is one 3. Pillar That one Seed to which the Promises are made is Christ. To Abraham and to his Seed as to One and that one Christ. Isaac was the Seed of Abraham Isaac stood only as a Figure of the Lord Jesus Isaac signifieth Laughter The Lord Jesus is the true Seed of Mirth and Joy When he cometh to us by his Spirit which is his proper his eternal Presence and Appearance he bringeâ—h back our Captivity from the Powers of Sin Sorrow and Death he filleth our Mouths with laughter he maketh us as those that Dream he placeth us in the midst of such glorious Persons and Things he cloatheth our Persons with so much Glory and all this by so â—asy so sweet so sudden so universal so unexpected a change that it seemeth for the greatness of the Glory more like a Dream than Truth But if Isaac here typifie the Son of God then doth Abraham stand in the place of God the Father The name signifieth The high Father of a Multitude or The Father of a high Multitude God the Father maketh the Promises to himself and to his Son Christ. Jesus Christ is the Seed to which the Promises are made and the Promised Seed the Pearl in the Casket of every Promise Thus God is one in the Gospel the Gracious Maker of the Promise the Rich Matter of the Promise the Glorious Heir of the Promise This Unity is the Love of the Gospel in which the Seed is one in the Father in Christ in all the Saints and this one Seed is the Lover the Love and the Beloved God loveth himself in his Son his Son in his Saints God Christ and the Saints lie all wrapt up in one Seed This is the Unity and this Unity the Love of the Gospel One Seed shining out and springing up thorow all into the Fellowship of all Beauties and delights with itself within itself We have set up some Lights in this verse to shew the Glories of Divine Love the more advantageously as they are presented to us v. 20. in those words God is One. Now let us draw nearer to the verse itself the Center of our discourse St Paul raiseth an Objection and answereth it v. 19. Object This is the Objection If the Gospel were before the Law of Eternal Force the only dispensation of Love Life and Righteousness why then was the Law added Ans. St. Paul answereth this Objection by Defining and Confining the Use and Times of the Law 1. St Paul defineth the end Use of the Law The Law was added because 〈◊〉 Transgression There was a fourfold use of the Law until Christ came to discover to restrain to heighten Sin to bring Condemnation and Death upon Sinners 2. The Times of the Law are câ—nfined to the coming of Christ Until thâ— Seed should come Then the Holy Apostle giveth us two Arguments to make it plain that the Law can be no more of force or have any place when Jesus Christ appeareth These two Arguments are taken from two Essential differences between the Law and the Gospel 1. Argum. The Law was ordained by Angels God appeared not under the Law in his own Person nor in that sweet and supream brightness which floweth immediately from his Face He cloathed himself with the created Light of the Angelical Nature and Glory as with a Garment In the Persons of Angels and their Beauties as under a vail he was seen and conversed with Man But when the Seed cometh which is Jesus Christ this is God in Person God in his own Essential Form and Image Now the Scene the Appearance is changed from the diversities of Angels and their Glories to the Divine Unity Now the Angels thorow which as multitudes of little Stars in the night the Light of the God-Head scattered faint glimmerings of itself vanished out of sight They resigned their weak Beams Beauties and Beings to one Sun that one Seed their Fountain the Unity of God in Christ. Here they are New-born they are made perfect they shine again in one Glory The Son of Man cometh now in the Glory of his Father in his own Glory in the Glory of all his Angels When Christ is seen in his Heavenly shape which alone is the Light of the Gospel Angels appear no more singly all Glories are seen united in their Center the Person of God in Christ. Now hear O Israel come forth and O ye Daughters of Sion the Lord your God your Jesus is one This is the first Argument and the first essential difference between the Law and the Gospel 2. Argum. The Law was ordained by Angels in the hand of a Mediator Now a Mediator is not of One but God is One v. 19. 20. Thus we are come home to the verse itself where you shall see all this discourse come home to our mark at which we aim the Fountain of all Evangelical Graces and Loves in the Unity of God We shall best understand these words by a distinction of Mediators There is a Mediator of Distance and of Unity This latter the Mediator of Unity is one with both the Parties between which he mediateth comprehendeth them both maketh both one in himself Such a Mediator Jesus Christ is in the Gospel Such a Mediator the Law hath not this place intendeth not This hath some shadow of itself in the Medium Participationis which Philosophy treateth of The Mediator of Distance is one who standeth between two to keep them apart because they cannot approach one to the other This is here meant The People of Israel said to Moses Let God speak to thee and we will hear thee But let not God speak to us any more least we die God approved of their words They have said well Thus the Law was ordained in the hand of Moses as a Mediator This we may express by the Medium Abnegationis a Mediator of Distance When the Seed cometh this Mediation this Administration the Distance and so the Law ceaseth Now God is One. Christ is the Seed Christ is come Christ hath two Natures in him but he is One Person in both Natures and that One Person the One only God God is the Person the Subsistency the Root out of which the whole Tree with all its Arms and Branches of both Natures Humane and Divine springeth in which it subsisteth from which all operations and fruits proceed to which all denominations belong which is the name to be named in all and to which every name belongeth This is Christ. The one Seed the one Spirit in all the Saints in all the Graces and Comforts of the Gospel is this Christ that one Person which is the only true God Thus God is one in all The Lord Jesus in his Heavenly Spirit and Body is the Glorious Circle of the Divine Unity in which God Christ and all the Elect Saints or Angels liâ— so close so enfolded and wrapt up mutually one in another that no Mediator can come between them that they need no Mediator
THE Rise Race and Royalty OF THE Kingdom of God IN THE Soul of MAN OPENED In several Sermons upon Matthew 18. 3. AS ALSO The Loveliness Love of Christ Set forth In several other Sermons upon Psal. 45. v. 1 2. Together with An Account of the State of a Saint's Soul and Body in Death By PETER STERRY sometimes Fellow of Emanuel Colledge in Cambridge and Late Preacher of the Gospel in London Matthew 11. 19. But Wisdom is justified of her Children LONDON Printed for Thomas Cockerill at the Three Leggs over against the Stocks-Market in the Poultry 1683. THE PUBLISHER TO THE READER Reader IF thou knew'st the Author of these following Discourses it is needless to say any thing to thee concerning him or them And if thou art still a stranger to him it is pity to detain thee from so profitable an Acquaintance as thou may'st yet most happily redeem with him by these his Excellent Works in which he has given us a much better Account of himself than it is possible now to receive from any other hand However the Publisher professes so great a Love and Veneration for his Person and is so great an Admirer of these and all other Discourses of his whicâ— he has yet seen that he dare not venture to tell thee his own thoughts of either lest he should offend against the Spring whilst he commends the Stream Vpon this and some other considerations which are to him of much weight he declines doing any thing that may pretend to look like a Preface and believes upon thy due perusal of what is here presented to thee thou wilt easily justifie his Modesty and Prudence herein Nor wilt thou then wonder that our Author and this his Book addresses thee so directly and without the recommendations of some of the Greater Lights and Rabbies of our present Times It would indeed be a new thing for a Person and Discourses so very heavenly and spiritual to receive such a complement and especially in an Age which has all along discovered such a watchful jealousie over and opposition to all the encreases and growths of Truth above the pitch and stature of Opinions and Principles commonly received among us An Age which instead of forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth unto those things which are before as the Apostle speaks Phil. 3. 13. has taken up its rest and satisfaction in present measures and attainments making them the Rule the Law the â—est and the Standard to all the further discoveries and breakings forth of God in the midst of us It has still been the Lot of the Divinest Births and Appearances of God in this lower World to be most solitary and neglected as to an outward pomp and attendance They are reserved for the Glory and Triumph of another day We read indeed of a Ruler who came to Christ by night being drawn by the fame of his Miracles and of the Multitude following him for the Loaves but upon that most spiritual Sermon of our Saviour's in the 6th chap. of John the Text tells us Many of the Disciples went back and walked no more with him And that the Twelve were themselves so stagger'd that our Lord saies unto them Will ye aâ—so go away Leaving then our Author and his Book among those excellent and best things whicâ— have alwaies stood alone in this World and been contented so to do I now apply my self to the proper service of these Lines which is to acquaint thee that these Discourses are posthumous and not designed for the Press when they were first Preached but are now made publick to answer the impâ—rtunities of particular Friends and thâ— requiring of a more universal Charity that so much Goodness should be communicative This is the reason why in the diligent perusal of this Book thou wilt find an omission of some few Heads of Discâ—urse as to the particular enlargement upon them both in the Sermons upon Matth. 18. and those upon the 45th Psalm As also why neither of those Discourses are compleatly finished Those few particular Heads being forgotten by our Author in his Original Copy which is here exactly observed and he by his death prevented bringing of either Discourse to their desired and designed perfection I must also acquaint thee that the State of a Saint's Soul and Body in death which makes the last part of this Book was intended by our Author as an Introduction only to several Sermons which he afterwards Preached upon that Argument from those two Scriptures 1 Thes. 4 14. and Heb. 2. 14 15. in which he dispatch'd the several Heads enumerated in the beginning as also those which are wanting at the end of that Discourse belonging to the first consolation and joy of death to a Saint which Sermons to the Reader 's great satisfaction had been here published as the Author 's finishing strokes to his excellent representation of Death had they not proved his own Funeral Discourses for before he could give us a Copy of them or correct one which was imperfectly taken from his mouth he died confirming to us his Belief of what he had deliver'd upon that Subject by his hastening to the highest proof thereof which is enjoyment However it is judg'd worth the Reader 's while to make what our Author design'd for the beginning of several other Discourses to be the conclusion of these it being so sweet a strain in his Dying Song and so admirable an expression of his Victory and Triumph over the King of Terrors I must also tell thee that some few Errata's have escaped the Press whiâ—h the more intelligent may rectifie as they read although for the sake of the more ordinary Readers they are careâ—ully corrected in the end of the Book 'T is hoped the Reader will not think it one that these Discourses are Printed in no bigger a Letâ—er and that we have leâ—t him no fairer a Margent because we have herein consulted his Purse and taken care he should buy as little waste Paper as was possible in the purchase of this Book Nor will the understanding Reader complain it wants the Ornament of a large empty Margent or the ostentation of one filled with Learned Quotations whilst in the reading of it he will find our Author has given him throughout his Book all manner of Humane and Divine learning after the best sort Well digested and converted into an excellent habit strength and activity of mind And now Reader I have only some few requests to present to thee for thy own sake rather then our Authours First It is probable thou maist here meet with some things which not onely from the manner of the expression but chiefly from the matter of them may be difficult and hard to be understood My request here is Thou would'st take great care not to Judge and condemn what thou art not able first to hear and understand lest by tâ—y rash Censures thou should'st blindly rush upon the hiding of power which the
Assurance ariseth from the Acknowledgment of God in the Mystery even of the Father and of Christ. The Mystery of the Gospel lies hid under the Law the Heavenly Image is covered and kept out of Sight by the Earthly All this while a Saint is apt to be looking down into himself and to judge of Love or Hatred by those Appearances which he finds of either in himself But still he finds those Appearances Mixt Unconstant Doubtful So he is ever tost from one thing to another with much Unstableness and Unquietness If he look up to God he sees Him in a Cloud thorow the Principles of the Creature in which he judgeth of God after the manner of Man and so one while he believes him to be a Sweet Friend another while an Irreconcileable Enemy But he that is truly Evangelical looks upward still like Stephen He sees with the Eye of his Spirit Heaven that Divine Image and State of things opened to him He seeth the Father and Jesus Christ standing at the Right Hand of the Father and himself in the Arms of Jesus Christ as Lazarus was seen lying in Abraham's Bosom This Discovery of the Mystery of God above gives him a full Assurance concerning the Acceptance of his Person in the Beloved One. 2. Solicitude for Affiance in Perplexities The Temper of a Legal Spirit in this Point is fitly express'd Psal. 116. 10. 11. I was greatly afflicted I said in my hast All men are Lyars While our Comforts depend upon the Forms of our Saviour's Appearing to us either Inwardly or Outwardly we are as cast off and at a Loss upon every Change When a Temptation or unexpected Trouble ariseth we are like a Ship in a Storm that hath lost its Anchor We are carried away with the violence of the Tempest Then wâ— cry All our Signs for Good have deceived us All the Marks of Divine Love which men have given us all the Encouragements and Comforts with which they have carried us on All the Manifestations and Workings which we discovered as Grounds of Assurance in our own Hearts All these have deceived us Good God whom or what shall we trust What shall we do that we may have rest in the Time of Trouble This is the uncertainty of his Comforts who is under the Law who hath not all his Comforts and Confidence wrapt up in One Spirit with Jesus Christ who is the Same without Change in the midst of all Changes Yesterday and to Day It is this alone which can make us sweetly to Rejoyce in our Infirmities and Tribulations 3. Solicitude for Light in the way While the Law is our School-master the Letter is our Way and Guide The Letter hath a Twofold Inconvenience in it First the Way of the Letter is cut out into great Diversity of Paths It is full of Windings and Turnings It hath manifold Rites and Observations in it Secondly the Letter itself is Old and Dim So the Directions which it gives us are very Dark and uncertain to us These Two Inconveniences make us perpetually full of Disputes and Doubts in our selves every step that we take whether we be in a right way or no. We never can be delivered from this Solicitude till we be brought into the High and Plain way of the Spirit in which the wayfaring Man though a Fool cannot erre 4. Solicitude For Life in the Work of Grace Rom. 8. 3. The Law being weak thorow the Flesh Heb. 7. 16. Iesus Christ is made a Priest not after the Law of a Carnal Command but after the Power of an Endless Life The Life of Grace under the Law is very Weak For the way of its Working is by Fleshly Principles It is so conveyed thorow them as if it were wrought out of them altogether In this State the Soul eats the Bread of Life with the Sweat of her Brows She is fain to till an Earth full of Bryars and Thorns She carries on the Working of Grace with much Difficulty for the present and Anxiety for the Future For the Life of Grace is weak and it puts forth itself after the Way of the Life of Reason by Parts Affections Passions Resolution Industry This way of Working by these Powers naturally carrieth along with it much Care and Vexation Whereas under the Gospel the New Earth bringeth forth the Fruit of the Spirit of its own accord according to the several Seasons and Growths of it And this is done while the Husbandman sleepeth while the Spirit lies sweetly at Rest in the Bosom of her Saviour without any Care or Toil. The Life of Grace in the Law is as Water drawn up out of a Deep Well by Buckets-full at a time But in the Gospel it is a Living Fountain springing up Freely Plentifully Uncessantly So much for the Signs of a Servile or Legal State in Religion I will conclude this Head with one Use of Consolation Application Use. Consolation You who feel not your selves carried up into the Glory of God by the Spirit as upon the Wing of an Eagle but are creeping towards Heaven like Worms upon the Ground you have great Priviledges belonging to you and a great Portion of Comfort Your Priviledges in which you that are under the Law may Glory and take Comfort are these You have an Adoption or Son-ship a Protection a Presence of Glory a Peculiar Worship a Pledge and Type you may have a Precious Seed in you 1. Priviledge Adoption or Son-ship Rom. 9. 4. You are the Israelites in the Letter or Flesh to whom pertaineth the Adoption God is your Father in a more especial way than to the Rest of Men in a nearer Relation than that of Creation You are Sons though by the Bond-woman You are begotten again of God into a New Image of Himself though this Image be in the Flesh and of the Flesh as the Mother 2. Priviledge Protection God was with all his Thousands of Angels on Mount Sinai in the midst of the Fire and Thick Darkness This was an Allegory and signified thy Heart with its Fears and Agonies under the Law in the midst of which God and His Angels dwell as a Defence over thee The Law was added because of Transgressions to Protect thee from the Power of the Devil in thy Lusts and Corruptions 3. Priviledge the Presence of Glory This is reckoned up Rom. 9. 4. The Glory The Glory is some Manifestation above the Work of Nature sent forth from God and having God present in it conversing with us by it Such was the Pillar in the Wilderness such the Smoak in the Temple the Appeapearance at the Oracle Thou also who fearest God and workest Righteousness though under the Law yet hast a Glorious Work of God upon thy Heart a Divine Appearance of God in thy Spirit a near Presence of God with it by which thou hast Access to Him and Communion with him We read of those that are near and those that are far off Thou in the State of Nature wast far oâ—f
The Spiritual Man at first lies hid under the Natural Man as Seed under the Ground So St. Paul speaks of it Gal. 3. 19. Wherefore then served the Law it was added because of Transgressions till the Seed should come to whom the Promise was made and it was ordained by Angels in the hand of a Mediator While a Man lives under the Law the Seed of Promise is not yet come that is the Spiritual Man which is One with Christ and so the Promised Seed is not come up or put forth in the Soul But it lies hid under the Ministry of Angels which restrain Sin by inward Impressions and outward Dispensations of the Good or Evil Things of this World and it lies hid under a Mediator which is the Earthly Image of God according to this Creation in which God stands as a Mediator between Man and Himself in the Spiritual Image which is the Heavenly Person of Jesus Christ. God in this Earthly Image Heightens and Suppresseth Sin by his Divided Appearances of Mercy and Wrath by his Divided Administrations of Allurement and Terror Reward and Punishment Thus God as a Mediator stands between Man and the Person of Christ hiding that Person together with the Spiritual Man which is in Christ from Man And so God converseth with Man at this Distance after this manner till the Seed come in which God and Man are no more Two but One Spirit in Jesus Christ. This is the First State of the Spiritual Man 2 Secondly the Spiritual Man breaks forth thorow the Natural Man appears in it and together with it Gal. 2. 20. I live yet not I but Christ liveth in me and the life which I live is by the Faith of the Son of God c. Christ and the Spiritual Man are joyned together by an inseparable Union When these break forth in a Man yet clothed with Flesh they draw the Person of a Man to have his Life in themselves as in his proper Principle They shew forth themselves to him as that Appearance and Image of Things in which he is to dwell The Principles of Nature are now as a Death to a Man so far as he abides in them The Fleshly Image of Things is a Prison or an Inchantment or a Whorish Woman to him He loaths the Embraces of it though he cannot quite shake it off A Saint now labours to crucify and casts off both these Yet while he is shut up in them he comforts himself in he casts himself upon the Spiritual Man and the Life of Christ which dwell in These together with him and look forth thorow these as thorow the Lattices upon him 3. The Third State of the Spiritual Man is that in which he is Absolute free from the Bonds of the Flesh no more Comprehended by but Comprehending the Natural Man in himself St. Paul speaks of this State 2 Corin. 5. 2. In this we groan earnestly desiring to be cloathed upon with our House which is from Heaven As Jesus Christ is at the same time Blessed and Glorious in Heaven yet withal living in thy Flesh who art a Member of Him and suffering with thee So thy Spiritual Man even while it is streightned here below in thy Natural Life is at Liberty above in Heaven in Jesus Christ. This Man at once comes down from Above in its full Glory upon thee and breaks forth from Below from out of thy Fleshly Life to a full Liberty And this is the House which comes down from Heaven to cloath thee that thou mayst not be naked But this House from Heaven doth not cloath thee till thy Earthly Tabernacle be dissolved in Death as appears by the first verse of that Chapter cited next before 2 Corin. 5. 1. When our Earthly Tabernacle is dissolved we have a House not made with Hands Eternal in the Heavens These are the Three States of the Spiritual Man The First of these is the Legal State of a Christian. The Second is the Evangelical State before Death The Third is the Angelical State that State to which we cannot come but by Death or a Change instead of Death when as Jesus Christ speaketh We shall be as the Angels in Heaven Thus much we have spoken of the First Distinction 2. Distinct. The Second Distinction is upon the Spiritual Man in the Evangelical State or upon an Evangelical Christian in this Life He also hath Three Distinct Growths St. Iohn speaks of all Three in One Place 1 John 2. 12. I write to you Little Children because your Sins are forgiven for his Names sake v. 13. I write unto you Fathers because you have known Him who is from the Beginning I write unto you Young Men because ye have overcome the Wicked One. I write unto you little Children because ye have known the Father v. 14. I have written unto you Fathers because ye have known Him that is from the Beginning I have written unto you Young Men because ye are strong and the Word of God abideth in you and ye have overcome the Wicked One The Apostle doubles his mention of all Three Growths for Certainty and Efficacy that we may take the more Clear and Distinct notice of it He placeth the Two Extreams the Children and Fathers First Then he puts the Middle-State in the Last Place because that is the more Remarkable and Active in the World The Children are not yet grown up to the Conflict The Fathers are past the Brunt and violence of it For the same Reason in his Repetition he adds something when he speaks of the Young Men to encourage them Now let us speak a word or two particularly of Each of these Growths 1. The First Growth of an Evangelical Christian is his Child-hood The spiritual Man when it first begins to put forth itself in us suits itself much to our Natural Capacities puts itself into Fleshly Forms and Appearances as into Swathing Bands Yet it submits and subordinates all these Appearances to the Spiritual Appearance itself in the highest and most grown State It Owns That It Depends upon That It Directs its Growth to That Thus it is a Little Child and Knows the Father 2. Secondly an Evangelical Christian comes to be a Young Man This is then when thou comest to distinguish between the Fleshly and the Spiritual Appearances of the Spiritual Man or of Jesus Christ in thee When a Saint grows strong in Spiritual Appearances when he begins to abide firm in them then he sets himself against the Fleshly Appearances because the Devil hath his Chiefest Strength and Seat in them And now thou hast overcome the Wicked One when once thou hast discovered and discerned the Fleshly Appearances from the Spiritual Life itself When thou labourest to crucify the One as fast as it Grows up that thou mayst live more abundantly in the Other thou hast now taken from the Devil his most Principal Power and Engine He is now falling apace like Lightning from Heaven in thy Soul This is
the Evil and Ugliness of Sin in the Light and Glass of their own Heavenly purity 2. Ans. Hatred is an intellectual contrariety The Unity and Love of the Divine Nature in the King of Saints and all his Holy Ones is essentially and formally in itself an irreconcilable opposition an active contrariety to Enmity and Sin as Light Day and Immortality are to Darkness Night and Death 3. Ans. God seeth Sin in order to his Wrath. God seeth his Wrath in ordeâ— to his Glory his Glory as the full object of his Love order is the Chain and Band of Unity Thus God beholdeth all at once as they lie comprehended in the Unity of Eternal Light and Love by their several Subordinations God beholdeth Sin as it is swallowed up into a flame of wrath the flame of wrath as it is heightned to a Light of Glory the Light of Glory as it shineth and liveth in the Eye of his Love the Fountain of all Lights Life and Joys Love is the Eternal and rich Root of all Glory is the Tree that springeth up out of this Root the perfect and full Image of Love in which it liveth diffuseth and delighteth itself within itself This Tree of Glory spreadeth itself into many flourishing Branches among which are Holiness Justice Wrath against Sin Wrath by the force of the contrariety raiseth up Sin as a mark to shoot its burning Arrows and cast his fiery Darts at Love thorow these Attributes letteth in Sin by the Law that it may display itself more fully in its War with its Enemy in it Conquest and Triumph over it that it may break forth and rise up thorow it more powerfully purely and sweetly like a flame going up to Heaven from a great pile of Wood perfectly subdued to it The Unity of God is now the Glass of Love in which alone God seeth alâ— Things and the Diamond which he seeth set and shining in every Ring of Operative or Permissive Providences Sin appeareth to him in the Glass of his Wrath and Justice These sheweth themselves to him by their reflections and Images in the Glass of hiâ— Glory His Glory shineth forth from the Arms and Bosom of his Love which is the inmost Center and outmost Circle of the Divine Unity Here all things lie here all things present themselves to God as Mysteries of Divinity and Love in the Unity of the Divine Nature God beholdeth with a fulness of Joy his Love the reflection of himself his own Fountain the Fountain of his blessed Unity in which he lyeth Eternally bathing himself in pure floods of Incomprehensible Pleasures this Love this Unity this Fountain he beholdeth in all his Glory His Glory is the Object of his Eye in the Severity of his Justice and Wrath. He contemplateth his Justice and Wrath alone in Sin Thus God seeth every where the Mystery of his Divine Unity as the great and bright deep of Eternity He seeth every where the Seal the express Image of his Divine Unity where all the riches of his Glory and Sweetnesses of his Love unfold themselves and sport together Thus O Saint learn to look upon every Sin See it in this Glass of Truth the mystery of the Divine Unity See this secret and invisible Jewel the mystery of the Divine Unity sealed upon it sealed up in it Thus shalt thou see Sin so as to preserve thy Purity and thy Love both in one Thou shalâ— see Sin so as to be at once a flame of Wrath to it and a Light of Glory a flame of Love in that flame of Wrath comprehending both Wrath and Sin in the Wrath. So shalt thou see Sin hate and dwell for ever with God who is the Beauty of Holiness and Love 4. Ans. God looketh upon a Sinner as upon a Prison and a Grave where the Truth the Divine Seed the Light and Life of the Divine Image lyeth detained captivated slain by a Lie the Prince of Life and Light by the Powers of Darkness His Wrath and Hatred against the Sinner is a zeal of Love He cometh forth with Thunders Lightnings Tempests and Earthquakes in his Wrath to break down the Prison walls to break open the Grave that the Prince of Glory may come forth into the Light of Life and the liberty of the Glory of a Son of God God as a Sun breaketh forth with power and in his Strength to dissolve by the force of his Beams the Inchantment and Light that the Sons of Light and the Truth may be set free Thus God hateth Sinners thus do thou hate them with a perfect Hatred Let thy fire be no bitter zeal but a zeal of Love Let thy woundings be Divine Anointings I have hitherto passed thorow only one half of my discourse upon the description of Spiritual Love by the supream Unity in the Divine Nature I shall take my ground for the other half Galat. 3. 20. This shall be my Center for a time from which my Motions shall arise and whither they shall return to end thee The words are these Now a Mediatour is not of one but God is one This Scripture hath a sweet and clear depth of Love in it but unfathomable This depth is the Unity of God St. Paul stateth here the most essential difference between the Law the Ministery of Wrath and the Gospel the Ministery of Love One is established in the hands of a Mediatour in the other God is one The Love-union in the Gospel is too near too sure too sweet to need or admit a Mediator The Fountain of all Evangelical Grace and Love is the Unity of God The Unity of the Spirit is the Band of Peace between the Uncreated and all Created Spirits Ephes. 4. 6. But we shall more clearly see the Riches Treasured up in this Scripture if we look upon it by the light of another Scripture in the same Chapter v. 16. Now the Promise was made to Abraham and his Seed he saith not to Seeds as to many but as to one And to thy Seed which is Christ. The Holy Apostle in this Chapter maketh it his work to prove that Righteousness is not by the works of the Law but by Faith in Jesus Christ according to the Gospel God descending into Christ and taking up Christ into himself Jesus Christ in this fulness and Glory of the God-Head entring into the Soul and taking the Soul into himself by the free Revelation and immediate Union of Faith This is the Righteousness of God and of his Saints in the Gospel One Argument by which St. Paul maintaineth Righteousness to be of Grace and not by Works is laid down v. 15. the Covenant of Grace was long before the Law He confirmeth that here v. 16. The Promises were made to Abraham and to his Seed c. The Holy Ghost in this verse established the Heavenly Building of the Gospel upon three beautiful and firm Pillars 1. Pillar The Gospel is a meer simple pure Promise That which was called in the verse