Priests and Levites shall not want a Man before me Jer. 33. 18. parallel to that in Isaiah cap. 30. ver 20. Thy Teachers shall not be remov'd into Corners any more but thine eye shall see thy Teachers and farther explain'd by that Glorious Assurance to the Christian Church Isaiah c. 59. v. ult This is my Covenant with them saith the Lord my Spirit that is upon thee and my words that I have put in thy Mouth shall not depart out of thy Mouth nor out of the Mouth of thy Seed nor out of the Mouth of thy Seeds Seed saith the Lord from henceforth and for ever The Sum of all which promises amounts to this that the Church shall never be left without true and good Pastors the supposition of that is contrary to the very Definition of a form'd Church Grex Pastori adunatus the Sheep shall never be depriv'd of a visible sufficient number of Faithful Shepherds who shall make appear their Love to the great Shepherd of the Sheep the Bishop of our Souls by feeding his whole Flock the small as well as the great the younger and weaker as well as the older and stronger for in the charge that Christ gave to St. Peter a particular tender care is taken of the Lambs especially for the use of these the little Children as the Apostles call them or the Men of little Faith as Christ was pleas'd to call the Apostles themselves in their Novitiate or State of Pupillage for such as these I say was design'd the form of sound words as one Scripture calls it or the form of Doctrine as in another place If it be demanded what such a Form was I answer it was either the very same that we call the Apostles Creed or at least some Apostolick Creed some Compendious account of the Catholick Faith And Isaac the their of Promise so long ago was a kind of Catechumen and the first of those meant in my Text. He was to be taught the sum of the Law deliver'd to Abraham in these few words Walk before me and be thou perfect and he was to learn the sum of the Gospel from him that was also Taught it of God in this short Creed and in thy Seed shall all the Nations of the Earth be Blessed Men Women and Children are included in that Universal Grace and if very Children of all Nations have any share in this Promise then are they also within that Precept given by Christ to his Apostles go Teach and Baptize all Nations Not that of necessity they are to be instructed first and Christen'd afterwards but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is make Disciples of them apply and enter them forthwith into the School of Christ as Philip of Macedon upon the Birth of his Son Alexander presently said to Aristotle There 's your Scholar as if he had said I Constitute you his Tutor from henceforth see him well order'd and instructed as he grows more and more capable of Institution And if Levit. 25. Children are styl'd by Almighty God my Servants then why not as well my Disciples by parity of reason this Religious Care of Instruction extends it self to those that are Children in understanding as St. Paul stiles them For as there is a Child say's the Prophet Isaiah of a Hundred years old that is for the ripeness of his knowledge so it follows there the Sinner of a Hundred years old shall be accursed And to deliver such from the Curse upon those that do err from Gods Commandments as David speaks to make them capable of the Blessing upon the true Genuine Children of Abraham faithful good Christians as this is the peculiar business of the Tribe of Levi to do good unto all Men so especially to those who may be stiled more peculiarly the houshold of Faith for being of the house of Levi. For if St. Paul has stated it to his own Son and Scholar Timothy that if any provide not for his own and especially for those of his own house where it means providing maintenance for their Bodily sustenance he hath denied the Faith and is worse than an Infidel Then a Clergy-man is worst of all that provides not well for the Souls of those descended from his own Loyns And if every Master of a Family be in some sense a Bishop in his own House then the Elders or Governours in the Church if they would be counted worthy of the double Honour for Ruling well must own a double obligation to Build up such in the most Holy Faith to breed them up in the Nurture and admonition of the Lord. The Duties of Teaching and Learning being thus secur'd next I proceed to settle the subject matter of such Divine Lectures and so I am fallen upon my Third Part the full extent of these Institutions that they should keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment And what is it first to keep the way of the Lord I answer in the words of the Apostle to hold the Mystery of the Faith in a pure Conscience To some tender ears it sounds but harshly in the Creed we call the Athanasian and it seems a hard saying which Faith except every one doe keep whole and undefil'd without doubt he shall perish everlastingly and then again This is the Catholick Faith which except a Man believe faithfully be cannot be sav'd But this keeping the Faith supposes it first committed to any ones Custody or in the words of my Text this keeping the way of the Lord supposes the sufficient knowledg of it to be first imparted and so Believing faithfully presupposes a Discovery and Delivery and therefore the Faith for which we are bound to contend earnestly the Essential or necessary Faith is justly call'd the Faith once deliver'd to the Saints Wherever the Gospel is Preach'd there of necessity must this Faith be deliver'd So that in this sense we call it Necessary Faith meaning that Doctrine which all Christian Pastors are oblig'd to Preach and wo unto them if they Preach not that Gospel or if they do Preach any other That Doctrine which all the people that hear it Preach'd by these Pastors are oblig'd to admit That way of the Lord which all Men are constantly to keep when once they are shew'd it and Commanded to walk in it But this is none of their case of whom it may be truly said How should they believe in him of whom they have not heard and how should they hear without a Preacher What parts of Divine Revelation are so absolutely necessary as none shall be sav'd without both Hearing of them and Believing them what is so fundamental is among the Arcana Imperii the secrets of God's Kingdom levius est nescîsse quam Errâsse 't is a less guilt says St. Augustine to be ignorant of the Truth than to maintain a false Doctrine Suppose that any of those Disciples that St. Paul found at Ephesus those Disciples for so they are styled for all their ignorance that
A SERMON Preached at the Anniversary Meeting Of the SONS of CLERGY-MEN In the Church of St Mary-le-Bow DECEMBER 4 1684. By FRANCIS Lord Bishop of ELY and PRESIDENT of the Society LONDON Printed by John Playford for Henry Bonwick at the Red Lyon in St. Pauls Church-yard 1685. To the Right Worshipful the STEWARDS Of the late ANNIVERSARY MEETING OF Clergy-Men's Sons And the rest of the Governours of the Charity for Relief of the poor Widows and Children of Clergy-Men My most Honoured Friends THough I could heartily wish you had been pleased to reserve for some better occasion the just power you have with me and that you had demanded some other proofs of the due regard I must have to all your motions instead of obliging me to publish this very plain discourse yet I should not make you a suitable return for all the Honour you have done me should I obstinately refuse whatever you earnestly request but whatever credit I may lose if I have any to lose I shall not think I have lost my labour if I can perswade my Brethren of the House of Levi to take special care that this Charity begin at home this great Charity of Religious Education The best portion that any Parents can leave their Children the only considerable Portion that many of the best Clergy-men can leave theirs and one of the best Legacies they can leave this Corporation will be such well bred Children as will deserve that Character St. Paul bestows on Timothy Who will naturally care for your state For to make our Children as perfectly good Christians as they ought to be will be the most effectual means to tye them fast to the Interests of this Body the stiff abetters of the good Old Cause in Scotland have ignorance and impudence enough to Christen their Children into the solemn League and Covenant as if that were the Covenant of Grace and so do some of them call it Let us show as much zeal and more according to knowlege by bringing our Youth to keep their Baptismal Vow and then they will never fail to Honour and Love the Church in which they were Born and Baptiz'd But especially Let all the Sons of Church-men be so well Tutor'd and Taught that they may be secur'd and settled in this resolution to live and dy true Sons of the Church of England As I am one of the meanest of those Sons so I am My most Honoured Friends Your most faithfull and most humble Servant Fran. Ely A SERMON Preached before the SONS OF THE CLERGY GENESIS XVIII v. 19. For I know him that he will Command his Children and his Houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him THese words are part of a great and worthy Character which God was pleased to give of Abraham the Father of the Faithful who at his Hospitable Gate had newly entertain'd three Sacred Guests whom though the Patriarch at first apprehended to be but Men yet we may justly suppose they were more than Angels for since one of them is all along styled the Lord and since Abraham makes Addresses of Adoration and Prayer directly to him Unless we could allow the Socinian Doctrine That it were Lawful to Worship a reature and the Roman Doctrine of Praying to Angels It seems at least piously credible that those who put on humane shapes to visit Abraham had Divinity about them and represented no less than the Three Adorable Persons of the Blessed Trinity and therefore our Church reads this for the First Lesson upon Trinity Sunday In memory of this Glorious Apparition to Abraham one of the Church-Historians gives Bozomen l. 2. c 4. this account That once every Year there was kept a Festival Day where under the Doctor 's Oak as they call'd it where they suppos'd Abraham sate in the plains of Mamre all Three Religions Jews Gentiles and Christians had a Customary meeting where they offer'd Sacrifices to their God according to the different Rites and Ceremonies in use among them untill the great Emperour Constantine prohibited any more of the Jewish or Heathenish Conventicles to be kept there Commanded the Place to be purg'd and order'd a Christian Temple to be erected wherein only the followers of Jesus as the true Children of Abraham should be conven'd to Celebrate an Holy Anniversary Such a Solemnity as this which our Gracious King hath Licens'd us to observe in memory of our Fathers who Commanded us their Children as Abraham did his to keep the way of the Lord And in Charity to their Widows and Orphans to do good and distribute unto them for with such Sacrifices God is pleas'd In the words may be easily observ'd these Four Parts 1. First here is establisht the Duty and Authority of Parents to propagate true Religion to their Children and the obligation of their Children to receive it from them For the due exercise of that Paternal Power and of this Filial obedience is requir'd by Almighty God Respectively of both Parties requir'd in the Persons of Abraham and his Descendants that he should Command his Children and his Houshold after him to keep the way of the Lord. 2. Secondly here is a just and strong presumption that especially such Fathers of Children as be also Fathers of the Church will most effectually perform this important charge and that the Children of such Ecclesiastical Men will also most conscientiously do their part to observe the Directions of their Parents and to follow their holy examples This was a thing that God took for granted of Father Abraham that he would take upon him to Teach as one having Authority and that his Godly Dictates would be admitted by all whom he owns for his Sons I know that he will Command his Children c. 3. Thirdly here is the full extent of that duty which lies upon Parents and this upon Children those to give and these to receive good Precepts that they should keep the way of the Lord And then that way is made plain before them it opens it self into these two ways to do Justice and Judgment 4. Fourthly here is the ample recompense of doing these duties with extraordinary application it shall derive a Temporal and Eternal Blessing upon the heads of such well-governing Parents and such well-Disciplin'd Children for these rewards are imply'd sufficiently by that promise that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him 1. Here is establish't the Duty and Authority of Parents to propagate true Religion to their Children and the Obligation of their Children to receive it from them For the due exercise of that Paternal Power and this Filial Obedience is requir'd by Almighty God respectively of both Parties requir'd in the Persons of Abraham and his Descendants that he should Command his Children and his Houshold after him to keep the way of the Lord. That all Parents
have been Legitimate and has in a manner undertaken to be himself our Guardian And with great sense of Gratitude you did but this time Twelvemonth at our solemn meeting Vote an Address worthy of your selves wherein you have plighted your Faith to Assert the Rights of this Hereditary Imperial Crown and this you did with the lowdest and joyfullest Acclamations And as we are most particularly and indispensibly oblig'd to be zealously true and faithful to our Prince and Country so in the second place we of all Mankind are most strictly engag'd to be most unfeignedly and concernedly Friends to the Church This was a Temper of mind which Abraham effectually Commanded and Taught his Children when he discarded and expos'd one of them that was Ismael for but making a mock of Isaac whom the Apostle makes a Type of the Church and represents that whole Transaction for a figure of such as are Born after the flesh how they Persecute such as are Born after the spirit For a Mans foes to be those of his own houshold is hard indeed But that any of the Churches enemies should be some of those who came out of her own Bowels is a great deal harder If there be any such they are most properly call'd a Generation of Vipers But whatever he be in his Name he is in his Nature an Ismael a kind of Wild Man who can put off the most Natural affection that the Son of a Clergy-man ows to the Church which is something more than his spiritual Mother and to whose tender care he belong'd as soon as ever he came into the world To call such a one a Janizary may be thought too much and yet considering some aggravating Circumstances 't is indeed too little for those Children of Christian Parents are snatch'd from the breasts of their Mothers soon after they are Dedicated to God in the Blessed Laver of Regeneration the wretched Infants are worse than offer'd to Moloch who kill'd them presently they are Consecrated to Mahomet they are Educated in all the prejudices of Mahumetanism which makes their Aversion to Christianity much their misfortune though very much also their fault But what excuse can be made to alleviate the guilt of one brought up not at the feet of Gamaliel as Saul was but like Timothy bred up as it were by St. Paul himself or by such as were followers of him as he was of Christ But on the other side what a vast advantage may the Church derive from the kindness of so many Worthy and Excellent persons as make up this Solemn Assembly who though very considerable in themselves yet are few in number compar'd with the rest of our Brethren as I take leave to stile them dispers'd over these Three Kingdoms Many whom God has bless'd and who may prove a Blessing to very many For though Jacob curs'd the wrath of Simeon and Levi yet it was also part of his Blessing upon them and through them upon all the rest of Abrahams Children that he would divide the Tribe of Levi in Jacob and scatter them in Israel that so they might carry along with them his Benedictions that they might dispense them far and near that they might be themselves a common Blessing So at this time are the Sons of the Sons of Levi in their several stations So many wealthy Citizens such as the Book of Wisdom describes in that Chapter where we find the praises of Abraham and his Children Men renown'd for their power giving Counsel by their understanding that is Men of business excellent managers to make up your Court of Assistants So many honourable Gentlemen and Noble Knights rais'd by their merits and services at Sea and Land bound by their Order as well as by their Extraction to protect your Widows and Orphans So many Clergy-men of the Church of England to do their parts and to make good that Plea for the Marry'd Clergy that a great part of the Clergy of England and among them some of the best of the Clergy are the Sons of the Married Clergy Such a Corporation as this will bear up the Character given by the Apostle to the Church it self as that is a Corporation depending as do all Christian Societies and this for one upon Christ the Head from whom the whole Body fitly joyn'd together and compacted by that which every joynt supplieth according to the effectual working in the measure of every part maketh increase of the Body But this falls in with my fourth and last head of discourse of which very briefly the Blessings upon well-governing Parents and well-disciplin'd Children that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him And what is that all Earthly and Heavenly all bodily and spiritual all temporal and eternal good things upon Him and His especially His by Adoption His by Faith any that follow His and their Footsteps His in Teaching Devotion theirs in Learning it All these shall be thus Blessed with Faithful Abraham But if thus shall his Seed be Bless'd with both hands with the Blessing of the Left as well as the Right hand how comes it to pass that so many of their miserable Orphans call for our help and Relief How are Times chang'd since David made it his Observation I have been young and now am old yet saw I never the Righteous forsaken nor his Seed begging their Bread But I answer neither does David here suppose that it can never happen thus but that it falls out rarely He never saw it He never saw the Righteous forsaken nor his Seed begging their Bread that is he never saw them begging and quite forsaken which must be repeated That the Children of the Righteous should never beg their Bread was no where promised the Jews themselves They were not exempted from this as a Temporary evil either for Tryal or for Punishment They were not priviledg'd from being beseig'd in their Cities not yet from being driven out of their Native Country and David himself in the time of his Flight and Banishment was reduc'd to that extremity as to ask and receive the Shew-Bread to keep himself and his followers from starving But that there should be none to pity or have Compassion upon the Fatherless Children or Widow that was the Curse on Judas and David had never seen that heavy Curse fall on any Children of Abraham 'T is only upon such Apostates from the Faith such as Sin Trecherously the Psalmist lays such load Let the Runegates continue in scarceness I answer secondly those promises of plenty and eating the Fat of the Land must either be abated to us or else spirituliz'd to an Evangelical sense they were more literaly fullfil'd to that Carnal people the Jews than must be expected by us Christians our part is to be always dispos'd for Martyrdom and God has never engag'd to Command that these Stones shall be made Bread rather than any Son or Daughter of Abraham shall be starv'd into Heaven no more than he has oblig'd himself out of these Stones to raise up Children unto Abraham But for the better promises Those exceeding great and pretious Promises as the Apostle calls them In thy Seed shall all the Families of the Earth be Bless'd the multiplying of Abraham's Children like the Sand of the Sea or the Stars of Heaven These Benedictions are in a manner appropriated to us Christians St. Augustine presses the Donatists hard with these Glorious Prophecies concerning the vast number of those that should flock into the Church that its Sons should be innumerable whereas they of that Sect or indeed of any other were a handfull of Men in comparison how vainly soever they pretended to be the Catholick Church upon which those unspeakable Blessings are entail'd and settled to the end of the World Enough I hope has been said of the great rewards in this World and in that to come for the Righteous and those that Teach their Children Righteousness to reinforce this obligation upon us especially upon us the Children of such Fathers as were also our Ghostly Fathers To call to mind the wise dictates to revolve the memorable sayings and to recollect the worthy Acts of such venerable Guides is one of the best Systems of Practical Divinity for our use For if St. Augustin himself the Night after his Mothers Funeral could not help falling into most tender Passions upon the remembrance of Monica his devout Mother how many wearisome steps she had taken to follow his idle Progresses in his vitious youth that she might recover her lost sheep and bring him home to Christ's Flock then what mighty powerfull effects will it work upon any one of us that had a pious Churchman to his Father to reflect on his admonitions such as for their Gravity and Piety might have become the mouth of St. Austin himself Such a Reverend Spiritual Father such a Saint has this whole Society lost in our late most worthy President For how can I treat of this subject of teaching others to keep the way of the Lord and treat of it before this Audience without one word in Commemoration of that incomparable person who with almost an incredible concurrence of Abilities both of mind and body and with a most indefatigable industry yet with all this was not more fitted to acquire all parts of Divine Learning than he was apt to Teach And being Dead he yet speaks and Teaches us by his example he perswades as powerfully as if Abraham himself had Commanded us as his Children he Preaches more efficaciously than if Abraham should send us a Lazarus from the Dead to press Repentance and Holy Living He exhorts us not to be weary as he never was of well doing he charges us to be as he was Stedfast Unmoveable always abounding in the work of the Lord knowing that our labour is not in vain in the Lord To whom c. FINIS