then this pactum this contract of mine own hand actual and habitual sin for of these one is wash'd out in water and the other in blood Ro. 7.20 in the two Sacraments But then there is Lex in membris saith the Apostle I find a law that when I would do good evil is present with me Sin assisted by me is now become a Tyrant over me and hath establish'd a government upon me and therefore is a law of sin and a law in my flesh which after the water of baptism taken and the water of penitent tears given after the blood of Christ Jesus taken and mine one blood given that is a holy readiness at that time when I am made partaker of Christs death to die for Christ throws me back by relapses into those repented sins This put the Apostle to that passionate exclamation O wretched man that I am and yet he found a deliverance even from the body of his death through Jesus Christ his Lord that is a free and open recourse and access to him in all oppressions of heart in all dejections of spirit Now when this Chirographum this band of Adams hand Original sin is cancell'd upon the Cross of Christ and this pactum this band of mine own hand actual sins wash'd away in the blood of Christ and this Lex in membris this disposition to relapse into repented sins which as a tide that does certainly come every day does come every day in one form or other is beaten back as a tide by a bank by a continual opposing the merits and the example of Christ Jesus and the practice of his fasting such other medicinal disciplines as I find to prevail against such relapses when by this blessed means the whole law against which I am a trespasser is evacuated will God condemn me for all this and not by a law when I have pleaded Christ Christ and Christ baptism and blood and tears will God condemn mean oblique way when he cannot by a direct way by a secret purpose when he hath no law to condemn me by Sad and discomposed distorted and distracted soul if it be well said in the School absurdum est disputare ex manuscriptis it is an unjust thing in controversies and disputations to press arguments out of manuscripts that cannot be seen by every man it were ill said in thy conscience that God will proceed against thee ex manuscriptis or condemn thee upon any thing which thou never sawst any unreveal'd purpose of his Suspicious soul ill-presaging soul is there something else besides the day of Judgment that the Son of man does not know disquiet soul does he not know the proceeding of that Judgment wherin himself is to be Judg but that when he hath died for thy sins and so fulfill'd the law in thy behalf thou maist be condemn'd without respect of that law and upon something that shall have had no consideration no relation to any such breach of any such law in thee Intricated entangled conscience Christ tels thee of a Judgment because thou didst not do the works of mercy not feed not cloth the poor for these were enjoyn'd thee by a law but he never tels thee of any Judgment therefore because thy name was written in a dark book of death never unclaps'd never opened unto thee in thy life He saies to the lovingly indulgently fear not for it is Gods good pleasure to give you the Kingdom but he never saies to the wickedest in the world live in fear dy in anxiety in suspition and suspension for his displeasure a displeasure conceiv'd against you before you were sinners before you were men hath thrown you out of that kingdom into utter darkness There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus The reason is added because the law of the Spirit of life hath made them free from the law of sin and of death All upon all sides is still refer'd to a law And where there is no law against thee as there is not to him that is in Christ and he is in Christ who hath endeavoured the keeping or repented the breaking of the law God wil never proceed to execution by any secret purpose ever notified never manifested Suspicious jealous scattered soul recollect thy self and give thy self that redintegration that acquiescence which the spirit of God in the means of the Church offers thee study the mysterie of godliness which is without all controversie that is endeavour to keep repent the not keeping of the law and thou art safe for that you shall be judged by is a law But then this law is called here a law of liberty and whether that denotation that it is called a law of liberty import an ease to us or heavier weight upon us is our last disquisition and conclusion of all So speak ye and so do as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty Lex libertatis That the Apostle here by the law of liberty means the Gospel was never doubted he had call'd the Gospel so before this place whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty 1.25 and continueth therein shal be blessed in his deed that is blessed in doing so blessed in conforming himself to the Gospel but why does he call it so A law of liberty not because men naturally affecting liberty might be drawn to an affection of the Gospel by proposing it in that specious name of liberty though it were not so The holy Ghost calls the Gospel a pearl and a treasure and a kingdome and joy and glory Not to allure men with false names but because men love these and the Gospel is truly all these a pearl and a treasure and a kingdome and joy and glory And it is truly a law of liberty but of what kind and in what respect not such a liberty as they have established in the Roman Church where Ecclesiastical liberty must exempt Ecclesiastical persons from participating all burdens of the State and from being traitors though they commit treason because they are Subjects to no secular Prince nor the liberty of the Anabaptist that overthrows Magistracy and consequently all subjection both Ecclesiastical Laick for when upon those words 1 Cor. 7.23 Be ye not servants of men St. Chrysostome sayes This is Christian liberty Nec aliis nec sibi servire neither to be subjects to others nor to our selves that 's spoken with modification an allegiance with relation to our first allegiance to God not to be so subject to others or to our selves as that either for their sakes or our own we depart from any necessary declaration of our service to God Deo First then the Gospel is a Law of Liberty in respect of the author of the Gospel of God himself because it leaves God at his liberty Not at liberty to judg against his Gospel where he hath manifested it for a law for he hath laid a holy necessity upon himself
the Law of Nature it self in exposing her self to that danger How far Humane Laws do binde the conscience how far they lay such an obligation upon us as that if we transgress them we do not only incur the penalty but sin towards God hath been a perplexed question in all times and in all places But how divers soever their opinions be in that they all agree in this That no Law which hath all the essential parts of a Law for Laws against God Laws beyond the power of him that pretends to make them are no Laws no Law can be so meerly a Humane Law but that there is in it a Divine part There is in every Humane Law part of the Law of God which is obedience to the Superior That Man cannot binde the conscience because he cannot judge the conscience nor he cannot absolve the conscience may be a good argument but in Laws made by that power which is ordained by God man bindes not but God himself And then you must be subject not because of wrath but because of conscience Though then the matter and subject of the Law that which the Law commands or prohibits may be an indifferent action yet in all these God hath his part and there is a certain Divine soul and spark of Gods power which goes through all Laws and inanimates them In all the Canons of the Church God hath his voice Ut omnia ordine fiant that all things be done decently and in order so the Canon that ordains that is from God in all the other Laws he hath his voice too Ut piè tranquillè vivatur That we may live peaceably and religiously and so those Laws are from God And in all of all sorts this voice of his sounds evidently qui resistit ordinationi he that resists his Commission his Lieutenancy his Authority in Law-makers appointed by him resists himself There is no Law that is meerly humane but only Lex in membris The Law in our flesh which rebels against the Law in our minde and this is a Rebellion a Tyranny no lawful Government In all true Laws God hath his interest and the observing of them in that respect as made by his authority is an act of worship and obedience to him and the transgressing of them with that relation that is a resisting or undervaluing of that authority is certainly sinne How then was Esthers act exempt from this for she went directly against a direct Law That none should come to the King uncalled Whensoever divers Laws concur and meet together that Law which comes from the superior Magistrate and is in the nature of the thing commanded highest too that Law must prevail If two Laws lie upon me and it be impossible to obey both I must obey that which comes immediately from the greatest power and imposes the greatest duty Here met in her the fix'd and permanent Law of promoting Gods glory and a new Law of the King to augment his greatness and Majesty by this retiredness and denying of ordinary access to his person Gods Law for his glory which is infinite and unsearchable and the Kings Law for his ease of which she knows the reason and the scope were in the ballance together if this Law of the King had been of any thing naturally and essentially evil in it self no circumstance could have delivered her from sin if she had done against it Though the Law were but concerning an indifferent action and of no great importance yet because Gods Authority is in every just Law if she could not have been satisfied in her conscience that that Law might admit an exception and a dispensation in her case she had sinn'd in breaking it But when she proceeded not upon any precipitation upon any singular or seditious spirit when she debated the matter temperately with a dispassioned man Mordecai when she found a reservation even in the body of the Law That if the King held up his Scepter the Law became no Law to that party when she might justly think her self out of the Law which was as Josephus delivers it Ut nemo ex domesticis accederet That none of his servants should come into his presence uncalled she was then come to that which onely can excuse and justifie the breaking of any Law that is a probable if not a certain assurance contracted Bona fide in a rectified conscience That if this present case which makes us break this Law had been known and considered when the Law was made he that made the Law would have made provision for this case No presuming of a pardon when the Law is broken no dispensation given before hand to break it can settle the Conscience nor any other way then a Declaration well grounded that that particular case was never intended to have been composed in that Law nor the reason and purpose thereof So when the Conscience of Esther was and so when the Conscience of any particular Christian is after due consideration of the matter come to a religious and temperate assurance That he may break any Law his assurance must be grounded upon this That if that Law were now to be made that case which he hath presently in hand would not be included by him that made that Law in that Law otherwise to violate a Law either because being but a Humane Law I think I am discharged paying the penalty or because I have good means to the King I may presume of a pardon in all cases where my priviledge works any other way then as we have said that is that our case is not intended in that Law it had been in Esther it should be in us a sin to transgress any Law though of a Law-nature and of an indifferent action But upon those circumstances which we mentioned before Esther might see that that Law admitted some exceptions and that no exception was likelier then this That the King for all his majestical reservedness would be content to receive information of such a dishonor done to his Queen and to her god she might justly think that that Law intended onely for the Kings ease or his state reached not to her person who was his wife nor to her case which was the destruction of all that professed her Religion It was then no sin in her to go in to the King Si Peream though not according to the Law but she may seem to have sinned in exposing her self to so certain a danger as that Law inflicted with such a resolution Si peream peream If I perish I perish How far a man may lawfully and with a good conscience forsake himself and expose himself to danger is a point of too much largeness and intricacy and perplexity to handle now The general stream of Casuists runs thus That a private man may lawfully expose himself to certain danger for the preserving of the Magistrate or of a superior person and that reason might have justified Esthers enterprise if
that our Deeds are the true seals of that love which was also love Ambrose when it was in words But Ne quod luxuriat in flore attenuetur hebetetur in fructu lest that tree that blew early and plentifully blast before it knit second your good words with actions too It is the Husbandry and the Harvest of the righteous man as it gather'd in David The Mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdom Psal 37.30 so we read it there it is in the Tongue in words onely The Vulgar hath it Meditatur He Meditates it so the heart is got in But the Original Hagah is noted to signifie fructificavit He brings forth fruits thereof and so the Hand is got in too And when that which is well spoken was well meant and hath been well expressed in Action that 's the Husbandry of the righteous Man then his Harvest is all in It is the way of God himself Philo Judaeus notes Exod. 20.18 that the people are said to have seen the noise and the voice of God because whatsoever God says it determines in Action If we may hear God we may see him what he says he does too Therefore from that example of God himself S. Gregory directs us We must says he shew our Love Et veneratione sermonis Ministerio largitatis what a fair respect in words and what a reall supply in Deeds Nay when we look upon our pattern that is God Tertullian notes well That God prevented his own speaking by Doing Benedicebat quae benefaciebat first he made all things Good and then he Blessed them that they might be better first he wrought and then he spoke And so Christs way and proceeding is presented to us too so far from not Doing when he speaks as that he Does before he speaks Acts 1.1 Luke ult 19. Christ began to Do and to Teach says S. Luke but first to Do. And He was mighty in Deeds and in words but first in Deeds We cannot write so well as our Copy to begin alwayes at Deeds as God and his Christ But yet let us labor to write so fair after it as first to afford comfortable words and though our Deeds come after yet to have them from the beginning in our intention and that we do them not because we promised but promise because we love to do good and love to lay upon our selves the obligation of a promise The instrument and Organ of Nature was the eye The Natural Man finds God in that he sees in the Creature The Organ of the Law which exalted and rectified Nature was the Hand Fac hoc vives perform the law and thou shalt live So also the Organ of the Gospel is the Ear for faith comes by hearing But then the Organ of faith it self is the Hand too A Hand that lays hold upon the Merits of Christ for my self and a Hand that delivers me over to the Church of God in a holy life and exemplary Actions for the edification of others So that All All from nature to Grace determines in Action in Doing good Sic facite Deo so do good to God in reall assisting his cause Sic facite Diis so do good to them whom God hath called Gods in reall secondings their religious purposes Sic facite Imaginibus Dei so do good to the Images of God in reall relieving his distressed Members as that you do all this upon that which is made the Reason of all in the second part of this text Because you are to be judged by the law of liberty Timor futuri judicii hujus vitae praedagogus Part. II. Basil Our School-Master to teach us to stand upright in the last judgement Judicium is the Meditation and the fear of that judgement in this life It is our School-master and School-master enough I said unto the fool Psal 75.5 thus and thus says David And I said unto the wicked thus and thus says he for says he God is the Judge He thought it enough to enlighten the understanding of the fool enough to rectifie the perverseness of the wicked if he could set God before them in that Notion as a Judge for this is one great benefit from the present contemplation of the future judgement that whosoever does truly and advisedly believe that ever he shall come to that judgement is at it now He that believes that God will judge him is Gods Commissioner Gods Delegate and in his name judges himself now Therefore it is a useful mistaking which the Romane Translation is fallen into in this Text in reading it thus Sicut incipientes judicari So speak ye and so Do as they upon whom the judgement were already begun For Qui timet ante Christi Tribunal praesentari Aug. He that is afraid to be brought to the last judgement hath but one Refuge but one Sanctuary Ascendat Tribunal Mentis suae constituat se ante seipsum Let him cite himself before himself give evidence himself against himself and so guilty as he is found here so innocent he shall stand there Let him proceed upon himself as Job did 9.28 and he is safe I am afraid of all my sorrow says he Afraid that I have not said enough against my self nor repented enough Afraid that my sorrows have not been sincere but mingled with circumstances of loss of health or honour or fortune occasioned by my sins and not onely not principally for the sin it self I am afraid of all my sorrowes sayes he but how much more then of my mirths and pleasures To judge our selves by the judgement of flatterers that depend upon us to judge our selves by the event and success of things I am enriched I am preferred by this course and therefore all 's well to judge our selves by example of others others do thus and why not I All these proceedings are Coram non Judice all these are literally Praemunire cases for they are appellations into forraigne Jurisdictions and forraigne Judicatures Onely our own conscience rectified is a competent judge And they that have passed the triall of that judgement do not so much rise to judgement at last as stand and continue in judgement their judgement that is their triall is passed here and there they shall onely receive sentence and that sentence shall be Euge bone serve Well done good and faithfull servant since thou didst enter into Judgement in the other world enter into thy Masters Joy in this But howso ever we be prepar'd for that judgement well or not well and howsoever the Judge be disposed towards us well or not well there is this comfort given us here that that judgement shall be per legem by a Law we shall be judged by a law of Liberty which is our second branch in this second part Per Legem The Jews that prosecuted the Judgement against Christ durst not do that without pretending a Law Habemus legem say they we have a law
and he hath transgressed that The necessary precipitations into sudden executions to which States are forced in rebellious times we are faine to call by the name of Law Martial Law The Torrents and Inundations which invasive Armies pour upon Nations we are fain to call by the name of Law The Law of Armes No Judgement no Execution without the name the colour the pretence of Law for still men call for a Law for every Execution And shall not the Judge of all the earth doe right Shall God judge us condemn us execute us at the last day and not by a Law by something that we never saw never knew never notified never published and judge me by that and leave out the consideration of that Law which he bound me to keep 1 Cor. 1.20 I ask S. Pauls question Where is the disputer of the world Who will offer to dispute unnecessary things especially where Authority hath made it necessary to us to forbear such Disputations Blessed are the peace-makers that command and blessed are the peace-keepers that obey and accommodate themselves to peace in forbearing unnecessary and uncharitable controversies 1 Tim. 3.16 but without controversie great is the mystery of Godliness The Apostle invites us to search into no farther mysteries then such as may be without controversie the Mystery of Godlinesse is without controversie and godliness is to believe that God hath given us a Law and to live according to that Law This this godliness that is Knowledge and Obedience to the Law hath the promises of this life and the next too all referr'd to his Law for without this this godliness which is holiness no man shall see God All referr'd to a Law This is Christs Catechisme in S. John That we might know the onely true God 17.3 and Jesus Christ whom he sent A God commanding and a Christ reconciling us if we have transgressed that Commandment And this is the Holy Ghosts Catechisme in S. Paul Deus remunerator Heb. 11.6 That we believe God to be and to be a just rewarder of mans actions still all referr'd to an obedience or disobedience of a Law The Mystery of godliness is great that is great enough for our salvation and yet without controversie for though controversies have been moved about Gods first act there can be none of his last act though men have disputed of the object of Election yet of the subject of Execution there is no controversie No man can doubt but that when God delivers over any soule actually and by way of execution to eternall condemnation that he delivers over that soule to that eternal condemnation for breaking his Law In this we have no other adversary but the over-sad the despairing soule and it becomes us all to lend our hand to his succour and to pour in our Wine and our Oyle into his Wounds that lies weltring and surrounded in the blood of his own pale and exhausted soule That soule who though it can testifie to it self some endeavour in the wayes of holinesse yet upon some collateral doubts is still suspicious and jealous of God How often have we seen that a needlesse jealousie and suspition conceived without cause hath made a good body bad A needlesse jealousie and suspition of his purposes and intentions upon thee may make thy mercifull God angry too Nothing can alienate God more from thee then to think that any thing but sin can alienate him How wouldst thou have God mercifull to thee if thou wilt be unmercifull to God himself And Qui quid tyrannicum in Deo Basil He that conceives any tyrannical act in God is unjust to the God of Justice and unmercifull to the God of Mercy Therefore in the 17. of our Injunctions we are commanded to arm sad souls against Despaire by setting forth the Mercy and the Benefits and the Godliness of Almighty God as the word of the Injunction is the godliness of God for to leave God under a suspicion of dealing ill with any penitent soule were to impute ungodliness to God Therefore to that mistaking soule that discomposed that shiver'd and shrivel'd and ravel'd and ruin'd soule to that jealous and suspicious soule onely I say Let no man judge you Coloss 2.16 sayes the Apostle intruding into those things which he hath not seene Let no man make you afraid of secret purposes in God which they have not nor you have not seen for that by which you shall be judged is the Law that Law which was notified and published to you The Law alone were much too heavy if there were not a superabundant ease and alleviation in that hand that Christ Jesus reaches out to us Consider the weight and the ease and for pity to such distrustfull souls and for establishment of your owne stop your devotions a little upon this consideration There is Chyrographum a hand-writing of Ordinances against me 14. a Debt an Obligation contracted by our first Parents in their disobedience and falne upon me And even that be it but Originall sin is shrewd evidence there 's my first charge But Deletum est sayes the Apostle there that 's blotted that 's defaced that cannot be sued against me after Baptisme Nay Sublatum cruci affixum it is cancel'd it is nailed to the Crosse of Christ Jesus it is no more sin in its self it is but to me to condemnation it is not here 's my charge and my discharge for that 28.15 But yet there is a heavier evidence Pactum cum inferno as the Prophet Esay speaks I have made a covenant with death and with Hell I am at an agreement that is says S. Greg. Audacter Indesinenter peccamus diligendo amicitiam profitemur We sin constantly we sin continually and we sin confidently and we finde so much pleasure and profit in sin as that we have made a league and sworn a friendship with sin and we keep that perverse and irreligious promise over-religiously and the sins of our youth flow into other sins when age disables us for them But yet there is a Deletum est in this case too our covenant with death is disanull'd sayes that Prophet when we are made partakers of the death of Christ in the blessed Sacrament Mine actuall sins lose their act and mine habituall sins fall from me as a habit as a garment put off when I come to that there 's my charge and my discharge for that But yet there is worse evidence against me then either this Chyrographum the first hand-writing of Adams hand or then this pactum this contract of mine own hand actuall and habituall sin for of these one is wash'd out in water and the other in blood in the two Sacraments But then there is Lex in Membris sayes the Apostle Rom. 7.21 I finde a law that when I would do good evil is present with me Sin assisted by me is now become a tyrant over me and hath established a government
upon me and there is a law of sin and a law in my flesh which after the water of Baptism taken and the water of penitent teares given after the blood of Jesus Christ taken and mine own blood given that is a holy readiness at that time when I am made partaker of Christs death to die for Christ throwes me back by relapses into those repented sins This put the Apostle to that passionate exclamation O wretched man that I am And yet he found a deliverance even from the body of this death through Jesus Christ his Lord that is a free an open recourse and access to him in all oppressions of heart in all dejections of spirit Now when this Chyrographum this bond of Adams hand Original sin is cancell'd upon the Cross of Christ And this Pactum this band of mine hand actual sins washed away in the blood of Christ and this Lex in membris this disposition to relapse into repented sins which as a tide that does certainly come every day does come every day in one form or other is beaten back as a tide by a bank by a continual opposing the merits and the example of Christ Jesus and the practise of his fasting and such other medicinall disciplines as I find to prevaile against such relapses when by this blessed means the whole Law against which I am a trespasser is evacuated will God condemn me for all this and not by a Law When I have pleaded Christ and Christ and Christ Baptism and Blood and Teares will God condemn me an oblique way when he cannot by a direct way by a secret purpose when he hath no law to condemn me by Sad and disconsolate distorted and distracted soul if it be well said in the School Absurdum est disputare ex manuscriptis it is an unjust thing in Controversies and Disputations to press arguments out of Manuscripts that cannot be seen by every man it were ill said in thy conscience that God will proceed against thee ex manuscripto or condemn thee upon any thing which thou never saw'st any unrevealed purpose of his Suspicious soul ill-presaging soul Is there something else besides the day of Judgement that the Son of Man does not know Disquiet soul Does he not know the proceeding of that Judgement wherein himself is to be the Judge But that when he hath died for thy sins and so fulfilled the Law in thy behalfe thou maist be condemned without respect of that Law and upon something that shall have had no consideration no relation to any such breach of any such Law in thee Intricated intangled conscience Christ tells thee of a Judgement because thou didst not do the works of Mercy not feed not cloath the poor for those were enjoyned thee by a Law But he never tells thee of any Judgement therefore because thy name was written in a dark book of Death never unclasped never opened unto thee in thy life He sayes unto thee lovingly and indulgently Fear not for it is Gods good pleasure to give you the Kingdome But he never sayes to the wickedest in the world Live in fear dye in anxiety in suspition and suspension for his displeasure a displeasure conceived against you before you were sinners before you were men hath thrown you out of that Kingdome into utter darkness There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus the reason is added because the Law of the Spirit of Life hath made them free from the Law of Sin and of Death All upon all sides is still referred to Law And where there is no law against thee as there is not to him that is in Christ and he is in Christ who hath endeavoured the keeping or repented the breaking of the Law God will never proceed to execution by any secret purpose never notified never manifested Suspicious jealous scattered soule recollect thy self and give thy self that redintegration that acquiescence which the Spirit of God in the means of the Church offers thee study the Mystery of godlinesse which is without all controversie that is endeavour to keep repent the not keeping of the Law and thou art safe for that that you shall be judged by is a Law But then this Law is called here a Law of Liberty and whether that denotation that it is called a Law of Liberty import an ease to us or a heavier weight upon us is our last disquisition and conclusion of all So speak ye and so do as they that shall be judged by the Law of Liberty Lex libertatis That the Apostle here by the Law of Liberty meanes the Gospel 1.25 was never doubted He had called the Gospel so before this place Whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty and continueth therein shall be blessed in his deed that is blessed in doing so blessed in conforming himself to the Gospel But why does he call it so a Law of Liberty Not because men naturally affecting liberty might be drawn to an affection of the Gospel by proposing it in that specious name of Liberty though it were not so The Holy Ghost calls the Gospel a Pearle and a Treasure and a Kingdom and Joy and Glory not to allure men with false names but because men love these and the Gospel is truly all these a Pearle and a Treasure and a Kingdome and Joy and Glory And it is truly a Law of Liberty But of what kind and in what respect Not such a Liberty as they have established in the Roman Church where Ecclesiastical Liberty must exempt Ecclesiastical persons from participating all burdens of the State and from being Traitors though they commit treason because they are Subjects to no secular Prince nor the liberty of the Anabaptists that overthrowes Magistracy and consequently all subjection both Ecclesiastical and Laick for when upon those words Be ye not servants of men 1 Cor. 7.23 S. Chrysostome sayes this is Christian liberty Nec aliis nec sibi servire neither to be subjects to others nor to our selves that 's spoken with modification with relation to our first Allegeance our Allegeance to God not to be so subject to others or to our selves as that either for their sakes or our owne we depart from any necessary declaration of our service to God Deo First then the Gospel is a Law of Liberty in respect of the Author of the Gospel of God himself because it leaves God at his liberty Not at liberty to judge against his Gospel where he hath manifested it for a Law for he hath laid a holy necessity upon himself to judge according to that Law where he hath published that law But at liberty so as that it consists onely in his good pleasure to what Nation he will publish the Gospel or in what Nation he will continue the Gospel or upon what persons he will make this Gospel effectuall So Oecumenius who is no single witness nor speaks not alone but compiles the former Fathers places this
liberty in God that God is at liberty to give this Gospel when he will and at liberty so as that he hath exempted no man how well soever he love him nor put on such fetters or manacles upon himself but that he can and will punish those that transgress this law So it is a Law of liberty to God nothing determined upon any man nothing concluded in himself lies so in Gods way as to hinder him from proceeding in his last judgement according to the keeping or breaking of this law still God is at his liberty And it is a Law of liberty in respect of us of us who are Christians and considered so Nobis either with a respect to the naturall man or with a respect to the Jew For if we compare the Christian with the naturall man the law of Nature layes the same obligation upon the naturall man as the Gospel does upon the Christian for the morall part thereof The Christian is no more bound to love God nor his neighbour then the naturall man is therein the naturall man hath no more liberty then the Christian so far their law is equal And then all the law which the Christian hath and the natural man hath not is a law of liberty to the Christian that is a law that gives him an ease and a readier way to perform those duties which way the natural man hath not and yet is bound to the same duties The natural man if he transgress that law which he finds in his own heart findes a condemnation in himself as well as the Christian therein he is no freer then the Christian But he finds no Sanctuary no Altar no Sacrifice no Church no such Liberties as the Christian does in the Gospel So the Gospel is a law of Liberty to us in respect of the natural man that it sets us at liberty restores us to liberty after we are falne into prison for debt into Gods displeasure for sin by affording us means of reconciliation to God again It is so also in respect of the Law given by God to the Jewes Judaei The Jewes had liberties that is refuge and help of sacrifices for sin which the natural man had not for if the natural man were driven and followed from his own heart that he saw no comfort of an innocency there he had no other liberties to flie to no comfort in any other thing no law no promise annexed to any other action not to Sacrifice as the Jewes or to Sacrament as the Christians but must irremediably sink under the condemnation of his own heart The Jew had this liberty a Law and a Law that involv'd the Gospel but then the Gospel was to the Jew but as a letter seal'd and the Jew was but as a servant who was trusted to carry the letter as it was seal'd to another to carry it to the Christian Now the Christian hath received this letter at the Jews hand and he opens it he sees the Jewes Prophesie made History to him the Jewes hope and reversion made possession and inheritance to him he sees the Jewes faith made matter of fact he sees all that was promised and represented in the Law performed and recorded in the Gospel and applied in the Church John 15.15 There Christ sayes Henceforth call I you not servants but friends Wherein consists this enfranchisement In this The servant knoweth not what his master doth the Jewes knew not that but I have called you friends sayes Christ for all things that I heard of my Father Hebr. 7.19 I have made known unto you The Law made nothing perfect sayes the Apostle Where was the defect he tells us that the old Covenant that is Galat 4.24 the Law gendreth to bondage What bondage he tells us that too when he says The Law was a Schoolmaster The Jews were as School-boys always spelling and putting together Types and Figure which things typified and figured how this Lamb should signifie Christ how this fire should signifie a holy Ghost The Christian is come to the University from Grammar to Logick to him that is Logos it self the Word to apprehend apply Christ himself and so is at more liberty then when he had onely a dark law without any comment with the natural man or onely a dark comment that is the Law with a dimme light ill eys as the Jews had for though the Jew had the liberty of a Law yet they had not the law of Liberty So the Gospel is a law of Liberty to God who is still at his liberty to give and take and to condemn according to that law and a law of liberty to us as we are compared to the natural man or to the Jew But when we confine our selves in our selves positively without comparison it is not such a law of liberty to us as some men have come too near saying That the sins of Gods children do them no harm that God sees not the sins of his children that God was no further out with David in his Adultery then in his Repentance But as to be born within the Covenant that is of Christian Parents does not make us Christians Aug. for Non nascitur sed renascitur Christianus the Covenant gives us a title to the Sacrament of Baptisme and that Sacrament makes us Christians so this law of liberty gives us not a liberty to sin but a liberty from sin Noli libertate abuti ad libere peccandum sayes the same Father It is not a liberty 2 Cor. 3.17 but an impotency a slavery to sin Voluntas libera quae pia sayes he onely a holy soul is a free soul Where the spirit of the Lord is there is liberty Leo. sayes the Apostle And Splendidissimum in se quisque habet speculum Every man hath a glasse a chrystal into which though he cannot call up this spirit for the Spirit of God breathes where it pleases him yet he can see this spirit if he be there in that glasse every man hath a glasse in himselfe where he may see himselfe and the Image of God sayes that Father and see how like he is to that To dare to reflect upon my selfe and to search all the corners of mine owne conscience whether I have rightly used this law of liberty and neither been bold before a sinne upon presumption of an easie nor diffident after upon suspicion of an impossible reconciliation to my God this is Evangelical liberty So then to end all though it be a law of Liberty because it gives us better meanes of prevention before and of restitution after then the natural man or the Jew had yet we consider that it is this law of Liberty this law that hath afforded us these good helps by which we shall be judged and so though our case be better then theirs because we have this law of Liberty which they wanted yet our case growes heavier then theirs if we use it not aright
The Jewes shall be under a heavier condemnation then the natural man because they had more liberty that is more means of avoyding sin then the natural man had and upon the same reason the Christian under a heavier condemnation then either because he shall be judged by this law of Liberty What judgement then gives this law This Qui non crediderit Mark 16.16 damnabitur and so sayes this Law in the Law-makers mouth He that believes not shall be damned And as no lesse light then Faith it selfe can shew you what Faith is what it is to believe so no lesse time then Damnation shall last can shew you what Damnation is for the very form of Damnation is the everlastingness of it and Qui non crediderit He that believeth not shall be damned there 's no commutation of penance nor beheading after a sentence of a more ignominious death in that court Dost thou believe that thou dost believe yet this law takes not that answer This law of Liberty takes the liberty to look farther Through faith into works for so sayes the Law in the mouth of the Law-maker To whom much is given of him much shall be required Luke 12.48 Hast thou considered every new title of Honour and every new addition of Office every new step into higher places to have laid new Duties and new obligations upon thee Hast thou doubled the hours of thy Prayers when thy Preferments are doubled and encreased thine Almes according as thy Revenues are encreased Hast thou done something done much in this kinde this law will not be answer'd so this law of Liberty takes the liberty to call upon thee for all Here also the Law sayes in the mouth of the Law-maker If thou have agreed with many adversaries sayes Christ Mat 5.25 let that be If thou have satisfied many duties for duties are adversaries that is temptations upon us yet as long as thou hast one adversary agree with that adversary quickly in the way leave no duty undischarged or unrepented in this life Beloved we have well delivered our selves of the feare of Purgatory none of us feare that but another mistaking hath overtaken us and we flatter our selves with another danger that is Compensation that by doing well in one place our ill doing in another is recompenced an ill Officer looks to be sav'd because he is a good husband to his wife a good father to his children a good master to his servants and he thinks he hath three to one for his salvation But as nature requires the qualities of every element which thou art composed of so this law of Liberty calls upon thee for the exercises of all those vertues that appertain to every particular place thou hold'st This liberty this law of Liberty takes It binds thee to believe Christ All Christ Gods Christ as he was the eternal Son of the Father God of God our Christ as he was made man for our salvation and thy Christ as his blessed Spirit in this his Ordinance applies him to thee and offers him into thine armes this minute And then to know that he looks for a retribution from thee in that measure in which he hath dealt with thee much for much and for several kinds of good according to those several good things which he hath done for thee And if thou be first defective in these and then defective in laying hold upon him who is the propitiation and satisfaction for thy defects in these this law of Liberty returnes to her liberty to pronounce and he Judge to his liberty to execute that sentence Damnaberis thou wilt be cast into that prison where thou must pay the last farthing thou must for Christ dyes not there and therefore there they must lie till there come such another ransome as Christ nay a greater ransome then Christ was for Christ paid no debts in that prison This then is the Christians case and this is the Abridgement of his Religion Sic loquimini sic facite to speak aright and to doe aright to profess the truth and not be afraid nor ashamed of that and to live according to that profession for no man can make God the author of sin but that man comes as near it as he can that makes Gods Religion a cloke for his sin To this God proceeds not meerly and onely by commadment but by perswasion too And though he be not bound to do so yet he does give a reason The reason is because he must give account of both both of Actions and of Words of both we shall be judged but judged by a Law a Law which excludes on Gods part any secret ill purpose upon us if we keep his Law a Law which excludes on our part all pretence of Ignorance for no man can plead ignorance of a Law And then a law of Liberty of liberty to God for God was not bound to save a man because he made him but of his own goodness he vouchsafed him a Law by which he may be saved a law of Liberty to us so that there is no Epicurism to doe what we list no such liberty as makes us Libertines for then there were no Law nor Stoicism nor fatality that constraines us to doe that we would not do for then there were no Liberty But the Gospel is such a law of Liberty as delivers us upon whom it works Serm. 4. from the necessity of falling into the bondage of sin before and from the impossibility of recovering after if we be falne into that bondage And this is liberty enough and of this liberty our blessed God give us the right use for his Son Christ Jesus sake by the operation of that Holy Ghost that proceeds from both Amen A Lent-SERMON Preached before the KING At WHITE-HALL February 16. 1620. SERMON IV. 1 Tim. 3.16 And without controversie great is the mystery of Godliness God was manifest in the Flesh justified in the Spirit seen of Angels preached unto the Gentiles believed on in the world received up into Glory THis is no Text for an Houre-glasse if God would afford me Ezekiah's signe Ut revertatur umbra 2 Reg. 20.9 Josh 10.11 that the shadow might go backward upon the Dial or Joshuah's signe Ut sistat Sol That the Sun might stand still all the day this were text enough to employ all the day and all the dayes of our life The Lent which we begin now is a full Tythe of the year but the houre which we begin now is not a full tythe of this day and therefore we should not grudge all that But payment of Tythes is growne matter of controversie and we by our Text are directed onely upon matter without controversie And without controversie c. Here is the compass that the essential Word of God the Son of God Christ Jesus went He was God humbled in the flesh he was Man received into glory Here is the compasse that the written Word of God went the Bible
then lastly The illusion upon this what a fearful state this shuts them up in That therefore their hearts are fully set in them to do evil And these three The perversness of colouring sins with Reasons and the impotency of making Gods mercy the Reason and the danger of obduration thereby will be the three parts in which we shall determine this Exercise Part I. First then in handling the perversness of assigning Reasons for sins we forbid no man the use of Reason in matters of Religion As S. August says Contra Scriptura nemo Christianus No man can pretend to be a Christian if he refuse to be tryed by the Scriptures And as he adds Contra Ecclesiam nemo pacificus No man can pretend to love order and Peace if he refuse to be tryed by the Church so he adds also Contra Rationem nemo sobrius No man can pretend to be in his wits if he refuse to be tryed by Reason He that believes any thing because the Church presents it he hath Reason to assure him that this Authority of the Church is founded in the Scriptures He that believeth the Scriptures hath Reasons that govern and assure him that those Scriptures are the Word of God Mysteries of Religion are not the less believ'd and embrac'd by Faith because they are presented and induc'd and apprehended by Reason But this must not enthrone this must not exalt any mans Reason so far as that there should lie an Appeal from Gods Judgements to any mans reason that if he see no reason why God should proceed so and so he will not believe that to be Gods Judgement or not believe that Judgement of God to be just For of the secret purposes of God Mat. 11.26 we have an Example what to say given us by Christ himself Ita est quia complacuit It is so O Father because thy good pleasure was such All was in his own breast and bosome in his own good will and pleasure before he Decreed it And as his Decree it self so the wayes and Executions of his Decrees are often unsearchable for the purpose and for the reason thereof though for the matter of fact they may be manifest They that think themselves sharp-sighted and wise enough to search into those unreveal'd Decrees they who being but worms will look into Heaven and being the last of Creatures who were made will needs enquire what was done by God before God did any thing for creating the World In ultimam dementiam reverant says S. Chrysost They are fallen into a mischievous madness Et ferrum ignitum quod forcipe deberent digitus accipiunt They will needs take up red hot Irons with their bare fingers without tongs That which is in the Center which should rest and lie still in this peace That it is so because it is the will of God that it should be so they think to toss and tumble that up to the Circumference to the Light and Evidence of their Reason by their wrangling Disputations If then it be a presumpteous thing and a contempt against God to submit his Decrees to the Examination of humane reason it must be a high treason against the Majesty of God to find out a reason in him which should justifie our sins To conclude out of any thing which he does or leaves undone that either he doth not hate or cannot punish sinners For this destroys even the Nature of God and that which the Apostle lays for the foundation of all To believe that God is Heb. 11.6 and that he is a just Rewarder Adam's quia Mulier The woman whom thou gavest me gave me the Apple And Eve's quia Serpens Because the Serpent deceiv'd me and all such are poor and unallowable pleas which God would not admit For there is no Quia no Reason why any man at any time should do any sin God never permits any perplexity to fall upon us so as that we cannot avoyd one sin but by doing another or that we should think our self excusable by saying Quia inde minus malum There is less harm in a Concubine then in another wife Or Quia inde aliquod bonum That my incontinence hath produc'd a profitable man to the State or to the Church though a bastard much less to say Quia obdormivit Deus Tush God sees it not or cares not for it though he see it If thou ask then why thou should'st be bound to believe the Creation we say Quia unus Deus Because there can be but one God and if the World be eternal and so no Creature the World is God If thou ask why thou should'st be bound to believe Providence we say Quia Deus remunerator Because God is to give every man according to his merits If thou ask why thou should'st be bound to believe that when thou seest he doth not give every man according to his merits we say Quia inscrutabilia judicia ejus O how unsearchable are his Jugdements and his ways past finding out For thou art yet got no farther in measuring God but by thine own measure and thou hast found no other reason to lead thee to think that God doth not govern well but because he doth not govern so to thine understanding as thou shouldst if thou wert God So that thou dost not onely make thy weakness but thy wickedness that is thy hasty disposition to come to a present Revenge when any thing offends thee the Measure and the Model by which the frame of Gods Government should be erected and so thou comest to the worst distemper of all insanire cum ratione to go out of thy wits by having too much and to be mad with too much knowledge not to sin out of infirmity or tentation or heat of blood but to sin in cold blood and upon just reason and mature considerations and so deliberately and advisedly to continue to sin Part II. Now the particular reason which the perversness of these men produceth here in this Text is Because God is patient and long-suffering So he is so he will be still Their perversness shall not pervert his Nature his goodness As God bade the Prophet Osea do 1.2 he hath done himself Go says he and take to thee a wife of fornication and children of fornication so hath he taken us guilty of spiritual fornication But as in the fleshly fornications of an adulterous wife the husband is for the most part the last that hears of them so for our spiritual fornications such is the loathness the patience the longanimity of our good and gracious God that though he do know our sins as soon as they speak as soon as they are acted for that 's peccatum cum voco says S. Gregory A speaking sin when any sinful thought is produc'd into act yea before they speak as soon as they are conceiv'd yet he will not hear of our sins he takes no knowledge of them by punishing them till our brethren have
been scandaliz'd and led into tentation by them till his law have been evacuated that that use of the law which is to shew sin to our consciences be annihilated in us till such a Cry come up to him by our often and professed sinning that it concerns him in his Honour which he will give to none and in his Care of his Churches which he hath promis'd to be till the end of all to take knowledge of them Yea though this Cry be come up to his Ears though it be a lowd Cry either by the nature of the sin as heavie things make a great noise in the moving or by reason of the number of the sins and the often doing thereof for as many children will make as great a noise as a loud Cryer so will the custome of small sins Cry as loud as those which are called peccata clamantia Crying sins Though this cry be encreased by this liberty and professed sinning that as the Prophet sayes Esa 3.9 They declare their sins and hide them not as Sodom did Though the cry of the sin be increased by the cry of them that suffer oppression by that sin as well as by the sin it self as the voice of Abel's bloud cryed from earth to heaven yea Gen. 4.10 though this cry ring about Gods ears in his own bed-chamber under the Altar it self in that Usquequo Domine when the Martyrs cry out with a loud voice How long Lord holy and true Revel 6.10 dost thou not judge and avenge our bloud yet God would fain forbear his Revenge he would fain have those Martyrs rest for a little space till their fellow servants and their brethren were fulfilled God would try what Cain would say to that Interrogatory Where is thy brother Abel And though the cry of Sodom were great and their sin exceeding grievous yet says God I will go down and see whether they have done altogether according unto that cry and if not I may know God would have been glad to have found Errour in their Inditement and when he could not yet if Fifty Fourty five Thirty Twenty Ten had been found righteous he had pardoned all Adeo malum Gregory quasi cum difficultate credidit cum audivit so loth is God to believe ill of man when he doth hear it This then is his patience Sententia But why is his patience made a reason of their continuance in sins Is it because there is no sentence denounced against sin These busie and subtile Extractors of Reasons that can distil and draw Poyson out of Manna Occasions of sin out of Gods Patience will not say so That there is no sentence denounced The word that is here used Pithgam is not truly an Hebrew word And though in the Book of Job and in some other parts of the Hebrew Scriptures we finde sometimes some forreign and out-landish word deriv'd from other Nations yet in Solomons writing very rarely neither doth Solomon himself nor any other Author of any part of the Hebrew Bible use this word in any other place then this one The word is a Chaldee word and hath amongst them the same signification and largeness as Dabar in Hebrew and that includes all A verbo ad legem from a word suddenly and slightly spoken to words digested and consolidated into a Law So that though the Septuagint translate this place Quia non est facta contradictio as though the reason of this sinners obduration might have been That God had not forbidden sin and though the Chaldee Paraphrast express this place thus Quia non est factum verbum ultionis As though this sinner made himself believe that God had never spoken word of revenge against sinners yet this sinner makes not that his reason That there is no Law no Judgement no Sentence given for every Book of the Bible every Chapter every Verse almost is a particular Deuteronomy a particular renewing of the Law from Gods mouth Morte Morieris Thou shalt die the death and of that Sentence from Moses mouth Pereundo peribitis You shall surely perish and of that Judgement from the Prophets mouth Non est Pax impiis There is no peace to the wicked And if this obdurate sinner could be such a Goth and Vandal as to destroy all Records all written Laws if he could evacuate and exterminate the whole Bible yet he would finde this Law in his own heart this Sentence pronounced by his own Conscience Stipendium peccati Mors est Treason is Death and sin is Treason His reason is not That there is no Law he sees it nor that he knows no Law his heart tells it him nor that he hath kept that Law his Conscience gives judgement against him nor that he hath a Pardon for breaking that Law for he never ask'd it and besides those Pardons have in them that clause Ita quod se bene gerat Every Pardon bindes a man to the good behaviour and by Relapses into sin we forfeit our Pardons for former sins All their Reason all their Comfort is onely a Reprieve and a Respite of Execution August Distulit Securim attulit Securitatem God hath taken the Ax from their necks and they have taken Security into their hearts Sentence is not executed Executed Execution is the life of the Law but then it is the death of the Man And therefore whosoever makes quarrels against God or arguments of Obduration out of this respite of Execution would he be better pleased with God if God came to a speedy Execution But let that be true Where there is no Execution there is no reverence to the Law there is truly and in effect no Law The Law is no more a Law without Execution then a Carcase is a Man And so much certainly the word which is here rendred sententia facta doth properly signifie A Judgement perfected executed Gen. 25.25 When Esau was born hairy and so in the likeness of a grown and perfect man he was call'd by the word of this text Gnesau Esau factus perfectus And so when God had perfected all his works Gen. 1. ult that is said then that he saw that all was good that he had made where there is the same word That he had perfected So that if the judgements of God had been still without execution if all those Curses Deut. 28.15 Cursed shalt thou be in the town and cursed in the field cursed in the fruit of thy body and in the fruit of thy land and in the fruit of thy cattel cursed when thou comest in and when thou goest out The Lord shall send thee cursings and trouble and shame in all thou setst thy hand to The Lord shall make a pestilence cleave to thee and a consumption and a fever The Lord shall make the heavens above as brass and the earth under thee as iron with all those Curses and Maledictions which he flings and slings and stings the soul of
Prophets now he is really actually come venit he is come we look for no other after him we joyn no other Angels nor Saints with him venit he is actually come and then venit sponte he is come freely and of his good-will we assigne we imagine no cause in us that should invite him to come but humbly acknowledge all to have proceeded from his own goodness and that 's the Action He came And then the Errand and purpose for which he came is vocare he came to call It is not Occurrere That he came to meet them who were upon the way before for no man had either disposition in himself or faculty in himself neither will nor power to rise and meet him no nor so much as to wish that Christ would call him till he did call him He came not occurrere to meet us but yet he came not cogere to compel us to force us but onely vocare to call us by his Word and Sacraments and Ordinances and lead us so and that 's his errand and purpose in coming And from that we shall come to the persons upon whom his coming works where we have first a Negative a fearful thing in Christs lips and then an Affirmative a blessed seal in his mouth first an Exclusive a fearful banishment out of his Ark and then an Inclusive a blessed naturalization in his Kingdom Non justos I came to call not the righteous but sinners And then lastly we have not as before his general intention and purpose To call but the particular effect operation of this calling upon the godly it brings them to repentance Christ does not call us to a satisfaction of Gods justice by our selves that 's impossible to us it is not ad satisfactionem but then it is not adgloriam he does not call us to an immediate possession of glory without doing any thing before but it is ad Resipiscentiam I came to call not the righteous but sinners to Repentance And so have you the whole frame mark'd out which we shall set up and the whole compass design'd which we shall walk in In which though the pieces may seem many yet they do so naturally flow out of one another that they may easily enter into your understanding and so naturally depend upon one another that they may easily lay hold upon your memory Part I. Ambrose First then our first Branch in the first Part is That Christ jufied Feasting festival and chearful conversation For as S. Ambrose says Frustra fecisset God who made the world primarily for his own glory had made Light in vain if he had made no creatures to see and to be seen by that light wherein he might receive glory so frustra fecisset God who intended secondarily mans good in the Creation had made creatures to no purpose if he had not allow'd Man a use and an enjoying of those creatures Our Mythologists who think they have conveyed a great deal of Moral doctrine in their Poetical Fables and so indeed they have had mistaken the matter much when they make it one of the torments of hell to stand in a fresh River and not be permitted to drink and amongst pleasant fruits and not to be suffered to eat if God requir'd such a forbearing such an abstemiousness in Man as that being set to rule and govern the creatures he might not use and enjoy them Priviledges are lost by abusing but so they are by not using too Of those three Opinions which have all pass'd through good Authors Whether before the Floud had impaired and corrupted the herbs and fruits of the earth men did eat flesh or no of which the first is absolutely Negative both in matter of law and in matter of fact No man might no man did and the second is directly contrary to this Affirmative in both All men might all men did and the third goes a Middle way It was always lawful and all men might but sober and temperate men did forbear and not do it of these three though the later have prevail'd with those Authors and be the common opinion yet the later part of that later opinion would very hardly fall into proof That all their sober and temperate men did forbear this eating of flesh or any lawful use of Gods creatures God himself took his portion in this world so in meat and drink in his manifold sacrifices and God himself gave himself in this world so in bread and wine in the blessed Sacrament of his body and his bloud And the very joys of heaven after the Resurrection are convey'd to us also in the Marriage-supper of the Lamb. That mensa laqueus which is in the Psalm is a curse 69.22 Let their table be made a snare let their plenty and prosperity be an occasion of sin to them that 's a malediction but for that mensa propositionum The table of Shew-bread Num. 4.7 where those blessings which God had given to man were brought again and presented in his sight upon that table the loaves were great in quantity and many in number and often renew'd God gives plentifully richly and will be serv'd so himself In all those festivals amongst the Jews which were of Gods immediate institution as the Passover and Pentecost and the Trumpets and Tabernacles and the rest you shall often meet in the Scriptures these two phrases Humiliabitis animas and then Laetaberis coram Domino first upon that day you shall humble your souls that you have Levit. 16.29 and very often and then upon that day You shall rejoyce before the Lord and that you have Deut. 16.11 and very often besides Now some Interpreters have applied these two phrases to the two days That upon the Eve we should humble our souls in Fasting and upon the Day rejoyce before the Lord in a festival chearfulness but both belong to the Day it self that first we should humble our souls as we do now in these holy Convocations and then return and rejoyce before the Lord in a chearful use of his creatures our selves and then send out a portion to them that want as it is expresly enjoyn'd in that feast Nehem. 8.10 and in that Esth 9.22 where their feasting is as literally commanded as their giving to the poor And besides those Stationary and Anniversary Feastings which were of Gods immediate institution And that Feast which was of the Churches institution after in the time of the Macchabees which was the Encoenia The Dedication of the Temple the Jews at this day in their Dispersion observe a yearly Feast which they call Festum Letitiae The feast of Rejoycing in a festival thankfulness to God that he hath brought the year about and afforded them the use of the Law another year When Christ came to Jairus house and commanded away the Musick and all the Funeral-solemnities it was not because he disallowed those solemnities but because he knew there was no Funeral to be solemniz'd in that
needed And that he might give full satisfaction even to Calumniators every way as he answer'd them out of Scriptures and out of Reason so because the Pharisees were States-men too and led by Precedents and Records he answers out of the tenour and letter of his Commission and Instructions which is that part of his answer that falls most directly into our Text Veni vocare I came to call not the righteous but sinners to repentance First then venit he came he is come venit actu he came in promise often ratified before Venit Actu now there is no more room for John Baptist's question Tune ille Art thou he that should come or must we look for another For another coming of the same Messias we do look but not for another Messias we look for none after him no post-Messias we joyn none Saints nor Angels with him no sub-Messias no vice-Messias The Jews may as well call the history of the Floud Prophetical and ask when the world shall be drown'd according to that Prophecie or the history of their deliverance from Babylon Prophetical and ask when they shall return from thence to Jerusalem according to that Prophecie as seek for a Messias now amongst their Prophets so long after all things being perform'd in Christ which were prophesied of the Messias Christ hath so fully made Prophecie History Venit actu He is really personally actually come Venit sponte and then venit sponte he is come freely and of his own meer goodness How freely Come and not sent Yes he was sent God so loved the world as that he gave his onely begotten Son for it There was enough done to magnifie the mercy of the Father in sending him How freely then Come and not brought Yes he was brought The holy Ghost overshadowed the blessed virgin and so he was conceiv'd there was enough done to magnifie the goodness of the holy Ghost in bringing him He came to his prison he abhorr'd not the Virgins womb and not without a Mittimus he was sent He came to the Execution and not without a desire of Reprieve in his Transeat Calix If it be possible let this cup pass from me and yet venit sponte he came freely voluntarily of his own goodness No more then he could have been left out at the Creation and the world made without him could he have been sent into this world without his own hand to the Warrant or have been left out at the decree of his sending As when he was come no man could have taken away his soul if he had not laid it down so if we might so speak no God no person in the Trinity could have sent him if he had not been willing to come Venit actu he is come there 's our comfort venit sponte he came freely there 's his goodness And so you have the Action Venit He came The next is his Errand his Purpose what he came to do Vocare Venit vocare He came to call It is not vocatus That Christ came when we call'd upon him to come Man had no power no will no not a faculty to wish that Christ would have come Non occurrere till Christ did come and call him For it is not Veni occurrere That Christ came to meet them who were upon the way before Man had no pre-disposition in Nature to invite God to come to him August Quid peto ut venias in me qui non essem si non esses in me How should I pray at first that God would come into me when as I could not onely not have the spirit of prayer but not the spirit of life and being except God were in me already Where was I when Christ call'd me out of my Raggs nay out of my Ordure and wash'd me in the Sacramental water of Baptism and made me a Christian so Where was I when in the loyns of my sinful parents and in the unclean act of generation Christ call'd me into the Covenant and made me the childe of Christian parents Could I call upon him to do either of these for me Or if I may seem to have made any step towards Baptism because I was within the Covenant or towards the Covenant because I was of Christian parents yet where was I when God call'd me when I was not as though I had been in the Eternal Decree of my Election What said I for my self or what said any other for me then when neither I nor they had any being God is found of them that sought him not Non venit occurrere He came not to meet them who were of themselves set out before Non Cogere But then non venit cogere He came not to force and compel them who would not be brought into the way Christ saves no man against his will There is a word crept into the later School that deludes many a man they call it Irresistibility and they would have it mean that when God would have a man he will lay hold upon him by such a power of grace as no perversness of that man can possibly resist There is some truth in the thing soberly understood for the grace of God is more powerful then any resistance of any man or devil But leave the word where it was hatcht in the School and bring it not home not into practice for he that stays his conversion upon that God at one time or other will lay hold upon me by such a power of Grace as I shall not be able to resist may stay till Christ come again to preach to the spirits that are in prison 1 Pet. 3.19 Christ beats his Drum but he does not Press men Christ is serv'd with Voluntaries There is a Compelle intrare Luk. 14.23 A forcing of men to come in and fill the house and furnish the supper but that was an extraordinary commission and in a case of Necessity Our ordinary commission is Ite praedicate Go and preach the Gospel and bring men in so it is not Compelle intrare Force men to come in it is not Draw the Sword kindle the Fire winde up the Rack for when it was come to that Mat. 22.10 that men were forc'd to come in as that Parabolical story is reported in this Evangelist the house was fill'd and the supper was furnisht the Church was fill'd and the Communion-table frequented but it was with good and bad too for men that are forc'd to come hither they are not much the better in themselves nor we much the better assur'd of their Religion for that Force and violence pecuniary and bloudy Laws are not the right way to bring men to Religion in cases where there is nothing in consideration but Religion meerly 'T is true there is a Compellite Manere that hath all justice in it when men have been baptiz'd and bred in a Church and embrac'd the profession of a Religion so as that
as Nathan said to David God will panish thee in taking those children from thee â—hich were the colours of thy sin Eccles 40.13 The children of the ungodly shall not obtain many branches not extend to many generations If they do if his children be in great number the sword shall destroy them His remnant shall be buried in death and his widows shall not weep Howsoever as the words of the text stand Iob. 27.14 the Holy Ghost hath left us at our liberty to observe one degree of misery more in this corrupt man That he is said to have begot his Son after those Riches are perished He had a discomfort in evil travail and in evil affliction before he hath another now that when all is gone then he hath children the foresight of whose misery must needs be a continual affliction unto him Augustin For St. Augustin reports it not as a leading Case likely to be followed but as a singular Case likely to stand alone that when a rich man who had no childe nor hope of any had given his Estate to Auretius Bishop of Carthage and after beyond all expectation came to have children that good Bishop unconstrained by any law or intent in the donor gave him back his Estate again God when he will punish ill getting will take to himself that which was rob'd from him and then if he give Children he will not be bound to restitution But if this rich man have his riches and his Son together the Son may have come from God and the riches from the devil and God will not joyn them together Howsoever he may in his mercy provide for the son otherwise yet he will not make him heir of his fathers estate The substance of the ungodly shall be dryed up like a river Eccles 40. and they shall make a sound like a thunder in rain It shall perish and it shall be in Parabolam it shall be the wonder and the discourse of the time If they be not wasted in his own time yet he shall be an ill but a true prophet upon himself he shall have impressions and sensible apprehensions of a future wast as soon as he is gone he shall hear or he shall whisper to himself that voice O fool This night they will fetch away thy soul he must go under the imputation of a fool where the wisdome of this generation which was all the wisdome he had Luk. 12.20 will do him no good he must go like a fool His soul must be fetch'd away he hath not his In manus tuas his willing surrender of his soul ready It must be fetch'd in the night of ignorance when he knows not his own spiritual state It must be fetch'd in the night of darkness in the night of solitude no sence of the assistance of the communion of Saints in the Triumphant nor in the Militant Church in the night of disconsolatenes no comfort in that sea Absolution which by by the power committed to them Gods Ministers came to the penitent In the name of the Father the Son the holy Ghost and it must be fetched this night the night is already upon him before he thought of it All this that the soul of this fool shall be fetched away this night is presented for certain and inevitable all this admits no question but the Qua perasti cujus erunt there 's the doubt Then whose shall those things be which thou hast provided If he say they shall be his Sons God saith here In his hand shall be nothing for though God may spare him that his riches be not perished before his death though God have not discovered his iniquity by that manner of punishment yet Quod in radice celatur in ramis declaraâ—ur God will show that in the bough which was hid in the root the iniquity of the father in the penury of the son And therefore To conclude all since riches are naturally conditioned so as that they are to the owners harm either testimonies of his former hard dealing in the world or tentation to future sins or provocations to other mens malice since that though thou may have repented the ill getting of those riches yet thou maiest have omitted restitution and so there hovers an invisible owner over thy riches which may cary them away at last since though thou maiest have repented and restored and possess thy riches that are left with a good Conscience yet as we said before from Nathans mouth the Child may die God that hath many waies of expressing his mercies may take this one way of expressing his judgment that yet thy son shall have nothing of all that in his hand put something else into his hand put a book put a sword put a ship put a plough put a trade put a course of life a calling into his hand And put something into his head the wisdome and discretion and understanding of a serpent necessary for those courses and callings But principally put something into his heart a religious fear and reverence of his Maker a religious apprehension and application of his Saviour a religious sense and acceptation of the comforts of the Holy Spirit that so if he feel that for his fathers hard dealing God hath removed the possession from him he doth not doubt therefore of Gods mercy to his father nor dishonor his fathers memory but behave himself so in his course as that the like judgment may not fall upon his son but that his riches increasing by his good travail they may still remain in the hands of his son whom he hath begotten A Serm. 11. SERMON PREACHED AT GREENVVICH Aprill 30. 1615. SERM. XI Esay 52.3 Ye have sold your selves for nought and ye shall be redeemed without money IT is evident in it self and agreed by all that this is a prophecy of a deliverance but from what calamity it is a deliverance or when this prophecy was accomplished is not so evident nor so constantly agreed upon All the expositions may well be reduced to three first that it is a deliverance from the captivity of Babylon and then the benefit appertains onely to the Jews and their deliverer and Redeemer is Cyrus Secondly that it is a deliverance from persecutions in the primitive Church and so it appertains onely to Christians and their Redeemer from those persecutions is Constantine And thirdly that it is a deliverance from the sting and bondage of death by sin and so it appertains to the whole world and the Redeemer of the whole world is Christ Jesus For the first since both the Chaldee Paraphrase and the Jewish Rabbins themselves do interpret this to be a prophecy of the Messias because they labour ever more as strongly as they can to wring our weapons out of our hands and to take from us many of those arguments which we take from the Prophets for the proof of the Messias it concerns us therefore to hold fast as much
his alleigance induces an addition of punishment upon the devil himself Consider a little further our wretchedness in this prodigality we think those Laws barbarous and inhumane which permit the sute of men in debt for the satisfaction of Creditors but we sell our selves and grow the farther in debt by being sold we are sold and to even rate our debts and to aggravate our condemnation We find in the history of the Muscovits that it is an ordinary detainder amongst them to sell themselves and their posterity into everlasting bondage for hot drink In one winter a wretched man will drink himself and his posterity into perpetual slavery But we sell our selves not for drink but for thirst we are sory when our appetite too soon decaies and we would fain sin more than we do At what a high rate did the blessed Martyrs sell their bodies They built up Gods Church with their blood They sowed his field and prepared his harvest with their blood they got heaven for their bodies and we give bodies souls for hell In a right inventary every man that ascends to a true value of himself considers it thus First His Soul then His life after his fame and good name And lastly his goods and estate for thus their own nature hath ranked them and thus they are as in nature so ordinarily in legal consideration preferred before one another But for our souls because we know not how they came into us we care not how they go out because if I aske a Philosopher whither my soul came in by propagation from my parents or by an immediate infusion from God perchance he cannot tell so I think a divine can no more tell me whither when my soul goes out of me it be likely to turn on the right or on the left hand if I continue in this course of sin And then for the second thing in this inventary Life the Devil himself said true skin for skin and all that a man hath will he give for his life Indeed we do not easily give away our lives expresly and at once but we do very easily suffer our selves to be cousened of our lives we pour in death in drink and we call that health we know our life to be but a span and yet we can wash away one inche in ryot we can burn away one inch in lust we can bleed away one inch in quarrels we have not an inch for every sin and if we do not pour out our lives yet we drop them away For the third peece of our self our fame and reputation who had not rather be thought an usurer then a beggar who had not rather be the object of envy by being great than of scorn and contempt by being poor upon any conditions And for the last of all which is our goods Seneca though our coveteousness appears most in the love of them in that lowest thing of all Adeo omnia homini cariora seipso so much does every man think every inferiour thing better than himself than his fame than his body than his soul which is a most perverse undervaluing of himself and a damnable humility yet even with these goods also as highly as he values them a man will past if to fuell and foment and maintain that sin that he delights in that which is the most precious our souls we undervalue most and that which we do esteem most though naturally it should be lowest our estate we are content to wast and dissipate for our sins And whereas the Heathens needed laws to restrain them from an expensive and wastful worship of their Gods every man was so apt to exceed in sacrifices and such other religious duties til that law Deus frugi Colunto Let men be thrifty moderate in religious expenses was enacted which law was a kind of mortmain and inhibition That every man might not bestow what he would upon the service of those Gods we have turned our prodigality the other way upon the devil whom we have made Haeredem in esse and our sole executor and sacrificed soul and life and fame and fortune all the gifts of God and God himself by making his religion and his Sacraments and the profession of his name in an hypocriticall use of them to be the devils instruments to draw us the easilyer and hold us the faster and what prodigality can be conceived to exceed this in which we do not onely mispend our selves Nihil but mispend our God The other point in this exprobration is that as we have prodigally sold our selves so we have inconsiderately sold our selves for nothing we have in our bargain diseases and we have poverty and we have unsensibleness of our miseries but diseases are but privations of health and poverty but a privation of wealth and unsensibleness but a privation of tenderness of Conscience all are privations and privations are nothing if a man had got nothing by a bargain but repentance he would think and justly he had got little but if thou hadst repentance in this bargain thy bargain were the better if thou couldst come to think thy bargain bad it were a good bargain but the height of the misery is in this that one of those nothings for which we have sold our selves is a stupidity an unsensibleness of our own wretchedness The Laws do annull and make void fraudulent conveyances and then the laws presume fraud in the conveyance if at least half the value of the thing be not given now if the whole world be not worth one soul who can say that he hath half his value it were not meerly nothing if considering that inventary which we spoke of before we had the worse for the better that were but an ill exchange but yet it were not nothing If we had bodies for our souls it were not meerly nothing but we finde that sin that sells our souls decays and withers our bodies our bodies grow incapable of that sin unable to commit that sin which we sold our souls for If we had fame and reputation for out bodies it were not nothing but we see that Heretiques that give their bodies to the fire are by the very law infamous and they are infamous in every mans apprehension If we had worldly goods for loss of fame and of our good name yet still it were not nothing but we see that witches who are infamous persons for the most part live in extreme beggery too So that the exprobration is just we have sold our selves for nothing and however the ordinary murmuring may be true in other things that all things are grown dearer our souls are still cheap enough which at first were all sold in gross for perchance an Apple and are now retailed every day for nothing Joseph was sold underfoot by his brethren but it is hard to say for how much some Copies have that he was sold for 20 pieces and some for 25 and some for 30 and S. Ambrose and S.
vow is included all the service that he could exhibite or retribute to God Now his staffe is become a sword a strong Army his one staff now is multiplyed his wives are given for staffes to assist him and his children given also for staffes to his age His own staffe is become the greatest and best part of Labans wealth In such plenty as that he could spare a present to Esau of at least five hundred head of cattell The fathers make Morall expositions of this That his two bands are his Temporall blessings and his spirituall And St. Augustin findes a tipicall allusion in it of Christ Aug. Baculo Crucis Christus apprehendit mundum cum duabus turmis duobus populis ad patrem rediit Christ by his staffe his Cross muster'd two bands that is Jews and Gentiles We finde enough for our purpose in taking it literally as we see it in the Text That he divided all his company and all his cattell into two troups that if Esau come and smite one the other might scape For then onely is a fortune full when there is somthing for Leakage for wast when a Man though he may justly fear that this shall be taken from him yet he may justly presume that this shall be left to him though he lose much yet he shall have enough And this was Jacobs increase and height and from this lowness from one staff to two bands And therefore since in God we can consider but one state Semper idem immutable since in the Devil we can consider but two states Quomodo cecidit filius Orientis that he was the son of the Morning but is and shall ever be for ever the child of everlasting death since in Jacob and in our selves we can consider first that God made man righteous secondly that man betooke himself to his one staff and his own staff The imaginations of his own heart Thirdly That by the word of God manifested by his Angels he returns with two bands Body and Soul to his heavenly father againe let us attribute all to his goodness and confesse to him and the world That we are not worthy of the least of all his Mercies and of all the Truth which he hath shewed unto his Servant for with my staff I passed over this Jordan and now I am become two bands A SERMON Preached at White-hall Serm. 13. April 19. 1618. SERMON XIII 1 Tim. 1.15 This is a faithfull saying and worthy of all acceptation That Christ Jesus came into the World to save Sinners of which I am the chiefest THE greatest part of the body of the old-Testament is Prophecy and that is especially of future things The greatest part of the new-Testament if wee number the peeces is Epistles Relations of things past for instruction of the present They erre not much that call the whol new-Testament Epistle For even the Gospells are Evangelia good Messages and that 's proper to an Epistle and the booke of the Acts of the Apostles is superscrib'd by Saint Luke to one Person to Theophilus and that 's proper to an Epistle and so is the last booke the booke of Revelation to the severall Churches and of the rest there is no question An Epistle is collucutio scripta saies Saint Ambrose Though it be written far off and sent yet it is a Conference and seperatos copulat sayes hee by this meanes wee overcome distances we deceive absences and wee are together even then when wee are asunder And therefore in this kinde of conveying spirituall comfort to their friends have the ancient Fathers been more exercised then in any other former almost all of them have written Epistles One of them Isidorus him whom wee call Peluciotes Saint Chrysostom's schollar is noted to have written Myriades Nicephor and in those Epistles to have interpreted the whole Scriptures St. Paul gave them the example he writ nothing but in this kind and in this exceeded all his fellow Apostles pateretur Paulus quod Saulus seceret saies St. Austin That as he had asked Letters of Commission of the State to persecute Christians so by these Letters of Consolation hee might recompence that Church againe which hee had so much damnified before As the Hebrew Rabbins say That Rahab did let down Jofuah's spies out of her house with the same cord with which she had used formerly to draw up her adultrous lovers into her house Now the holy-Ghost was in all the Authors of all the books of the Bible but in Saint Paul's Epistles there is sayes Irenaeus Impetus Spiritus Sancti The vehemence the force of the holy-Ghost And as that vehemence is in all his Epistles so amplius habent quae e vinculis as Saint Chrysostome makes the observation Those Epistles which were written in Prison have most of this holy vehemence and this as that Father notes also is one of them And of all them we may justly conceive this to be the most vehement and forcible in which he undertakes to instruct a Bishop in his Episcopall function which is to propagate the Gospell for he is but an ill Bishop that leaves Christ where he found him in whose time the Gospell is yet no farther then it was how much worse is he in whose time the Gospell loses ground who leaves not the Gospell in so good state as he found it Now of this Gospell here recommended by Paul to Timothie this is the Summe That Christ Jesus came into the World to save Sinners c. Division Here then we shall have these three Parts First Radicem The Roote of the Gospell from whence it springs it is fidelis sermo a faithfull Word which cannot erre And secondly we have Arborem Corpus the Tree the Body the substance of the Gospell That Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners And then lastly fructum Evangelii the fruit of the Gospell Humility that it brings them who embrace it to acknowledg themselves to be the greatest sinners And in the first of these the Roote it selfe wee shall passe by these steps First that it is Sermo the Word That the Gospell hath as good a ground as the Law the new-Testament as well founded as the Old It is the word of God And then it is fidelis Sermo a faithfull Word now both Old and New are so and equally so but in this the Gospell is fidelior the more faithfull and the more sure because that word the Law hath had a determination an expiration but the Gospell shall never have that And againe It is Sermo omni acceptatione dignus Worthy of all acceptation not only worthy to bee received by our Faith but even by our Reason too our Reason cannot hold out against the proofes of Christians for their Gospell And as the word imports it deserves omnem acceptationem and omnem approbationem all approbation and therefore as wee should not dispute against it and so are bound to accept it to receive it not to
say they S. Paul acknowledges himself to be the greatest not the greatest sinner in the world but the greatest of them upon whom the grace of God hath wrought effectually St. Augustines interpretation is for one half thereof for the negative part sake primus saies he non tempore He saies he was the first sinner but he does not mean the first that sinned the first in time but then for the affirmative part which follows in Augustine that he was primus malignitate the first the highest the greatest sinner why should we or how can we charge the Apostle so heavily Beloved to maintain the truth of this which St. Paul saies we need not say that it was materially true that it was indeed so it is enough to defend it from falshood that it was formally true that is that it appeard to him to be true and not out of a sodain and stupid inconsideration but deliberately First he respected his own natural disposition and proclivity to great sins and out of that evidence condemned himself As when a man who professed an art of judging the disposition of a man by his face had pronounced of Socrates whose virtue all the world admir'd that he was the most incontinent and licentious man the greatest theif and extortioner of any man in the world the people despis'd and scorned the Physiognomer and his art and were ready to offer violence unto him Socrates himself corrected their distemper again and said It is true that he saies his Judgment is well grounded for by nature no man is more inclined to these vices then I am And this disposition to the greatest sins St. Paul knew in himself He that hath these natural dispositions is likely to be the greatest sinner except he have some strong assistance to restrain him and then he that hath the offer of such helps and abuses them is in a farther step of being the greatest sinner And this also St. Paul had respect to now that he had had a good and learned education a good understanding of the law and the Prophets a good mortification by being of the strict sect of the Pharisees and yet he had turned all the wrong way and was therefore in this abuse of these manifold graces the greater sinner He look'd farther then into his own nature or into his resistance of asistances he looked into those actions which these had produc'd in him and there he saw his breathing of threatnings and slaugher against the Disciples of the Lord his hunger and thirst of christian blood and so saies St. Augustine Nemo acrior inter persecutores ergo nemo prior inter peccatores as he found himself the greatest persecutor so he condemns himself for the greatest sinner But all these natural dispositions to great sins negliences of helps offer'd sinful actions produced out of these two might be greater in many others then in St. Paul it is likely it may be certain to us that they were so but it was not certain to him he knew not so much ill by any other man as by himself Consider those words in the Proverbs 30.2 Surely I am more foolish then any man and have not the understanding of a man in me for though they be not the words of Salomon yet they are the words of a Prophet and a Prophet who surely was not really more foolish then any man then in consideration of something which he found in himself saies so he that considers himself shall find such degrees of sin as that he cannot see than any man hath gone lower Or if he have in some particular and notorious sin yet in quovis alio quid occultum esse potest quo nobis superior sit August He that is fallen lower then thus in some sin yet may be above thee in Grace he may have done a greater sin yet not be the greater sinner another hath killed a man and thou hast not thon mayst have drawn and drunk the blood of many by usury by extortion by oppression Another in fury of intemperance hath ravished and thou hast not thou maist have corrupted many by thy deceitful solicitations and then in thy self art as ill as the ravisher and thou hast made them worse whom thou hast corrupted Cast up thine own account Inventary thine own goods Rom. 2.5 for sin is the wrath of the sinner and he treasures up the wrath of God reckon thine own sins and thou wilt find thy self rich in that wealth and find thy self of that Quorum that the highest place in that company and mystery of sinners belongs to thee Sum. St. Paul does so here yea then when he saw his own case and saw it by the light of the spirit of God when he took knowledg that Christ was come and had sav'd sinners had sav'd him yet still he saies sum primus still he remains in his accusation of himself that he was still the greatest sinner because he remained still in his infirmity and aptness to relapse into former sins As long as we are we are subject to be worse then we are and those sins which we apprehend even with horror and amazement when we hear that others have done them we may come to do them with an earnestness with a delight with a defence with a glory if God leaves us to our selves As long as that is true of us sum prmus homo I am no better then the first man then Adam was and none of us are in any proportion so good that is true also Quorum primus sum ego I am still in a slippery state and in an evident danger of being the greatest sinner This is the conclusion for every humble christian no man is a greater sinner then I was and I am not sure but that I may fall to be worse then ever I was except I husband and imploy the Talents of Gods Graces better then I have done A SERMON Preached at White-hall Serm. 15. February 29. 1627. SERMON XV. Acts 7.60 And when he had said this he fell a sleep HE that will dy with Christ upon Good-Friday must hear his own bell toll all Lent he that will be partaker of his passion at last must conform himself to his discipline of prayer fasting before Is there any man that in his chamber hears a bell toll for another man and does not kneel down to pray for that dying man and then when his charity breaths out upon another man does he not also reflect upon himself and dispose himself as if he were in the state of that dying man We begin to hear Christs bell toll now and is not our bell in the chime We must be in his grave before we come to his resurrection and we must be in his death-bed before we come to his grave we must do as he did fast and pray before we can say as he said that In manus tuas Into thy hands O Lord I commend my Spirit
dicas de loco tuo inutilis mihi est say not of thy place that it is good for nothing if thou must be put to doe the duties of the place in the place for it is good for this that when thou hast done that thou mayst sleepe Stephen's sleepe die in Peace Sis aliquid Be something that was our first and then hoc age doe truly the duties of that place without pretermitting thine own without intermedling with others which was our second and then our third consideration is Sis aliquis Be sombody be like sombody propose some good example in thy calling and profession to imitate Sis aliquis It was the counsell of that great little Philosopher Epictetus whensoever thou undertakest any action to consider what a Socrates or a Plato what a good and a wise man would doe in that Case and to doe conformably to that One great Orator Latinus Rufus proposed to himselfe Cicero for his example and Cicero propounded Demosthenes and hee Pericles and Pericles Pisistratus and so there was a concatenation a genealogie a pedegree of a good Orator Hieron Habet unumquodque propositum principes suos In every Calling in every Profession a man may finde some exemplar some leading men to follow The King hath a Josias and the beggar hath a Job and every man hath some But here wee must not pursue particulars but propose to all him whom our Text proposes Saint Stephen Stephanus and in him wee offer you first his name Stephen Stephen Stephanos is a leading an exemplar name a Significative a Propheticall a Sacramentall a Catechisticall name a Name that carries much instruction with it Our Countryman Bede takes it to be an Hebrew name and it signifies saith hee Normam vestram Your Rule Your Law To obey the Law to follow to embrace the Law is an acceptable service to God especially the invariable Law the Law of God himselfe But wee are sure that this name Stephen Stephanos signifies a Crowne to obey the Crowne to follow to serve the Crowne is an acceptable service to God especially the immarcessible Crown the Crown of Glory Nomen Omen scarce any man hath a name but that name is Legal and Historicall to him His very name remembers him of some rules and lawes of his actions So his name is legall and his name remembers him of some good men of the same name and so his name is historicall Nomina Debita In the old formularies of the Civill Law if a man left so many names to his Executors they were so many specialties for debts Our Names are Debts every man owes the world the signification of his name and of all his names every addition of honour or of office layes a new Debt a new Obligation upon him and his first name his Christian-Name above all For when new names are given to men in the Scriptures that doth not abolish or extinguish the old Jacob was called Jacob after God had called him Israel Gedeon Gedeon after he was called Jerubaal and Simon when he was Peter too was called Simon Changes of Office and additions of Honour must not extinguish our Christian Name The duties of our Christianity and our Religion must preponderate and weigh down the duties of all other places and for all together Saint Gregory presents us a good use of this diligence to answere our Names Quo quis timet magis ne quod dicitur non esset eo plus quam dicitur erit The more a man is afraid that hee is not worthy of the name hee beares whether the name of office or his Christian-Name the better Officer and the better Christian he will be for that feare and that solicitude and therefore it is an usefull and an applyable Prayer for great Persons which that Father makes in their behalfe Praesta quaesumus Domine ut quod in ore hominum sumus in conspectu tuo esse valeamus Grant O Lord that wee may alwayes be such in thine eyes as wee are in their tongues that depend upon us and justifie their acclamations with thy approbations And so far Stephens name as his name signifies the Law and as his name signifies the reward of fulfilling the Law a Crown hath carried us to the consideration of the duty of answering the signification of our names But then there are other passages in his History and Actions that carries us farther First then we receive Saint Stephen to have been Saint Paul's kinsman in the flesh and to have been his fellow pupill under Gamaliel Discipulus and to have been equall to him at least in the foundations in natural faculties and in the super-edifications too in learnings of acquisition and study And then to have had this great advantage above him That hee applied himselfe as a Disciple to Christ before Saint Paul did and in that profession became so eminent for all the Sects the Libertines themselves taking the liberty to dispute against him Act. 6.9 they were not able to resist the wisedome and the Spirit by which hee spake as that his Cosin Paul then but Saul envied him most and promov'd and assisted at his execution For upon those words but two verses before our Text That they that stoned Stephen laid down their clothes at Saul 's feet Saint Augustine sayes 7.58 In manu omnium eum lapidavit That it was Saul that stoned Stephen though by the hands of other executioners Men of the best extraction and families Men of the best parts and faculties Men of the best education and proficiencies owe themselves to God by most obligations Him that dyes to day God shall not only aske where is that Soule Is it as cleane as I made it at first No stayn of Sin or is it as clean as I wash'd it in Baptisme No sting No venome of original sinne in it Or is it as clean as I left it when wee met last at the Sacrament No guiltinesse of actuall sinne in it God shall not only aske this Where is that Soul Nor only aske where is that Body Is it come back in that Virginal integrity in which I made it Or is it no farther departed from that then Marriage which I made for it hath made it Are those Maritales ineptiae that we may put Luther's words into God's mouth the worst that is faln upon that body God shall not only ask for that Soul and that Body but aske also Where is that Wit that Learning those Arts those languages which by so good education I afforded thee Truly when a weake and ignorant man departs into any vicious way though in that case he doe adhere to the Enemy and doe serve the Devill against God yet he carries away but a single Man and serves but as a common Souldier But he that hath good parts and good education carries a Regiment in his person and Armies and munition for a thousand in himself Though then thy kinsmen in the flesh and
himself is purus actus all action all doing comfortable words are good cordials they revive the spirits and they have the nature of such occasional physick but deeds are our food our dyet and that that constantly nourishes us 1 Jo. 3.18 Non verbo sayes the Apostle Let us not love in word nor in tongue but in deed and in truth Not that we may not love in words but that our deeds are the true seals of that love which was also love when it was in words Ambro. But Ne quod luxuriat in flore attenuetur habetetur in fructu Least that tree that blew early and plentifully blast before it knit Second your good words with actions too It is the husbandry and the harvest of the righteous man as it is gathered in David The mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdome Ps 37.30 So we read it there it is in the tongue in words only the vulgar hath it Meditatur he meditates it so the heart is got in But the original Hagah is noted to signifie fructificavit he brings forth fruits thereof and so the hand is got in too And when that which is well spoken was well meant and hath been well expressed in action that 's the husbandry of the righteous man then his harvest is all in It is the way of God himself Philo Judaeus notes Exo 20.10 That the people are said to have seen the noise and the voice of God because whatsoever God sayes it determines in action If we may hear God we may see God what he sayes he does too Therefore from that example of God himself Saint Gregorie directs us we must sayes he shew our love Et vaneratione sermonis et ministerio largitatis with a fair respect in words and with a reall supply in deeds Nay when we look upon our pattern that is God Tertullian notes well That God prevented his own speaking by doing Benedicebat quae benefaciebat first he made all things good and then he blessed them that they might be better first he wrought and then he spoke And so Christs way and proceeding is presented to us too so far from not doing when he speaks as that he does before he speaks Christ began to doe and to teach Act. 1.1 Luk. ult 19. sayes St. Luke but first to do And he was mighty in deeds and in words but first in deeds We cannot write so well as our copy to begin alwayes at deeds as God and his Christ but yet let us labor to write so fair after it as first to afford comfortable words and though our deeds come after yet to have them from the beginning in our intention and that we doe them not because we promised but promise because we love to do good and love to lay upon our selves the obligation of a promise The instrument and organ of nature was the eye the natural man finds God in that he sees in the creature The organ of the Law which exalted and erectified nature was the hand Fac hoc et vives perform the law and thou shalt live So also the organ of the Gospel is the ear for faith comes by hearing but then the organ of faith it self is the hand too a hand that layes hold upon the merits of Christ for my self and a hand that delivers me over to the Church of God in a holy life and exemplary actions for the edification of others So that all all from nature to grace determines in action in doing good Sic facite Deo so do good to God in reall assisting his cause Sic facite Diis so do good to them whom God hath call'd Gods in reall seconding their religious purposes Sic facite imaginibus Dei So doe good to the images of God in real relieving his distressed members as that you doe all this upon that which is made the reason of all in the second part of this Text Because you are to be judged by the law of libertie Timor futuri judicii hujus vitae paedagogus 2. Part. Basil judicium Our School-master to teach us to stand upright in the last judgment is the meditation and the fear of that judgment in this life It is our school-master and school-master enough I said unto the fool thus and thus sayes David Ps 75.5 And I said unto the wicked thus and thus sayes he for sayes he God is the Judg He thought it enough to enlighten the understanding of the fool enough to rectifie the perversness of the wicked if he could set God before them in that notion as a Judg. For this is one great benefit from the present contemplation of the future Judgment that whosoever does truly and advisedly believe that ever he will come to that Judgment is at it now he that believes that God will judg him is Gods Commissioner Gods delegate and in his name Judges himself now Therefore it is a useful mistaking which the Roman translator is faln into in this text in reading it thus Sicut incepientes Judicari so speak ye and so do as they upon whom the Judgment were already begun for qui timet ante Christi tribunal praesentari August he that is afraid to be brought to the last Judgment hath but one refuge but one Sanctuary Ascendat tribunal mentis suae et constituat se ante seipsum let him cite himself before himself give evidence himself against himself and so guilty as he is found here so innocent he shall stand there Let him proceed upon himself 9.28 as Job did and he is safe I am afraid of all my sorrows saies he afraid that I have not said enough against my self nor repented enough afraid that my sorrows have not been sincere but mingled with circumstances of loss of health or honor or fortune occasioned by my sins and not only not principally for the sin it self I am afraid of all my sorrows saies he but how much more then of my mirths and pleasures to judg our selves by the Judgment of flatterers that depend upon us to judg our selves by the event and success of things I am enrich'd I am preferd by this course and therefore all 's well to judg our selves by example of others others do thus and why not I all these proceedings are Coram non Judice all these are literally praemunire cases for they are appellations into faraign Jurisdictions and foraign Judicatures Only our own conscience rectified is a competent Judg and they that have pass'd the tryal of that Judgment do not so much rise to Judgment at last as stand and continue in Judgment their Judgment that is their tryal is pass'd here and there they shall only receive sentence and that sentence shall be Euge bone serve well done good and faithful servant since thou didst enter into Judgment in the other world enter into thy Masters joy in this But howsoever we be prepared for that Judgment well or not well and howsoever the
better means of prevention before and of restitution after than the natural man or Jew had yet we consider that it is the law of liberty this law that hath afforded us these good helps by which we shall be judged And so though our case be better than theirs because we have this law of liberty which they wanted yet our case grows heavier than theirs if we use it not aright The Jews shall be under a heavier condemnation than the natural man because they had more liberty that is more means of avoyding sin than the naturall man had and upon the same reason the christian under a heavier condemnation than either because he shall be judged by the law of liberty What Judgement then gives this law This Mar. 16.16 Qui non crediderit damnabitur So sayes this law in the law-makers mouth He that believes not shall be damned And as no lesse light than faith it self can shew you what faith is what it is to believe so no lesse time than damnation shall last can shew you what damnation is For the very form of damnation is the everlastingness of it And qui non crediderit he that believeth not shall be damned there is no commutation of penance nor beheading after a sentence of a more ignominious death in that Court Doest thou believe that thou doest believe yet this law takes not that answer This law of liberty takes the liberty to look farther through faith into works for so sayes the law in the mouth of the law-maker To whom much is given Luc. 12.48 of him much shall be required Hast thou considered every new title of honor and every new addition of office every new step into higher places to have laid new duties and new obligations upon thee hast thou doubled the hours of thy prayers when thy preferments are doubled and encreased thine alms according as thy revenues are encreased hast thou done something done much in this kind this law will not be answered so this law of liberty takes the liberty to call upon thee for all Here also the law saies in the mouth of the law-maker If thou have agreed with many adversaries sayes Christ Mat. 5.25 let that be if thou have satisfied many duties for duties are adversaries that is tentations upon us yet as long as thou hast one adversary agree with that adversary quickly in the way leave no duty undischarged nor unrepented in this life Beloved we have well delivered our selves of the fear of Purgatory None of us fear that but another mistaking hath overtaken us and we flatter our selves with another danger that is compensation That by doing well in one place our ill doing in another is recompensed An ill officer looks to be saved because he is a good husband to his wife a good father to his children a good master to his servants and he thinks he hath three to one for his salvatien But as nature requires the qualities of every element which thou art composed of so this law of liberty calls upon thee for the exercises of all those vertues that appertain to every particular place thou holdst This liberty this law of liberty takes It binds thee to believe Christ all Christ Gods Christ as he was the eternal Son of the Father God of God our Christ as he was made man for our salvation and thy Christ as his blessed spirit in this his ordinance applies him to thee and offers him into thine armes this minute And then to know that he looks for a retribution from thee in that measure in which he dealt with thee much for much and for several kinds of good according to those several good things which he hath done for thee And if thou be first defective in these and then defective in laying hold upon him who is the propitiation and satisfaction for thy defects in these This law of liberty returns to her liberty to pronounce and the Judg to his liberty to execute that sentence Damnaberis thou wilt be cast into prison where thou must pay the last farthing thou must for Christ dyes not there and therefore there thou must lie till there come such another ransome as Christ nay a greater ransome than Christ was for Christ paid no debts in that prison This then is the christians case and this is the abridgment of his Religion Sic loquimini Sic facite To speak aright and to do aright to professe the truth and not be afraid nor ashamed of that and to live according to that profession For no man can make God the author of sin but that man comes as neer it as he can that makes Gods religion a cloak for his sin To this God proceeds not meerly and onely by commandment but by perswasion too and though he be not bound to do so yethe does give a reason The reason is because we must give account of both both of actions and of words of both we shall be judged But judged by a law a law which excludes on Gods part any secret ill purpose upon us if we keep his law A law which excludes on our part all pretence of ignorance for no man can plead ignorance of a law And then a law of liberty of liberty to God for God was not bound to save a man because he made him but of his own goodness he vouchsafed him a law by which he may be saved A law of liberty to us so that there is no Epicurism to do what we list no such liberty as makes us libertins for then there were no law nor Stoicism nor fatality that constrains us to do that we would not do for then there were no liberty But the Gospel is such a law of liberty as delivers us upon whom it works from the necessity of falling into the bondage of sin before and from the impossibility of recovering after if we be fallen into that bondage And this is liberty enough And of this liberty our blessed God give us the right use for his son Christ Jesus sake by the operation of that holy Ghost that proceeds from both Amen A SERMON Preached to Queen Anne at Denmarke-house Serm. 18. December 14. 1617. SERMON XVIII Proverbs 8.17 I love them that love me and they that seek me early shall find me AS the Prophets and the other Secretaries of the holy Ghost in penning the books of Scriptures do for the most part retain and express in their writings some impressions and some air of their former professions those that had been bred in Courts and Cities those that had been Shepheards and Heardsmen those that had been Fishers and so of the rest ever inserting into their writings some phrases some metaphors some allusions taken from that profession which they had exercised before so that soul that hath been transported upon any particular worldly pleasure when it is intirely turn'd upon God and the contemplation of his all-sufficiency and abundance doth find in God fit subject and
plura because they are more and so as the more beautiful and better proportioned a body is the more it draws the eye to look upon it so they are nearer quia potiora because they are better and so as the more evidence and light and lustre they have in themselves the easier things are discerned so they are nearer Plura quia manifestiora because they are more visible First how there should be more helps in the Christian religion then in the Jewish is not so evident at first for first if we consider the law to be salvation they had a vast multiplicity of laws scarse less then 600 several laws whereas the honor of the Christian religion is that it is verbum abbreviatum an abridgment of all into ten words as Moses cals the Commandements and then a re-abridgment of that abridgment into two love God and love thy Neighbour that is faith and works If we consider their laws to be their salvation they had more and if we consider their sacrifices to be their salvation they had more too for their Rabbins observe at least 50 several kinds of contracting uncleaness to which there were appropriated several expiations and sacrifices whereas we have only the sacrifices of prayer and of praise and of Christ in the sacrament for so it is the ordinary phrase manner of speech in the Fathers to call that a sacrifice not only as it is a commemorative sacrifice for that is amongst our selves and so every person in the congregation may sacrifice that is do that in remembrance of Christ but as it is a real sacrifice in which the Priest doth that which none but he does that is really to offer up Christ Jesus crucified to Almighty God for the sins of the people so as that that very body of Christ which offered himself for a propitiatory sacrifice upon the cross once for all that body and all that that body suffered is offered again and presented to the Father the Father is intreated that for the merits of that person so presented and offered unto him and in contemplation thereof he will be merciful to that congregation and applie those merits of his to their particular souls These are our sacrifices prayer and praise and Christ thus offered and how are these more then the Jews had they had more laws and more sacrifices and as many sacraments as we and if nearness of salvation consist in the plurality of these how is salvation nearer to us then to them quatenus plura in that first respects as the means are more as it is truly and properly said that there are more ingredients more simples more means of restoring in our dram of triacle or mithridate then in an ounce of any particular syrup in which there may be 3 or 4 in the other perchance so many hundred so in that receit of our Saviour Christ quicquid ligaveris in the absolution of the Minister that whatsoever he shall bind or loose upon earth shall be bound or loose in heaven there is more physick then in all the expiations and sacrifices of the old law There an expiation would serve to day which would not serve to morrow if it were omitted till the sun were set upon it it required a more severe expiation and so also an expiation would serve for one transgression which would not serve for another but here in the absosolution of the Minister there is a concurrence a confluence of medecines of all qualities purgative in confession and restorative in absolution corasive in the preaching of Judgments and cordial in the balm of the sacrament here is no limitation of time at what time soever a sinner repenteth nor limitation of sins whatsoever is forgiven in earth is forgiven in heaven salvation is nearer us in this respect that we have plura adminicula more outward and visible means then the Jews had because we may receive more in one action then they could in all theirs It is so also not only quia plura because we have more means Potiora but quia potiora because those means which we have are in their nature better more attractive and more winning The means as we have said before were their laws and their sacrifices and their sacraments and for their law it was lex interficiens non perficiens it was a law August that punished unrighteousness but it did not confer righteousness and their sacrifices being in blood if we remove from them their typical signification and what they prefigured which was the shedding of the blood of the lamb which takes away the sins of the world must necessarily create and excite a natural horror in man and an aversness from them Take their sacraments into comparison and then one of their sacraments Circumcision was limited to one sex it reached not to women and their other sacrament the passover was in the primary signification and institution thereof only a gratulatory commemoration of a temporal benefit of their deliverance from Egypt And therefore to constitute a judgment proportionably by the effects we see the law and the sacrifice and the sacraments of thy Jews did not much work upon foraign Nations it was salvation but salvation shut up amongst themselves whereas we see that the law of the Chrstians which is to conforme our selves to our great example and pattern Christ Jesus who if we would consider him meerly as man was the most exemplar man for all Theological vertues moral too that ever any history presented the sacrifices of Christians which are all spiritual therein more proportional to God who is all spirit and the sacraments of Christians in which though not ex opere operator not because that action is performed not because that sacrament is administred yet ex pacto and quando opus operamur by Gods covenant when soever that action is performed whensoever that sacrament is administred the grace of God is exhibited and offered nec fallaciter as Calvin saies well it is offered with a purpose on Gods part that that grace should be accepted we see I say that these laws and these sacrifices and these sacraments have gain'd upon the whole world for in their nature and in their attractiveness and in their applyableness and so in their effect they are potiora better and in that respect salvation is nearer us then it was to the Jews Manifestiora And so it is lastly quia manifestiora because they have an evidence and manifestation of themselves in themselves Now this is especially true in the sacraments because the sacraments exhibit and convey grace and grace is such a light such a torch such a beacon as where it is it is easily seen As there is a lustre in a precious stone which no mans eye or finger can limit to a certain place or point in that stone so though we do not assign in the sacrament where that is in what circumstance or part of that holy action
her ruine might have saved her Country but in her case if she had perished they were likely to perish too But she is safer then in that for first she had hope out of the words of the Law out of the dignity of her place out of the Justice of the King out of the preparation which she had made by Prayer which Prayer Josephus either out of tradition or out of conjecture and likelihood Records to have been That God would make both her Language and her Beauty acceptable to the King that day Out of all these she had hope of good success and howsoever if she failed of her purpose she was under two Laws of which it was necessary to obey that which concerned the glory of God And therefore Daniels confidence and Daniels words became her well Behold our God is able to deliver me and he will deliver me but if he will not I must not forsake his honor nor abandon his service And therefore Si peream peream If I perish I perish It is not always a Christian resolution Si peream peream to say If I perish I perish I care not whether I perish or no To admit to invite to tempt tentations and occasions of sin and so to put our selves to the hazard of a spiritual perishing to give fire to concupiscencies with licentious Meditations either of sinful pleasures past or of that which we have then in our purpose and pursuit to fewel this fire with meats of curiosity and provocation to blow this fire with lascivious discourses and Letters and Protestations this admits no such condition Si pereas If thou perish but periisti thou art perished already thou didst then perish when thou didst so desperately cast thy self into the danger of perishing And as he that casts himself from a steeple doth not break his neck till he touch the ground but yet he is truly said to have killed himself when he threw himself towards the ground So in those preparations and invitations to sin we perish before we perish before we commit the act the sin it self We perished then when we opened our selves to the danger of the sin so also if a man will wring out not the Club out of Hercules hands but the sword out of Gods hands if a man will usurpe upon Gods jurisdiction and become a Magistrate to himself and revenge his own quarrels and in an inordinate defence of imaginary honor expose himself to danger in duel with a si peream peream If I perish I perish that is not onely true if he perish he perishes if he perish temporally he perishes spiritually too and goes out of the world loaded with that and with all his other sins but it is also true that if he perish not he perishes he comes back loaded both with the temporal and with the spiritual death both with the blood and with the damnation of that man who perished suddenly and without repentance by his sword To contract this and conclude all If a man have nothing in his contemplation but dignity and high place if he have not Vertue and Religion and a Conscience of having deserved well of his Countrey and the love of God and godly men for his sustentation and assurance but onely to tower up after dignity as a Hawk after a prey and think that he may boldly say as an impossible supposition Si peream peream If I perish I perish as though it were impossible he should perish he shall be subject to that derision of the King of Babylon Quomodo Cecidisti Esa 14.12 How art thou faln from Heaven O Lucifer thou son of the morning How art thou cast down to the ground that didst cast lots upon the Nations But that provident and religious Soul which proceeds in all her enterprises as Esther did in her preparations which first calls an assembly of all her Country-men that is them of the houshold of the Faithful the Congregation of Christs Church and the Communion of Saints and comes to participate the benefit of publick Prayers in his house inconvenient times and then doth the same in her own house within doors she and her maids that is she and all her senses and faculties This soul may also come to Esthers resolution to go in to the King though it be not according to the Law though that Law be That neither fornicator nor adulterer nor wanton nor thief nor drunkard nor covetous nor extortioner nor railer shall have access into the Kingdom of Heaven yet this soul thus prepared shall feel a comfortable assurance that this Law was made for servants and not for sons nor for the Spouse of Christ his Church and the living Members thereof and she may boldly say Si peream peream It is all one though I perish or as it is in the Original Vecasher quomodocunque peream whether I perish in my estimation and opinion with men whether I perish in my fortunes honor or health quomodocunque it is all one Heaven and earth shall pass away but Gods word shall not pass and we have both that word of God which shall never have end and that word of God which never had beginning His Word as it is his Promise his Scriptures and his Word as it is himself Christ Jesus for our assurance and security that that Law of denying sinners access and turning his face from them is not a perpetual not an irrevocable Law but that that himself says belongs to us For a little while have I forsaken thee but with great compassion will I gather thee for a moment in mine anger I hid my face from thee for a little season but with everlasting mercy have I had compassion on thee saith the Lord Christ thy Redeemer How riotously and voluptuously soever I have surfeited upon sin heretofore yet if I fast that fast now how disobedient soever I have been to my Superiors heretofore yet if I apply my self to a conscionable humility to them now howsoever if I have neglected necessary duties in my self or neglected them in my Family that either I have not been careful to give good example or not careful that they should do according to my example and by the way it is not only the Master of a house that hath the charge of a Family but every person every servant in the house that hath a body and a soul hath a house and a Family to look to and to answer for yet if I become careful now that both I I my self will and my whole house all my family shall serve the Lord If I be thus prepar'd thus dispos'd thus matur'd thus mellow'd thus suppled thus entendred to the admitting of any impressions from the hand of my God though there seem to be a general Law spread over all an universal War an universal Famine an universal Pestilence over the whole Nation yet I shall come either to an assurance that though there fall so many thousands on this and on that
then whosoever wishes that it might be forgotten wishes that it had proceeded And therefore let our tongue cleave unto the roof our mouths if we do not confers his loving kindness before the Lord and his wonderful works before the Sons of men Then I say did his Majesty shew this Christian courage of his more manifestly when he sent the profession of his Religion The Apology of the Oath of Allegeance and his opinion of the Romane Antichrist in all languages to all Princes of Christendom By occasion of which Book though there have risen twenty Rabshakes who have rail'd against our God in railing against our Religion and twenty Shemeis who have raised against the person of his sacred Majesty for I may pronounce that the number of them who have bark'd and snarl'd at that book in writing is scarceless then fourty yet scarce one of them all hath undertaken the arguments of that book but either repeated and perchance enlarged those things which their own Authors had shovel'd together of that subject that is The Popes Temporal power or else they have bent themselves maliciously insolently sacrilegiously against the person to his Majesty and the Pope may be Antichrist still for any thing they have said to the contrary It belong'd only to him whom no earthly King may enter into comparison with John 17.12 the King of Heaven Christ Jesus to say Those that thou gavest me have I kept and none of them is lost And even in him in Christ Jesus himself that admitted one exception Judas the childe of perdition was lost Our King cannot say that none of his Subjects are fled to Rome but his vigilancy at home hath wrought so as that fewer are gone from our Universities thither in his then in former times and his Books abroad have wrought so that much greater and considerable persons are come to us then are gone from us I add that particular from our Universities because we see that since those men whom our Universities had bred and graduated before they went thither of which the number was great for many years of the Queens time are worne out amongst them and dead those whom they make up there whom they have had from their first youth there who have received all their Learning from their beggarly and fragmentary way of Dictates there and were never grounded in our Schools nor Universities have prov'd but weak maintainers or that cause compar'd with those men of the first times As Plato says of a particular natural body he that will cure an ill Eye must cure the Head he that will cure the Head must cure the Body and he that will cure the Body must cure the Soul that is must bring the Minde to a temperature a moderation an equanimity so in Civil Bodies in States Head and Eye and Body Prince and Council and People do all receive their health and welfare from the pureness of Religion And therefore as the chiefest of all I chose to insist upon that Blessing That God hath given us a Religious King and Religious out of his Understanding His other Virtues work upon several conditions of men by this Blessing the whole Body is blest And therefore not only they which have been salted with the salt of the Court as it is said of the Kings Servants but all that are salted with the salt of the Earth Ezra 4.24 Matth. 5.13 Mark 9.50 as Christ calls his Church his Apostles all that love to have salt in themselves and peace with one another all that are sensible of the Spiritual life and growth and good taste that they have by the Gospel are bound to praise him to magnifie him for ever that hath vouchsafed us a Religious King and Religious out of Understanding Many other happinesses are rooted in the love of the Subject and of his confidence in their love his very absence from us is an argument to us His continual abode with us hath been an argument of his love to us and this long Progress of his is an argument of his assurance of our loyalty to him It is an argument also of the good habitude and constitution to which he hath brought this State and how little harm they that wish ill to it are able to do Mamertinus Maximiano upon any advantage Hanc in vobis fiduciam pertimescunt This confidence of his makes his home-enemies more afraid then his Laws or his Train'd-Bands Et contemnise sentiunt cum relinquuntur When they are left to their own malignity and to do their worst they discern in that how despicable and contemptible a party they are Cum in interiora Imperii seceditis when the King may go so far from the heart of his Kingdom and the enemy be able to make no use of his absence this makes them see the desperateness of their vain imaginations He is not gone from us for a Noble part of this Body our Nation is gone with him and a Royal part of his Body stays with us Neither is the farthest place that he goes to any other then ours now when as the Roman Orator said Nunc demum juvat orbem terrarum spectare depictum Eumenius cum in illo nihil videmus alienum Now it is a comfort to look upon a Map of the World when we can see nothing in it that is not our own so we may say Now it is a pleasant sight to look upon a Map of this Island when it is all one As we had him at first and shall have him again from that Kingdom where the natural days are longer then ours are so may he have longer days with us then ever any of our Princes had and as he hath Immortalitatem propriam sibi filium sibi similem as it was said of Constantine a peculiar immortality not to die because he shall live in his Son so in the fulness of time and in the accomplishment of Gods purposes upon him may he have the happiness of the other Immortality and peacefully surrender all his Crowns in exchange of one a Crown of immortal glory which the Lord the righteous Judge lay up for him against that day To conclude all and to go the right way from things which we see to things which we see not by consideration of the King to the contemplation of God since God hath made us his Tenants of this World we are bound not only to pay our Rents spiritual duties and services towards him but we are bound to reparations too to contribute our help to society and such external duties as belong to the maintenance of this world in which Almighty God hath chosen to be glorified If we have these two Pureness of heart and Grace of lips then we do these two we pay our Rent and we keep the world in reparation and we shall pass through all those steps and gradations Ambros which St. Ambrose harmoniously melodiously expresses to be servi per timorem to be the servants of
may make a Prayer a Libel if upon colour of preaching or praying against toleration of Religion or persecution for Religion he would insinuate that any such tolerations are prepared for us or such persecutions threatned against us But if for speaking the mysteries of your salvation plainly sincerely inelegantly inartificially for the Gold and not for the Fashion for the Matter and not for the Form Nanciscor populi gratiam my service may be acceptable to Gods people and available to their Edification Nonne Dei donum shall not I call this a great Blessing of God Beloved in him I must I do And therefore because I presume I speak to such I take to my self that which follows there in the same Father that he that speaks to such a people does not his duty if he consider not deliberately Quibus Quando Quantum loquatur both to whom and at what time and how much he is to speak I consider the persons and I consider that the greatest part by much are persons born since the Reformation of Religion since the death of Idolatry in this Land and therefore not naturaliz'd by Conversion by Transplantation from another Religion to this but born the natural children of this Church and therefore to such persons I need not lay hold upon any points of controverted Doctrine I consider also Quando the time and I consider that it is now in these days of Easter when the greatest part of this Auditory have or will renew their Hands to Christ Jesus in the Sacrament of his Body and his Blood that they will rather loose theirs then lack his and therefore towards persons who have testified that disposition in that seal I need not depart into any vehement or passionate Exhortations to constancy and perseverance as though there were occasion to doubt it And I consider lastly Quantum how much is necessary to be spoken to such a people so disposed and therefore farther then the custom and solemnity of this day and place lays an Obligation upon me I will not extend my self to an unnecessary length especially because that which shall be said by me and by my Brethren which come after and were worthy to come before me in this place is to be said to you again by another who alone takes as much pains as all we and all you too Hears all with as much patience as all you and is to speak of all with as much and more labour then all we Much therefore for your ease somewhat for his a little for mine own with such succinctness and brevity as may consist with clearness and perspicuity in such manner and method as may best enlighten your understandings and least encumber your memories I shall open unto you that light which God commanded out of darkness and that light by which he hath shin'd in our hearts and this light by which we shall have the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ Jesus Divisio Our parts therefore in these words must necessarily be three three Lights The first shows us our Creation the second our Vocation the third our Glorification In the first We who were but but what but nothing were made Creatures In the second we who were but Gentiles were made Christians In the third we who were but men shall be made saints In the first God took us when there was no world In the second God sustains us in an ill world In the third God shall crown us in a glorious and joyful world In the first God made us in the second God mends us in the third God shall perfect us First God commanded light out of darkness that man might see the Creature then he shin'd in our hearts that man might see himself at last he shall shine so in the face of Christ Jesus that man may see God and live and live as long as that God of light and life shall live himself Every one of these Parts will have divers Branches and it is time to enter into them In the first the Creation because this Text does not purposely and primarily deliver the Doctrine of the Creation not prove it not press it not enforce it but rather suppose it and then propose it by way of Example and Comparison for when the Apostles says God who commanded light out of darkness hath shin'd in our hearts he intimates therein these two Propositions first that the same God that does the one does the other too God perfects his works and then this Proposition also As God hath done the one he hath done the other God himself works by Patterns by Examples These two Propositions shall therefore be our two first Branches in this first Part. First Idem Deus the same God goes through his works and therefore let us never fear that God will be weary and then Sicut Deus as God hath done he will do again he works by pattern and so must we and then from these two we shall descend to our third Proposition Quid Deus what God is said to have done here and it is that he commanded light out of darkness In these three we shall determine this Part and for the Branches of the other two Parts our Vocation and our Glorification it will be a less burden to your memories to open them then when we come to handle the Parts themselves then altogether now Now we shall proceed in the Branches of the first Part. Part 1. Memb. 1. Idem Deus In this our first Consideration is Idem Deus the same our God goes through all Those divers Hereticks who thought there were two Gods for Cordon thought so and Marcion thought so too the Gnostiques thought so and the Maniches thought so too though they differ'd in their mistakings for errour is always manifold and multiform yet all their errours were upon this ground this root They could nor comprehend that the same God should be the God of Justice and the God of Mercy too a God that had an earnestness to punish sin and an easiness to pardon sin too Cordon who was first though he made two Gods yet he used them both reasonable well for with him Alter Bonus Alter Justus Iren. 1.28.29 one of his Gods is perfectly good merciful and the other though he be not so very good yet he is just Marcion who came after says worse because he could not discern the good purposes of God in inflicting Judgements nor the good use which good men make of his Corrections but thought all acts of his Justice to be calamitous and intolerable and naturally evil therefore with him Alter Bonus Alter Malus he that is the merciful God is his good God and he that is so just but just is an ill God Hence they came to call the God of the New Testament a good God because there was Copiosa Redemptio plentiful Redemption in the Gospel and the God of the Old Testament Malum Deum an ill God
because they thought all penalties of the Law evil They came lower to call that God which created the Upper Region of man the Brain and the Heart the presence and privy Chamber of Reason and consequently of Religion too a good God because good things are enacted there and that God that created the Lower Region of man the seat and scene of Carnal Desires and inordinate Affections an ill God because ill actions are perpetrated there But Idem Deus the same God that commanded light out of darkness hath shin'd in our hearts The God of the Law and the God of the Gospel too The God of the Brain and the God of the Belly too The God of Mercy and the God of Justice too is all one God In all the Scriptures you shall scarce find such a Demonstration of Gods Indignation such a severe Execution as that upon the Syrians when after the slaughter of one hundred thousand foot in the field in one day the walls of the City into which they fled fell and slew twenty seven thousand more The Armies of the Israelites were that day but as little flocks of kids says the Text there and yet those few slew one hundred thousand The Walls of Aphak promised succour and yet they fell and slew twenty seven thousand Now from whence proceeded Gods vehement anger in this defeat The Prophet tells the King the cause Because the Syrians have said The Lord is God of the hills but he is not God of the vallies The Israelites had beaten them upon the Hills and they could not attribute this to their Forces for they were very small they must necessarily ascribe it to their God but they thought they might find a way to be too hard for their God and therefore since he was a God of the mountains they would fight with him in the vallies But the God of Israel is Idem Deus one and the same God He is Jugatinus and Vallonia both as St. Aug. speaks out of the Roman Authors he is God of the mountains he can exalt and he is God of the Vallies he can throw down Our Age hath produced such Syrians too Men who after God hath declared himself against them many ways have yet thought they might get an advantage upon him some other way They begun in Rebellions animated persons of great blood and great place to rebels their Rebellions God frustrated Then they came to say to say in actions Their God is God of Rebellions a God that resists Rebellions but he is no God of Excommunications then they excommunicated us But our God cast those thunder-bolts those Bruta fulmina into the Sea no man took fire at them Then they said He is a God of Excommunications he will not suffer an Excommunication stollen out in his Name against his Children to do any harm but he is no God of Invasion let 's try him there Then they procured Invasion and there the God of Israel shew'd himself the Lord of Hosts and scattered them there Then they said he is the God of Invasions annihilates them but he is not the God of Supplantations surely their God will not pry into a Cellar he will not peep into a vault he is the God of water but he is not the God of fire let 's try him in that Element and in that Element they saw one another justly eviscorated and their bowels burnt All this they have said so as we have heard them for they have said it in loud Actions and still they say something in corners which we do not hear Either he is not a God of Equivocations and therefore let us be lying spirits in the mouthes of some of his Prophets draw some men that are in great Opinion of Learning to our side or at least draw the people into an Opinion that we have drawn them or else he is not the God of jealousie and suspition and therefore let us supple and slumber him with security and pretences and disguises But he is Idem Deus that God who hath begun and proceeded will persevere in mercy towards us Our God is not out of breath because he hath blown one tempest and swallowed a Navy Our God hath not burnt out his eyes because he hath looked upon a Train of Powder In the the light of Heaven and in the darkness of hell he sees alike he sees not onely all Machinations of hands when things come to action but all Imaginations of hearts when they are in their first Consultations past and present and future distinguish not his Quando all is one time to him Mountains and Vallies Sea and Land distinguish not his Ubi all is one place to him When I begin says God to Eli I will make an end not onely that all Gods purposes shall have their certain end but that even then when he begins he makes an end from the very beginning imprints an infallible assurance that whom he loves he loves to the end as a Circle is printed all at once so his beginning and ending is all one Make thou also the same interpretation of this Idem Deus in all the Vicissitudes and Changes of this World Hath God brought thee from an Exposititious Child laid out in the streets of uncertain name of unknown Parents to become the first foundation-stone of a great family and to enoble a posterity Hath God brought thee from a Carriers Pack upon which thou camest up to thy change of Foot-Cloathes and Coaches Hath God brought thee from one of these Blew-Coats to one of those Scarlet Gowns Attribute not this to thine own Industry nor to thine own Frugality for Industry is but Fortunes right hand and Frugality her left but come to Davids Acclamation Dominus Fecit It is the Lords doing That takes away the impossibility Psal 118.22 If the Lord will do it it may be it must be done but yet even that takes not away the wonder for as it follows there Domiminus fecit est Mirabile though the Lord have done it it is wonderful in our eyes to see whom and from whence and whither and how God does raise and exalt some men And then if God be pleas'd to make thee a Roll written on both sides a History of Adversity as well as of Prosperity if when he hath fill'd his Tables with the story of Mardoche a man strangely raised he takes his Spunge and wipes out all that and writes down in thee the story of Job a man strangely ruin'd all this is Idem Deus still the same God and the same purpose in that God still to bring thee nearer to him though by a lower way If then thou abound Luk. 12.19 come not to say with the over-secure man Soul thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thine ease eat drink and be merry and if thou want come not to that impatience of that Prophet Satis est Lord this is enough now take away my life Nay though the Lord lead thee