perfect lacking nothing Alas if the unprofitable servant be cast out what shall become of the Malignant the Covetous the Proud the Luxurious How are we then to think of that triple charge of Pasce of Jacobs enduring frost and heat of the shepheards keeping watch by night and then of Leo Rugiens to devour both Pastor and Flock And how are they able to resist if we assist not unless we exhort rebuke exhort and minister a word of consolation to every soul that is weary and then the people to be swift to hear How precious is the treasure we bring though in earthen vessels Is it not the Word of God we bring and offer you To mens words we owe temporary belief if they speak wisely and a Resignation of our Judgements till we hear them out But to the Word of God which is diffused into a Sermon or else woe to him that makes it we owe an absolute Resignation and perpetual captivity Take heed then of contempt or wanton ranging after an heap of such Teachers as are after our own lusts lest we cause God to withold this bread from Heaven and endanger the famishing of our souls Let England remember the error of the Jewish Church once the Jewel and peculiar of the Lord of Hosts the defection of the Romish the Degeneration and then the demolition and abolition of Antioch Ephesus Corinth and many others O think in time for we draw very near it of this peoples sin here at the twelfth and thirteenth verses They held the Table of the Lord contemptible and snuffed at it perchance respecting the gorgeous Idols of the Gentiles In the same corrupt affection as many carnal Gospellers not ashamed to let men hear their wishes for the stately and triumphant shews again of Masse Dirges Processions Pilgrimages God hath blest the Land and Church even to the stupor and envy of our Neighbours with abundance of the Gospel of peace and the blessing of God in his Ordinance and with many curious and exact work-men Jewelers of souls and will we not bless the Lord praise him and magnifie him for ever Will we not prize this unsearchable Riches of Christ Shall we rather strive to quench and do despite to the Spirit of his Grace by despising Prophecying and like Swine and Dogs trample upon and turning again rend and tear such as pour these precious Pearls before us stoning them that are sent unto us with hard and bitter censures If the ministration of the Law was glorious what is that of the Gospel Examine it Is it not the Power and Wisdom of God and in the Administration of the Sacrament is not the bread we break the communion of the body and the cup we reach out into you from God the communion of the blood of Jesus Are not the offices of the Church such as distinguish us from Dogs and Infidels Let me then first creep a little into mount Ebal and bitterly curse all those thas have evil will at Sion and then flie into Gerizim and cheerfully bless with blessings of the right band Praise and Honor and Salvation upon the heads of all those Christian Kings Princes and people of all conditions who in their several places seek the advancement of the Truth of God and the encouragement of his faithfull servants while their own hearts strike them with the conscience and guilt of maliciousness and propenseness to Idolatry or schismatick Innovations that dare not say Amen 3. We come briefly to the third day to which we must all come the day of death when Gods own having past the fervor of youth and clean escaped the flesh and worlds contagions and the fiery darts of Satan having in short done what they came for they descend into the grave with their bodies like a rick of corn into the Barn in due season and their spirits return to God that gave them when even death is to them precious as well for rest and security as for that new Newness of life which then begins in death clearing to them that whereof Euripides doubted whether to die were indeed to live and contrary for so St. Paul determines it Christ is to me life and death is to me advantage and therefore desired he this day of his dissolution wherein he might be more perfectly united to his Jesus For these his holy Jewels are never so well set as when inset in the joy and Glory of their Lord and Master which makes that in such souls even the approaching towards death fils and purifies with high and heavenly apprehensions as it is in natural motions nearer still to the center or as in Diggers in a Myne who work most earnestly when near the Treasure But if it happen that any of these Jewels be so far dignified as his Lord accepts his life in sacrifice by Martyrdome consummate in sealing the Truth of Jesus with his blood how doth this add fresh ornament and addition of honor to these Servants of God as came to pass with that Protomartyr St. Stephen first made up a Jewel after his Master those stones the Persecutors threw surrounding his head as a precious Crown of Glory However they are all that die in the Lord enfranchised from those chains of corruption which abide the best alive for we dare not boast our Saints as Bellarmine doth Gouraga or his Fellow doth Phil. Nerius who was fain to pray God to depart from him and draw back his mind from heavenly things No we have learnt another way of humble acknowledgement from St. Paul I know that in me that is in my flesh dwels no good thing and St. James In many things we sin all and the day of absolute absolution from sin is not till this day of dissolution wherein these Jewels by death come to take possession of everlasting life 4. The last is the last of dayes Novissimus and the day of Renovation which none but the ancient of days can know and of which also there is a mixt mention in the beginning of this fourth chapter The day of the Lord comes as a furnace and Rev. 6. The great day of his wrath called the day of the Lord Jesus and the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ Rom. 16. The first day we spake on the day of affliction and the last we spake on the day of death do roule up sometime all together It befals alike saith the Preacher to the clean and unclean to him that swears and to him that fears an oath and for the second the day of powerfull preaching the word Hypocrites elude it The devil can transform himself into an Angil of Light and his zanies may make a fair shew in the flesh saith the Scripture But at this great day shall be a real Partition of Sheep and Goats of Wheat and Tares which yet flock and grow together then he will gather his elect from the four winds and declare his mighty Power in glorifying both their souls and
our relict condition as also of the spreading venom and malignity of original corruption Nascimur morimur that 's bad enough comes up and is cut down like a flower but this is worse Nascimur inficimur we cannot come up like a flower which lifts his pure Crown into the air and rising through unclean earth is not sullied contracts retains nothing of the saeculency and dusty soil No flower in all the garden of mankind but Jesus of Nazareth but only that one Lilly among the Thorns one Rose of Sharon one flower of Jesse that was ever growing in God from all Eternity had a Proviso put in for him that nor in birth nor life nor death he should see or know or take any Corruption But upon all mankind that is meerly so the infection works the infection of sin as it is entred here in Adam so it went over all like a deluge in as much as in one all have sinned and all rise tainted with their Fathers leprosie which is by some supposed to be the meaning of that speech in St. Peter 1 Pet. 1.18 where he tels the Saints They are redeemed from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vain conversation received by tradition or by traducement from your Fathers and from this Great grand-father of all those Fathers from which taint nothing can purifie our souls but the precious incorruptible blood of Christ as of a Lamb without blemish But of this the Apostle plentifully in that fifth Chapter to the Romans By one mans disobedience many were made sinners but expresly verse 12. By one man sin entred and past over all These two contemplations are enough to break up the spring-head of our tears and with strong cries make us declare and deplore our misery But who believes our report or who spends his tears upon this subject We find a prophane Esau crying cut with a great and exceeding bitter crie for the loss of a blessing in the things of this life Corn and Wine and Lordship Gen. 27.34 And so I find even David werping and crying for a wicked son And the earth is full of such howling habitations for earthly grievances But who will follow the example of David Psa 51. Behold I was shapen in iniquity the warmth of my conception in the womb was sinfull O purge me wash me create in me a clean heart O God renew a right spirit in me who considers rightly the cursed radical contagion of our nature which strives even after the grafting into Christ and receipt of the Grace of sanctification in our spirit and struggles for Dominion That which we should hourly watch lest it prevail over us that shrub and bramble which would top or dwarf the Cedar of Gods Grace in us and hath force in our members to bring forth fruit unto death Rom. 7.5 Such forcible entry makes this inborn corruption that like the strong man keeping possession or as a Sheriffe that hath Posse comitatus and seises and outs the owner and bars him from the use of his goods Such rule this unruly wickedness keeps in our hearts and such a sway it bears so that it is no longer I that do it but sin saith the Apostle that raigns in me and makes me lose all power and all good even Bonum possibilitatis a loss irrecoverable irremediable and no cure for this wound in nature They talk of a natural Balsom in mans body for all bodily diseases But were it not for a spiritual bleeding balm from that anointed holy Saviour were it not for that double spring of Grace and Blood derivable to us and to be let in upon us for the reviving and refreshing of our fainting souls what would become of our salvation And though in that fountain set open for Judah for Jerusalem for sin and for transgression I may wash and be cleansed from this leprosie yet mark how that Gospel begins both in the language of the Baptist and his Master afterward Repent and then the Kingdom of heaven is at hand then the Kingdom of heaven is within you that sweet sorrow of a contrite sinner that usefull pulp of those tears we fall at the sight and feeling of our strong corruptions is best to make conserve and preserve of grace in our bearts which God and his holy Angels beholding as it is Vinum Angelorum making them rejoyce in Heaven so himself will renew his Miracle upon such souls and turn that water into the wine of consolation Thirdly After this mournfull lecture of bemoaning our loss and deprivation and depravation natural Let me speak a word in season against that solemn sin of Pride Look to the rock from whence thou art hewn Some boast of original descendings from famous Ancestors and yet too many sons are born in original debt and diseases of their Parents of whom they are so apt to brag But it is enough and more for ever to strip all sorts of men out of all vain and mad dressings and coverings of themselves under that mishapen and monstrous vice of Arrogance that here they find Illud quod dicere nolo Quod dici no lunt dici potuisse non potuisse refelli That which men cannot endure to hear or think upon we are all loth to turn and look upon our Fathers nakedness not out of modesty as Shem and Jophet but because in height and pomp and in the vaniry of high-soaring imaginations we strive to forget both God and him and our selves It is therefore that God in this Text comes still and calls after us and shews us both the Receipt and the Probatum two dusts brings Adam in his hand and presents every man to himself as in a general Glass of humane frailty And this Vbi tu is now no more a question but an Indicative and Demonstrative an Adverbial and a Proverbial a very radical Primitive and Affirmative of Egomet with Tute and Ille Ipse and brings all to Idem in Adam here and jumbles all the genders of mankind common and doubtfull or epicoene Sparrows and Eagles and all sexes and professions and degrees of mankind Princes and People and calls in that voice of the Psalm O ye sons of men How long will you love to belie your selves Quid superbis Why so goodly O thou earth and ashes Monstrons Incongruity to behold servants in the saddle saith Solomon and Princes to foot it by but an incomprehensible ugliness in the looks of a proud man when we look up to Heaven and contemplate him that came down from Heaven for us men came down indeed stript and empty of all his Glory An incarnate crucified and humble God Will neither his main Precept Learn of me learn this above all thy Learning Nor his Example Behold I have given you an example Will nothing swage the swelling of thy proud stomack Think yet there is no Grace but for the humble no sight of God and his Glory but for the meek And if thou resist that spirit of
Pharisees by Christs own Testimony religious and yet wicked People may draw near with their lips and their hearts far enough off If thou hast Faith saith St. James let us see it Let your Light shine How why in action shine or else to bare Profession our Saviour threats a round and proportional Answer At that day I will profess to you I know you not Objection But will the weak soul say May I trust to these Answers I may I first trust to my Repentance I feel indeed the weight of sin and finding the offence of an infinite Justice I am horribly afraid dejected like David when he asked his sad soul Why art thou so heavy I am so so wounded pierced struck thorow and my heart rebounds into my eyes I weep and I crie mightily for Mercy but can I hope it Is not sin a Serpent a Sea a Fire a Poison Was I not stung by this Serpent drowned in this sea miserably schorcht by this fire envenomed in the whole Mass of my nature with this corruption before I was born And since alas I have added to this Ocean put fewel to this fire help to infix this sting and work into my heart the contagion and then am I able to resolve against sin to deny ungodliness to reject the Tempter to give my lusts their final answer I find indeed natural men moral men when they will compound an happy man put inthis one ingredient Responsare cupidinibus sibi imperiosus enabling him to check and controul to command and subdue rebellious Passions by the dictates of rectified Reason and their several answers to diverse corrupt affections are enough to shame me and all that profess themselves Christians But were they able to keep their own rules or am I able What to hate sin so as I ought with a perfect hatred I flie some enormous vices for fear of Laws But Tolle periclum Jam vaga prosiliet c. And though I know there is death in the Pot the wages of sin is no better though I pull the fruit and taste it and prove it to be nought but Gall and Bitterness nay barrenness and shame yet such is my madness to pursue a new shame and seek death in the error of life falling like a Bird or a Beast Nay no brid no beast would so oft fall into the same snare same pit into the same sin whereof I have again and again repented me What then shall I do Shall I rely on my second answer and trust in my own righteousness Some bold men dare do so and dare teach others so dare boast a stock and treasure of mercy and satisfaction But Lord I find the language of Canaan thy holy Word and the cries of thy holy servants far otherwise I find thy Bernard say Nolo Horreo meritum Thy David O Lord If thou enter into judgement no flesh shall be justified and thy blessed St Paul I find another Law haling me c. Rom. 7. and therefore I hear him crying ripe to say O miserable man who shall deliver me These are yet the Ejaculations of an humble soul asking seeking knocking at the gate of heaven and this very debating is a fruit of the Spirit growing on to a perfect answer In mens consultings and resolvings for worldly affairs they may they do usually mis-count miscarry fortune choaks their artillery But in these holy provisions the end is ever gracious success glorious If the Jailor in the Acts and St. Peters Hearers come but to a wounded conscience to be prickt at their hearts and cry What shall I do Mark what follows and how fast it follows Believe Repent be baptized and saved Saved How by Believing in him that is able to frame a sufficient Answer He that made them wonder at his gracious answers and to whom no man was able to answer a word Who was that and where is he to be had If any man sin any man that finds himself a sinner Let him put his answer to this Advocate for we have him saith St. John we have an Advocate Jesus Christ the righteous He is the Propitiation for our sins Take then thy shield of faith and quench all the fiery darts of the devil This is the new and living way of answering God by his Son by the blood of Jesus Hebrews 10. May not then the Christian Believer have access with boldness For shall both bleed for sin or shall he bleed in vain Peccavi peccatum grande saith he I have committed an hainous sin yet on my Faith and Repentance I will go to God and say Lord thou canst have but Blood Merit Sacrifice Satisfaction exact Obedience Take then thy Son Jesus He is all these and all these to me for he is mine I receive him by faith and I find comfort hope lively hope full assurance in him I will not therefore flie with Cain and cry with him My sin is greater No thy mercy rejoyces against sin and now therefore there is no condemnation to them that be in Christ Jesus My answer then to thy Bill is it was torn when his body was torn it is cancelled and was nailed to his Cross My debt was great but is paid to the utmost farthing Thy wrath let it be a cup he hath drunk it of Let it be more a whole Wine-press he hath trode it alone I will then put on my Lord Jesus and come in the rayment of my elder Brother and be roab'd in his innocency and canst thou then deny me No thou canst not thou mayest as well deny thy self For if I have it fair to shew under thy own hand Every gracious Promise in thy Gospel is such yea this was thine own Act in my salvation For God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself But may I not prodigally and presumptuously fling away my soul in a vain confidence of Mercy Yes many do so that will do nothing themselves not when they have the assistance and proffer of help from Heaven Therefore I will compound and put all these answers together I will trust to my Saviours merit But I will repent too and pray too and work too and so work out mine own salvation with fear and trembling And though I have no Holiness of mine own and without it no seeing thee at the Day of Judgement yet thou the God of my peace wilt sanctifie me against that day 1 Thess 5. O blessed and full answer now and O blessed condition of such happy souls so far from affrightment at thought of the Judges coming that they shall then rejoyce and lift up their faces and in the mean time are of the number and communion of those Saints that love his appearing looking for and hasting to the comming of their Lord in glory calling and crying Bow the Heavens and come down and Lord how long And come Lord Jesus come quickly I have done with the explication of my Text. There is a fourfold application First In general to
sober and watch And another Work out your salvation with fear and trembling Presumption in all our addresses to the Almighty ever to be avoided lest it taint our sacrifices And however in the coelestial bodies sure we are in all heavenly souls there is duly observed a motus trepidationis even when they lay hold on Vitis and press Racemus here for there be several Acts of our Saviour considerable Three several Advents and for three several creations To the first he came with faciamus Let us make man in our Image and likeness soul and body To the third and last He will come with perficiamus to make it up a full Redemption by his restoring all things which act is also called a Regeneration and respecting man a renewing or change of our vile bodie like his glorious But there is a secoud Advent here mentioned When he came in a body for the Recreation of our souls A work which is no longer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eph. 2.10 His Poem this Piece shewing him a work-man to the proof and therefore well rendred in our translation the work-manship of God created in Christ Jesus On this act in medio done by the Mediator which Janus like afflects on the last reflects on the first On this are we to fix and pitch our consideration which was done by him to the end that all ruin'd since the first and hopefull of the last may claim by vertue of this Act. If at that dreadfull day of Judgement we would see him without amaze or wishing for overwhelming rocks and mountains over us O learn betimes to view him and run after him and lay hold upon him in this advent 'T is this creation puts down thy first and better never made never born if not renewed if not reborn For how much more horrible then ten thousand thunder-claps will the burst of that voice be Depart I know you not no not the work of thy own hands No for though my Plasma I formed you yet you deformed your selves and hated to be reformed by being made conformable to me in life in death in resurrection THE third Cup is of Conformity or Corcordance you may have heard of Saint Francis conformities how like in every thing to our blessed Saviour they ridiculously and blasphemonsly paint him But such morsels are for the vast jaws and ravenening hollow womb of a Papist for their Bel and Dragon faith that devour what ever book or Balade or Bull or Breve without one grain of salt one jot of Reason obtrudes upon them Blessed be God they will not down with us but this must This Cup of conformity I intend which is the eager and earnest desire of resembling our Love and Mercy for else what pretence have we to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What fellowship hath Christ with Belial yoak-less unenduring to be ruled by his example If a child of light walk so and his disciple follow him first Do this by observing his setting forth which was Oriens a day-spring from on high and thence he flows and descends in his prime Radii of Peace and Righteousness comes as a light to be the Glory of his people A prime lesson for all those that are highly descended and those too that are highly ascended to wealth and honour so to frame their aspects and influences in visiting relieving chearing of Inferiors dilighting to be Children of light followers of God as dear children avoiding as all other iniquitie for none must tarry in his sight so specially those sins which most do thwart i◠a cross line the Zodiack wherein this Sun of Righteousness was pleased to move such are oppression Blood Cruelty Violence Mark how God beats them from his Altar Isa 1 in Indignation Care I for such sacrifice Wash you Put away the evil of your works or ' I le not vouchsafe you a word Secondly Conform and follow him from his entrance on the work of our Redemption at those first purple drops the Primitiae the first fruits in the Temple of his circumcision and there we begin to work out our salvation at the circumcision of the heart pareing away the superfluity of maliciousness and cut to the quick by remorse for sin Our rockie bosoms cleft and falling blood in anguish forced to cry out like those hearers What shall we do to be saved and this circumcision spreading and going round to our eyes and ears and lips chastening and subduing and sanctifying all natures power in us by the power of Racemus here If this in any good measure past then on still to thy Saviours gracious life growing in grace and favour with God and man on to this temper of meekness humbleness in life in death and such a death a crucifixion Know you not That they which be Christs have crucified the flesh with affections and lusts and like his resurrection arising to new life and an ascension too so high the Apostle mounts the Metaphor and follows him into heaven if risen with Christ up then and set your affections on heavenly things Col. 3.1 But stay a little Is this the way to heaven A cup of Conformity call you this ere this be done our Comfort will be cold and dead if we must so learn Christ we are like all to go without Vitis and Racemus too durus Sermo The harshest peice of your Sermon This and I confess it so but we must drink it we must strive with it I but take heed of urging too far You may kill mens hearts and startle many weaker souls from a course in Christianity by being too rigid For when all is said and done and all our Receipts considered when we have once received the Grace of Baptism and often been confirmed in faith by receiving the other Sacrament and receiving so many so sweet and precious Promises in Christ by his word preached after all these Powers we find our selves still under the power of our Corruptions Well! All this may well enough be answered but there is a double fear that surther assaults us First Our Ignorance of the faith For you yourselves you Preachers keep such a stir wtih your definitions and distinctions and disputings about the thing it self The Act and the habit and then the lodging it in the Will or in the Understanding or both The consisting in Assent or Assurance or Obedience Some or all of these So that in such a distraction how shall a weak believer understand you Then secondly our infirmities are so many and so great that they are ready to sink our faith down to the brink of Desperation in Gods mercies and sorce us wretches to cry out who shall deliver us Why Remember yet what was set by I promised to resume that Cup and now it is the season now in the bitterness of soul you are fittest to taste the sweet and sure and everlasting mercies of God in Christ Jesus and for that purpose am I here to minister a word
meat and drink to do service And here again Corpus aptasti I am sure we sure were â—â—â—er so fitted for a body and for an house For were it not for this house in woful state were all the great houses of the Land all the Princely houses of all Christian lands the famous houses of York and Laneaster Valois Burbon Medices and Austria The right descent and purest royal blood is from this house of flesh but for this house and his wearing it and bearing all ours sins on the top of it For into the house they came not What Title but from this Ancestour to Paradise the Palace the Nonsuch above not a Tarquin Priscus or Superbus but beholden to this Servius nay the best and purest votaties in this house of God the place of his service not David or Solomon or good King Ezekiah not Constantine or Theodosius or Jacobus or Carilaus no gratious King of famous Memory or present Merit no body though never so embellisht or embraved shall ever joyn in that Quire of his Saints and holy Angels above without the mediation of the body of Jesus our Lord and the service done in that body 5. But what service in that Inn at Bethlem where was no room for him it was yet made serviceable for us for there we Inn to this day all at that Star we Gentiles claim by those that were Primitiae first Guests to that house of Gold and Incense we find there he had and we Partakers of his fine Gold and good service hath his Incense done us I am sure We pray Lord increase our faith and he that could help our unbelief Lord might do us good service if so surely a hundred Sermons in this house not more available then the dumb Cradle of our Lord in that cratch The Scripture speaks evidently saith the Apostle the Scripture lies mute thâ— Cradle house yet therein is an herald to proclaim the fulfilling of two great Prophecies one was Et tu Bethlem there Christ to be born The other that of his poverty A Worm shame of men out-cast of the people Upon the very Pillars of this house which are but the staves of the Cratch may we safely relie and build our Faith this blinded and madded the Jew but thus it must be thus must Christ be born if ever he do us good this obscureness to manifest him this emptiness to be his fulness of a Messiah to fulfill the Scripture that so our joy might be full full of joy and Peace in believing This the service he doth our Faith and no less service in making us humble I believe Lord and may not every one say I am humble Lord too but Lord help our unhumility Help us off with the double lets of outward Pomp and inward Pride Behold this Royal Insant reaches out his hand to serve us from his Cratch in our Bed-chambers and by his powerfull his high and mighty and stupendious Humility thrusts it to our hearts and strips off all from the souls and bodies of his faithfull servants all that may offend the eye of his heavenly Father and in that voice comes from him in this Cradle though yet inarticulate we hear him in the evidence of his holy Word and Spirit say Learn of me Put on the Lord Jesus Christ who thus in this House serves us and helps his servants both in their Faith and their Humility 6. and 7. In the sixth and seventh the private houses and banqueting houses of his servants the Lord serves as a Builder and a Watch-man and a â—â—aplain to say Grace and bless and loves to do â—â—vice there in the freedom of his conversation said in his dish by the proud Pharisee and in dayly working that Miracle of warry juice turned into Wine concoct into fresh and cheerfull blood 8. Next he serves us in those water-houses Wilt not thou O Lord go forth with our Armies saith the Psalmist so we may say The Lord hath gone forth with our Navies as in 88. so Quadragesimus octavus too Mirabilis Annus And then it is the Lord and the Power of his Might that hath saved the Metaphorical ships of Church and State kept those Bottoms from forreign invasive storms and dangerous Schisms and Leaks at home Skilfull Mariners may do well but he the Pilote at the Helm Christo Duce auspice regno is a Right Prophetick and true Inscription by Land and Water His bloody Cross a braver Flag and nobler Badge then Lucida sidera Castor Pollux This Pollens Lux ipsa the true Light to guide the whole feet He did us worthy service who first came by ship to conveigh the Light of the Gospel hither some years before a spark of fire at Rome What doth Lux by whose blessing on our ships we may by the same way derive the Light to other Nation yet in darkness as importing so thus exporting too the unsearchable Riches of Christ to which all Treasures of East and West are pale and drowsie and muddy things as a little Gravel in comparison Thus venture I still on with my frail bark and well enough if still Cesarem veho bear his well tryed Patience and attention along while Dominum Caesarem vebo That Lord who now could find no further house-room on earth or water but ceas'd not yet to do us further service in his very Sepulchre 9. For till he came thither thither we were come dead and buried bound hand foot in the grave-cloaths of our sins sealed up and claspt down with a stony weight of the wrath of God which would have prest us to the nethermost Hell But behold in that short time of his abode in this house what Rare Redoubts and Mines this mighty Engineer casts and contrives works a descent through the Iron jaws of death down to Hell and like a Conqueror ascends leading in Triumph Captivity Captive opening so and seasoning and sweetning so this house before so dreadfull filled with ultimum terribilium that his Disciples all that love and seek him in Life and Death shall never find discomfort in a Grave Nothing but a Requiem and Dormitory with Angels sitting at the head and feet till he awake them in Tuba novissima and raise them to a meeting in the clouds where all his servants shall enter into the joy of that their Lord. 10. As for the Catholick Church to demand his service there is to ask What good the Vine the Head the Bridegroom the Corner-stone do to the Branches Members Spouse and Building in those strict Unions nay closer then all those per euâ—dem spiritum Behold so am with you never to offer to part from you never to suffer you to part from me to the end of the world in the end and world without end which will be soon discovered by the Service done to each particular Member in every â—fâ—nr Souls and Bodies in that house For is not our body his house wonderfully and fearfully built that little world of beauty shaken
a week tythe all I possess This was well he ought to do so But Christ that saw his root was vain glory brings him on the stage for our learning to play his part of Miles gloriosus with a Panegyrick of his own praises in his prayer With Lord I thank thee that I am not like other men But all such flaring Hypocrites are met with by St. James Thou hast faith so hath the Devil saith he Is that faith which is all words and no works Can that Faith save thee Or is it vera fides Very faith indeed No it is the other Fià es rather that is a very Fiddlestring Saith not St. Paul as much Sever it from works of Charity and it is a meer sound and an ungracious sound too A sounding brass or a tinkling Cymbal Again they are met with by this Apostle where expounding this Text he tells them and us that walking in Light is all one with walking honestly Now is there any honor whence honesty is derided Is it not a shame Is this to deal fairly Is it fit men should so mis-use God and Godliness What make a shew of Godliness and have nothing to shew for it when it comes to the proof If nothing but profess saith Christ I shall be even with you one day Now it s your day to appear goodly and glorious before deluded men and to be thought Saints But when I come to be made manifest in my true and real Saints and to glorifie them indeed then I 'le profess too I 'le profess to you I know you not I know you well enough from the heart root but to be the men you call your selves My Saints my Elect and choice servants for such I know you not Depart from me you have been Retainers and Pretenders to and talkers of piety but workers of Iniquity 2. So far of active now for passive obedience A Christian ought to be such a one as old Philosophy and Poetry did Ideate only and imagine Sibi imperiosus totus teres atque rotundus A kind of Aeneas or Vlysses and Achilles mingled not only to do but suffer nobly For which end the Stoicks made men believe they had no infirmities but had turned out all their Passions and affections which is impossible Nor is that the thing which God requires 'T is not a disparking a disforesting but a Cicuration a Subjugation a Captivity a Crucifixion a Mortification and then farther respecting Christian profession Walking here implies a bold and constant course both in our faith and in our obedience the life and soul of faith a course undaunted an Eagles flight bold and forth on Comes humane injury in the way The heathen could rowse his friend with a Te moneo ut omnem gloriam quâ inflammatus fuisti omni cura industria consequare magnitudinemque animi ne unquam inflectas cujusquam injuria A Christian vertue then should be à crassiore tela then for every file to break 'T is for a weak or guilty mind to be troubled with injurious words like our Duellists preventing the day of Judgement and calling their brother to account next morning for every idle word over night by sending him the length of their sword And since I have mentioned Duellists let me have leave to throw three or four cool words this morning on that fire which is but Ignis fatuus and a Meteor that hath a place only in a middle rank and region of mankind The whole skie of women are clear against it Nobles for Council sit or government will learn to look down with storn upon it Beggars and the poorer Tribes ca◠live and die with a few brawls and broken heads The three professions are better taught and men of Trade and Occupation in Cities and Corporations understand not the word Business in the quarrelling Dialect So that fighting is confined it descends not usually beneath a serving man nor ascends above a Knight and being thus comprest the hope is it will shortly vanish into nothing For it rises from that which is next to nothing that is Vanity and Lyes and Vapors And you shall observe them still most tender of that dreadfull word the Lye on whom it falls in the nature of a true jest and such most enraged about Reputation forsooth whom wise and honest men know to have very little or no Reputation to lose Briefly What think these Gallants of the old Roman bravery and height of spirit Can they shew me from all that story a pair of worthy courages unless they will alledge those mercenary Fencers embrandled and fighting a duell for the Lye or the son of a whore or any such poor froath as flies from men in wrath or vext with distemper in drink or play But I am preaching to sober Christians a Religion that never occasions much less necessitates any Disciple to a fact which must inevitably draw on or endanger their hanging or damning or both And have we so learned Christ Did not that Lord and King of Glory empty himself first of all his Glory and make himself of no Reputation and then endured such contradiction of sinners such cruel mockings and revilings How many false accusations bore He before he bore his Cross So what a Tullying and declaiming of Tertullus What Rattles and Drums and Gun-shot And what a Catalogue of sufferings past St. Paul before he could finish his course and attain the Crown of Righteousness and even in the shock of painfull afflictions a man of God endued with a true Christian fortitude and Patience will learn to take up his Cross and learn by it as a a sound Distinction and take it as Gods usefull Fan to unmingle him from the chaffie and feathery things of the world and will look through it and find Gods primary intention of Mercy in sending it So David the man after Gods own heart did experiment his afflictions to be good for him and reductive of him into a right way And such a passive walk was his clean through In his beginning the Bear the Lion the uncircumcised Philistine then Troops of enemies with arrows and arrows prepared shot and shot privily Cost and Care and Wit employed to ruine him yet he sings The Lord is my Light and my Salvation whom then shall I fear Nay so far from fearing that if we belong to God it belongs to us to look for crosses What son is it whom the Father chastens not It is the lot of all his genuine Children it is the walk of all his pasture-sheep In the sheep-walk comes the storm the Shearer the Butcher Why For thy sake are we killed all the day long and counted as sheep to the slaughter If it come to death for Christ or his Cause it is the highest dignification to our nature next his own assuming it that parting with life is the consummate the best part of thy walk that severing is Union and that dissolution make the knot indissoluble 1. We come now
with those three Children of Light then walk on to fire unquenchable and utter darkness Then know O King that though our God will not deliver us yet will not we transgress the bounds of his Law to worship the Image that thou hast set up But then in this case we must look to our evidence that it be clear and sull Light nor streightned nor enlarged by our own or other mens false expositions For allow him but the ordinary gloss and every sinner will excuse his grossest crimes Is not the prohibition plain enough Thou shalt not commit Aultery Fornication Let it not be once naned yet all this with a Roman wash of venial sin or their rule of Caute si non caste will easily perswade some of their Novices or she Prosylite that there may be a kind of witty fornication tolerable or moderate Adultery So that Command Thou shall not steal Let the High-way thief or Highland Plunderer interpret he will tell you It s true unless you be under an invincible necessity or else promise to restore or accompt one day though you intend the day of Doom and such glosses men allow themselves in the main Articles of the Creed I believe the Catholick Church Ask the Anabaptist what it is It is a company whereof he is a prime man illumined needing no Scripture-rule but the Law of love and liberty Ask the Papist And he saith 't is nothing but a fine man at Rome with a triple Crown and a number of Fellows in red hats like Minstrels attending on him while with his foot he kicks off the Crowns of Kings and treading on the necks of Emperors cries super Aspidem Basiliscum c. Or briefer thus The Catholick Church in our Creed is Ecclesia Catholica Romana which though it be a Bull and infold a contradiction yet it serves for a Charm and the poor seduced Papist on whose brest it is hung is therewith stupified and dare not stir out of that Circle if he do the Devill will take him for God hath no deer out of that Pale that 's the Ark and out of the Popes Parish there is Salvation So then it must be no false or new-devised but old and full Light from Scripture that shall guide us And it can never become any Child of Light to cast his conscience into cloudy and raw and scrupulous fetters and startle and flie out of a Christian course or from a Christian Church upon conceited or imaginary Tropicks much less when the world or Devil would draw us to disorder our ways by their Cancer and Capricorn the griping claws of earthly Profit or the goatish Delights of sensual and carnal Pleasure Secondly And above all our Saviours Light is our best Direction And observe that Sun of Righteousness ere he rose a clear Light comes forth of Promises and Prophesies then a Day-star then in fulness of time he breaks the East discloses and he shines on in Wisdom at twelve years old grows in stature in Grace and Favour with God and man After his Baptism and taking on him the Ministry He goes about Preaching Healing doing good and suffering evil till he die rises ascends sends the Holy Ghost intercedes in Heaven for us and on earth is with us by his Spirit and Word to the end and in the end his final Reâ—olution and Revisitation to bring us to those joyes â—hat have no end This was and is his course Vade tu fae similiter Go thou and do like him How can we Why Be followers of God The Child may follow though non passibus aequis In his action he said I have given you an example and of his Passion the Scriptures saith He suffered leaving us an example Children learn to write and sew by Copies and Samplers so must we and so shall we if once our hearts be toucht with an Adamant if once tramed on by the Epiphany of such a star Then like those Eastern Magi we shall rejoyce to follow it yea content to take up our Cross and follow him content to be down and dark and despairing so we may rise to Light and stradiation and enabling Grace pursuing him through Ignorance Error and Death who is the Way the Truth and the Life And never giving over our Revolution and Resolution till we come to set where we rose born back with endless and impatient desires to enjoy Jesus the Author and Finisher of our saith and the end of our faith the salvation of our souls I have done with the explication of my Text There remains a word of Application to our selves first so had we best or it will be done to out hands with Medice cura te ipsum May I have leave then once more to look upon the Light and apply it first to the Learning and then to the Life 's of clergie men Wherein if I shall seem to teach any of these my Reverend Fathers or of my Learned Brethren it is with this protestation of primo meipsum 1. Our Learning first must be Lux in Demino we are Seers eyes to the Mystick body of Christ Jesus Dark Ignorance then to us should be a thing most horrible as t is to that sense in nature A foule and fearfull sight if those holes in our faces were empty and those bals of living fire pluckt from our fronts What is it when me want filling for so large a Sphere as our profession is A wofull Spectacle to see a blinking Glow-worm where a star of Magnitude should shine We are Gods Lawyers and Physitians with truth of Direction and severity of observance in our cures And is it not scandalous and dangerous an Ignoramus an Emperick or Montebank in our Calling unless as Circe and AEsculapius were both accounted Apollo's off-spring so Mediocrity and Excellency make no difference in Profit or Repute which makes so many take up with Atalanta Declinat cursus aurumy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But God would have us workmen able Ministers dividing the Word of Truth arighe And is noe Learning a mighty wedge and wrest in that Affair Aristole handles the affections in his Rhetoricks and sure I am that all our Rhetorick hath edge little enough to pierce into the wooden and stony affections of our common hearers Orpheus it had need to be in Sylvis to draw Beasts and Blocks And what shall we do in learned Audience They will soon perceive upon whose wheels our motions are such as can taft every vein of water and tell which savours Sulphur Vitriol or Steel but worst of all in convincing the Adversary What will become of our empty Frigats grapling with a man of war or a Jehu Jesuit thaâ— charges furiously when he finds a wak Adversary We must walk then to the Heaven of Scripture and stars of Interpreters no casting off those Beam without a self-illuminating and to get us work mens tools for sharp and flat peirce not alike though there be the like percussion We are Gods Smiths and
not aware I took at first no notice of his Fatherly corrections which are indeed his compassions and consolations Thy Rod and thy staff comfort me Psalm 23. But now I feel his coming to visit me is like his visiting the earth which he visits and enriches Psalm 65. like a Physitians visiting an Hospital to cure for if I am sure it is the hand of my God I am sure also that it is in Love for God is Love t is his Essence immutable No reason then his visitation should prove to an irreligious sadness or a melancholy a dejection a jealousie a diffidence So long as the work is his though he purge or cut so he give me not over so he cast me not out of his hands so I hear not that voyce which is more dreadfull then ten thousand thunders Depart from me c. Thus far I am to debate what I am to answer in affliction Surely the best answer is no answer at all Tacui Domine and my soul kept silence not as unaffected remorseless but as subdued by faith repentance obedience working me to a blessed patience captivating and bringing into subjection every exorbitant every wild and wandring imagination Once have I spoken saith holy Job but I will no more or if my heart will vent I have forms and molds ready wherein to cast my words that of Ely It is the Lord c. and David behold here am Is let him do unto me as it seems good in his own eyes and I will confess too to his glory the fruit and the root I find that thou O Lord of very faithfulness hast caused me to be troubled Psalm 119. and thy visitation hath preserved my spirit Job 10.12 And to draw this into practice in each particular affliction for every one is Gods Embassadour and none to be dismiss'd unanswered The application is a world of matter which I cannot look at now only for that I find my self in a Seminary in a Colledge of Divines I may have the liberty the recreation too to make for you and my self one particular application For we my Brethren that are or should be pars indocili melior grege if your pulse beat like mine are certainly so much infested with no worldly calamity as when saevit malignum ignobile vulgus as when we find our selves disgrac'd counted the seum of those that are indeed the scum of the world when all we can say or do which way soever we frame our doctrine or conversation it is as water spilt upon the ground For though we pipe unto them they will not dance though we mourn they will not weep Let a mans behaviour be like Iohn the Baptist rough austere they cry he hath a Devil or if enlarged in freedom of conversation like our Saviour away with him a glatton a wine-bibber a friend of Publicans and sinners So that the ground of the quarrel rests not in being thus or thus affected or qualified or endowed but they hate us for our very calling But what answer have we I could tell you one a harsh one of the Cynical Philosopher who being demanded How it happened that the great and wealthy people affected rather to be liberal in rewarding Fools and Players and Jesters and beggers then men of his profession answered for that they might perchance have some hope of proving such themselves but no hope of turning Scholars This was bitter But we have learn'd a better of the Apostle I pass not to be judged by you and a better yet of a better master Let not your hearts be troubled they called our Master Belzebub and shall not I drink of the cup which my father gives me saith he so shall we not drink the potion which our Lord hath begun to us which by tasting first he hath sweetened for us Is the Disciple greater so is he daintier then his Master Were we like the Apostles persecuted whipt imprison'd that consideration would make us march on in all these dificulties and like hardy souldiers non gementes sequi Imperatorem But rather rejoycing that we were counted worthy to suffer any thing for his name sake and if it came to death we know our Answer Christ t s to me life and death is to me advantage But I forget my self for I am bound to a further Port to that which is appointed after death for after that to Judgement When God shall visit c. Of this final Judgement the Text informs us two Things It shall be and it shall be most dreadfull therefore needs debating and casting for our Answer First it shall be He will visit Even the Heathen had an Apprehension an expectance of such a day a time quo Mare quo Tellus correptaque regia Coeli Ardeat mundi moles operosa laboret All this frame unling'd unpin'd and burnt And the new-discovered world have discovered this too though who discovered it to them is hard to determine But I speak to Christians who as fully as we believe God in Heaven believe from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead But Where When What Where I know not about Mount Olivet and they think they argue it fairly and probably from what we find in the Prophet of the valley of Jehosophat Joel 3.2 and that of the Angels This Jesus which is taken up from you into Heaven shall so come again as you have seen him go into Heaven Act. 1.11 However that sure we are of this his Elect by his Angels from the four winds from one end of Heaven to the other shall be gathered into one place Mat. 24.31 When tell us when shall these things be You know who ask'd that question and you know our Saviours Answer Take heed that no man deceive you and when wicked Mockers ask'd it the Apostle sets no day he durst not he could not Job was resolved in the Article he shall stand the last upon earth Job 19. but no time limited The Prophecy father'd on Elias tels us of two thousand yeers Inane two thousand Lex two thousand Dies Messiae and then the Conflagration But our Saviour controuls all over-rules all Of that day and hour knows no man nor Angel nor the Son kimself Only by many signs accomplished by the Apostles calling those the last days then what may we imagine now if but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then a Tantillum then that span of time is now contracted to an inch and he that shall come will come and will not tarry But what what will he come for he will come to visite such a Session Visitation as none before it No Star-chamber no high Commission no Parliament-Bar no Council-table no Inquisition so formidable Why who comes the Circuit the LORD the LORD-Chief-Justice Judge of all the world Wise Incorrupt with Power and great Glory with such a Train all his Saints and his Holy Angels and this is that day the day the day the great day of his wrath Zeph. 1.
failed his Trust which amounts to a lye On the other side when I give another the lye and know in my own conscience he hath not lyed I give the Lye to my self And what cause have I if I say the Sun shines when it doth shine and another tels me it is a Lye for it is midnight to persesecute such a one to death for making himself a foollish Ruffin and Lyar in his own knowledge So that to give it in any case except of Loyalty and Life is frivolous and irrational Object They object These Discourses savour of Cowardize I answer 'T is true if they call it Cowardize to fear God or hell whereas the truly wise or valiant knows there is nothing else to be feared For against an enemies sword we find 10000 seven-penny men wag'd at that price in the wars that fear it as little perchance less then any prosest sword-man in the world Diligentissima in tutela sui fortitudo and it is saith Aristotle a mediocrity between doubting and daring Sicut non martyrem poena so not fighting but a good cause declares the valiant man In which whosoever shall resolvedly end his life resolvedly I mean in respect of the cause to wit in defence of his Prince Religion or Country as he may justly be numbred among the Martyrs of God so may those that die with malicious hearts in private Combats or Duels be called the Martyrs of the Devil Neither indeed do we take our own Revenge or punish the Injuries offered us by the death of the injurious For the true conquest of revenge is to give him of whom he would be revenged cause to repent him and we lay the Repentance of another mans blood upon our own conscience and drown our souls in the wounds of our enemies A second Objection or Demand will be Do I condemn generous defence of Honor prest with Injury I answer No if the Injury be violent for the Law of nature which is a branch of the eternal Law and the Laws of all Christian Kings and States do favour him that is assail'd in the slaughter of the assailant but no Gentleman on a Chartel or Chalenge being defied is bound to answer in point of Honor in a private combate because omitting the greatest which is the point of Religion the point of Law is directly contrary which hath dominion over the point of Honor which can judge it which can destroy it except you will stile those Arts honourable where the hang-man gives the Garland For the Laws of the Land having appointed the Hangman to second the Conqueror and the Laws of God appointed the Devil to second the Conquered dying in malice I say he is base and also a fool that accepts of any Chartel so accompanied A third Objection How shall a noble or gentle man be repaired in Honor for Infamy unsufferable Answer By the Court martial For do we not in cases of debts goods lands and all things else submit without disgrace to law because it may be felony to take by violence that which is our own And if Honor be dearer then goods or life it self yet know what is true Honor It is the History or Fame following Acts of Vertue or Acts of difficulty and danger for publique good He that in these fails by Cowardize or base affection is dishonoured but acting a private Combate for a private respect and most commonly a frivolous one is no act of vertue because contrary to Gods Law and the Kings nor difficult on even terms nor for publique good but contrary For a man may be Felo de se robbing so his King and Country as for contumelious words if I cause my enemy to confess be sorry or make amends all these or any are sufficient and the dis-reputation is not mine but his and for matter of Fact or Blows c. famous is that decision of the French Marshals in the case of Monsieur de Plessis struck by a Baron which was awarded to kneel before Mr. Pl. in open Court sitting in his Chair and to tender him a sword and a cudgil and Plessis to chuse with which he would strike but he for gave him and which of these two had the disgrace If you say the Barons Repentance was enforced and so no dishonor to him you may as much alledge for a thief confessing at the Gallows that his Repentance is enforced too so all enforced repentance is inflicted upon us for something done unworthy of a Gentleman or an honest man and therefore the Court of Chivalry most charitable for the blood of men violently spilt doth not bring forth hony bees as that of Buls doth which sting but the fingers or the face but it produces that monstrous beast Revenge which hath devoured so many noble personages of several nations as there is nothing more lamentable nor more threatning the wrath of God upon supream Governors then the permission therefore K. James extinguisht those deadly Feuds in Scotland and our Laws are strong against Duellists in England My Additions follow in a Sermon to K. Charls The Heathen could rouse his friend with a Te moneo ut omnem glotiam ad quam à pueritia inflāmatus fuisti omni curâ industriâ consequare magnitudinemque animi tui qu am ego semper sum admiratus semperque amavi ne unquam inflectas cu jusquam injuria A Christian vertue then should be è crassiore telâ then for every flie to break 'T is for weak and guilty minds to be troubled with injurious words like our Duellists preventing the day of Judgement and calling their brother to account for every idle word over night by sending him the length of his sword But I desire to throw three or four cool words upon this ignis fatuus a meteor that hath place only in a middle rank or region of mankind For first The whole skie of women are cleer against it among the males all nobler spirits fitted for Counsel or Government will learn to look down with scorn upon it Beggars and the poorer Tribes can live and die with a few brawls or broken-heads at most The three professions are better taught finding no Aphorism or Law of God or man to defend it and men of Trade and Corporations understand not the word Pusiness in the quarrelling Dialect so that fighting is confin'd it descends not usually beneath a serving-man nor ascends above a knight And being thus comprest the hope is it will shortly vanish into nothing for it rises from that which is next to Nothing Vanity and Lyes and Vapors in Tap-houses and Taverns And you shall observe such guests still more tender of that dreadful word the Lye on whom it falls in the nature of a true jeast and such most enrag'd about Reputation whom wise men know to have little or no Reputation to lose Briefly What think these Gallants of the Roman bravery and height of spirit Can they shew me from all that story a pair of worthy Courages out take the mercenary Fencers embrandled and enkindled to go forth and fight a Duel for the Lye or the son of a whore or any such poor froth as flies from men in wrath or vext with distemper in drink or play But are we not Christians a religion of meekness that never occasions much less necessitatets any Disciple to a deed that must inevitably draw on or endanger his hanging or damning or both The Captain of which profession the Author and Finisher of our faith and salvation was consecrate through sufferings made himself of no reputation and endured such contradiction of sinners FINIS