thence drops on the very skirts of his rayment even the rest of the Creatures who have all some interest in his body and therefore in his glory Whereby we are given to consider not only the greatness but the large extent of the Almighty's goodness in this Act of his Incarnation For bonum est sui diffusivum goodness is diffusive and loves to communicate it self and that of God the supream good most of all other And indeed whatsoever we every where see whatsoever any where is or hath any being it is nothing else but a Communication of the Divine goodness from whence they have all that they have whatsoever they are But now in this mystery God did communicate a new goodness and a greater than ever before not only unto man but in a sort unto all his Creatures which all have some title in his person and shall in their time receive a benediction from it for man as he was Supremum Creationis colophon the last and supream work of the Creation so was he the sum and recapitulation of all that was created before him and all that was so created was but either spiritual as the Angels or corporeal as the rest of the world and in man who hath a material body with the one and an immaterial Soul sutable to the other both were bound up together in one Creature A Creature which hath being with the Elements whereof he is compounded life and vegetation with plants sense with beasts reason and spiritual existence with the Angels and therefore a little but compleat world within himself Nexus vinculum totius creaturae the very knot and band that holds together the whole Creation And therefore the whole world being united in man and man unto God every Creature of the world cannot but have some interest in the union who have a part in the Nature that was united Had he assumed the nature of Angels the rest of his works that are corporeal had been excluded Had he taken unto him a Celestial body and made his Tabernacle in the Sun the Creatures that have life and sense had lain unregarded and should any of these have been honoured with it those that are intelligent and spiritual men and Angels had been left out under contempt for ever Man therefore was the only creature in whom he could interest and honour all the rest as being both corporeal and spiritual and having in him being life sense intellect and whatsoever the rest have and are And mansnature therefore he only assumed ut dum una assumitur in qua reliquarum gradus continentur in una reliquae omnes quoad suos gradus assumerentur That so assuming the one wherein the degrees of all the rest were contained all the rest in that one according to their degrees might be assumed Wherefore that Cardinal Schoolman Cajetan said not amiss Incarnatio est elevatio totius universi in divinam personam the Incarnation is an exaltation of the whole Universe into the Divine Person Since by it man in whom all things are knit together is himself knit and united unto God that as man is all in one so God might be all in all And all from God receive not only elevation and honour but blessing and benediction in Christ Jesus the Son of God who is therefore the head both of men and Angels to them a Conserver to us a Redeemer and not unto us only but unto all other Creatures that were made for our use and become subject unto vanity through our sin that as they suffered by mans transgression so in man they might partake of mans Redemption And therefore the whole Creation saith St. Paul travaileth in pain together with us and together with us shall be delivered into the glorious liberty of the sons of God and therefore waiteth until they shall be revealed For which reason our blessed Lord fully is as he is termed Saelvator mundi the Saviour not of man alone but of the whole aspectable world and whatsoever is in it Thy truth reacheth unto the Heavens saith David of him and thy faithfulness unto the Clouds how excellent is thy name in all the World thou Lord shalt save both man and beast and what name is that which is so excellent in all the world but the name of a Saviour thou Lord shalt save both man and beast And therefore the prophet Esay calls unto Heaven and Earth the Forest and all the Trees that are in it that is the whole world and whatsoever dwelleth therein to sing and rejoyce together for this Redemption Sing O Heavens for the Lord hath done it shout ye lower parts of the Earth break forth into singing ye Mountains O Forest and every Tree therein for the Lord hath redeemed Jacob and glorified himself in Israel Esay xliv 22. And St. Paul gives the reason which is the same we have hitherto given because in this Redeemer all things in Heaven and Earth were collected and gathered together in one even in Christ Eph. x. 10. And not only gathered and collected but restored in him and renewed For nova jam facta sunt omnia all things are now made new saith the same Apostle Most worthily therefore at the name of Jesus the knee of every Creature both in Heaven and Earth and under the Earth is injoyned to bow and give glory as being by that name glorified in a sort and restored to more excellent perfection So great so universal is the goodness declared in this Act Yet this is not all But as it is great unto man and universal unto the Creature so is it the highest Communication of goodness in it self and the best demonstration of the intrinsick goodness of the Creator the highest in it self because in this he communicates himself which is not goodness but goodness it self Besides this there are but three degrees of communication Nature Grace and Glory but this fourth of hypostatical union infinitely exceeds them all on which all acknowledge their dependance for it restores Nature gives Grace purchaseth Glory Nature indeed and natural properties are a great communication of Gods goodness unto natural things supernatural Grace unto the Soul of man in this life a greater Divine glory unto body and Soul in the life to come greatest of all yet the best goes not farther than a Created quality for though being glorified we shall see God see his Essence and be blessed in seeing it yet we shall see it but per speciem by a Divine indeed but a created light but in this of Incarnation he doth not exhibit any shews or similitudes he doth not bestow any created gift whether of natural or supernatural order but he gives and bestows himself immediately unto his Creature who doth as immediately see and injoy him in himself being the self-same Person with him a communication of goodness wonderful above all other and not to be conceived had it not been revealed And as the highest in it self so is it the greatest
glory unto him that sitteth upon the throne and to the Lamb for evermore Who now shall mourn who shall weep for such a Soul none can sorrow for her unless they envy her happiness foelix illa anima imitationem desiderat nâ—n planctum that blessed Soul is no subject of grief but a pattern for imitation And therefore if any weep in her death they must be tears of joy not of sorrow and if they be of sorrow they must not be for her but for our selves and our own loss This indeed is great and invaluable and when you think on it weep a Gods name Quis natum in funere matris flere vetat he were barbarous that would forbid it you yet you shall not have all to your selves we 'll bear you company for she was a publick loss Such a Wife such a Mother such a Friend such a Mistriss such a Neighbour such and so good a Woman and so great an example of Virtue cannot should not go to the grave with dry eyes in whose loss so many have interest I would praise her if I could to make you weep more but she is beyond my commendations A Woman of her Wisdom and Judgment of her Wit and discourse so free and liberal and yet so prudent and provident withal for she was so in her self though misfortunes befel her so sweet so kind so mild so loving and respective to all and withal so charitable to the poor a Chirurgeon to the hurt and a Physician to the sick she eat not her morsels alone and their loins were warmed with her wooll as Job speaks such a Woman so well born and bred and of such a strain beyond ordinary as she seemed with the blood to inherit too the virtues of all her Ancestors so upright and clear and innocent in her whole course that the eye of envy nay were all the malice of the world infused into one eye it could not find any just stain to fasten on her such a one so every way compleat surely no Man unless he had her own or the wit and tongue of an Angel can sufficiently commend neither can we if we regard our own loss sufficiently bewail But the truth is she is not lost non amissa sed praemissa sent before she is lost she is not And therefore you whom it most concerns though you mourn mourn not as those without hope It is but a short separation and the time will come when you shall see her again though not with these earthly affections Pay the due tribute unto nature but then shut up the sluces for graces sake And the God of all grace give you comfort the Holy Ghost the Comforter himself replenish your heart with consolations And the blood of Jesus Christ wash us all from all our sins and strengthen us with the power of his might that we may so live whilst we remain here in this Prison of the Body that when it shall be dissolved we may obtain mercy from him to lead forth our Souls To lead them with his grace and then as he hath done to this blessed Saint receive them unto glory There with her and all the company of righteous spirits that are gone before us to sing praise and honour unto his holy name for evermore To this God the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost c. Laus Deo in aeternum THE Second FUNERAL SERMON FOR THE DAUGHTER SERMON XIII Upon ROM viii 10. And if Christ be in you the Body is dead because of Sin but the Spirit is life because of Righteousness MAN of all Gods Creatures is the strangest compounded the most marvellous mixture that ever was a very fardel of contrarieties wonderfully united and wrapt up in one bundle Heaven and Earth light and darkness Christ and Belial may seem to dwell together and man the house of their habitation what can be more directly opposite than Flesh and Spirit Life and Death Sin and Righteousness and lo all of them united here in one verse nay in one man For the Text is but the Anatomy of man and must therefore be composed of and divided into the same parts man himself is As his body is composed of contrary Elements heat and cold fire and water So his person is composed of contrary Natures Corporal and Spiritual Body and Soul His Natures again of contrary qualities Life and Death the Body is dead the Soul lives and lastly these qualities issuing from contrary causes sin and righteousness death from sin and life from righteousness The Body c. And though the sin by which the body dies is our own yet that we may know that the righteousness whereby the Soul lives is not of our selves but received from our Saviour there is a caution given in the entrance of the verse If Christ be in you So then here are three couples a Body and a Soul Sin and Righteousness Life and Death The body with her two attendants sin and death the Soul with her two endowments righteousness and life The former is universal and common to all the Sons of Adam according to the flesh the latter particular and proper only to the Children of the second Adam begotten by the Spirit If Christ c. I begin with the first part which is a meditation of death and our chief Christian comforts against death But yet before the Apostle brings in his consolations he premises a conditon If Christ be in you To teach us that the comforts of God belong not indifferently to all men He that is a stranger from Christ hath nothing to do with them What hast thou to do to take my Covenant into thy mouth so long as thou hatest to be reformed saith God in the Psalm I. When our Saviour commanded his Disciples to proclaim peace unto every house they came to he foretold them it should rest only on the Sons of peace He forbad them in like manner to give those things which were holy unto doggs or to cast pearls before Swine This stands a perpetual Law to all his messengers that they presume not to proclaim peace to the impenitent and unbelieving but as Jehu said unto Jehoram's horsman what hast thou to do with peace so are we to tell the wicked who walk on still in their sins that they have nothing to do with the peace or promises or priviledges of the Gospel If Christ be in you c. Secondly if we compare the verse immediately precedent or that which is subsequent with this between both you shall easily perceive after what manner Christ dwells in his Children Sometimes we are said to be in Christ and sometimes Christ is said again to be in us and both in effect come to one we are in Christ by faith and Christ is in us by his Spirit For so it follows If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies It is
1 Cor. xi 28. But let a Man examine himself and so let him eat of that Bread and drink of that Cup. SERMON IX X XI On Christmass day fol. 268 295 324. I. on Luke ii 10 11. And the Angel said unto them Fear not for behold I bring you tydings of great joy which shall be to all people For unto you is born this day in the City of David a Saviour which is Christ the Lord. II. on Gal. iv 4 5. When the fulness of time was come God sent forth his Son made of a Woman made under the Law That he might redeem them that are under the Law that we might receive the adoption of Sons III. on Esay liii 8. And who shall declare his Generation SERMON XII XIII Two Funeral Sermons fol. 356 384. I. For the Mother on Psal. cxlii verse ult Bring my Soul out of Prison that I may give thanks unto thy Name which thing if thou wilt grant me then shall the Righteous resort unto my Company II. For the Daughter on Rom viii 10. And if Christ be in you the Body is dead because of Sin but the Spirit is life because of Righteousness A DISCOURSE OF OATHS SERMON I. Upon JER iv 2. And thou shalt swear The Lord liveth in Truth in Judgment and in Righteousness THough all Sins be dangerous unto the Soul of man and none so small as may be neglected since a man may be choaked under a heap of Sand as well as crushed to death by the fall of a Tower yet the greater a sin is and the more general it is grown the greater danger and more inevitable destruction doth attend it And therefore it doth require our chief labour and diligence both to avoid such in our selves and to give the best notice we can unto others of the peril By negligence the least Leak may drown the Ship but the Pilot's special care is of the Rock on which if his Vessel fall it certainly splits Now of all the Sins whereunto the Corruption of man is subject I think there is scarce any so great and so common so great in it self and so common in the world so injurious unto the Majesty of God and so frequent amongst the Sons of men as the sin of Swearing The vain and irreverent using rather abusing of that Sacred Name in our ordinary speech which if well considered we should tremble but to think on A sin which the Wise man tells us will bring a Curse upon the house where it is used and it is no less likely to bring a Curse upon a whole Land and Nation where it is universal So that this impiety of all other as it brings with it a greater and more general danger so it calls for from all especially from all us whom it most concerns a great and universal care All endeavours should run forth to the quenching of a common fire It is indeed often galled and sharply taxed from such places as these obviously and by the way But the point contains much and will require a set discourse of that and nothing else for we cannot be too industrious against a publick mischief For which reason I have now made it the subject of my discourse as it is of this Verse Wherein you have the whole Nature and full doctrine of an Oath and how prepared it may be wholesome which otherwise used is deadly poison For an Oath is not simply and utterly unlawful my Text says Thou shalt swear but then it must be qualifyed with the due form and matter and manner The form must be As the Lord liveth that is in the Name of the living Lord The matter Truth and Righteousness the manner or modification Judgment Thou shalt c. But before you may fully apprehend the division of the Text it will be requisite that I shew you some divisions of an Oath for there are divers sorts There is a bare and simple Oath and there is an Oath mixt with a Curse and execration The bare and simple Oath is only a plain and naked contestation wherein we call God to witness of what we say The execratory is when we bind over and oblige either our selves or something dear unto us unto some notorious punishment if so be that be not true which we say as when one swears by his Life Soul Salvation and the like Again there is an Oath wherein there is a manifest and express assumption of the Name of God which needs no instance we know it too well by daily and fearful example And there is an Oath wherein God is called to record tacitly and implicitly under the Name of those Creatures wherein his Glory doth especially shine and appear So he that sweareth by heaven sweareth both by heaven and by him that dwelleth therein And lastly which is specially material There is an Oath Assertory and an Oath Obligatory Assertory when we affirm or deny any thing past or present Obligatory when we promise or threaten something to come Which being observed you may easily make a fit Application of the three terms in my Text Truth Judgment and Righteousness Truth unto an assertory Oath Righteousness unto a promissory Judgment and discretion unto both For which cause it is placed in the midst between both For an Assertory oath must be True lest we swear falsly A Promissory Righteous lest we swear to do unjustly and both with discretion and judgment lest we swear lightly and rashly Thou shalt swear c. So then we may in some case swear but the Oath must have the right form it must be made in the name of the Lord And the due matter in Truth if Assertory in Righteousness if Promissory And then in a discreet manner with premeditation and judgment in both Wherein you see how we may swear and how we may not swear In Truth Judgment and Righteousness we may swear but falsly unjustly and rashly and vainly we may not swear Of these points in their order beginning with the first The Lawfulness of an Oath and that in case a man may swear Thou shalt c. 1. There are not wanting some and those even amongst the Fathers themselves who have censured all Oaths though permitted by the Law yet as condemned by the Gospel which contains they say a Doctrine of more than legal perfection of this opinion were St. Basil and Theophylact and it is the error of the Anabaptist unto this day Others have thought that an Oath may be lawful under the Gospel but then only before a Magistrate and when it is required by such as have authority thereunto But the common and more general opinion both of the Antient Fathers and Modern Divines is that it is not simply unlawful for a private man to swear and in a private action when some urgent cause either the honour and Glory of God or some great good and benefit of our Neighbour doth call for it at our hands since it is not the use of an Oath but
habet all our time that is past death hath seised on it and so much of our life is consumed Let me then warn you and stir up your meditations of your mortality in the words of Moses Deut. xxxii 29. O that men were wise then would they understand this then would they consider their latter end Sure we are unwise that we consider not the things past the evil we have committed the good we have omitted the benefits of God we have abused the time we have mispent and yet we grieve not because we think not yet whether we shall die More unwise are we not to consider the things present the deadness of our Body and uncertainty of our death the difficulty of Salvation and the small number of such as shall be saved and yet we shame not because we think we shall not yet die But most unwise are we that we consider not the things to come Death Judgment Hell all to come and yet we fear not because we think we shall never die But O that we were wise then should we understand then should we consider our latter end and considering it we should both prepare for it now and more cheerfully entertain it when it comes memorare novissims remember thy end saith the Wiseman in aeternum non peccabis and thou shalt never offend never do amiss Ecclus vii 36. So universal is the goodness of this consideration and therefore I have stayed the longer on it But now I pass from mortality to the cause of it from death to sin that first brought it into the world The body is dead because of sin Sin it is and only sin which is as the cause of all our dolours and calamities so of death it self that follows them without this there never had been there never could have been any death in the world Death were not death had it not a sting to kill but the sting of death is sin as the strength of sin is the law saith our Apostle The cursed apple of disobedience which our first Parents would needs eat sticks still in all our teeth it was poyson unto his nature and infected his blood and he hath derived the contagion to all his posterity who still continuing to feed on forbidden fruit as he did do perpetually strengthen the original Disease and draw death upon themselves more hastily and violently than either that sin procured or the prime corruption of nature for it doth inforce Hence then we may perceive first how foolish they are who living still in sin yet never consider that they are the Butchers and Murtherers of themselves according to that of the Psalmist The malice of the wicked shall slay themselves xxxiv 21 his own sin which he hath conceived brought forth and nourished shall be his destruction Every Man judgeth Saul miserable that died upon his own Sword but what better are other wretched Men whose sins and iniquities are the cruel instruments of death wherewith they slay themselves Souls and Bodies too Thus are they twice miserable first that they must die and secondly that they are guilty of their own death O the lamentable blindness of Men who albeit in their life they fear nothing more than death yet do they entertain nothing more willingly than sin which causeth their death In bodily diseases Men are content to abstain even from ordinary food when they are informed it will but nourish their sickness and this they do to eschew death only herein they are so ignorant that notwithstanding they abhor death yet they take pleasure in unrighteousness that brings it upon them And secondly which shall be the last use we will make of this point Since sin it is that did first bring and doth still hasten on death upon wicked Men what marvel is it if in these last and worst days the Lord strike the bodies of Men with sundry sorts of diseases and sundry kinds of death seeing Man by sundry sorts of sins doth not cease to provoke him unto anger He frameth his Judgments proportionable to our iniquities if ye walk stubbornly against me and will not obey me I will then bring seven times more plagues upon you according to your sins Levit. xxvi 25. He hath a famine to punish intemperance and the abuse of his creatures if the memory of our own corrupt and putrifying bodies cannot do it he hath a devouring sword to bring down the pride of our hearts If we have fiery and unclean affections he doth not need burning Fevers and loathsome diseases to punish them And now if the Lord after that he hath stricken us with such a dreadful pestilence shall renew his Plague amongst us or go on to finish that former destruction with the Sword of our enemies what shall we say but the despising of his former fatherly corrections or our stubborn walking against the Lord our God hath procured it justly unto our selves Quid mirum in poenas generis humani crescere ir am Dei cùm crescat quotidie quod puniatur what marvel that the wrath of God increase every day to punish Man when that doth daily increase which deserves that God should punish it But enough of this part it is now time to pass on to the second and most worthy part as of Man so of my Text from the Body to the Soul from the memory of death to the comforts against death for though the body be dead yet it is but the body the spirit which is the highest consolation of a Christian is yet alive Mans life it self But the spirit is life I cannot now stand to discourse of the excellent Nature of Mans Spirit and the wonderful union of it with flesh and blood for Man you see is no simple creature but compounded of both both a Body and a Spirit He is the abstract and brief compendium of all the creatures of God The world was corporeal the Angels spiritual and both were united in Man and made as it were into one creature A creature which hath being with the elements life with plants sense with beasts reason and spiritual existence with Angels that so the Almighty God first uniting all his creatures in Man and then uniting Man unto himself in the person of Christ might in some sort through Man communicate himself to all his creatures Worthily therefore did the Naturalists term him a little world and as worthily did St. Austin say of him that of all the miracles that were ever wrought amongst Men Man himself is the greatest miracle and that not only in regard of his two substances but especially in regard of their marvellous union that a mass of clay should be quickened by a spirit of life and both united into one person That as God himself hath diverse persons in one Nature so man hath diverse and those contrary natures in one person Commonly says Bernard the honourable agrees not with the ignoble the strong overgoes the weak the living and the dead dwell not together
Non sic in opere tuo domine non sic in commixtione tua not so in thy work O Lord not so in thy commixtion here the living and the dead dwell both together The body is dead because of sin but the spirit is life Here then are the high consolations of a Christian against death briefly comprised and they are three That his death is neither total nor final but his life is perpetual His death is not total it is only of the body for the spirit lives it is not final for the spirit is not said only to live but that it is life and that in two respects first because it shall give life again unto the body and that secondly an everlasting life and therefore it is not barely the spirit shall live but in the abstract the spirit is life So you may perceive the reason why the Apostle varies his manner of speech he said not the body is death as he says the spirit is life neither saith he the spirit is alive as he said the body is dead but the body is dead and the spirit is life the body is dead and not death because it shall live again and the spirit is not alive but life because by the virtue of the spirit it is that it shall live and live for ever The spirit c. So our life is perpetuate our death but short and not total Amidst these comforts what hath death in it that shall greatly trouble or distress the faithful Soul why should it not stand erect in the midst of all the panick terrors thereof so long as there is begun in us a life which no death shall ever be able to extinguish Albeit death invade the natural and vital powers of our bodies and suppress them one after another yea though at the length he break in upon this lodging of clay and demolish it to the ground yet the inner Man and spiritual that dwells in the body shall escape with his life The Tabernacle is cast down that 's the most our enemy can do but he who dwells in it removes unto a better The dissolving of the body to him is but the breaking up of the prison wherein he hath been so long detained that he may thenceforth be delivered into a glorious liberty For as the Bird escapes out of the snare of the Fowler so the Soul in death mounts up and flies away wiâ— joy into the rest of her Maker The Apostle knew this well and therefore desired to be dissolved that he might be with Christ. As in the battle between our Saviour and Satan Satans head was bruised but he did no more than tread on our Saviours heel so shall it be in the conflict of all his members with Satan by the power of our Lord Jesus we shall be more than conquerors For the God of peace shall tread him under our feet Rom. xvi While he is there let him nibble about the feet it is no great matter yet 't is all he can do and let him do it Manducet terram meam dentem carni infigat let him bite the dust saith Ambrose it was his original curse let him eat that part of me which is earth let him bruise my body all this is still but to tread upon my heel my comfort is there is a seed of immortal life in my Soul which no power of the enemy is able to approach much less to overcome and extinguish for the spirit doth not only live but is life life eternal The spirit is life c. But yet that we may more fully understand to whom these consolations belong and what spirits they are that can live in death and injoy the comforts of life when their bodies can live no longer it is added because of righteousness The spirit is life because of righteousness or for righteousness sake The righteous then these are they to whom it belongs these only are the holy Spirits that shall revive in the midst of life and live in death as they died while they lived whilst the body lived they died unto sin and when the body dies they shall live unto God For as the life of the Soul is the comfort of the heart so the spirit of righteousness is the life of the Soul And therefore deceive not thy self in a matter of such moment in the business of thine everlasting welfare but be most assured that so far forth thou dost live as thou art sanctified and no farther As health is to the body so is holiness to the spirit A body without health falls out of one pain into another till it die and a Soul without holiness is polluted with one lust after another till it perish eternally As the Moon hath light more or less as it is in aspect with the Sun so the Soul enjoys life less or more as it is turned or averted to or from the Lord of life whose righteousness only can give life as this life peace and joy unto the Soul Miserable are those wicked ones that want both they are as St. Jude speaks bis mortui twice dead that is dead both in body and Soul Their Souls indeed do live and shall live eternally a natural life but there is a life of Grace as well as of Nature by the one the Soul lives for ever by the other it lives for ever in happiness This life they do not they shall not ever live and as for the natural the Spirit of God accounts that but a death whilst they live in the body he saith they are dead in sins and when they go out of the body though they live yet he calls their life and justly an eternal death Immortality seems to be added rather to their sorrow than to their Souls Since their Souls are only kept immortal that their punishment might be everlasting It is true that so long as Men enjoy this natural life in health of body and prosperity of fortune the loss that comes by want of the spiritual life is not so safely discerned no more than the defects of a ruinous house are known in time of fair weather but when the storm of affliction when the tempest of death shall come pouring down upon him then the decaies and breaches will manifest themselves How woful then must his condition needs be that hath now no other life but a natural and must now part with that and he knows not whither In this estate he cannot but die either uncertain of comfort or rather most certain of Condemnation And therefore it is not much to be marvelled they are so loth to think or so much as to hear of that final and fatal time O death how bitter is thy remembrance unto such saith the Wiseman How doth the only apprehension thereof even chill the blood in his veins kill the very marrow in his bones Belshazzar's doom is no sooner written upon the wall but the joints of his loins are loosed and his knees smite one against
another How did that one word of the Witch strike Saul thorough and thorough leaving him tumbling on the earth in a swoon To morrow by this time thou and thy sons shall be with me so bitter indeed is the remembrance even of bodily death unto those that have no spiritual life in their Souls But what misery may we think will there be in the enduring and suffering of that whose only expectation is so fearful Sad and fearful is the departure of the wicked though it outwardly appear not in all the comforts of my Text belong not to them as their Spirits were dead whilest they lived so they shall not live when they die Where there is no righteousness there can be no life For the Spirit c. No the righteous the righteous that is the faithful and penitent Souls these are they who as they have the true spiritual life in present so in death they shall have the true comforts of the blessed life which is to come for however God at other times brings trouble heaviness and afflictions on his best servants yet at that hour he never fails to assist them and in the midst of death to make the life of their Souls appear more clearly for righteousness sake He may seem to absent himself from them and to hide his counâ—◠〈◊〉 but then in that day of need in that last and fearful time which most requires it they shall be sure of his comforts he will not fail then to discover his face and make the light of his countenance to shine into that region of darkness and by the gracious beams thereof to chear up his people lighting and guiding their feet through that obscure Valley and shadow of death into the blessed ways of immortality and peace Believe not me look upon the holy men of God a little and see it perfomed with your Eyes Behold the Patriarch Jacob the Father of the Patriarchs he who wrestled not only that one time at the River Jabbock but all his life long with the arme of the Almighty continually afflicting him But see how contrary it fell out in the end when all the clouds of affliction being blown over a calm of contentment follows and he is gathered unto his Fathers in peace but first mark how the Lord gave him strength before he went hence and was no more seen wherewith he collects his fainting Spirits raiseth himself in his bed calls his Sons about him tells them of things to come great things to come for many generations and with an inspired Spirit ready to expire gives every one his several blessing and benediction in such a prophetical so high and Heavenly a strain and stile as if an Angel had sate on his lip and I doubt not but many Angels sate waiting in that door of the body for the coming forth of his Soul which stayed not long after to receive and convey it into the bosom of his Grand-father Abraham there to rest in everlasting peace Look upon Joshua that valiant Captain who having spent his life in travail and more than Herculean labours warring against Gyants and the Sons of Aâ—ak yet at last you may see him sitting down in peace and dividing the spoil among the Children of Jacob And in the end death drawing near see how he summons the Tribes of Israel together and in a sweet Oration recounts unto them all the mercies of God which had followed them from Terab the Father of Abraham that dwelt beyond the flood to Cheusem that had now gotten possession of the promised land within Jordan And being full of the spirit and spiritual life with such power of speech he exhorts them to the fear and service of this merciful God that the whole Congregation as if they had had but one heart and one Soul and both throughly affected joyntly cry out God forbid that we should forsake the Lord nay he is our God and we will serve him Josh the last After this manner from the flame of his own zeal having kindled a fire in the hearts of others this great Worthy and worthy Servant of the Lord lived in his death and dyed in peace See holy Samuel the Judge of Israel going to his grave as to his bed and in him consider the power and vertue of a good conscience arising from the memory of a well acted life Whose Ox or whose Ass have I taken whom have I defrauded or opprest or at whose hands have I received a bribe saith he in the publick assembly and all the people bare witness unto him saith the Text. Hoc ducit ad fâ—nus sepulturam this is it that accompanies him to his Grave and layes him in his rotten Sepulcher The like blessed savour of rest did this peace of conscience send forth in the blessed Apostle S. Paul who in that wonderful confidence was bold to deliver up his Soul in the breath of the same words as it were his Saviour had done before him a Consummatum est I have finished my course I have kept the faith henceforth is laid up for me a Crown of righteousness which the Lord the just Judge shall give me in that day words worthy of a Soul so near its Heaven Lastly view the Protomartyr Steven blessed with peace in the midst of a cruel death for all torments are easy if they have answerable comforts The obstinate Jews threw the stones of death at him but he filled with the Holy Ghost looks stedfastly into Heaven where he beholds his Saviour standing at the right hand of God to whom now dying he speaks as he had done before to his Father in manus tuas into thy hands O Lord I commend my Spirit Such have been the blessed ends of these holy men of God and of many others famous in their Generations and such it shall be in all others that faithfully serve him though peradventure it is not manifest in all Their bodies are buried in the Earth but they have left a name behind them and a memory sweeter than the perfume made by the art of the Apothecary as was spoken of the good King Josiah And what is there now that can more deeply affect an honest and a good heart what can a religious mind either so much desire unto it self or behold with so great joy in another as to see a devout and penitent Soul give a peaceful farewel unto Nature and in the depth of death depart full of the comforts of immortality and life But it may be far off examples will be left too far off respects for likely those that are nearest do affect us better if so you want them not neither two among the rest more remarkable you have had of late The one not long since the other now before your eyes The Mother and the Daughter of both whom I may truly say in the words of my Text their bodies were dead while they lived and their Souls lived in the death of their bodies for righteousness sake A
that we may farther distinguish the diverse kinds of either And two sorts sure there are apparently Verbal Wars and Violent so the Orator doth divide duo sunt genera decertandi â—num per vim alterum per disceptationem There are two sorts of war and contention the one by force the other by dispute and contestation that proper unto Beast this unto Men yet Men may fly unto that faith he when this latter may not be used or hath been used to no purpose For in case of injuries between States or Princes that have no Superiour Judges if reason may not prevail for right or restitution the Sword of necessity must dispute the cause and be bold to carve out its own satisfaction But then what large satisfaction men do usually cut out to themselves that are their own Carvers and Judges in their own causes backed with Caesars Maxime of War in the Poet Omnia dat qui justa negat what bitter revenges they take of their brethren what sorrows and calamities what slaughter and effusion of blood and confusion they bring upon the world until the whole earth doth groan and mourn if not totter and reel like a drunkard under the burthen is an argument fitter for tears than discourses for prayers unto God than declamations unto Men that little regard them But such are the conditions of the former sort violent and bloody The second are of a milder nature disceptive onlay and verbal In which kind I shall not now meddle with the pleas and pleadings between right and wrong bellum forense These are but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 private brabbles between person and person founded in meum tuum frigida illa verba saith St. Chrysostome quae innumera genuere bella c. but only with 〈◊〉 those disceptations and disputes which concern verum falsum Truth and Error even in Faith and things pertaining unto God bellum Ecclesiasticum a war publick too as that other between States and Kingdoms so this between Churchmen and Churches as the war most especially intended in the Text and that we be not much offended at it ever and in all ages permitted by the Divine Dispensation for great reasons more or less to exercise the Church of God And these wars it were yet something well had they contained themselves within their proper sphere of disceptation and dispute though even thus such contention it self and the bitter fruits which it produceth is cause sufficient to bring sorrow enough on the heat of every true Son of the Church for whose heart smarteth not to consider the divisions I say not now of Reuben but of Levi and their great thoughts of heart to behold the parts and parcels divisions and subdivisions factions and fractions whereinto they have broken and even crumbled themselves To see the Coat of Christ that should be without seam not only rent in pieces but torn even unto rags until Religion Christian Religion seem to suffer the same fate with that Lady in Plutarch quam cum procorum singuli possidere nequirent integram in partes direpserunt obtinuit nemo omnium But have these contentions stayed here Have they not thrown aside the Pen and drawn forth the Sword lest chiding and fallen to blows words have bred exasperation and exasperation hatred more than Vatinians mortal or rather immortal hatred not content to spend it self on the goods the bodies the lives of the living but to rage on the Memory the Bones and the very Ashes and Sepulchres of the dead yea on the very Souls as far as they might of both how many such Souls of our late Predecessors whole blood in most Savage manner poured forth and spilt is yet even almost warm are there now lying under that Altar in the Revel and crying unto God with an usquequo how long Lord merciful and true And how well may we cry out and admire too with that Poet Tantum Relligio potuit suadere malorum For certainly there is neither of these contentions whether by disceptation or violence whether they be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 publick Wars or private Fightings of either sort but will well deserve an unde of admiration and inquisition too but first of admiration in regard of the inter vos the parties contending which is the second point whence c. And sure were the vos here only but men it were not without marvel since such violent and bloody contention as the Orator said well is proper to Beasts to Beasts that are of divers kinds and several natures as full of passion as void of understanding not unto Men that are rational of the same blood and descended from the loins of the same Parent in whom the lines of their several Pedegrees do all meet and center themselves in unity original that so in their running on from thence there might be continued a fraternity perpetual Beasts indeed come forth armed and in their several kinds well appointed for war into the world but Man is sent out without Tooth or Talon horn or hoof from the womb tanquam animal sociale ad pacem colendam natum as a civil and sociable creature designed and born unto peace Is it not strange that such notwithstanding should become belluis ipsis magis belluini more full of beastly ferity than beasts themselves That this sociable Animal should justifie the madness of the most Savage and intractable creatures steel their affections with more cruelty and barbarity than Bears and Lions can learn in the Wilderness As if they had sucked Tygers in the desert rather than the Daughters of Men or were a Cadmean generation born not of Women but terrae filii sprung up out of the earth sown with the teeth of Serpents for just so we destroy one another pereunt per mutua vulnera fratres like the young men that played before Joab and Abner every man thrusting his Sword in his Brothers side This cannot be without marvel But yet this is not it there is something more in the vos than this St. James directs his speech not meerly unto Men to animal Men and Infidels but unto Christian Men to Men whose Badge and Cognizance yea whose very form and essence is mutual Love and Charity unde inter vos It is but a just admiration this whence are wars amongst such That divers and several Religions should strive even unto death that the Jew and the Christian contending the Gentile should fall upon both as in the primitive times is no great matter but that one and the same should nourish intestine war that the Children of the same Mother should struggle and fight like Jacob and Esau in the very womb that bears them that is it that is marvellous indeed For we may not conceive that Christianity infolds within it several Religions As far as the World is Christian it is but one in which indeed there may be and are Factions and Parts some Schisms and
that shall undertake such a debt that in this case shall be content to take up our forfeited bond and put in new security of his own be bound skin for skin body for body and life for life and be content to pay the bond too when the day comes his love sure is full and he brings comfort with him to purpose And even this he did this he undertook and this he performed for us He undertook it at his Circumcision and performed it in his passion Whosoever is Circumcised factus est debitor universae legis he becomes a debter unto the whole Law saith St. Paul Gal. v. 3 At his Circumcision then he undertook the debt he entred bond anew with us and in sign that he so did he then shed a few drops of his blood whereby he signed the bond as it were and gave those few drops as a pledge or earnest that when the fulness of time came he would not fail to shed all the rest And shed it he did what at his Circumcision he undertook at his passion he performed even to the full He bound himself in a bound of death and death he underwent even the death of the Cross the most bitter reproachful cursed death of the Cross so payed all to the uttermost farthing and having paid it delevit Chirographum he cancelled the handwriting the sentece of the Law that till then was of record and stood in full force against us but now that the whole world might know it to be void he hung it up in the same place where it was satisfied he nailed it to the Tree of his Cross Col. ii 14. But yet this is not all the penalty is but one part of the Law and he became debtor universae legis to the whole Law saith the Apostle and the whole Law he payed whatsoever was due In the Law we consider a double force or power it hath a commanding and it hath a condemning power a power directive and a power vindicative it hath precepts which it injoins and it hath punishments which it inflicts by the one it informs us what we are to do by the other what we must suffer if we do it not and he was under both parts that both might be fully discharged for as he satisfied the one at his death so the other in his life In his life he exactly kept and observed all the precepts of the Law to the least tittle and in his death he received the full punishment of the Law to the worst and utmost extremity and so was under both and fulfilled both paid all both principal and forfeiture the principal in keeping the Law himself the forfeiture in suffering the penalty of the Law for others that so others might be freed from both Sure now the Sons humility that humbled himself to death even the death of the Cross is full no less full than the Fathers love The Father sent and sent his Son the Son was made and made of a Woman made of a Woman and made under the Law made under the Law and both parts of the Law that he might be fully made And this is Gods fulness Let us now proceed unto Mans fulness for from this fulness of the Fathers love and the Sons humility we all receive the fulness of our own bliss and happiness contained in our Redemption and Adoption for to these purposes all this was done That he might redeem them c. And these two Redemption and Adoption are the two degrees of our making for without them we had been marred utterly undone and they fully answer unto the two degrees of his making made of a Woman and made under the Law He under the Law that we might be redeemed from under the Law he made the Son of Man that Men might be made the Sons of God So the making of him was his own marring but his marring was our making he twice marred by his making we twice made by his marring He of God made Man and of Man made a sinner we of sinners that is bondslaves to the Law made Freemen and of Freemen Sons Sons of God and Heirs annexed with Christ. And what more is there that we could wish to make it up fuller since our desires can extend no farther than to be rid of all evil and to be endowed with whatsoever good is and by these two Redemption and Adoption we are made partakers of both To be redeemed from under the Law is to be quit of all evil and to be adopted into the state of Children is to be intitled unto all that is good For all evil is in being under the Law from whence we are redeemed and all good in that heavenly inheritance whereunto we are adopted we were created to inherit a glorious Kingdom but through sin we lost our inheritance and not so only but together with it we forfeited our lives a sentence of death and everlasting destruction was passed upon us and from this now we are freed by redemption in that again we are reestated by adoption and what would we more But we must speak a little in particular of both and first of Redemption That he might redeem c. Every deliverance is not Redemption but such only as is obtained by a just and a full price so the word imports and something more Redemption a rebuying or buying back again of something formerly sold or forfeited into the possession of another Ever a former alienation must go before and a valuable satisfaction follow after otherwise there may be a bare emption without the former a reemption without the latter but unless both be precedent it cannot be Redemption And sure such a matter had formerly befallen us A kind of alienation had gone before whereby we had made away our selves sold our inheritance and forfeited our lives A making away indeed rather than a sale it was for such a trifle made away first in Adam for the forbidden fruit a matter of no moment since in our own persons daily made away for some trifling pleasure or profit not much more worth And having thus passed our selves away by this selling our selves under sin the Law seiseth on us whose dreadful doom is death and Hell and everlasting sorrows there with the Prince of Hell So infinite a punishment doth it inflict because in the breach of it an infinite Majesty was offended In this heavy case we lay shut up under the Law as in a Prison Rom. iii. 23. fast bound with the cords of our own sins Prov. v. 22. the sentence passed on us and we waiting but for execution what evil is there not in this estate and on every Soul that is in it Our Faith sure is weak and we do not throughly apprehend what we have only heard of but could we see it with the seeing of the eye as Job speaks were we permitted to stand on the brink and look into that fearful pit of everlasting horror whereunto we are condemned by the Law
not then a Carnal presence but a Spiritual that doth link and associate unto Christ. To make up our union with him it is not needful that his humane nature should be drawn down from Heaven or that his body should be every where present on Earth as the Ubiquitaries affirm or that the Bread in the Sacrament should be transubstantiate into his body as the Papists imagin His dwelling in us is by his Spirit and his union with us is spiritual So himself in the same place where he speaks of eating his flesh and drinking his blood doth interpret himself the flesh profiteth nothing the words that I speak are spirit and life And his Spirit it is not his body that shall give life unto the Spirit when the body shall perish If Christ c. This touch shall suffice for the condition I proceed to the substance of the Text. The Body is dead It contains as I said an admonition of our frailty corruption and death and comforts against death It is but the body that is dead the Spirit is life First of our corruption and frailry The body is dead That we all tend unto death we all know but the Apostle's speech is more remarkable he says not the body is subject to death but by a more significant phrase of speech he presseth it homer The body is dead There is a difference between a mortal body and a dead body Adams body before the fall was mortal in some sort that is subject to a possibility of dying but now after the fall our bodies are so mortal as they are subject to a necessity of dying yea if we'll here with the Apostle esteem of death by the beginning and seisure of it they are dead already The forerunners and harbingers of death dolours infirmities and heavy diseases have seised already on our bodies and marked them out as lodgings which shortly must be the habitation of their Master But how near this manner of speech draws unto true propriety they best conceive who best understand how that malediction of God and curse of the Law The day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt die the death was fulfilled If God spared not the Angels when they waxed proud will he spare thee who art but a putrifying worm Ille intumuit in coelo erga in sterquilinio he was puft up in Heaven and therefore was cast down from the place of his habitation and if I wax proud lying on a dunghil shall I not be cast down into Hell So often therefore as corrupt nature stirreth up the heart to pride because of youth and health beauty and strength and the like perfections of the body let this consideration humble thee that though these are fair and beauti ful flowers yet they cannot but suddenly wither because the root from whence they sprung is corrupt and rotten and even dead already Neither is it more available to the cutting down of arrogance and pride than to teach us Temperance and sobriety What availeth it to pamper that Carcase of thine with excess of delicate feeding which is possessed by death already If Men took the tenth part of that care to present their spirit holy and without blame unto the Lord which they take to make their bodies fair and beautiful in the eyes of Men they might in short time make a greater improvement in Religion and Virtue than they have done But herein is their folly they make fat the flesh with precious things which within few days the worms shall devour but never care to beautify the Soul with holy and virtuous actions which shortly is to be presented to God Let us therefore refrain from the immoderate cherishing this proud and dead flesh meats are ordained for the belly and the belly for meats but God will destroy them both 1 Cor. vi 13. I might inlarge this point almost infinitely for the benefit of this consideration is not confined unto Humility Sobriety and Temperance or any particular virtues but it 's universal restraining from all evil and inciting powerfully unto all virtue and goodness Nihil sic revocat bominem à peccato quà m frequens mortis meditatio saith St. Aug. nothing can so recall a Man from his evil ways as the frequent meditation of death especially if he consider as the certainty of death so the uncertain time of his death and the unchangeable estate of everlasting misery if he die in his sins Would to God we were wise thoroughly to apprehend and apply this unto our own Souls It is strange that there is nothing so well known nothing of greater benefit and yet nothing so little regarded What a Prodigy is it that sinful Men should carry about their death in their bosoms and in every vein of their Bodies and yet scarce admit a thought of their mortality into their minds but live here as if they verily thought they should never die If we had no Religion yet reason would teach us that our strength is not the strength of stones and yet them even the drops of water weareth nor our sinews of Brass and Iron as Job speaks and yet these the rust and canker consumeth but a vapour but a smoak which the Sun soon drieth or the wind driveth away It was wittily said of Epictetus the Philosopher who going forth one day and seeing a Woman weeping that had broken her Pitcher and the next day meeting another Woman that had lost her Son Heri vidi fragilem frangi hodie video mortalem mori Yesterday saith he I saw a brittle thing broken and to day I see a mortal Man die And what difference of frailty between these two surely none unless Man be the frailer of the two For as St. Austin hath it Take the brittlest veslel of earth or glass and keep it safe from outward violence and it may last many thousand of years but take a Man of the most pure complexion of the strongest constitution and keep him as safe as thou canst he hath that within his own bowels and bones that will bring him to his end Nay I hear some say saith the same Father that such a one hath the Plague or the Pleurisie and therefore sure he will die but we may rather say such a one liveth and therefore sure he will die for diverse have had these Diseases and did not die of them but never any Man lived that did not die The Consumption of the Liver is the messenger of Death the Consumption of the Lungs the Minister of Death the Consumption of the marrow and moisture the very Mother of Death and yet many have had these Diseases and not died of them But there is another kind of Consumption which could never yet be cured it is the Consumption of the days the common Disease of all Mankind David saw it and spake of it when he said my days are consumed like smoke Psal. cii yea the Philosopher saw it and could say of it quicquid praeteritum est temporis mors