Adam as thou damnest all by the first I say Zach. 3.2 thou art not love and shalt light short of my love O hellish blasphemy The Lord rebuke thee Our recreation or redemption is a greater might and mercy than all the rest for in the creation God made man like himself but in the redemption he made himselfe like man Māgna est redemptio cum et precium datur et pecunia non videtur Tertul. Illic participes nos fecit honorum suorum hîc particeps est factus malorum nostrorum In making the world he spake the word onely but to redeeme the world Dixit multa et fecit mira Passus est dura verba duriora verbera The Creation of the world was a work as it were of his fingers Psal 8.3 But redemption is called the work of his Arme Psal 98.1 Also it is a greater work to bring men from sin to grace than being in the state of grace to bring them to glory because sin is far more distant from grace than grace is from glory By Christ we have a plenary redemption of soul and body out of the clawes of Satan As the bird is in the fowlers net so were we in the Devils snare but we may say with them in the Psalme the net is broken and we are delivered yea we are delivered eternally we shall never fall into that bondage again The afflictions whereunto we are incident in this life viz. Sickness poverty malevolent tongues imprisonment death it self c. are temporal but our redemption and joy are eternal Let that comfort us in all the calamities of this life We love them that obtain a temporal redemption for us If a young man be bound prentise to an hard Master for fourteen or twelve yeares and if one should buy out his Apprentiship and set him free would he not take himself much beholden to him If thou wert a Gall-yslave under the Turk and one should rid thee out of it wert thou not much beholden to him We were bound Prentises to Sathan he kept us in his snare at his will and pleasure being his bondmen we should have remained in hell-fire world without end Now Christ Jesus hath redeemed us and made us the free-men of God and Citizens of heaven how are we indebted to him Christ hath brought us out of the Gally of sin and damnation therefore let us sound forth his praises all the dayes of our life In the work of redemption God layes naked to us the tendrest bowels of his Fatherly compassion For by giving us his Son he shewed us all his love at once as it were imbodyed All other spiritual blessings meet in this as the lines in the center as the streames in the fountaine If the Centurion were held worthy of respect because he loved our Nation said they and built us a Synagogue What shall we say of Almighty God who so loved our soules that he gave his onely begotten Son c. The end of our redemption is to serve God we are redeemed from our old conversation not to our old conversation we are bought with the blood of Christ not to serve the Devil our selves the flesh the world we have served them too much already from henceforth we must serve God Heb. 9.14 Christ hath therefore broke the devils yoke saith one from off our necks Servati sumus ut serviamus that we may take upon us his sweet yoke and not carry our selves as sons of Belial Serve we must still but after another manner as the Israelites did when brought out of the Egyptian bondage yet thou shalt keep this service saith Moses Exod. 12.25 Ye are not your own for ye are bought with a price therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit which are Gods 1 Cor. 6.19 20 By his own blood Christ entred in once into the Holy place Hebr. 9.12 having obtained eternal redemption for us In whom we have redemption through his blood Eph. 1.7 Ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things as silver and gold but with the precious blood of Christ as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot 1 Pet. 1.18 19. Thou wast slain and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred Rev. 5.9 and tongue and People and Nation Reconciliation It is the note of Chrysostome upon the phrases of reconciling and making peace 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrys hom 3. in Colos that the one implieth an enmity the other a war and it is elsewhere asserted that the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all unrighteousnesse and ungodliness of men and consequently against men for all their unrighteousnesse and ungodliness in this respect it is that all men by nature are children of wrath So long as man stood in his integrity there was Pax amicitiae a peace of amity and friendship between God and man but when man sought out many inventions God was most justly provoked to anger Thus at first and ever since sin hath proved the make-bate the kindle-coal that incendiary between the Creatour and his creature The meditation of which may convince us of 1. The odious nature of sin Pro. 6.19 No persons more abominable than the contentious Solomon justly declameth against him that soweth discord among brethren That beatitude of our Saviour Mat. 5.9 carrieth in it according to the rule of contraries a curse Cursed are the peace-breakers for they shall be called the children of the Devil But oh how accursed and hateful a thing is sin which hath broke the peace not between man and man brother and brother only but God and man father and son Let our anger wax hot against that which causeth his wrath to wax hot against us 2. The miserable estate of a sinner Caelestis ira quos premit miseres facit Sen. Trag. because he is under the wrath of God Divine anger is an unsupportable burthen No wonder if the Psalmist put the question who may stand in thy sight when once thou art angry Psal 76.7 Not Angels in heaven Jude 6. Nor great men on earth Rev. 6.15 16. David seeling some drops or sparks of this anger saith there was no rest in his bones by reason of it Those that do not feel have cause continually to be in fear Mind this against Socinians But now by Christ we are not onely reconciled to God but God is also reconciled to us there being a pacification of Divine wrath by Christs death Under the Law the High-Priest made an attonement for the people Levit. 16. So did Christ for his people God and man were fallen out Christ made us friends God was displeased with us he pacified his wrath towards us which the Father by an audible voice winesses from heaven Mat. 3.17 This is my beloved Son In quo hominibus bona volu◠Euthym. in whom I am well pleased That is as Cajetan and others Habeo in
obitum faelicem Which Cyrus understanding delivers him saying Et ea quoque mihi evenire possunt This was also a vertue for which Q. Camd. Eliz. Elizabeth was said to be famous Next to the holy Scripture she preferred as the best piece Seneca's book of clemency In a word Mercy is an excellent and divine vertue it draweth near to the nature of God who is the Father of mercies Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy Mat. 5.7 Be ye therefore merciful as your father also is merciful Yea Luke 6.36 Put on therefore as the elect of God holy and beloved bowels of mercies Col. 3.12 Cruelty Crudelitas est atrocitas animi in paenis exigendis Cruelty hath usually something to cover its deformity It is one of the companions of ambition and covetousnesse If Ahab have a desire to Naboths vineyard either Naboth must part with it or his life There is a manifold cruelty 1. Mr. Marburie Cruelty of combination when we make our selves strong in a faction to oppose and oppresse all that go not our way 2. Cruelty of the eye when we can be content to behold our brethrens miseries without any compassion 3. Cruelty of heart when we make our selves merry with their afflictions 4. Cruelty of tongue when we insult over them and brand them with taunts 5. Cruelty of the hands When we 1. Either persecute their persons with molestation 2. Or touch their liberty with unjust restraint 3. Or rob them of their goods by cruel direprions 4. Or hinder the course of justice that should do them right 5. Or procure their death So that they are not all innocent of this great offence that keep themselves from shedding of blood They that invade the meanes or maintenance of life that pinch the labourer in his wages or make the hireling work for nothing or let their hire sleep in their custody whilst he pineth for want of things necessary are all guilty of it Tacitus saith of the Germanes out of whom our Saxons that they were so given to Mars that they thought it no better than sloathful to get that by sweat which they might have by blood It 's storied of Nero he fell into such a sucking vaine of slaughter Euseb l. 2. c. 25. that he abstained not from his most dear and familiar friends Yea he tormented with divers kinds of death his own mother his brethren his wife Strabo saith that the ancient Irish were so savage that they fed upon mans flesh Grimst p. 34. Solinus addes more that when they were victors they rubbed their faces with the blood of them that were slain in the fight after they had drunk some Exemplum de populis habitantibus in minori Asià circa pontum habemus qui crudis humanis carnibus vescuntur proprios suos liberos coquunt amicis inter epulas proponunt Exemplum etiam de quodam Phalaride qui dicitur filium suum comedisse The Turks are a most barbarous people having Christians in their hands Turk Hist fol. 756. some they have put quick into the ground to the wast and there for their pleasure shot at them with arrows others have they stripped their skins over their eares and others miserably empailed And no lesse famous rather infamous for inhumanity are the Spaniards Sr. Fr. Drakes travels Of some they have squeezed out their brains Others they have rosted till their eyes dropt out And think they shew the innocent Indians great favour when they do not for their pleasure whip them with cords scratch them with thornes and day by day drop their naked bodies with burning bacon Another Author addes In India you may find more cursed prodigies than ever the Sun beheld in any Map of misery where the Roman Apostles did exceed Cain or if possible Judas where they ravished and then murthered Queenes tore infants in peices cast men to mastives cut children in collops to feed dogs men never did the like Devils could do no more The Romans descended from Edom say the Jewes Edom had a name of blood Mount-Seir was their possession Usually Hereticks are exceeding cruel witness the Sadduces of old Anabaptists of later times Eusâ—b l. c. 3.23 the hill of blood Acheldama their purchase the field of blood Our English when they grow Romish against the nature of our Nation become bloody which is imputed to the scituation of the English Colledge in Rome which is founded in the ruines of bloody Neroes house Of all the stories of Christians of Heathens of all the bloody Tragedies plotted in hell or acted under heaven never any so horrid as the bloody baptisme of India by the Jesuites They have long intended to have the second part of this Tragedy to be acted here The courtesie that Polyphemus promised Vlisses was that he should be the last that he would devour The tender mercies of the wicked are cruel Pro. 12.10 It was said of our K. Edward the fourth that he had made the white rose flourish as long as Henry the fourth the red if he had not made it change colour with too much blood Q. Tomiris having overcome Cyrus and taken him cut off his head and casting it into a boll of blood said Satia te sanguine Those who are the lovers of other mens miseries usually misery finds them out Instruments of cruelty are in their habitations Gen. 49.5 6 7. O my soul come not thou into their secret unto their assembly mine honour be not thou united for in their anger they slew a man and in their self-will they digged down a wall Cursed be their anger for iâ— was fierce and their wrath for it was cruel Revenge Some have been heard to say Proniâ—â—eres ad vindictam sumus quà m gratiam Bodin O how sweet is revenge What a pleasent draught is a draught of blood Spightful spirits hunger and thirst for the downfall and misery of those who stand in their way nor will any thing satisfie hatred but the ruine of those who are hated Yea some men though themselves be mortal yet their wrath may seem to be immortal As was Hanibals against the Romanes and our Edward the first against the Scots Dan. Hist fol. 201. Adjuring his Son and Nobles if he died not to bury his corps till they had absolutely subdued the countrey Bodinus relates a most tragical story An Italian was at deadly feud with one once his familiar friend Bodin lib. de Repub. cap. 6. pag. 951. and for ten years sought occasion to satisfy his wicked revenge but being frustrated of his hope pretended reconciliation and having one time an advantage sets on the man overcometh him and is going to kill him The miserable men desired him to spare his life The revengeful man said he would do it on condition he would renounce God and all the benefits of his soul Though this was hard to the poor man yet fear of death makes
up in victory We may easily perceive Mille modis laethi miseros mors una fatigat Et tum quo que cum crescimus vita decrescit Sencc how all this our Contexture is built of weak and decaying pieces Tully writeth of Hortensius that after his Consulship he decayed in his rare faculty of Eloquence though not so sensibly that every auditor might perceive it yet in such sort that a cunning Artist might observe that he drew not so clear a stroke in his pieces nor cast on them so rich and lively colours as before Mors hominis pecudum differt In pecudibus perit anima cum corpore redit in nihilum quod fuit ante nihil Non verò ita homines anima rationalis non perit cum corpore sed corpori tandem adjungetur anima unde domicilium templum aeternum Dei erit Death Serpent-like meddles with nothing but a godly mans dust When death takes hold of the Body as Potipher's wife did of Joseph's cloak the Soul leaves it as he did that and flies to God One reason of dying is God will have our Bodies to be new cast and come out beautiful and bright This corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortal must put on immortality Under the Law persons were unclean till the evening so are we till death because we shall never utterly lay by our body of corruption till we lay aside our earthly body Omega nostrorum mors est Owen Epigram Nec dignus est in morte accipere solatium qui se non câ—gitavit esse moriturum Cypr. mors alpha malorum is true of wicked men And sad it is for any to say at death Omnia fui nihil sum Yet as the Vipers flesh is made a preservative against her poyson so from the bitter cup of Death ariseth to a child of God health joy salvation Who is afraid to die said Bradford but such as hope not to live eternally Death once a curse is now turned into a blessing as Levi's curse of being scattered better fitted them to teach the Tribes in every City The godly Cautator Cygnus Funcris ipse sui at their death knowing that out of their labour they must receive a plentiful harvest they rejoyce to see the troops of Angels and are so much the more ravished with joy as they draw nearer to their death by which they are delivered from the prison of the flesh the floods of misery and the deceits of the Devil drawing nearer to the Crown of glory and fruition of eternal rest and felicity with the Saints of God Bolton said on his death-bed He hoped none of his Children durst meet him at the great Tribunal of Christ in an unregenerate estate Satan tempts forest at death The Coward when we are at weakest when entring into Heaven though he cannot hinder us yet he will be treading upon our heels and troubling us But be of good comfort Serpens nunquam nisi moriens in longum est Meeting two Boats on the water we think the other moves ours stands still Even so we are usually more mindful of the mortality of others than our own But there are two rules never to be forgotten That the Son of God died for thee And that thou thy self though thou livest long must die nay art shortly to die Nihil sic revocat hominem à peccato quà m frequens meditatio mortis Aug. If thou shouldest live in the utmost part of Ethiopia where men so long live as are called Macrobians yet die thou must nor canst thou know where when or how The death of the Son of God who did acquit thee from eternal death and thy own death being so certain must be as two spurs of love to drive thee through the short race of this momentany life unto the goal of eternal happiness Consider 1. The time we have to live is less than a Geometrical point 2. How wicked the Enemy is who promiseth us the Kingdom of this World that he might take from us a better 3. How false Pleasures are which only embrace us to strangle us 4. How deceitful Honors are which lift us up to cast us down It is the sublimity of wisdom to do those things living Hic est apex summae sapientiae ea viventem facere quae morienti essent appetenda which are to be desired and chosen by dying persons Let every man in the address to his actions consider whether he would not be infinitely troubled that death should surprise him in the present dispositions and then let him proceed accordingly Austin with his mother Monica was led one day by a Roman Practor to see the Tomb of Caesar Himself thus describes the Corps It looked of a blue mould the bone of the nose laid bare the flesh of the nether lip quite fallen off his mouth full of worms and in his eye-pits two hungry toads feasting upon the remanent porâ—ion of flesh and moisture and so he dwelt in his house of darkness This meditation might be a means to allay our sinful appetites make our spirits more sober and desires obedient But some are as unwilling to meditate of Death as a child to look into the dark If they make their Will they think they are nearer to it But let us acquaint our selves with Death as when a horse boggles we ride him up to the object Yea as Christ said when the Disciples were afraid let us handle it and see Omnem crede diem tibi diluxisse supremum And let us always be ready in what corner soever we are that when God calls we may with Abraham say Behold my Lord here I am Death like the stream of Jordan between us and our Canaan runs furiously but stands still when the Ark comes Blessed is the death of those that have part in the death of Christ Death every where expecteth us If thou therefore be wise Mors. ubique nos expectâ—â— tu fi saplens cris ubique illam expectabis Senec. Heb. 9.27 do thou expect Death every where To this end remember Austins admonition Be afraid to live in such an estate as thou art afraid to die in It is appointed unto men once to die Purgatory Lo say some quoting Heb. 9.8 Heaven was not opened in the time of the Law till the passion of our Saviour Christ therefore the Patriarchs and others that died then went not to Heaven but were in a place of Rest distinct from Heaven This is their Limbus Patrum which they have forged But quickly to stop their mouths It is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A gate in the Kings Pallace may be opened though not known The way to the Holiest of all that is to Heaven prefigured by their Sanctum Sanctorum was not yet manifested it was obscured under Types and Figures darkly revealed to them That one place of Scripture following puts out the very Fire of Purgatory For if
up to Jerusalem Here then in this part of the History we have set down unto us 1. The time of Pauls journey Then three years after 2. His journey I went up to Jerusalem 3. The end or purpose of his journey To see Peter 4. The time of his residence there fifteen dayes I abode with him fifteen dayes All these prove manifestly that the Gospel was not revealed unto him by flesh and blood whether those of his own Nation or the Apostles but onely by the revelation of Jesus Christ Then after three years that is when three years were expired after his inspiration Not seeing so much as an Apostle much lesse hearing in preaching the Gospel up and down Damascus and Arabia he went up to Jerusalem In Arabia If Arabia the happy made now more happy by the Gospel if Arabia the stony mollifying the stony hearts of the inhabitants if Arabia the desart Christ takes possession of it by Paul his messenger Three years did he continue preaching the Gospel in Arabia and Damascus ere he came to Jerusalem The Apostle we see yields an account of his time spending both of years and of days to teach all especially the Ministers of Gods Word to keep an account of their time This is the doctrine in general drawn from the example of the Apostle That we must have a care how we spend our time that it be not consumed in trivial affairs matters of no weight of no consequence but on high and profound matters such as well as belong to our everlasting salvation as those of our ordinary calling God hath appointed that every man should have a double calling one respecting God another man The first without the last cannot be the last without the first may be but miserable Our service unto God sanctifies the creatures service unto us And as we cannot be without the first except we turn Atheists so not without the last except we turn beasts A Christian of all other hath most to do he having so many improvements of reason so many reasons of faith which is above reason had he no other calling he of all other hath least reason to be idle And that for these reasons If he consider the preciousness of time Time is precious as every gist of God is Time is the most precious flower in the garden of this world Tempore saith Simonides fiunt sapientes Simonides in time men are made wise men and Thales makes time to be omnium Sipientissimum therefore precious time It learns it teaches it alters all things In the fulness of time was our Redemption wrought and in the end of time shall be accomplished Head and hands make a perfect natural man counsel and action a perfect civil man faith and good works a perfect spiritual man for all these things there must be a time Therefore precious time The book of nature doth furnish with a knowledge of the power and wisdom of a most powerful of a most wise God in time hence time makes a perfect humanist God gives us a head for contemplation hands for action and time for all things In this book of nature there are delivered unto us Principles of morality God gave us time enough to learn them but we through sin made it short and our selves forget him his and our selves and therefore he writ the moral law rather in tables of stone than in the table of our hearts as more faithful registers of his Law and withal to shew that our hearts are harder than stones Stones suffering ravings in time our hearts never therefore our hearts being so hard God must raise himself children out of stones Hence comes counsel and action and an understanding heart all in good time There is a book called the book of God out of which Ministers are to preach the Word and to be instant in season and out of season To preach with Paul to pray daily with Cornelius Centurion of the Italian band to conferre like Philip with the Eunuch Treasurer to Candaoâ— the Ethiopian Queen and to be always in action The calling teacheth them to be still calling of men to repent and beleeve The Prophets are called Seers and Watchmen of Israel to shew that Ministers should have their spiritual eyes alwayes open ever in the act of seeing Neither is this book made for Ministers only but for all with David to meditate upon day and night God gives time for this also Another reason is if we consider our brittle estate the shortness of our life-time Here we are clad with clods of dirt our mud-wals begin to moulder in our conception Our whole life is but an active death Earth we were earth we are and to earth we shall must returne God not we can tell how soon Job 14. Martis habet vices quae trahitur vita gemitibus Gen. 47. Man that is borne of a woman hath but a short time to live yet uncertain our life is but little enough Jacob was an hundred and thirty years old when his son Joseph set him before King Pharaoh yet like a good old man did he say few and evill have the dayes of the years of my pilgrimage been We are but poor pilgrims in this world Pilgrims remain not long in one place no more do we no more can we in this world Our life is but a vapour Jam. 4.14 so is death soon come soon gone How like then unto death is our life and a vapour is the Hierogliphique of both This should animate us and set us forward to lay hold on eternal life Josh 10. in time while time is Time will stay for no man Joshuah could command the sun and moon Sun stand thou still upon Gibeon and thou I soon in the valley of Ajalon but he could not command time to make a stand Hesekia by his prayer unto God 2 King 20. made the sun run back ten degrees in the firmament but time runn'd on forward We have as much to do as we can do while we live Another reason is if we consider what advantage the grand enemy of our salvation Satan gets by our idlenesse Then is his only time to clap wicked suggestions into our hearts When we are most idle than the devil is as busie as a butler about us then doth he make an assault with his wicked spirits hell's black guards to tempt us to under go this or that devilish complot When our minds are wandring in the ayre we know not where nor what about the devil enters in True it is there is a time for all things but no time to be idle A time to be born Eccles 3. a time to dy a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted a time to kill and a time to heale a time to break down and a time to build up a time to weep and a time to laugh a time to mourn and a time to dance a time to cast away stones and a time to
bound giving life to others losing his own being crucified slew Satan on the Cross and through death destroyed the Devil the Authour of destruction There is but one only Saviour because the Gospel proclaims it One only way to salvation whereby Abraham became righteous and the Patriarchs Apostles and Prophets entred Heaven One Lord one Faith one Baptism In him alone was fulfilled all that was spoken of the Messiah He only satisfied Gods Justice by a punishment which could be infinite for so is God or equal to infinite for so was Christ though for time finite yet for value infinite which no other Creature ought not could ought not if it be not the soul that sinned could not because Gods wrath is unquenchable Angels could not do it they are incarnate and finite our selves could not we are carnal sold under sin He alone was God and Man 1. Man that sin might be punished in the nature offending yet man without sin to fulfill all righteousness 2. God 1. To bear the burden of Gods wrath 2. To vanquish sin death hell and Satan 3. To restore life and righteousness to Man He must be Man for Mans Redemption but not sinful Man for Mans salvation He alone could perform the Office of a Saviour internally and externally 1. Internally illuminating our minds with faith hope and charity 2. Externally in Doctrine and Works He alone took away the sins of the World His blood alone was paid to God the Father as the price of our Redemption God only was our Creditor ours the debt and Jesus the Pay-master who gave himself for us to God and blotted out the hand-writing that was against us The Devils ordinary way of driving to despair is by shewing a man his sin but not his Saviour Joseph of Arimathea first begged the body of Jesus and then laid it in a new Sepulchre so should we and then lay him in a new heart If a man will have his Beloved he must part with his Beloved if he will have his beloved Saviour he must part with his beloved sin Dulce nomen Jesus In Cant. Serm. 15. sayes Bernard Mel in ore melos in aure jubilus in corde Honey in the mouth melody in the ear joy and exultation in the heart Melius mihi non esse Medit. Cap. 39. sayes Austin quà m sine Jesu esse melius est non vivere quà m vivere sine vitâ I had rather be in Hell with Jesus than in Heaven without Jesus if it were possible Joshua which was a Type of Christ hath the same name with our Saviour Christ yet in a diverse manner Joshua was a Saviour for them in temporal things Christ in spiritual and eternal things He saved them from the Canaanites earthly enemies Christ from sin death hell and Satan spiritual enemies He gave them a Land flowing with milk and honey in this World Christ gives us an everlasting habitation a celestial Paradise in the World to come She shall bring forth a Son Matth. 1.21 and thou shalt call his name Jesus for he shall save his people from their sins 1 Thes 1.10 Jesus which delivered us from the wrath to come Neither is there salvation in any other Acts 4.12 for there is none other name under Heaven given among men whereby we must be saved Let it be here noted that the very name Jesuite savoureth of blasphemous arrogancy One of their own gives the reason because our Saviour hath communicated unto us the thing signified by the name Christ but not by the name Jesus But we see also their nature in their 1. Craft and 2. Cruelty The Jesuites have a device at this day in handling Texts of Scripture by their nice distinctions to perplex and obscure the clearest places and for those that are doubtful not at all to distinguish or illustrate them Again in points of controversie they make a great puther about that which we deny not but say little or nothing to the main business Besides how have they formerly for a long time shut or rolled up the Book of the holy Scriptures yea and cast them under foot using in the mean time the Fathers Scholasticks In primâ regulâ tradunt Papae Romani vocem no◠aliter ac Christi Sermonem audiendam esse Sententiaries Canonists Legends c. And since this Book of God began again to be opened how have they laboured to roll it up again questioning the Authority thereof not accounting the same to be Divine but as it is confirmed by the judgment of the Church that is of the pope For thus they expresly write That in it there is so much of the Deity as the Popes Church attributes unto it neither ought God to be believed but because of the Church A Jesuite hath peace in his mouth war in his heart He courteth with the smooth tongue of an Harlot when either he hath poyson in his cup or Powder-plots in his head They say their weapons are prayers and tears but see the contrary The truth is they are the Popes Blood-hounds Simulata sanctitas duplex iniquitas trusting more to the prey than to their prayers They strive under pretence of long prayers and dissembled sanctity which is double iniquity to subdue all to the Pope and the Pope to themselves These shall receive the greater damnation Matth. 23.14 The name Christ signifieth Anointed the oyle wherewith he was anointed is called the oyle of gladness Kimchi Quia totus mundus in unctione Christi ejus missione laetabitur because the whole World should be cheared up by the Unction and Mission of Messiah He received the Spirit without measure that of his fulness we might all receive and grace for grace righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost That none of any Degree Calling Condition or Countrey are excluded from partaking of Christ it is well taken notice of that the place of Christs Birth was Domus publici juris not a private House but an Inne which is open for all Passengers and that not in a Chamber but the Stable which is the commonest place of the Inne Besides the Superscription upon his Cross was written in Hebrew Greek Cyril Theoph. and Latine the three languages that were best known and most used all the World over Moreover the Cross it self was erected not within the City but without the Gate to intimate saith Leo Vt Crux Christi non Templi effet Ara Leo. sed Mundi That it was not an Altar of the Temple but the World However this we are sure is Gods Truth That there is neither Jew nor Greek there is neither bond nor free there is neither male nor female but all are one in Christ Jesus Gal. 3.28 Christ is the Way the Truth and the Life 1. Via in Exemplo Bern. 2. Veritas in Promisso 3. Vita in Praemio Jesus Christ the same yesterday and to day and for ever Hebr. 13.8 Christ is idem
under correction Alexander forgave many sharp swords but never any sharp tongues Moreover God hath bedged in this unruly evil with a double hedge of lips and teeth And it is placed on purpose in the midst betwixt the brain and the heart that it might take the advice of both It is also tied fast by the root There is much need you see of reforming and polishing this member Death and life saith Solomon are in the power of the tongue Upon the right or ill using of it a mans safety doth depend And lest you should think the Scripture only intendeth temporal safety or ruine Our Saviour saith By thy words thou shalt be justified and by thy words condemned One of the prime things that shalt be brought forth to judgment are your words Again He that keepeth his mouth keepeth his life but he that openeth wide his lips shall have destruction The wise man intimateth a similitude of a City besieged to open the gates betrayeth the safety of it all watch and ward is about the gate So the tongue is the gate or door of the Soul by which it goeth out in converse and communication to keep it open and loose guarded letteth in an enemy which proveth the death of the Soul Face The Face is the table of beauty or comelinesse and when that is abused it is made the seat of shame hence spitting in the face is such an act of reproach And cocovering the face as in Haman the mark of a condemned man It is reported of Malcotius as also of Augustus that the majesty of his countenance Turk Hist fol. 415. with the resplendant beams issuing out of his eyes as it bad been the rayes of the Sun were of such piercing brightnesse that no man was able with immoved and fixed eye long to behold the same Likewise in the description of Tamerlane amongst the rest Fol. 235. in his eyes sate such a rare majesty as a man could hardly endure to behold them without closing of his own And many in talking with him and often beholding of him became dumb which caused him oftentimes with a comely modesty to abstain from looking too earnestly upon such as spake unto him or discoursed with him En quam difficile est animum non prodere vultu The face varieth as the mind varieth Index animi valâ—us That is seen in the face which is out of sight Four things are chiefly seen in the face 1. Pride Psal 10.4 2. Fear Dan. 5.6 3. Envie and Discontent Gen. 31.2 5. 4. Guilt and shame Gen. 4.7 Thus the evidences of the heart are read there and we may take the copy of a mans spirit in his countenance Dugge God hath placed the womans Dugge saith Weemse in her breast Duplex est causa Physica moralis and not in her belly as in beasts and that for two causes 1. Physical 2. Moral The Physical cause God hath placed them so near the liver that the milk might be the better concocted and the more wholesome for the child The Moral cause that the woman might impart her affection and love more to her child by giving it suck with hen dugge which is so near the heart Hence the giving of suck was one of the greatest obligations of old betwixt the mother and the children Hand Amongst the several outward members of the body the Hand is of great use Fox 1. By the Hand we promise and threaten Hence the right hand of fellowship Turk Hist fol. 1392. â—he left hand is the most honourable amongst the Turks 2. We reckon by it the Ancients reckoned upon their left hand untill they came to an hundred years Prev 3.16 and then they began to reckon upon their right hand Hence Solomon Wisdom cometh with length of dayes upon the right hand meaning that Wisdom should make a man to live a long age 3. We worship with the hand Idolaters used to kisse their Idols but because they could not reach to the Moon to Kisse her they kissed their hand in homage before her To this practice Job seems to bear reference when he saith My mouth hath not kissed my hand Cap. 31.27 The Ancients do understand all that which is from the shoulder to the fingers ends to be the hands subdivided into three parts bracbiums cubitum extremam manum purging himself of this kind of Idolatry as some conceive In a word it is the Organ of Action and the special Providence of God is to be marked that he hath made man to take his meat with his hand and hath not left him to gather it up with his lips as the Beasts do for if a man did so his lips would become so thick that he could not speak distinctly as we see by experience by those that have so Heart The Jewes compare the heart of Man for the excellency of it to three things 1. To the Holiest of all where the Lord gave his answers so the Lord gives his answers first out of the heart 2. To Solomons Throne as the stateliest place where the King sits so the Lord dwells in the heart of man as in his Throne 3. To Moses Tables in which he wrote the Law so God promiseth to write his Law in mans heart Three things God holdeth in his own hand 1. Revenge 2. Future Events 3. Searching of mens hearts Principale animae non secundùm Platonem in cerebro sed juxta Christum in corde 'T is not the eye that seeth but the heart not the ear that heareth but the heart not the tongue that speaketh but the heart Yea there is in the heart both 1. Talking Psal 14.1 and 2. Walking Ezek. 11.21 In Gods account Quicquid con non facit non fit The heart is the first mover of all the actions of man for as the first mover carrieth all the spheres of Heaven with it so doth the heart of man carry all the members of the body with it In natural Generation the heart is first framed and in supernatural Regeneration it is first reformed The heart is primum vivens ultimum moriens So the spiritual life of grace begins in the heart first and is last felt there Hence it is that Michael the Archangel and the Devil strove no faster about the body of Moses than they do about the heart of man Liver Next to the heart in man is the Liver and from hence it hath in latine the name jecur quasi juxta cor as it were placed near unto the heart This is the shop of sanguification or fountain of blood from whence by the channels of the * Especially vens sorta and vena cava veins it is carried over the several Provinces of mans body God hath fenced the noblest parts as the brain with Pia mater and Duramater the heart with Pericardia so the liver is enclosed by a Net called Roticulum Lungs The Lungs are the bellows of the voyce and are seated near the heart to
threatening this sendeth forth a warm gale a South-wind of Promise The office of the Law is to accuse and terrifie of the Gospel to heal and comfort Finally the Law is a killing Letter but the Gospel a quickning Spirit Great and many are the blessings brought upon the world even upon the heads of those who unfainedly believe the Gospel Viz. 1. Reconciliation with God not only of God unto us but of us unto God which is the staying or taking away that enmity against God and those hard thoughts of him which lay burning and working in our inward parts together with kindling of a spirit of love towards him and the raising of an honourable opinion in us of him in the stead thereof 2 Cor. 5.18 19. Rom. 5.10 Col. 1.21 2. Justification or righteous-making in the sight of God setting us free from all guilt demerit and imputation of sin whatsoever Act. 13.38 39. Rom. 3.21 22. 5.9 3. Adoption or relation of Son-ship John 1.12 13. Rom. 8.14 15. Gal. 3.26 4.6 7 c. 4. Mortification of the body of sin and death which is in us The Gospel ministers wisdom and strength to do it Rom. 6.3 4 5. Col. 3.3 5. 1 Pet. 4.1 5. Our vivification to a more excellent life an inspiration of a new principle of vital motions and actions far more honourable and august than our former Rom. 6.4 Jam 1.18 Eph. 2. 6. Peace with God that of Conscience also Rom. 5.1 Act. 10.36 Rom. 10.15 Eph. 3.17 7. Redemption and deliverance from the wrath and vengeance to come 1 Cor. 1.30 Eph. 1.7 Col. 1.14 1 Thes 1.10 8. The Gospel lifts not up the world with the hope and expectation of a Redemption or deliverance from the wrath which is to come but of an investiture and possession also of the glory which is to come Yea it carries on them who believe so far in the ways of righteousness and peace until they be ready to enter into the city of the great King Col. 1.12 Act. 20.32 Hence the Gospel must needs be a doctrine of â—oy Many of the Jews whom the thunders of Sinai the terrours of the Law moved not John Baptist wins with the Songs of Sion To which put pose S. Cyril mystically interpreting those words of the Prophet Micah 4.4 That every man should sit under his vine and under his fig-tree observeth that Wine is an emblem of joy the Fig-tree of sweetness and by both is shadowed that joy which the Evangelical doctrine should produce in those who sit under the preaching of it Indeed those doctrines which reveal God and Christ can only give solid comfort unto the soul and these doctrines are no where made known but in holy Writ and they are most clearly delivered in the Gospel The Gospel holds forth the New Covenant that constellation of Promises so called not simply but in respect of the discovery of it as we call some places the New world Unto this Covenant the Sacraments are the Broad-seal and the Spirit is the Privy-seal This Covenant was a great chearer to Davids heart 2 Sam. 23.5 He hath made with me an everlasting covenant ordered in all things and sure Which is all my salvation and all my desire Also Christs Testament and last Will And this is the comfort of Gods elect that Heaven is conveyed unto them by legacy All that God requires of us is to take hold of his Covenant and to receive his gift of righteousness And this also he hath promised to cause us to do writing his law in our hearts c. And truly the Gospel is chiefly promissory yea it is a Promise and that such as hath many Promises in the womb of it and those as the Apostle Peter calls them 2 Pet. 1.4 exceeding great and precious not of temporals but spirituals nay eternals Fellowship with God remission adoption eternal life what not are the choise and precious benefits which the Gospel revealeth and offereth to us So that it is a treasury of divine riches a storehouse of the souls provision a Cabinet of heavenly pearls all things truly good and justly desireable being contained in and conveyed to us by it Besides the preaching of the Gospel is the bell whereby we are called to eternal glory As by the sound of a trumpet the people were called together in the time of the Law so this is the Silver-trumpet sounding in our ears whereby we are called to the Kingdom of Heaven The common opinion is and the most antient Copies say as much that Matthew wrote his Gospel eight years after Christ Mark ten Luke fifteen and John forty two Plato when ready to die blessed God for three things 1. That he made him a Man 2. That he was born in Greece 3. That he lived in the time of Socrates David Chytraus also blessed God for three things 1. That he had made him a Man and not a Beast 2. That he had made him a Christian and not a Pagan 3. That he had his education under those excellent Lights Luther and Melancthon Austin wished but to have seen three fights 1. Romam in flore Rome in the flourish 2. Paulum in ore Paul in the Pulpit 3. Christum in corpore Christ in the flesh But greater is our happiness in enjoying the Gospel Vers 17. Mat. 13.16 Blessed are your eyes for they see and your ears for they hear For verily I say unto you that many Prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things whiâ—h ye see and have not seen them and to hear those things which ye hear and have not heard them We have the Turtles voice the joyful sound the lively Oracles The Sea ab out the Altar was brazen and what eyes could pierce thorow that Now our Sea about the Throne is glassie like to Chrystal cleerly conveying the light and sight of God to our eyes All Gods Ordinances are now so cleer that we may see Christs face in them and be transformed into the image and similitude of Christ Behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the Gospel of peace Luk. 2.10 Rom. 10.15 and bring glad tidings of good things Repeâ—t ye Mark 1.15 and believe the Gospel Christs Humiliation Incarnation The Scripture tells us how that man comes four ways into the world Aug. Serm. 20. de Temp. 1. By the help of man and woman so all are usually born 2. Without any man or woman and so the first man was created 3. Of a man without a woman and so was Eve made 4. Of a woman without a man and so was Christ born So that Christ birth differs from the birth of others He that was more excellent than Angels became less than Angels Vt nos aquaret Angelis minoratus est ab Angelis He that laid the foundation of the earth and made the world was himself now made Factor terra factus
in terrâ Creator coeli creatus sub coelo being the Child of Mary sine quo pater nunquam fuit sine quo mater nunquam fuisset So that as David sang This is the day which the Lord hath made we may say This is the day wherein the Lord was made we will rejoyce and be glad in it This was that Holy that Stone cut out of the mountain without hands that Flower of the field growing without mans labour When the fulness of the time was come God sent forth his Son made of a woman Gal. 4 4. Joh. 1.14 1 Tim. 3.16 And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us God was manifesi in the flesh Passion It was a great kindness which Abraham shewed unto Lot when he hazarded his own life and the lives of his family to recover him out of the hands of Chedarlaomer But not comparable to that kindness which our Kinsman the Lord Jesus shewed us when he gave his life to deliver us from the hand of our enemies Mortuum Caesarem quis metuat Sed morte Christi quid efficacius If Caesar he once dead who will â—ear Christ even when dead is terrible to his enemies Nothing more effectual than his death By suffering death he destroyed him who had the power of death When he was condemned of man he condemned sin that it should not condemn man Passus est ut infirmus operatus ut fortis Aug. He suffered as a weak man but wrought as a strong one As the Serpent without life erected in the wilderness overcame the living serpents that stung Israel So the Lord Jesus by suffering death slew that Serpent that living in us had stung us to death Sanguis ejus effunditur Patre ordinante filio volente Spiritu sancto dante Gorran Judâ tradente Judaea procurante Pilato judicante Gentili exequente The High Priest under the Law as he was a type of Christ in sundry respects so likewise in his death He who killed a man negligently fled to the City of refuge and stayed there until the death of the High Priest and then he was free Jesus Christ by his death frees us and sets us at liberty One saith Christ continued in his torment twenty hours at the least Others say Sedul Homâ— â— that he was so long on the Cross as Adam was in Paradise in pleasure Origen de morte magni Regis The Theeves fared better on their Crosses than Christ on his for they had no â—rrision no superscription no taunts no insultations they had nothing but pain to encounter but death to grapple with but he death and scorn Pro servis dominus moritur pro sontibus insons Pro aegroto medicus pro grege pastor obit Pro populo rex mactatur pro milite ductor Pro opere ipse opifex pro homine ipse Deus As Eve came out of Adams side sleeping so the Church is taken out of Christs side bleeding Vt effundatur sanguis Christi ne confundatur anima Christiani A flux of blood in the head is stanched by opening a vein in the foot But here to save all his members from bleeding to death blood must be drawn from the head Which of Christs senses was not a window to let in sorrow He sees the tears of his Mother hears the blasphemy of the multitude is put to death in a noisom place to his scent his touch felt the nails and his taste the gall a reed for reproach is put into his hand a diadem in scorn is set upon his head his head harrowed with thorns his face of whom it was said Thou art fairer than the children of men is all besmeared with the filthy spettle of the Jews those eyes clearer than the sun are darkned with the shadow of death those lips which spake as never man spake are now drenched in gall and vinegar Nam cum mortis aculcum non possit accipere natura deitatis noscendo tamen sâ—scepit de nobis quod pati posset pro nobis Leo. Serm. 8. de Pas Hoc primum tormentum magnum mysterium quod passibilis factus est Hillar de Trin. l. 10. Christi humilitas est nostra sublimitas Christi crux nostra victoria Christi patibulum noster triumphus Orig. Hom 8. L. 9. and those feet that trampled on the Powers of darkness are now nailed to the footstool of the Cross Though Christ were both God and Man yet he suffered not in his Divine but in his Humane nature which may be thus illustrated 1. A Man we know consisteth both of soul and body and yet when he is dead we do not understand it of his soul for that cannot die but his body only 2. Thus The Sun shines on a Tree the Carpenter cuts down the Tree but wounds not the Sun 3. Or as the two Goats mentioned Levit. 16. the one is slain but the other escapes so of Christ in his two natures God the Creator suffers in the flesh that the flesh of the creature should not suffer for ever God himself reconciled the world unto himself God himself became Mediator God himself redeemed Mankind with his own blood He who was offered assumes the flesh of the creature and becomes Reconciliator We may say of Christs bloody sweat what the Poet Lucan having his veins cut dying said Sanguis erant lachrymae quaecunque foramina novit Humor ab his largus manat cruor ora redundunt Et patulae nares sudor rubet omnia plenis Membra fluunt venis totum est pro vulnere corpus Englished by D.T. His blood were tears and what pores sweat did know Blood in great plenty did spring forth and flow Through 's mouth and nose his sweat was red each lim Swet with full veins all 's but one wound in him Read Isa 53. all along His own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree 1 Pet. 2.14 that we being dead to sin should live unto righteousness by whose stripes ye were healed Is it nothing to you 1. am 1.12 all ye that pass by Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow which is done unto me wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger Descensio Christi ad Inferos Sepultura Christi est requies Christiani Ambros Buried our Saviour was 1. That none might doubt of his death 2. That our sins might be buried with him 3. That our graves might be prepared and perfumed for us as so many beds of roses or delicious dormitories Isa 57.2 If Christ did descend personally into Hell he must either descend in body or in soul Now his body could not go into hell for that was laid in the grave that very night by Joseph of Arimathea And for his soul that could not be in hell for Christ said to the Thief upon the Cross This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise And how could that be if his soul did then go
eo complacentiam ad redimendum reconciliandum genus humanum As the salt waters of the Sea when they are straitned thorow the earth they are sweet in the rivers so saith one the waters of Majesty and justice in God though terrible yet being strained and derived through Christ they are sweet and delightful In many things we offend all who then can be saved Our sins for number exceed the sands of the sea and the least sin is sufficient to throw us into hell without Christ But by Christ we are reconciled to the father and have peace with him Hence we may have a blessed calme lodged in our consciences as when Jonah was cast over board there followed a tranquility Let the meditation of this Eph. 4.32 cause a reconciliation amongst Christians forgiving one another even as God for Christs sake forgave you Consider 1. God himself offers reconciliation to us Jer. 3.1 and shall we be so hard-hearted as not to be reconciled one to another Let us be merciful as our heavenly Father is merciful 2. All we do is abominable in the sight of God without it Mat. 5.23 24. If thou bring thy gift to the Altar and there remembrest that thy brother hath ought against thee go thy way first be reconciled to thy brother Thou shouldst have done it before yet better late than never First seek the Kingdome of God God should be first served yet he will have his own service to stay till thou beest reconciled to thy brother If I speake with the tongues of men and Augels if I come to Church and heare never so many sermons talk never so gloriously of Religion c. and dwel in hatred be not reconciled I am but a tinkling cymbal 1 Cor. 13.1 3. We can have no assurance of our reconciliation to God without it Mat. 18.35 As the King dealt with his servant so God will cast such into the Prison of hell for ever This should make us all to quake 4 We have no certainty of our lives This night may our souls be taken from us Jovinian the Emperour supped plentifully went to bed merrily yet was taken up dead in the morning And if death take us before we take one another by the hand as a token of hearty reconciliation what shall become of us We should not suffer the sun to go down upon our wrath Johannes Eleemosynarius Arch-Bishop of Alexandria Eph. 4.26 Soc est in occasu vir maximè honorande being angry in the day with Nicetus a Senator towards night sends this message to him My honourable brother the Sun is in setting let there be a setting of our anger too If we do it not within the compass of a day yet let us do it within the compass of our lives Aculeus apis not Ataleus serpentis Let not our anger be like the fire of the Temple that went not out day nor night Let us not say with Jonah I do well to be angry even unto death Cap. 3.9 Let our anger be the sting of a Bee that is soon gone not the sting of a Serpent that tarries long and it may be proves lethall Christ is a merciful and faithful High-Priest Hebr. 2.17 in things pertaining to God to make reconciliation for the sins of the people He hath made peace through the blood of his Cross Colos 1.20 God hath reconciled us to himself by Jefus Christ 2 Cor. 5.18 19 20. and hath given to us the ministery of reconciliation viz. that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation We pray you in Christs stead be ye reconciled to God If when we were enemies Rom. 5.10 we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son much more being reconciled we shall be saved by his life Glorie to God in the Highest Luke 2.14 and on earth peace good will towards men General Calling It is the estate and condition of Christianity For herein we are called to the service of God in all parts of holiness with promise of eternal reward through the merits of Christ So it is termed because the means by which God worketh upon us ordinarily is his Word or the voice of his servants calling upon us for amendment And because through the mighty working of the Spirit of Christ the voice of Gods servants speaking out of the Word is directed unto us in particular with such power and life and our dead hearts are so revived that the doctrine is as if God did speak to us in particular we receiving the word of the Minister as the very voice or word of Christ Thus the dead hear the voice of the Son of God and live As also because God would hereby note unto us the easiness of the work he can do it with a word As he made the world and calleth up the generations of men as the Prophet sheaketh so can he in an instant with a word convert a sinner He said Let there be light and there was light So if he say Let there be 〈◊〉 grace there is presently true grace There is a twofold calling 1. External that general invitation which by the preaching of the Gospel is made unto men to invite them to come in unto Jesus Christ most in the world are thus called both good and bad 2. Internal when the Spirit of God accompanies the outward administration of the Word to call a man from ignorance to knowledge and from a state of nature to a state of grace So that the first is alone by the outward sound of the Word But the other not by the trumpet of the Word alone ringing in the ear but by the voice of the Spirit also perswading the heart and moving us to go to Christ Of this calling spake our Saviour Christ No man cometh to me Inanis est sermâ— docentis nisi intus sit qui docet except the Father draw him namely by his Spirit as well as by his Word Judas was called He was not a Professor alone but a Preacher of the Gospel Simon Magus was called he believed and was baptized Herod wâ—s called He heard John Baptist sweetly and did many things that he willed him Sundry at this day come to Church hear Sermons talk of Religion that do not answer Gods call Therefore let us intreat the Lord to call us effectually by his blessed Spirit out of our sins to holiness and newness of life If we be thus called we shall receive the eternal inheritance which Christ hath purchased for us Let us be suiters to God that he would make us partakers of this calling that makes an alteration of us 1 Cor. 6.9 11. If we were Idolaters as Manasseh to call us out of our superstition and idolatry If persecutors as Paul to call us out of our persecuting If we are Adulterers as David to call us out of our uncleanness If Drunkards out of our dâ—unkenness If
Quia exercitiis stultitiae delectatur Pro. 10.23 5. Quia stultitiam suam spargere aliis communicare amat Pro. 12.23.13.16 6. Quia contemnit opponit sese mediis instructionis Pro. 15.5 7. Mediis illis quae maximè faciunt ad sapientiam abutitur Pro. 26.9 8. Omnes suas facultates applicat ad nequitiam exercendam manifestandam Pro. 6.12.13.14 Thus Sin and Folly are more than like one another for they are the same He is a fool who hath not wisdom to direct himself but he is the fool who will not follow the counsel and direction of the wise He is a fool that hath no knowledge and he is a fool who makes no use of the knowledge which he hath A fool is not able to judge of the nature of things and therefore he is angry with every thing that hits not his nature or his humour Hence Solomon Eccl. 7.9 Be not hasty in thy Spirit to be angry for anger resteth in the bosom of fools They that are emptiest of understanding are fullest of will and usually so full that we call them wilful And surely those men are more foolish than others inasmuch as they think themselves wiser than all Stustorum plena sunt omnia Wisdom like the Rayl flyes alone but foolishness Partridge-like by covies Mr. Adams There is the 1. Sad fool 2. Glad fool 3. Haughty fool 4. Naughty fool The sad fool that 's the envious man an enemy to all Gods favours if they fall from him he dies languishing The glad foll or rather mad fooll the dissolute man ready with a jest to put goodnesse out of fashion he dies laughing The haughty fool the ambitious man ever climbing towers though he never looks how to get down he forsakes peace at home to seek war abroad The naughty fool the coveteous man the very fool of all losing his friend time body soul and yet having no pleasure for it Jer. 17.11 He wasts him self to preserve his meanes Christ calls him fool which might best do it Luk. 12.20 As for the Atheistical fool he is that meer animal that hath no more than a reasonable soul and for little other purpose than as salt to keep his body from putrefying When an heire is impleaded for an Ideot the Judge commands an apple or a counter with a peece of gold to be set before him to try which he will take if he takes the apple or the counter and leaves the gold he is then cast for a fool and unable to mannage his estate for he knows not the value of things or how to make a true election Wicked men are thus foolish and more for when which is infinitely more sottish Heaven and hell life and death are set before them they chuse hell rather than heaven and death rather than life They take the mean transitory trifling things of the world before the favour of God Pardon of sin a part in Jesus Christ and an inheritance among the Saints in light Fools make a mock at sin Prov. 14.9 Shame shall be the promotion of fools Cap. 3.35 Sèe then that ye walk circumspectly not as fools but as wìse Eph. 5.15 Sincerity It is the bottome grace especially commending us to God It is conceived not to be so properly a distinct grace as the perfection of every grace It s the filling up of all our duties without this they are as empty sounds A sincere man is like a Chrystal-Glass with a light in the midst which appeareth through every part thereof so as that truth within breaketh out in every parcel of his life There is in his obedience to God 1. An universality 2. Uniformity 3 Ubiquity He hath respect unto all Gods Commandments so far as he knows them without prejudice or partiality and is the same at home as abroad in the closet as in the Congregation His faith is unfained his love cordial his wisdom undissembled his repentance a renting of the heart he truly aims at pleasing God and not at by-respects Christ is said to be girt about the paps with a golden girdle Rev. 1.13 So the Angels are brought in girded there Cap. 15.6 to signifie the best estate of their Pastours coming nearest then in sincerity to Christ In the first age of the Church they wore their girdle about their middle but the more spiritual they became their girdle went the more upward To this the Apostle may seem to allude Eph. 6.14 And truely here as one saith well if ever unbelt unblest he is a loose man that wants this girdle of sincerity There is a devilish proverb passeth amongst men That plain dealing is a Jewel but he that useth it shall die a beggar But the contrary may be asserted that it is both a means formally enabling to outward happinesse and also a special qualification that hath in a peculiar manner the promises annexed to it Pro. 14.11 Cap. 11.3.2 Chro. 16.9 And whereas it may be said that it often falls out that uprightness is oppressed This is easily answered if we consider 1. That many of the outward calamities that befal godly persons are not simply evils as the world judgeth but rather markes of special honour God puts upon them Jobs body was full of ulcers but his heart was pure and those tribulations he grapled with were onely probatory to trie his strength to draw out his graces and increase his glory 2. We must not limit God to every moment of time when he will honour and cleer his people The world at first was a confused Chaos but at the end of six dayes it was a curious work So God hath his time and we should not desire God should break off his work before he hath made an end of it Jam. 5.11 And David calls upon us to mark the upright man Psal 33.37 The beginning may be trouble but the end is peace Qualis Majorisreatus minoris infamia es tali◠appare For secret sins 1. They are as visible to God as the most open 2. As damnable to the soul 3. And what they want in number they have in nature and frequently in delight Encouragements to sincerity 1. It s the onely perfection we attain here Deut. 30.6 2. It makes us acceptable to God Eph. 6. ult 3. Where it is God passeth by many infirmities 2 Chro. 30.19 4. It is the best policy Psal 101.1 Pro. 11.3 5. It brings wonderful comfort and support under all afflictions and temptations 2 King 20.3 2 Cor. 1.12 That sincerity is most opposed by Satan is plain Job 2.3 As if the Holy Ghost would intimate this unto us that Satan pulled more at that than at his estate Satan did not care at all to pull Jobs Oxen c. from him but to pull his grace and sincerity from him As this gotten and improved is the joy of Angels so could it be stoln away or destroyed it would be the joy of Devils Sinceritas quasi sine carâ pure honey without the wax
shall never end but in a full enjoyment of him in heaven But the latter is accompanied with the neglect of good meanes and with a presumption of a good end Security is a life led sine curâ it abandoneth the fear of God chaseth a way faith ripeneth sin and hasteneth judgements For it willingly sleepeth in sin as unwilling to be awakened blesseth it self in iniquity and therefore the curse must needs be neer For a man to become so secure as not to have any feeling of the danger wherewith he is inclosed such a one seemeth to be strangely metamorphosed into a man of iron When Callipolis was taken by the Turks Turk Hist fol. 186. and the newes thereof brought to Constantinople such was the madnesse of the Greeks that they made small account thereof and to extenuate the matter when they had any talk thereof in jesting-wise commonly they said That the Turks had but taken from them a pottle of wine But for that it proved a right great losse and much concerned the State as the issue made to appear For the manner of the taking of Babylon Heredotus reports that upon one of their great Holy-dayes when all the City were in their dancing and disports Ex inopinato eis Persae astiterunt Chron. 35. on a sudden the Persians came upon them they came into the City and took a part of it when the other part sung out their song and danced on and knew not that the enemy had surprized them To shake us out of security consider 1. Our whole life is a Temptation 2. A godly man is never without a treasure and a thief to steale it 3. No place admitteth security 4. The further sin goeth the more deadly it is 5. No wise man contenteth himself with present â—ase nor liveth by things present but providently forecasteth for after times A man is never lesse safe Bern. si vis securus esse time securitatem fortuna quem nimiùm fovet stultum fâ—cit than when he seemes furthest from danger fear of security being the guard of safety great fortunes being the recks of ruine If thou wouldest be secure then fear security for whomsoever fortune too much cherisheth she makes a fool Which the wisest King expresseth thus Pro. 10.2 Treasures of wickedness profit nothing Herein not much unlike to Merchants who having had good successe at Sea adventure for more and so lose all So that it is too true that as much light hurts the eyes so too much felicity clouds the understanding making the conceit of a safety the cause of sorrow Hence is that golden rule of Solomon Pro. 28.14 Beatus est home qui semper est pavidus In the dayes of Noe Mat. 24.38.39 that were before the flood they were eating and drinking marrying and giving in marriage untill the day that Noe entred into the Ark and know not untill the flood came and took them all away When they shall say peace and safety 1 Thes 5.3 then sudden destruction commeth upon them as travaâ—l upon a woman with child and they shall not escape Fortitude He that will not strive against the wind will not reach the Port it becomes men as well to oppose misfortunes as children to cry over them A valiant man undertakes without rashness and performs without fear he seeks not for dangers but when they find him he beares them with courage and success he hath oftimes looked death in the face and passed by with a smile and when he sees he must yield he both welcomes and contemns it he forecasts the worst of all events and encounters them before they come in a secret and mental warre he is the master of himself and subdues his passions to reason and by this inward victory works his own peace he is afraid of nothing but the displeasure of the highest and runs away from nothing but sin he looks not how strong he is but how innocens his sword is to him the last of his trials and he draws still as defendant not as challenger where no man better manageth it with more safety with more favour be had rather have his blood seen than his back and disdains life upon base conditions he had rather smother an in jury than revenge himself of the impotent and it is a question whether he more detests cowardliness or cruelty he talks little and brags lesse he lyes ever armed with wise resolution he is neither prodigal of blood to mis-spend it idely Posse et nolle nobile nor niggardly to grudge it when either God calls for it or his countrey his power is limited by his will and he holds it the noblestrevenge that he might hurt and doth not he is so ballasted with wisdome that he floats safely in the midst of all tempests When Modestus the Praefect would have wonne Basil to that heresy first he gave him fair speeches Alas Sir saith he this language is fit to catch little children Know you not saith the Praefect who we are that command it No body saith â—asil whilest you command such things Your goods shall be confiscated Answ He needs not fear confiscation that hath nothing to lose nor banishment to whom heaven is his onely countrey nor torments when his body will be dasht with one blow nor death the onely way to set him at liberty You are mad said the Praefect Opto me in aternum sic delivare said Basil I have torne garments and a few books and so I live in the world as one that is always ready to leave it As for my body it is so weak one blow will make it insensible of grief and tormments Ignis crux bestiarum conflictationes said Ignatius yea let all the torment men and Devils can invent fall upon me so I may enjoy my Lord Jesus Christ And again Frumentum dei sum Lyons teeth are but like a Milne which bruiseth but wasteth not the good wheat onely makes it fit to be good bread Polycarp being bidden by the Proconsul to defie Christ and he should be safe answered Octoginta sex annos illi jam inservivi c. Rather dy a thousand deaths than deny my Lord Jesus Contemptus à me est Romanus favor furor said Luther Again Mallem vivere cum Christo quam regnare cum Caesare And again in the cause of God he was content Totius mundi odium impetum sustinere He said to God concerning outward things Valdè protestatus sum me nolle sic satiari ab eo Sr. Anthony Kingston coming to Hooper and telling him life was sweet Act. and Mon. and death bitter His answer was The death to come is more bitter and the life to come more sweet The Earl of Murray said by John Knox a Scottish divine when interred here lyes the body of him who in his life time never feared the face of any man Thou therefore endure hardness as a good souldier of Jesus Christ 2 Tim. 2 3. Fear
There are many kinds of fear 1. Natural which is the gift of God the ornament of nature by which we are warned and in some sort armed for the avoiding of evil that may befall us 2. Servile whereby goodness is not loved but punishment is onely feared 3. Initial to which he may apply those words in Prov. 1.7 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge 4. Filial a fear of God as he is our Father whereby we are solicitous not to lose his favour 5. Worldly and carnal when a man rather than to forsake his own contentment and case cares not to forsake God by forsaking his Commandments Augustus coming ill to his Crown is said to have broken sleeps and used to send for some in talk to pass the night away Caligula the Emperour hid himself when ever he heard the thunder Our fear of God must not be servile but filial Si Domnius ubi timor Malach. 1.6 to this end the fear and love of God are to be mixed Timete cum amore amate cum timore This by some called reverentialis timor by others a chast fear because it is like the fear of a chast wife who feareth to lose her husbands love But the last swayes exceedingly we are too much afraid of man When Gehazi saw the host of the Aramites he cryed Alas what shall we do When Herod frowned on them of Tyre and Sidon they quaked and sought his favour c. At this day if a great man set himself against us and threaten to break our backs If a rich man be our enemy and threaten to sit on our skirts we are in a woful case we know not what to do there is no heart in us Against this fleshy and ungodly fear oppose this buckler The Lord is my helper I will not fear what man can do unto me Such a man threatens me God sends a curst Cow short horns he hath a thousand wayes to curb him God can take the breath out of his nostrils in the twinkling of an eye Overcome him by flies as Pharaoh With one flie as Adrian He can send Wormes to eat him up as he did Herod c What comparison betweene God and man God is a Spirit man is flesh God is strong man is weak God is the Creator man is the creature If God be on our side who can be against us Fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul Mat. 10.28 but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell Magnanimity A Painter in a rage casting his Pensel from him made such a some for a Mad-dog as he could not otherwise have light upon by Art and industrie Yet reason not rage is as I conceive a fit ingredient towards the making up of this vertue The old age of an Eagle is better than the youth of a lark It is reported of the Cannibals that in a whole age a man shall not finde one that doth not rather embrace death than either by word or countenance remisly to yield one jot of an invincible courage There is none seen that would not rather be slain and devoured than sue for life or shew any fear It was Alexanders great encouragement at his last fatal battel that he was to fight with all the power of Persia at once Mahomet the Persian Sultan enraged with the overthrow of his Army in his fury caused all the ten Captains which had the leading thereof to have their eys pluckt out threatning also to attire all the souldiers that fled out of the battle in womens apparel and so disgraced to carry them about as cowards Famous was the faith and fortitude of Philo the Jew Eusâ—b l. 2. c. 5. one of the Legates sent from them to the City of Rome who after he was excluded threatned and commanded to depart being likewise in danger to receive a mischief from Cajus the Emperour who was much moved and incensed against him yet he being reviled went forth and unto the Jewes which were with him in company he said We ought to be of good chear for by right God should take our part Sith Cajus is angry with us The Lacaedemonians were wont to say It is a shame for any man to flie in time of danger But for a Lacaedemonian it is a shame for him to deliberate Socrates would not hearken to his friend Criton perswading him to shift for himself by a dishonourable flight Necesse est ut eam non ut vivam as Pompey said Much lesse should a Christian when called by God to suffer Go said Luther I will surely go sith I am sent for in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ yea though I knew there were so many Devils to resist me as there are tiles to cover the houses in Worms When Spalatinus had sent to him to enquire whether or no he would go to Worms and appear in the Gospels cause if Caesar summoned him Luth. Epist Omnia de me praesumas said he praeter fugam palinodiam Fugere nolo multò minus recantare it a me confortet Dominus When the Earl of Salisbury being inclosed round with the Army of Sultan Melexala Turk Hist fol. 104. was advised to fly The noble Earl answered no more but God forbid that my fathers Son should run away from the face of a Sarasin Should such a man as I flee Said Nehemiah I am ready said Paul not to be bound only but also to die at Jerusalem for the Name of the Lord Jesus The righteous is bold as a Lyon Prov. 28.1 Pusillanimity Honourable exploits try what mettal we are of as hard weather tryes what health Withered leaves fall off in a wind rotten boughs break when weight is laid on them and earthen vessels when set empty on the fire This cowardly passion of faintheartedness dispirits a man expectorates his manlinesse and exposeth him to the cruel mercy of an enemy Some do account one pair of heeles worth two pair of hands But better of the two to be boldly temerarious than basely timorous As was Hannibal Decad. 5. f. 1. of whom Livy reports that Princeps praelium inibat ultimus concerto praelio excedebat He was first in the battel and last out Want of courage shewes that men like stags have stout and stately heads but want hearts Besides there is this evil in cowerdice that it is catching If thou faint in the day of adversity thy strength is small Prov. 24.10 Deut. 20.8 Isa 35.4 What man is there that is fearful and faint-hearted Let him go and return unto his house lest his brethrens heart faint as well as his heart Say to them that are of a fearful heart Be strong fear not Patience The Patient man is made of a Metal not so hard as flexible his shoulders are large fit for a load of injuries which he bears not out of basenesse and cowardliness because he dare not
said You may throw my body from this steep hill yet will my soul mount upward again Your blasphemies more offend my soul than your torments do my body Fabrianus said That every drop of his blood should preach Christ and set foâ—th his praise Doctor Cranmer Archbishop of Canterbury said Act. â—on Forasmuch as my hand offended in writing contrary to the heart my hand shall be punished therefore for may I come to the fire it shall first be burned Which accordingly he did and held his right hand so stedfast and unmoveable saving that once with it he wiped his face that all men might see his hand burned before it touched his body It is the Evening that crowns the Day and the last Act that commends the Scene Be thou faithful unto death Apoc. 2.10 and I will give thee a crown of life Inconstancy The unconstant man treadeth upon a moving earth and keeps no place He hath not patience to consult with reason but determines meerly upon fancy No man so hot in the pursuit of what he liketh no man sooner weary He is fiery in his passions his Heart is the Inne of all good Motions wherein if they lodge for a night it is well by morning they are gone and if they come again he entertains them as guests not as friends He is good to make an Enemy of ill to make a Friend In an unconstant man Senec. lib. de Tranquil there is first Nusquam residentis animi voluntatio uncertain rollings of spirit and then vita pendens a doubtful and suspensive life For our actions do oft bear the image and resemblance of our thoughts A double-minded man is unstable in all his wayes Jam. 1.8 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Perseverance God's elect child cannot fall finally Because he is held up by God's immutable will God's constant love and will is ever to be look'd upon as the onely cause of our safety which keeps our wills by grace against these over-mighty enemies And wretched were we if our wills were put to keep themselves by grace saith one For if Adam without sin resisted not the Principalities c. that opposed him how much less we that are burdened with a body of sin Because he hath an established faith his salvation is certain because saith is the evidence of things not seen Because there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus He is free from the law of sin and death If a son then no more a servant How dares flesh and blood say if a son yet again a servant Once a son and no more a servant once a son and a son for ever If a son then an heir A son saith Christ abides in the house for ever Aug. He that makes men good makes men to persevere in goodness Gods grace in his children is winning infallibly holding inseparably and leading indeclinably Dr. Field Perseverance in good beginneth not in the will but in Gods protecting grace that upholds the will from desisting Hence to every new work the will needs a new grace as Organs give sound no longer than while the bellows are blowing them Predestination gives a sure perseverance for none shall pluck Christs sheep out of his hand And though they may fall their slips are not final Sin reigns not in them wholly Or say they are punished it is a temporal Hell not eternal They are scourged that they may not be damned There are drops of displeasure for small sins and there is hot wrath for great sins but no whole displeasure without a whole reign of sin which cannot be We persevere in grace because built on the Rock Christ the Rock keeps us we keep not the rock yea the Rock keeps us that we keep the Rock For if it did not so the Rock did not keep us for if our keeping of the Rock were not kept by the Rock we should never keep it nor be kept But the Scripture saith we are kept from falling because we are grounded on the Rock and therefore the Rock doth keep us even from falling from the Rock faith a certain Author in his Ground of Arminianism Natural and Politick We should be like the Sun till Noon ever rising But there be many like Hezekiah's Sun that go back many degrees whose beginnings are like Nero's five first years full of hope and peace Or like the first moneth of a new servant Or like to the four Ages first golden then silver brasen iron Or to Nebuchadnezzars image begin gloriously but end basely Look to your selves this is a fearful sight a fearful condition Can he be ever rich that grows every day poorer Can he ever reach the goal that goes every day a step backward from it Alas how then shall he ever reach the goal of Glory that goes every day a step backward in Grace Successivorum non sâ—mul est esse perfectio saith Aquinas which accords to that of Tertullian Perfectio ordine posthumat But Multorum est incipere finire paucorum The Galatians began well so do many but Paul finished his course so do few Like the Diurnal-river in Peru so called because it falleth with a mighty current in the day but in the night is dry because it is not fed with a Spring but caused meerly by the melting of the Snow which lieth on the mountains thereabouts De Origine scribit Erasmus in vita ejus p. 1. Animum ejus plusquam adamantinum fuisse inde Adamantius dictus quem nec vitae austeritas nec perpetui labores nec dura paupertaâ— nec aemulorum improbitas nec suppliciorum terror nec ulla mortis facies à sancto instituto vel tantillum dimovere potuit Antiochus mustering all his Army in the presence of Hannibal much of their furniture being of glittering gold asked him If all this were not enough for the Romans meaning to overcome them Hannibal answered Enough were they the most covetous men in the world meaning to animate good souldiers Certainly Per finalem perseverantiam pertingitur ad praemium Innocent 3. l. 2. de sacr Altar Myst c. 41. Luk. 9.62 qui perseveraverit usque ad finem hic salvus erit No man having put his hand to the plough and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God He that endureth to the end shall be saved Mat. 10.22 Gal. 6.9 Therefore let us not be weary in well-doing for in due season we shall reap if we faint not Apostacy The just man falls seven times a day but he riseth again Ille propriâ— est aâ—ostata qui fidem veram antea professus ab eâ in totum recedit Apostata idem sonat quod desertor transfaga If a man fall on the bridge he may rise again if he fall besides it he is drowned All falling after knowledge is not the unpardonable sin Noah fell Lot David Solomon c. It is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The
hath seen 2. External an outward way of walking That speech of God to Abraham takes in both Gen. 17.1 Walk before me and be thou perfect Thus if we speak metaphorically that 's not onely a way which we tread with our feet but that 's also a way which we tread with our actions A right course of life is a right way Go here saith God it is a way of holinesse go there it is the way of justice Come hither this is the way of truth Thus God beckens and invites man into his way And surely there 's no safety out of Gods way many have died in Christs way but no man ever perished in it God knoweth the way that I take Job 23.10 Quality Worth is valued by the quality not by the greatnesse of a thing Pro. 30.25 26. Some feeble creatures have a notable forecast And others what they want in strength they have in wisedome The least measure of true faith if exerted and exercised will bring a man to heaven though he have not this or that faith to rely upon God without failing without feeling as resolving that neverthelesse God will hear him in that very thing that he prayes for Verily I say unto you if ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed Mat. 17.20 ye shall Experience The requisites for a City or Incorporation are One to judge a law to rule power to defend wisedome to order and riches to communicate Man the City of God at his creation had these will for the King reason for the law free-will for power for wisedome knowledge for riches obedience and cogitations for Inhabitants But man triumphed gloriously in a chariot of glasse which was broken with an Apple And now man is deceived by Satan infected with sin banished from Paradise sweating in labour living in sorrow continuing in warre and fearful of death I have read of a monster having a head like a man teeth like a Lion wings like an Eagle tail and nails like a Dragon and breathed fire like a Devil The wicked man hath reason for his head presumption for his wings stiffnesse in wickednesse for his teeth temptation for his nails and envy for his breath Some sparks of the Deity were created in man in the beginning which he striving to blow into a flame blew them out And now what gets man in the Devils service but death what comfort in his conscience but horrours eyes flaming nostrils fuming eares glowing hands burning and heart trembling As the body of Cerberus supports three heads so the stem of sin sends forth three armes The concupiscence of flesh the lust of the eyes and the pride of life Delilah deceives Sumpson and the Philistines pull out his eyes Delilah is the flesh the Philistines bind him when reason yeilds to sensuality and pull out his eyes when sin perswades him to iniquity Fas est ab hoste doceri Lay thine hand upon him Job 41.8 remember the battel do no more Aeconomical Order Natura AS Galaton painted Homer vomiting Reliquos verò Poems â—a quae ipsâ—â—â—muisset haurientes To signifie saith Aelian that he was the first Poet and all the other as well Greek as Latine but his Apes In like manner Moses is called Oceanus Theologus from whom all other Writers as Armes are derived Aristotle was called Vltimus conatus naturk Nature the common mother breedeth divers effects according to the constitution of each body Many times by events and accidents divers deformities and blemishes appear which by nature were not decreed to be There is greatest cold in the bosome of the earth when the Sun with greatest vehemency shines on it to heat it even so our corrupt nature doth never shew it self more rebellious and stubborn than when the Law of God begins to rectifie it as an unruly and untamed horse the more he is spurred forward the faster he runs backward Rom. 7. so the perverse nature of man is so far from being reformed by the Law that by the contrary sin that was dead without the Law is revived by the Law and takes occasion to obey its concupiscence When we speak of sins against nature our meaning is against the light of nature not against the corruption of nature Naturally Homo est inversus Decalogus whole evil is in man and whole man in evil And there is never a better of us Therefore Christ came to dissolve the old frame and to drive out the Prince of darknesse who hath there entrencht himself We were by nature the children of wrath Eph. 2.3 even as others Marriage It is called In scripturis 〈◊〉 conjugalis 〈◊〉 tur Conjugium à conjungendo i.e. à jugo communi qâ—o vir 〈◊〉 simul in unam carnem veluti in unum hóminem junguntur Matrimoniam quasimatrem monens nam à matre dictum est Conubium numero plurali Nuptiae à nubendâ— i. e. tegends vel obtegendo quia sicut coelum interdum nubibus obtegitur sic untiquitus virgines dum ad vires dactbantur Gâ—dw Antiâ— belamine tegebantur idque ad testandum 1. Pudorâ—m verecundiâ—m 2. Subjectionem obedientiam sen alterius potestatem in se Some honour marriage too much as the Papists that make a Sacrament of it Sacramentum hoc magnum est Ephes 5.32 yet the Greek word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and if every mystery should be a Sacrament there should not be seven but seventy Sacraments and more Neither doth he speak of marriage but of the conjunction of Christ and his Church in that place A number there be also that have exceedingly disgraced it So Epiphanius recordeth oâ— him Marâ—â—on called Matrimony Inventionem diaboli Saturnius and Basilides blushed not to affirme that Nubere generare were à Satana And Hierom with Tertullian wrest some sentences of St. Paul to the disgrace of marriage But let them all say what they will The very first work God did after the very first creation was his marrying of man to woman and one of the first Miracles Christ wrought was in honour of marriage Here Bellurmine also toyes with a triple distinction such as that in his Treatise for Purgatory where Peter Martyr non-plust him A great scholar but were he as great as his great-Grandfather that came to our Saviour with scriptum est his greatnesse were nothing because it is against God who onely is great without quantity Great is Diana of the Ephesians yet nothing because an Idol Before marriage let us begin with God as Abrahams servant did Dos non Deus makes such marriages Forma bonum fragile est 〈◊〉 Res est forma fugaâ— Senec. send me good speed this day And make a Christian choice let not red angels and ruddy cheeks be the loadstones though the one is not wholly to be contemned and the other is an ornament much to be commended But rather grace and vertue remembring what the wise man saith Prov. 31.30 Favour is deceitful
and bennâ—y is vanity but a woman that feareth the Lord she shall be praised And being married let us arme our selves against the crosses of it Dulciter amarum It is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a sweet bitter thing Saint Paul hath read the destiny of married folks 1 Cor. 7.28 Such shall have trouble in the flesh If we have not Christian patience in some measure to bear them Conjugium turned into conjurgium we shall dishonour this honourable estate instead of honourable we shall make it onerable burdensome to our selves and others Take heed of matching with one of the daughters of Heth for he that graffs into a crab-stock is like never to want verjuice An hard adventure it is to yoke ones selfe with any untamed heifer that beareth noâ— the yoke of Christ Marriage is honourable in all Heb. 13.4 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the bed undefiled Husband A number of Nabals there are that tyrannize over Vxor admonenda persaepe reprehendenda 〈◊〉 verberanda uunquam Aurelii vox est and trample upon their wives as if they were not their fellows but their footstooles not their companions and copes-mates but their slaves and vassâ—ls Many that live as Lamech like lions in their houses quarrelsome austeere discourteous violent with high words and hard blows fitter indeed to live in Bedlam than in a civil society These are together in the house no otherwise than as two poysons in the stomack their houses being more like kennels of hounds than families of Christians Or as so many fencing-Schools Mr. Trapp wherein the two sexes seem to have met together for nothing but to play their prizes and to try masteries Job was not more weary of his boyles than they are of their bed-fellows cursing their wedding-day as much as he did his birth-day and thirsting after a divorce aâ— he did after death which because it cannot be had their lives prove like the sojourning of Israel in Marah where almost nothing could be heard but murmuring and mourning conjuring and complaining I confesse Febris Hectiea uxor mala non nisi morte avellenda Scal. it were better to be married to a Quartan-ague than to a bad wife so said Simonides for there be two good dayes for one bad with the one not one with the other But that should have been looked to aforehand If men by leaping unadvisedly into the marriage estate have drawn much misery upon themselves Vxoris vitium aut tollendum aut tollerandum est Varro know a wive faults must be either cured or coverd mended if we can made the best of if we cannot If the first she is made better if the second we Qui tollit hanc sibi commodiorem praestat qui tolerat ipse se meliorem reddit Gellius Husbands Col. 3.19 love your wives and be not bitter against them Wife Vxor quasi unxor domum enim viri deducta oleo postes in ungebat We must not chuse wives by dancing or playing under an Oak for then we shall sooner light upon a wild wanton than a â—ild Matron which will become rather a gâ—dding Dinah running abroad to see the Countrey than a sage Sarah keeping her self within the doors of her tent which will become rather a carelesse Grashopper than a careful Ant yea we shall sooner win an whorish Harlot Helen as did Paris than a vertuous Electra as did Phylades Nature makes a woman A good wife is the beauty and ornament of the house Election a wife but to be prudent wise and vertuous is of the Lord Prov. 19.14 A good wife was one of the first real and royal gifts bestowed on Adam Not a gift of industry but of destiny for Marriages are made in heaven Sylla had been happy if he had had no wife All evils as Elements are most troublesome when out of their proper place as impiety in Professours injustice in Judges discomfort in a wife This is like a tempest in the Haven most troublesome most dangerous Prov. 19.13 In a great battel between the Persians and the Turks Turk Hist. fol. 512. in which the Turks had victory some which were present reported that amongst the heaps of them that were slaine were found the dead bodies of divers Persian women who being armed and following their husbands died with them in the battel whom Selymus the first caused to be honourably buried But what a woful wife was Jesabel to Ahab of which wretched couple it is said that Regina erat rex Rex verò regina It never goes well when the hen crowes How many have we known whose heads have been broken with their own rib Satan hath found this bâ—it to take so well that he never changed it since he crept into Paradise Wives have a double advantage in perswading with their husbands 1. In regard of nearnesse a wife hath opportunity and freedom to improve that opportunity 2. The motions or perswasions of a wife whether to good or evil are very taking upon a husbands heart Bajazet the fourth King of the Turks marrying Despina the fair daughter of Lazarus the Despot she allured him to drink wine Fol. 207. forbidden by their Law and caused him to delight in sumptuous banquets which his predecessors Othoman Orchanes and Amurath never used The deadly difference that fell out betwixt those two noble Seymours in Edward the sixth time Sir Iohn Heywood in the life of K. Ed. 6. p. 84. was thorow the instigation of their ambitious wives which caused our English Historian passionately to cry out O wives Woman wat first given to man for a Comforter saith he not for a Counsellor much lesse a Controler and Director And it is remarkable that in the first sentence against man this cause is expressed Because thou obeyedst the voice of thy wife Gen. 3.17 A wife is made for a help to man and never so much need of help as in affliction That which is good at all times is at some times better A wife should ever be a help to her husband but then most when he cannot help himself The vertue of some wives hath appeared gloriously at such times True conjugal love ouâ— lives all changes both of time and state The story is famous of Prince Edward wounded with a poysonad knife Speeds Chron. pag. 630. by a treacherous Assassine to whom when other means of cure proved ineffectual his wife the Lady Eleanor sucked out the poyson and gave him both case and healing A rare pattern of conjugall fidelity The woman was not made of a bone of the head nor of any anterior part nor of the foot nor yet of any hinder part to shew that she must not be Domina nor Praelata nor serva nor yet Post-posita But she was made of a bone of the side of a bone under the arm and not far from mans heart to shew that she is socia to be protected and defended by the husband and that he
watcheth stands sits upon thorns while he is here O mihi â—am longè mantâ—at pars ultima vitae because he panteth and desireth to be dissolved and to be with Christ We may desire life upon a threefold account To 1. Bring more glory to God 2. Get more grace 3. Do more good to others Epaminondas saith aptly We may salute Young men with Good morrow or welcom into the world Old men with Good night because they be leaving the world Only those of middle age with Good day Our pilgrimage on earth is called a Day for 1. The shortness of this life 2. That after this our day is spent we shall no longer work Magna vitae pars elabitur malè Senec. Epist. 1. agentibus maxima nihil agentibus tota aliud agentibus Similis an ancient man who lived seven years well caused this to be written on his tomb-stone Hîc jacet Similis cujus aetas Multorum annorum fuit Diu vixi diu peccavi ipse Septem duntaxat annos vixit Many and great are the miseries of this life Cogita unde veneris et crubesce ubi sis et ingemisce quò vadis et contremisce A mans life when it declines casts of the lees Qui bene latuit bene vixit Vivere est bene valere Non anto â—illam fortunam rudeâ—â—viâ—â— aptam Aurum sitisti aurum bibe Bernard speaking unto man saith Think from whence thou camest and be ashamed where thou art and sign for sorrow whither thou goest and themble with anguish Like unto him saith Austin Intelligas ergo in quantum sit ingressus tuâ—â— flebilis progressin tune debilis egress◠〈◊〉 horribilis The meer natural mans life is comforted in three things especially 1. Quiet rest 2. Liberal diet 3. Good apparel When one brag'd unto Lacon of the multitude of his ships and shipping he answered he little esteemed that felicity that hanged upon ropes and depended on cables But such is all mundane prosperity Crassus that so greedily hunted after the Paâ—â—â—â—ans gold perishing miserably had his head cast into a vessel of gold with this inscription or Motto Thou that hast thirsted after gold now drink thy fill Tertullian reports of the Indians and Ethiopians that they made no more account of gold than dirt Wise Solomon saith there is a time to be born and a time to die you do not hear him say a time to live Death borders upon our birth and our cradle stands in our grave We lament the losse of our Parents how soone shall our 〈◊〉 bewaâ—le ours Out of those words of Job c. 1.21 Nâ—ked came I out of my mothers womb and naked shall I return thither It plainly appears the life of man is nothing else but a coming and a returning here is nothing said of staying or â—â—â—ding We have here no continuing City while we are here we can hardly be said to continue here and after a few dayes we shall not be here at all It is but a coming and going Natura hic nobis diversorium commorandi dedit But this riddle passeth the worlding as the fisher mans did Homer Quae cepimuâ— reliquâ—mus quae non cepimus nobiscum portamus Mat. 10.39 Conâ—es â— Vita isâ—a in corpore umbra est vitae et imagâ— non veritas Ambr. in Psal 118. Jam. 4.14 it is but a â—â—oud and an ebbe and then we are carried into the Ocean of eternity It were well if the world were as our Tent yea as our Inne if not to lodge yet to bait in What shall a wicked man say when death comes fiercely and pulls him by the throat and summons him to hell Who can but tremble the messenger being terrible but the message worse Then the raging despairs of an evil conscience finding no peace within lesse without Contrariwise the gracious soul hath no leisure to care for sufferings that beholds her crown which if she were enjoyned to fetch it thorow the flames of hell her faith would not stick at the condition Austin doubted whether to call it a dying life or a living death Nescio an â—icenda sit vita morâ—alis an vitalis mors The whole course of life is but a flying shadow a little spot of time between two eternities So that it is improper to ask when we shall die but rather when we shall make an end of dying for first the infancy dieth then the childhood then the youth then age and then we make an end of dying This life in the body is a shadow and an image of life not the truth of it What is your life it is even a vapour that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth away Age of Man De dinturnitaâ—e vitae humanae bifariam loquiâ— possumus Viz. 1. Ante Diluviam Zanard de gen et corrup cap. 29. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Disceptabis â—rem 2. Post Diluvium Loquendo de eâ ante diluvium notum est multos per multa secula vixisse ut sacra nos docent historia At loquendo de vita humana post diluvium jam audivimus dominum dicentem non permaâ—abit spiritus meus in homine quicaâ—o est suntque dies hominis centum viginti annorum But since then Scripture makes mention of seventy years So Solon in Lacresus and to the same sense speaketh Macrobius also saying Septiâ—s dein Anni 〈◊〉 Physicis creditur meta vivendi hoc vitae humanae perfectuâ—â— spaoium termiâ— natur c. The Fathers lived longer but as mans wickednesse increased so their dayes decreased and now their lives are daily shortned the generations dispatcht away that the world may sooner come to an end Lord make me to know mine end and the measure of my dayes what it is Psal 39 4. that I may know how fraile I am Old age This once come saith the Philosopher youth is no more to be expected as when once winter is come no more of the past summer As in an house Stillicidiâ— praecedunt râ—inam so in a man gray haires sore-signify deaâ—lâ— Therefore when the Palm-tree is full of blomes the map of age is figured in the forehead and the Calenders of death appear in the furrowes of the face then it is high time for a man to be think himself of death Annus octogessimus me admonor ut sarcenas colligam said Varre It is high time for me to pack up and to be gone out of this life Cleanthes was wont sometimes to chide himself Ariston wondering â—hereat Qui canos quiâ—â—â— habet sed mentem non habet asked him whom chidest thou Cleanthes laughed and answered I chide an old fellow who hath gray haires in deed but wants understanding and prudence worthy of them Such are sick of Ephraims disease Hos 7.9 Quò magis senâ—scunt cò maâ—is stultâ—sâ—unt Or of our neer neighbours disease if that of Erasmus who conversed among them be true The elder they are the foolisher they are
that he might the sooner be out of his pain but he half in choler replied that he would not lose the least step of his gate for all the whipping in Paris That which in Christians deserves greatest commendations is an unmoved patience in suffering adversities accompanied with a setled resolution of over-coming themâ— Bishop Hooper seeing a Pardon lying by him to be given him if he would recant Act. Mon. cried to them that stood by If you love my soul away with it His answer to Master Kingston advisinghim to save his life by recanting is worth noting Life indeed is sweet and death bitter But alas consider that the death to come is more bitter and the life to come more sweet Therefore for the desire and love I have to the one and the fear and terror I have of the other I do not so much regard this death nor esteeme this life but have setled my self through the strength of Gods Spirit patienly to passe through the torments and extremities of the fire now prepared for me rather than to deny Gods Word and Truth 'T was resolutely spoken of Bishop Ridley to Latimer at the stake Be of good comfort brother for God will either asswage the fury of the fire or else strengthen us to abide it Newes being brought to John Philpot of his burning the next day he answered undauntedly I am ready God grant me strength a joyful resurrection I might adde abundantly Who puts to Sea for a long Voyage and at a great charge must resolve to hold on his course against all winds and weather or accidents that may offer to stop him So we in Christianity must wrestle with all difficulties rather than quit the enterprise Being once embarqued on we must with a Caesarean confidence and a Spartan resolution to go on with the sword or fall on the sword I am ready not to be bound only Acts 21.13 but also to die at Jerusalem for the Name of the Lord Jesus Vox verè Christianorum Martyrdom We must expect persecutions here for how should God wipe away tears from our eyes in heaven if on earth we shed no tears How can Heaven be a place of rest if on earth we find it How could we desire to be at home if in our journey we did find no grief How could we so often call upon God and talk with him if our enemy did sleep all the day long How could we elsewhere be made like unto Christ in joy if in sorrow we sob'd not with him If we will have joy and felicity we must needs feel sorrow and misery If we will go to heaven we must sail by hell If we will embrace Christ in his robes we must not think scorn of him in his rags If we will siâ— at table with Christ in his Kingdom we must first abide with him in his temptations If we drink of his cup of glory forsake not his cup of ignominy Can the head-corner-stone be rejected and the other more base stones in Gods building be in this world set by We are of his living stones be content then to be hewen thereby to be fitted to be joyned to your fellows that suffer We are Gods corn fear not therefore the flail the fan miln-stone nor Oven We are all Christs lambs look to be fleeced and slain Ignatius qui Apostolorum temporibus proximus fuit Quid hoc mali est cujus reus gaudet cujus accusatio votum est cujus poena feli citas Tertul. cum ex Syriâ usque Romam ad bestias duceretur inter alia scribebat O salutares bestiae quae preparantur mihi quando venient quando emittentur quando eis frui licebit carnibus meis De eodem scribit Irenaeus Frumentum Christi sum dentius bestiaerum molor ut mundus Dei panis inveniar King Henry the fourth deposer of King Richard the second was the first of all English Kings that began the unmerciful burning of Christs Saints for standing against the Pope And William Sawtree was the first of all them in Wickliff's time that was burned he suffered Anno Dom. 1400. saith Fox Bishop Hooper in a Letter to Mistris Warcope Dear sister take heed you shall in your journey towards heaven meet with many a monstrous beast Paul fought with some at Ephesus If there be any way saith Bradford to heaven on horse-back 't is Persecution Should we look for fire to quench our thirst Even as soon shall Christs true servants find peace in Antichrists regiment It was likewise his saying At God sent for Elijah in a fiery chariot so sendeth he for me for by fire my dross must be purified that I may be fine gold in his sight Queen Anne wife to King Henry the 8. led to the Tower to be beheaded said The King was constant in his course of advancing her For from a Private Gentlewoman to a Marchioness then to a Queen and when he could no higher then to a Martyr Cansa non poena Martyrem facit ait Cyprian Nam ut dixit Gregor Cum Christo crucem periturus latro suscepit sed quum reatus proprius tenuit pro crucifixo non absolvit Aug. Diverso fine fato Bucholc It is one thing to suffer as a Martyr and another thing to suffer as a Malefactor Ibi erat Christus ubi latrones Similis poena dissimilis causa Sampson died with the Philistins by the fall of the same house but for another end and by a different destiny Martyrdom is the lowest subjection that can be to God but the highest honour It brings death in the one hand and life in the other for while it kills the body it crowns the soul When one said to a certain Martyr Take heed 't is a hard matter to burn Indeed said he it is for him that hath his soul linked to his body as a Thiefs foot is in a pair of fetters And they loved not their lives unto the death Revel 12.11 Spiritual Warfare Our life is compared to a warfare The chief Captain General on the one side is the Mighty Lion of the Tribe of Judah the Prince of Peace the Conqueror of death hell and sin The grand Captain on our enemies part is the great red Dragon the old crafty Serpent the Governor of Darkness The Lieutenants of the fields are Fleshly Sensuality against Spiritual Reason The Serjeants of the Band are the cursed children of Darkness against the faithful children of Light The common souldiers are the Law of our Members warring against the Law of our Mind the effects of the Flesh against the fruits of the Spirit Sathans souldiers handle such like arms as these The Breast-plate of Injury the Girdle of Falshood the Shoos of Discord the Shield of Insidelity the Helmet of Mistrust the piercing Darts of Cruelty the Canon-shot of spightful Reproachâ—s the Arrows of lying Slanders the Sword of the Flesh c. On the contrary Scripture shews us the
out of their bellies For which cause also the Hebrews called them Oboth or bottles because the bellies of those women that were thus made use of by the Devil were swelled as big as bottles In the year of Grace 1536. a certain Damsel at Frankfort in Germany being possessed with a Devil and stark mad swallowed down pieces of money with much gnashing of her teeth which monies were presently wrung out of her hands and kept by divers Bucholc Chr. Luther's advice being requested it was this To pray hard for her Vrbanus Regius in a Sermon of his at Wittenberg made mention of a certain Maid possessed by the Devil and when she should have been prayed for in the Congregation the Devil made as if he had been departed out of her But before the next publike meeting Satan returned and drove the Maid into a deep water where she presently perished Melanchton tells a story of an Aunt of his that had her hand burnt to a coal by the Devil appearing to her in the likeness of her deceased husband And Pareus relates an example of a Bakers daughter in their countrey possest and pent up in a Cave she had digg'd as in a grave to her dying day Much like unto that poor creature mentioned Mat. 8.28 It is to be feared the Devil that was cast out of the Demoniacks bodies is got into many mens hearts oft casting them into the fire of Lust and water of Drunkenuess Athanasius had a conceit that the Devil may be driven out of a body by repeating the 68. Psalm Possessed with Devils Mat. 4.24 and lunatick Sorrow Secundum Deum 2 Cor. 7.10 Mundum 2 Cor. 7.10 For the first Sin bred sorrow and sorrow being right destroyeth sin as the worm that breeds in the wood eats into it and devours it So that of this sorrow according to God we may say as the Romans did of Pompey the Great Plut. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That it is the fair and happy daughter of an ugly and odious mother But the sorrow of the world is that which carnal men conceive Act. Mon. fol. 1901. either for the want or loss of good or for the sense or fear of evil Thus Queen Mary who died as some supposed by her much sighing before her death of thought and sorrow either for the departure of King Philip or the loss of Calice or both Thus Nabal sorrowed To these may be added a third An hellish sorrow a desperate grief for sin Virtus nolentium nulla est as was that of Judas Fained or forced grief is nothing worth He grieved and yet miscarried It was squeezed out of him as verjuice out of crabs But Peter went forth to weep bitterly Gods people are commanded to afflict themselves with voluntary sorrow Some shadow of it we have in Epaminondas the Theban General who the next day after the Victory and Triumph went drooping and hanging down his head And being asked why he did so He answered Blur. Yesterday I found my self too much tickled with vainglory therefore I correst my self for it to day But we have a better example in holy David whose heart smote him and made him smart inwardly saith the text 2 Sam. 24.10 after he had numbred the people The soundness and sincerity of sorrow is shewed by the secrecy of it Ille dolet verâ— qui sine teste dolet He grieves with a witness that grieves without a witness Zech. 12.12 Sorrow is a breaker It breaks no bones but it breaks the heart Worldly sorrow breaks the heart to death Godly sorrow breaks the heart to life Sorrow shortneth the spirit of man that is Sorrow over-acted weakens the whole man and leaves him unable to put himself forth in action Joy is the dilatation or widening of the heart much joy makes the spirit free to act So sorrow is a straitner of it it makes a man narrow-hearted and narrow-handed it stops him in his actings or stays him from acting We commonly say Sorrow is dry 'T is so because it is a drier A broken spirit drieth the bones Pro. 17.22 Aristotle in his book of Long and short Life assignes Grief for a chief cause of death All immoderations saith Hippocrates are great enemies to health We have heard of some whose hearts being filled with vexing cares Quia spiritus tristis exiceat â—ssa have filled their heads with gray hairs in a very short time As some have an art to ripen fruits before nature ripens them so the Lord hath a power to hasten old age before nature makes us old Many troubles in one year may make a man as old as many years Grief is like Lead to the soul heavy and cold It sinks downward and carries the soul with it Mans Mind is like the stone Tyrrhenus which so long as it is whole swimmeth but being once broke sinketh David was decrepit with much grief at seventy years of age Jacob attained not to the days of the years of the life of his fathers as being a man of many sorrows And this some think was the reason our Saviour Christ at little past thirty was reckoned to be towards fifty Lam. 3.1 Joh. 8.57 He was the man that had seen affliction Mention is made of a German Captain at the Siege of Buda Anno 1541. Turk Hist. who seeing the dead body of his unfortunate but valiant Son presented to him a sudden and inward grief did so surprise him and strike to his heart that after he had stood a while speechless with his eyes set in his head he suddenly fell down dead The Casuists and Schoolmen affirm sorrow for sin to be the greatest of all sorrows In 1. Conatu 2. Extensione 3. Appreciatione 4. Intensione Though other Mourning coming down hill having Nature to work with it and nothing to hinder it make more noise Mine eye is consumed because of grief Psal 6.7 Heaviness in the heart of man maketh it stoop Prov. 12.25 When I remember these things I pour out my soul in me c. Have mercy upon me O Lord for I am in trouble Mine eye is consumed with grief Psal 42.4 yea my soul and my belly For my life is spent with grief and my years with sighing My strength faileth because of mine iniquity and my bones are consumed Psal 31.9 10. Desire It is a passion which we have to attain to a good thing which we enjoy not Est voluntarius affectus ut res quae bona existimatur deâ—st vel existat vel possideatur that we may imagine is fitting for us There is a threefold desire 1. Natural 2. Reasonable 3. Spiritual And every one of these by their order are subordinate to another and there is no repugnancie amongst them In Fevers we desire to drink and yet we will not And so in Apoplexies to sleep and yet we will not A mans hand is gangren'd a Chyrurgeon comes to cut it off The
of them but to offer up an Expiatory sacrifice for the wrong God received and a sufficient price for the impetration of our sins remission To this end another Priesthood as was necessary was ordained in mercy by the effectual execution whereof sin committed should be expiated and an access made for transgressors unto the Throne of grace And this is the Priesthood only of Jesus Christ the Righteous who knew no sin and in whose mouth was found no guile Being holy harmless undefiled and separate from sinners Before this high Calling should be actually executed by Christ in person it was the will of our Heavenly Father 1. That men should be apprehensive of the want thereof by the conviction of conscience of the multitude of sins and gravance of them 2. That the minds of men should be throughly toucht with a longing for it are it came to the real performance yet so as that in the interposing time their hopes might be supported against despair that might spring out of the remorse of conscience for their sins which would not be taken away but by that High-Priest which taketh away the sins of the world Hereupon a Typical Priesthood was instituted for a time till the fulness of time called the time of reformation Heb. 9.10 determin'd by the most prudent Dispenser of times and seasons should come Men of infirmities and subject unto sin were then by the Law of a carnal precept appointed to offer up for the sons of men innocent beasts in whose death by the effusion of their blood wherein consisted their life they did contemplate their own merit These creatures did not any thing worthy death as was rightly conceived neither could these Sacrifices cleanse the Sacrificers from sin to perfection as pertaining to the conscience This was understood wherefore then they could not but conclude that being they did offer such they did but give to God under their hands and seals an acknowledgment of their errors and a confession of a due debt Yet seeing God was the Author of the institution of them and accepted them at their hands as sacrifices of a sweet smelling favour they conceived a lively hope of grace and pardon framing with themselves the like discourse to that of Samson's mother Judg. 13.23 If the Lord were pleased to kill us he would not receive a burnt-offering and a meat-offering at our hands Heb. 10.1 Bona gratia gloria These Figures then being but the shadows of good things to come not the very image of the things did bear up their hopes and in some measure establish their confidence in him by whom they expected good things to come This is the ground of the Apostles reasoning Heb. 9.13 If the blood of bulls and goats sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh there 's the shadow how much more see the substance shall the blood of Christ who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God Here then I am to intreat of my Saviour's Priesthood whereby eternal Redemption is obtained that they who are called may receive the promise of eternal inheritance A Subject challenging most reverent devotion and care Now that I may not rove from the Apostle's intended scope Three things should be handled 1. Of him as he is a Priest befitting us Such an High-Priest became us 2. Of his personal qualities related in the concrete Who is holy harmless undefiled separate from sinners 3. Of his dignity to which he is advanced Made higher than the heavens How deep are all men in the guilt of sin all men enlightned with the knowledge of the truth easily perceive who when brought to the acknowledgment of this cannot be so ignorant as not to know the depth of their misery The depth of their misery without the successful Mediation of the Son of God is their abiding under the wrath of God which cometh upon the children of disobedience For the removal whereof the Supreme Moderator that dwelleth in the Heavens ruling all things hath anointed his Son High-Priest to deal in things concerning men To whom as he gave the nations for his inheritance Psal 2. Psal 110. and the uttermost parts of the earth for his possession so hath he confirmed him to be an High-Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec From whom by an heavenly decree he expected the full discharge of the Priestly function imposed upon him Sacerdos q. Sacer dux the intent and purpose whereof was to bring men to God And this being the act of Mercy according to the good pleasure of his will willing to pass by offences his Justice whose rigor is inflexible ever loving righteousness and haring iniquity steps in to claim satisfaction This must have been given for the sins of the sons of men before they could have vouchsafed them any perfect hope of a gracious reconcilement To join therefore Mercy and Justice together whereby to end the difference the Divine Wisdom concluded That the punishment due to sin should be converted into an Expiatory sacrifice and this should appease and quiet the one and make an easie way and entrance for the other At quarendum Sacrificium But such a one was to be sought for and such a one too as might be Sacerdes Sacrificium both Priest and Sacrifice Here was a work fit only for the scrutiny of the Sacred Trinity infinitely surpassing the imagination of Man though never so vast All the Creatures could neither afford the one nor the other An Angel could not be Priest Man must to plead the cause of men with God Neither could the Sacrifice for man be an Angel because it was not meet that the death of an Angel should be the expiation of a crime perpetrated by man Nay further might it be so we should I believe be hardly induced to believe that an Angelical oblation offered by that Spiritual nature would profit us The nature that offended ought in all equity to purge away the offence and to suffer for it Among Men therefore must the search be made but there was little hope to find out one that could that would sufficiently effectually undergo so great a task All were sinners terrified with the horrid guilt of their accusing consciences and held captive in the chains of sin under the tyranny of the Prince of darkness None of these durst approach to present an offering unto God who is pure Light neither were any of them able were any willing to sustain or endure the severe countenance of an angry God before whom he was to appear Yet a Man must have done the deed if ever the deed were done Hereupon it was agreed upon that the Son of God God over all blessed for ever should be made the Son of man to be made the Saviour of man the worlds Creator should become one of the creatures of the world to redeem the rest fram'd after the similitude of sinful
and frequently iterated purified not the conscience did not abolish trespasses merited not celestial blessings But the Word of the Oath after the Law Heb. 10.14 did constitute Christ for ever a Priest to purifie the conscience to abolish trespasses to merit celestial blessings For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified As one therefore said to David Thou art worth ten thousand of us so we may say of Christ our High-Priest because God did swear Thou art worth ten thousand worlds of the other And such an High-Priest became us Thus much for the manner of Christs taking the holy order of Priesthood which was by Covenant by Oath both binders His executing of this place is in the next place to be considered which as the former deserves our most reverend regard Fidelity and assiduity both commend the undertakers of a weighty matter and both are met in Christ for the important work of our Redemption by grace All his force was ever bent that way to ruine our adversaries and raise us In the administration of his Priestly office he practised it offerendo intercedendo by Sacrisicing by Interceding which were the two things that held most of that Order in continual imployment He stood our friend without the least flinching usque ad aras to the very death when we stood in opposition to God to him to our selves Before he presented himself an Oblation to the Father of Spirits he prepared himself for it by a most submissive humiliation a most sincere obedience by most zealous supplications and a most exquisite sense of humane infirmities all which out-stretch the limits of all thoughts of man He suffered the brightness of that glory which he had with the Father before the world was for a time to suffer an eclipse He was without form and comeliness and when men saw him Isa 53.2 there was no beauty that they should desire him His entertainment in the world was but discourteous and poor At his first entrance he was laid in a manger and after though he was Lord of Heaven and earth yet had be not whereon to lay his head Necessity forc'd him to fly and oft to hide himself because his hour was not yet come to save his life Uncivil language slanderous reports extream indignities were heapt upon him These were the several stiles wherewith the wicked world was pleased to honour him A Samaritan a Glutton a Wine-bibber a Seducer a Traitor a Friend to Publicans sinners a Devil at least one possest of a Devil yet all this made him not tread one step awry from the hallowed paths of a filial obedience for notwithstanding he was a Son Heb. 5.8 Schola crucis schola lucis yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered He suffered the first part of his Passion in a Garden for sin where sin was first committed where he offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears to him that was able to save him from death and was heard in that he was raised up by the unresisted power of his Almighty working Soon after was he betrayed apprehended bound and forsaken Betrayed to expiate our treason in Adam Apprehended to restore us Captives unto liberty bound to dissolve the chains of our sins Forsaken to perform the work of satisfaction and redemption all alone by himself He was arraigned condemned whipped and crowned with thorns Arraigned by Jew and Gentile He stood there for both their sakes to exempt them from the Tribunal of the Judge of all the world Condemned to justifie us in the sight of God by his incomparable innocence Whipped to deliver us from the spiritual corporal and eternal scourge which we deserved Crowned with thorns to 1. Signifie his pacification of God for our ambition in Adam 2. His meriting for us an eternal crown 3. His collecting a Kingly people out of the most thorny and burtful nations which as a crown should compass God about in serving and honoring of him 4. His bearing of our thorny cares that we might quietly repose our trust in him He was clothed with a Purple garment and in his hand was there put a Reed both intimating he was a King though both done in derision Isa 63. The first shews he was that Warriour forespoken by the Prophet Who is this that comes from Edom with red garments The other that he was he that should break the Serpents head For 't is the observation of some learned that a Reed is most mortal to a Serpent and therewith were men used to kill them Besides that by it as by a Pen he did obliterate the hand-writing in the Lords Debt-book that was against us He suffered in Golgotha and naked too in Golgotha a place of dead mens bones where malefactors suffered to raise up the banner of righteousness and salvation even in the place of death and condemnation But he suffered there naked too to satisfie for our first parents transgression who were spoiled of the garment of Innocency and perhaps to shew how we should enter into Heaven as Adam into Paradise naked in body but clad in soul with innocency with immortality In a word 't was to expiate our shameful nakedness to which our first sin exposed us And this is the naked truth of the Truth This done all was not done for which Christ came into the world for 't was but preambulatory to a greater work ensuing what was hitherto done for hereby was he compleatly sitted to give himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour Eph. 5.2 There did therefore succeed this 1. The offering up of his Body by the effusion of his precious Blood upon the high Altar of the Cross where he suffered the loss of his life the price of our Redemption without blood there being no remission Heb. 9.22 View him there and he is just as the Prophet did describe him Isa 53. A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief Here he was lifted up to answer the elevation of the Sacrifices of the Old Law all types of him Isaac represented him in umbra in the shadow when the substance followed even in this point so did the Brasen Serpent they are the words of our Saviour As Moses lifted up the Serpent in the wilderness There it was Vide vive here Crede vive even so must the Son of Man be lifted up that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life Joh. 3.14 He was lifted up in the air that he might overcome the Prince of the air and the Spiritual wickednesses in high places triumphing over them in it He was lifted up in the air to hang on a tree that as death by a tree entred into the world so on a tree it should be destroyed and life brought back again and besides that he might bear the curse of the Law Col. 2.15 being made a curse for us
saith Bernard Offenso Dee c. Bern Jer. 17.5 When God is offended with me Who shall pray for me to make man my refuge I am inhibited under the pain of a dreadful execration Cursed be the man that trusteth in man and maketh flesh his arme and whose heart departeth from the Lord. To commit our cause to the blessed heavenly Courtiers that are indeed ministring spirits sent forth to minister for them that shall be heirs of salvation Heb. 1.14 We have no such warrant c. Therefore his conclusion it Talis ergo requirendus ad orandum qui sit idoneus ad placandum we must therefore seek to such a one to pray for us who is of a competent ability to make God propitious to us And such alone is the Angel of the Covenant the mâ—â— Christ Jesus For none cometh to the Father but by him none are reconciled to God but by his passion by his intercession And such an High-Priest became us Now the Lord Jesus Christ the great shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the everlasting Covenant make us perfect in every good work to do his will working in us that which is well-pleasing in his sight Christian Religion hath for its object Christ and him crucified which to know is in the end life without end All our happinesse is enwrapt in him for in him alone 1 Cor. 1.30 and by him shall all the Nations of the earth be blessed he is made to us of God wisdom righteousnesse sanctification and redemption Hence he became our High-Priest to reveale to us the will of the Father whereby we may become wise unto salvation thus he is our wisdom To bestow upon us everlasting righteousnesse whereby we may be justified in the sight of heaven thus he is our righteousnesse To infuse into our hearts the saving graces of his quickning Spirit whereby we may be holinesse to the Lord so our sanctification Lastly to pour out his righteous soul a sacrifice for sin whereby to redeem us from the power of our enemies and from the hand of all that hate us thus our redemption So that of this fulnesse we do all receive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 John 1.16 and grace for grace Gratia N.T. pro gratia V. the grace of the new Law the Law of faith for the grace of the old Law Theophil the Law of works saith Theophilact that is the grace by which we receive the remission of sinne next the grace by which we receive at last everlasting life saith August which is the free gift of God through Jesus Christ our Lord. August Rom. 6. ult First the grace of God towards his Son after the grace of the Son toward us to make us the sons of God say Divines But with Musculus I say Musculus that our receiving of grace for grace is of grace upon grace intimating the pouring out upon us an over-flowing measure and a copious multiplication of supernatural gifts without discrimination First we receive one then another than to that with an augmentation of all according to the divine dispensation wherefore the Father of mercies is said to blesse us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus Ephes 1. electing us in him before the foundation of the world adopting us in him his Son to be his sons in him making us uccepted in him as in his beloved redeeming us through the precious blood of him as of a Lamb without spot vouchsafing us the forgivenesse of our sins for his sake according to the riches of his grace unfolding unto us by the divine illumination of his Spirit the secret mysteries of salvation and sealing us by the same Spirit to the glorious day of our full and perfect redemption John 14 6. Sequemur Demine te perte ad te te quia veritas per te quia vita ad te quia vita Bern. Our High-Priest himself tells us that He is the way the truth and the life whereupon Saint Agustine Ambulare vis est via falli non vis est veritas mori non vis est vita wilt thou walk uprightly He is the way wilt thou not be deceived He is the truth Wilt thou not die He is the life The like saith Saint Ambrose Si Caelum desideras via est si errorem fugis veritas est si mortem times vita est If thou desirest heaven He is the way if thou declinest error He is the truth if thou fearest death He is life He hath laid open the gates of heaven for them to enter that believe in him that walk in him He is the way he hath dispel'd all the clouds of ignorance and mists of error that we might see the truth and embrace it He is the truth he hath swullowed up death in victory that we might in him triumph over death and the grave and live in him with him and by him and He is the life All these is our High-Priest to us the way truth and life in whom the fulnesse of the God-head dwelleth bodily He is holy harmlesse undefiled seperate from sinners Davenant in Colos 2. and made higher than the heavens For such an High-Priest became us Which leads me to his gracious qualities Thy gracious assistance therefore my blessed Saviour deny me not but supply my wants out of the largenesse of thy bounty fill my heart with heavenly meditations then guide my pen to set forth thy praise being holy harmlesse c. Quo major est cujusque virtus eo difficilius est de ipso dicere Bertius in Oraf by how much more eminent are the good parts of any man by so much the more difficult is it to report exactly of his deserved commendations The glorious shine of my Saviours worth the Sun of righteousnesse doth so dazle I professe my weak understanding that as I cannot fully comprehend his admired worth so I cannot but be defective in delineating his matchlesse qualities wherefore foreseeing I shall come short perhaps of the Readers expectation but certainly of a perfect decyphering of such a High-Priests character as the Spirit hath exprest be so charitably affected as either to passe it over with a friendly connivance or to taxe it with an easie censure In confidence therefore of Divine assistance and Christian good-will I proceed under correction because of polluted lips to treat of the holinesse of our High-Priest He is holy as he is God for God cannot be tempted with evil James 1.13 There is no unrighteousnesse in the holy one of Israel Hearken unto me saith Job cap. 34.10 ye men of understanding far be it from God All sin is offensivum Dei adversivum á Deo that he should do wickednesse and from the Almighty that he should commit iniquity Hither tends that part of Davids prayer Psal 5.4 Thou art not a God that hath pleasure in wickednesse neither shall evil dwell with thee Either therefore we must confesse him
12. and from the guilt of original sin 2. They are confirmed in the joyful expectation of a perfect holinesse he that was so careful to have his natural body so exquisitely fitted will not certainly neglect his Mystical body the Church being bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh but will sanctifie and cleanse it that he may present it to himself a glorious Church not having spot or wricnkle or any such thing but that it should be holy and without blemish Ephes 5.26 27. Therefore to make us so such an High-Priest became us who is holy harmlesse As our High-Prie st was thus in his original innocent so was he in the whole course of his life undefiled Men and Devils did indeed conspire to bring him within their compasse but could not prevail their guilded Pills of corruption plausible to flesh and blood could not be swallowed down of him his unblemisht foul was of a purer condition than that it should be infected by those foul spirits The Master of Sentences gives a double reason for it Lomb. Sent l. 3. 1. Because it was hypostatically united to the eternal Son of God 2. Because the Spirit was given unto him sine mensura without measure he was full of grace and truth John 1.14 Now it is a rule delivered by Romes Angelical Doctor that Quanto aliquid receptivum propinquius est causae influenti tanto abundantius recipit Aquin. by how much any that receiveth is more near to the flowing cause by so much doth it the more plentifully receive Wherefore the holinesse of our gracious Mediatour is such as being God and man inseperably that he could not possibly be defiled by actual sin The Apostle saith directly that he knew no sin that is experimentally in his own person he is called a Lamb undefiled and without spot Pilate that gave him over into the hands of sinners to be crucified ingeniously confest he could find no fault in him at all that good thief as a father calls him that was crucified with Christ made a good confession when he said We receive a due reward of our deeds but this man hath done nothing amisse hence there is added to his sacred name the title of righteous Jesus Christ the righteous 1 John 2.1 for the end why he came into the world was to fulfil all righteousnesse thereby to save sinners Qui caeteros salvos faceret debuit ibse peccato vitio carere saith Augustine Wherefore August Daniel 9. he is said to be the most holy and to have everlasting righteousness So that he gave most compleat and perfect obedience to the Law of God in every point applauded by a voice from heaven This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased This actual righteousness void of all tincture of evil was not only for himself but was efficacious for us for as many as believe in him to the end of the world for Christ is the end of the Law for righteousnesse to every one that believeth Rom. 10.4 For this cause did the Prophet Jeremy foreshew the name whereby he should be called and that is THE LORD OVR RIGHTEOVSNESSE Legis finis interficiens perficiens Aug. Jer. 23.6 This makes good that Apostolical assertion we read 2 Cor. 5.21 That he was made sinne for us that is a Sacrifice to expiate our sin who knew no finne that we might be made the righteousnesse of God in him So that we have as solid justification to life by his obedience as ever we were subject to death by Adams disobedience for as by one mans disobedience many were made sinners so by the obedience of one Rom. 5.19 shall many be made righteous From this Fountain of grace do flow those streams of peace like those in Paradise that make glad the City of our God Peace with God with our selves with men with all the creatures haven and earth are met together in a blessed league For in him it pleased the Father should all fulnesse of divine graces dwell and by him to reconcile all things to himself by him I say whether they be things in heaven or things in earth Col. 1.20 This serves also for another purpose to be a pattern for our imitation to be holy as he is holy to be undefiled members of that body whereof he is the head to walk before him and be upright with Abraham that believed in him The title of Christian which we all have by him should make us so to adhere to him in a conformity to his life Vt quia sine ipso nihil esse possumus per ipsum possimus esse quod dicimur that because without him we can be nothing by him we may be in truth what we are said to be the words are Bernards I must tell you what Saint Peter told them to whom he wrote his first Epistle Bern. 1 Pet. 2 9. Vilelatens viâ—tus quid â—â—m submeâ—sa tâ—vebris Proderit c. Claud. ye are a chosen generation a royal Priesthood a peculiar people that ye should shew forth the vertues or praises 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of him who hath called you out of darnesse into his marvellous light They are the words of Gregory the great in his Epistle to Theodorus Duke of Sardinia Justitiam quam mente geritis oportet coram heminibus luce operum demonstretis the integrity or righteousness ye bear in your mind ye ought besure to express and shew it before men by the light of works which doth justly accord with our Saviours mind Let your light so shine before men that they seeing your good works may glorifie your Father which is in heaven The greatest light in the firmament of the Church which is the heaven upon earth Hierom said that he did deligere Christum habitantem in Augustino is Christ himself the light of the lesser lights is but borrowed from him not to be concealed but to be seene to the eyes of the world after the example of the greatest light who hath lest us an example that we should follow his steps 1 Pet. 2.21 And believe me none are blessed but they alone that with our undefiled High-Priest are in some measure undefiled in the way who after him walk in the Law of the Lord. Ye shall hear how Saint Bernard on the Canticles Censures him that doth not frame his life to the obedience of the Gospel of Christ Dignus plane est morte Bern. in Cant. qui tibi Christe vecusat rivere he is without all doubt worthy of death who denies O Christ to live to thee Good reason then it is that we who are the redeemed of the Lord washed in his blood should in an honourable respect of our potent Redeemer conform our selves to the like strickt godly life he did and not to wallow in the sordid sins of the damned crue from which that we might be withdrawn according to the working of his mighty power Such an High-Priest
received more in the second Adam than we lost in the first Where sin abounded grace did much more abound Rom 5.20 In Adam we lost our native innocency in Christ we receive absolute perfection and integrity in Adam we lost Paradise on earth in Christ we receive the Kingdom of heaven the true Paradise of God at whose right hand are pleasures for evermore How then can that infinite mercy repel us from him when we come unto him being now made partakers of his nature much rather being reconciled we shall be saved by his life Rom. 5.10 And this is called the glory of his grace whereby we are made accepted in the beloved in whom we have redemption through his blood even the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace Eph. 1.6 7. Gods goodness appears in his justice worthy of admiration for the God of mercy as he was inclined so was he content to pardon sinners if it might stand with the unblemisht reputation of his exactest justice That therefore his justice might not suffer his mercy brought to passe the incarnation of his Son thereby to satisfy his justice and appease his wrath Rom. 3.25 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Him hath God set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past hence he is said to dy for us that is in our stead which taketh away condemnation Cap. 8.34 and bringeth peace to undoubted salvation Cap 5.10 Here is plenary satisfaction to God for us and a peaceful reconciliation betwixt God and us Hence 't is said that he was made sin for us that is a sinner 2 Cor. 5.21 which cannot be but either interna pollutione by an inward infection which was impossible to him vel externâ reputatione by an outward repute and estimate which was no otherwise than by undergoing the punishment due to us which he hath done as was meet by which Gods justice is everlastingly immutably and fully satisfied and we perfectly saved Hence he is said to bear our iniquities Isa 53.4 which is not tollerantia patientiae the bearing of patience though he did bear them patiently but by bearing them he took them away behold the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world neither is it sola poestas auferendi peccata 1 Pet. 2.24 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 onely an authentick power or authority of taking away our sins but which is far more he actually bare our sins in his one body on the tree that is submitting himself to divine censure and justice did suffer the punishments of our offences by which we passe from death to life for by his stripes we are healed by his death we are saved Hence he is said to have paid for us the price of our Redemption we are bought with a price faith the Apostle whereby is intimated our captivity and subjection unto the just vengeance of the Almighty We were debters unto him and were broke like bankrupts upon the matter despoil'd of all good we had and disenabled to pay the price of our redemption which the Son of God undertaking saith of himself Mat. 20 28. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Tim. 2.6 that he came to give his life a ransome for many whereof the Apostle making use saith that Christ our Mediatour gave himself a ransome for all The Apostles All are those Many mentioned by the Evangelist Hence he is said to be an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour Ephes 5.2 Such a one as hath wrought a perfect reconciliation and an eternal peace betwixt God and us his justice satisfied our sins pardoned our souls saved Such a one as all sacrifices before him were but his shadows and for any to be after him is but needless and most unlawful for he after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever sate down on the right hand of God and by that one offering hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified Thus to satisfie the justice of God and secure us Heb. 10.12.14 the Sonne of God is sent from God into the world and went stitch-through with the work of our redemption So that it is compleat and cannot admit the least exception nothing in it being defective nothing superfluous To close up this point admire the wonderful temper of Gods mercy and justice which no creature could find out before God did manifest it and none now it is made manifest can fully apprehend it In sending us a Saviour God was merciful that he might be just and just that he might be merciful For in his mercy he sent him he gave him to us in his justice he made him a curse he punished him with death for us which he triumphantly overcame he made him sin for us that knew no sinne to the end that through his mercy again we might be made the righteousnesse of God in him Cor. 5.22 Wherefore with holy David unto thee O God do we give thanks unto thee do we give thanks for that thy name is near thy wondrous works declare Psal 75.1 The works of thy mercy the works of thy justice are exceeding wonderful in our reparation Thy Name thy nature is near unto us in thy Son Nomen i.c. Numâ—n who being the true IMMANVEL God with us hath wrought and accomplished our deliverance Not unto us O Lord not unto us but to thy Name give the glory Tibi gloria nobis lucrum let the glory be thine now the gain is ours Glory be to God on high Thus much concerning the first thing imported in this Glory which is a pious admiration of Gods infinite Wisdom Power and Goodness The second thing imported in this Glory is a religious honour due to God which is evermore the necessary consequent of pious admiration We honour our Benefactors the best we may as the benefit bestowed and the love of the Benefactor doth require and the greater the benefit the greater is the Benefactors love and the greater his love the greater honour is due to him from the receiver Great out of doubt is the Gift God sent to us freely confer'd upon us it is a Gift of an heavenly nature of the highest vaine his own only begotten Son him hath God given that aâ— many as believe in hiâ— should not perish but have everlasting life Seeing then that he graciously vouchsafed to honour us so highly so lovingly we cannot in modesty in honesty in piety but highly honour him again who is the highest Being then upon the point of honour I must fixe upon those two points wherein this honour doth consist which are 1. Obedience not fained but real 2. Divine worship or adoration of him First then because God hath sent a Saviour into the world to visit us his people from on high and to redeem us from below the nethermost hell we are to render all sincere obedience to him
that soul alone that hath Christ it hath the Spirit of Christ Happy that soul alone that hath the Spirit of Christ it hath God Happy that soul alone that hath God it hath all things The sins of true Believers and all their imperfections do like the Morning-dew at the Suns approach vanish away and dissolve into nothing by the beams of the Sun of Righteousness by whom we have access by faith into his grace wherein we stand and rejoyce in hope of the glory of God Here 's a remedy to stanch a bleeding heart here is rest for a troubled spirit here is a Cordial restorative for a Christian soul that aforetimes did surfeit with the luscious bewitching pleasures of a sinful life and after trembled at the killing fears of the pangs of Hell To say something more how our peace with God was wrought which is worthy of all observation Know the condition of the Obligation of the first Covenant was this Do this and thou shalt live the transgression whereof by necessary consequence must have brought death To reduce us then into grace with God again after our desertion Doing and Suffering was requisite the one serving to give us life the other to save from death both for expiation of our offences and satisfaction of the offended Justice Our peace then is made by Christ's 1. Doing 2. Suffering By Christ's doing For if by our ill doing we undid our peace our peace must be mâ—de up by well doing which we being unsufficient for Christ whose grace is abundantly sufficient for us performed in our stead His conversation iâ— the days of his flesh besides his unspotted and pure Conception was unblemished He came to fulfill all righteousness and did so In the volume of the book it is written of me Heb. 10.9 saith our Saviour Lo I come to do thy will O God I can quickly impannel a sufficient Jury out of the three Kingdoms the Kingdom of this World the Kingdom of Grace and the Kingdom of Glory some friends others foes by their just verdict given up already to justifie the Innocency of our Blessed Redeemer An Angel in the 9. of Daniel calls him The most Holy And the same Angel tells his Virgin Mother that That Holy thing which should be born of her should be called the Son of God The Prophet Isaiah by Divine inspiration saith That he did no sin neither was there guile found in his mouth S. Peter saith He was a Lamb without blemish and without spot The Apostle to the Hebrews describes him to be Holy harmless undefiled separate from sinners S. John insorms us that We have an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the Righteous He is said by the Spouse in the Cantieles to be white and ruddy Ruddy in respect of his bloody Passion and whire in regard of his unstained Innocence Pilate though Christs enemy ingenuously professeth that he could find no fault in him Traiterous Judas when the fact was done confesseth that he did betray the innocent blood Habemus consitentem reum There was Herod's action in causing him to be arrayed in a gorgeous white robe as an implicite testimony of his innocence Pilate's wife bids her husband sitting on the seat of Judgment to have nothing to do with that Just man The Thief upon the Cross condemning himself and his fellow makes this his last and his best confession This man hath done nothing amiss The Centurion when he saw what fell out upon the death of Christ concluded with himself Verily this was the Son of God Luk. 4.34 or as S. Luke hath it Of a truth this was a just man The Devil too I know thee who thou art the Holy one of God For more evidence I can produce from heaven a cloud and innumerable company of witnesses as that Rev. 15.3 Part of the Saints heavenly song is Just and true are thy ways thou King of Saints Lastly take with us the sentence of the just Judge of all the world uttered from Heaven This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased I need to say no more in it 't is a plain case here 's a threefold cord Vox Dei vox populi vox populi Dei The voice of God the voice of the people the voice of the people of God Now for our comfort know thus much Christ's active righteousness was meritorious for our salvation for our peace wherefore Christ is said to be made to us of God righteousness and sanctification and that he knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him By Adam's fatal disobedience the peace was broken by Christs perfect and absolute obedience the peace is renewed As by the disobedience of one man the first Adam many were made sinners and so enemies to God so by the obedience of one man the Man Christ Jesus the second Adam many are made righteous and so reconciled to God Our peace then is made by Christs doing in fulfilling the Law in every point which in every point we did unrighteously violate He did work upon the Earth to work our peace in Heaven Which in like manner he did by suffering as well as doing Which I will by Divine assistance also briefly prosecute Were we not sinners Christ had no need to suffer Had he not now suffered we should not be saved because sinners All our deaths could not have wiped away one sin much less all our sins and therefore not made our peace Eternity of torments is satisfaction indeed to Gods Justice but then what hope of mercy of peace of life What we therefore could not do by suffering eternally Christ hath effected for us by a timely death Rom. 5.10 Act. 20.28 1 Joh. 1.7 We being sinners Christ died for us and being enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son Hence he is said to have purchased his Church that is the peace of his Church with his own blood and his blood to cleanse us from all sin Divine Truth terms him The Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world The sin of the world that takes away the world from God the removing where of out of the way makes way for grace and so for peace for a world of men Princeps vitae est interfectus ut nos ad vitam restitueret Dominus gloriae crucifixus est ut nos ad gloriam exaltaret The Prince of life was put to death to restore us from death of life The Lord of glory was ignominiously crucified to exalt us unto glory He was content to be for saken of his Father and to bear his indignation to make peace for us through the blood of his cross to reconcile us who were sometimes aliens and enemies in the body of his flesh through death to present us holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight Col. 1.21 22. Eph. 5.2 For this very purpose he became a Peace-offering for us Christ loved us and hath
8.36 For Christ hath freed us from the curse of the law being made a curse for us If the Son make you free ye shall be free indeed And liberty from the bondage of sin Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin saith our Saviour Joh. 8.34 But he that hath the peace of a good conscience is not in subjection to the dominion of sin but is servant to righteousness having obtained the liberty proper to the sons of God to which he is called Liberty from the burden of humane traditions and superstitious inventions of men either crept into the Church through the subtilty of Satan or neglect of the Pastors or impiously imposed by the Antichristian Hierarchy under the shew of piety and Religion 1 Cor. 7.23 Ye are bought with a price be not ye the servants of men Liberty from the fear of Tyrants in matters concerning the solemn worship of God or fear of danger in matters indifferent The conscience of a man rightly informed and guided by discretion is apt to undertake all that may make for Gods glory the Churches good and his own salvation Fear not little flock it is your Fathers pleasure to give you a kingdom The last effect of this peace is Joy and it is called Joy unspeakable in the Holy Ghost such an excess of joy as we want utterance to express it A good conscience that is a pacified conscience saith Solomon is a continual feast it frollicks and merries the heart in the very prease of adversity it encourages a man to alacrity of spirit and a certain hope of victory and it admits no bitter invective to be cast out against us to deject us nor produceth any clamorous accusation to ruine us Amâ—s but being calm and quiet excusat absolvit consolatur saith Amesius it pleads our excuse it frees us from condemnation it brings in an ebullition or a springtide-like overflow of all soveraign comforts Balaam did wish that he might die the death of the righteous I for my part wish to live the life of the righteous None under heaven can live a more truly jocund life or at greater hearts ease than he that hath an upright conscience towards God and towards man His soul in the midst of tribulation is full ballasted with rejoicing which the world cannot take away Hab. 3.18 It was Habbakkuk's resolution that notwithstanding all misery he would rejoice in the Lord he would joy in the God of his salvation But is it so with the wicked can they participate of saving consolation It cannot be Yet my charity forceth this good wish for them I would they did for then would they bid adieu to all sinful courses which in the end prove dismal I am sure I have seen the wicked rejoice in their wickedness yet that rejoicing as it is like crackling of thorns under a pot of short continuance so it is never hearty And wot you why surely because their conscience can never be at rest There is no peace Isa 57.21 saith my God unto the wicked For their consciences tell them that the Lord hath a quarrel unto them for their sins they see their condemnation printed in their soul as it were with red letters in an Almanack How can it be otherwise Where there is no zealous reluctation to evil but a constant gliding into mischief and study to transgress when sinners confident in the imagination of their giddy heads like Tumblers that stand upon their heads kick against Heaven what expectation of peace or joy or what hope of Divine solace can they have On the contrary They that war against the flesh and will not admit any composition th Satan they that spend themselves to please God and to be in league with heaven It cannot be but being that all your aims bend at peace Isa 57.2 you shall end in peace and rest in joy and glory everlasting Now the God of peace that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus that great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the everlasting Covenant make you perfect in every good work to do his will working in you that which is well-pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ to whom be glory for ever and ever There remains yet two other kinds of peace to be treated of peace with one another and with the creatures Sin the cause of all confusion hath so distempered the whole fabrick of man and bred such malignant humors in our nature that unlesse the God of order take us in hand we are apt upon the least occasion to lay violent hands one upon another or else by secret contrivances to work one anothers downfal If unbridled passions once get but an head in man nothing unlesse Gods restringent grace stop him shall hold him from breaking out into outragious disorders Wherefore to cure this malady this running sore it seemed good to the God of peace to send his beloved Son the Prince of peace into the world Part of whose function was not to put men together by the eares Sacrosancta 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nobis committitur non 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but to combine their hearts together by a loving union He came and preached peace to you that were afar off and to them that were nigh My peace saith Christ I give unto you And this is my commandment saith love it self that ye love one another Ephes 2.17 John 14.27 cap. 15.12 17. History reports that the Temple of Janus in Rome Paynim at the time of Christs Nativity had all the gates thereof laid open Histor Rom. which was interpreted to be a manifest intimation of a general peace over all the world And out of doubt in whom the Spirit of Christ beareth rule they are ever addicted to a peaceful life for peace whereof the turbulent spirit makes no reckoning is reckoned among the fruits of the blessed spirit Seeing then that Christ brought it preacht it gives it commands it I shall therefore briefly presse it This kind of peace is twofold Civil and Ecclesiastical As Religion is the King upon which the Government of the Political State depends and moves so Peace is the Raile that keeps both close together Truth hath aver'd it that Kingdoms Cities and houses divided against themselves cannot stand Factious spirits in the Commonwealth and schismatical hot-brains in the Church by their unhappy divisions lay a gap open for destruction to enter in by For the preventing whereof be ever observant of the Apostles wholsome advice which is 1 Thes 4.11 5.13 to study to be quiet and to be at peace among your selves We must not let loose the raines to precipitate passion or let flie distastful language unbeseeming the professors of the Gospel of Christ but ever by a sanctified discretion moderate our minds in love and keep our selves within the precise circuit of Piety and Religion Reason it self pleadeth for a civil behaviour towards all which in reason cannot be denied
number the mercies of God to me in particular saith he were to number the drops of water which are in the Ocean the sands on the shore the stars in the sky Mirrour of Martyrs This one act of his good will his Sons mission exceeds the capacity of a whole world of men to give it a due value He would not destroy us being his enemies when he might in justice destroy us but to save us inglorious miscreants sent his Son from glory and did as Abraham would have done with Isaac his onely and beloved darling offer him up to death to redeem us from it As King Solomon said to Abiathar the Priest Thou art worthy of death but I will not at this time put thee to death So said the Soveraign of Soveraigns to us His Son is destined to what we deserved to make us partakers of his deserts Salvator noster natus est nobis crucifixus mortuus est pro nobis ut morte suâ mortem nostram destrueret Aug. Man cap. 27. saith an uncertain Author Our Saviour is born to us crucified and dead for us that by his death lie might destroy our death for ever Wherefore the Lord Jesus upon the Cross giving the foil to our malicious enemies Sin Satan and Death Sin Satan and Death have lost the day to our endless comfort and the glorious manifestation of Gods good-will towards men I may not smother in thankless silence the blessed consequences of my Saviours life and death tendred for our restauration how happily they took effect with the Father in our behalf and accorded in every point of his decree with the good pleasure of his will For first there followed the imputation of Christs righteousness for the remission of our sins And then the Sanctification of us by his Spirit sent into our hearts for the suppressing of the dominion of sin in us Both which shew as speaks the Apostle the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness to us Ephes 2.7 through Christ Jesus First it pleased the Father that the fulness of the Spirit should dwell in him and that of his fulness we should all receive His righteousness then is made over unto us by the goodness of a righteous God whose purity as it admits no mixture of imperfection so neither without Christs perfection any justification of a sinner For none are justified but such to whom God imputes no sin and such are they only to whom God imputeth righteousness without works Which righteousness Rom. 4.6 7. being without our works and imputed must proceed not from our selves full of the soul stains of ugly sins but from another even from him alone in whom dwell all perfections Jesus Christ the righteous Thus and thus alone is God in his Son the Author and finisher of our salvation not imputing our sins unto us but reconciling us unto himself by the imputed righteousness of his Son by whom we have access unto the Father and are no more counted strangers forreiners and exiles but are reimpatriated and made fellow-citizens with the Saints and of the houshold of God Whereupon it is that by the grace of God to use the Apostles speech we are what we are And if by the grace and good will of God then surely not of debt not of merit for grace excludeth both To him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace Rom. 4.4 Cap. 11.6 but of debt And here I could wish with all my soul that this and other infallible Oracles of highest Truth could heat our adversaries from Humane Merits and bring them to the Divine Mercies from Free-will and Possibilities of Nature to the Grace and Good-will of God To merit Heaven by all we can do is a fetch beyond all power of Nature and to aver it a strain as of excessive pride so beyond all true Divinity Merits in us are no such props to our faith as Mercies in God The first grounded upon self-conceit and fond opinion the last upon the demonstration of the Spirit The first all of the Romish faction receive for Orthodoxal truth which we reject for false the last they reject for false which we embrace for truth That Italian-Priest who Achan-like troubles all Israel the festered Head of an infected Body hath so distempered the world with this plausible assertion as that all his Abettors from the most learned Dogmatist to the meanest Papist stand rather to their own strength for their Justification than fly to Gods mercy as having more confidence in their own abilities and pretended merits than in the alsufficiency of Christs Mediation and Redemption or at least as much Who whilst they stand thus affected what do they but detracting both from the Lord and from his Anointed ascribe the honour of the day and glory of our salvation as well to the Free-will of Man Saunders his Petition as Good-will of God But O my soul come not thou within their secrets neither be partaker of their defections Chuse rather than combine with them ever to pray with that zealous Martyr in this wise O my heavenly Father look upon me in the face of Christ or else I shall not be able to abide thy countenance such is my filthiness The best of us may confess with the leprous person We are unclean we are unclean and therefore without him no blessedness to be obtained by the best of us Joh. 14.6 No man cometh to the Father but by me saith Christ And no man cometh unto me saith Christ again except the Father draw him Thus betwixt the Father and the Son we are well provided for without whom who thinks to be saved Plaut Merca. doth take his mark amiss Vbicunque putant vivere runnt maximè as the Comedian speaks Where they think to live most happily they die most wretchedly Wherefore for us to repose any confidence in our own imperfect works or to seek a shelter under the Merits of Saints recorded in the Pope's Kalendar or wheresoever else is utterly to renounce the Merits of Christ and the good-will of God Neque enim qui habet virtutem amplius opus habet neque qui valet viribus Clem. Alex. eget instauratione saith Clement of Alexandria For he that is perfect needs not to be beholding to another neither needeth he any reparation his proper strength is already compleat They that are whole need not the Physician but they that are sick saith the Physician of souls Let then the swolne Pharisees of the Roman Court in humility of spirit learn here to check their insolent boasting of their natural goodness and meritorious actions referring all to the goodness of the Chiefest Good Let them march under Christs colours as the Captain of their salvation Let them set up their rest in him as the securest Sanctuary for distressed souls O worthy Elizeus how affectionate were thine Obsequies You may remember that he could neither be perswaded nor beguiled nor forced from Elijah when he
nature he had made ours by grace And here we may be as bold as to conclude we are the sons of God because the natural Son of God assumed body of our body flesh of our flesh and bone of our bones that he might be the same with us and we the same with him Thus he became our Kinsman to whom of property by the old Law it did belong to redeem his brethren Which that he might effect he did conquer Death and who could do this but he who is our Life He did vanquish Sin and who could do this but Righteousness it self He did bring into his subjection the Forces of the world and the Powers that rule in the air and who could do this but he that is the Power of God And who is this Life this Righteousness this Power of God but Jesus Christ very God of very God and yet the Son of Man Christ was God and Man Man that sin might be punished in the nature offending yet Man without sin to fulfill that Righteousness which none of us sold under sin can fulfill He was Man that as by the disobedience of the first Adam sin entred into the world so by the obedience of him who is the second Adam righteousness should bring justification to life And as by one mans disobedience many were made sinners so by the obedience of one many shall be made righteous By the righteousness of his obedience Active and Passive Active in perfecting all the duties injoined by the Law Passive in suffering the wrath of God the punishment of our disobedience Thus our confusion is taken away and life and righteousness are restored unto us And he was God withal that the Justice of God might receive compleat satisfaction by a punishment that should be infinite or equal to infinite which none but God could give And therefore Christ is said as God to have purchased his Church with his own blood Act. 20. 1 Joh. 3.16 and to lay down his life for us And though his punishment was not so infinite but that it was finite yet it was only finite for time but was for value as it ought to be infinite Thus the Son of True God did bear the burden of his Fathers wrath in our nature which no other Nature ought to do but the soul that sinned which no other but God could do because God is a consuming fire and his wrath unquenchable by any creature Forasmuch as God alone could not die because not subject to passion nor Man alone overcome death because too weak It was requisite that our Redeemer who should die for our sins should be both that by the weakness of the one nature he might submit himself to the power of death thereby to undergo punishment due to sin and by the strength of the other he should by sustaining the Manhood make good his part against death and swallow it up in victory O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory But thanks be to God Sarcasmo conflat hostili derisione quâ mors ridenda propinatur saith one that hath given us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ And thus much of the Person humbled which is Christ God and Man The next point to be discuss'd is Wherein his Humiliation did consist that is in general He suffered From the time of his nativity to the very hour of his death was he not free from suffering He was no sooner born but Herod sought his life He was subject to the infirmities of our nature sin excepted He was hungry and thirsty weary and faint sorrowful and discontented his poverty was extream though Lord of all and Possessor of heaven and earth he had not so much as whereon to lay his head Grievous was the temptation he suffered by Satans onset infinite were the injuries that were offered him by the cursed brats of Satan both in word and deed In word by false calumnies and forged accusations by contumelious detractions and cursed blasphemies In deed by framing of projects and laying of plots how to take away his life He was despised and rejected of men a man of sorrowes and acquainted with grief and we hid as it were our faces from him Isa 53. He was despised and we esteemed him not surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrowes Yet we esteemed him stricken smitten of God and afflicted His whole life was a perpetual passion He was never let alone until upon the Cross he gave himself a ransom for all and his enemies never ceased until they drew out his hearts blood which he for our redemption in his loving kindness was willing to part withall He had power in his own hand to lay down his life and he had power to assume it again For albeit his life lay at the stake yet could he were he so disposed command legions of Angels beside his own power which was alsufficient to deliver him either by putting his enemies to flight or by repressing their violence that either they would not or they should not hurt him or by utterly subverting them But being that he came into the world to the end to suffer to compass for us a world without all end he withdrew not his neck from the yoke but set himself forward to bear the iniquity of us all laid upon him Thus Christ was subject to passion but not according to his divine but humane nature For as he is God he is Actus purissimus and cannot suffer but yet he being God suffered in the nature assumed which was capable of suffering that is in his Manhood So that here we have the highest Person and the lowest Humiliation met together Wherefore in this suffering of our Lord there are three things according to Bernards observation specially noted Bernard Opus modus causa In opere patientia in modo humilitat in causa charitas commendatur Patientia singularis humilitas admirabilis sed charitas inestimabilis There are the work the manner of performing and the cause In the work which is suffering his patience is commended in the manner his humility in the cause his charity for charity moved him to suffer with patience and humility His patience is singular none like it his humility admirable none ever came never shall come near it his charity inestimable for it is incomparable All which may appear unto you by presenting to your view his special sufferings immediately preceding his death In these sufferings of our Saviour you may see the foulest act of Treason that ever was committed the greatest Cruelty that was ever heard of both hatcht in the pit of hell Judas his familiar friend comes and betrays him with a false-hearted complement a Kiss his love was only from the teeth outward deceit was in his heart and the poison of asps under his lips but no wonder the Devil was in him Peter his Disciple than whom none more forward in times past to confess him to be
God no man all spirit no body And besides it argues an impossibility for no creature can be changed into the Creatonr no finite body into an infinite and eternal substance It sufficeth us to know that Christ's soul and body were conditioned according to the description given when he entred into his glory And thus much of the person exalted Christ who for the joy that was set before him endured the crosse despising the shame Hebr. 12.2 and is set down on the right hand of the throne of God We are next to consider Christ's exaltation the degrees of which are threefold the first degree is his Resurrection answering to the first degree of his humiliation which was his death The second degree is his ascension answering the second of his humiliation which was his burying The third degree which is the height of his exaltation is his sitting at the right hand of God opposed to the lowest of his humiliation which was his descâ—nt into hell his remaining in the state of the dead By these degrees Christ entred into his glory My text limits me to the first degree of his exaltation which is his Resurrection from the dead It was a cruel conflict that Christ had upon the crosse he had his own Father against him taking vengeance upon him for the sins of the world he had Satan against him who out of a malicious disposition plotted and attempted his ruine he had the world against him in bruing their hands and their hearts in his blood his blood be upon us and our children say the Jewes The chief Priests the Scribes the common people the souldiers bandied themselves together against the Lord and against his annointed So close was their pursuing of him that indeed he received the foile they pierced his hands and his feet with nailes and his sides with a speare in the end they ended his dayes the height of their malice But not long after he reviv'd for the third day he rose again which he did for his own greater glory for his and our enemies more shamefull overthrow and for his disciples firmer consolation This was foretold by himself this was testified by men and Angels and is beleeved that he rose the third day Our faith in this is underpropt not only by the testimony of Angels and men Luk. 24.46 but also by Scripture and Arguments Thus it is written and thus it behoved Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day By Arguments containing manifest demonstrations of the truth of his resurrection drawn from 1. His body 2. His soulâ— In that which is drawn from his dody Christ doth declare three things 1. That his body was a true real substantial and sollid dody And not framed onely in the imagination or compos'd all of an airy substance Feele and see saith he a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have 2. That his body was a humane body by shewing how that he had the true and perfect effigies and expressions or a man to be seen by the eye 3. That it was the very same numerical body which he hâ—d before by laying open to the view the grievous wounds which he suffered in his body Behold my hands and my feet that it is my self The wounds in his body discover the naked truth of his resurrection In the Argument which is deducted from his soul reunited to his body his resurrection is proved and that by the operations and works of the threefold life proceeding from the soul whereof man is partaker 1. By the works of the nutritive life in that he did eat and drink with them 2. By the works of the sensitive life his answers to his disciples giving evidences of his hearing his discerning them from others of his seeing 3. By the works of the intellective life in his discourses and explications of the profound mystery of the crosse Moreover the time when he rose was the third day He lay not dead in the grave three compleat dayes under the dominion of death for then he should not have risen till the fourth day So that he was but one day and two pieces of two dayes in the grave for he was buried in the evening before the Sabbath and rose in the morning the next day after the Sabbath The Friday evening he was buried the sunday morning he rose again which was the first day of the week and is now our Sabbath observed in memory of his glorious rising who is the Sun of Righteousness from death unto life And as in the first Day of the first World Light was commanded to shine out of darkness upon the deeps So in the first Day of this new World made new by Christ this glorious Sun after its Eclipse come to its period appeared in the brightness of his glory and gives light for ever to those that sit in darkness and dispels those clouds of obscurity that were under the Old Testament from the Christian world So long he rested in the grave as three days yet not full for a demonstraiton of the truth of his death And no longer that his body might not see corruption For had he risen presently we might doubt of the truth of his death Had he remained longer in the grave or unto the end of the world his body would according to the course of nature be corrupted and we might doubt of the truth of his Divinity which required for the manifestation of his power a quick resurrection of his body and a reuniting of the soul thereunto To confirm therefore our faith in both He rose the third day from the dead to enter into his glory As for the power by which he was raised it was not by any other than his own Though this act be attributed to the Father Act. 2.24 yet it is his power too For whatsoever is the Father's is his because He and the Father are one It was the power of his Divinity Superas evadere ad auras Hic labor hoc opus est that effected this great work Destroy this temple and within three days I will raise it again Joh. 2.19 I have power to lay down my life and I have power to take it again cap. 10.18 Secundum Divinitatis virtutem corpus resumpsit animam quam deposuerat anima corpus resumpsit quod dimiserat sic Christus propriâ virtute resurrexit saith Aquinas According to the mighty working of the Godhead his body reassumed the soul which it did resigne and the soul that body out of which it parted and thus Christ by his own proper power did rise from the dead For indeed it was not possible that he should be holden of it Act. 2.24 for then should he not enter into his glory Here come two points occasioned by these words to be treated of Viz. 1. The Necessity of Christ's Resurrection 2. The Ends thereof Of the Necessity of his Resurrection As it was necessary that Christ should
die so was it necessary he should live again 1. In regard of Gods Decree Isa 53.10 revealed in his Word promising that He should see his seed that is the Just and that He would prolong his days Peter in his Sermon on the day of Pentecost averrs That David in the 16. Psalm spake of Christ's Rising by way of prediction the knowledge whereof came unto him by Divine infusion Act. 2.31 2. It was necessary for the instruction and settlement of our Faith we being naturally prone to infidelity And that 1. Concerning the Divinity of our Saviour Christ the glory and truth whereof had not been made sufficiently apparent had he not used his power in rising again But in that he is risen he hath mightily declared himself to be the Son of God i.e. Ex afflicto ejus statu as Gal. 4.14 very God of very God Who although he was crucified through weakness yet he liveth by the power of God 2 Cor. 13.4 If Christ be not risen saith the same Apostle 1 Cor. 15. then our preaching is in vain and in vain our faith By his Resurrection therefore we obtain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fidei a full measure of faith in this that there is no place of doubting left us but that we firmly may believe that Jesus Christ is true God for whom to be held bound in the strict chains of a powerful death is a matter of the greatest impossibility Again it was necessary for the settlement of our Faith 2. Concerning the victory Christ hath gotten over death The weaker is overcome of the stronger so that if Christ had not risen he had been weaker than Death had not been a sufficient Redeemer we had been still in our sins we could not have been perswaded God had received perfect satisfaction But being that he is revived by the same Power that giveth life unto all Death hath no longer dominion over him Gods justice is satisfied and we remain no longer in our sins Wherefore we may well in the language of triumph proclaim O death where is thy sling O grave where is thy victory And we continuing the same note may adde by the vertue of a lively faith Thanks be to God who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ 3. It was necessary for the comforting assistance of our Hope lest it should be converted into a Desperate humour Our propensity to Desperation is by woful experience too well known But inasmuch as our Saviour our Head Clarissima fidei confâ—ssio Brentius Brevis longa totaque aurea est haec Apologia saith another had a glorious Exit out of the grave and an absolute conquest over death it is forcible enough to make us hope that we his members united unto him by the indissoluble bond of the Spirit shall also rise again after death Upon this hope was that speech of Job grounded I know that my Redeemer liveth and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth and though after my skin worms destroy this body yet in my flesh shall I see God whom I shall see for my self and mine eyes shall behold and not another though my reins be consumed within me Job 19. Were it not for Christ's Resurrection hope herein might have failed both him and us for his is the cause of ours therefore is he stiled Primitiae dormientium The first-fruits of them that sleep 4. It was necessary for the compleat and perfect consummation of our eternal happiness For in that he was humbled to sustain great evils by dying for our freedom from all evil so was he glorified by his Resurrection for our promotion to all â—ood He was delivered for our offences and raised again for our justification Rom. â— ult And as it is Heb. 7.25 He is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them 5. It was necessary in regard of the compleat discharge of his office of Priesthood to which he was from all eternity anointed of the Father If he had not risen again he had not performed the full duty of that calling which required that he should make satisfaction for the sins of people which he did by offering up himself an Offering and a Sacrifice to God of a sweet smelling favour upon the Cross And further that calling required also that he should apply the vertue of this Sacrifice the merit of his death to every true Believer which could not be performed without his Resurrection So that as he died to satisfie the justice of God so was it requisite he should rise from death to make to us a particular application of the vertue of his Passion by his effectual Intercession unto his Father in heaven for us upon earth Whereupon comes the Apostles Quaere and Answer Rom. 8.34 Who is he that condemneth It is Christ that died yea rather that is risen again who is even at the right hand of God who also maketh intercession for us Thus much of the Necessity of Christ's Resurrection The second point is concerning the Ends of his Resurrection which are divers Viz. 1. In regard of himself 2. In regard of the Law 3. In regard of us In regard of himself the end of his Rising was twofold 1. To declare that he himself that Holy and Just one whom the Jews had by wicked hands crucified and slain was the Prince of life Who at his pleasure as he could give life to others so unto himself Act. 3.15 though he were brought to the lowest step of an humbled state though death held him in its hands For if at his Crucifying the shaking of the earth the rising of some dead bodies the obscuration of the Sun not hap'ning within the compass of the course of nature because not at the usual time of the conjunction of those two Planets the Sun and Moon wrested a confession out of the spectators that He was the Son of God much more may his Resurrection evict thus much that He is the Prince of life who might lay down and take up his life when he pleased And 2. That having finished and perfected the great work of our Redemption he might reign thenceforth for ever in glory â—â—n 7.14 Whose dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away and whose Kingdom that which shall not be destroyed Albeit he seemed for a time to be deposed from his Royalty whilst he submitted himself to death yet it was but a short cessation that he might come off with the greater honour and so to enter into his greatest glory In regard of the Law the end of his Rising was to ratifie the truth of that Promise of life which was pass d unto man upon the performance of that Covenant passed betwixt God and man Do this and thou shalt live It could not be but that in equity Christ should live again being that he did fulfill exactly and precisely
the ordinance of God for He did all things well Wherefore to shew that God keeps his word and that the truth of his promises is infallible He rose again from the dead In regard of us the end of his Rising is threefold Viz. 1. For our Example 2. For our Justification 3. For our Faith c. First for our Example tending to the information of us in the ways of righteousness in the paths of life That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father even so we also should walk in newness of life that the body of sin might be destroyed Resurectione Domini configuratur vita quae hic geritur and that henceforth we should not serve sin Rom. 6.4.6 The Resurrection of Christ from the dead should be a pattern for us wherein there is some effective vigor to raise us from the death of sin to a gracious life The power of effecting both is in God A Dâ—o est quod unima vivat per gratiam corpus per Animam That the soul lives by grace and the body by the soul comes from God Aquinas who is the Author of life And saith Ames Christ rising from death is tum demonstratio quam initiatio as well a demonstration as the initiation or beginning of our Rusurrection by whom we pass from death unto life Secondly for our Justification They are the express words of the Apostle He was raised again for our justification Rom. 4. ult For now that he hath gotten the victory over death by reviving he applies by the vertue thereof all the benefits of the Gospel unto us to the exceeding great consolation of our souls Lastly for the establishment of our faith concerning the obtaining of life everlasting For indeed if the Head be risen the members may be sure to rise too and if the Head receive life and glory doubtless the members which have their proper dependunce of him shall receive the like perfection for a glorified Head cannot be without a glorified body Now Christ is the head of the body the Church Col. 1.18 who is the beginning the first-born from the dead that in all things he may have the preheminence Of the fulness of whose glory in the day of our perfect redemption we shall all receive a full measure For a Conclusion Communi naturae lege moriuntur homines The sons of men composed of dust and ashes die by the common law of nature Eternity is proper to another world not to this to this Inconstancie The Son of the most High himself when he became the Son of man was subjected to Mortality He pleaded no Prerogative royal to be exempted from that end which God setled in the course of nature Our times upon the Earth may be said to be lasting but not everlasting though in the hands of God Heaven decreed a period to our Lives which we cannot prevent and to which Christ at the appointed houre did submit himself with all obedience not able to avoid it Necessity was laid upon him to pay the dubt to Nature which might serve for a payment of our debt to God yet not respectu peccuti Wâ—ems Protralcture of Gods image in man pag. 43. but respectis poenae this necessity was not in respect of sin He was a Lamb without blemish and without spot but in respect of that punishmenâ— which he did oblige himself to undergo for the sins of men Est illata necessiaâ— Adamò innata necessit as nobis assumpta necessitas in Christo Necessity of death was laid upon Adam for his sin necessity of death is imbred in us and by a voluntary assumption there was a necessity of death in Christ A man willingly gives his word for such a summe for his friend but when he hath willingly given it he must of necessity pay it So Christ willingly took this debt upon him and in the fulness of time when 't was exacted paid it down even his life to God and nature But albeit he thus parted from the world yet God hath raised him up Etiam animalula quaedam typâ— Resurrectionis sunt Lavat in Job 14.12 having loos'd the paines of death because it was not possible that he should be holden of it So though the hand of fate by Natures unconfused order reduce us to our first principles yet shall we rise again by the mighty power of our eternal Maker The Judge of all the word hath appointed a day wherein to judge the world to which all must rise And as all must die and after death come to judgment so Christ was once offered to bear the â—ius of many and unto them that look for him shall be appear the second time without sin unto salvation THE BLESSED AMBASSADOR OR THE Best sent into the Basest GALATH. 4.6 And because ye are sons God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts crying Abba Father GODS love wherewith he hath embrac'd the sons of men in his onely Son is of such large extent as cannot be limited as cannot be measured the breadth and length and depth and height thereof Eph. 3.18 19. doth passe our knowledge Doth passe our finding out The length the breadth the depth of the earth the sea the heavens Mathematicians by their speculations do conjecture but the love of God the most ingenious and judicious cannot it so exceeds so much as conjecture much lesse perfectly know because infinite Would a man part with his only son and alone darling and he content he should die a most ignoble and ignominious death to ransome his servants his cantives his slaves rebels that would cut his throat I cannot be perswaded the world affords such a man such a Phenix there was but one in all the world Abraham found willing to slay his son to rip up his bowels that spruug out of his own when God commanded it Yet the Lord of heaven and earth whose mercies are over all his works sent his only Son to save sinners to dye that by his death we may live Though servants Cantives slaves rebels yet by his Son made Kings Priests Prophets sons and heirs of an eternal inheritance O the depth the height and length and breadth of Gods love He sent his Son forth from him to bring us to him he freely gave him to redeem us from the insulting power of Sathan from the captivity and dominion of sin from the oppressing tyranny of the world to bring us into the glorious liberty of the Sons of God This liberty this sonship is obtained by faith for to as many as beleeve in his name hath he given power to become the Sons of God All ye then that beleeve are no more servants but sons not sons of wrath but sons of God not sons by nature but sons by grace And because sons behold the Lords bounty is enâ—arged toward you the treasures of his graces are open for you the store-house of his riches is
as much as possibly may be If it be possible as much as in you is have peace with all men Rom. 12.18 hereby are we known to be the happy subjects of the Prince of peace As for gentlenesse it is that whereby we behave our selves friendly and courteously to every man shewing all meeknesse unto all men Tius 3.2 whether they be good or bad It standeth in these points 1. To speak friendly and lovingly to every man 2. To salute courteously without dissembling not according to the common fashion of the world full of curtesie full of craft 3. To be ready upon all occasions to reverence and honour every man in his place Non mentiâ—ntis astu sed compatientis assectu non quiâ— fallâ—t illum sed qui se cogitat illum Aug. to which God shall call him As for goodnesse it is when a man is serviceable to all men at all times upon all occasions thus Job was eyes to the blind and feet to the lame a father unto the poor Job 29.15 Thus good Paul was made all things to all men that by all means he might save some 1 Cor. 9.22 Observing his own rule delivered to the Galatians cap. 5.13 By love serve one another hereby condemning that profane perverse and gracelesse practice of the world every one for himself and God for us all As for faith or fidelity it performs these two duties 1. It maketh conscience of a lye and speaketh not one thing and thinketh another like Machiavels scholars but uttereth the truth without the least dissimulation 2. It makes a man keep his lawful promise though it be to his own hurt For mine own part I shall never desire a firmer obligation of an honest man so reputed than his lawful and serious promise which if he do not perform he cracks his credit before men and sins before God As for meeknesse it is when by injurious and rash dealing a man is provoked and yet he neither intends nor attempts a revenging requital As for temperance it is a bridling of our appetite in meat drink or apparel 1. Our eating and drinking must be joyned with fasting not riot lest with overmuch pampering our selves we prove unfit for Gos service 2. Our attire must be decent both for fashion and matter as that it may expresse the graces of God in the heart as sobriety Zeph. 1.8 gravity humility we must not be strangely attired for faith the Lord I will punish all such as are cloathed with strange apparel Consider this O ye daughters of Jerusalem and men of Israel that ye fashion not your selves strangely according to the world and incurr the heavie displeasure of the most just God such covering is a discovering of your nakednesse whereby it is made most apparent to the world that instead of sobriety intemperance instead of humility pride instead of graviâ—y wantonnesse doth reign among you so that you are not led by the Spirit of God whose government and direction ye should follow but rather by the spirit of error Expostulate then can you find in your hearts an utter dislike of sin because it is sin and a godly sorrow for it Can you find in your hearts a forsaking of sin seconded with a fixt resolution of yielding obedience to the Divine Ordinances of God Can you find in your hearts an avoiding of all occasions that may minister matter of offending God with an unsatisfied desire to be at peace and unity with him then the Spirit of his Son is sent into our hearts The fifth benefit confer'd on those on whom the Spirit is confer'd is that unspeakable comfort which none can take away from them conceived in them in the time of their greatest extremity hence the Spirit is called the Comforter John 14.16 Our Saviour told his Disciples that he would send them another Comforter that should remain with them for ever Hence again he is call'd Oleum laetitiae the oyle of gladnesse he cheareth the heart of man by raising up his dead spirits and making him to rejoyce in the Lord. The causes of our sorrow are either outward calamities or a troubled conscience in both which the Comforter takes away our sorrow and begetteth joy We read of the Apostles that after Christ ascended they fled from place to place and hid themselves for fear of the spiteful Jews But as soon as they received the holy Ghost they were as bold as Lions they preach't Christ crucified in publick they impartially reproved sin to the full and taking heart of grace did rejoyce that they were counted worthy to suffer for the name of Christ Hence did proceed that heroick spirit that History reports to be in those Martyrs which spilt their blood for him that spilt his blood for them 'T is not the face of man could daunt them their inward comfort did far exceed their outward tribulation and though their bodies perisht by external violence yet so great was their spiritual consolation that they felt no pain In like manner when any of the faithful are through extreme poverty brought low and thereby brought into contempt in the world yet they comfort themselves in the providence and promises of God that can never fail insomuch as that all calamities he what they will cannot deprive them of their inward comfort Nor yet a troubled conscience altogether though an unsupportable burden for then when their consciences are troubled the Spirit labours to restore them to the joyes of their salvation by stirring up faith in them apprehending Christ and with him the remission of sin purisying their hearts and consciences from dead works assuring them that their reconciliation is made in heaven and that there is now no condemnation unto them than which there cannot be a greater comfort in this world Physitians have observed in the heart two motions the one is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a dilatation or enlargement of the heart the other is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a constriction or closing up of the heart Spiritual Physitians may observe the same in their hearts where the Spirit of God takes up his mansion My heart saith David is enlarged enlarged with those comforts and joyes which the Spirit that inhabits there begets there and none else And the heart is closed up again against the receiving or entertaining all worldly sorrow which as the Apostle saith causeth death and keeps within it self the joy of the holy Ghost hence the hearts of the faithful may be said to be full full of joy full of the holy Ghost full of life for God sends forth the Spirit of his Son into their hearts The last benefit whereby the Spirits presence is noted in our hearts is the strength valour and livelihood whereby we go on in the Spirit fighting a good fight against the enemies of our salvation and finishing our course with joy We hear of an order of Knights called Knights of the holy Ghost of this order are all the faithful that undertake Christian
Socer and after banished into France with his wanton Herodias died an Exile The Jews that persecuted Christ and his Apostles what punishments they had their lamentable wars and more lamentable destruction is a sufficient testimony Herod Agrippa that put James John's brother to death was put to death by vermine as his Grandfather was If we take a slight view of the Ten Persecutions Nero who robb'd Peter and paid Paul Peter of his life Paul with death was his own death kill'd himsel Domitian that banished John into Pathmos and crucified Simon Bishop of Jerusalem that put Publius Bishop of Athens to death was killed and his statues and monuments taken quite away Trajan that caused Simeon Bishop of Alexandria to be crucified and Ignatius Bishop of Antioch to be devoured of wild beasts suffered many miseries in his time Tiber overflowed all Rome Pantheon burnt with thunderbolts Cities in Asia shaken with grievous Earthquakes and the whole Empire almost wasted by a most wretched dearth Adrianus in whose Persecution Alexander Bishop of Rome with Hermes his wife children and household to the number of twelve hundred and fifty persons were burnt all in a furnace and Theodorus a Deacon had his tongue cut out of his head his hands and feet cut off afterwards beheaded and was cast to dogs at this time there were ten thousand crucified in Mount Ararat round with thorns and their bodies pierced through with darts at last he died doubting of the life to come Antoninus Verus and his brother Luâ—us persecuted Polycarpus Bishop of Smyrna and Justin the Philosopher put to death but in their time there did an unheard of Plague spread over a great part of their Empire Severus a most severe Emperor in persecuting the Christians caused Irenaeus Bishop of Lions and Calixtus Bishop of Rome to be martyred but after he himself was slain and the Roman Empire afflicted with Civil wars Maximinus who martyred Hypolitus Bishop of an head City in Arabia was killed by his soldiers Decius in whose reign another Bishop of Antioch suffered death died miserably in the Scythian war suffocated in a fen In the persecution under Valerian died Cypriun Bishop of Carthage that Caesar of the Christian But he was vanquished by Sapor King of Persia and served instead of a footstool when the Persian took horse I had almost forgot one thing A Judge in the time of Severus condemned one Agapeius a youth of fifteen at whose execution the Judge fell down from his seat and cried his bowels burnt within him and so died Dioclesian and Maximian raised a Persecution which like a flood ran over all the Roman Provinces Syria Tyre Egypt c. But at last Dioclesian in his old days poyson'd himself and Maximian died a dogs death he was hang'd up for a sign of Gods wrath by Constantine Thus in these Ten Persecutions Gods Ministers run through fire and water as the Prophet David speaks of the afflictions of Gods children and were not spared But God spared not to punish those wicked Emperors the raisers of them Then after Julian the Apostate plays the devil but God the Lord of Hosts for the Persian got the honor of the day and Julian wounded sprinkling his blood up toward heaven died blaspheming Vicisti tandem puer Galilee Vulence seduced by the Arrians made havock of the Church but being taken of the Gothes in a Cabin whither he fled was burnt there I could proceed The Mahumetan Persecution I need not insist on Only The Saracens they are vanished Selymus the first Turkish Emperor rooted out of that Nation and the Turks they never are at ease but at continual war whose end by the judgment of the more learned is at hand Neither need I and therefore will not insist on the Persecutions continued under the Popes in Italy Germany Spain France England and in the Eastern tract of the world But who knows not the state of that Church from whom are hidden what deaths many and most of them died Take one for all Boniface the 8. of whom it is reported He came in like a Fox he reigned like a Lion and died like a Dog Let these Examples be as so many arguments to induce Gods Ministers howsoever persecuted to rejoice for Blessed are you when for Christs sake ye suffer persecution for yours is the kingdom of heaven Mat. 5. They that will not receive your crying aloud without sparing shake the dust off your feet against them Sodom and Gomorrah shall be in a better case at the last day than they Mat. 10.14 cap. 11.22 cap. 12.42 It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Siaon than for them The Ninevites and the Queen of the South shall rise up in judgment against them Therefore tell them their own soundly and fear not Though ye be among scorpions as the Lord said to Ezekiel spare not for fear of the ensuing dangers For whosoever spareth incurs his own destruction and the destruction of the people both shall be overwhelmed in the flood of Gods wrath both shall sink into the gulf of everlasting perdition both being as the Prophet Jeremy speaks sifted in the sieve of vanity Yea Press things home to the Conscience and spare not though no hope of amendment of their life appear God bids thee and duty birds thee because God bids thee 1.2 Though ye will not be believed as Jeremy was not where Azariah Johanan and all the proud men said to him Thou speakest falsly Yet cry aloud and spare not leave the event to God Go saith he to Ezekiel and tell this people whether they hear or hear not If they do they shall have life if not judgments are prepared for scorners and stripes for the back of fools Prov. 19. ult For if they heir not you when you cry from God to them God will not hear them when they cry to him or you for them Jer. 7.16 Now God Almighty enable embolden and encourage all his Ministers to cry aloud to those whose minds are wandring that their hearts may turn to God to those that are in pursuit of their own wicked lusts that they may be reclaimed to those that are afar off that they may hear and return homeward to God to those that are asleep in sin that they may awake to righteousness to those that stop their ears that they may open them with gladness to those that hear carelesly that they may hear diligently to those that are dead in sins that they may arise and be quickned with the life of grace to the life of glory Again As we must take heed of our Doctrine so we must take heed of our Lives that we be unspotted of this wicked world Mundamimini qui fertis vasa Domini Ye that carry the vessels of the Lord be clean The Breast-plate of the Priest had this inscription HOLINESS TO THE LORD signifying that we should have Holiness imprest in our hearts Remember the Orders ye have taken they are holy Holy Orders Be
in the salvation of penitent and beleeving soules the glory of his justice in the condemnation of obdurate and perverse malefactors As it is a perfect law so it is a law of liberty oppos'd to the Mosaical which is lex senvitutis a law of thraldome The liberty of this law in respect of our twofold condition is twofold 1. Gracious here in the life of grace wrought by Christ the Son of the everliving God if the Son make us free we are free indeed Joh. 8.36 Wherefore we have a free accesse at all times to call upon the Father of mercys imploring his powerful assistance in holy actions and invincible protection from all evil 2. Glorious in the life of glory called Vindicationis libertas the liberty of compleat redemption the creature being delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God Phrasis qulgatissima est Deum colere Non secus at que agri fertiles inprimis optimi sic Dei cultus fâ—uctus fert ad vitam aternam uberrimos Of this twofold liberty there are these parts 1. A liberty from sin our submission to the Gospel and faithful embracing of the promises of God in Christ frees us both from the raigning power of sin and from the condemning power For being made free from sin we become servants to God and have our fruit unto holiness and the and everlusting life Rom. 6.22 2. A liberty from the yoke of the ceremonial law and bondage of the morall From the yoke of the ceremonial law which was so ponderous as that neither we nor our fathers were able to bear but now by Christ and the law of faith it is blotted out quite abolished and taken out of the way And from the bondage of the moral law in these ensuing particulars 1. From the curse and consequently from the punishment of sin the transgression of the law Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a curse for us Gal. 3.13 Rom. 8.1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Apostle certifies us that there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus 2. From the rigour and exaction of the law requiring of us for our justification perfect righteousness inherent in us and perfect obedience to be practis'd by us 3. From the terrour and coaction of the law which ingendereth servile fear in those who are under it and compelleth them through the horror of torment as bond-slaves by the whip or rack to the outward though unwilling performance of it But those that are under the law of grace are zealously addicted to good works and services of God which are over done by them with the free consent of a plous mind the original cause whereof is not any natural disposition but the love of God shed abroad in our hearts by the holy Ghost which is given unto us 4. from the instigation of the law for which reason saith Pareus on 1 Cor. 15.56 it hath got the name of the strength of sin whereby sin appears more sinfull which is not caused by any fault in the law in it self good and condemning sin but through the viciousness of our unregenerate nature that takes occasion from the sacred prohibitions of it to transgresse which irritation is accidentall not essentiall to the undefiled law of the righteous Lord. Another part of this liberty is a liberty from death which is twofold the first and the second They that are effectually in subjection to the Gospel the glad-tidings of peace are free from the first death as it is a punishment And from the second over them the second death shall have no power Tollitur morâ— non ne fiat sed ne obsit Aug. To them the nature of the first death is changed and made but transitus ad vitam a passage from death to life it is the end of sin and misery and the beginning of our unspeakable happiness the high-way from the vale of teares to the Kingdom of glory and Celestiall joyes the Period of a mortall life and the innitiation of a life immortal Last of all there is a liberty from Sathan and the world granted to the sons of God adopted in the Son of God the Son of God hath over come the strong man Not imperium Principis but Carnificis à Lapide and bound him as being stronger than he thorough death he destroyed him that had the power of death that is the Devil and delivereth them who through fear of death were all their life time subject to bondage Heb. 2.14 Get thee behind us Satan as Christ said to Peter and let the wicked world follow thee which Christ hath over-come Joh. 16. ult And since O loving Saviour we live free men free from sin reigning condemning free from Satan and the world under the easy yoke of thy Evangelical Law and under the protection of thy wings We will with thy disciples follow thee whithersoever thou goest and run after thee whither thy good Spirit shall lead us Thus it is apparent how the Gospel of Christ is a perfect Law of liberty into which whoso looketh and continueth therein he being not a forgetfull hearer but a doer of the work shall be blessed in his deed From the bottome of the stairs or ladder we now go up the steps the first whereof is speculation whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty Joh. 5.39 Audite saeculares comparate vobis Biblia animae Pharmaca Chrysost Prono capite propenso collo accurate in trospieere 1 Pet. 1.12 It was a good advice blest be the mouth that gave it Search the Scriptures which is made good by the reasons rendred for in them ye think ye have eternal life and they are they which testify of me saith our Saviour hence this search must not be slight this speculation not vain this looking not perfunctory our Knowledge of Christ and eternal life depending on it This is intimated in the original word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying an exact and accurate prying into a thing as if one to find out somewhat difficult to find out should stand in this posture with his body or head bended towards the earth his eyes contracted and fixed upon some object as if he did intend to look it through and so to inform himself fully Thus when we attempt to look into the abstruse mysteries of divinity to acquaint our selves with the sacred Principles of Religion a superficial view is of no avail Profound matters require a serious and frequent meditation an indefatigable study hence the Apostle St Peter describing the desire of the Angels to know the hidden mysteries of salvation expresseth it by the same word the Angels desire to look narrowly into the things revealed to us by the Holy Ghost a work worthy their and our pains not to be posted over with a careless run but to be stuck close unto and prosecuted until finished and the mind in
imputed to them many were the spots and wrinkles of the Saints whilst here militant Sanctity imports among other things a cleansing from impurity whence Isidore Sancti quasi sanguine tincti Saints are so called because they are sprinkled with the blood of Jesus Christ that cleanseth from all sin Who were antiently purified were sprinkled with the blood of the Sacrifice so now the Saints with the blood of the Son of God who gave himself for them to God an Offering and a Sacrifice of a sweet smelling savour the righteousness and merits of which Sacrifice are made theirs by assignment Assignata est homini aliena justitia quia caruit suâ Bernard saith Bernard The righteousness of another is allotted and assigned unto man because he lost his own conferr'd on him of God Since mans first apostacy and fall from God none could ever be perfect Saints in this world without the perfect rightcousness of Christ which perfects them alone to whom it is imputed who being in Christ Jesus are considered as one mystical person with him who is their Head from whom floweth all perfection by whom remission of sin is compassed and through whom freedom from condemnation eternally is obtained Thus Gods Saints are Saints by Imputation whom I believe in Christ to be no sinners and therefore not guilty of death but just and holy and lords over both sin and death and assured heirs of everlasting life The Saints of God are Saints by Renovation For to whom God sent forth his Son into the world to redeem them God sends forth the Spirit of his Son into their hearts to sanctifie them which Sanctity wrought by the Spirit of grace and Word of God is a quality or qualification newly created in their hearts whereby the Image of God which was lost by the fall of Adam is again restored and the corruption of sin by degrees abolished the working grace of the blessed Spirit never ceasing until by a transcendent operation it mould and frame them to righteousness and true holiness Hence they are called new creatures whose intentions and actions are conformed to the exact rule of hóliness Gods most holy Word and the unerring directions of his renewing Spirit Saints thus by Renovation have in them a twofold grace and righteousness Viz. 1. Inherent grace 2. Actual grace The inherent grace or righteousness of the Saints doth not originally arise out of the principles of Nature but of Gods free grace not of their own industrious acquisition but of Gods favorable infusion Hereby the tyranny of sin was and is suppressed in them and the violence of their natural corruption inclined to mischief by the predominancy of a more effectual grace habituated in them kept in order and subjection Hereby the ruines of our nature are repaired and we by the quickning power of the God of life therein graciously revived Hereby all Gods Saints are disposed and enabled to perform his injunctions and made acceptable in the Beloved without whom inherent grace or sanctity is neither permanent nor operative for in Christ and by Christ alone the Saints are what they are and do what good they do The actual righteousness of the Saints of God is that conformity which their actions proceeding from the habit of grace wrought in them by the Spirit of sanctification dwelling in their hearts have to Gods law This is moral yet the beginning the progression and the finishing of it proceeds from the Supreme Author of all good Nulli sunt conatus nostri ad bonum si non excitentur vani si non adjuventur We never bend our endeavours and forces to the performance of any good thing if not excited and all are but vain if not supported For who is sufficient for these things that God exacts if God enable not His grace is sufficient for us and without it we insufficient for them The Saints work out their salvation with fear and trembling but by the help of God that worketh in them both to will and to do of his good pleasure By the efficacy of his al sufficient working they exercise themselves unto godliness and apply their hearts to his service Hence they are called Vessels of honour and Temples of the Holy Ghost sequestred from all others for the service of the Lord and honour of his holy Name It is to honour and to serve him that the Saints are by Baptism admitted into the Church Nazianzen whence Nazianzen describes Baptism to be Pactum vitae purioris cum Deo A compact made by man with God to lead an undefiled life and not to walk in the way of sinners Sanctity I conceive to be like a Diametrical line in a Circle constituting two distinct Hemispheres of men differencing the good from the bad the Saints from the Wicked whereby we and all men who are the Saints of God now in being are advertised to eschew the society of Atheists Blasphemers Drunkards Adulterers Idolaters and all malefactors and to tread in the pure footsteps of the blessed Saints in their heavenly hemisphere composing our selves to keep within the Compass into which no Devil can have admittance We are men if Saints of another and a better world and must not fashion our selves according unto this It is reported of the people of Lorain Heyl. Geâ—gâ— That they participate of the French Complement and German Drinking I fear it may be reported of too many of us and that report too true That we participate of the French Complement and German Drinking of the Spaniards Oppression and Cruelty of the Italians Whoring of the Turks Atheism of the Jews Avarice of the Papists Superstition of Machiavels Perfidiousness and many others evil heapt up in the pack of mischief But these things become not Saints they stand in opposition to their conditions such men are Antipodes to the Godly walking contrary unto them Wherefore lay aside all uncleanness of the flesh let not the phantastick pleasures of this bewitching world besot your souls neither come you into the assembly of the wicked whom the world may stile but with a false glosse Men of renown Chrysost It is Chrysostom's speech on the 24. of Matthew Sanctorum est non inquirere mansiones ubi clariores sunt viri fed ubi fideliores nec gaudent ubi epulae sunt largae fed ubi storet sanctitas It is not the property of Saints to desire to dwell in those mansions where the more famous men of this world resort but where the more faithful dwell neither delight they to be where dainties are in abundance but where sanctity and holiness doth most flourish Like Moses that chose rather to live miserably with the opressed Israelites than deliciously in the Court of Pharach among swaggering Gallants Be ye thus minded as becometh Saints Set up your rest where Religion flourisheth where Piety is practised where good works performed where Grace reigneth and be ye as they holy and do as they do good otherwise God will
spue you out of his mouth like the luke-warm Laodiceans Hierom. Non Hierosolymis fuisse fed Hierosolymis bene vixisse laudandum est saith Hierom Not to live in Hierusalem but to live well in Hierusalem is praise-worthy We must not live in the Church amongst the Saints but we must be Saints of the Church Thus the Saints of God by renovation have in them inherent and actual sanctity which in respect of their twofold state is twofold imperfect and perfect imperfect in their state militant and perfect in their state triumphant First then There was never Saint found nor ever shall be found Saint so journing on this earth during the days of his pilgrimage indued with absolute or compleat sanctity Their righteousness is but inchoative begun here yet true but not perfect until the day of our full and perfect redemption until our absolute translation from death to life until our better change out of this life of mortality into the life of immortal glory Aug. Nullus sanctus caret peccato nec tamen ex hoc desinit esse sanctus cùm affectu teneat sanctitatem saith Austin No Saint wants sin yet doth he not hereby cease to be a Saint being his affection is possest of holiness The desires of his soul have embraced grace for which God graciously embraceth his soul This impersection of the Saints appears by the Apostle complaining of a law in his members rebelling against the law of his mind and so leading him captive to the law of sin in his members whereby the good that he would do he did not Of this he speaketh 2 Cor. 7.1 when he saith Let us cleanse our selves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit perfecting or finishing holiness in the fear of God Where the word finishing importeth the imperfection of the most perfect meer man under which he still groaneth in this life and for which Paul he still cries out O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death until the day wherein he shall finish his course and sanctification in Gods fear We hear the Saints praised for the strictness of their holy life and not undeserved their goodness is applauded of the good and honored of the best Ambrâ—s Yet saith Ambrose Cognascamus sanctos non naturae praestantioris fuisse fed observantiae majoris nec vitia nescisse fed emendasse Let us know that the Saints had not a more excellent nature than we but had a greater observance and respect to God neither were they void of sin but were always on the mending hand They were ever inclining to that perfection which they had not yet obtained and declining that evil which makes men incapable of perfection Do ye so likewise for be assured that they that live in the world without sanctity and amendment of life live without the true God of the world which whosoever doth Hierom. shall not live out of this world with God world without end Non nisi sanctes Coelestis aula suscipiet saith Hierom The Court of Heaven entertains no Courtiers but Saints and holy men There shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth Rev. 21.27 or worketh abomination but they which are written in the book of life Where their imperfection is turned to perfection and their incompleat grace to perfect glory Secondly So that albeit the Saints are not perfect in their state militant yet are compleat in their state triumphant Though not throughly holy in the state of grace yet their sanctification accomplished in the state of glory where no foe can oppress them no sin infect them no devil pervert them ubi una placida fida tranquiâ—itas una sollida perpetua securit as saith Cyprian Cypr. where there is onely pleasing and faithful tranquillity where onely is solid and perpetual security Without are dogs and sorcerers and whoremongers and murtherers and idolaters and whosoever loveth and maketh a lye Onely the blessed that do his commandment Rev. 22.14 15. enter into the city the new Hierusalem Who are like Absolom in another sense from the sole of the foot to the crown of the head without blemish and not like Isaiah's sinners from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot no whole part This happy perfection and perfect happiness let it be as annexed to the glory of God the highest point of your ambitious thoughts and the But to which you shoot all the arrows of obedience Then shall ye being with the Saints righteous by imputation and renovation by grace inherent and actual here imperfect but perfect registred and placed with the Saints shall be like the Sun in the firmament of heaven And so much concerning the Subject of this Text Gods Saints whom I leave in their proper sphere having brought them to their long home where I trust we shall all meet them in glory everlasting The second part of the Text is the Attribute of special honour proper to the Saints This honour What is imported by this honour is exprest in the foregoing verses and in the first part of the Text. To be brief 't is this An absolute victory over all People Nations Kings and Potentates that fight against the Saints But being we cannot conceive a Conquest before a Conflict I will by Divine assistance treat a little of the Saints Conflict and their honorable Conquest Gods children and Saints are here in a continual warfare Afflictions saith one are perpendicular to his graces in them Vertue never yet wanted opposites Tendit ad astra per aspera virtus The way to Heaven as one observes is strewed with briars like that which Jonathan and his Armour-bearer passed betwixt two rocks Bozez and Seneh that is foul and thorny Grievous and many are the Massacres of the Saints The French proverb of Sicknesses is true of the Churches persecutions and conflicts They come on horse-back but go away on foot And Rest and Pleasure like Oxen come slow and heavily and go away like Post-horses on the spur The Kings of the earth assemble themselves against the Lord and his anointed ones To omit others Have not France Germany Spain Italy who not been up in arms against the Professors of the Truth to send them through the Red sea of Tribulation into the land of Canaan And do not those bitter enemies exercise all manner of cruelty that barbarous rage can invent Cursed be their anger for it was fierce and their wrath for it is cruel As for torments and kinds of death Phalaris and his fellow-tyrants come short of those Bloodhounds of the Spanish Inquisition whom I may compare to the women of Vlna in India Heyl. Geogr. who black their teeth because dogs teeth are white so these black their souls with the works of darkness because the souls of the Saints are white with innocency But yet as the malignant fury of inveterable men in authority did not terrifie the
you after rain fair weather after darkness light after tempestuous storms a gentle calm after a temporary misery everlasting glory And this honour have all his Saints And thus much concerning the Attribute of special honour This honour The last part of the Text is the latitude or extent of this special honour All Gods Saints have it This honour have all his Saints Every one whom the Lord of Hosts calls to bear arms or to expose his life or fortunes to dangers in this spiritual war He doth furnish him with all military habiliments und confers upon him that strength whereby he may return conqueror upon whose victorious return unto him from whom he came he crowns him with glory and honor Every particular Saint hath due unto himself by promise a crown of life laid up for him which the righteous Judge shall at the last day give unto him Peter Paul James John and every sanctified man shall not miss of the King of Kings royal pay Be thou faithful unto death saith the Spirit in the Revelation and I will give thee the crown of life He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death He that overcometh and keepeth my works unto the end to him will I give power over the nations and he shall rule them with a rod of iron as the vessel of a potter shall they be broken to shivers To him again saith the same Spirit that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne even as I also overcame and am set down with my Father in his throne So that all and every one of his Saints hath the honour of overcoming and triumphing upon the overthrow of their Antagonists God will thus deal with you too if you keep on hostility against the enemies of your salvation if you be faithful defenders of the true faith An honorable end ever crowns honorable actions And what other can be the expectation of the Heirs of salvation which is the proper title of Gods Sâ—ints and I trust that title with all the concomitants thereof ours Be ye sure then to make your Election your Justification your Sanctification sure For not those that are registred Saints in Popes Calendars are thus honored but only they that are cleansed with the blood of Christ they that are sanctified with the holy Spirit only they who are Canonized in heaven and belonging to the election of grace Who to their exceeding joy at the last day shall hear that fearful sentence of death pronounced against their enemies Go ye cursed c. And this judgment have all the wicked And that comfortable sentence of an endless life prono need to them Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of the world which Kingdom is called by the Apostle the inheritance of the Saints in light And this honour have all his Saints Amen WARRANTABLE SEPARATION WITHOUT Breach of Union GAL. 2.9 And when James Cephas and John who seemed to be pillars perceived the grace that was given unto me they gave to me and Barnabas the right bands of fellowship that we should go unto the heathen and they unto the circumcision VERITAS semper habet inimicos pictas semper derisiones truth is never free from foes ever ignorant piety never free from division ever prophane but truths triumph rests in this invicta manet that it stands for ever because a beam of the divine wisdom Pieties glory consists in this it fits for heaven They that continue to the end in truth and piety here is their triumph here is their honour they shall be saved and reign with God Coheirs with Christ in the likeness of God as at the beginning What truth more hated than the truth of the Gospel by the Jew the Jew 's convinct What piety or Religion more contemned than Christian piety by the Jew also the Jew is forsaken Who more hated for the truth and pious living than Christ the Lord of glory received into glory After Christ who more despised hated reviled persecuted for the constant profession of the truth of the Gospel both in life and doctrine than Paul now clothed with glory and majestey for thus shall it be done to him whom the King delighteth to honour Was it not thus with Paul had he not false brethren that said to him as the Jewes did to Christ What new doctrine is this Or as the Epicurean and stoick Philosophers said unto him may we know what this new doctrine whereof thou speakest is thou bringest strange things unto our eares Did not false brethren creep in derogating from his Apostolical dignity but such was his undoubted resolution that neither their great words nor their high looks could daunt him Weather-beaten-souldier as I may so speak in Christianity See his defence in the first Chapter of this Epistle like that among the Philosophers in the midst of Mars hill continuing unto this verse in hand where he shakes off his viperous opponents with as much ease as he did the viper from off his hands I need not point out the several verses tending to his purpose but rather confine my self to the text Onely thus much in general false brethren there were as he calls them in the 4th verse of this Chapter contradicting the Gospel preached by him and Christian liberty to whom he yeelded not a foot of ground or advantage Whereupon the Apostles subscribe unto him on sure grounds and plain demonstrations in the 7. and 8. verses and in the text And this is the occasion Thus you see truth stands firme piety unalterable 1 Cor. 11.1 Be ye therefore followers of me as I am of Christ Jesus saith Paul and ye shall stand firme unmoveable Vincenti corona to him that overcomes will I give a Crown Apoc. 3. and he shall sit in my throne saith Christ Thus Paul gets the glory of the day witness the parts of the text which may seem to be a Paradox 1. An union admitting a separation 2. A separation without breach of the union 1. In the union are the persons united James Cephas John and Paul and Barnabas with a description of the former from their offices who seemed to be pillars 2. The ground of the union perceived the grace that was given unto me and the consequitur thereof the act of union they gave unto me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship Thus by the grace of God they are united And by the same grace separated Se via sindit in ambas that we should go unto the heathen and they unto the circumcision And here I cannot let passe any name without note To begin with the persons uniting worthy of that title the Scripture gives unto the Giants in the sixth of Genesis men of renown stiled here to that effect Pillars James Cephas and John in number three not haply without mystery intimating how in the counsel of he wen it was determined before by the highest powers the powers
Divine the Trinity that Paul should be an Apostle of Jesus Christ Three such whose same for the eminency of their spiritual endowments spread far and wide Three such whose wisdom by reason they were more familiar with Christ than the rest was haply of an higher straine These were the three disciples which he cul'd from the rest to go with him up into the mountain where he was transfigured Q. Elizabeths Motto was Video Tacco Cambd. Eliz. to whom at his coming down he said see ye tell to no man the vision until the Son of man rise from the dead Mat. 17. These are the three that attended on him when he restored the dead maid to life Luk. 8.51 And two of these Cephas and John were with him in the extremity of his agony when he said my soul is sorrowful even unto death Mat. 26.38 Now severally of each name a little more than naming them First James James of Jacob which imports a supplanter of him I may say Judg. 8. as Zeba and Zalmunnah said of Gideou as is the man so is his strength Strong in faith vindicating the truth from the blowes of the adversary Hence rightly named Justus doing justice a work of righteousness towards God towards the man of God Towards God while like a good King he seconds a defender of the faith towards the man of God Paul whilst he acknowledging Paul's gifts to be the gifts of God protects him as himself from the rage of false brethren and giving the definitive sentence on his side like a Patron of truth A true testimony of his love to Christ This was he that was called the Lords brother tyed unto him with a true-loves-knot indissoluble by force of either man or Angel good or bad And here you find him maintaining his brothers right against these white devils hypocrites false brethren Let me exhort you then to be followers of him as he was of Christ Jesus Supplant sin Satan the wicked enemies of God of man and ye shall be Israels prevalent with God Cephas followes this was Simon Peter Joh. 1.42 thou art Simon the son of Jonah Difference between Cephas and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thou shalt be called Cephas by interpretation a stone And Mat. 16. blessed are thou Simon Barjonah I say also unto thee thou art Peter and hence proceeds the Papists paradox that Peter is the head of the Church but there is no such matter Christ is the onely head Christ is the onely foundation Christ is the onely head Quantum inter stellas â—una minores Ephes 5.23 for God hath put all things under his feet and gave him to be head over all things to the Church Eph. 1.22 Hence he is compared to an husband as the husband is the head of the wife so Christ is the head of the Church Christ is the onely foundation for no other foundation can any man lay than that is laid which is Christ Jesus 1 Cor. 3.11 This subtle invention of the Papists was thrust in among the other false heads of their Religion to make that stumbling-block unto us I mean the Pope head of the Church without sense without reason but since he is a stumbling-block unto the true professors of Christ the Captain of our salvation Heb. 2. and a dead head I will grace him onely with the title of a block-head being spel'd and put together Here all the nimble chop Jesuites more in words than in substance labour in vain to prove Peter prince of the Apostles let them put on their considering caps and weigh these things in the balance of the Sanctuary the Word of God I would send them no farther than to the two verses before the text together with the text where we find Paul for gifts of the Spirit to be equal with Peter and the rest where James is prefer'd before Peter where James Cephas and John are called Pillars equally where Paul's territory doth extend farther than Peters as the Gentiles the Jewes And thus I give them a Mittimus to the Pope with a flea in their eare Thus much by the way I will prosecute it no farther leaving it to those more parts who as Jael did by Sisera can hit the naile in the head down to the ground Judg. 4. This name must have his note Cephas or Peter it signifies a rock or a stone as rocks or hard stones are wont to be laid in the foundation of any building so the faith of Peter and of the whole Church doth stay upon Christ the firm and unmoveable rock upon whom the whole Church is bullded As he is Cephas a stone so Simon one that is attentive one that is obedient both fruits of faith by it he walked on the sea and sunk not like a stone by it he confessed Christ to be the Son of the living God after the resurrection he was demanded of Christ thrice to feed his sheep to feed them with the Word and Sacraments thrice bidden because haply to be done in the name of three the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost he fed Christs flock for at one Sermon he converted three thousand hearers he healed the man that was lame from his mothers womb be killed by the power of the Word two scab'd sheep Ananias and Saphira his wise for lying unto the holy Ghost he healed Aeneas sick of the palsie he raiseà Tabitha from death to life he convinc't Simon Magus of his Sorcery And as the best were and are not without their faults no more was he without his Three times together denied he Christ wherein rather than in any thing else the Pope succeeds him and therefore Antichrist But Peter wept bitterly for his lapsus linguae 2 Sam. 25. Antichrist is not touched with grief but rejoyceth in what he doth therefore as Abigail said of Nabal so Lof him As his name is so is he These things being known because as Paul speaks of other things they were not done in a corner made him wonderful in the eyes and eares of all and therefore counted a grand Pillar of the Church Here we find him receiving Paul into his fellowship with heart and hand with the rest of the Apostles Now give me leave to exhort you to be followers of him as he was of Christ Jesus Herein shall you shew your selves to be attentive and obedient to the heavenly voice and hereby you are made precious stones knit to the rock Christ Jesus in the new Hierusalem now here and above hereafter in glory Now I come to John Luke 1. which is as much as gracious to whom I may apply that salutation of the Angel to the Virgin Mary haile thou that art highly favoured the Lord is with thee blessed art thou among women So haile thou that art highly favoured or graciously accepted or much graced the Lord is with thee blessed art thou among the sons of men for thou hast found favour with God thou
grace that was given him Once a profest Enemy to Christianity now a profest Preacher of the Gospel of grace Once a Subverter of Gods Church now a Converter unto Gods Church On whom I will pass my censure as one did on Origen for his writing Vbi bene nemo melius â—bi male nemb pejus Where he hath done well none did better where ill none worse We read of two names that were given him Saul and Paul Hierom. S. Hierom is of opinion that he was first called Saul and by converting Sergius Paulus to the faith received that name Paul tanquam trophaeum as a victory Others suppose that he being a Pharisee was called Saul but after his conversion Paul that his Religion being changed he changed his name Origen thinks he had two names Origen as Matthew is called Levi and Solomon Jedidiah But it matters not much whether you call him Saul or Paul In both names is contained a Prognostication of good Saul signifies Lent of the Lord Lent of the Lord to try his people lent of the Lord to convert the Elect yet unregenerate lent of the Lord to confirm all in the faith of Jesus Christ praedicando precando by preaching praying by preaching to them by praying for them lent of the Lord to glorifie his Name by doing his will here on earth as it is in heaven As lent of the Lord so lent to the Lord As Hannah said of Samuel I have lent him unto the Lord as long as he liveth he shall be to the Lord. 1 Sam. 1.28 And as for his other name Paul that signifies Wonderful or Rest Wonderful for his Conversion for his Conversation All that heard him preach were amazed Act. 9. Wonderful for his Conversion respecting circumstances Light from heaven shining about him his blindness his falling to the earth going with a bloody mind post-haste to Damascus his hearing of a voice from heaven his trembling and astonishment his receiving of his sight by Ananias Wonderful for his Conversation in preaching in working miracles casting out evil spirits healing the sick whether absent or present Wonderful for patience in tribulation in labours in perils in death in all miseries In a word wonderful for faith See my Waters of Marah for life for doctrine wisdom understanding And here he took up his Rest resting from blaspheming Gods Name resting from persecuting Gods chosen Israel resting from all errors of faith of doctrine of life for a time in grace and now for ever by grace in glory by the grace that was given him And forasmuch as he was of the Tribe of Benjamin we may apply unto him the prophesie and blessing that Jacob gave to Benjamin Benjamin shall raven as a wolf in the morning he shall devour the prey and at night he shall divide the spoil Paul in his youth before his Conversion as a ravening Wolf persecuted and devoured the faithful but being made of a ravening Wolf as quiet as a Lamb he distributed the food of the Gospel unto the world by the grace that was given unto him Baronius speaking of Paul Baronius derives his name from the Latine word Paulus little We read of King Saul how he debased himself Am not I a Benjamite of the smallest of the tribes of Israel 1 Sam. 9.21 1 Cor. 15.9 Paulus quasi Paululus and my family the least of all the families of the tribe of Benjamin We read the like of our Saul I am the least of the Apostles that am not meet to be called an Apostle because I persecuted the Church of God but by the grace of God I am what I am And again I am made a Minister of the Gospel according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me Opulentissima metâ—lla quo um in also latent venae unto me who am less than the least of all Saints is this grace given that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ Eph. 3.8 9. So that Paul thus despicable in his own sight Sen. ep 23. Ruth 2.10 might say unto the Lord as Ruth said unto Boaz Why have I found grace in thine eyes that thou shouldst take knowledge of me Thus you have heard of the Man who was inricht with the rich treasures of spiritual wisdom concerning whom I may demand of you as Pharaoh did of his servants concerning Joseph Can we find such a one as this is a man in whom the Spirit of God is Unto which demand I annex Pharaoh's answer Forasmuch as God hath shewed thee all this there is none so discreet and wise as thou art O Paul Therefore as Tully was called Phaenix Oratorum the Phenix of Orators Lactantius Phaenix Christianorum the Phenix of Christians and Cyprian the Christian Caesar Why not Paul Phaenix Apostolorum the Phenix or None-such of Apostles For his rare vertues for his invaluable gifts for the light of grace seen known understood perceived of James Cephas and John which when they had seen known understood and perceived they gave unto him the right hand of fellowship And thus I come to the act of union Grace brings in love and love union whereof it is an affection Perceived the grace that was given unto me they gave unto me and Barnabas the right hund of fellowship 1 Sam. 3.8 When they perceived Gods graces to him in him as Eli perceived that the Lord called the child Samuel they gave unto me the right hand of fellowship dextras societatis they made him a right Benjamite by spiritual union a son of the right hand they admit him into their fraternity or as Citizens speak they make him brother of their company Thus they go hand in hand to shew that Birds of a feather flock together Men indued with the same graces called by the same Spirit must be hand-fastned and heart-fastned by the same Gordian knot of love Let me not transcend the limits of these words I take it then that we have infimated here unto us the sweet harmony the consent the sympathy between the Ministers of the Gospel of grace This is pleasant musick in the ears of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Behold how good and pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity Psal 133. The curtains coupled together compassing the Tabernacle typically represented the concord and agreement of Ministers So a garment without seam about Christ the true Tabernacle full of Gods glory in whom dwelt the fulness of the Godhead bodily Their agreement must be like unto that of the parts of mans body exprest by Hippocrates one agreement one confluence all consenting being tied and united by the strong ligament of grace or love This union is spiritual therefore it must be an union of spirits an union of unions a meeting of friends exprest by the text fellowship But if you would know what fellowship you may find it Phil. 1.5 a fellowship in the Gospel and ver 27. stedfast in
the Word they feed all Nations by two and two to signifie the calling of two people Jew and Gentile Rom. 3.29 The Jews thought that God was confined unto them Is he the God of the Jews onely is not he also of the Gentiles yes of the Gentiles also Therefore our Saviour sent them as well to the Gentile as to the Jew They are likened to the bells of the High-Priest they depend on the vertue of the Eternal Priest after the order of Melchisedeck Psal 19. Rom. 10. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that as the Psalmist reports there is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard their sound went into all the carth and their words unto the ends of the world They are like the middle bar in the midst of the boards in the Tabernacle which reach from end to end Exod. 26.28 They are the Chariots of the Lord Bernard who by saith hope and charity carry the Trinity through the world Non corporis praesentiâ sed mentis providentia saith Bernard not in bodily presence but in the wisdom of the mind providing for future things like Ezekiels chariot going to the four corners of the world Quae regio in terras nostri non plena laboris Thus Christ sent Now a little of the Apostles sending That they should go unto the Gentiles and we unto the Circumcision Nihil hîc statuunt Apostoli quod non ante statuit Deus Here the Apostles ordain nothing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith a Greek Father that was not preordained of God It was Gods own voice to Ananias Paul is a chosen vessel unto me to bear my name before the Gentiles and Kings and the children of Israel Act. 9.15 Paul was Gods chief Hearld the Gospels loudest Trumpeter It was Gods own voice unto Paul himself I will send thee far unto the Gentiles Act. 22.21 It was Gods voice unto the Prophets and Teachers that were at Antioch Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them Act. 13.12 Whereupon they immediately went and preached unto the Gentiles And here note the wisdom of God Paul a Gentile full of wisdom was sent here unto the Gentiles who sought for wisdom Peter a Jew excellent for working miracles sent unto the Jews who sought always for miracles and signs a sign of their infidelity all working togeher for the good of his elect of one mind when farthest asunder Now seeing the Jews have rejected the yoke of Christ and the Gentiles of whom we are a part have taken it on them We may say of them as they sometime of us We have a little sister and she hath no breasts Amazon-like she hath one breast the Old Testament but wants the other the chief breast the New Let us pray for them as they did for us that they may hear Christ crying out aloud to the Church Cant. 6. Return return O Shulamite return return that we may look upon thee and see as it were the company of two Armies the one of Jews the other of Gentiles all one Church one flock We pray thee then O Heavenly Father to call the uncalled Jew and Gentile to comfort the comfortless and to make an end of these dayes of sin wherein we live and cause our Saviour to appear in the clouds for our full and perfect Redemption Do it for his sake that died for us To whom with Thee and thy Holy Spirit be given all glory As it was in the beginning so now and ever shall be world without end Amen FINIS Deo soli Gloria ERRATA PAg. 5. lin 18. read earth p. 6. l. 17. r. us p. 7. l. 13. carnal p. 9. l. ult place p. 11. l. 1. then Marg. r. via p. 13. l. 46. ipse p. 14. l. 35. recusat vivere marg r. diligere p. 15. l. 6. that l. 10. replenisht l. 14. through marg absit p. 16. l. 16. loquentes p. 17. l. 37. Jerusalem p. 18. m. infimis p. 23. l. 42. Man p. 25. l. 9. vertue l. 10. godliness p. 27. l. 5. offence p. 28. l. pen. to p. 31. l. 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 marg in uudis p. 32. l. ult with p. 34. l. 6. parvae l. 20. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 35. m. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 37. l. 34. conversationis l. 36. distraction l. 48. Spirit l. 49. Bernard p. 46. l. 43. good p. 50. l. 7. eum p. 53. l. 1. know p. 72. r. generatione l. 44. in p. 73. l. 41. Spirit l. 45. add of p. 74. m. ille p. 77. l. 51. grants p. 78. m. vocis p. 79. l. 19. nothing l. 48. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 80. l. 24. add may p. 81. l. 27. add are p. 84. l. 49. r. sapientissimum p. 96. l. 14. through p. 100. l. 50. either p. 106. l. 19. r. Divesses p. 107. l. 16. parts l. 47. his p. 108. l. 47. she p. 109. l. 44. indifferent p. 113. l. 16. get l. 19. then marg ornamento p. 114. l. 7. vox l. 30. placed p. 115. marg calce p. 129. Mercury p. 130. l. 23. add in l. 31. mercies marg vulgatissima p. 131. m. introspicere p 134. l. 30. r. thence p. 135. l. 52. commends p. 136. m. egerint p. 140. l. 7. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 142. m. ratis p. 148. l. 19. r. columna es A TABLE Of the Principal THINGS contained in the EXERCITATIONS A. ADam's fall what misery to mankind Pag. 4 Angels rejoyce at the good of Gods Church Pag. 18 What to be admired in God Pag. 20 Ardency in prayer how grounded Pag. 79 80 Ground of our Adoption Pag. 81. Benefit of it Pag. 81 82 Gods dearest children subject to Afflictions Pag. 117 God sends not Angels but Men-Angels to preach the Word why Pag. 128 Apostles called Pillars why Pag. 147 forward B. THe glory of our Saviours Body and Soul in his state of Exaltation Pag. 58 Brittle estate of man Pag. 85 Bishop what Pag. 126 Baseness of the Popish Clergy Pag. 135 Blessedness Pag. 136 C. GOD would have mens hearts prepared for Christ Pag. 4 Christ ordered our High-Priest by Covenant Pag. 6 Purity of Christs conception Pag. 12 Peace of Conscience what it produceth in man Pag. 31 32 Civil peace Pag. 33. Peace with the Creatures Pag. 38 Converts stand upon firmer terms in Christ than before their first declination Pag. 40 Christs cruel conflict upon the Cross Pag. 59 The best in this life partly carnal Pag. 71 Comfort unspeakable a benefit of the Spirit Pag. 75 Crying of the Spirit in our hearts Pag. 77 forward Crying in prayer what ibid. and forward Calling not to be neglected Pag. 87 Christ the Head of the Church how Pag. 104 forward Pag. 145 Cross of Christ Pag. 137 Conflict and Conquest of Saints Pag. 141 forward D. CHrist must die a cursed Death Pag. 8. His Dignity Pag. 15 16 A Doxology Pag. 18 Our divisions cause Papists insult Pag. 37 The
blessed consequences of Christ's Life and Death Pag. 41. Why Christ died Pag. 53 Of the Three Persons in the Deity largely Pag. 67 68 forward Inferences from the Spirits dwelling in our hearts Pag. 76 77 Christian society should be delightful Pag. 92 Songs of Degrees Pag. 113 Doctrine what must be preached Pag. 122 forward E. FRults of Christs Exaltation Pag. 15 16 The malignity of Envy Pag. 35 Ecclesiastical peace Pag. 36 Christ Exalted according to both Natures Pag. 57 forward Six Evidences of the Spirits dwelling in our hearts Pag. 73 74 No easie matter to be a Minister of the Gospel Pag. 92 An Emperors duty Pag. 121 F. WE may come confidently to God us to a Father Pag. 80 Not build Faith on a staggering foundation Pag. 92 The Soul naturally subjected to Fear Pag. 95 96 Several Fears Pag. 96 forward Benefis of holy Fear Pag. 98 forward Two causes of Fear Pag. 99 The uses Pag. 100 forward Foundation of the Church who Pag. 147 forward G. GOD the All-wise and gracious Moderator Pag. 5 Grace for grace how Pag. 10 11 Of Gods Glory at large Pag. 19 20 What Glory due to God from man imports Pag. 20 21 Gods Good-will how superabundant Pag. 43 44 In what particular acts expressed Pag. 45 forw Comfortable inferences thence deduced Pag. 46 The Spirits mission into our hearts a great gift Pag. 68 69 God and the Holy Spirit not unequal ibid. Heart governed by the Spirit Pag. 74 God is Christs Head how Pag. 111 God alone to be invocated Pag. 114 Grace inherent and actual Pag. 139 Concerning Grace at large Pag. 150 forward H. HOw Christ is Holy Pag. 11 12. How Harmless ibid. The benefits of Christ made higher than the Heavens Pag. 17 18 Honour to God wherein it consists Pag. 22 23 24 Heart the Metropolis of the Soul Pag. 34 Humiliation of Christ a work of power mercy justice Pag. 48 forward Wherein it consists Pag. 51 forward Holy Ghost called a Spirit why Pag. 63 64 Spirit of the Son why ibid. Heart principally desired in man Pag. 72 It 's the seat of the Spirit proved Pag. 72 73 Head of the Woman is Man in what respects Pag. 107 Hear the word how Pag. 133 134 I. JEsus a reverend Name Pag. 6 Indignities put upon Christ Pag. 7 8. His intercession Pag. 9. Not for all promiscuously ibid. Fruit of it Pag. 10 Justice and Mercy Pag. 21. Both to be admired Pag. 22 Justification Pag. 41 Illumination of the understanding Pag. 73 A Christian least reason to be idle why Pag. 84 forward Satan gets great advantage by it Pag. 85. Idleness reproved Pag. 87 Vse of it Pag. 88 Insufficient Ministery the evil of it Pag. 132 133 James unde Pag. 145 John what it signifies Pag. 146 K. KIngs their duty Pag. 113 116 117 Four Divinity-Lectures for them Pag. 115 Not exempted from afflictions Pag. 117. To be prayed for Pag. 118 L. LOve God how Pag. 23. Gods love to Mankind Pag. 63 64 Livelihood from the Spirit Pag. 75 76 What love should be betwixt Ministers Pag. 89 Ministers must take heed to their lives how Pag. 126 Gospel why called a Law Pag. 129 130 A perfect Law ibid. A Law of liberty Pag. 130 131 In what language Ministers should deliver their message Pag. 132 M. THe first Man was the first order'd Priest Pag. 3 Mans recovery is by a Mediator Pag. 4 Of Gods Mercy Pag. 39 The Mediator must be both God and Man Pag. 50. forward Mission of the Spirit Pag. 70 Plotters of Mischief Pag. 87 Man is the womans head Pag. 106 forward Ministers improvidence fatal to the Church Pag. 120. Ministery an hard task ibid. Must look to themselves how Pag. 121 Neither spare for love nor fear Pag. 123 124 How called and why Pag. 126 forward Merits confuted Pag. 41 42 N. TO Number our days what Pag. 86 O. THe Offence committed must be purged away by the Nature offending Pag. 5 God added an Oath to the Covenant of grace and peace why Pag. 6 7 Oblation of Christ in the Heavens Pag. 9 Obedience to God internal external largely Pag. 22 23. How qualified Pag. 24 25 Excellency of Order Pag. 103 Offices mutually to be performed by man and wife Pag. 109 forward P. DIgnity of Christ's Priesthood Pag. 7 A double comfort from the purity of our High-Priest Pag. 13 Christ a Pattern for our imitation Pag. 14 Peace fourfold wrought by Christ Jesus Pag. 26 27 How made Pag. 27 28. Peace of a good Conscience amply described Pag. 30 31 32. Peace pressed Pag. 33 34 The Spirit of the Son is a Person why Pag. 66 67 And distinct why ibid. And the third and last Person how ibid. Pilgrimage some kind lawful Pag. 8 Papists false Inferences refuted ibid. forward Apostles are Pillars Pag. 91 Perfection absolute not here Pag. 98 Promises strongest Arguments Pag. 116 Ten Persecutions Pag. 124 125 Perseverance Pag. 135 Practice Pag. 136 Saints estate perfect and imperfect how Pag. 140 forward Protestants whence Pag. 141 Peter the signification Pag. 146 Paul what imports Pag. 151 forward Q. OF Quenching the Spirit Pag. 77 R. ROme's Sacriledge Pag. 10 Righteousness of Christ efficacious to us Pag. 13 14 Resurrection of Christ Arguments proving it Pag. 59. Necessity of it Pag. 60 61. Ends of it Pag. 61 62. The Conclusion Pag. 62 63 Regeneration Pag. 73 Religious hearts in a continual awe of God Pag. 96 Reading and Meditation to be joyned Pag. 134 Remembrance Pag. 135 136 Our Religion how founded Pag. 149 S. THe Son of God must be made the Son of Man Pag. 5 Sufferings of Christ the reason Pag. 8 Christ separate from sinners how Pag. 14. Made sin for us how Pag. 21 22 Benefits by Christs sufferings Pag. 29 Sanctification Pag. 43 None by nature excepted from sins contagion Pag. 43 Sufferings of Christ were incessant Pag. 51 Some specialties Pag. 52. Necessity of them Pag. 53 forward And Effects Pag. 55 forward The Application Pag. 56 Sons of God what Pag. 81 Spirit of truth and of lying Pag. 83 States how guided Pag. 116 Religion the soul of them ibid. Scripture to be compared with Scripture Pag. 134 The Spirit to be supplicated for Pag. 135 Saints two sorts Pag. 138 forward Saul what signifies Pag. 151 T. MYstery of the Trinity Pag. 68 Time an account to be kept of Pag. 84 Precious ibid. Will not be stayed Pag. 85 How we must make account of it ibid. Time must be redeemed Pag. 86 V. CHrist undefiled in the whole course of his life and why Pag. 13 Vbiquity refuted Pag. 17 Vnion with Christ Pag. 73 Vniversality of the Church Pag. 105 Voice of God daunting Pag. 127 128 Vnion must be amongst Ministers Pag. 152 W. CHrist born of a Woman why Pag. 5 6 The Word made flesh how Pag. 13 Divine Worship Pag. 25 26. largely God to be worshipped every where Pag. 90 The merciful project of Gods Eternal Wisdom Pag. 47 Bitterness to Wives discovers it self how Pag. 110 forward Word to be looked into accurately Pag. 131 FINIS