fulfilled the Commandements of God yet wantest thou one thing for that work which must merit must be Opus indebitum Now obedience to every branch of Gods law is a debt which we are owing to God by the law of creation and God may say to every one of us as Paul said to Philemon Thou owest to mee even thine owne selfe Doth a Master thank that servant which did that which he was commanded to do I trow not so likewise When yee have done all things which were commanded you say we are unprofitable servants we have but done that which was our duty to do Inutilis servus vocatur saith Austin qui omnia fecit quia nihil fecit ultra id quod debuit And Theophylact upon that place The servant if he work not is worthy of many stripes and when he has wrought let him be contented with this that he hath escaped stripes 3. That work by which thou must merit must be thine own but thy good works if thou look to the first cause are not so Quid habes quod non accipisti 1 Cor. 4. It s God that worketh both the will and the deed Phil. 2. 13. Not I but the grace of God in me 1 Cor. 13. So then put case thou couldst fulfill the law and it were not a payment of debt yet is no merit due to thee but to him whose they are Dei dona sunt quaecunque bona sunt Every good and perfect gift comes from above even from the father of lights And Deus sua dona non nostra merita coronat 4. Admit it were in thy power to fulfill the law that it were no debt that thy works were wholly thine and God had no part in them this is not enough there must be some proportion between the work and the reward or no proper merit Now between thy best works and the Kingdome of heaven promised to Christs little flock there is not that proportion that is Inter stillam muriae mare Aegeum as Tullie speaks between the light of a candle and the light of the Sunne between the least grane of sand that lies on the Sea-shore and the highest heaven as shall presently appear 5. Last of all that thy work may merit at Gods hands some profit or honour must thereby accrue to him But my goodnesse saith David O Lord reacheth not unto thee but to the saints that are on the earth If thou be righteous saith Elihu what givest thou to God or what receiveth he at thine hand Job 35. Who hath given unto him first Rom. 11. 35. All these five things are requisite for the merit of works but not onely some but all of them are wanting to our best works and therefore we must with the Scriptures ascribe our whole salvation to the grace of God and acknowledge nothing inherent in us to be the prime cause of all his graces but his owne good will and pleasure I count the afflictions of this world not worthy the glory that shall be revealed Rom. 8. And in another place he tells us That wee deserve hell for our evill workes The wages of sinne is death but not heaven for our good deeds and sufferings but of Gods bounty and mercie Eternall life is the gift of God Rom. 6. Not by the works of righteousnesse which wee had done but according to his mercie he saved us Tit. 3. And ye are saved by grace through faith not of your selves it is the gift of God Eph. 2. And how doth he prove that Abraham was justified by faith and not by works because Ei qui operatur merces non imputatur secundū gratiam sed secundum debitum And if Abraham had been justified by works he had wherein to rejoyce but not with God Rom. 3. These are places of Scripture and let me build upon this occasion to produce an assertion which once I brought upon another point which some that I see here present were pleased to except against as savouring of blasphemy though the words excepted against were none of mine but of Justin Martyr who lived above 1400. years agoe and confidently brought by him in his discourse with Tryphon a Jew if any I will not say Pelagian or Arminian or Papist but if all the Fathers of the Primitive Church if all the ancient Councels if Moses and all the Prophets if Paul and all the Apostles if an Angel from heaven nay if God himself these are the words of Justin the Martyr should deliver any doctrine repugnant to that which is contained in this booke I would not believe him Agreeable unto these places of Scripture was the doctrine of the ancient Church Gratia evacuatur si non gratis donatur sed meritis redditur Aug. Epist 105. Non dei gratia erit ullo modo nisi gratuita fuerit omni modo And in a third place Non pro merito quidem accipimus vitam aeternam sed tantum pro gratia Tract 3. in Ioh. And thus have I confirmed my proposition by reason by Scriptures and by the testimonie of the Church and Contra rationem nemo sobrius contra ecclesiam nemo pacificus contra scripturas nemo Christianus senserit as a Father saith Unto all these might be added if it were needfull the confession of the learnedst of our Adversaries let our Enemies be Judges who cry down this blasphemous doctrine of Merit God saith one of them doth punish Citra condignum but rewards Vltra condignum and Scotus as Bellar confesseth holds that Bona opera ex gratia procedentia non sunt meritoria ex condigno sed tantum ratione pacti acceptationis divinae And of the same opinion saith he were other of the old Schoolmen and of the new Writers Andreas Vega. Ferus as in many other points between us the Pontificians so in this he is as sound a Catholique and as good a Protestant as Calvin himselfe or any that hath written on this subject in Math. cap. 20. vers 8. Gratis promisit gratis reddit si dei gratiam favorē conservare vis nulla meritorum tnorum mentionem facito And in Acts 15. Qui docet in operibus confidere is negat Christi meritum sufficere Both which places many others of the same Author their Index Expurgatorius hath wiped out using him the ancient fathers as Tereus dealt with Progne who cut out her tongue lest she shold tel the truth Yea and Bellarmine himselfe after he hath spent seventeen leaves in defence of merit of works and scrapt and catcht and drawn in by the shoulders whatsoever he could out of the Scriptures or ancine Fathers for colouring that Tenent at length brings this Orthodoxall conclusion with which I will conclude this point Very Orthodoxall indeed if two letters be transposed Propter incertitudinem propriae justitiae let it be Propter certitudinem propriae injustitiae propter periculum inanis gloriae tutissimum est fiduciam totam in sola Dei misericordia benignitate
octo pedum He whom the whole earth could not content was at length contented with a parcel of ground of eight yea of six foot long Herod when upon a day he was arrayed in royal apparel and sate on the bench and gave such an excellent charge that the people cried non vox hominem sonat It is the voyce of God and not of man immediatly after proved neither God nor man For he was eaten up of wormes and gave up the Ghost Rare examples for the Gods of the earth to look down into their own bosomes and to remember that they must die as men It is a good custome of the Emperour of the Abyssenes Prester John to have every meal for the first dish that comes on his table a dead mans skull to put him in mind of his mortality So was that which was used by Philip namely to have a boy every day to put him in mind that he was to die as a man Not much unlike was the old practise of the Egyptians who when their Princes went to banquet used to beare before them the picture of a dead man to put them in mind of their mortality 24. Seeing then that ye must die study to have your accounts in readinesse that whensoever the Lord shall call you hence hee may finde you provided Be faithfull in those high rooms wherein God hath placed you Ye execute not the judgements of man but of the Lord. Aske counsel therefore of God and weigh your proceedings in the ballance of the sanctuary Do nothing but what God commands you and the testimony of a good conscience will warrant to be lawful remembring that ye must one day God knowes how soon that day will come be summoned to appear before the common Judge of all flesh who is a burning and consuming fire who is not blinded with secret closenesse nor corrupted with bribes nor moved with friends nor allured by flatterers nor perswaded by the importunity of intreaters to depart anâ— haires breadth from the course of justice no though these three men Noah Daniel and Job should stand before him and make intercession in your behalf These things remember and do and ye shall have comfort in your lives comfort at your deaths And when your souls shall be removed from those earthly cottages wherein they now dwell they shall be translated into everlasting habitations and received with this joyful and comfortable welcome it is well done good servants and faithful ye have been faithful in a little I will make you rulers over much enter into your masters joy 25. Like men It is implied in the conclusion of my text that it is the lot and condition of all men to die And therefore as it concernes magistrates so it concerns all others to provide themselves for their end because as the tree fals so it lies that is as the day of death shall leave them so the day of judgement shall finde them Remember this yee that are to be witnesses for giving testimony unto the truth and jurers for giving a verdict according to the truth And as you love and reverence the truth it selfe as ye desire the benefit of your Christian brethren which ye should love as your selves as ye wish the glory of God which ye should tender more then your selves let it be a forcible motive unto you to deal uprightly in every cause with every man without declining to the right hand or to the left then shall ye sanctifie the name of God by whom ye do swear to speak truly to deal truly ye shall give occasion to good men to praise God for you and ye shall not need to be ashamed to meet God in the face when he shall call you to a reckoning for your doings But on the other side if rewards shall blind you or fear enforce you or pitty move you or partiality sway you or any respect whatsoever draw you to smother the truth and favour an evil cause yee pearce your selves through with many darts For first you are false witnesses against your neighbour secondly ye are thieves ye rob him of his right thirdly ye are murtherers ye kill him in his body or in his name or in his maintenance fourthly and which is worst of all ye take the name of your God in vain yea as much as in you lieth ye take his godhead from him and make him who is the truth from everlasting to be all one with the devil who is a lyar from the beginning If ye must be countable unto God when he shall call you hence for every idle word that goes out of your mouthes and if the least ungodly thought of your hearts in the rigour of Gods justice deserve eternal death how shall ye be able to stand in judgement under this ponderous Chaos of so many crying sins I cannot prosecute this point only for conclusion I say with Moses behold this day have I set before you life and death blessing and cursing choose life and ye shall live If not I pronounce unto you this day ye shall surely perish The mouth of the Lord hath spoken it 26. You whose profession is to open the causes in controversie and by your knowledge in the laws to distinguish between right and wrong truth and falshood remember that ye must die And therefore I beseech you in the fear of God to study to make the cause of your clients sure as that ye do not in the mean time forget S. Peters counsel to make your own election sure I urge this the rather because absit reverentia vero I will speak the truth in despite of all scoffes and I hope such as are ingenious will bear with my plainnesse if as Philip said of the Macedonians I call a boat a boat and a spade a spade because it seemeth to be much neglected by many of your profession who with Martha trouble themselves about many businesses but anum necessariâ—m to meet Christ and talk with him they scarce remember it I remember the saying of Demades touching the Athenians when they refused to make Alexander one of their Gods and Cassander who was his successour threatned that unlesse they would do it he would presently overthrow their city the Athenians said Demades have reason to look to themselves lest while they are too curious about heaven they lose the earth But these men have need to look to themselves lest while they trouble themselves too much about the earth they lose heaven by whose means especially it is effected that our courts do too much resemble the Lyons den which howsoever other beasts in simplicity went flocking on heaps unto yet the fox that found by experience how others sped durst not come near it Quia me vestigia terrent said she Omnia te adversum spectantia nulla retrorsum All comes to them little from them they have as attractive a force for silver as the loadstone
winnow it and shall blow the chaffe and scatter it away from the face of the earth The reasons hereof first respect the wicked and that is to make them more inexcusable in that conversing with the godly they do not learne godliness but as those which walk in the sunne though they change their outward colour yet they still retaine their inward nature so these though they receive an outward tincture of godlinesse yet they still keepe their inward corruption Hereupon it is that Corazin and Bethsaida are more inexcusable then Tyrus and Sidon that the men of Nineve and the Queen of the South shall rise against the Jewes and shall condemne them that it shall be better for them of Sodome in the day of judgement then for Capernaum 2. The Lord by this meanes effecteth the conversion of some which are not yet called For as the Aramits by walking with the Prophet were at unawares brought unto Samaria so many who are not as yet called by walking with the righteous are catched at unawares and brought to Christs sheepfold 3. The Lord doth hereby exercise his children and keeps them still fighting wheras otherwise they would be ready to fall asleepe in the cradle of carnall securitie The coldness of devotion that is in the worldlings doth by an Antiperistasis oftentimes stirre up the heate of zeale in Gods Children While the winds strives to blow out the fire it increaseth the flame and while the wicked doe indeavour to consume the heate of zeale in Gods Children and to make them as cold as they themselves are they often blow it up and make it farre greater then it was before I told you before what Tully saith of Muraena that his chastity was more seene in living among the effeminate Asians then ever it was at Rome And I am sure Lots continencie did farre more appeare when he lived amongst the Sodomites then when he was in the mountaine with his two daughters If Gods Children should have none but such as Moses and Elias to converse with them they would say as Peter did unto Christ when he was transfigured upon the mountain Master it is good for us to be here let us here upon this mountain build us Tabernacles They would never say with the Psalmist Lord who shal dwel in thy tabernacle and who shall rest upon thy mountain Whereas now being vexed with these Cananites that dwell amongst them and are thorns in their sides and pricks in their eyes they are wearie of the earthly Canaan and long for another which floweth with better things then milk and honie They cry out as Rebeccae when she felt the two twinnes strugling in her wombe if it be so why are we thus 12. To leave then the conclusion and to come to some application thereof Are the wicked intermixed with true and zealous professors What shall wee then say to the old Donatists and the Brownists and Anabaptists which separate themselves from the true Church and say with those in the Prophet Come not near us for wee are holier then ye Methinks I may say unto them as Constantine said to Acesius a Novation Bishop Let them make a Ladder for themselves to ascend into heaven here is no place for them on earth as long as this world shall last the Lords wheat shal grow up with the tares Christ hath spoken it and Christ is truth if there be in them any charitie they will assent to this veritie yea but light hath no communion with darknesse nor bitternesse with honie nor life with death nor the unbeleever with the infidell It is the objection of Petilian the Donatist against Austin But his answer is that when they eschew the darknesse they forsake the light when they flee from death they flee from life also Attendis Zizania per mundum triticum non attendis cum per totum utraque sint jussa crescere Attendis semen maligni quod ad finem messis separabitur non attendis semen Abrahae in quo benedicentur omnes gentes Dost thou marke the darnell and dost thou not remember the wheat Dost thou thinke upon the seed of the Serpent whose head shall be crushed and dost thou not thinke upon the the seed of Abraham in whom all the Nations of the earth shall bee blessd when thou fleest from the chaffe thou forsakest the good wheat which is mingled with it When thou separatest thy selfe from the seed of the wicked thou separatest thy selfe from the seed of Abraham When thou thus dividest thy selfe from the Hypocrites that are in the true Church thou cuttest thy self from the Church and a member taken from the whole must needs perish If thou wilt thinke upon this with that heedfulnesse that thou shouldst thou wilt not forsake the greene pastures of the Lord that are besides the waters of comfort because of the goats nor leave Gods house because of the vessels of dishonour nor runne out of the Lords floore because of the chaffe nor separate thy selfe from the wheat because of the tares which shall at length be bound in a bundle and cast into the fire nor burst the unitie of the Lords net because of the bad fish which swimme in it which when the net is brought to land shall be cast away but as a father speakes tolerare potius propter bonos commixtionem malorum quam violare propter malos charitatem bonorum rather for the good to tolerate the bad then for the bad to forsake the good But before I leave this point I must give thee this lesson and I beseech thee marke it well though of necessity thou must live amongst the ungodly yet thou must not walke in the counsell of the ungodly much lesse standing stand in the way of sinners and least of all sit downe in the seate of the scornfull Though thou dwell among Wolves thou must not ululare cum lupis howl with the wolves though thou accompany with the fornicators of this world and with the coveteous and with extortioners and with idolaters for else thou must goe out of this world yet be not partaker with them in their sinnes least thou be partaker with them in their punishments Though a corporall separation cannot be had yet in spirit thou must separate thy selfe for let every one that calleth on the name of the Lord separate himselfe from iniquity Thou seest what is thy lot if not with Lot to dwell with Sodomites or with Naaman to be amongst the Aramites or with Joseph to live among the Aegyptians if thou canst not say with David Woe is me that I am constrained to dwell in Meshech and to have my abode in the Tents of Kedar Yet mayest thou say with Esay Woe is me for I dwell in the midst of a people of polluted lips With Christ and his Apostles thou must converse with a Judas with the Hebrews thou
must live with the Cananites with the Spouse in the Canticles thou must be as an apple tree amongst the wild trees of the forrest or as a lilie amongst the thornes Let not these wild trees which are moved with every blast of winde by the shaking of their boughes beate downe thy fruit and though the thornes pricke thee yet keepe still a lilies beautie Thou must touch pitch but beware of being defiled with it Thou must walk upon coales beware of burning thy feet though thou lie among the pots among the washpots of the Lord as Moab is called among the vessels of dishonour that are kept for the day of wrath yet must thou be as the wingr of a dove that is covered with silver wings and her feathers like gold Be not like the Apothecarie that carryeth the smell of his shop about him nor like the River Jordan which looseth his sweet waters in the lake Asphalites But like the fish in the salt sea which still retaine their freshnesse passe through the brinish Ocean of this world as Arethusa doth under the Sicilian sea Doris amara suâ—â—â— non intermiseat undam In a word though thou canst not wholy separate thy selfe from the workers of darknesse yet have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darknesse but even reprove them rather Nay from such works as much as thou mayest lawfully separate thy selfe for thou wilt in time joy in the latter if thou long enjoy the former it is a matter of some difficulty to be continually handling pitch and birdlime and to have none cleave to thy hands Aristotle noteth it of his master Plato that conversing long with the Pythagorians he learned from them many erronious opinions which afterward he stifly maintained Alexander by conversing with the effeminate Persians and Annibal by living in Capua did abate so much of their former valour that it was doubted whether they were the same men they had been before Julian in profession sometimes a Christian by conversing with Libanius and Maximus became an Apostata To go no further with the examples of heathen men you know that Joseph living in Pharaohs Court began to swear by the life of Pharaoh And the Hebrewes dwelling among the Idolatrous Egyptians which worshipped an oxe did meetly well imitate them for they worshipped a calfe And pitching for a time in the plain of Moab they sacrificed to Baal Peor and ate the offerings of the dead An infected sheep will sooner spoile a whole flock then a whole flock will cure an infected sheep It is no hard matter to change wine into vineger but to turn vineger or to change water into wine Hoc opus hic labor est This is such a miracle as will never be wrought unlesse Jesus be at the feast It is an easie matter to be infected with the plague of sinne If thou remove out of the fresh ayre into the company of contagious persons And though thou be regenerate and the old man hath got his deadly wound yet is there a sympathy between thee and the wicked Thy affections are like tinder ready to kindle with every sparkle that the wicked shall strike in them And sinne once kindled is like wilde-fire it will not be quenched with every kinde of water This poison perhaps will not be perceived at the first yet like the biting of a madde dogge it will never cease infecting thy blood till it come at thy heart Beware then of dogs Avoid as much as is possible such contagious places as are dangerous to infect and keep thy selfe in the fresh ayre where the spirit that quickneth doth blow But whereas thou canst not wholly avoid the company of sinners for as before was said the good and bad fish swim together in Gods net avoid their sinnes hearken unto Solomon My sonne if sinners intice thee consent thou not My sonne walk not thou in the way with them refraine thy foot from their path but contrariwise when they entice thee to evil perswade them unto that which is good Be to them as Noah was to the old world a preacher of righteousnesse as Lot was to the Sodomites who dwelling amongst them vexed his soul with their unlawful deeds as Christ was to the woman of Samaria who by desiring of the water of Iacobs well to quench his thirst brought her to desire the water of life whereof whosoever drinketh shall never more thirst and as he was with Publicans and sinners who refused not to go to their corporall banquets that he might feed them with spirituall food as Iohn was with the Pharisees and Saducees who preached unto them faith and repentance and as Paul was amongst the Idolatrous Athenians who went with them through their idolatrous temples and read the titles and inscriptions written upon their altars but to this end to take a text and argument thence to perswade them to the worship of the true God So much of the person delivering The action followeth deliver 13. Treason is a sinne so odious that even the heathen which were guided but with a glimpse of natures light howsoever sometimes for their own advantage they approved the fact yet they could never away with the author of it It was Augustus his saying of Rimotalchus the King of Thrace which vanted himself for the betraying of Antonie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I may love the treason but I hate the traitour And it was the saying of Antigonus Proditores tantisper amo dum produnt ast ubi prodiderint odi I love a traitour when hee commits the treason but when he hath done it I detest him These speeches though plausible at the first argue corruption in the speakers For if the traitour be evil surely the treason cannot be good The old Romanes could abide neither For when Pyrrhus his physitian seeking to gratifie the Romanes promised to give his master poyson the Romanes made Pyrrhus acquainted with it and willed him to look unto himselfe And when the schoolmaster of the Phalascides children offered to betray those which were committed to him to Camillus his hand Camillus sent them bak again and made his own schollers to beat him This fact of it selfe so hainous is further aggravated by the person betrayed If Judas had betrayed one of his fellowes the sinne had been horrible but he makes it farre worse he betrayeth his master He goes yet further for behold whither man doth fall if the spirit of God do not direct his steps he delivereth him into the hands of his hatefull enemies who came to deliver us from our enemies and from the hands of all that hate us He delivereth him to death who came to restore us that were dead in our sinnes to life who to satisfie for our hunting after vanities was himselfe hunted like a Pelican in the wildernesse to satisfie for our carnal and sensual pleasures left the bosome of his
Being demanded a reason hereof he said that Gods bread was sweet and good for Kings Or like our old Country-man Brennus who when he went about to rob the Temple at Delphos said that God was rich and therefore should part with something to supply his wants and with Dionysius they count gold too cold to cloath Apollo with a garment of worse stuffe is good enough when the question was proposed whether golden chalices or woodden were to be used in the administration of the sacrament Boniface bishop and afterwards Martyr made answer that in former times they had golden ministers and wooden chalices but in his time wooden Priests used golden chalices I may say the contrary in the times of our fore-fathers were blockish and woodden Priests and then they had golden cups Then the people would even have pulled out their owne eyes to have given to those blinde guides and were so ready to offer their free gifts to the building of the Tabernacle that Moses was constrained to say the people bring too much and more then is enough nay moreover to make a proclamation and enact a statute which yet is in force but needless that neither man or woman should prepare any more for the oblation of the sanctuarie But now thanks be to God wee have golden pastors and woodden dishes are thought good enough for them Dicite pontifices in templo quid facit aurum What should the Church doe with gold Peter said unto the lame man gold and siver have I none The Kings danghter is al glorious within they forget what followes her cloathing is of wrought gold the Ministers Kingdome is not of this world a competent living is sufficient that is 40. or 50. l. tush he must not be troubled with the thorny cares of this world you take too much upon you yee sonnes of Levi thus would these wild asses and fat buls of Bashan beate out of the manger the Oxen that tread out the corne that they may have the best themselves and leave only the orts for them which should have all Alas beloved that Gods Legats which should be harbarous and beneficiall unto the poor and provide for their Family should thus be stâ—nted by such whose hearts are never satisfied with earth till their mouthes be filled with gravel But let them not thinke that the ministers living is ever competent where any part of his right is detained And therefore let them beware how they play the Judas instealing out of the bag which is committed unto them part of that reliefe which should sustaine Christ and his Apostles or betray him in his maintenance and by a consequence in his Members the flock by withdrawing their food For if Succus pecori then it must needs follow that lac subducitur agnis if the pasture be without the fleece the flock shall want their fodder It is an objection which some would fasten as a scandall upon our Universities that many of our preachers drone-like lurk in their owne hives and flee not abroad that they bury their talent at home in their owne studies as in the ground whereas by settling themselves in some Country charge they might put it out to their Masters best advantage But I shall tell you the case is with them as it was with the sick impotent man by the poole Bethesda in the 5. of John gladly would they be in the poole but there is none to put them in an angel troubles the water and presently while they are comming another steps downe before them The fountains are stoped no streame can flow abroad unlesse Tagus-like it have golden sands or like unto Eurotas and Alpheus it passe under the earth as it were by some sleight and secret conveyance and so burst up on the suddaine in some place where it cannot be prevented or like unto Tygris that fierce and swift running river which perforce wil burst down such dammes and banks as would hinder his course or last of all like unto Meander that insinuating and parasiticaâ—l river as I may call it which windes and turnes it selfe into every pleasant vally that it may as it were get the good will and favour of the places where it comes These 4. rivers finde the easiest passage rich Tagus fierce Tigris subtil Eurotas and winding Maeaender The rest for the most for I speak not of all though the waters be as pleasant as the 4. rivers of Eden yet shall they stand on a heap like the waves of Jordan when the Israelites passed over or as a pool or the dead sea without any vent whereas if there might at the vacancy of livings an offer be made unto one of the Universities and a choice made thence no doubt but the gospel of Christ would flourish in every quarter of this realm from Dan to Beersheba from the river of Twede unto the lands end And God would for this cause even open the windows of heaven unto the inhabitants thereof and powre downe upon them a blessing without measure and rebuke the devourer for their sakes that he should not destroy the fruits of their ground neither should their vine be barren in the field as the Lord speaks by the Prophet Malachie 17. I have dwelt too long upon this point Onely to end I would these men would remember Iudas his end Demirorte Antonî quorum facta imitaris eorum exitum non perhorrescere it is the saying of Tully to Antony I wonder Antony that thou art not afraid of those mens deaths whose lives thou imitatest And it is strange that these men will be like unto Judas in the premises and never think of the conclusion that was inferred thereupon I am not a Prophet nor am I the sonne of a Prophet that I should foretel the manner of their particular ruines Thus much upon good grounds I will say that these goods will in time profit them no more then the price of him that was valued availed Iudas they will be like Eagles feathers they will eat and consume the rest of their substance or like equus Sejanus and aurum Tolossanum in Gellius which were still infortunate to those that had them And those goodly buildings which they make for themselves with the ruines of Gods house I will speak in the words of Isaiah against the enemies of the Church the Pellican and the Hedgehogge shall possesse them the great Raven and the Owle shall dwell in them and he shall stretch out upon them the line of vanity and the stones of emptinesse they shall bring forth thorns in the palaces thereof nettles and thistles in the strong holds thereof and they shall be habitations for dragons and courts for Ostriches there shall meet Zim and Jim and the Fairies shall dance there and the Skrichowle shall rest there and shall finde for her selfe a quiet dwelling there shall the Owle make her nest and lay and hatch and
and their knees to smite one against another But to leave these and to make an end of this point Seeing that sinne is such a burden unto our consciences let us take head that we do not load them too much if we were fully perswaded that such and such meats would cause an ague we would willingly abstain from them Now sinne causeth a greater sicknesse unto our soules then is an ague unto our bodies viz a troubled conscience and a wounded spirit who can bear how then dare wee commit it when Rebecca felt the strugling of Esau and Jacob in her wombe she wished she had been barren and said if it be so why am I thus Sinne may be pleasant in getting but it is bitter in bearing better we were barren then feel the pains and throwes before we be delivered of it And if it be so why are we thus Turpius ejicitur quam non admittitur alter Better to give this guest no entertainment at all then discredit our selves with God for harbouring it Therefore before thou do any thing consider with thy selfe whether it be a sinne or no examine it by the law of God if it be a sinne see thou do it not lest afterward thou feel the pain when it shall come into thy bowels like water and like oyle into thy bones When the remembrance of it shall burn within thee like fire and gnaw like a worm upon thy heart perchance thy conscience is so heardned that thou canst not feel nor call to remembrance thy sinnes which if it be so miserable and wretched art thou for without a feeling of sinne and repentance for the same there is no remission to be expectedyet there will a day come when God knowes but certainly it will come when thou shalt find them to be heavier then lead upon thine heart When thy master shall call thee to a reckoning and the day of thy departing cometh then will the book of thy conscience be laid open and thou shalt read such a Catalogue of thy sinnes therein that even then thou sha't plainiy perceive the never dying worm to gnaw upon thy soule and the unquenchable fire to beginne to burn within thee unlesse the Lord in merey shall give thee grace to repent that so thou mayest be saved therefore strive alwayes to hav a good conscience and if thou wilt be carefull that thine eye because it is the most tender and precious part of thy body be not troubled with the least mote Be much more careful of thy conscience the eye of thy soul that it be not troubled with beams of great and horrible sinnes Wilt thou never be sad live well this is the best means to gain the joy and peace of conscience Happy is that man who when his fatal hour approacheth can say with Paul I have in all good conscience served God until this day Verily this will more availe him then if he should conquer the whole world and have all the Monarchs of the earth to cast down their scepters before his footstoole Thus much of the first point his condemnation I proceed to the second his mortification or imperfect repentance He repented himself c. THis repentance was an extreme grief of heart arising from the curses of the law and apprehension of Gods wrath which as it was in Judas so was it in Pharaoh and Ahab and the Ninevites and many of the heathen Orestes and Nero when they had killed their Mothers were exceedingly troubled and wished to be clensed and Hercules in the Tragedy when he had kill'd his wife and children runnes up and down like a madman and cries out that if the whole sea should runne through his hands it would not wash him from that bloudy fact So that this is no part of true mortification yet it is a preparative thereunto The wheat must be threshed with the flayle before it be fanned from the chaffe with the wind and a natural man must be as it were threshed with the terrours of the law before he be fanned from his corruptions with the wind of the Spirit In natural mutations before a substantial forme be corrupted andan other educed è potentiâ materiae certain alterations or previal dispositions are required as necessary for hastning of this change So in a Supernatural mutation when a sonne of wrath is to be made a sonne of God the terrours of the law are required as necessary precedents for hastning this change The law like the shoomakers elson pricks the heart legal sorrowes and fears like the bristle come after and true mortification like the thread comes in the last place Take the elson and the bristle from the shoomaker and he cannot use his thread take legal sorrow and compunction of heart from a natural man and he cannot be brought to true repentance So that Judas goes well thus farre he goes yet further he makes confession of his fault first in general I have sinned then in particular I have been a traytour I have betrayed and which is worst of all I have betrayed the innocent blood If Judas this repentance notwithstanding be damned to hell merciful God what shall become of thousands amongst us which go under the name of Christians and come short of Judas in repentance They are seldome touched with any sorrow for their sinnes but say they be surely not half of that sorrow that Judas was in admit they be come they to the next step do they make confession admit this too come they to a third do they make satisfaction doth the sacrilegious Church-robber bring back again that which he hath wrongfully taken from the sonnes of Levi and say I have sinned doth the bloud-sucking Usurer restore that which he hath wrongfully taken from the poor by sundry practises of covetousnesse and say I have sinned is there any who after that he hath done wrong is sorry for it and confesses his fault and is ready to make amends and say thus and thus have I done thus and thus have I sinned all these are necessary to salvation but these are not all that are necessary to salvation We must go thus farre with Judas but we must not here stay with Iudas Iudas by stepping a foot short got a break-neck fall and is tumbled into the pit of hell We must go a step further and fasten our feet upon the corner stone by a true and saving faith and then our sinnes be they never so many never so grievous shal not bring us to condemnation but though they be as Crimson they shall be made white as snow though they be red like scarlet they shall be as wool We read in the Gospel of 3 whom our Saviour rased from death to life the first was Iairus his daughter she was dead in the house and Christ raised her in the house The second was the widowes sonne of Naein he was dead in the way they were carrying him to the place of burial and Christ raised him in
the way The third was Lazarus and he was dead stinking in his grave and Christ raised him there Saint Austin doth thus moralize the stories ista tria genera mortuorum sunt tria genera peccatorum c. These three kinds of dead men are three kinds of sinners whom our Saviour doth daily raise from death unto life These are those that be dead in the house these be they that have conceived sinne in their hearts but have not actually committed the same he feare dead in the house for there is no sinne no not the least exorbitant thought of its own nature venial but he that raised Iairus daughter will upon their repentance raise these the second sort are those that are dead in the way these are they that have conceived sins in their souls and actually committed the same these are in the way to be buried in Hell but he that said to the widdows sonne of Naim young man arise is able and willing upon their repentance to raise these The third are those that with Lazarus lye stinking in the grave these are they that have not onely conveyed sinne in their hearts and actually committed the same but by long continuance have got an habit of sinning and continued custome like a great stone is laid upon their graves the case of these men is fearefull but he that said Lazarus come forth is able and readie if they lay as deep as Hell upon their serious repentance to raise these Non haec dico fratres saith he ut qui vivunt vivant sed ut qui mortui sunt revivificant I speak not these thiâ—gs Brethren that those that live in sin may be incouraged to continue therein but that those who are dead in sinne may be revived well then let us be sorry with Judas let us make confessâ—ion with Judas let us make fatisfaction with Judas but let us never despaire with Judas be our sins never so hainous for there is no more proportion between our sins and Christs merits apprehended by faith then there is to use Tullies phrase inter Sillam muriae mare Aegeum between a drop of brine and the Aegean nay the whole Ocean Sea For as Rahab the Harlot was saved by reason of a red thred which was tied to her window when Jericho was destroyed so be thou ten thousand times worse then ever Rahab was if the red thred of Christs bloody passion be tyed to the window of thy heart by faith doubt not but thou shalt be saved though not Iericho but the whole world should be destroyed But without this faith our legal sorrow will availe nothing our confession nothing our satisfaction will profit nothing for as a plaster be it never so excellent if as soone as it is laid upon a sore it be wiped off will not heale the sore and as a potion be it never so precious if as soone as it be drunke it be vomited up again will not 〈◊〉 he inward maladies that are in a mans bodie So the precious plaster of Christs merits will not heal the wounds of our soules if it be wiped off by unbeliefe nor will the Soveraign potion of his merits cure our inward maladies if they be vomited up by incredulitie I have read somewhere of a Lacedemonian who riding on his way hapned to finde a dead man and not knowing perfectly that he was dead he alighted from his horse to trie whether he could make him stand when he could not but the dead fell sometime this way and sometime that he said to himself deâ—st profecto aliquid intus there is something wanting within that should keep him up he said truly for his soul was wanting a man without faith be he never so sorrowfull for his sinnes make he never so ample a confession of them be he pressed even to the mouth of hel with a dolefull remembrance of his iniquities yea though he could say the whole Bible on his fingers ends he is never able to stand in judgement nor to make answer before the Lord in the congregation of the righteous and no marvell for by faith wee stand 2 Cor. 1. 24. and therefore it stands us all upon for the best of as all hath but fidem implicitam I mean a weake and imperfect faith to pray with the Apostles O Lord encrease our faith and with the father of the possessed child Lord I believe help my unbeliefe PSAL. 82. 6 7. I have said ye are Gods but yee shall die like men THere are three sorts of men who if they be faithfull in their places and follow the direction of their books are the chief pillars to support a Christian common-wealth the Physitian the Divine and the Magistrate These three are in the body politick as the three principall parts the liver the heart and the braine are in the body of man The Physitian is the liver the Divine is the heart and the Magistrate is the brain of the common-wealth The liver is called the beginning of the natural faculty it segregateth the humours it ingendreth alimental bloud and by veins sends it into each part of the body whereby the whole is nourished and preserved Like unto it is the Physitian who purgeth the body of man from such noxious humours as whereby it may be endangered and prescribeth such a diet as whereby it may be best nourished and kept in health The heart is called the beginning of the vital faculty it ingendreth the vital spirits and by arteries sendeth them into every particular member To which I compare the Divine For as the heart is the fountain of the vital spirits and the beginning of the vital faculty so is the Divine the fountain and beginning though not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of generation nor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of radication yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to use the Physitians terms of the dispensation of the true vital spirit Hee is the means to make thee of a natural man such as the Physitian leaveth thee a spiritual substance The brain which is called the beginning of the animal faculty is the chief commander of the whole it sitteth in the highest room as in a stately palace being compassed about with the pericranium the cranium and the two meninges as so many strong castles and countermures against all forrain invasion It hath the five externall senses as intelligencers to give notice what is done abroad the common sense the phantasie and the understanding as privy counsellers the memory as a book of records But yet it is not idle but is continually busied in tempering the spirits received from the heart which it sendeth by the nerues through the whole body thereby giving sense and motion to every part A fit embleme of a good Magistrate who as he hath his forts and guard and counsellours and records c. so must he remember that he hath not these for his own proper use but for the whole and therefore should bestir himself for benefitting the whole
not being able to equalize them in wealth peradventure not descending of so ancient a house as they Tunè Syri Damae aut Dionysi filius audes Dejicere è saxo cives tradere Cadmo It was an old objection in the Satyrist what darest thou being thus and thus descended presume to give judgement upon a man that is better born then thy self yes why not hee is now in Gods place He that lifteth the poore out of the myre and raiseth the beggar out of the dunghil that he may set him with the Princes of his people hath styled him with his name and set him in his room I remember a story in Herodotus of Amasis an Egyptian king who in the beginning of his reign was scorned of his subjects by reason of the basenesse of his parentage which when the king observed he took a golden basen wherein his guests were wont to wash their feet and use to some homely purposes and thereof made an image of one of their Gods and set it in an eminent place of the city which when the Egyptians saw as they were marvellous superstitious they came flocking on heaps unto it and worshipped it Hereupon Amasis calling the people together told them that he was like unto that basen which before was vile and abject yet now was worshipped because of the forme it bare so he though before he was mean and base yet now was to be honoured because he was the king for the persons sake whom he did represent It skilleth not what the Magistrate hath been or what hereafter he may be For the present be thy reputation never so great thou art to honour and reverence him if not for the mans sake yet for Gods sake whose person hee beareth The story of Quintus Fabius is very worthy the noting Quintus Fabius was sent by the Senate of Rome to his sonne who was Consul and resided at that time in Apulia The old man either by reason of his age or to trie his sonnes courage went riding to his sonne which when his sonne observed he sent a Sergeant and commanded him to light and come on foot if he would speak with the Consul The by-standers thought it great arrogancy in the young man to be so bold with his aged father But old Fabius who had experience what it was to be Consul knew well that he did no more then did beseem him experiri volui fili said he satin ' scires Consulem te esse It is not for a Magistrate to debase himself neither is it for others of what reputation soever to equalize themselves with the Judge whom God hath placed over them whom Solomon would have to be feared whom Peter would have to be honoured whom Paul would have to be obeyed not for wrath only but even for conscience sake 10. And this is not only meant of godly and religious Magistrates such as are described by Moses which make Gods law of their privy Counsel and turn not aside to the right hand or to the left but of wicked and ungodly governours too such as are described by Samuel which take mens sons and appoint them to his charets and to be his horsemen and to runne before his charets and take their fields and give them to his servants and their vineyards and give them to his Eunuches The reason is because as well the bad as the good are of God The one he gives in his love the other in his anger He that gave the regiment of a Common-wealth to Caius Caesar a milde and gentle Prince gave it also unto Marius a bloudy Consul He that gave it unto Augustus a myrrour of humanity gave it unto Nero a monster of crudelity He that gave it unto Vespasian gave it unto Domitian He that gave it unto Constantine a religious defender of Christianity gave it unto Julian an author of apostasie saith Austine And be they good or bad we have no commandment from him but parendi patiendi of obeying them when their precepts are not repugnant to Gods statutes and of suffering with patience whatsoever they shall lay upon us It was a worthy saying of the mother of the two Garaes when they kept Sigismond in prison that a crowned king if he were worse then a beast could not be hurt without great injury done to God himself A lesson which she learned from David whose heart smote him when he had cut the the lap of Sauls garment because he was the anointed of the Lord although he himself was before that time anointed to be king over Israel and was without cause hunted by Saul like a Pelican in the wildernesse and an Owle in the desart 11. Then to draw thy sword and to seek perforce to depose such as God hath placed over thee either because they are not sutable to thy affections or not faithful in their places what is it but with the old gyants 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to fight with God with the curre dog to bite at the stone and not regard who casteth it or with the rebellious child to snatch at the rod and never remember who smiteth with it The weapons of a Christian in this case when such a case doth happen must be preces lacrymae prayers that either God would turn the heart of an evil Magistrate or set in his room a man David-like after his own heart and tears for his sinnes which as they are the cause of warre famine pestilence and all other calamities so are they also of wicked and ungodly Magistrates Otherwise they have reason to fear that if God should displace an evil Magistrate hee would set a worse in his room According to that of the old wife of Syracuse who when others prayed for the death of Dionysius the Tyrant she prayed for his long life being sent for by Dionysius and demanded wherein she was beholden unto him that she so devoutly prayed for him in nothing said she am I beholden to thee and yet I have great reason to pray for thee For I remember when I was a young wench there was a cruel tyrant that reigned over us and all of us prayed for his death I as fast as any shortly after he was slain and then came a worse in his room Then we prayed for his death at length he was dispatched Now after both these art thou come and thou art a thousand times worse then all thy predecessours And wl o knowes but when thou art gone God may if it be possible send a worse in thy room This they may justly expect which continue in their sinnes and think by their private endeavours to crosse Gods ordinance Thus much of those duties which are required at the hand of every private man towards the Magistrate 12. My second inference shall touch those duties that are required at the hands of Magistrates in that God hath made them his deputies As God hath
they should offer sacrifice for their sinnes who amongst the new people holier then the Apostles and yet the Lord commanded them to say in their prayers forgive us our debts To this Bellarmine answereth that we may say forgive us our debts for veniall sinnes which in this life we seldome or never want But I object Either these sinnes which they call veniall are against the law of God or not if the former then the faithfull doe not fulfill the Law if the the latter then they are not debita and therefore wee need not say in respect of them forgive us our debts This assertion is further confirmed by the testimonies of Hierom and Austin Hierom against the Pelagians lib. 2. I confesse that there are just men but that there are any without sinne this I deny againe behold the Apostles and all the faithfull cannot doe that which they would Austin de spiritu litera cap. ultimo Siquanto major notitia tanto major dilectio profecto quantum nunc deest dilectioni tantum perficiendiae justitiae deesse credendum est and de perfecta iustitia tunc erit plena iustitia quando plena sanitas tunc plena sanitas quando plena charitas tunc plena charitas quando videbimus eum sicuti est neque enim erit quod addetur ad dilectionem cum sides pervenerit ad visionem And in the same book as long as there remaineth any carnall concupiscence wee cannot love God with all our heart Now what these Father 's maintained was the opinion of the Church at that time Bernard came long after them when the Church had gathered much corruption and was becom like Glaucus the Sea God who having sundrie parts of his bodie worne and consumed by beating upon the rocks and the shelves hath the same parts repaired with shels and wreck yet what was his opinion in this point we may gather out of his fiftieth Sermon upon the Canticles Si placet tibi de effectuali charitate datum fuisse mandatum non inde contendo dummodo acquiescas tu mihi quod minime in ista vita ab aliquo homine possit vel potuerit impleri Thus wee have proved our assertion by reason by Scripture and by testimonie of the antient Church Contra rationem nemo fobrius contra Scripturas nemo Christianus contra Ecclesiam nemo pacificus senserit Against reason no sober man against the Scriptures no Christian man against the Church no peaceable man will judge Thus much concerning the connexion Now I proceed to the first proposition It is to no purpose to begin a good course of life unlesse thou hold it out and continue till the end For to forsake sinne for a time and to returne againe unto it is as ill as not to forsake it at all If the righteous turn away from his righteousnesse and commit iniquitie and doe according to all the abominations that the wicked man doeth all the righteousnesse that he hath done shall not be metioned but in his transgressions that he hath committed and in his sinne that he hath sinned in them he shall die Ezech. 14. 24. nay it is farre worse for if after they have escaped the filthiness of the world they be yet intangled againe therein their latter end is worse then their beginning for it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness then after they have knowne it to tuâ—ne aside from the commandements given unto them 2 Pet. 2. 20 21. And if we sinne willingly after we have received the knowledge of the truth there remaineth no sacrifice for sinne but a fearefull looking for of judgement and of violent fire which shall devoure the adversaries Heb. 10. 26. And the Apostle elswhere saith that it is impossible for such to repent Judas runne well but Sathan hindred him he cast before him a golden Apple which brought him out of his way it had been better for Judas to have been a stranger unto Christ as Pilate was then to have forsaken him after he was chosen for though both of them did most grievously transgresse in that they put to death the Lord of life yet Judas that delivered him had the greater sinne Iohn 19. 11. as it is in bodily diseases so it is in the sicknesse of the soule if the sick person be well guided oftentimes there is hope of recoverie but if while he is in recovering he by negligence fall into a relapse his disease is more dangerous then it was before and for the most part proveth incureable Even so in spirituall sicknesses those that sleep in their sinnes may be awaked those that are sick with sinne may be cured yea those that are dead in their sinnes may be raised but if after they be awaked they begin to snort again if after they be cured they fall sick againe if after they be raised they die againe this is a spirituall relapse their case is dangerous if not altogether desperate The reasons hereof are divers 1. Because such men refuse the meanes of salvation when they have been offered unto them and therefore their sinne is greater then if they had been hood-winked with a vizard of ignorance which though it doth not altogether excuse yet doth it extenuate the offence This made the Jewes more inexcusable in that when Christ offered himself unto them they rejected him This is the condemnation saith our Saviour that light is come into the world and men love darknesse rather then light Againe if you were blind you should not have sinne but now ye say we see therefore your sinne remaineth 2. Such men commonly sinne upon presumption neglecting the commandements contemning the threatnings abusing the patience and long-suffering of Almighty God now these sinnes of all others that great sinne against the holy Ghost excepted are most pernitious and therefore David prayeth God that he will keep him from presumptious sinnes 3. Such men do crucifie unto themselves the Sonne of God and make a mock of him they tread under foot the blood of the Covenant as an unholie thing they make Christ like Sisiphus in the Fable to begin his worke of redemption anew after that he hath once finished it as if the sick person after that his Physitian hath recovered his health should of purpose eate such meats as would renew his disease and that to this end that he may put his Physitian to a new labour and trie his skillin recovering him again or as if a banckrupt after that his friend out of his love hath discharged all his debts and undertaken to be his suretie he should of purpose runne upon a new score in hope that his friend will pay it againe and therefore this may be the fourth reason the Lord giveth them over unto reprobate minds and vile affections to do those things that are not convenient and to commit iniquitie even with greediness Now as when the Pillar upon which the house standeth is taken away the house must
God of no effect by your traditions So ye shew your selves to be Children of the old Pharises hold on in your courses and fulfill the measure of their wickedness A Sermon preached at the funerall of Dr. Senhouse Bishop of CARLILE Job 14. 14. If a man dy shall he live againe all the dayes of my appointed time will I waite till my changing come IF for this lifes sake only the faithfull had hope in Christ they were of all men the most miserable saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 15. 19. For though they be not in distresse yet are they afflicted on every side though not overcome of povertie yet in povertie though they perish not yet they are cast downe though they be not forsaken yet for his sake they are persecuted all the day long and are accounted as sheep appointed to be slain but they know that he that raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up them by Jesus and therefore they faint not knowing that their light affliction which is but for a moment causeth unto them a farre more excellent and eternall weight of glory and that when this earthly house of this Tabernacle is destroyed they have a building given of God that is an house not made with hands but eternall in the heavens 2 Cor. 5. 1. If any man be not fully perswaded hereof I may say to him as Philip did to Nathaniel Come and see Come and behold a lively picture a notable experiment hereof in the speaker of these words who not long before if any men in the world might have taken up Niobe's boast in the Fable Sum foelix quis enim negat hoc foelixque manebo Hoc quoque quis dubitat c. His Garners had been full and plenteous with all manner of store his sheep brought forth thousands and ten thousands in his field his Oxen were strong to labour no leading into captivity and no complaining in his streets his wife was as a fruitfull Vine upon the wals of his house his sonnes grew up as the young plants and his daughters were as the polished corners of the Temple besides this he was so hedged about by Gods providence that the sonne of wickedness could not hurt him And was he not happy that was in such a case But maxima pars est foelicitatis fuisse foelicem the remembrance of a mans felicity past adds to his present miserie For now his Children which were unto him as the Arrows in the hand of a Gyant are taken away by deaths arrow they cannot assist him his goods and cattels the externall complements of his former felicity are violently taken away by the Sabeans his enemies they cannot love him his friends miserable comforters God wot instead of sweet consolations to his distressed soule thunder out such sharp threatnings that they doe increase his calamity and more to grieve him the wife of his own bosome appointed by God as a help for man is now become as Dalilah was to Sampson a snare to him his own flesh like a tinder-box kindling with every sparkle that Sathan doth strike unto it lusts and fights against him yea and God himselfe hath drawn a curtain before his eyes hath his face as though he had quite forsaken him behold now and see if there be any sorrow like his sorrow his Children have left him his goods taken from him his friends revile him his wife entangles him his flesh buffets him God seemeth to forsake him tell me if his hope were only in this life if he were not of all the men in the world the most miserable nothing is left to solace him in this great calamitie but that which the Poet fableth left within the vessels mouth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Some hope remaineth in the crooked and broken vessel which as a helmet keeps him from blows as an anchor holds the ship both sure stedfast that it be not dashed by the winds upon som shelves or rocks as a corke holds up above the waters that he sink not and in a word makes him resolve with himselfe not to be quite dismayed nor utterly discouraged at these calamities which are befallen him being such as are not worthy of the glorie which shall be revealed but with patience to wait when his landlord will come and put him out of this earthly house and cloth him with that house which is from Heaven All the days of my appointed time will I wait til my changing shall come As though he had said the Arrows of the Almighty are in me an the venom thereof doth drink up my spirit and the terours of God fight against mee which makes me I confesse to send forth some unsavourie speeches yet they shall neve◠quite discourage me nor deprive me of my hope which shall be accomplished after this fleshly Tabernacle shall be destroyed for I am sure that my Redeemer liveth and that I shall see him even with these eyes and no other for me and in this hope and confidence I will patiently wait and expect not for a short time but even all the time that my soul shall continue in this Tabernacle which cannot be long for that houre when this body shall be dissolved and the Spirit shall returne unto God that gave it All the dayes c. In which words wee may observe and learne these Lessons 1. That every man hath an appointed time by God which he cannot passe mine appointed time 2. That a mans life is not long before he come to his full period dayes 3. Seeing the time of mans life is limited we ought alwayes to waite and provide our selves for death I will wait 4. We are not to waite some part but all our life long All the dayes 5. That death to the godly and regenerate is but a change or a passage to a better life my changing These shall be handled in their severall order but first I will speake a little of the connexion of this latter part with the precedent part of this verse In the former he proposed this question If a man dye shall he live again not as one denying the resurrection of the body but as I take it as a fleshly man not fully perswaded but somewhat doubting of the truth hereof as in the tenth verse of this chapter man is sick and dyeth and man perisheth and where is he As if he should have said is it impossible that a man shall dye and be turned to dust and eaten up of worms and turned to grasse and goe as it were a progresse through a beasts bodie shall be revived and live againe if a man dy shall he live againe The spirituall man which prevaileth against the flesh makes this reply that though he doe not see any naturall reason for it yet he will believe it and he will defend the conclusion maugre all the premises that can be brought against it All the dayes of mine appointed
Goliath like give him a sword for the cutting of our own throats Againe Is it so that in the regenerate so long as he remaineth in this earthly Tabernacle there remain not some few reliques but many fragments of the natural man so that there is a combat between the flesh and the spirit where then be the Papists which maintain justification by works Can a clean thing come out of that which is unclean saith Job and can our minds wils and affections wherein the flesh and the spirit are mixed together produce any effect which is not impure and imperfect and therefore farre short of that perfection and righteousnesse which is required by the Law I do not say that they are sinnes that is but a slander of the Papists but they have some degrees of sins and imperfections joyned with them the best come that groweth in our fields hath some grains blasted the best fruits that we can bring forth are in some part rotten the best gold that we can show is much mixed with dross and cannot abide the touchstone it is an easie matter I confesse for a sinfull and unregenerate cloysterer to say somewhat for the dignitie of workes in justifying a man but when we enter into an examination of our own consciences and find so many sins and imperfections lurking in every corner of our hearts it will make us crie out with Bernard meritum meum miseratio domini my merit is the Lords mercie and again sufficit ad meritum scire quod non est meritum Nay if we look up unto God and consider him not as a mans brain considereth him but as his word describeth him unto us with whose brightness the stars are darkned with whose anger the earth is shaken with whose strength the mountains melt with whose wisdom the crafty are taken in their own nets at whose pureness all seem impure in whose sight the heavens nay the very Angels are unclean we must needs confesse with Job that if we should dispute with God we could not answer him one for a thousand and confesse that he found no stedfastness in his Saints yea and when the heaven is impure in his sight much more is man abominable and filthy which drinketh iniquitie like water and therefore pray unto him with David that he will not enter into judgement with us because in his sight shall no man living be justified but I must leave this point and come unto the second All the dayes of my appointed time c. Every man hath an appointed time by God which he cannot passe Though Adams wisdome was such that he could give names to everie creature according to their nature yet he forgate his owne name because of his affinitie between him and the earth the sons of Adam are like their father they are witty enough about the creatures but they quite forget their own names and their natures too and this is the cause why they be so holden with pride and over-whelmed with crueltie they wil contend with Nebuchadnezzar in Isa to advance themselves even above the stars of God and to match their Grand-father the first Adam who though he was made of the earth would with the wings of pride soare into heaven and care little for being like their elder brother the second Adam which from Heaven came unto earth and took upon him our infirmities and miseries but let them secure themselves never so much the tide will tarrie for no man for their Father eat sowre grapes and his childrens teeth are set on edge their Father for eating a grape of the forbidden Vine had this sentence pronounced against him Unto dust thou shalt returne and his children shall be lyable to it till heaven and earth be removed and there be no more death The tender and dainty women which never adventure to set the sole of their feet upon the ground for their sofness and tenderness as Moses speakes have a day appointed when their mouthes shall be filled with mould and their faces which they will not suffer the sun of the Firmament to shine upon lest it should staine their beautie shall be slimed with that earth which they scorned to touch with the soles of their feet those rotten posts which spend themselves in whiting and painting as though they would with Medea recal their years or with the Eagle by casting their old bill renew their youth have a day set them in which deaths finger shall but touch them and they shall fall in pieces and returne to their dust those which cloth themselves with linnen and build them houses of Cedar and add house to house and and to land as though they should continue for ever or at the least as if their journy to the heavenly Canaan lay all by land and nothing by Sea have a determinate time when their unsatiable desires shall be content with a Golgotha a place of dead mens souls a little part of a potters field asmuch as will serve to hide and cover their earthen vessel Cui satis ad votum non essent omnia terrae Climata terra modo sufficit octo pedum Are not his dayes determined saith Job the number of his moneths are with thee thou hast appointed his bounds which he cannot passe it is not nobility of Parents nor wisdom nor comelinesse of person nor strength of bodie nor largenesse of dominions that can lengthen the thred of a mans dayes Pallida mors aequo pulsat pede pauporum tabernas regumque turres Deaths Arrow will as soon pierce the strong Castle of a King as the poor cottage of a Countrie Swain be thou more zealou then Moses or stronger then Sampson or beautifuller then Absalom or wiser then Solomon or richer then Job or faithfuller then Samuel Ire tamen restat Numa quo devenit Ancus This is the conclusion of all flesh at the time appointed thou must dye yield thy body to deaths Serjeant to be kept Prisoner in the Dungeon of the earth till the great Assises which shall be holden in the clouds at the last day the conclusion is most certain howevsr the premises be most fallible and doubtfull I say not that the time of our lives are equally lengthened or that the dayes our life consist of like houres some see but a winter day and their breath is gone some an â—quinoctial day and they live till their middle age some a long Summers day and live till old age all of them with the Beast called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall be sure to dye at night the course of mans life is like the journy of the Israelites from Aegypt to Canaan some dye as soon as they are gone out of Aegypt some in the midle way some with Moses come to the edge and borders of Canaan some indeed with Caleb and Joshua enter the promised Land alive such as shall be living at the last day but this is without
the ordinarie course and beyond the extent of the statute enacted after mans transgression to say nothing that their change shal be equivalent with death that it may be as great a question whether their bodies be the same which they were before as it was amongst the Athenian Philosophers whether the Ship wherein Theseus sailed to Crete to kill the Minotaure was the same when the decayed parts of the ship were repaired with new planks till at length none of that wood was left that furrowed the Sea between Athens and Creet the rest which are without this compasse have an hour assigned them when they must leave their bodies in the Wilderness but then be carefull of their health use recreation observe dyet seek to the Physitian all these as they will not add one cubit to their stature so can they not add one minut to their appointed time Indeed Hezekiah had fifteen yeers added to his dayes but this was not by the help of man but by his immediate power which turneth man to destruction and again he saith Come again ye sons of Adam and again it was not added to his appointed time for as God is not as man that he should lye so is he not as the son of man that he should repent but it was added to that time wherein by the course of nature the thred of his life should have been broken the thred of nature is tyed to the foot of Jupiters chaire for as it is with the fruits those which are not pulled off the trees when they are ripe will fall themselves so it is in men those that are not by force taken away by the course of nature drop down themselvs that axiom in natural Philosopie is true that every thing is resolved into that whereof it is composed which made Anaxagoras to say when he heard his sonne was dead I knew still that I had begotten a mortall man and Epictetus when walking one day into the fields he saw a woman break an earthen pot at the Well and going abroad the next day he heard some Children weep for their Father that was dead when he came home his speech was this heri vidi fragilem frangi bodie vidi mortalem mori it is no greater matter that a mortall man should dye then that an earthen vessel shall be broken if any man should doubt of the certainty hereof I would say unto him as Bildad said to Iob Inquire I pray thee of the former age and prepare thy self to search of their Fathers for wee are men of yesterday and are ignorant so our dayes on earth are but as a shadow will not they teach and tell thee that all flesh is grasse How many millions have lived before thee and where are they Omnis haec magnis vaga turbaterris Iviâ— ad manes so that I may say with Iâ— know ye nothing have ye not heard it hath it not been told you from the beginning have ye not understood it by the foundations of the earth he sitteth on the circle of the earth and the Inhabitants therof are as grashopers he bringeth the Princes to nothing and maketh the Judges of the earth as vanity as though they were not planted as though they were not sown as though their stock took no root in the earth so he bloweth upon them and they wither and the whirl-wind shall blow them away in stubble Isa 40. Out of which place its plain that as God hath set every man his limits and bounds which he cannot passe which was my first collection out of the second part of my division mine appointed time so it is evident likewise that this time is but short which is my second observation dayes To this purpose it is that Moses saith teach me O lord to number my dayes if he had said moneths they had been but the passing of the sun through a sign or yeares they had been but a few revolutions of the swift running Giant through the Zodiack quickly gone but yet to shew unto us the momentarie shortness of our lives he expresseth them by dayes which if they be naturall they contain but so many turnes of the heavens upon the axeltree of the world or artificial they contain but the remaining of the sun in our Horizon which seemeth to be Davids meaning when he saith that God hath made his dayes as it were a span long a short winter day he makes but a little fragment of a circle and then presently the sun of his life is down as the Lord liveth said he unto Ionathan and as thy soule liveth there is but a step between me and death he meant in that place that he was dayly in danger of his life by reason of Saul which never ceased from persecuting him though there were no persecuting Sauls in the world as there are too many yet with David as many as are sprung from the loyns of Adam have but one step between them and death it is neerer unto them then their clothes on their backs they carrie it about with them in their own bosoms and though it presently get not the masterie yet Serpent like it is still nibling at their heels and will never leave tripping them till it hath brought them to the ground Prima quae vitam dedit hora carpsiâ— The first houre that they began to breath but an inch from the thred of their life if a mans bodie were made of Adamant or steel or brasse the wicked Ethnick needed not to have exclaimed against God that the Raven and the Hart and the Phoenix should live so many ages whereas the life of a man like a Weavers shuttle or swift post is presently gone for though they should come at length to a full point as the flint will at length be broken and brasse and steel cankered and consumed yet they should first passe so many ages that they could not say with Iacob few and evill have our dayes been but alas they are but of a glassie mettall the least fall will crack them they are of potters clay the seast knock will break them so that we may say to death with him in the Tragedy Parce venturis tibi mors paramur Sis licet segnis properamus ipsi Hence it is that mans life is counted as as a buble of the water a vapour a smoak a dream a spaâ—n a tale that is told And are these things so hence then we might first learn not to put our trust and confidence in man as though he were able to prolong our dayes for let him be as tall as the sons of Anak or mightier then Og king of Basan whose bed was of Iron or more terrible then Goliath which so affrayed the Israelites that they durst not come neer unto him yet he cannot deliver his own much lesse thy bodie from the grave or make an agreement unto God for it he is but a man whose breath is in his nostrils
and shall be sure though he be the mightiest potentate in the world to heare Nebuchadnezzars sentence against him O man to thee be it spoken not thy kingdom only but even thy life is departed from thee but to trust in him with whom the Inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing and who according to his will worketh in the inhabitants of the earth and the Army of Heaven and none can stay his hand or say unto him why dost thou so it is he that hath limited our lives and set bounds to our dayes which we cannot passe Again hath God limited our lives and given Bars to our dayes as unto the Seas saying hitherto shall ye goe and ye shall go no further then I might put you in mind to beware of two dangerous rocks upon which many unheedfull Saylers have split their Ships the first lyes on the left hand that we relye not too much on the outward meanes for that were to trust in man and contemn God the second on the right hand that because our years are determined we neglect not the ordinarie meanes for that were to tempt God we must not think that wee can keep our selves in prison when we are called to the Bar nor yet must we breake the Prison before the Goale deliverie Asa sought to Physitians and dyed Hezekiah sought not and had fifteen yeers added to his dayes the one sought to the Physitian and not to God the other to God not to the Physitian we must joyn them both together or else we shall make a fallacie or paralogisme in Christianitie which Logicians call a benè divisis ad malè conjuncta for we may with Asa use the Physitians but farre more with Hezekiah seek unto the Lord. But the third and last use is this that seeing mans death is appointed yea and that it must be shortly wee make use of this short time and not wastfully mispend this golden opportunitie it was Apelles his custom not to let any day slip without drawing of some lines with his pensil and it was Pythagoras his rule to his schollars that they should never suffer their eyes to sleep at night till they had taken a diligent survey of all their dayes labour no more should we let one day passe without using of that talent which God hath given us nor suffer our eyes to sleep nor our eye-lids to slumber nor the temples of our head to take any rest before we have taken a strict account with our selves how we have bestowed the day past alwaies waiting and expecting that day when we shall pay our Grand-mother her due which is the third note I observed Scilicet Vltima semper Expectanda dies homini est We should ever expect our last houre when we must make our account to God that whether he call us to a reckoning at evening or at morning or at mid-night we may have our accounts ready when we see a vapour drawn up by the heat of the sun when we see the smoak ascend up the Chimney when we see the Post coursing on the way when we see a glasse broken when we heare a blast of wind when we put off our clothes when we lye down to sleep when we dream a dream we should still remember the shortnesse and uncertaintie of our lives that they are like vapours quickly consumed like smoak presently vanished like a Post in a moment passed like a wind shortly ceased like a glasse presently cracked like our clothes quickly sullied like a dream in an instant perished so that it is as strange that we should not remember it as that wee should not remember the number of our fingers or with Corvinus forget our owne names but alas we see this and yet we will not see it we know it well and yet we will not consider it we are sure that death will shortly knock at our doores and yet wee will say unto our selves as Peter did unto Christ pitty thy selfe this thing shall not happen unto thee we will perswade our selves of our lives a◠the false Prophet perswaded the Jewes of the safety of their Citie when the enemie was ready to surprise it This City shall not be delivered into the hands of the King of Babel we can build our houses plant our trees sowe our fields gather our fruits into our Barns for those things we can observe a fit season but yet the ordering of our lives the salvation of our souls as though they were trifles not worthy the looking into we post them oft to our better leasure Surely the Stork in the aire knoweth her appointed times and the Turtle and the Crane and the Swallow observe the time of their comming and yet man will not remember the time when he must come to his particular judgement when he must leave these toyes which he makes his chiefest delight and say I have no pleasure in them When wee see a man dye we remember our mortality but we have no sooner pu him in the grave then we have buryed in the earth of oblivion the remembrance of our own death we are no sooner in our own houses then we return to our old sins the swearer to his blasphemie the wanton to his pleasures the Usurer to his unlawfull gaining the Drunkard to his vomit every one to his old wayes not one will think with himself that he may be the next which shall be turned out of the doores We count that rich cormorant in the Parable a right fool and so he was indeed who when his field brought forth abundance of fruit determined to pull down his barns and make them greater and then to say to his soule take thy rest not remembring that even that night his soul might be taken from him demiror te Antoni said Tullie to Anthonie quorum facta imitaris eorum exitus non perhorrescere and is it not as strange that we should imitate this Cormorant in his life and not think upon his end we sleep and secure our selves with the old world and never remember a flood which is ready to sweep us all away we remember well the former part of the Epicures sentence let us eate and drink and be merry but we forget the latter end to morrow we shall dye we do not remember that every one hath a Serjeant at his elbow ready to arrest him and to say Lusisti satis edisti satis atque bibisti Tempus abire tibi est Thou hast eaten and drunken thy pleasure thou must now be gone Beloved Christians do ye desire the salvation of your own souls I know ye desire it oh then bestow not this short time which the Lord hath lent you here in the Land of the living in chambering and wantonnesse in luxurie and riotousnesse in strife and envie in oppression and covetousness but use it to the glorie of God that when ye shall goe hence and be no more seen ye may be received into everlasting
which some Schoolmen make a fifth kind of feare which they call naturall which is not evill if it be kept within its bounds For to be touched somewhat with those things which be by nature terribilia and may do evill as Death Famine want of necessaries for this life is not evill Aristotle notes it as a kind of brutishnesse in the Celtae that they feared not Lightnings nor Inundations nor Earth-quakes But now to exceed in this kinde and for avoyding of mundane evills to incurre the displeasure of God with Elisha's servant to see thine Enemies but not thy Friends with Saul to be greatly afraid of Goliah and not to see the power of God in little David It proceeds from an evill root an immoderate love of this world and is joyned with a distrust to his providence who hath said I will not leave thee nor forsake thee and is here forbidden by our Saviour Feare not Janus-like it looks both back-ward and forward Backwards to the precedents of this Chapter so it contains the use which we are to make of that which hitherto hath been delivered concerning Gods providence Forward to the latter part of the verse and so it is a conclusion of an argument a majori thus Gods elect are Kings sonnes States of Paradise and heires apparent to the crown of Heaven Ergo they need not feare but he will watch over them with his fatherly provision protection and direction in his kingdome of grace Take it whether way ye will and it will afford us this proposition Such is Gods fatherly care and providence over his children that they need not be discouraged by humane nor mundane fears As the night Crow sees in the night but is blind in the day So a naturall man is quick-sighted in temporall things but blind in spirituall For as the Sun lighteneth the Earth but darkeneth the Heaven So his understanding giveth him direction about earthly things but for heavenly and spirituall them it darkneth and obscureth This as by many other things it is evident so especially by the worlds rash judgement touching Gods providence over his children while they remaine in these houses of clay for they seeing that the godly are oftentimes hunted as a Partridge upon the mountains or as a Pelican in the Wildernesse and an Owle in the Desart whereas the ungodly as Job speaks have their houses peaceable and without fear and the rod of God is not upon them they rejoyce in the sound of the Organs and spend their dayes in wealth They I say seeing these things not being able to give the true reason of them because God made them neither of his Court nor Privie Counsell and yet storning to be ignorant in any thing though they knew nothing as they ought to have known began to lye and libell against that eternall power in which they live move and have their being Some of them because they would not seem to impute any injustice unto God thought that such as they saw groaning under the heavy burden of affliction howsoever unto the worlds eye they might seem devout and righteous yet in very deed and before God which seeth not as man seeth for man looks on the outward appearance but God beholds the heart they were dissemblers and hypocrites Thus Paul when he had gathered a few sticks for the fire and a Viper came out of the heat and leapt on his hand was by the Barbarians counted a murtherer Job when the heavy hand of God was upon him was by Zophar thought to be a man forgotten of God for his iniquity Nay Christ our Saviour that immaculate Lamb who had done no wickednesse neither was there any guile found in his mouth was judged by the Jewes as a man plagued and smitten of God for his sinnes Isa 53. 5. Others not much unlike the old Thracians who as Herodotus writes when it thundered used to shoot up their arrows towards Heaven and to tell God that he cared for none but himselfe affirmed that though God had made the world yet the government thereof he committed to Fortunes wisdome and direction Others that he ruled Caelestiall bodies and those that are above the Moone but for these base creatures that are below it is against his divine Majestie to respect Scilicet is Superis labor est c. Others that hee was tyed to second causes and could work no otherwise then he found them disposed Hereupon came the fable of the three Fates sitting by Jupiter the one holding a Dâ—staff the second spinning the third cutting the thread whose decrees Jupiter cannot alter nor resist and Homer brings in Jupiter with a chain in his hand to which the whole world is tyed in certaine links of Causes Jupiter hath in his owne power the moving of the first linke but after the first like is moved then hee meddles with no more but one link draws on another The same Poet brings in Jupiter complaining upon the Fates by whose immutable decree he is hindered that hee cannot deliver Sarpedon from death And Neptune desiring to hinder Vlysses from coming into his Countrey for the hurt done to his sonne Polyphemus but cannot because the Fates are against him So Juno in Virgil complaines that she is resisted by the Fates from hindering Aeneas to come into Italie Mene incoeptodesistere victam Nec posse Italia Teucrorum avertere regem Quippe vetor fatis Nay some upon this occasion stickt not to come to that height of impiety that they adventured to deny that which with a pen of iron and with the point of a diamond is written in the tables of their hearts that there is a God Marmoreo Licinus tegitur tumulo Cato parvo Pompeiâ—snullo And hereupon to make up the verse came that blasphemous speech Quis putat esse deum Yes blasphemous mouth there is a God and this God is not God of the mountaines only but he is God of the valleys too he looks not only to the things which are in Heaven his Throne but also unto the things that are on Earth his foot-stool the young Ravens are fed by him one Sparrow cannot fall unto the ground without him he numbers the haires of our heads and puts our teares into a bottle and marks our treadings and reckons our steps Hee careth for his chosen as a Shepheard doth for his Flock nay as a Master doth for his houshold nay as a Father for his own Children As a father pittieth his owne children so is the Lord mercifull to them that feare him Nay as a mother loveth the sonne of her wombe which is greater then the fathers love as Aristotle well noteth Can a woman forget the child of her womb Isa 49 Emphatically spoken a woman Women where they love love earnestly David to shew the ardency of Jonathans love towards him hyperbolically extolls it above the love of a woman Can a woman forget her child Her love to children is great not only by reason
shall ever perish Thou art a Souldier in that Camp whereof the weakest in the end shall be a Conquerour Feare not the Lord is with thee thou valiant man Neither tribulation nor anguish nor nakednesse nor sword nor death nor life nor Angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus He whose name is Amen the faithfull and true Witnesse and therefore cannot goe back with his word hath promised to his whole Flocke his divine protection and assistance in his Kingdome of grace and will at length bring us to everlasting happinesse in his Kingdome of glory Feare not little Flocke for it is your Fathers pleasure to give you the Kingdome The Third Sermon LVKE 12. 32. For it is your Fathers good pleasure c. HAving finished the former branch the Doctrine we are now to come to the second part the Reason and herein observe 1. The granter your Father 2. The thing granted a Kingdome 3. The grantees Not all Adams sons but the Sheep of this little Flock you 4. The consideration or cause impulsive and that is nothing in Man but the love and good pleasure of Almighty God your Father is well pleased At this time only of the first the Grantor your Father He who hath one only naturall sonne God begotten from everlasting of the same substance with himselfe and in all things equall to himselfe and one only begotten sonne by grace of Conception Man made of the seed and substance of a Woman both which concur to the making of one and the same individuall person of Immanuel the Messiah is if you take the word not personally but essentially 1. A Father of all his Creatures Similitudine vestigij because there is not the meanest creature in the world wherein he hath not imprinted some characters and foot-steps of himselfe in which respect Job calls the Worm his sister and mother Job 17. 14. 2. A Father of the Angels Similitudine gloriae So they are called The sonnes of God John 1. 6. 3. A Father of all Man-kind Similitudine imaginis wherein man was created Gen. 1. 27. 4. Not of all mankind but only of a certain number whom he before the foundation of the world was laid not for any goodnesse either of faith or works which he did foresee for what did he foresee but what he decreed to bestow upon them of his free grace and love pick'd and cull'd out of that masse of corruption into which by Adams sin they were to come and in the fulnesse of time effectually calleth that is separateth from the world and admits into his houshold and familie and makes them Who by nature were dead in sinnes and trespasses living members of Christs mysticall bodie Thus he is a Father of all believers I will be a father unto you and ye shall be my sonnes and daughters saith the Lord Almighty 2 Cor. 6. 18. The spirit of adoption beareth witnesse that we are his children and bids us cry Abba Father Rom. 8. 16. In this sense our Saviour bids us Call no man father on earth because we have but one Father which is God Matth. 23. 9 and sends us in our prayers to our Father which is in Heaven Matth 6. 9. Thus is he a Father of his little flock And well may he be called Father for what doth a natural parent to his child which the Father of Spirits doth not in an infinite larger and better measure to his 1. An earthly father begets his child and is the cause of his naturall being 2. He gives him a name 3. He feeds him 4. He cloatheth him 5. He protects him from wrongs 6. He corrects him for his faults 7. According to his meanes he provides an inheritance or a portion for him God doth all these to his sonnes the Sheep of this little flock 1. He begets us Jam. 1. 18. For which cause he is styled the father of spirits Heb. 12. 9. This is a meer work of God to which the power of free-will doth no more concurre then a child is a Coadjutor to his father at his natural generation I grant that as in substantial mutations before a forme be corrupted and another educed e potentia materia there are certaine alterations or previal dispositions for making way to this change So in this supernatural mutation when a sonne of Adam is to be made a son of God God ordinarily useth certain previal dispositions The Law and the Gospel are preached the heart of man is shaken with the terrors of the law and cast down to the ground as Paul was at his conversion and touched with feare of punishment sorrow for sinne desire and hope of pardon c. But as those previal alterations are no essential parts of natural generation though preparatives thereunto Nor is there in the Matter any more then a meer passive power for receiving the substantial form so neither are these previal dispositions any essential part of our supernatural regeneration Nor is there in the wil any active but a mere passive power for receiving this supernatural being which is only wrought by the finger of God The Apostles evidences are strong for this point let us heare them we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus meaning that there is no more power in a naturall man for begetting himselfe a new then there was in that dry dust whereof Adam was made for assisting God in the creation of man A naturall man is dead in sinne Can a dead man revive himselfe Could Lazarus when he had been three dayes stinking in the grave move hand or foot till Christ had put his soule into him No more can a natural man so much as move himselfe to a supernatural and spirituall work till God regenerate him and as it were create him anew and infuse into the powers and faculties of his soule a quickning spirit He hath a heart of stone I will take the stonie heart out of their bodies a heart of stone not a heart of iron for though iron be hard yet the heate of the fire will mollifie it and the stroak of the hammer will turne it into a new forme but no heat will mollifie a stone no hammer can beate it out or bring it into a new shape but by breaking it So our hearts are by nature such that they cannot be softned or turned to that which is right till they be broken in pieces and cast in a new mould And again as no water can be drawn out of a stone so no goodnesse can be educed out of a natural mans heart We are by nature evill trees and an evil tree cannot bring forth good fruit The Apostle tels us That of our selves we cannot so much as think a good thought That it is God that giveth both the will and the deed And our great Master whom we are
be a great Eclipse of the Moone signified unto them by a Messenger that he was a Prophet sent unto them from the great God of Heaven and Earth and that if they would not furnish him and his company with such things as they wanted God whose Prophet he was would utterly destroy them In token whereof quoth he the next night at such an houre the Moone shall loose her light they for all this continued in their obstinacy and scorned his threatnings At the houre named the Moone by degrees entring into the shadow of the earth was at length in those parts for a space quite darkened which when the Barbarians saw presently they ran unto Columbus they fell down at his feet they honoured him as a man they worshipped him as a God they offered themselves and whatsoever was theirs to be wholly at his service Verily the Papists do Columbus great wrong who for this witty shift deserves rather the name of a Prophet amongst them then that great Elias of the new World Francis Xaverius for his juggling Tricks in those Parts deserves the name of a waker of Miracles To end this Point Seeing it is a matter of such difficulty to distinguish a true Prophet from that which is false both because they are of things to come the truth whereof cannot be sifted out before the time be expired and though they have naturall causes yet be they such as cannot be known unto men and if they could yet seeing as already hath been proved the Infidels and Pagans have had their prophesies let the Papists prove the gift of Prophesy to be perpetual in their Church which they can never do and let them bring us as great Catalogues of their Prophesies as they do of their Miracles and lying Wonders a thing not impossible to men of such rare invention but let none from these slender Premises infer this conclusion that there is the true Church of God but rather let him undoubtedly beleive that the words of my Text are verified of these men Many shall say unto me at that day Lord Lord have not we by thy name prophesied c. Let us not think that the Precept of the Law was given in vaine If there arise a Prophet or a Dreamer of Dreames and give thee a Signe and a Wonder and the Signe and Wonder which he hath told thee shall come to passe saying Let us follow strange Gods as these men do thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that Prophet for the Lord your God proveth you to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your Heart and with all your Soule Deut. 13. 1 2 3. Thus much of the first the second followeth A man may be a Preacher of the Gospell and a meanes of saving others and be damned himselfe I have a long Journey to go and the time allotted me but short so that I cannot stand upon the proofe of this Proposition neither is it needfull I should having no Donatists no Anabaptists to impugne let it suffice to add unto my Text the words of the Apostle Phil. 1. 15. Some preach Christ through envie and strife truly for all that not sincerely else would not the Apostle have added that which followeth I therein joy yea and in that will joy This Sermon upon the Mount of which my Text is a Branch was preached at the Consecration of the twelve Apostles of which number Judas was one whom a while after he sent abroad to preach the Gospell then called he the twelve Disciples and sent them to preach the Kingdome of God and to heale diseases and they went through every Town preaching the Gospell and healing every where Luk. 9. 2. 6. For all Judas his preaching and healing he did not preach unto nor heale himselfe it had been good for him that he had never been born Matth. 26. The first Use and Inference of which let me â—rave your patience to spend some time shall concerne the hearers of the word It may lesson them not to have the truth of the glorious God in respect of persons as Iames speakes or that I may expresse my selfe in other words that they do not forsake or neglect a truth preached because the life of the Speaker is offensive and scandalous Saul may prophesie and Caiphas may prophesie and Iudas may prophesie And many shall say unto me at that day Lord Lord have not we by thy name prophesied Shall not Saul be credited because he is rejected why not is not Saul also amongst the Prophets 1 Sam. 19. Shall Caiphas his prophesie not be esteemed because he took away the life from the Lord of life surely yes for this spake he not of himselfe but being high Priest that yeare he prophesied that Jesus should die for the Nation Ioh. 11. 51. Shall Iudas his Sermons be set at nought because he is a damned Reprobate himselfe surely no For whosoever shall not receive you nor heare your words it was spoken to the twelve of which Iudas was one Truly I say unto you it shall be easier for them of Sodome and Gomorrah in the day of Iudgment then for that City Matth. 10. 14. 15. Oh then shall any man be such an Enemy to his own Salvation as that if the life of his Teacher be misliked he will therefore set at nought the word of God truly though not sincerely delivered what were this but to reject God himselfe as he saith unto Samuel It is not thee but me whom they haue rejected 1 Sam. 8. 7. The word of God is a Touch-stone to try every mans Actions whether they be Gold or Drosse it is a line and squa re to make us fit Stones for Gods Temple Now shall I mislike the Touch-stone because the Gold is counterfeit shall I make fit the Rule for the Stone and so make it a Lesbian Rule especially if it be a rough and unhewed Stone and as yet not fit for that building whereof Christ Jesus is the corner Stone If I be sick unto death shall I refuse physick because I mislike the Physician or because he will not take the same physick himselfe An tibi cum fauces urit sitis aurea quaeris Pocula cum esurias fastidisomnia praeter Pavonem rhombumque When thou art thirsty will thou refuse Drink unlesse it be given thee in a guilded Bowle When thou art hungry will no Meat content thee but Patridges and Pheasants Surely thou hast too dainty a Stomack it commonly falls out otherwise men that are hungry will not refuse wholesome meat though they have no good opinion of the Party that reacheth it and when they are thirsty they will not refuse Drink though it be given them in a woodden Dish Shall a man have a care of his Body and none of his Soule if my Soule be sick unto death shall I refuse physick because the Physician takes it not himselfe or shall I refuse the bread of life and water of life
utimur monachi judicamur quia ebrij non sumus nec cachinno ora dissolvimus contumaces vocamur tristes si tunica non candueriâ— stâ—tim illud e trivio impostor est Graecus saith Hierom. If a Minister be liberall he is called riotous if frugall covetous if merry dissolute if grave austere if silent melancholy if he stand upon his reputation proud and arrogant Woe unto them that call good evill In the Primitive Church when the comparison between Gentilisme and Christianity did much resemble Cleanthes his picture in Tullie where Voluptuousnesse was painted in a chaire of State and Vertue kneeling at her feet there was not a more odious name saith Tertullian then to be called a Christian Bonus vir Cujus Seius sed malus tantum quod Christianus So it is with some they were good men but they are but Ministers they are but Priests Hos populus ridet multumque torosa juventus the name is odious to some they cannot away with it But if his person cannot be excepted against his doctrine for matter or manner shall Faelices essent artes inquit Fabius they be Hieroms words Si de illis soli artifices judicarent poëtam non potest nosse nisi qui versum potest stuere Philosophos non intelligit nisi qui scit dog matum varietates c. Nostra autem quam sit dura conditio hinc potes anima dvertere quod vulgi sit standum judicio Happy were the Arts saith Quintilian if only Artificeâ—s should judge of them None judgeth of a Poet but he that can make a Verse None gives censure of Philosophers but he that is acquainted with their opinions A Shoo-maker meddles with a shooe but not with the Stocking a Taylor with a garment and goes no further but for a Preacher men of all Trades will censure him and none so much as they that understand least If with Nathan he tell David that he is the man If with Elijah he tells Ahab that it is hee and his fathers house that troubles Israel If with John Baptist he tell Herod that it is not lawful for him to have his Brothers Wife Hic nigrae succus loliginis haec est aerugo Now these be hard sayings who can heare them And if they cannot reprehend the matter of his speech the manner thereof will afford some matter enough to speak of If Paul speake of his Mysteries and Revelations before Festus he is beside himselfe much learning makes him mad And if this Doctor of the Gentiles applying himselfe to the rude capacity of the ignorant Corinthians for he becomes all things to all men that by all meanes he might win ne some use a more familiar phrase and feed them with milke because they cannot digest strong meate he is presently by some seducer in that Church censured to be a plain silly fellow his bodily presence is weake and his speech is of no valew Thus he is rewarded Evill for good and hatred for his good will and thus are Gods builders in many places constrayned to build with one hand and to hold their weapons against their enemies in the other as did those builders of Jerusalem against Sanballat and Tobiah and other Enemies of Judah and Benjamine Neh. 4. 17. Dextra tenet pennam strictum tenet altera ferrum May they not in this case take up Davids complaint I verily lie among the children of men which are set on fire They have venenum ptyados the poyson of a spitting Aspe under their lips their teeth are spears and arrows and their tongues a sharp sword But beloved I have perswaded my selfe better things of you and such as accompany salvation though I thus speake Only for conclusion of this Use let me intreat you with the Author of the Epistle to the Hebr. See that yee despise not him that speaketh I meane Ministeriall speakers If ye doe ye despise him that speaketh from heaven Whose blood speaketh better things then that of Abel But receive such as the Galatians received Paul who received him as an Angel of God and would have pulled out their owne eyes to have given unto him and have them in a singular love even for their works sake But above all things tread not under foot the bread of life because of the unworthinesse of any that reacheth it Refuse not the water of life because of the uncleannesse of any Conduit-pipe that conveyeth it Reject not the promise of life because of the lewdnesse of any Embassador that bringeth it Forsake not the way of life because of the blackishnesse of any that sheweth it Contemn not the word of life because of the imperfections of any that preacheth it For assuredly as the rain cometh down from Heaven and ascendeth not thither againe but accomplisheth that for which it is sent so shall the Word of God be by whomsoever it shall be delivered it will either harden you if yee be as clay or it will soften you if yee be as waxe it will either work upwards or down-wards it will either prove the savour of life unto salvation or of death unto damnation Oh then so provide your eares to heare that ye may say with young Samuel Speake Lord for thy servant heareth and hearing it pray that your hearts may be unlocked to receive it and receiving it believe it and believing it practise it in your lives and conversations that ye may be filled with the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ unto the praise and glory of God Having now dispatched my message to Hearers let mee crave leave that I may turne my speech to the Preachers of the Word May a man be a Prophet and deliver true and sound Doctrine for the benefit of others and for all be an unregenerate man a damned Reprobate himselfe Then let me exhort you all my deare Brethren or rather with Austine Hortor vos omnes charissimi meque ipsum hortor vobiscum I exhort you and my selfe together with you as we desire to escape everlasting damnation and to have our part with Christ in his glorious Kingdome let us as the Apostle exhorts take heed not only to Doctrine but to our selves first not only to our preaching that it be sound but to our lives also that they be unblameable let us not only be vigilant that the Bell strike right above but that the wheels of the Clock go right below let us not only so speake but so do as they that shall be judged by the Law of liberty least after we have preached to others and been a meanes of their Salvation ipsi reprobi fiamus we our selves be tumbled into Hell as the Builders of the Arke were meanes of saving Noah and his Family and for all that were drowned themselves we may not expect it is not expedient we should for any to gaine a good report of all men Dogs will be barking at the best was he a good man of