once escaped without shame or so much as valuable loss And thus much for that first Observation The next thing we shall observe from Gods approving of Abimelech's answer and acknowledgment of the integrity of his heart is That some ignorance hath the weight of a just excuse For we noted before that Ignorance was the ground of his Plea He had indeed taken Sarah into his house who was another mans Wife but he hopeth that shall not be imputed to him as a fault because he knew not she was a married woman the parties themselves upon enquiry having informed him otherwise And therefore he appealeth to God himself the trier and judger of mens hearts whether he were not innocent in this matter and God giveth sentence with him Yea I know that thou didst this in the integrity of thine heart Where you see his ignorance is allowed for a sufficient excuse For our clearer understanding of which point that I may not wade farther into that great question so much mooted among Divines than is pertinent to this story of Abimelech and may be useful for us thence viz. Whether or no or how far Ignorance and Error may excuse or lessen sinful Actions proceeding therefrom in point of Conscience let us first lay down one general certain and fundamental ground whereupon indeed dependeth especially the resolution of almost all those difficulties that may occur in this and many other like Questions And that is this It is a condition so essential to every sin to be Voluntary that all other circumstances and respects laid aside every sin is simply and absolutely by so much greater or lesser by how much it is more or less voluntary For whereas there are in the reasonable soul three prime Faculties from whence all humane Actions flow the Understanding the Will and the sensual Appetite or Affections all of these concur indeed to every Action properly Humane yet so as the Will carrieth the greatest sway and is therefore the justest measure of the Moral goodness or badness thereof In any of the three there may be a fault all of them being depraved in the state of corrupt nature and the very truth is there is in every sin every complete sin a fault in every of the three And therefore all sins by reason of the blindness of the Understanding may be called Ignorances and by reason of the impotency of the Affections Infirmities and by reason of the perverseness of the Will Rebellions But for the most part it falleth out so that although all the three be faulty yet the obliquity of the sinful Action springeth most immediately and chiefly from the special default of some one or other of the three If the main defect be in the Understanding not apprehending that good it should or not aright the sin arising from such defect we call more properly a sin of Ignorance If the main defect be in the Affections some passion blinding or corrupting the Judgment the sin arising from such defect we call a sin of Infirmity If the main defect be in the Will with perverse resolution bent upon any evil the sin arising from such wilfulness we call a Rebellion or a sin of Presumption And certainly these sins of Presumption are the greatest of the three because the wilfullest and those of Ignorance the least because there is in them the least disorder of the Will which doth its office in some measure in following the guidance of the understanding the greater fault being rather in the understanding for misguiding it And of sins of Ignorance compared one with another that is ever the least wherein the defect is greater in the understanding and in the will less From this Principle do issue sundry material conclusions and namely amongst many other most pertinently to our purpose these two The one that all Error and Ignorance doth not always and wholly excuse from sin The other that yet some kind of Ignorance and Error doth excuse from sin sometimes wholly but very often at least in part The whole truth of both these conclusions we may see in this one action of Abimelesh in taking Sarah into his house In him there was a twofold Error and thence also a twofold Ignorance The one was an Error in universali Ignorantia Iuris as they call it concerning the nature of Fornication which being a heinous sin he took to be either none at all or a very small one The other was an error in particulari Ignorantia Facti concerning the personal condition and relation of Sarah to Abraham whose Sister he thought her to be and not Wife though she were both That former Ignorance Ignorantia Iuris in Abimelech was in some degree voluntary For Abimelech had in him the common Principles of the Law of Nature by the light whereof if he had been careful to have improved it but even so far as right reason might have led a prudent and dispassionate natural man he might have discerned in the most simple Fornication such incongruity with those Principles as might have sufficiently convinced him of the unlawfulness thereof It is presumed that all Ignorance of that which a man is bound to know and may know if he be not wanting to himself is so far forth wilful Now Abimelech was bound to know that all carnal knowledge of man and woman out of the state of Wedlock was simply unlawful and so much if he had not been wanting to himself in the use of his Naturals he might have known and therefore it was a kind of wilful ignorance in him in some degree that he did not know it And therefore further he cannot be wholly excused from sin in taking Sarah notwithstanding both that and his other ignorance for although he did not know her to be Abraham's Wife yet he knew well enough she was not his own wife and being not so to him whatsoever she was to Abraham it skilled not he should certainly not have taken her To plead Ignorance that he knew not Fornication to be a sin would little help him in this case For men must know they stand answerable unto God for their Actions not meerly according to the knowledge which they ought
Education Custom Tradition the Tyranny of their Leaders the fashion of the times not without some shew also of Piety and Devotion and themselves withal having such slender means of better knowledge though it cannot wholly excuse them from sin without repentance damnable yet it much lesseneth and qualifieth the sinfulness of their Idolatry arguing that their continuance therein was more from other prejudices than from a wilful contempt of Gods holy word and Will And as for their Repentance it is as certain that as many of them as are saved did repent of their Idolatries as it is certain no Idolater nor other sinner can be saved without Repentance But then there is a double difference to be observed between Repentance for ignorances and for known sins The one is that known sins must be confessed and repented of and pardon asked for them in particular every one singly by it self I mean for the kinds though not ever for the individuals every kind by it self at least where God alloweth time and leisure to the Penitent to call himself to a punctual examination of his life past and doth not by sudden death or by some disease that taketh away the use of reason deprive him of opportunity to do that Whereas for Ignorances it is enough to wrap them up all together in a general and implicite Confession and to crave pardon for them by the lump as David doth in Psalm 19. Who can understand all his Errors Lord cleanse thou me from my secret sins The other difference is that known sins are not truly repented of but where they are forsaken and it is but an hypocritical semblance of penance without the truth of the thing where is no care neither endeavour of reformation But ignorances may be faithfully repented of and yet still continued in The reason because they may be repented of in the general and in the lump without special knowledge that they are sins but without such special knowledge they cannot be reformed Some of our fore-fathers then might not only live in Popish Idolatry but even die in an Idolatrous act breathing out their last with their lips at a Crucifix and an Ave-mary in their thoughts and yet have truly repented though but in the general and in the crowd of their unknown sins even of those very sins and have at the same instant true Faith in Jesus Christ and other Graces accompanying salvation But why then may not I will some Popeling say continue as I am and yet come to Heaven as well as they continued what they were and yet went to Heaven If I be an Idolater it is out of my Error and Ignorance and if that general Prayer unto God at the last to forgive me all my Ignorances will serve the turn I may run the same course I do without danger or fear God will be merciful to me for what I do ignorantly Not to preclude all possibility of mercy from thee or from any sinner Consider yet there is a great difference between their state and thine between thine ignorance and theirs They had but a very small enjoyance of the light of Gods Word hid from them under two bushels for sureness under the bushel of a Tyrannous Clergy that if any man should be able to understand the books he might not have them and under the bushel of an unknown tongue that if any man should chance to get the books he might not understand them Whereas to thee the light is holden forth and set on a Candlestiâ—k the books open the language plain legible and familiar They had eyes but saw not because the light was kept from and the land was dark about them as the darkness of Egypt But thou livest as in a Goshen where the light encompasseth thee in on all sides where there are burning and shining lamps in every corner of the land Yet is thy blindness greater for who so blind as he that will not see and more inexcusable because thou shuttest thine eyes against the light lest thou shouldest see and be converted and God should heal thee Briefly they wanted the light thou shunnest it they lived in darkness thou delightest in it their ignorance was simple thine affected and wilful And therefore although we doubt not but that the times of their ignorance God winked at yet thou hast no warrant to presume that God will also in these times wink at thee who rejectest the counsel of God against thine own soul and for want of love and affection to the truth are justly given over to strong delusions to believe Fables and put thy confidence in things that are lies So much for that matter Secondly Here is a needful admonition for us all not to flatter our selves for our ignorance of those things that concern us in our general or particular Callings as if for that ignorance our reckoning should be easier at the day of judgment Ignorance indeed excuseth sometimes sometimes lesseneth a fault but yet not all ignorance all faults not wilful and affected ignorance any fault Nay it is so far from doing that that on the contrary it maketh the offence much more grievous and the offender much more inexcusable A heedless servant that neither knoweth nor doth his Masters will deserveth some stripes A stubborn servant that knoweth it and yet transgresseth it deserveth more stripes But worse than them both is that ungracious servant who fearing his Master will appoint him something he had rather let alone keepeth himself out of the way beforehand and micheth in a corner out of sight of purpose that he might not know his Masters will that so he may after stand upon it when he is chidden and say He knew it not such an untoward servant deserveth yet more stripes Would the Spirit of God think you in the Scripture so often call upon us to get the knowledge of Gods will and to increase therein or would he commence his suit against a land and enter his action against the people thereof for want of such knowledge if ignorance were better or safer Oh it is a fearful thing for a man to shaâ—â— instruction and to say he desireth not the knowledge of God Noluerunt intelligere ut bene agerent When men are once come to that pass that they will not understand nor seek after God when they hate the light because they take pleasure in the works of darkness when they are afraid to know too much lest their hearts should condemn them for not doing thereafter when like the deaf Adder they stop their ears against the voice of the charmer for fear they should be charmed by the power of that voice out of their crooked and Serpentine courses when they are so resolved to take freedom to sin that they chuse to be still Ignorant rather than hazard the forgoing of any part of that freedom what do they but even run
Books writ ex professo against the being of any original sin and that Adam by his fall transmitted some calamity only but no Crime to his Posterity the good old man was exceedingly troubled and bewailed the misery of those licentious times and seem'd to wonder save that the times were such that any should write or be permitted to publish any Error so contradictory to truth and the Doctrine of the Church of England established as he truly said by clear evidence of Scripture and the just and supreme power of this Nation both Sacred and Civil I name not the Books nor their Authors which are not unknown to learned men and I wish they had never been known because both the Doctrine and the unadvis'd Abettors of it are anâ— shall be to me Apocryphâ—l Another little story I must not pass in silence being an Argument of Dr. Sanderson's Piety great Ability and Judgment as a Casuist Discoursing with an honourable Person whose Piety I value more than his Nobility and Learning though both be great about a case of Conscience concerning Oaths and Vows their Nature and Obligation in which for some particular Reasons he then desired more fully to be inform'd I commended to him Dr. Sanderson's Book De Iuramento which having read with great satisfaction he ask'd me If I thought the Doctor could be induced to write Cases of Conscience if he might have an honorary Pension allow'd him to furnish him with Books for that purpose I told him I believe he would and in a Letter to the Doctor told him what great satisfaction that Honourable Person and many more had reaped by reading his Book De Iuramento and ask'd him whether he would be pleas'd for the benefit of the Church to write some Tract of Cases of Conscience He reply'd That he was glad that any had received any benefit by his Books and added further That if any future Tract of his could bring such benefit to any as we seem'd to say his former had done he would willingly though without any Pension set about that work Having received this answer that honourable Person before mention'd did by my hands return 50 l. to the good Doctor whose condition then as most good mens at that time were was but low and he presently revised finished and published that excellent Book De Conscientiâ A Book little in bulk but not so if we consider the benefit an intelligent Reader may receive by it For there are so many general Propositions concerning Conscience the Nature and Obligation of it explained and proved with such firm consequence and evidence of Reason that he who reads remembers and can with prudence pertinently apply them Hic nunc to particular Cases may by their light and help rationally resolve a thousand particular doubts and scruples of Conscience Here you may see the Charity of that honourable Person in promoting and the Piety and Industry of the good Doctor in performing that excellent work And here I shall add the Judgment of that learned and pious Prelate concerning a passage very pertinent to our present purpose When he was in Oxon and read his publick Lectures in the Schools as Regius Professor of Divinity and by the truth of his Positions and evidences of his Proofs gave great content and satisfaction to all his hearers especially in his clear Resolutions of all difficult Cases which occur'd in the Explication of the subject matter of his Lectures a Person of Quality yet alive privately ask'd him What course a young Divine should take in his Studies to enable him to be a good Casuist His answer was That a convenient understanding of the Learned Languages at least of Hebrew Greek Latin and a sufficient knowledge of Arts and Sciences presuppos'd There were two things in humane Literature a comprehension of which would be of very great use to enable a man to be a rational and able Casuist which otherwise was very difficult if not impossible 1. A convenient knowledge of Moral Philosophy especially that part of it which treats of the Nature of Humane Actions To know quid sit actus humanus spontaneus invitus mixtus unde habent bonitatem malitiam moralem an ex genere objecto vel ex circumstantiis How the variety of circumstances varies the goodness or evil of humane Actions How far knowledge and ignorance may aggravate or excuse increase or diminish the goodness or evil of our Actions For every Case of Conscience being only this Is this Action good or bad May I do it or may I not He who in these knows not how and whence humane Actions become morally good and evil never can in Hypothesi rationally and certainly determine whether this or that particular Action be so 2. The second thing which he said would be a great help and advantage to a Casuist was a convenient knowledge of the Nature and Obligation of Laws in general To know what a Law is what a natural and a Positive Law what 's required to the Latio dispensatio derogatio vel abrogatio legis what promulgation is antecedently required to the Obligation of any Positive Law what ignorance takes off the Obligation of a Law or does excuse diminish or aggravate the transgression For every Case of Conscience being only this Is this lawful for me or is it not and the Law the only Rule and Measure by which I must judg of the lawfulness or unlawfulness of any Action It evidently follows that he who in these knows not the Nature and Obligation of Laws never can be a good Casuist or rationally assure himself or others of the lawfulness or unlawfulness of Actions in particular This was the Judgment and good counsel of that learned and pious Prelate and having by long experience found the truth and benefit of it I conceive I could not without ingratitude to him and want of charity to others conceal it Pray pardon this rude and I fear impertinent Scrible which if nothing else may signifie thus much that I am willing to obey your Desires and am indeed London May 10. 1678. Your affectionate Friend Thomas Lincoln THE PREFACE TO THE READER HOW these Sermons will be looked upon if at all looked upon by the men of the Times is no very â—ard matter to conjecture I confess they are not A-la mode nor fitted to the Palate of those men who are resolved before-hand without tasting or trial to nauseate as unsavoury and unwholesome whatsoever shall be tendered unto them from the hand of an Episcopal Divine And therefore the republishing of them in this state of Church-affairs now the things so much contended for in some of them are worn out of date and thrown aside will be deemed at least a very unseasonable Undertaking to as much purpose perhaps it will be said as if a man would this year re-print an Almanack for the Last For the latter part of the Objection at the peril be it of those that had the hardiness
and the office of teaching and instructing others And such men should not be weaklings Secondly Ours are such as take themselves to have far more knowledge and understanding and insight in the Scriptures and all divine Learning than other men such as between pity and scorn seem most to wonder at the ignorance and simplicity of the vulgar and to lament which is God knoweth lamentable enough though not comparable to what it was within not many years since the want of knowledge and the unsufficiency of some of the Clergie in the Land And with what reason should these men expect the priviledge of Weak ones Thirdly Our Church hath sufficiently declared and published the innocency of her purpose and meaning in enjoyning the Ceremonies nor so only but hath been content to hear and receive and admit the Objections and Reasons of the Refusers and have taken pains to answer and satisfie to the full all that ever yet could be said in that behalf And therefore it is vanity for these men or their Friends in their behalf to alledge weakness where all good means have been plentifully used for full information in the points in doubt Lastly Upon the premisses it doth appear that the weakness of our Brethren pretended by those that are willing to speak favourably of them proceedeth for the most part not so much out of simple ignorance arising from the defect either of understanding or means as out of an ignorance at the best in some degree of wilfulness and affectation in not seeking or not admitting such ingenuous satisfaction as they might have by Reason if not out of the poyson of corrupt and carnal affections as they give us sometimes but too much cause to suspect of pride of singularity of envy of contention of factious admiring some mens persons By which and other like partial affections mens judgments become oftentimes so blinded that of unwilling at the first they become at length unable to discern things with that freedom and ingenuity they should And so the Cases differ in regard of the Persons They differ thirdly in the Practice of the Persons There the strong did eat because he was well assured he might do it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Verse before my Text and the weak did no more but forbear eating as indeed he might do no Authority interposing to the contrary But here we conform not only because we know we may lawfully do it but for that we know we must of necessity do it as bound thereunto in obedience to lawful Authority and in the conscience we ought to make of such obedience And the refusers do not only de facto not conform to the contempt of Authority and the scandal of others but they stand in it too and trouble the peace of the Church by their restless Petitions and Supplications and Admonitions and other publications of the reasons and grounds of their such refusal And verily this Countrey and the County hath been not the least busie in these factious and tumultuous courses both in troubling our most gracious judicious and religious Sovereign with their Petitions and also in publishing their Reasons in a Book called The Abridgment Printed 1605. to their own shame and the shame of their Countrey He who as I have been informed was thought to have had a chief hand in the collecting of those Reasons and Printing of that Book was for his obstinate refusal of Conformity justly deprived from his Benefice in this Diocess and thereupon relinquished his Ministery for a time betaking himself to another Calling so depriving the Church and People of God of the fruit and benefit of those excellent gifts which were in him But since that time he hath upon better and more advised judgment Subscribed and Conformed and the Church like an indulgent Mother hath not only received him into her bosom again but hath restored him too though not to the same yet to a Benefice elsewhere of far greater value Lastly There is difference in the faulty carriage of the persons and that on both parts especially on ours For though our Non-Conforming Brethren condemn us with much liberty of speech and spirit having yet less reason for it than the weak Romans had for the strong among them might have forborn some things for the weak's sake and it would have well become them for the avoiding of scandal so to have done which we cannot do without greater scandal in the open contempt of lawful Authority yet we do not despise them I mean with allowance from the Church if particular men do more than they should it is their private fault and ought not to be imputed to us or to our Church but use all good means we can to draw them to moderate courses and just obedience although they better deserve to be despised than the weak Romans did they being truly Weak ours Obstinate they Timorons ours also Contemptuous Now these differences are opened betwixt the Case in my Text and the Case of the Church we may the better judge how far forth Saint Paul's advice here given to the Romans in their case of eating and not-eating ought to rule us in our case of conforming and not-conforming in point of Ceremony And first of not despising then of not judging The ground of the Apostles precept for not despising him that ate not was his Weakness So far then as this ground holdeth in our case this precept is to be extended and no further And we are hereby bound not to despise our Non-conforming Brethren so far forth as it may probably appear to us they are weak and not wilful But so far forth as by their courses and proceedings it may be reasonably thought their refusal proceedeth from corrupt or partial affections or is apparently maintained with Obstinacy and Contempt I take it we may notwithstanding the Apostles admonition in my Text in some sort even despise them But because they think they are not so well and fairly dealt withal as they should be Let us consider their particular grievances wherein they take themselves despised and examine how just they are They say first they are despised in being scoffed and flouted and derided by loose companions and by profane or Popishly affected persons in being stiled Puritans and Brethren and Precisians and having many jests and fooleries fastned upon them whereof they are not guilty They are secondly despised they say in that when they are convented before the Bishops and others in Authority they cannot have the favour of an indifferent Hearing but are proceeded against as far as Suspension and sometimes Deprivation without taking their Answers to what is objected or giving Answers to what they object Thirdly in that many honest and religious men of excellent and useful gifts cannot be permitted the liberty of their Consciences and the free exercise of their Ministery only for standing out in these things which our selves cannot but confess to
fortunate success of his damned Plots and witty Villainies That a weak Prophet should have heart and face enough to proclaim judgment against an Oppressing King in the prime of his Jollity That a bloody Tyrant should tremble at the voice of a poor Prophet and the rest some of which we shall have occasion to take in incidentally in our passage along mark we well but this close of the Chapter in the words of my Text And it will be hard to say whether it can contain matter more Strange or more Comfortable Comfortable in that Gods mercy is so exceedingly magnified and such strong assurance given to the truly penitent of finding gracious Acceptance at the hands of their God when they find him so apprehensive of but an outward enforced semblance of Contrition from the hands of an Hypocrite Strange in that Gods mercy is here magnified even to the hazard of other his divine perfections his Holiness his Truth his Iustice. For each of these is made in some sort questionable that so his Mercy might stand clear and unquestioned A rotten hearted Hypocrite humbleth himself outwardly but repenteth not truly and God accepteth him and rewardeth him Here is Gods mercy in giving respect to one that ill deserved it but where is his Holiness the while being a God of pure Eyes that requireth Truth in the inward parts and will not behold iniquity thus to grace sin and countenance Hypocrisie A fearful judgment is denounced against Ahab's house for his Oppression but upon his humiliation the sentence at least part of it is reversed Here is Mercy still in revoking a sentence of destruction and if somewhat may be said for his Holiness too because it was but a temporal and temporary favour yet where is his Truth the while being a God that cannot lye and With whom is no variableness neither so much as the bare shadow of turning thus to say and unsay and to alter the thing that is gone out of his lips A Judgment is deserved by the Father upon his humiliation the execution is suspended during his life and lighteth upon the Son Here is yet more mercy in not striking the Guilty and if somewhat may be said for Gods Truth too because what was threatned though not presently is yet at last performed yet Where is his Iustice the while being a God that without respect of persons rendreth to every man according to his own works and will Not acquit the guilty neither condemn the innocent thus to sever the Guilt and the Punishment and to lay the Judgment which he spareth from the Father upon the Son from the more wicked Father upon the less wicked Son Thus God to magnifie the riches of his Mercy is content to put his Holiness and his Truth and his Iustice to a kind of venture That so his afflicted ones might know on what Object especially to fasten the Eyes of their souls not on his Holiness not on his Truth not on his Iustice not only nor chiefly on these but on his Mercy He seeketh more general glory in and would have us take more special knowledge of and affordeth us more singular comfort from his Mercy than any of the rest as if he desired we should esteem him unholy or untrue or unjust or any thing rather than unmerciful Yet is he neither unholy nor untrue nor unjust in any of his proceedings with the sons of men but righteous in all his ways and holy in all his works and true in all his words And in this particular of his proceedings with King Ahab at this time I hope by his blessed assistance so to acquit his Holiness and Truth and Iustice from all sinister imputations as that he may be not only magnified in his mercy but justified also in the rest and clear when he is judged as we shall be thereunto occasioned now and hereafter in the handling of this Scripture wherein are three main things considerable First the Ground or rather the Occasion of God's dealing so favourably with Ahab namely Ahab's humiliation Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me because he humbleth himself before me I will not c. Secondly the great Favour shewed to Ahab thereupon namely the suspension of a Judgment denounced I will not bring the evil in his days Thirdly the Limitation of that Favour it is but a Suspension for a time no utter removal of the Judgment But in his Son's days will I bring the evil upon his house Wherein we shall be occasioned to enquire how the first of these may stand with God's Holiness the second with his Truth the third with his Iustice. And first of Ahab's Humiliation Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me This Ahab was King of Israel that is King over those ten Tribes which revolted from Rehoboam the Son of Salomon and clave to Ieroboam the Son of Nebat Search the whole sacred story in the books of Kings and Chronicles and unless we will be so very charitable as notwithstanding many strong presumptions of his Hypocrisie to exempt Iehu the Son of Nimshi and that is but one of twenty we shall not find in the whole List and Catalogue of the Kings of Israel one good one that clave unto the Lord with an upright heart Twenty Kings of Israel and not one or but one good and yet than this Ahab of the twenty scarce one worse It is said in the sixteenth Chapter of this Book that Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him at verse 30. and at verse 33. that he did more to provoke the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the Kings of Israel that were before him and at verse 25. of this Chapter That there was none like unto Ahab which did sell himself to work wickedness in the sight of the Lord. An Oppressour he was and a Murderer and an Idolater and a Persecutor of that holy Truth which God had plentifully revealed by his Prophets and powerfully confirmed by Miracles and mercifully declared by many gracious deliverances even to him in such manner as that he could not but know it to be the Truth and therefore an Hypocrite and in all likelihood an obstinate Sinner against the Holy Ghost and a Cast-away This is Ahab this the man but what is his carriage what doth he he humbleth himself before the Lord. Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me The manner and occasion of his humbling is set down a little before at verse 27. And it came to pass when Ahab heard those words the words of Elijah the Prophet dealing plainly and roundly with him for his hateful Oppression and Murther that he rent his clothes and put Sackcloth upon his flesh and fasted and lay in Sackcloth and went softly And that is the humbling here spoken and allowed
the less depth of earth But the very same cause that made it put up so soon made it wither again as soon even because it wanted deepness of earth So the Hypocrite when the fit taketh him he is all on the spur there is no way with him but a new man he will become out of hand yea that he will Momento turbinis But he setteth on too violently to hold out long this reformation ripeneth too fast to be right spiritual fruit As an Horse that is good at hand but naught at length so is the Hypocrite free and fiery for a spurt but he jadeth and tireth in a journey but true Grace all to the contrary as it ripeneth for the most part by leisure so it ever lasteth longer as Philosophers say of Habits that as they are gotten hardly so they are not lost easily We heard but now that the Faith Repentance Reformation Obedience Ioy Sorrow Zeal and other the graces and affections of Hypocrites had their first motion and issue from false and erroneous grounds as Shame Fear Hope and such respects And it thence cometh to pass that where these respects cease which gave them motion the graces themselves can no more stand than a House can stand when the foundation is taken from under it The Boy that goeth to his Book no longer than his Master holdeth the rod over him the Masters back once turned away goeth the Book and he to play and right so is it with the Hypocrite Take away the rod from Pharaoh and he will be old Pharaoh still And Ahab here in this Chapter thus humbled before God at the voice of his Prophet this fit once past we see in the next Chapter regardeth neither God nor Prophet but through unbelief disobeyeth God and imprisoneth the Prophet Now then here is a wide difference between the Hypocrite and the godly man The one doth all by fits and by starts and by sudden motions and flashes whereas the other goeth on fairly and soberly in a setled constant regular course of humiliation and obedience Aristotle hath excellently taught us to distinguish between Colours that arise from passion and complexion The one he saith is scarce worth the name of a Quality or Colour because it scarce giveth denomination to the subject wherein it is If Socrates be of a pale or of an high-coloured complexion to the question Qualis est Socrates What a like man is Socrates it may be fitly answered saith Aristotle that he is a pale man or that he is a high-coloured man But when a man of another Complexion is yet pale for fear or anger or red with blushing we do not use to say neither can we say properly that he is a pale man or a high-coloured man Accordingly we are to pronounce of those good things that sometimes appear in Hypocrites We call them indeed Graces and we do well because they seem to be such and because we in Charity are to hope that they be such as they seem but they are in true Judgment nothing less than true Graces neither should they indeed if we were able to discern the falseness of them give denomination to those Hypocrites in whom they are found For why should a man from a sudden and short fit of Repentance or Zeal or Charity or Religion be called a Penitent or a Zealous or a Charitable or a Religious Man more than a man for once or twice blushing an high-coloured man Then are Graces true when they are habitual and constant and equal to themselves That is the second Note Constancy I will not trouble you with other Notes besides these Do but lay these two together and they will make a perfect good Rule for us to judge our own hearts by and to make trial of the sincerity of those good things that seem to be in us Measure them not by the present heat for that may be as much perhaps more in an Hypocrite than in a true Believer but by their Integrity and Constancy A man of a cold Complexion hath as much heat in a sharp fit of an Ague as he that is of a hot Constitution and in health and more too his Blood is more enflamed and he burneth more But whether do you think is the more kindly heat that which cometh from the violence of a Fever or that which ariseth from the condition of a man's Temper No man maketh doubt of it but this is the more kindly though that may be more sensible and intense Well then a man findeth himself hot in his Body and fain he would know whether it be calor praeter naturam or no whether a kindly and natural heat or else the Fore-runner or Symptom of some Disease There is no better way to come to that knowledge than by these two Notes Universality and Constancy First for Universality Physicians say of Heat and Sweat and such like things Universalia salutaria partialia ex morbo If a man be hot in one part and cold in another as if the Palms of his Hands burn and the Soles of his Feet be cold then all is not right but if he be of an indifferent equal heat all over that is held a good sign of Health Then for Constancy and Lasting if the Heat come by fits and starts and Paroxysms leaping eftsoons and suddenly out of one extreme into another so as the party one while gloweth as hot as fire another while is chill and cold as Ice and keepeth not at any certain stay that is an ill sign too and it is to be feared there is an Ague either bred or in breeding but if he continue at some reasonable certainty and within a good mediocrity of Heat and Cold it is thought a good sign of Health As men judge of the state of their Bodies by the like rule judge thou of the state of thy Soul First for Integrity and Universality is thy Repentance thy Obedience thy Zeal thy Hatred of sin other Graces in thee Universal equally bent upon all good equally set against all evil things it is a good sign of Grace and Sanctification in the heart But if thou repentest of one sin and persistest in another if thou obeyest one Commandment and breakest another if thou art zealous in one Point and cool in another if thou hatest one Vice and lovest another flatter not thy self too much thou hast reason to suspect all is not sound within Then for Continuance and Lasting I deny not but in case of prevailing Temptations the Godly may have sometimes uncomfortable and fearful Intermissions in the practice of godliness which yet make him not altogether Graceless as a man may have sometimes little distempers in his body through mis-dyet or otherwise and yet not be heart-sick or greater distempers too sometimes to make him sick and yet be heart whole But yet if for the most part and in the ordinary constant course of thy life thou hast the practice of repentance
less of the two viz. to say there were two Gods a good God the Author of all good things and an evil God the Author of all evil things If then we acknowledge that there is but one God and that one God good and we do all so acknowledge unless we will be more absurd than those most absurd Hereticks we must withal acknowledge all the Creatures of that one and good God to be also good He is so the causer of all that is good for Every good gift and every perfect giving descendeth from above from the Father of lights as that he is the causer only of what is good for with him is no variableness neither shadow of turning saith St. Iames. As the Sun who is Pater luminum the fountain and Father of lights whereunto St. Iames in that passage doth apparently allude giveth light to the Moon and Stars and all the lights of Heaven and causeth light wheresoever he shineth but no where causeth darkness so God the Father fountain of all goodness so communicateth goodness to every thing he produceth as that he cannot produce any thing at all but that which is good Every Creature of God then is good Which being so certainly then first to raise some Inferences from the Premisses for our farther instruction and use certainly I say Sin and Death and such things as are evil and not good are not of Gods making they are none of his Creatures for all his Creatures are good Let no man therefore say when he is tempted and overcome of sin I am tempted of God neither let any man say when he hath done evil It was God's doing God indeed preserveth the Man actuateth the Power and ordereth the Action to the glory of his Mercy or Iustice but he hath no hand at all in the sinful defect and obliquity of a wicked action There is a natural or rather transcendental Goodness Bonit as Entis as they call it in every Action even in that whereto the greatest sin adhereth and that Goodness is from God as that Action is his Creature But the Evil that cleaveth unto it is wholly from the default of the Person that committeth it and not at all from God And as for the Evils of Pain also neither are they of Gods making Deus mortem non fecit saith the Author of the Book of Wisdom God made not death neither doth he take pleasure in the destruction of the living but wicked men by their words and works have brought it upon themselves Perditio tua ex te Israel Hosea 13. O Israel thy destruction is from thy self that is both thy sin whereby thou destroyest thy self and thy Misery whereby thou art destroyed is only and wholly from thy self Certainly God is not the cause of any Evil either of Sin or Punishment Conceive it thus not the Cause of it formally and so far forth as it is Evil. For otherwise we must know that materially considered all Evils of Punishment are from God for Shall there be evil in the City and the Lord hath not done it Amos 3. 6. In Evils of sin there is no other but only that Natural or Transcendental goodness whereof we spake in the Action which goodness though it be from God yet because the Action is morally bad God is not said to do it But in Evils of Punishment there is over and besides that Natural Goodness whereby they exist a kind of Moral Goodness as we may call it after a sort improperly and by way of reduction as they are Instruments of the Iustice of God and whatsoever may be referred to Iustice may so far forth be called good and for that very goodness God may be said in some sort to be the Author of these evils of Punishment though not also of those other evils of Sin In both we must distinguish the Good from the Evil and ascribe all the Good wheresoever it be Transcendental Natural Moral or if there be any other to God alone but by no means any of the Evil. We are unthankful if we impute any good but to him and we are unjust if we impute to him any thing but good Secondly from the goodness of the least Creature guess we at the excellent goodness of the great Creator Ex pede Herculem God hath imprinted as before I said some steps and footings of his goodness in the Creatures from which we must take the best scantling we are capable of of those admirable and inexpressible and unconceivable perfections that are in him There is no beholding of the body of this Sun who dwelleth in such a a Glorious light as none can attain unto that glory would dazle with blindness the sharpest and most Eagly eye that should dare to fix it self upon it with any stedfastness enough it is for us from those rays and glimmering beams which he hath scattered upon the Creatures to gather how infinitely he exceedeth them in brightness and glory De ipso vides sed non ipsum We see his but not Him His Creatures they are our best indeed our only instructers For though his revealed Word teach us that we should never have learned from the Creatures without it yet fitted to our capacity it teacheth no otherwise than by resemblances taken from the Creatures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as St. Paul calleth it Rom. 1. the whole Latitude of that which may be known of God is manifest in the Creatures and the invisible things of God not to be understood but by things that are made St. Basil therefore calleth the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the very School where the knowledge of God is to be learned And there is a double way of teaching a twofold method of training us up into that knowledge in that school that is to say Per viam Negationis and per viam Eminentiae First Viâ Negationis look whatsoever thou findest in the Creature which savoureth of defect or imperfection and know God is not such Are they limited subject to change composition decay c Remove these from God and learn that he is infinite simple unchangeable eternal Then Viâ Eminentiae look whatsoever perfection there is in the Creature in any degree and know that the same but infinitely and incomparably more eminently is in God Is there Wisdom or Knowledge or Power or Beauty or Greatness or Goodness in any kind or in any measure in any of the Creatures Affirm the same but without measure of Godâ—â— and learn that he is infinitely wiser and skilfuller and stronger and fairer and greater and better In every good thing so differently excellent above and beyond the Creatures as that though yet they be good yet compared with him they deserve not the name of good There is none good but one that is God Mar. 10. None good as he simply and absolutely and essentially and of himself such The creatures
that they are good they have it from him and their goodness dependeth upon him and they are good but in part and insome measure and in their own kinds Whensoever therefore we find any good from or observe any goodness in any of the Creatures let us not bury our meditations there but raise them by those stairs as it were of the Creatures to contemplate the great Goodness of him their Creator We are unhappy truants if in this so richly furnished School of God's good Creatures we have not learned from them at the least so much knowledge of him and his goodness as to admire and love and depend upon it and him Look upon the workmanship and accordingly judge of the Workman Every Creature of God is good surely then the Creator must needs excel in goodness Thirdly there is in men amongst other cursed fruits of self-love an aptness to measure things not by the level of exact truth but by the model of their own apprehensions Who is there that cannot fault anothers work The Cobler could espy something amiss in Apelles his master-piece because the Picture was not drawn just according to his fancy If a thousand of us hear a Sermon scarce one of that thousand but he must shew some of that little wit he hath in disliking something or other There the Preacher was too elaborate here too loose that point he might have enlarged contracted this he might have been plainer there shewed more learning here that observation was obvious that exposition enforced that proof impertinent that illustration common that exhortation needless that reproof unseasonable one misliketh his Text another his Method a third his Stile a fourth his Voice a fifth his Memory every one something A fault more pardonable if our censures stayed at the works of men like our selves and Momus-like we did not quarrel the works of God also and charge many of his good Creatures either with manifest ill or at leastwise with unprofitableness Why was this made Or why thus What good doth this or what use of that It had perhaps been better if this or that had never been or if they had been otherwise Thus we sometimes say or think To rectifie this corruption remember this first clause of my Text Every Creature of God is good Perhaps thou seest not what good there is in some of the Creatures Like enough so but yet consider there may be much good which thou seest not Say it giveth thee no nourishment Possibly it may do thee service in some other kind Say it never yet did that yet it may do hereafter Later times have found out much good use of many Creatures whereof former ages were ignorant and why may not after-times find good in those things which do us none Say it never did nor ever shall do service to man although who can tell that yet who knoweth but it hath done or may do service to some other Creature that doth service to man Say not that neither yet this good thou mayest reap even from such Creatures as seem to afford none to take knowledge of thine own ignorance and to humble thy self thereby who art so far from comprehending the essence that thou canst not comprehend the very works of God The most unprofitable Creatures profit us at least this way Visu si non usu as Bernard speaketh if not to use them yet to see in them as in a glass Gods wisdom and our own ignorance And so they do us good if not cedendo in cibum if not exhibendo ministerium in feeding and serving us yet exercendo ingenium as the same Bernard speaketh in exercising our wits and giving us a sight of our ignorance But yet those Creatures which are apparently hurtful to us as Serpents and Wild beasts and sundry poysonous plants but above all the Devils and cursed Angels May we not say they are ill and justly both blame and hate them Even these also are good as they are the Creatures of God and the workmanship of his hands It is only through sin that they are evil either to us as the rest or in themselves as the Devils These now wicked Angels were glorious Creatures at the first by their own voluntary transgression it is that they are now the worst and the basest And as for all the other Creatures of God made to do us service they were at first and still are good in themselves if there cleaveth to them any evil whereby they become hurtful to us that is by accident and we have to thank none but our selves for that For who or what could have harmed us if we had been followers of that which was good It was not of their own accord but through our sinfulness that the Creatures became subject unto vanity and capable either to do or to suffer ill They had been still harmless if we had been still faultless it was our sin that at once forfeited both our innocency and theirs If then we see any ill in them or find any ill by them let us not lay the blame or wreak our hatred upon them let us rather bestow our blame and hatred where it is most due the blame upon our selves the hatred upon our sins If Balaam had done justly he should have spared the Ass and have corrected himself but the false Prophet doth the fault and the poor beast must bear both blame and strokes When we suffer we curse or at the easiest blame the Creatures this weather that flood such a storm hath blasted our fruits sanded our grounds shipwrack'd our wares and undone us When alas these have neither heart nor strength against us but what our selves put into them by our sins Every sense of evil therefore in or from the Creatures should work in us a sense of our disobedience unto God should encrease in us a detestation of the sins we have committed against God should teach us by condemning our selves to acquit the good Creatures of God which as they are good in themselves so should they have been ever and only good unto us if we had been true to our selves and continued good and faithful servants unto God They are all good do not thou accuse any of them and say they are evil do not thou abuse any of them and make them evil Hitherto of the first Point the goodness of the Creatures Every Creature of God is good Followeth the second which is their Use consisting in their lawfulness unto us and our liberty unto them every Creature of God is good and nothing to be refused Nothing That is most agreeable to the argument of the former verse nothing fit for food but more generally and so I rather think the Apostle intendeth no Creature of God whereof we may have use or service in any kind whatsoever Nothing which may yield us any comfortable content for the support of this life in point of
hearts not only with that joy and gladness which ariseth from the experience of the Effect viz. the refreshing of our natural strength but also joy and gladness more spiritual and sublime than that arising from the contemplation of the prime cause viz. the favour of God towards us in the face of his Son that which David calleth the light of his countenunce For as it is the kind welcome at a friends Table that maketh the chear good rather than the quaintness or variety of the dishes Super omnia vultus accessere boni so that a dinner of green herbs with love and kindness is better entertainment than a stalled Ox with bad looks so the light of Gods favourable countenance shining upon us through these things is it which putteth more true gladness into our hearts than doth the Corn and the Wine and the Oil themselves or any other outward thing that we do or can partake Now this sanctified and holy and comfortable use of the Creatures ariseth also from the Word of Gods decree even as the former degree did but not from the same decree That former issued from the decree of common Providence and so belonged unto all as that Providence is common to all But this latter degree proceedeth from that special Word of Gods decree whereby for the merits of Christ Jesus the second Adam he removeth from the Creature that curse wherein it was wrapped through the sin of the first Adam And in this the wicked have no portion as being out of Christ so as they cannot partake of Gods Creatures with any solid or sound comfort and so the Creatures remain in this degree unsanctified unto them For this reason the Scriptures stile the Faithful Primogenitos the first-born as to whom belongeth a double portion and Haeredes Mundi heirs of the World as if none but they had any good right thereunto And S. Paul deriveth our Title to the Creatures from God but by Christ All things are yours and you are Christs and Christ is Gods As if these things were none of theirs who are none of Christs And in the Verse before my Text he saith of meats that God hath created them to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth as if those that wanted Faith and Saving Knowledge did but usurp the Bread they eat And indeed it is certain the wicked have not right to the Creatures of God in such ample sort as the Godly have A kind of Right they have and we may not deny it them given them by Gods unchangeable ordinance at the creation which being a branch of that part of Gods Image in man which was of natural and not of supernatural grace might be and was foully defaced by sin but was not neither could be wholly lost as hath been already in part declared A Right then they have but such a right as reaching barely to the use cannot afford unto the user true comfort or sound peace of Conscience in such use of the Creatures For though nothing be in and of it self unclean for Every Creature of God is good yet to them that are unclean ex accidenti every Creature is unclean and polluted because it is not thus sanctified unto them by the Word of God And the very true cause of all this is the impurity of their hearts by reason of unbelief The Holy Ghost expresly assigneth this cause To the pure all things are pure but to them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure but even their mind and conscience is defiled As a nasty vessel sowreth all that is put into it so a Conscience not purified by Faith casteth pollution upon the best of Gods Creatures But what is all this to the Text may some say or what to the Point What is all this to the Duty of Thanksgiving Much every manner of way or else blame S. Paul of impertinency whose discourse should be incoherent and unjoynted if what I have now last said were beside the Text. For since the Sanctification of the Creature to our use dependeth upon the powerful and good Word of God blessing it unto us that Duty must needs be necessary to a sanctified use of the Creature without which we can have no fair assurance unto our Consciences that that Word of Blessing is proceeded out of the mouth of God And such is this Duty of Thanksgiving appointed by God as the ordinary means and proper instrument to procure that Word of Blessing from him When we have performed this sincerely and faithfully our hearts may then with a most chearful but yet humble confidence say Amen so be it in full assurance that God will joyn his Fiat to ours Crown our Amen with his and to our So be it of Faith and Hope add his of Power and Command blessing his Creatures unto us when we bless him for them and sanctifying their use to our comfort when we magnifie his goodness for the receipt You see therefore how as unseparable and undivided companions the Apostle joyneth these two together the one as the Cause the other as the Means of the Creatures sanctification it is sanctified by the Word of God and Prayer By the Word of Gods powerful decree as the sole efficient and sufficient Cause and by the Prayer of Thanksgiving for such Prayer he meaneth as either hath Thanksgiving joyned with it or else is a part of Thanksgiving or Thanksgiving a part of it by Prayer I say and Thanksgiving as the proper Means to obtain it This is the blessed effect of Thanksgiving as it is an Act of Religion And thus you have heard two grand Reasons concluding the necessity of Thanksgiving unto God in the receiving and using of his good Creatures The one considering it as an Act of Iustice because it is in the only acceptable discharge of that obligation of debt wherein we stand bound unto God for the free use of so many good Creatures The other considering it is an Act of Religion because it is the most proper and convenient Means to procure from the mouth of God a word of Blessing to sanctifie the Creatures to the uses of our lives and to the comfort of our Consciences This Thanksgiving being an Act both of Justice and Religion whensoever we either receive or use any good Creature of God without this we are unjust in the Receipt and in the Use Prophane It is now high time we should from the Premises infer something for our farther use and edification And the first Inference may be shall I say for Trial or may I not rather say for Conviction Since we shall learn thereby not so much to examine our Thankfulness how true it is as to discover our Unthankfulness how foul it is And how should that discovery cast us down to a deep condemnation of our selves for so much both Unjustice and Prophaneness when we shall find
might to have had those means considered which he had afforded them of knowledge Those means even where they are scantest being ever sufficient at the least thus far 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle speaketh Rom. 1. to leave the transgressor without excuse and to make void all pretensions of Ignorance That Error then did not wholly excuse Abimelech from sin because his Ignorance was partly wilful yet we may not deny but even that error did lessen and extenuate the sinfulness of the Action something and so excuse him in part à tanto though not à toto Because it appeareth by many evidences that his ignorance therein was not grosly affected and wilful and look how much measure you abate in the wilfulness so much weight you take off from the sin The light of Nature though to a man that could have made the best of it it had been sufficient to have discovered the vicious deformity and consequently the moral unlawfulness of Fornication yet was it nothing so clear in this particular as in many other things that concerned common equity and commutative Iustice. Besides common Opinion and the Custom of the times and Consent though corrupt Consent of most Nations in making but a light matter of it might easily carry him with the stream and make him adventure to do as most did without any scruple or so much as suspicion of such foul wickedness in a course so universally allowed and practised These respects make his wilfulness less his ignorance more pardonable and his sin more excusable And I make no question the premisses considered but that Abraham's sin in denying Sarah to be his Wife notwithstanding the equivocating trick he had to help it was by many degrees greater than was Abimelech's in taking her as being done more against knowledge and therefore more wilfully Abimelech's sin in taking her though with some degrees of wilfulness being yet a sin rather of Ignorance whereas Abraham's sin in denying her was a sin of Infirmity at the least if not much rather a sin of Presumption Now although this former Error Ignorantia Iuris could not wholly excuse Abimelech from sin in what he had done but in part only for he sinned therein by giving way to unchaste desires and purposes against the seventh Commandment yet that other Error of his Ignorantia Facti in mistaking a married woman for a single doth wholly excuse his fact from the sins of injustice in coveting and taking another mans Wife against the eighth and the tenth Commandments He had not the least injurious intent against Abraham in that kind and degree and therefore though he took his wife from him indeed yet not knowing any such matter by her especially having withal made ordinary and requisite enquiry thereafter it must be granted he did it unwittingly and therefore unwilfully and therefore also unsinfully as to that species of sin S. Augustine saith truly Peccatum ita est voluntarium ut si non sit voluntarium non est peccatum without some consent of the will no complete actual sin is committed Such ignorance therefore as preventeth à toto and cutteth off all consent of the will must needs also excuse and that à toto the Actions that proceed there-from from being sins It is clear from the words of my Text that Abimelech's heart was sincere in this action of taking Sarah from any injury intended to Abraham therein although de facto he took his wife from him because he did it ignorantly By what hath been spoken we may see in part what kind of Ignorance it is that will excuse us from sin either in whole or in part and what will not Let us now raise some profitable Inferences from this Observation First our Romish Catholicks often twit us with our fore elders What say they were they not all down-right Papists Believed as we believe Worshipped as we worship You will not say they all lived and died in Idolatry and so are damned And if they were saved in their faith why may not the same faith save us And why will not you also be of that Religion that brought them to Heaven A motive more plausible than strong the Vanity whereof our present Observation duly considered and rightly applied fully discovereth We have much reason to conceive good hope of the salvation of many of our Fore-fathers who led away with the common superstitions of those blind times might yet by those general truths which by the mercy of God were preserved amid the foulest overspreadings of Popery agreeable to the Word of God though clogged with an addition of many superstitions and Antichristian inventions withal be brought to true Faith in the Son of God unfeigned Repentance from dead works and a sincere desire and endeavour of new and holy Obedience This was the Religion that brought them to Heaven even Faith and Repentance and Obedience This is the true and the Old and Catholick Religion and this is our Religion in which we hope to find salvation and if ever any of you that miscal your selves Catholicks come to Heaven it is this Religion must carry you thither If together with this true Religion of Faith Repentance and Obedience they embraced also your additions as their blind guides then led them prayed to our Lady kneeled to an Image crept to a Cross flocked to a Mass as you now do these were their spots and their blemishes these were their hay and their stubble these were their Errors and their Ignorances And I doubt not but as S. Paul for his blasphemies and persecutions so they obtained mercy for these sins because they did them ignorantly in misbelief And upon the same ground we have cause also to hope charitably of many thousand poor souls in Italy Spain and other parts of the Christian World at this day that by the same blessed means they may obtain mercy and salvation in the end although in the mean time through ignorance they defile themselves with much foul Idolatry and many gross Superstitions But the ignorance that excuseth from sin is Ignorantia Facti according to that hath been already declared whereas theirs was Ignorantia Iuris which excuseth not And besides as they lived in the practice of that worship which we call Idolatry so they died in the same without repentance and so their case is not the same with S. Paul's who saw those his sins and sorrowed for them and forsook them But how can Idolaters living and dying so without repentance be saved It is answered that ignorance in point of fact so conditioned as hath been shewed doth so excuse à toto that an Action proceeding thence though it have a material inconformity unto the Law of God is yet not formally a sin But I do not so excuse the Idolatry of our Fore fathers as if it were not in it self a sin and that without repentance damnable But yet their Ignorance being such as it was nourished by
and compare it but with other Creatures which is but reasonable and then all the allegations aforesaid are quite beside the purpose The Soul is a most rich indeed an inestimable commodity Pretiosa anima saith Solomon Prov. 6. the precious Soul So he saith but that speech is somewhat too general he doth not tell us how precious Indeed he doth not for in truth he could not it is beyond his or any mans skill to give an exact praisement of it There is somewhat bidden for it Mic. 6. But such a contemptible price that it is rejected with scorn though it seem to sound loud thousands of Rams and ten thousands of Rivers of Oyl He that alone knew the true worth of a soul both by his natural knowledge being the eternal wisdom of God and by his experimental knowledge having bought so many and paid a full price for them our blessed Redeemer the Lord Iesus assureth us there is no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All the universal world affordeth not a valuable compensation for it Mat. 16. we will rest upon his word for this as well as we may and spare further proof 18. And then the inference will be clear that there never was in the World any such folly as sin is any such fools as sinners are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as he said and Solomon putteth the fool upon the sinner I am not able to say how oft That we should thus sell and truck away these precious Souls of ours the very exhalations and arrachements if I may so speak of the breath of God not estimable with any other thing than with the precious blood of God and that not for the whole world which had been to our incomparable disadvantage no nor yet for any great portion thereof but for a very small pittance of it whereof we can have no assurance neither that we should hold it an hour and which even whilst we have it and think to enjoy it perisheth in the using and deceiveth our expectations Which of us laying the Premisses to heart can do less than beshrew his own grievous folly for so doing and beg pardon for it at the hands of God as David did after he had numbred the people I have sinned greatly in that I have done and now I beseech thee O Lord take away mine iniquity for I have done very foolishly 19. And the more cause have we most bumbly to beg pardon for our baseness and folly herein by how much less we are any way able to excuse either of both it being our own voluntary act and deed For so is the next particular Ye have sold your selves Naturally what is blame-worthy we had rather put off upon any body else light where it will than take it home to our selves Translatio criminis the shifting of a fault is by Rhetoricians made a branch of their Art We need not go to their Schools to learn it Nature and our Mother-wit will prompt us sufficiently thereunto we brought it from the womb suck'd it from the breasts of our mother Eve This base and foolish act whereof we now speak how loth are we to own it How do we strive to lay the whole burden and blame of it upon others or if we cannot hope to get our selves quite off yet as men use to do in common payments and taxes we plead hard to have bearers and partners that may go a share with us and ease us if not à toto yet at leastwise à tanto and in some part But it will not be Still Perditio tua ex te it will fall all upon us at the last when we have done what we can 20. We have but one of these three ways to put it off a fourth I cannot imagine By making it either Gods act who is the original owner or Adams act who was our Progenitor or Satans act who is the Purchaser If any of these will hold we are well enough Let us try them all It should seem the first will for is there not Text for it How should one of them chase a thousand saith Moses except their rock had sold them Deut. 32. and God was their rock So David Psal. 44. Thou hast sold thy people for nought and sundry times in the Book of Iudges we read how God sold Israel sometimes into the hands of one enemy and sometimes of another Very right But none of all this is spoken of the Sale now in Question it is meant of another manner of Sale which is consequent to this and presupposeth it God indeed selleth us over to punishment which is the Sale meant in those places but not till we have first sold our selves over to sin which is the sale in this place We first most unjustly sell away our souls and then he most justly selleth away our bodies and our liberty and our peace and our credit and the rest 21. Let us beware then whatsoever we do we do not charge God wrongfully by making him in the least degree the Author of our sins or but so much as a party or an accessory to our follies either directly or indirectly Himself disclaimeth it utterly and casteth it all upon us Isa. 50. 1. Which of my Creditors is it to whom I have sold you If it were my deed deal punctually tell me when and where and to whom But if it were not why do you lay it to my charge Behold for your iniquities have you sold your selves It was meerly your own doing and if you suffer for it blame your selves and not me 22. Hâc non successit We must try another way and see if we can leave it upon Adam For did not he sell us many a fair year before we were in reruâ—â—â—aturâ And if the Father sell away the inheritance from his â—nborn child how can he do with all And if he cannot help it why should he be blamed for it Must our teeth be set on edge with the Grapes our Grand father ate and not we It must be confest the first Sale was his Personal Act by which he passed away both himself and all his Posterity and so were we venditi antequam editi sold a long while before we were born And that Sale is still of force against us I mean that of Original sin till it be annulled by Baptism inasmuch as being virtually in his loins when he made that Contract we are presumed to have given our virtual consent thereunto But there is another part of the Sale which lieth most against us whereto our own actual consent hath passed in confirmation and for the further ratification of our fore-fathers act when for satisfaction of some ungodly lust or other we condescended by committing sin in our own persons to strengthen Satans title to us whatever it was as much as lay in us Like the unthrifty Heir of some unthrifty Father who when he cometh at Age for a little spending-money in hand is
of both Laws Civil and Canon with the vast Tomes of Glosses Repertories Responses and Commentaries thereon and take in the Reports and year-books of our Common-Law to boot for Divinity get through a course of Councils Fathers School men Casuists Expositors Controversers of all sorts and Sects When all is done after much weariness to the flesh and in comparison thereof little satisfaction to the mind for the more knowledge we gain by all this travel the more we discern our own Ignorance and thereby but encrease our own sorrow the short of all is this and when I have said it I have done You shall evermore find try it when you will Temperance the best Physick Patience the best Law and A good Conscience the best Divinity I have done Now to God c. AD AULAM. The Tenth Sermon WHITE-HALL at a publick Fast JULY 8. 1640. Psal. 119. 75. I know O Lord that thy Iudgments are right and that thou of very faithfulness hast caused me to be troubled 1. IN which words the holy Prophet in two several Conclusions giveth unto God the Glory of those two his great Attributes that shine forth with so much lustre in all the Works of his Providence his Iustice and his Mercy The glory of his Iustice in the former conclusion I know O Lord that thy judgments are right the glory of his Mercy in the latter And that thou of very faithfulness hast caused me to be troubled And to secure us the better of the truth of both Conclusions because flesh and blood will be ready to stumble at both We have his Scio prefixed expresly to the former only but the speech being copulative intended to both I know O Lord that thy judgments are right and I know also that thou of very faithfulness hast caused me to be troubled Our order must be to begin with the Conclusions first as they lie in the Text and after that to proceed to David's knowledg of them although that stand first in the order of the words In the former Conclusion we have to consider of Two things First what these judgments of God are that David here speaketh of as the Subject and then of the righteousness thereof as the Praedicate I know O Lord that thy judgments are right 2. What Iudgments first There are judicia oris and there are judici◠operis the judgments of Gods mouth and the judgments of Gods hands Of the former there is mention at Verse 13. With my lips have I been telling of all the judgments of thy mouth And by these Iudgments are meant nothing else but the holy Law of God and his whole written Word which every where in this Psalm are indifferently called his Statutes his Commandments his Precepts his Testimonies his Iudgments And the Laws of God are therefore amongst other reasons called by the name of Iudgments because by them we come to have a right judgment whereby to discern between Good and Evil. We could not otherwise with any certainty judg what was meet for us to do and what was needful for us to shun A lege tuâ intellexi at verse 104. By thy Law have I gotten understanding St. Paul confesseth Rom. 7. that he had never rightly known what sin was if it had not been for the Law and he instanceth in that of lust which he had not known to be a sin if the Law had not said Thou shalt not covet And no question but these judgments these judicia oris are all right too for it were unreasonable to think that God should make that a rule of right to us which were it self not right We have both the name that of judgments and the thing too that they are right in the 19th Psalm Where having highly commended the Law of God under the several appellations of Law Testimonies Statutes and Commandments ver 7 and 8. the Prophet then concludeth under this name of Iudgments ver 9. The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether 3. Besides these Iudicia Oris which are Gods judgments of directions there are also Iudicia Operis which are his judgments for correction And these do ever include aliquid poenale something inflicted upon us by Almighty God as it were by way of punishment something that breedeth us Trouble or Grief The Apostle saith Heb. 12. that every chastening is grievous and so it is more or less or else it could be to us no punishment And these again are of two sorts yet not distinguished so much by the things themselves that are inflicted as by the condition of the persons on whom they are inflicted and especially by the Affection and Intention of God that inflicteth them For all whether publick calamities that light upon whole Nations Cities or other greater or lesser Societies of men such as are Pestilences Famine War Inundations unseasonable Weather and the like or private Afflictions that light upon particular Families or Persons as sickness poverty disgraces injuries death of friends and the like All these and whatsoever other of either kind may undergo a two-fold consideration in either of both which they may not unfitly be termed the Iudgments of God though in different respects 4. For either these things are sent by Almighty God in his heavy displeasure as Plagues upon his Enemies intending therein their destruction Such as were those publick judgments upon the Old World swept away with the flood upon Sodom and the other Cities consumed with fire from Heaven upon Pharaoh and his Host over-whelmed in the Red Sea upon the Canaanites spewed out of the Land for their abominations upon Ierusalem at the final destruction thereof by the Romans And those private judgments also that befel sundry particular persons as Cain Absolon Senacherib Herod and others Or else they are laid by Almighty God as gentle Corrections upon his own Children in his Fatherly love towards them and for their good to chastise them for their strayings to bring them to repentance for their sins to make them more observant and careful of their duty thence-forward to exercise their Faith and Patience and other Graces and the like Such as were those distresses that befel the whole people of Israel sundry times under Moses and in the days of their Iudges and Kings and those particular Trials and Afflictions wherewith Abraham and Ioseph and Iob and David and Paul and other the holy Saints and Servants of God were exercised in their times 5. Both the one sort and the other are called Iudgments but as I said in different respects and for different reasons Those former Plagues are called Gods Iudgments because they come from God not as a loving and merciful Father but as a just and severe Iudg who proceeding according to course of Law giveth sentence against a malefactor to cut him off And therefore this kind of judgment David earnestly deprecateth Psal. 143. Enter not into judgment with thy servant for then neither can I nor any flesh living be
of a discreet Father and the affection of a tender Mother towards the fruit of their own loyns and womb And the Apostle at large prosecuteth the resemblance and that in this very matter whereof we now speak of our heavenly Fathers correcting his children in love and for their good most accurately and comfortably in Heb. 12. 22. But to return back to the relation of friendship from which yet I have not digressed for can we have any better friends than our Parents If any of us have a friend that is lethargick or lunatick will we not put the one from his drousie seat and shake him up and make him stir about whether he will or no and tie the other in his bed hamper him with cords yea and with blows too if need be to keep him quiet though it be death to the one to be stirred and to the other to be tied Or if we have some near friend or kinsman that we wish well to and partly dependeth upon us for his livelihood that will not be advised by us but will flie out into bad company drink and quarrel and game will we not pinch him in his allowance refuse to give him entertainment set some underhand to beat him when he quarrels in his drink or to cheat him when he gameth too deep and if he will not be reclaimed otherwise get him arrested and laid up and then let him lie by it till shame and want give him some better sight and sense of his former follies Can any man now charge us truly with unfaithfulness to our friend for so doing Or is it not rather a good proof of our love and faithfulness to him Doubtless it is You know the old saying Non quòd odio habeam sed quòd amem it hath some reason in it For the love and faithfulness of a friend is not to be measured by the things done but by the affection and intention of the doer A thing may be done that carrieth the shew of much friendship with it yet with an intent to do the party a mischief Eutrapelus cuicunque nocere volebat c. As if he should put his friend upon some employment he were unmeet for of purpose to disgrace him or feed him with money in a riotous course to get a hanck over his Estate like Sauls friendship to David in giving him his Daughter to wife that she might be a snare to him to put him into the hands of the Philistines This is the basest unfaithfulness of all other sub amici fallere nomen and by many degrees worse than open hostility Let not their precious balms break my head Let the righteous rather smite me friendly saith David There may be smiting it should seem by him without violation of friendship And his wise Son Solomon preferreth the wounds of a Friend before the kisses of an Enemy These may be pleasanter but those will prove wholsomer there is treachery in these kisses but in those wounds faithfulness 23. You may perceive by what hath been said that God may cause his servants to be troubled and yet continue his love and faithfulness to them nevertheless yea moreover that he bringeth those troubles upon them out of his great love and faithfulness toward them It should make us the more willing whether God inflict or threaten whether we feel or fear any either publick calamity or personal affliction any thing that is like to breed us any grief or trouble to submit our selves to the hand of God not only with patience because he is righteous but even with thankfulness too because he is faithful therein Very meet we should apprehend the wrath of God and his just indignation against us when he striketh for he is righteous and will not correct us but for our sin Which should prick our hearts with sorrow nay rend them in pieces with through contrition that we should so unworthily provoke so gracious a God to punish us But then we must apprehend his wrath that we doubt not of his favour nor despair of staying his hand if we will but stay the course of our sins by godly repentance and reformation for he is faithful and correcteth us ever for our good Doth he take any pleasure think you in our destruction He hath sworn the contrary and dare you not believe him Doubt ye not therefore but that humility and confidence fear and hope may consist together as well as justice and mercy may in God or repentance and faith in us Presume not then to continue in sin but fear his judgments for he is righteous and will not acquit the guilty Neither yet despair of finding pardon but hope in his mercy for he is faithful and will not despise the peâ—itent I forbid no man but charge him rather as he meaneth to build his after comforts upon a firm base to lay a good foundation of repentance and godly sorrow by looking first upon Gods justice and his own sins that he may be cast down and humbled under the mighty hand of God before he presume to lay hold of any actual mercy But after he hath by this means assured the foundation let him then in Gods name proceed with his work and bring it on more and more to perfection by sweet meditations of the great love and gracious promises of our good God and his undoubted sted fastness and faithfulness therein Never giving it over till it come to that perfection of art and skill that he can spy love even in the very wrath of God Mel de petra suck honey out of the stony rock gather grapes of thorns and figs of thistles Till we attain to this I say not but we may have true hope and comfort in God which by his mercy may bring us to salvation but we have not yet that fulness of joy and peace which because by Gods grace if our own endeavours be not wanting it is attainable in this life we should press hard after of rejoycing in tribulation and counting it all joy when we fall into divers temptations 24. Somewhat a hard lesson I grant yet if we can but learn some of Davids knowledge it will be much the easier He speaketh not here you see out of a vain hope because he would fain have it so nor out of some uncertain conjecture as if perhaps it might be so but out of certain knowledge gotten by diligent and attentive study in the Word of God and by his own experience and observation I know O Lord that thy judgments are right and that thou of very faithfulness hast caused me to be troubled For the former branch of this knowledge that concerneth the righteousness of Gods judgments it is a thing soon learned I have shewed you the course already There is no more to be done but to examine our own carriage and deserving and we shall find enough I doubt not to satisfie fully in that point and therefore
there need no more be said of it All the skill is about the latter branch how we may know that it is done out of very love and faithfulness whensover God causeth us to be troubled 25. For which purpose the best help I can commend unto you for the present is to observe how variously Almighty God manifesteth his love and faithfulness to his children in all their tribulations especially in three respects every one of which marvellously setteth forth his gracious goodness towards us First the End that he aimeth at in them Secondly the Proportion that he holdeth under them and thirdly the Issues that he giveth out of them 26. For the End first He aimeth always at our good Our earthly friends do not ever so no not our Parents that love us best The Apostle telleth us and experience proveth it that they chasten us sometimes for their own pleasure He meaneth that sometimes when they are distempered with passion and in an outragious mood they beat the poor child either without cause or more than there is cause rather to satisfie their own fury than to benefit the child But he doth it always for our profit saith he Heb. 12. If I should enter here into the Common place de bono afflictionis I should not well know either where to begin or when to make an end In the whole course of Divinity I find not a field of larger scope than that is I shall therefore bring you but into one corner of it and shew you how God out of very faithfulness maketh use of these troubles for the better draining out of some of those evil corruptions that would otherwise so abound in us like noysom humours in the body that they would endanger a plethory in our souls especially these four Pride Security Worldly-mindedness and Incompassion 27. Pride must be first else is it not right And we have store of that in us Any toy puffeth us up like a bladder and filleth us full of our selves Take the instance but in our knowledge A sorry thing God knoweth he that hath most what he knoweth is not the thousandth part of what he knoweth not and yet how strangly are some over leavened with a very small pittance of it Scientia inflat the Apostle might well say knowledge puffeth up So do riches and honour and praise and valour and beauty and wit or indeed any thing A bush of hair will do it where it groweth yea and where it groweth not Now prosperity cherisheth this corruption wonderfully as ill-humours abound most in full bodies and ill weeds grow rankest in a fat earth and setteth a man so far from God and above himself that he neither well knoweth the one nor the other Our Lord then when he seeth us thus high set sendeth afflictions and troubles to take down these unkindly swellings to prick the bladder of our pride and let out some of the wind and so he bringeth us into some better acquaintance with our selves again King Philip had a Crier to put him daily in remembrance that he was but a man lest he should forget it and think himself a little God as his Son Alexander did soon after But there is no remembrancer can do this office better than affiictions can Put them in fear O Lord that the Heathen may know themselves to be but men Psal. 9. If afflictions were not would not even that be soon forgotten 28. Security is next Ease and prosperity fatteneth the heart and maketh us drousie and heavy in Gods service It casteth us into a spiritual Lethargy maketh us settle upon our lees and flatter our selves as if we were out of gunshot and no evil could reach us Soul take thine ease eat and drink thou hast provision laid up before-hand for many years yet to come Marvel not to hear ungodly men vaunt it so in a vapouring manner Psal 10 Tush I shall never be removed there shall no harm happen unto me when holy David upon some little longer continuance of prosperity than usual did almost say even as they he thought his hill so strong that he should never be removed Psal. 30. When God seeth us thus setling upon our lees he thinketh it high time to pour us from vessel to vessel to keep us from growing musty He layeth his hand upon us and shaketh us out of our dead sleep and by laying trouble upon our loyns driveth us to seek to him for remedy and succour He dealt so with David when in his prosperity he had said he should never be removed as we heard but now out of Psalm 30. the next news we hear of him is He was removed God out of very faithfulness caused him to be troubled and he was the better for it Thou didst turn away thy face from me and I was troubled Then cried I unto thee O Lord and gat me to my Lord right humbly as it there followeth in that Psalm In the time of my trouble I sought the Lord saith he elsewhere Belike in the time of his ease he either sought him not or not so carefully In their afflictions they will seek me diligently Hosea 5. but negligently enough out of affliction Absolon had a mind to speak with Ioab but Ioab had no mind to speak with him Absolon sendeth for him one messenger after another still Ioab cometh not Well thinketh Absolon he will not come but I will fetch him and so he sendeth some of his people to fire his corn-fields and that fetcheth him then he cometh running in all haste to know what the matter was So God sendeth for us messenger after messenger one Sermon after another to bring us in we little regard it but sit it out and will not come in till he fire our corn or do us some displeasure and that if any thing will bring us 29. Thirdly we are full of worldly-mindedness Adhaesit pavimento as David speaketh in this Psalm so may we say but quite in another sence Our soul cleaveth to the dust We all complain the world is naught and so it is God mend it tot us in maligno nothing but vanity and wickedness and yet as bad as it is our hearts hanker after it out of all measure And the more we prosper in it the more we grow in love with it the faster riches or honours or any of these other vanities encrease the more eagerly do we pursue them and the more fondly set our hearts upon them Only afflictions do now and then take us off somewhat and a little embitter the lusciousness of them to our taste That we have any apprehension at all of the vanity of the world we may thank for it those vexations of spirit that are interwoven therewithal Loving it as we do being so full of those vexations as it is how absurdly should we doat upon it if we should meet with nothing in it to vex us 30. Lastly we are full of
God of admirable Wisdom by whom are weighed not only the actions but also the spirits of Men and their very hearts pondered neither is there any thing that may escape his Enquiry Trust not therefore to vain excuses for certainly thy heart shall be throughly sifted and thy pretensions narrowly looked into when he taketh the matter into his consideration Doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it The next step is for Deprehension or Conviction and that grounded upon his knowledg or Omniscience And he that keepeth thy soul doth not he know it As if he had said Thou mayest by colourable pretences delude Men who are strangers to thy soul and cannot discern the thoughts and intents of the heart But there is no dissembling before him unto whose eyes all things are naked and open nor is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight He that made thy soul at the first and hath ever since kept it and still keepeth it observing every motion and inclinatinon of it he perfectly knoweth all that is in it and if there be any hidden guile in any secret corner of it tho obscured from Man's search by never so many windings and labyrinths yet he will undoubtedly find it out He that keepeth thy soul doth not he know it 3. The last step is for Retribution and that grounded upon his justice And shall not he render to every Man according to his Works As if he had said If mortal Man was to decide the Matter thou mightest have some hope that time and other means that might be used might frame him to thine own bent either to connive at a gross fault or to admit of a slender excuse But God is a most righteous Iudg not to be wrought upon by any artifice to do iniquity or to accept the persons of Men. According therefore as thy works are so without all question shall thy doom be Shall not the Iudg of all the World do right And shall not he render to every Man according to his Works 6. Thus you see the Text opened and therewithal opened a large field of matter if we should beat out every particular But that we may keep within some reasonable bounds and within the time we will hold us to these three principal points or conclusions First That the several excuses before mentioned as supposed to be pointed at in the Text may be sometimes pleaded justly and reasonably and in such case are to be admitted and allowed Secondly That they may be also all of them and are God knoweth too often pretended where there is no just cause for it Thirdly That where they are causlesly pretended tho they may blear the eyes of Men yet will they be of little avail in the sight of God Of each of these in the order as I have now proposed them and first of the first If thou sayest Behold we know it not 7. Questionless if that Allegation could never be just Solomon would wholly and absolutely have rejected it Which since he hath not done but referred it to judgment we may conclude there are times and cases wherein it will be allowed as a good and sufficient plea if it shall be said Behold we knew it not We esteem it the Fool 's Buckler and it is no better as it is many times used to say Non putâram Yet may a right honest and wise Man without the least blemish to his reputation be sometimes driven to take up the very same buckler and to use his own just defence When he is charged with it as his crime that his brother hath been oppressed and he hath not delivered him be he a private Man or be he a publick Minister of Justice it will sufficiently acquit him both in the Judgment of God and of his own heart and of all reasonable Men if he can say bonâ fide as it is in the Text Behold I knew it not The truth whereof I shall endeavour to make appear to you in each of the three forementioned respects First Men may want due information for matter of Fact or secondly Their judgments may be in suspence for point of right or Thirdly Where they perfectly comprehend both the whole business and the equity of it there may lie such rubs in the way as all the power and skill they have will not be able to avoid so that tho the cause be good they cannot tell for their lives which way to do good in it In any of which cases may they not well say Behold we knew it not 8. First They may want information for matter of Fact Not to speak of things farther off which therefore less concern us of those things that are done amongst them that live under us or near us how many passages are there that never come to our knowledg Much talk there is indeed in all our meetings and much bold censuring of the actions of those that are above us at every table Yet much of this we take up but upon trust and the credit of flying reports which are ever full of uncertainty and not seldom of malice and so we run descant upon a false ground But as for the affairs of them that are below us whereon especially the Duty of the Text is to be exercised other than what we chance to hear of obiter and by imperfect or partial relations very little thereof is brought to our ears by way of just complaint or according to pure truth And of all Men the greatest are sure evermore to know the least It is one of the unhappinesses of Princes and Magistrates and all that are in high place that whereas all their speeches and actions are upon the publick Stage exposed to the view and censure of the very meanest as a Beacon on the top of a hill open to every eye and bleak to every wind themselves on the contrary can have very little true information of those abuses and disorders in their Inferiors which it properly belongeth to them both to punish and reform If in private Families which being of a narrow compass are therefore easily looked into the Masters commonly be the last that shall hear of what is amiss therein Dedecus ille domus sciet ultimus how much more then is it improbable in a great Township in a spacious County in a vast Kingdom but that manifold â—usances and injuries should escape the knowledg of the most vigilant and conscionable Governors When both Court and City and the whole Empire rang of wanton Livia's impudent lasciviousness and Messalina's audacious courtings of Silius the Emperors themselves Augustus Father to the one and Claudius Husband to the other heard nothing of either till the news was stale every where else Principes omnia facilius quam sua cognoscunt saith the Historian concerning the one and the Satyrist concerning the other Dum res Nota urbi populo contigat Caesaris aures And no doubt but many pious and
of Bribes as a Man would shake off a Viper or other venemous beast that should offer to fasten upon his hand as Paul did at Malta Acts 28. The word that here in the Text is rendred Munus a Gift or a Bribe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Targum there rendreth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mammon dishquar whereunto that Mammon of unrighteousness mentioned Luke 16. and wherewith our Saviour would have rich Men make themselves friends may very well seem to have reference Altho I confess that phrase there may not improbably be conceived in another notion somewhat different from this to note the falseness deceitfulness and uncertainty of these worldly riches in opposition to spiritual riches a little after there called the true riches for so the words Mammon dishquar do properly import as who say the false or lying riches or in comparison of the true and durable riches falsly so called However the phrase seemeth to be proverbial and taken in the former sense to bear this meaning in that place As worldly wise Men that have Suits depending in the Courts will attempt by bestowing gifts upon him or his servants to make the Iudg their friend that so the cause may be carried on their side when it cometh to an hearing with the like wisdom should Christian Men make themselves friends of the poor who are God's favourites by giving Alms to them out of their worldly goods that so they may find favour with him at the day of judgment The proverbial use of that phrase which made me the rather observe it sheweth what was the common opinion Men held of gifts bestowed to procure favour in judgment to wit that they were the Mammon of unrighteousness And that in a double respect first As the price of an unrighteous sentence in the intention of the giver and then as a piece of unjust and unrighteous gain in the receiver prohibited by the Lord in the Law as well as the other two branches of Injustice were and that both frequently and expresly and taxed by the Prophet as a sin of a very high nature a mighty sin I know your manifold transgressions and your mighty sins they afflict the just they take a bribe and they turn aside the poor in the gate from their right Amos 5. 36. But it may be said Since we have aready comprehended all injuries under the two former heads Fraud and Oppression how cometh it to be here mentioned as a third thing and distinct from them both Either we must free it from being injurious or reduce it to one of the two Fraud or Oppression I answer in short that Bribery is properly a branch of Oppression For if the bribe be exacted or but expected yet so as that there can be little hope of a favourable or but so much as a fair hearing without it then is it a manifest oppression in the receiver because he maketh an advantage of that power wherewith he is intrusted for the administration of justice to his own proper benefit which ought not to be and is clearly an oppression But if it proceed rather from the voluntary offer of the giver for the compassing of his own ends then is it an oppression in him because thereby he getteth an advantage in the favour of the Court against his adversary and to his prejudice For observe it the greatest oppressors are ever the greatest bribers and freest of their gifts to those that may bestead them in their suits Which is one manifest cause besides the secret and just judgment of God upon them why oppressors seldom thrive in their estates near the proportion of their gettings Even because so much of what cometh in by their oppressions goeth out again for the upholding of their oppressions It was not for nothing you may well think that Solomon so yoked these two things together oppressing the poor and giving to the rich in Prov. 22. He that oppresseth the poor to encrease his riches and he that giveth to the rich shall surely come to want As he hath a spring one way so he hath a drain another way which keepeth him from rising to that excess or heighth he aimeth at 37. Bribery then is a branch of Oppression That we have cleared But yet one part of the doubt remaineth why if it belong to one of the two is it here mentioned as a third species different from both For this I say First It might be specially mentioned as a corruption more particularly incident to the Office of Iudicature in respect whereof especially Samuel now stood upon his justification whereas Frauds and most other Oppressions are of a larger and more comprehensive extent And secondly Because it hath a peculiar formality by it self whereby it differeth from other injuries of either sort in this that whereas all other whether Frauds and Oppressions are involuntary on one part for Volenti non fit injuria no Man is willing to be either defrauded or oppressed if he knew it and knew how to help it this of Bribery is done with the mutual knowledg and consent both of the Giver and Receiver 38. Which circumstance maketh it at least in this one respect somewhat worse than either of the former that whereas in other frauds and oppressions the one party only is guilty because they are done without the consent of the other party in this of Bribery both parties are guilty because both consent Neither doth this joynt consent of both parties hinder but that it is still injurious Because the injury that is hereby done is not done to either of the parties thereunto consenting supposing the consent on both parts free and spontaneous but it is done by them both to a third party namely to the adversary of him that giveth the bribe whose consent you will easily suppose never to have been asked in the business So that the injury is still done non volenti 39. Of the commonness of which sin especially in inferiour Officers who are ever and anon trucking for expedition it would be impertinent to speak from this Text wherein Samuel speaketh of it only as it might concern himself who was a Iudg. Of the heinousness of it in the sight of God and the mischief it doth to the Commonwealth when it is found in Iudges and Magistrates I shall forbear to speak the time being withal now well-nigh spent because out of the confidence I have of the sincernity of those that now hear me I deem the labour needless Only I cannot the Text offering it but touch somewhat at that property which Samuel here ascribeth to a bribe of blinding the eyes Solomon speaketh much of the powerful operation of gifts and bribes how they pacifie anger procure access into the presence of great persons and favour from them and sundry the like which are all of easie understanding and the truth of them as well as the meaning obvious But the effect here mentioned of blinding the eyes
of it as a hard imposition when he is required to restore to the right owner that which he hath unjustly taken from him that Man is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there needeth no other testimony nor evidence against him than his own Conscience to condemn him Nay I may say yet more There needeth not so much as that his own mouth will do it Ex ore tuo thou unjust Man I bid thee not answer me do but answer thy self this one question and it shall suffice If it go hard with thee to restore it back to him that hath a true right in it did it not go as hard thinkest thou with him to part with it before to thee who hadst not the same right thereunto that he had I say no more consider it well and then remember the grand Rule never to be forgotten Do as you would be done to 45. Concerning the manner of Restitution and the measure the time place persons and other circumstances thereunto belonging many things there are of considerable moment and very needful to be understood of all Men that love to deal justly which I may not now enter into Whole Volumes have bin written of this Subject and the Casuists are large in their discourses thereof But for the thing it self in general thus much is clear from the Iudicial Law of God given by Moses to the people of Israel from the Letter whereof tho Christians be free positive Laws binding none but those to whom they were given yet the Equity thereof still bindeth us as a branch of the unchangeable Law of Nature That whosoever shall have wronged his Neighbour in any thing committed to his custody or in fellowship or in any thing taken away by violence or by fraud or in detaining any found thing or the like is bound to restore it and that in integrum to the utmost farthing of what he hath taken if he be able Nor so only but beside the Principal to offer some little overplus also by way of compensation for the damage if at least the wronged party have sustained any damage thereby and unless he shall be willing freely to remit it Moses his Law speaketh of a fifth part more as if he had wronged his Neighbour to the value of twenty sheckels the restitution was to be after the rate of four and twenty See the 6th of Leviticus in the beginning of the Chapter The assignment of that proportion belonged to the Iewish people and the obligation thereof therefore expired together with that policy but yet still reason and equity require that something be done The Lord give us all hearts to do that which is equal and right and in all our dealings with others to have evermore the fear of God before our eyes knowing that of the Lord the righteous Iudg we shall in our souls receive at the last great Assize according to that we have done in our bodies here whether it be good or evil Now to God the Father c. AD POPULUM The Eighth Sermon Prov. 19. 21. There are many devices in a Man's heart nevertheless the counsel of the Lord that shall stand 1. IT being impossible for us to know God absolutely and as he is his essence being infinite and so altogether incomprehensible by any but himself the highest degree of knowledg◠we can hope to attain unto at least in this life is by way of comparison with our selves and other Creatures Whereby it is possible for us making the comparison right and remembring ever the infinite disproportion of the things compared to come to some little kind of glimmering guess what he is by finding and well considering what he is not 2. But even in this way of Learning we are oftentimes very much at a loss Because we fall for the most part either short or over in that from which we are to take our first rise towards the right knowledg of God to wit the right knowledg of our selves We do not only see very imperfectly at the best because we see but in a glass as saith the Apostle but we mistake also most an end very grosly because we are apt to make use of a false glass We think foolishly yea and wickedly too sometimes as it is Psal. 50. that God is even such an one as our selves and yet God knoweth little do we know what our selves are There is so much deceitfulness in our hearts so much vanity in our thoughts so much pride in our spirits that tho we hear daily with our ears that Man is like a thing of nought that he is altogether vanity yea lighter than vanity it self and see daily before our eyes experiments enow to convince us that all this is true yet we are willing to betray our selves into a belief that sure we are something when indeed we are nothing and to please our selves but too much in our own ways and imaginations 3. To rectify this so absurd and dangerous an Error in us absurd in the ground and dangerous in the consequents and withal to bring us by a righter understanding of our selves to a better knowledg of God useful amongst other things it is to consider the wide difference that is betwixt God's ways and ours betwixt our purposes and his For my thoughts are not your thoughts saith the Lord by the Prophet neither are your ways my ways For as the heavens are higher than the Earth so but much more than so too are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts Weigh them the one against the other in the ballance of the Sanctuary or but even by the beam of your own reason and experience so it be done impartially and you will easily acknowledg both the vanity and uncertainty of ours and the certainty and stability of his thoughts and purposes 4. We have a Proverb common amongst us that yieldeth the conclusion Man purposeth but God disposeth And this Proverb of Solomon in the Text discovereth ground enough whereform to infer that conclusion There are many devices in a Man's heart nevertheless the counsel of the Lord that shall stand And that in three remarkable differences between the one and the other therein expressed First In the different names of the things Ours are but Devices his is Counsel Secondly In their different Number Ours are Devices in the plural Number and with the express addition of multiplicity also Many Devices His but one Counsel in the Singular Thirdly In their different manner of Existing Ours are but conceived in the heart we have not strength enough to bring them forth or to give them a being ad extra many devices in a Man's heart But he is able to give his a real subsistency and to make them stand fast and firm in despight of all opposition and endeavours to the contrary The counsel of the Lord that shall stand 5. The whole amounts to these two points First When we have tossed many and various thoughts
We find it expressed with that adjunct Heb. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the immutability of his Counsel And it is here laid down as the great foundation of our Christian hope and the very strength of all our consolation Quod scripsi scripsi What he hath written in the secret Book of his determinate Counsel though it be counsel to us and uncertain until either he reveal it or the event discover it yet is it most certain in it self and altogether unchangeable We follow our own devices many times which we afterwards repent and truly our second thoughts are most an end the wiser But with God there is no after-counsel to correct the errors of the former he knoweth not any such thing as repentance it is altogether hid from his eyes He is indeed sometimes in the Scriptures said to repent as Gen. 6. and in the business of Nineveh and elsewhere But it is not ascribed unto God properly but as other humane passions and affections are as grief sorrow c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to import some actions of God eventually and according to the manner of our understanding like unto the operations which those passions produce in us but have nothing at all of the nature of those passions in them So that still that is eternally true which was spoken indeed by a false Prophet but whose spirit and tongue was at that time guided by the God of Truth Num. 23. 19. God is not a Man that he shall lye Neither the Son of Man that he should repent His Counsel therefore standeth ever one and the same not reversed by repentance or countermanded by any after counsel 18. Followeth the third Difference which consisteth in their Efficacy that is expressed in the Text by their different manner of Existing Many devices may be in a man's heart but it is not in his power to make them stand unless God will they shall never be accomplished But in despight of all the World the counsel of the Lord shall stand nothing can hinder or disappoint that but that it shall have the intended effect 19. The Heart although sometimes it be put for the appetitive part of the Soul only as being the proper seat of the desires and affections as the Head or Brain is of the conceptions or thoughts yet is it very often in Scripture and so it is here taken more largely so as to comprehend the whole Soul in all its faculties as well the apprehensive as the appetitive and consequently taketh in the Thoughts as well as the Desires of the Soul Whence we read of the thoughts of the heart of thoughts arising in the heart of thoughts proceeding from out the heart and the like The meaning then is that multitudes and variety of devices may be in a Man's head or in his heart in his thoughts and desires in his intentions and hopes but unless God give leave there they must stay He is not able to bring them on further to put them in execution and to give them a real existency They imagined such a device as they are not able to perform Psal. 21. Whatsoever high conceits Men may have of the fond imaginations of their own hearts as if they were some goodly things yet the Lord that better understandeth us than we do our selves knows all the thoughts of Men that they are but vain Psal. 94. And this he knoweth not only for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it is so by his omniscience and prescience but for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 too which is the most perfect kind of knowledg why it is so even because his hand is in it to render them vain It is he that maketh the devices of the people yea and of Princes too as it is added in some Translations to be of none effect Psal. 33. 20. Possibly the heart may be so full that it may run over make some offers outward by the mouth for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh and the tongue may boast great things and talk high It may so indeed but that boasting doth not any thing at all to further the business or to give the thoughts of the heart a firm bottom or base whereon to rest it many times rather helps to overturn them the sooner We call it vapouring and well may we so call it For as a vapour that ariseth from the earth is scattred with the wind vanisheth and cometh to nothing so are all the imaginations and devices that are conceived in the heart of Man blasted when the Lord bloweth upon them and then they come to nothing 21. But as for the Counsels of his heart they shall stand Rooted and established like the Mountains The foundation of God standeth firm though spoken by the Apostle in another sence is most true in this also What he hath purposed either himself to do or to have done by any of his Creatures shall most certainly and infallibility come to pass in every circumstance just as he hath appointed it It is established in the Heavens and tho all the Powers in Earth and Hell should joyn their forces together set to all their shoulders and strength against it and thrust sore at it to make it fall yet shall they never be able to move it or shake it much less to remove it from the place where it standeth or to overthrow it His Name is Iehovah it signifieth as much as Essence or Being 1. Not only because of the eâ—ternity of his own being and that from himself and underived from any other 2. Nor yet because he is the Author of Being to all other things that are 3. But also for that he is able to give a Being reality and subsistence to his own Will and Word to all his Purposes and Promises Da voci tuae vocem virtutiâ— What he hath appointed none can disappoint His counsel doth shall must stand My Counsel shall stand and I will do all my pleasure Isa. 46. 10. 22. The consideration of these differences hath sufficiently discovered the weakness frailty and unsuccessfulness of Mens devices on the one side and on the other side the stability unchangeableness and unfailingness of God's Counsels Whereof the consideration of the Reasons of the said differences will give us yet farther assurance and those Reasons taken from the Soveraignty the Eternity the Wisdom and the Power of God 23. First God is the prima causa the soveraign Agent and first mover in every motion and inclination of the Creature Men yea and Angels too who far excel them in strength are but secondary Agents subordinate Causes and as it were Instruments to do his Will Now the first cause hath such a necessary influence into all the operations of second causes that if the concurrence thereof be with-held their operations must cease The Provdence of God in ordering the World and the acting of the Creatures by his actuation of them is