our Lord more followed then their Master they consulted St. John § 190 before whom John discourse giving testimony to our Lord § 191 which fully satisfied them § 192 But John himself boldly reproving Herod was by him cast into Prison § 195 Meanwhile our Lord departed out of Judea into Galilee § 196 thro Samaria coming to Sychar § 197 where fitting by the Well he discoursed with and converted a woman and many of the Inhabitants § 204 Thence after 2 daies stay he continued his journey towards Galilee § 205 where he healed the Rulers son § 206 Then he went to Capernaum where preaching with great applause § 207 he gathered Disciples Particularly § 208 Simon Peter Andrew and the sons of Zebedee § 209 With whom the next Sabbath he entred into the Synagogue and taught 〈…〉 Spirit § 213 And departing from the Synagogue he entred into Simons house and cured his wives mother § 214 Betimes in the morning he retired privatly to Prayer § 215 And leaving Capernaum he went about other cities and towns of Galilee § 217 Going over the Lake he discoursed with several of the Scribes concerning following him § 220 Passing over in the night-time he calmed a great storm § 221 And the next morning landed in the countrey of the Gadarens where he met with two possessed violently with Devils Which casting out he permitted to enter into Swine and to drown them in the Lake § 225 Upon which the Gadarens being displeased desired him to depart And § 226 he immediatly returned into the ship § 227 and came to Capernaum § 228 Where he cured a paralytick on the Sabbath-day § 231 Thence going to the Sea-side he called Mathew and dined with him § 233 justifying that action § 234 as also the not so frequent fasting of his own as of Johns Disciples § 237 Then Jairus the Rules of the Synagogue intreated him to come and cure his daughter § 238 going along with him he cured the woman touching his garment § 240 and went forward to Jairus's house and restored his daughter to life § 241 Returning thence to Capernaum by the way he cured 2 blind men § 242 And at Easter went up to Jerusalem § 243 Where he cured a known Paralytick lying at the Pool on the sabbath-Sabbath-day § 245 To the great offence of the Jews § 246 But our Lord justified himself § 247 and his Disciples also for plucking rubbing and eating the ears of corn on the Sabbath-day § 248 himself also for curing a man with a withered â—and on the Sabbath when as it should seem he returned to Capernaum § 249 But the Pharisees joyning themselves with the Herodians sought how they might put him to death Which caused his suddain departure thence by Sea § 250 into a Mountain where he chused his 12 Apostles § 255 and constituted Peter the first or cheif § 257 and preached unto them that divine Sermon concerning the Beatitudes § 262 Recapitulated and § 263 the contrary woes § 264 The rest of that Sermon also is explained § 269 Yet not all pressed as equally necessary § 272 Thence he proceeds to instruct them how to pray § 275 and how to behave themselves in their Apostolical office particularly concerning false teachers A brief account of what is contained IN THE SECOND PART of the Life of our SAVIOUR § 1 OUR Saviour informing his Disciples of the dangerous temtation shortly to come upon them and providing them against it § 2 Judas departed to the High Priests to bargain for betraying him § 3 who agreed with him § 4 and gave him Officers and Guards to apprehend him § 5 They came and found him in the Garden of Gethsemane § 6 Whither our Lord retired § 7 and his Disciples with him § 8 all especially Peter resolving and promising never to forsake him § 9 our Lord being arrived in the Garden comforted his Disciples and took some of them to be witnesses of his great agony there § 10 In the garden he § 11 enters upon a spiritual combat § 12 by Gods permission § 13 very sharp upon several grounds § 15 as he discovers to the three Apostles which he had also hinted before in the Temple § 17 so that he sweated blood § 18 and an Angel was sent to strengthen him in § 18 but not deliver him from sufferings § 20 Then he riseth from the ground and with great cheerfulness and serenity prepares for his suffering § 21 meets those sent to apprehend him § 22 Whom his Disciples especially Peter prepare to resist § 23 blamed therefore by our Lord § 24 who after a short expostulation with the Officers § 25 yeilds himself into their power § 26 who laid hold upon a young man accidentally there present § 27 and carried our Lord late in the night to Annâ—s § 28 then to Caiphas the High Priest § 29 where he was strictly examined § 30 divers witnesses appearing against him § 33 To whose frivolous accusations our Lord answered not § 34 Wherefore the High Priest adjured him to confess the truth § 35 which he did with great courage and plainess § 36 warning them of his future power and glory § 38 Mean while 2 of his Disciples John and Peter follow him to the High Priests Palace § 39 where Peter denied him 3 times § 40 For which he was very much greived Meanwhile § 43 our Lord was very ill used by the servants and Officers § 46 as was prophecied of him § 49 In the morning he was carried before the Governour § 53 before whom he was vehemently accused § 54 Which Judas seeing made away himself § 57 as was fore-prophesied § 59 Our Lords behaviour as he was led to the Governor § 60 Before whom the Jews laid many things to his charge § 62 But examined by Pilate and found innocent he § 64 was sent to Herod § 68 Who despising him returned him to Pilate § 69 and Pilate endeavoured to save him 1 by proposing his releasment § 70 2 by chastising him § 71 and suffering him to be mocked by the Soldiers § 73 The Jews urged that he called himself the Son of God and laid other accusations against him § 76 till they forced Pilate yet with great reluctance § 80 to condemn him to be Crucified § 81 a death foreshewed by the Prophets and chosen by himself § 90 and to commit him to the Soldiers § 91 Who led him to execution much pitied by divers persons § 95 unto Golgotha Where they offer him mingled-wine § 96 stripped-off his garments § 97 set a title over his head § 98 and Crucified him § 99 And divided his garments § 100 Meanwhile many of the people and one of the theives mocked but divers pittied him Our Lord having disposed of his Blessed Mother § 101 was silent whilst many prodigies appeared § 103 At last he said I thirst and gave up the Ghost § 104 The meaning of those prodigies § 105 acknowledged by the Centurion §
Gentiles to this Common Lord of Jew and Gentile was effected on this manner A new Star for some time before our Saviours birth had appeared in the heavens probably of an extraordinary splendor and brightness suitable to the person whom it prognosticated Which by the Orientals much given to Astrology was soon discerned and raised in them a great devotion and earnest addresses to the Divine Majesty Creator of the Universe to know for the presignification of what strange effect he had sent it Whereupon probably by some such Revelation made to them in the East as they received afterward in Judea concerning their return Mat. 2.12 they were assured of the Birth of this Messias or great King to whom all the world should become tributary and subject Of which Prince also it is likely in so general an expectation of the Jews as then was that they had heard or also read something formerly Therefore these first believers of the Gentiles crediting all things of this Prince worthy so supereminent a dignity and being persons of high condition as the Magi in those Countries ordinarily were if not Princes made hast to be amongst the first that should profess their subjection and fealty to Him And as the Orientals usually do not approach great Personages without some present prepared some small quantity portable in a journy of the richest Gifts their Country was famed for wherewith to present Him And so setting forth upon this divine Indication either from some nearer parts of Chaldea or of Arabia Felix which lies some six daies journy Eastward from Jerusalem whence also the Queen of Sheba Arabia also being called Ethiopia Numb 12.1 A type of them came with the like gifts to visit King Salomon 1 King 10.2 Within not many daies after our Lords Nativity they arrived in Judea probably the Star that incouraged their journey now disappearing that so they might repair to the Royal City in Quest after the place thereof and so by our Lords special providence be the first Promulgators of the Birth of the Messias and awaken the sloth of Gods own people to make a stricter inquiry after it And well might the Jews at least when our Lord afterward at thirty years of age publickly appeared to them have reflected on this Star and the search of these Oriental Sages and Herods slaughter punctually agreeing with his Nativity Come hither and supposing that what was manifested to them strangers about the time was not concealed to Gods own people they made inquiry in the Metropolis of the Nation concerning the place where they might have access to and adore Him For they imagined that either this Prince the Messias might be of the present Royal Stock or if otherwise was of such a transcendent Soveraignty and descent so favoured from heaven such a King Paramount and extending his scepter over the whole world according to the frequent prophecies made of Him as other inferior Kings should have no envy to but joy therein which conceit was also nourished in them by Herods professing his ready concurrence in the same Adoration so soon as the place of his Residence should be discovered § 63 They coming therefore to Jerusalem and making openly such an inquiry and also declaring their late beholding of the Star that was newly displayed in the Heavens as a publick Herald thereof Herod Himself was not a little startled for in those daies much discourse passed in the world either by the Jewish prophecies divulged and the time prefixed in Daniels weeks now expired or by the Sybils or otherwise of the coming of this Prince of Princes and the return of a golden Age and some called the Herodians named Herod for the person The people also were troubled wondring at this Relation from strangers confirm'd by such a Celestial Messenger at their High Quality their concernment in a King of Israel and their boldness in confessing Him before Herod And expecting also some great change of affairs shortly if their words and prognostications proved true § 64 Herod who was a stranger King to this Nation and that the very first an Idumean by birth sufficiently suspitious of a supplantation and therefore intending mischief became as it were to satisfy these Sages very inquisitive after the place of this new Prince the Christ his Birth whom he seemed to reverence as a Person sent from Heaven rather for advancing and dilating Sanctity and Religion than for pursuing secular Honours The place therefore of his birth he strictly enquired after that so by the Divine providence both time and place might be manifested and proclaimed as it were to the world the one by the Gentiles the other by the Jews The chief Priests and Scribes are assembled about it and readily return answer out of the Prophet Micha Mic. 5.2 that Bethleem Davids City was to be the Place thereof And thou Bethleem Ephrata saith he that art a little one in the thousands of Juda. Out of thee shall come forth unto me he that shall be the Dominator in Israel And his coming forth is from the beginning from the daies of Eternity Having an eternal procession from the Father and an Eternal decree of his Messias-ship This for the place But further whatever certainty they might have also from Daniels weeks or Gen. 49.10 or other places concerning the Time it was not safe for them to pronounce any thing Herod therefore for his better information in this returns to the Sages and very secretly requires of them a punctual account of the first appearance of the Star conjecturing from hence the Age of the Child Which having learnt he desires that after they had found this great Prince they would in their return give him Intelligence of it that He also might pay his Duty to this expected Messias and Heir of all Nations And so dismissed them as the Divine wisdom ordered it without joyning to them any further attendance of his own Court perhaps out of a Countenance to slight the matter and pass things with less noise as also least any such discovery made by persons more interessed than these Strangers might some way or other disappoint his Bloody purpose or have given some jealousy to the parents to have conveyed him away Tho indeed this his secrecy defeated his Design Who was also glad to see the Jews so supinely careless in this affair who began even at his Birth tho thus alarm'd and provoked by the believing Gentiles to neglect and deny this their Lord Except only this stranger Idumean that was vigilant how to dispatch Him § 65 But the Zealous Sages unwearied still pursue their Quest and being not far gone from Jerusalem have this their untired diligence rewarded with a new appearance of their celestial Guide the Star filling them with exceeding great joy Mat. 2.10 after its former so long disappearance because unbelieving Jerusalem was unworthy of such a light and with as much admiration that the day-light obscured not its splendor For Bethleem being not above
res varias omninoque diversas versaretur For that naturally one action hinders another at least as to the highest intention of it which hindrance might also be in our Lord so far as his Divinity pleased to leave in his humanity also these sinless infirmities as a resemblance of the constitution of other men § 145 We read of a like thing done by our Lord afterward That before the solemn election of those persons who were to be chosen by him for the promulgation of the Gospel through the world after his departure hence that he retired alone into a solitary Mountain the evening before and there continued all night in praier Luk. 6.12 As also when he was in Capernaum being much followed and pressed upon by the people he is said to have made use of the solitude of the night and to have risen a great while afore day and to go into a solitary place to his praiers Mark 1.35 and said Luk. 5.16 to have withdrawn himself into the Desart for performing this duty But however this be stated concerning the advantage our Lords Devotions might receive from Solitude doubtless one principal end of this his forty daies and all his other retirements afterwards was that he might give us an example herein and shew us the great necessity of solitude fasting and withdrawing from secular affairs for our enjoying a nearer conversation with God and our overcoming of Temptations and especially for our better Preparation in the undertaking any weightier affairs such as is in the first place the Ministry and predication of the Gospel And another end seems to be this also that He who as other Teachers sent from God must necessarily spend the most of his time in an active life and common conversation yet might also in these his practices and especially this his for so long a time inhabiting the Desart allow also and countenance and recommend to those that have more need of and are more disposed to it the other life that is more addicted to solitude fasting continual praier and contemplation In the same manner then as our Lord is said to have passed that whole night before the Election of his Apostles and the other times of his repairing to Mountains and Desarts Viz. in praier and contemplation so may we rationally imagine him to have spent these forty daies and nights and his fasting in so great a suspension of his natural faculties to have bin an individual companion thereof § 146 In which forty daies fast and Devotion Moses as a type had preceded him once and again both first in his receiving the Law from God Exod. 24.18 34.28 which he was to communicate to the children of Israel as our Lord now was the Gospel and a second time in his making intercession for the people and obtaining their pardon Concerning which he saith Deut. 9.18 That he fell down before the Lord as at the first forty daies and forty nights without eating bread or drinking water because of all their sins which they sinned and that the Lord hearkned unto him And in his then being admitted also upon his earnest supplication to see Gods glory Exod. 33.18 34.5 and as also according to this action of Moses before we may suppose our Blessed Lord to have thus also prostrated himself before his Father in these forty daies and forty nights for the sins of the world and to have offered himself as Moses to be made a curse for our sakes see Gal. 3.13 and Exod. 32.32 compare Deut. 9.26 and so to obtain pardon for all true believers Of whom also the Goat sent into the Desart laden with the peoples sins was herein a type And as this type Moses in the Law so another preceded in the Prophets in Elias their Head his fasting forty daies in the same desart and Mountain as Moses and He there having also the Vision of and extraordinary communion with God As also our Lord's humanity afterward in the Holy Mount was admitted to behold his Fathers Glory in a bright cloud descending upon the Hill and to partake of the splendours thereof and also these two Men Moses and Elias representing the Law and Prophets were there present to do him Homage in whom both these were to be compleated Such exact resemblance were the Law and Prophets to have with the Gospel § 147 The similitude also here is not to be passed by which our Lords being here first conducted by his Father into the Desart before his beginning to take his possession of the inheritance both of the Jew and Gentile promised him by his Father hath to that former divine conduct of the Israelites Ps 2.8 first into the Wilderness after our Lord also as they had bin called out of Egypt Mat. 2. and the correspondence also which his forty daies abode there hath to their forty years Yet in this much unlike that he in this Desart being pressed also with the same necessities as they I mean as to hunger and thirst after so long a fast and upon it by the Devil much urged to the like offending of God Viz. not by not waiting his good time Yet he stood where they fell and with all patience contrary to them though having Miracles in his own power attended the time of the Divine good pleasure for his relief and here also He receiving at length the supply of his hunger from Angels sent to him may be said in some sense as they to have bin fed with their food § 148 This then was another end of our Lords withdrawing into this desolate place that he might be there tempted of the Devil saith S. Matthew chap. 4.1 and fulfil his Fathers good pleasure in his being exposed also like unto us unto the encounters and strangely-rude treatments of the enemy of mankind Satan For who hath bin in his temptations so rudely handled and carried about by him as our Lord was and that he might thus be as the Apostle observes Heb. 2.17 4.15 a more merciful High Priest to succour and assist us in those our temptations the like to which he had experimentally suffered himself and again that He might also in his fasting solitude and praier shew to us the armes by which we also may obtain the Victory over this Tempter It was also most congruous that the second Adam should undergo the same combat with him as the first who was foiled in it and ruined by it that so he might recover mankind after the same way as he was undone and having first mastered this strong man who could find nothing in him Jo. 14.30 no pride of life no disobedience no lust of the eyes or of the flesh he might proceed to spoil his house and his goods and the long possession he had gotten of wretched mankind as indeed our Lord did triumph over him in his following Life Death and Resurrection § 149 To these I may add yet another reason of our Lords withdrawing himself from John and the people namely
to qualify and lessen the great and suddain fame that might be of him which also was done for our example from that publick testimony they saw given by the other persons of the Trinity the Father and the Holy Ghost as also in the rest of his life he used frequent concealments of himself and enjoyned others silence for the non-preventing his future sufferings that so his six weeks absence and non-appearance might a little remit the former expectation and the Baptists immediatly sending all men after him whose manifestation was only to be discovered by certain degrees and therefore when returning from the Desart his stay with the Baptist much proclaiming him was only for two or three daies § 150 After his forty daies abode in this desolate place prostrated as Moses in his Fast before the Divine Majesty in praiers and intercessions and such Contemplations of God as his types Moses and Elias had formerly enjoyed and probably accompanied as they with a suspension of his natural faculties and a perpetual fast our Lord began when such his Devotions were ended and nature returned to its ordinary functions to be vehemently an hungred The Devil even the Prince of them as may appear from Matt. 25.41 Apoc. 12.9 who had narrowly watched Him hitherto and looked upon him with such an envious eye as he did on our first parents in their Innocency but could not attack him whilst in praier when this was ended and he saw also so great an hunger to pinch our Lord which our first parents had not when he prevailed with them to eat forbidden meats had entertained hence some hopes of prevailing upon his infirm humanity as he did on theirs viz. not to wait for his Fathers Provision for him in due time of such food as was necessary but with a power of Miracles presently in an extraordinary manner after such a meritorious Act of forty daies fast to supply himself with it In which Temptation also he hoped to make some advantage in reminding him of the dignity of his person and suggesting unto him that he was the Son of God Especially at this time the honour done him lately not only by the Baptist but from God himself both the Father and the Holy Ghost from heaven and now also the great Change of his life entring upon the office of the Messias might seem to have elevated his thoughts and ambitions above the temper of his former meanly entertained condition For tho the Devil had heard those glorious words pronounced from Heaven but lately at his Baptism and in his ranging every where for prey probably was well acquainted also with all the former miraculous passages of his life lead also hitherto without all sin and with all the prophecies concerning our Lord if we see how readily he afterwards quotes Scripture to him and how in his first accosting of him he pressed his being the Son of God yet since our Lord was also clothed with our infirm flesh he might not so perfectly discern the Hypostatical Vnion of such his lately assumed Humanity with the Deity nor how far it might be invested or assisted therewith and its weakness receive influences from it For this General enemy of mankind saw this his human nature clothed with all the infirmities as here in suffering hungar and passions or affections of it Whereby his flesh or sensitive appetite at that of others did naturally desire things delectable to it as meat drink rest sleep c. But yet these desires were alwaies such as were perfectly subjected to the guidance of right reason and wholly ordered and moderated by it and such wherein he had hitherto never sinned though it is most likely that Satan had not forborn before to tempt him as others to some exorbitancy therein even from his child-hood and again were such wherein he was also by reason of the Hypostatical Union of this nature to the Deity and perfect sanctification thereof by it utterly impeccable though this not known to the Devil Our Lord saith the Apostle not only felt our infirmities Heb. 4.15 but was in all points tempted like as we are i. e. by external objects occurring and inviting his nature to the use of them but without sin this sensitive nature was ever so overruled by reason as never by the least consent of his will to proceed to any excess beyond the bounds set by the Divine Commands Poterat quidem anima Christi saith S. Thomas 3. Q. 15. Art 4. resistere passionibus ut ei non supervenirent praesertim virtute divina sed propria voluntate se passionibus subjiciebat And In nobis quandoque hujusmodi motus non sistunt in appetitu sensitivo sed trahunt rationem quod in Christo non fuit quia motus naturaliter humanae carni convenientes sic ex ejus dispositione in appetitu sensitivo manebant quod ratio ex his nullo modo impediebatur facere quae conveniebant § 151 Therefore from this his liability to passions and the new change of his life Satan conjectured a fair opportunity for begetting in his humanity in his former life hitherto so poorly treated some Elation of mind and vain ostentation of its transcendent dignity and present advancement Or supposing Satan knew such an Union of this his humanity to the Deity as that our Lord could not possibly commit the least sin and that his present temptations were but in vain as all his former had bin yet was his malice to him so extream as it could not let him rest so far as God permitted and he rejoyced to give him some molestation though with a greater mischief to himself a quality we observe also in the Devil's children malicious men who do not forbear to afflict their neighbors in their own suffering much greater dammage § 152 He then as soon as God had relaxed his chain invades our Lord and probably appears to him in some comely and Glorious shape as we may conjecture from his last temptation wherein he desires Adoration from him Or as some think to be more sutable to the place shewed himself in the habit of some religious Hermite Or perhaps not disguising at all who he was which also was well known to our Lord subtilly desired some evidence of the supereminent Dignity of our Lords person as it were for his own satisfaction and that he might know his due subjection to him His request therefore was that if he were the very Son of God as he was lately proclaimed from heaven to be he would for the honour also of his human nature hitherto so meanly treated now shew an act of his Divine omnipotency and taking some pitty of its present necessities command those Stones that lay before him to become so many loaves of bread especially since in that desart place he could expect no other ordinary supply As indeed long ago in the like necessity the same Lord out of the stony Rock in the Desart brought forth water And the more kind
her water-pot behind her ran presently into the City which also was the intent of our Lords talking with her Viz. to communicate the Gospel also to these first fruits of the Samaritans who were half Israelites and Midlings between the Jews and Gentiles And told them that surely the Messias was come and was in the field or at least some great Prophet that had told her all things that ever she had done upon which the men of the City also hasted and came forth unto him § 202 Mean while his Disciples were returned from the Town with provision for dinner and as they came near perceiving his familiar discoursing with the Samaritan woman wondred not a little at it from the strangeness they knew was between the Jew and Samaritan and perhaps from the little converse our Lord had formerly used with wemen especially so alone and commonly his discourse only of the kingdom of God and spiritual matters which to a Samaritan seemed impertinent and such a one little capable thereof But standing in great reverence durst not ask him concerning it but when she was now gone away invited him to take his dinner To which well knowing this their wonder and so intimating to them what he had bin doing he told them transferring the discourse to higher matters as he did that with the woman concerning her water that he had meat to eat that they knew not of that it was his meat to do the will of him that sent him and in all places to finish his work toward those to whom he was sent Signifying to them that he was also among others to intend the conversion and salvation of these poor and despised Samaritans and of that foolish people in Sychem as they are called Ecclesias 50.26 that whereas they reckoned yet fower months unto harvest there appeared a great harvest every where to be gotten in as it were prenoting to them the conflux that would be made to him presently out of this City that the feilds were white already and the world prepared for the reapers the same Metaphor he used again afterwards when in Galilee great multitudes flocked unto him Mat. 9.37 sorry the labourers in this harvest were so few He proceeded also to tell them that they were chosen to be the reapers thereof and to enter upon the former labours and tillage of the Prophets and to gather much fruit to be stored up in life eternal where also both the former sowers and they the latter reapers should at last receive their full wages and rejoyce together in those Heavenly Treasuries § 203 By this time the woman was returned out of the City and a multitude of people with herto see our Lord the Prophet she told them of and to hear his further discourses concerning their Religion To whom our Lord in great compassion having preached as he did formerly in Judea the Gospel and Kingdom of heaven and remission of sins through belief in him the Saviour of the world with such his speeches he so opened their hearts for these were a part of these fields he spoke of that were already white unto harvest that the men overjoyed gratefully cold the woman that they had now received much more satisfaction from our Lord himself than from her relation concerning him and so much importuned him for a longer stay with them where having spent two daies more for their confirmation in the faith he thought fit to depart lest by such his longer conversation with them some scandal might be given to the Jews Among whom also as being the former Church of God the Gospel was in the first place to be published and therefore in sending his Disciples abroad he commanded them not to enter into any Towns of the Samaritans though himself was pleased in passing as it were to reap this first fruits thereof As also elsewhere he healed and converted to believe in him some other Gentiles and not Israelites Mat. 15.26 8.10 whom he saw extraordinarily prepared thereto And it is very observable for a further conviction of the ingrateful obstinacy of the Jews that this poor despised people were the first of his Auditors we read of that after his first called Disciples without also any Miracles of his shewed among them made such a noble confession of him saying We know that this is indeed the Christ and the Saviour of the world Which conversion of the Samaritans our Lord perfected some three or four years after as our Lord was now ascended into heaven by sending his Apostles thither before their spreading further to the Gentiles See Act. 8.5 6. At which time also we find the same credulity and alacrity in this people as is here And the people saith the Text with one accord gave heed unto those things which Philip spake as commonly those more grosly erring are sooner convinced thereof and reduced to truth § 204 After two daies stay in this place Our Lord went on his journey for Galilee and returned to Cana where he had formerly done the Miracle of changing the water into Wine the Fame of which as also the Galileans in their going to the Paschal feast there having seen the great miracles he had also done at that time in Jerusalem made this people to entertain and welcome him with very great applause and concourse and much better prepared for receiving his Heavenly doctrine and counsels the chief business for which he descended from heaven And by the Divine providence so ordering it that our Lord also might be the more welcome and secure among the Capernaites in particular where he designed his chief Residence it then so happened that the Son of a Noble man and Royal Officer in Capernaum fell sick and his life at last utterly despaired of Whereupon his Father hearing of our Lords miracles and of his return into those quarters hasted to Cana and there humbly besought him that he would vouchsafe to come down speedily to Capernaum and heal his Son who lay at the point of Death which also afforded our Lord an occasion of declining Nazareth where he knew his former mean education would render the function of his office less beneficial and the miracle might make also his return to Capernaum much more acceptable and desired § 205 Our Lord making some delay and reprehending his Auditors that without miracles they were so slow to believe the Noble-man again importuned him to make some hast before his Son was dead Whereupon he presently dismissed him with this answer that his Son lived signifying to him that he would heal him as well without going to him Which thing as he believed so he found most true when taking leave of our Lord and departing presently upon it meeting his Servants the next day he perceived from them his Son 's perfect recovery punctually at the time our Lord spoke these words and so he and his whole family were converted to the faith of the Gospel some imagining him to have bin Cusa an Officer of Herod's
reward promised there to them we may also gather the generality of this their fact § 209 With them then he returned into Capernaum and there on the next Sabbath day according to his custome wherever he was see Luke 4.31 he entred into the Synagogue and there taught the people In which Synagogues or Jewish Churches built in all places even in Jerusalem were exercised first the Reading of Moses and the Prophets Acts 15.21 Luk. 4.16 Then an expounding of them and Sermons of exhortation by the learned the Priests Scribes Lawyers c. See Act. l3. 14 15 16. Luk. 4.20 1 Cor. 14.31 In these also were used Praier Hymns and Psalms some entiteled pro Sabbato Collections also for the poor Only no sacrificing save at the Temple in Jerusalem Here as our Lord taught the people saith the Evangelist were astonished at his doctrine for that his words were with power and he taught them as one that had authority Mark 1.22 Luk. 4.32 and not as the Scribes authority both internally with more satisfaction and conviction and power over mens spirits by the Holy Ghost at the same time working in their understandings and hearts enlightening subduing enflaming and setting them on fire and externally also with more assurance and asseveration Amen Amen dico vobis Qui habet aures audiendi audiat Quodscimus loquimur telling them who sent him and strengthening such testimony with miracles and doing these also commandingly and with authority with authority commanding the evil Spirits saith the Evangelist Mark. 1.27 Luk. 4.36 Increpans rebuking the diseases the Seas the Winds all done with great Majesty This teaching with authority is in the Gospel frequently noted of our Lord Mat. 7.29 after his long Sermon in the Mountain This made the High Priests Officers in hearing him say Never man spake like this man and the woman in his Sermon cry out Blessed is the womb that bare thee and the brethren going to Emaus reflect afterwards upon it that whilst he spake their hearts burned within them And the men of Nazareth that had so much prejudice against him there meanly and illiteratly educated Luk. 4.22 are said to have wondred at the words of grace that proceeded out of his mouth And many times his Adversaries were so a mated with his speeches Psal 45.2 that they would not reply one word to him All this according to the prophecy Diffusa est Gratia in labiis â—uis and Esay 49.2 Os meum quafi gladius acutus And this Power and Spirit he communicated also to his Apostles whence S. Paul 1 Cor. 2.4 My preaching was in demonstration of the Spirit and of power And 1 Thes 1.5 out Gospel came to you in power and in the Holy Ghost and in much assurance and so he directs Titus Chap. 2.15 Loquere exhortare argue cum omni imperio Now if the Holy Spirit such in the servants what was it in the Lord § 210 As he was speaking thus in the Synagogue to the people a man that was possest with an unclean Spirit all Devils being ordinarily called thus because delighting in all impurity therefore they desired rather to enter into Swine standing amongst them all possessed not being continually agitated or molested by the evil Spirits but by fits perhaps when the disposition of the Body the humours at such times do also concur with it The Devil that was within him either not able to endure the presence of our Lord or also having received some secret command already from him as those Mark 5.7 8. to quit his prey or terrified with his words speaking of the destruction of the Kingdom of Satan cryed out desiring that he would let him or them alone and not destroy them sometimes speaking in the singular number and sometimes in the plural the like request to which we find elsewhere Mat. 8.29 and Luk. 8.31 and Mark â— 10 where in Matthew the Devils beseech him that he would not torment them before their time and in Luke that he would not send them into the Abysse and in Mark that not send them out of the country We find also several other passages in Scripture that may further explicate the present condition of these miserable and cursed creatures unto us As their being said by S. Peter 2 Pet. 2.4 Jude 6. and S. Jude to be reserved in chains under darkness or as S. Peter to be cast down to hell unto or until the judgment of the great day Eph. 2.2 6 12. and S. Pauls calling Satan the Prince of the power of the Air and these evil Spirits the Rulers of the darkness of this lower world and Satan being said that He goeth about here seeking whom he may be permitted to devour 1 Pet. 5.8 and the like is said in Job 1.7 and the evil Spirit cast out of a man his being said to walk in dry and defart places and so finds no rest there Mat. 12.45 till permitted to return to his former lodging by new finning better prepared for him their crowding also so many of them as they get leave into one person and so much more mischevous there than a single one could have bin as we hear of seven cast out of Mary Magdalen and of the Spirit returning with seven more worse and fiercer than himself and of a Legion in the furious Gadaren and we have them answering our Lord sometimes in the singular sometimes in the plural number by what is spoken Apoc. 20.3 Of a closer imprisonment of Satan and so of his Regiment of evil spirits that shall be before the worlds end than is yet for the present § 211 Now I say by all these well considered it seems first That the evil Angels suffer not such torments now as they shall hereafter when they shall be judged at the last day by our Lord and also by his Saints 1 Cor. 6.3 Apoc. 20.10 compare 3.7 And 2ly that Though they are cast down to hell or the inner bowels of the earth full of darkness as their proper Prison and place of present sufferings whither also the souls of wicked men descend and are tormented with them yet both they and the chief Prince of them are permitted by God to come forth of this lower prison upon the earth such of them and for such duration of time and extension of place as the Divine Majesty pleaseth for the greater exercise and trial of the just here and for the afflicting and executing of Gods justice on the obstinatly wicked sometimes even to the possessing and inhabiting them even many of these evil Spirits in one man After the same manner as the good Angels descend from heaven their place of Bliss for the Protection of the just and regular government of this lower world against the malice of these malign Spirits Which evagation of evil Spirits and their inhabiting here a less darkness and especially the hurt they can do to any men seems by some of the former expressions to afford some solace
the custome of the Jews See Jer. 9.17 2 Chron. 35.25 were called thither and by their doleful Notes and Voices according to the design of these excited the grief of all those friends and acquaintance that came to lament with the Parents of the deceased Our Lord commanded their silence and slighted the matter to do this great miracle with the more privacy so the less as yet to provoke the envy and persecution of the Pharisees as also to be a pattern herein to us of avoiding applause He excluded all others and took only into the roome the parents of the Damsel and three of the Disciples a competent number for witnesses and taking the deceased maid by the hand bid her arise which she presently did her soul returning to her and walked before them Our Lord to shew the cure perfect bidding them to give her some food the parents and Disciples must needs be much astonished hereat This being for the Rulers honour and rewarding of his patience the first of the only three persons our Lord raised from the dead during his whole life time And therefore this as the first done with more secrecy the raising of the widows Son more openly and of Lazarus again more publickly than that And his power herein also was manifested by several degrees First this maid was raised not long after deceased and whilst yet lying in her bed but the widows Son when already carried forth to be buried And lastly Lazarus after his having bin buried and lain four daies in his Grave The Parents then being enjoyned secrecy but no way perswaded thereto thinking it a part of their gratitude to divulge it Our Lord departed toward his own lodging in Capernaum § 241 In the way two blind men followed him desiring testorement of their sight and stiling him the Son of David i. e the promised Son to whom the Kingdom of David should be restored see Luk. 1.32 and see the like of other blind men Mat. 12.23 and Mark 10.47 52. which was an act of great faith in them Our Lord took no notice of them in publick but when come into the house he first to try and strengthen their faith asked them whether they believed that he was able to do such a thing and then touching their eyes with his hands imputed the cure to their faith enjoyning them also secrecy but in vain to men so overjoyed As these cured blind men went out from our Lord they brought to him one possessed with a Devil that rendred him dumb and speechless Which Devil being cast out the dumb presently had his speech restored to him the people wondring and praising God the Pharisees raging and blaspheming and divulging among the people when their mouths were stopt as to his other miracles that for his ejecting Devils he did it by the power of the Prince of the Devils with whom he was in league over the rest his Subjects perhaps by them now at first in our Lords absence but afterward in his presence too where we shall also meet with our Lords answer to it § 242 After our Lords residence for some four months at Capernaum and elsewhere in Galilee as appears by Jo. 4.35 42. and his visiting all the Cities and Villages thereof teaching in their Synagogues preaching the Gospel healing their sick and doing many miracles among which was the raising of the Rulers young daughter deceased to life the next Paschal feast of the Jews now approached being the second of those feasts succeeding his baptism and he now in the thirty second year of his age For the Celebration whereof our Lord together with his Disciples went up to Jerusalem whose words and actions there are delivered to us by S. John writing after the rest of the Evangelists and supplying many things omitted by them who declareth chiefly these his words and actions transacted in Galilee the place of our Lords ordinary residence for declining the fury of the Pharisees and Rulers of the Jews till the appointed time of his Death was at hand § 243 Here then S. John first relates a Miracle done at Jerusalem by our Lord upon a much-known Paralytick Done on the Sabbath day and further the man bid by him to take up his bed and walk contrary as it seemed to their law forbidding them the doing any work Exod. 20.10 and particularly bearing of any burdens Jer. 17.21 22 which thing when discovered by the great ones among the Jews to have bin done by our Lord so highly enraged them saith the Text as instead of magnifying him for so great and charitable a Miracle they not only persecuted but thought to stay him for causing such a breach of the Sabbath Jo. 5.16 The Story is this Near the Sheep-or beast-Gate and not far from the Temple was a great pool said to have bin made first by Solomon where the Sacrifices were to be washed and made clean before they were carried into the Temple This pool serving for such an Holy use an Angel of God at certain times but uncertain when or how often or whether more usually at the feasts descended and moved or troubled and muddied or ruffled the waters thereof After which motion discerned the first person any way infirm of his limbs lame blind withered paralytical c. that could get into the water was immediatly and perfectly cured which curing of one only shews it to proceed from a peculiar divine dispensation and not any natural cause and this because rarity recommends and sets a great value on Gods works as we see our Lord also of many infirm that then lay here cured only one In the five porches thereof built for this purpose and the place therefore called Bethesda i. e. Domus misericordiae lay a multitude of infirm people waiting for the troubling of the water Among these was a poor man lying on a bed that had laboured under his infirmity thirty-eight years inveterate and incurable who also had lain there a long time by reason of his poverty having no help and still prevented by others stepping into the moved water before him § 244 Our Lord visiting this Hospital if I may so call it on the Sabbath made choice of this man on whom to shew his mercy restrained here in order to his passion from such universal benefactions as he wrought in Galilee both as being a greater object of charity and his long infirmity well known abroad and as one having a bed the carrying away of which bed on the Sabbath he knew would give the Jews much occasion of inquiring after him that commanded it and by which he might shew to them more publickly his authority and commission and whence he was and that he was both Master of the most veteran and incurable diseases and Lord also of the Sabbath After his having asked him first to excite his faith and expectation whether he had a desire to be cured and heard his doleful complaint who hoped it only from the waters he bad him presently
their Disciples see Mat. 23.5 and intended only the advancement of their own honour with men which they saw our Lords eclypsed They sought to justifie themselves before men saith S. Luke 16.15 and they did their works that they might have glory of men Mat. 6.2 and they loved the praise of men saith S. John more than the praise of God Jo. 12.42 and this ruined their faith founded on humility and obedience sancta stultitia ut sapiens fiat 1 Cor 3.18 that therefore whilst now they thus rejected him who coming in great humility spake all things unto them in the name of God his Father and no way magnifyed himself nor sought as they his own Glory Jo. 7.18 8.50 by Gods just judgment upon them they should hereafter be given up to follow others who came to them in their own name many seducers and false Prophets neither by true miracles or other testimony shewing their Commission from God as he did Which things were eminently fulfilled by this nation prone to follow those who pretended themselves Prophets not long after our Lords ascent into heaven by many Heads of their factions provoking the Roman Armies and the destruction of the Nation following upon it § 247 Our Lords Sermon being ended occasioned by the Jews accusing him first for a breach of the Sabbath in his curing the Paralytick and then again of Blasphemy in the defence he made for himself In which discourse of his they and said only truth in it said he made himself equal with God A new Controversy concerning the Sabbath happened again not long after on this manner On the first Sabbath succeeding the Paschal feast as S. Lukes word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is commonly understood in reckoning in the seven Sabbaths till Pentecost from the second day of the Paschal-feast On this or some other so called Our Lord with his disciples perhaps in his removal now towards Galilee after the feast ended or as some think in his going from Mount Olivet through the vale to Jerusalem passed through some corn-fields probably in going to some Synagogue there to instruct the people as was his ordinary practice on the Sabbath and as may be conjectured from the multitude of people that followed him and among them some Pharisees who quitted him not watching most narrowly all his waies words and actions for materials of accusation against him Now some shorter journeys on the Sabbath were not disallowed because of repairing to the publick places of Gods service when at some distance from mens habitations In this field the Disciples or some of them at least being much an hungred began as they passed to pluck the eares of corn and so rubbing them in their hands to eat it a thing indulged by the law to any travellers through their Neighbours corn Deut. 23.25 and a thing commonly done had it not bin on the Sabbath and so this labour done in it Viz. of rubbing the eares in their hands For it seems on other Festival daies besides the seventh day of the week which festivals were also called Sabbaths See Lev. 23.11 15.24 32. though in these also they were prohibited the doing of any servile work yet they might then do any thing relating to preparing their diet see Exod. 12.16 But on the seventh day they were prohibited any work whatever See Levit. 23.7 comp 3. even in order also to their daily food as to making any fire for dressing it c. Exod. 35.3 Though this again could not be so strictly understood as that no motion might be used on that day in order to our diet as the carrying or setting it on a Table the cutting of it into pieces or putting it in their mouths And the Disciples food here seems to be a provision ready-dressed there only remaining their picking it out of the ear to put it in their Mouths The Pharisees streight observing this their rubbing of the eares instead of any Compassion toward the poor disciples who endured much hardship both as to diet and lodging in this ambulatory life of the Lord they waited on fell on quarrelling again at their breach herein of the Sabbath and hereof made their complaint to our Lord. To whom he answered but out of the Scriptures several things all intimating that these zelots were too strict and scrupulous in this matter He represented to them then that David in a kind of necessity was excused in eating of the Proposition Bread and prohibited to any save the Priests That the Priests in the Temple on the Sabbath-daies for the necessary performance of their office profaned the Sabbath Viz. in the work of repairing the fire on the Altar killing and preparing the Sacrifices c. and were blameless herein whence the Jewish proverb that In Templo non est Sabbathum which Temple if it excused them that there was here one greater than the Temple the attendance on whom and the wanting of other necessary provision might excuse the Disciples in this fact That himself was Lord and Author also of the Sabbath as also of the whole law and a Judg of the true observance or breach thereof our Lord taking occasion every where to let them know who he was that so they might believe in and have salvation by him And that the Sabbath being made for the benefit of man the rest thereof was not extended to deprive him of any necessaries And besides these he pressed them again with that place in Hosee I will have mercy and not Sacrifice Herein upbraiding their hypocritical pretences of sacrifice religious ceremonies and the worship of God to discountenance works of mercy and charity which on this day as to others so much more may be performed to our selves and this in particular of repairing our bodies therein with necessary sustenance that therefore if they had well known what that saying meant they would not have condemned the guiltless Thus our Lord where his urging misericordiam volo non sacrificium and Davids and the Priests fact in a case of necessity argues his disciples though t is probable in a morning as his own hungring was Mat. 21.18 much pinched with hunger and that in this ambulatory and Pilgrim life they made many poor meals and missed many and so their Master too And that the same happened to them for lodging And therefore he forewarned the Scribe that would attend on him Mat. 8.19 what he must expect § 248 To this Quarrel concerning the Sabbath the Evangelist adds another happening on another Sabbath perhaps the next Our Lord now returned into Galilee and probably to Capernaum went as usually into their Synague and taught Now there stood before him a man that had his right hand withered And the Pharisees observing it and nothing bettered by our Lords late answer to them watched him whether he would heal him on the Sabbath that they might have saith the Text still more accusation against him Our Lord perceiving their wicked thoughts having first called forth the
person and set him in the midst of the Assembly as an object of great pity before he cured him and that he might do it as it were with their good leave and consent or with the more shame and confusion to them asked them what they thought of it whether it was lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil to save life or to destroy it there being no medium between bene male facere in any necessity of our neighbour the non-releiving of which if in our power is a sin to which they being silent not only to let him go forward in his purpose but because they knew not what safely to answer he demanded further who among them having one Sheep faln into a pit would not streight go lay hold of it and pull it out on the the Sabbath and then how much a man better than a sheep and a greater charity this where less our own interest And thus saith the Text when he had looked round about on them with anger being grieved for the hardness of their hearts upon his only bidding the man stretch forth his hand and his doing so it was restored whole as the other Where it seems somewhat hard to find a breach of the Sabbath as to any corporal work Our Lord held his hands still touched him not only spake to him the man stretched out his hand and who doth not this on the Sabbath without guilt yet it appears they were though silenced not satisfied but rather more filled with madness § 249 So that they went presently upon it and joyned themselves with the Herodians whom we find also Mat. 22.16 combining with the Pharisees and questioning our Lord about the lawfulness of paying tribute And in Mark 8.15 Our Lord warns his Disciples to be-ware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod i.e. of the Herodians where S. Mat. c. 16.6 saith of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Saducees It seems then they were a looser and more prophane Sect much what of the Saducee-opinions much more addicted to and complying with Herod and the present Roman Government than the Pharisees were and so sufficiently odious to them but yet these as siding with the Secular state able to do more mischief and so they were made use of by the Pharisees in the persecution of our Lord. With these then the Pharisees consulted how they might destroy our Lord and that presently as appears by his suddain removal out of that place which probably was Capernaum From whence he went as he used to the Sea of Tiberias giving order to his disciples that a small ship should wait upon him so to avoid the press of the people and more commodiously to teach them out of the ship For an infinite multitude of them from all Quarters from the coasts of Tyre and Sidon and of the other side of Jordan and from Idumea as well as Judea and Galilee followed him what way ever he moved Partly for hearing his most admirable and ravishing discourses and prudent answers partly for having their sick cured by him cured without suffering any repulse or delay and all diseases whatever equally remedied and no more necessary for it than only the touching of him Which thing also caused the greater press upon him and forced him to the help of a ship As for the possessed the unclean Spirits presently fell down and adored and with loud cryes confessed him to be the Son of God though rebuked by him for it and silenced Where S. Matthew who beheld these things in writing his Gospel takes occasion to set forth the meekness charity patitience humility and complyance of our Lords compassionate carriage towards every ones infirmity in the words of the Prophet Esay foretold concerning him Esay 42.1 Behold my Servant whom I have chosen my beloved in whom my Soul delighteth I will put my Spirit upon him and he shall shew judgment to the Gentiles He shall not contend or use rigor or violence in his Office nor imperiously command and cry ou ts nor shall any man hear his voice aloud in the streets A bruised reed shall he not break and the smoaking flax shall he not extinguish but treats his infinite supplicants with incredible tenderness and meekness and against his as weak adversaries no way shews his power until by his own patience and sufferings he send forth judgment unto victory and perfectly establish righteousness in the earth and in his name the Gentiles received to mercy shall also trust and believe and become Subjects to his Scepter § 250 In those daies not long after our Lords return into Galilee from the second Paschal feast and about a year of his preaching being in all about three years and an half Or half a week of years now run out and as some conjecture now about the time of Pentecost at which time also God promulgated his law on Mount Sinai to the children of Israel as appears in Exod 19.1 and 11. compared with chap. 12.18 from the 14th day of the first Month to the 3d day of the 3d Month being just 50. daies and at which very time also our Lord afterward sent his Holy Spirit upon his Apostles enabling them to keep the law formerly delivered and lastly when now also our Lord saw the multitudes that flowed to him from all Quarters still greatly increasing and more labourers necessary for so great an harvest at this time I say and on such a necessity our Lord thought fit to make a Solemn Election out of the number of his Disciples and followers of 12 persons according to the number of the 12 Tribes to whom they were to be sent that they might assist him in his Ministry and whom after some time of their instruction he might disperse abroad to preach the new Kingdom of the Gospel concerning him in the several Cities of that Nation and for giving the more authority to their Doctrine to cure all diseases and eject Devils but this not in theirs but in his Name that so all might believe in this their new Saviour and obey his Doctrine and Commands § 251 On the Night therefore preceding this his Election when in the Evening the people with whom he spent the day were departed to take their rest he retired into a Mountain probably not far distant from Capernaum for in the context Mark chap. 3. Luk. 6. chap. we find our Lord after his departing from their Synagogue by the Lake teaching the people out of a ship because they thronged him immediatly before this And there is an high hill a few miles distant from Capernaum westward towards Bethsaida described in Eugene Rogiers Terre Sancte Lib. 1. chap. 10. that is called to this day Mons Beatitudinum On the top of which was anciently built a Church the ruines whereof still remain We find also in Mark 1.35 mention of a Desert not far from Capernaum into which our Lord retired for prayer and so from thence went into
again very early in the morning Luk. 21.37.38 he returned to teach the people in the Temple the whole body of the Nation as it were being then at Jerusalem whither also saith the Evangelist the people came early to hear him See for these things Jo. 18.1 2. Luk. 21.37 38. Mark 11.11 12 19 20. well compared This he had done now for several daies together after his humble triumphal entrance into Jerusalem riding on a little Asse-colt on Palme-sunday All the day shewing himself in the Temple to all the Nation assembled at this great Feast and teaching them publickly and using now greater authority than ordinarily there Mat. 21.12 Luk. 19.45 healing also there the corporally diseased that were brought unto him Mat. 21.14 and afterward retiring to this garden or to Bethany every night From whence one of these mornings as he was travailing towards the City being an hungred he went to gather some fruit on a fig-tree in his way and finding none thereon to shew to his Disciples the great power of a strong faith in God that is joyned with purity of life Mat. 11.25 he cursed it and as they passed by it the next morning following the Disciples saw it withered away Probably in this Garden also it was that as he and his Disciples were sitting in one of these dayes after his coming from the Temple on Mount Olivet and beholding the Temple over against them and the stately structure thereof he made to them privatly there now before his approaching death and departure from them that large prediction of the final destruction of it and of Jerusalem c. Mat. 24.3 Mark 13.1 2 3. set down Mat. 24. Mark 13. and Luk. 21. After he had spoken of it formerly weeping when he entred into the City in his humble Triumph on Palm-Sunday Luk. 19.41 and again in his Sermon in the Temple Mat. 23.37 And our Lords Ascent into heaven also upon Mount Olivet seems to have bin somewhere hereabouts For it is said Luk. 24.50 That our Saviour at the time of his Ascension led his Disciples forth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not to be taken strictly as if he carried them thither Now Bethany was almost fifteen furlongs that is almost two miles from Jerusalem on the side of Mount Olivet Jo. 11.18 And his Ascent is said Act. 1.12 to have bin upon Mount Olivet which was a Sabbaths-daies journey from Jerusalem which Sabbath daies journey is ordinarily accounted seven or eight furlongs i. e. about a mile Now his ascent being not in the village of Bethany where can we more probably conjecture it to be than in or nigh to this Garden the former usual place of his privat resort with his Disciples That as Grotius observes Qui locus submissionis istius testis fuerat idem esset Gloriae That where he had his Agony there he should begin his Glory Again the vally between this place and Jerusalem being called the vally of Jehosaphat where it is thought the last judgment shall be 't is probable that here also on that day our Lord will descend in Glory where he was with so much unjust violence apprehended and bound and carryed away to judgment § 6 This then was the place where Judas and his Troops intended to surprize him Our Lord also chusing rather to be taken in this place of retirement at his prayers than in his Inne at a Feast For our Lord well knew this design of Judas and all his preparations and therefore could easily have disappointed it by withdrawing himself elsewhere as he had done twice formerly because his hour was then not fully come Yet as before when he saw this wicked Servant unreclaimable by any kindness he had resignedly and fearlesly bid him that what he was resolved to do he should do it as speedily as he could so now thirsting extreamly to accomplish his Father's Will the Prophecies that were made of him and the full Redemption of mankind out of the hands of that mortal Enemy who had thus also even now carried away his own Servant he now riseth up leaves the house and marcheth over the Brook Cedron through the vally of Jehosaphat straight towards the place where he knew he should be looked-for chearfully resolved to meet his approaching sufferings and presenting this Lamb in that piece or ground where he knew these Butchers would look for it to hurry it to the slaughter Such Resolution he shewed when he took his leave of Galilee half a year before Luk. 9.51 Dum complerentur dies assumptionis ejus ipse faciem suam firmavit ut iret in Jerusalem And such an order of finishing this his passion he discovered in that speech upon mention of this his Baptism in sweat and blood Luk. 12.50 Baptismo habeo baptizari quomodo coarctor donec perficiatur and discovered but now at the Table again saying Desiderio desideravi c. Luk. 22.15 § 7 His Disciples followed him sad and dismayed yet hitherto well resolved not to quit their Master two of them armed with Swords one of which was S. Peter Our Lord by the way gently told them That they all that night should be offended in him not expressing their future fault in its worst terms i. e. should take offence at such things as they should see happen unto him and so forsake him whom they had formerly confessed for the Son of God For that now the time foretold was come that he the Shepheard should be smitten and the Sheep be scattered making use here of prophecies and his fathers good pleasure declared therein as a consolation and an unviolable prescription in all these sorrowful events And after this prediction of their miscarriage instead of reproaching he comforts them and bids them take heart again for that he had like a careful Shepherad prayed for them to his Father and there should be no final revolt in them nor their faith in him suffer more than a short Eclipse and that after his Resurrection he would render himself before them in their own Countrey Galilee and that there after his sufferings were past they should with great gladness again enjoy his presence Galilee being the place both where he had most Disciples and where was most privacy for its remoteness from Jerusalem the divine Wisdom having Decreed for leaving the more reward to faith that his appearance should not be to all the people or Nation that saw him dy and therefore a certain Mountain therein Mat. 26.32 28.7 probably that of his Transfiguration which St. Peter calls the Holy Mount 2 Pet. 1.18 was appointed by him and probably also the Particular time set when and where he would make the most publick Manifestation of his Resurrection which his Father 's good pleasure admitted where also above five hundred of his Disciples assembled together had at once this beatifical Vision 1 Cor. 15.6 To return § 8 To this the Disciples more looking upon their present love and affection to their dear Master than
by our Lord in his Palm-Sunday Triumph when as from Mount Olivet he beheld the City he wept over it Luk. 19.41 and again in the Holy week of his Passion when in the Temple he told them their house was now left unto them desolate Mat. 23.38 and again when he sate on the Mount Olivet over against the prospect of the Temple Mat. 24.1 c. with his Disciples and lastly as he went to Execution and saw the people weeping for him As the cheif Priests in this suddain transmitting of our Lord to Pilat shewed the great zeal they had of his speedy dispatch so this Eve of the great feast of the Passover seems also to be one of the usual daies if not of the tryal yet of the Execution of Malefactors thus made more Exemplary at the time of so great a confluence of People hither Because we find others then executed besides our Lord and because it is said to be the custome in honour of this great Feast for the Roman Governour at this Sessions to release one of the Persons condemned to the Jews who as they had lost the power of putting any to death so of pardoning or releasing any from it § 60 Our Lord brought hither was committed to the Roman Guards and carried by them to the Praetorium or Court of Judgment But the High Priests and Antients of the Jews entred not in with him because this Evening they were to eat the Pasch not performed by them in its proper time as it was by our Lord because the Paschal-Feast-day happening this year to fall on the day before the Sabbath was by a former custome transferred to it Now the eating of the Paschal Lamb was prohibited to all that were any way unclean Numb 9.11 and the Jews held the touching or any Gentile whom they esteemed unclean as not being cleansed at all from their pollutions according to Levit. 5.3 and 15.1 c. to render them so he who touched any thing unclean becoming unclean Lev 5.2 For this cause they stayed without and it happened also opportunely for their better prevailing with and perswading the people by and by that they should save Barabbas rather than Jesus the one a true raiser of Sedition and the other falsly accused of it § 61 This impediment of their entring into the Pallace and there preferring their accusation against the Prisoner made them also hope from Pilat rather a Confirmation of their sentence and an order for his execution than a reexamination of his cause and that his guilt in such an extraordinary case should be taken upon their word But God would not suffer their Injustice so to be huddled up nor yet Pilat who it seems had more intelligence of their proceedings then they imagined for a Roman Tribune and Cohort were also employed in our Lords apprehension Jo. 18.12 and doubtless had heard much of the fame of Jesus and had a vigilant Eye upon his motions and on the concourse of the people made to hear him but without discovering any harm in his actions and also who knew saith the Text that not for any capital crimes of his but for meet envy no small Guilt of theirs they had delivered him He therefore seeing the Prisoner stand before him without his Accusers riseth from the bench and unexpectedly goes forth to them and askes them what accusation they brought against him who now answered him also in general that if he were not a Malefactor they would not have sent him to him Pilat somewhat moved with such their declining his further examination of the matter desires them then since they had found him such they would resume the matter into their own hands and finish the work they had begun and punish the Delinquent themselves according to his demerit Upon which they replyed That his crimes were such as deserved death and that in the most severe and exemplary manner which it was not permitted to them to inflict and so when thus urged to it began to accuse him to the Governour of such things as they imagined might be of most weight with him and the Roman-Militia pressing in particular his forbidding to give Tribute to Cesar and saying that he himself was Christ a King An accusation in the sence they intended it and as it might any way intrench upon Cesars rights very false For as for Tribute he had both actually before paid it when demanded of him to Cesar Mat. 17.26 and also being asked by them the Pharisees joined with the Herodians Mat. 22.16 the question about the lawfulness of it but two or three daies before his apprehension on purpose saith the Evangelist Luk. 20.21 that they might take hold of his words that so they might deliver him into the power of the Roman-Governour he affirmed it and utterly silenced them with that divinely prudent answer of his Reddite quae sunt Caesaris Caesari quae sunt Dei Deo that they should give to Cesar Cesars Coine And as for his Messias-or Kingship he had confessed it indeed but that his sitting upon his Throne should be not here but in Heaven ad dexteram Patris and the Glory of it not present but hereafter Quando veniet cum nubibus The like account whereof he gave afterward to Pilat and also de facto when the Multitude purposed to have made him King Jo. 6.15 he had declined it and presently withdrew himself and elsewhere in a contraversy between two Brothers about dividing Luk. 12.14 a piece of land he refused to be an Arbitrator and sent his Disciples about the countrey without carrying a peny of money or so much as a staff Mat. 10.10 i. e. wherewith to defend themselves or offend others taught them continually Patience and non-resistance if struck on the one cheek to turn the other the fundamental way of the propagation of his Kingdom In his late apprehension he commanded Peter to put up his Sword and forbad the use of it against authority and presently repaired the hurt he had done with it All which fulfils that so often repeated of our Lord in the Psalms Oderunt me gratis without any cause Et quae ignorabam interrogabant me § 62 Pilat upon this their accusation returned into the Praetorium where he had left our Lord in the custody of the Roman-Guards and calling him before him asked him whether he was the King of the Jews meaning that Messias or Christ or King that the Jews had so long expected perhaps because that his Accusers had told him that our Lord had before them openly himself confessed it Our Lord though well knowing what had passed without yet to reduce the Governour the more to reflect on his own observation and experience and on the malice and envy of his Adversaries well known to him desired doubtless with a great appearance of gravity and Majesty to know whether he asked such a Question of himself and from any jealousy our Lord's life and actions had raised in him of his aspiring
Christians being only six foot square and eight foot high and the entrance into it on the East-side about three foot high and three foot three inches broad On the right side of which Sepulcher from the entrance the Sacred body of our Lord was placed see Mark 16.5 compared Jo. 20.12 with his head toward the West After this the door or mouth of the Cave was shut up and fenced with a massy piece of rock cut out for the purpose not to be removed but by the help of many hands to hinder any violation of the Sepulcher or Body or robbing it of those costly linnen and spices that should be bestowed upon it Such a cave it was where Lazarus was buried Jo. 11.38 31 41. with a great Stone rolled upon the entrance into it which our Lord then commanded to be removed and our Lords raising of him a lively type of the same thing he would shortly after perform in raising himself Meanwhile those women our Lords former Disciples and Attendants that assisted not in this action keeping some distance perhaps in respect of these honourable persons with whom they had no acquaintance observed all that was done where their Lord was laid and how the Sepulcher made fast and it being now too late because night approached they intended after the Sabbath ended to express their last love and affection to ther dear Lord also in bringing some more sweet odours and spices for preserving and perfuming of his Sacred body and the narrow roome where it lay more to shew the honour and devotion they bare to it and once more to behold to touch and kiss those most holy Relicks than that there was now need of any more such cost § 113 Thus our so cruelly murthered Lord was now at rest whilst his glorious Soul meanwhile that was never separated from the Deity and now attended on with multitudes of Angels descended into Hell and the lowest parts of the Earth and of his Kingdom and there triumphed over the Powers of Darkness conquered as to their former Tyranny over man and over the lower part of this world by his late death and delivered also thence such imprisoned Souls as were capable of the mercy and favours of his Passion according to that of the Prophet Zee 9.11 Tu quoque in sanguine testamenti tui emisisti vinctos tuos de lacu in quo non est aqua and so with them entred into Paradise the place of joy and Repose for all happy souls till the resurrection of their bodies where he was adored by them as the Author of their Salvation and endless felicity and amongst the rest by the Soul of his late Fellow-sufferer though upon a just account the penitent Theif and so this its beatifical presence they there injoyed till the appointed time of its return to exalt also his crucified body to the state of glory Thus I say our so cruelly murthered Lord was now at rest but not so the consciences of the Pharisees and High Priests Whose seeing these two noble persons Joseph and Nicodemus thro so much popular hate to have so honourably interred his Body gave them a great jealousy and the predictions also about his rising again the third day much disturbed them Though a thing which was quite forgotten by our Lords Disciples and Followers who one would think had most cause to have remembred it and which he had so often told them of and they had upon hearing it from him also disputed amongst themselves what should be meant by it as they descended from the holy Mount after our Lord's Transfiguration and after this again were by him minded of it but the night before his passion as they went along to the Garden he telling them then also that when risen he would go before them into Galilee Mat. 26.32 I say this forgotten by them yet now very much troubled and disquieted the thoughts of the High Priests They could now call to mind how when they asked him a sign once and again Mat. 12.38.16.4 he alleged to them that of Jonah and that the Son of man as Jonah in the Whales belly should lye three daies in the heart of the earth and so be cast up again and the jaws of Death not be able to detain him And his saying that if they destroyed the Temple meaning his Body after three daies he would raise it up which speech of his though before they made it misconstrued by them an Article to condemn him yet now they could apprehend in another and its right sense and might thereby have condemned themselves Now also perhaps the words of our Lord spoken with so much Majesty before them at his arraignment ran in their mind that they should shortly see him sitting on the right hand of Power and lastly the obsequious respects they saw given to his body by those two eminent persons they conceived might arise from some such hopes and were performed from some such expectation Remembring therefore these predictions and perhaps not free from all fears of such an event after having beheld such wonderful things at and before his death they thought it meet at least to prevent any cheat in the business and to hinder that his Disciples might not upon such rumour of his rising again to deceive the credulous people remove secretly his body and so shew the empty Sepulcher and suborn some to say they had seen him though indeed no reason they had to suspect any such thing but rather that his Disciples if finding his words false would at least recant their former error and confess him an Impostor and a false Prophet Therefore they hasted again to Pilat for all that it was the Sabbath it being late over night before they were informed of his solemn and sumptuous Burial and relating to him these predictions and the bad consequence that might be of them importuned him that there might be set a watch before the Sepulcher till the third day and as if jealous also of the corruption of the Watch that the Sepulcher might be sealed besides But why this seal because if the body were taken away there must be a breach of the seal and so this theft discovered But so would there be a breach of it if the body risen again For how could they imagine that that power which raised the body might or would not also throw open the door for its passage But this Seal served well meanwhile to save it from the pillage of the Soldiers and to guard it from the Guards Some Antients say that the stone was by them fastned to the Sepulcher with iron These things were done accordingly by themselves the Governour leaving this wholly to their own ordering and doubtless much wondring at these their extravagant jealousies and fears So to the Monument they go set this Guard and seal the stone and this with no regret that it was on the Sabbath of the breach of which but by better works surely than these they had so
so his glorified Body should not remain alone but have also a great train of other glorified Bodies whom he thought meet to wait upon him and with it ascend to Heaven Who to shew his conquest not only over his own but our death and to confirm to us also our resurrection by vertue of his were together with him the Primitiae dormientium and the primogeniti ex mortuis in whom the divine Wisdom thought fit then to foreshew what is to be performed and made good to the rest of the bodyes of all his Saints now lying in their dust at the great day And some of these Saints also in these their new restored bodyes came into the Holy City saith the Evangelist stiling it so as if now sanctified with their presence and in alluding to the celestial Jerusalem of which these glorified bodyes were now to be eternal Inhabitants and there these also appeared to many saith the Text according as the Divine providence disposed testifying to them the Resurrection of our Lord and further confirming it with their own and so presently disappeared again Now what glorified persons these should be whether some holy men or also Disciples of our Lord that were lately before deceased as the Baptist S. Simeon Anna Zachary S. Joseph or others whose Sepulchers were near the City and well known and now viewed to be opened and empty by such as remembred their interment appearing to such to whom their persons were formerly well known or also whether most of the more eminent former Patriarchs and Prophets that had lain now so long a time in the dust and whom our Lord would gratify with a more early Resurrection we not knowing how far his favours now at this his entrance into his glory might be extended though what S. Peter saith of David Act. 2.34 seems somewhat to weaken such an opinion here I say it would be too curious to inquire further into such a matter hidden from us to whom several things of the Oeconomy of the next world for certain reasons of the Divine Wisdom are as yet but very sparingly revealed § 117 Amidst these extraordinary discourses of our revived Lord by the Guards and by the Saints risen with him the Galilean women who on the Eve of the Sabbath had observed where his Body was laid and knew nothing of the Guards that were set there the next day and having now prepared a more choice composition of spices and odours than the former hast of his burial would permit to Nicodemus in which women also used to be better skilled rose up very early in the Morning to go to the Sepulcher there to visit his precious Body and pay this last office of their duty and love unto it These were Mary Magdalen and Mary our Blessed Ladyes sister-in-law and mother of our Lords Brethren Salome the mother of James and John Joanna the Wife of Herods Steward and some others besides But no mention is there of our Lords Mother the Blessed Virgin amongst them and the reason why she who had a much greater love to and grief for her Son than any other yet was not so active as they in expressing it seems to be either that John to whose prudent care she was committed had restrained her return to the Sepulcher so to put some bounds to her grief and that this might not add sorrow to sorrow or rather because both the faith of his Resurrection before it came to pass was never diminished or ecclipsed in her who also full of Grace laid up in her heart all our words and well remembred what others forgot and also because most probably our Lords consolation of her so soon as he was risen was not at all deferred but that by his immediat apparition to her he afforded her an early recompence of her former suffering those sword-points of sorrow at his Cross and also of the faith which in her alone withered not at that time as in the rest Though our Lord mean-while did not think fit to use her having so near a relation to his person for a witness to others of his return to life which she also might then understand from him was to be discovered by certain degrees for the greater trial of his Disciples and evidence of the fact and so whilst others went to and fro she remained after this beatifical sight all this morning in the posture of so great a Mourner retired continuing in a rapture of joy and uncessant praises and thanksgivings to God For none can here rationally imagine that our Lord who vouchsafed to honour Mary Magdalens love and tears and S. Peters primacy and extraordinary affection to him with a gratious sight of him before the other men or women omitted this to his own Mother more loving and beloved by him § 118 The most Holy Virgin thus retired and the other women as yet busy in ordering their Provisions Mary Magdalen more regardless as formerly Luk. 10.42 of such by-businesses more fervorous and impatient in her affection to be with what was yet left her of our Lord whom only the devout observation of the Sabbath could have restrained from the Sepulcher so long ran before the rest whilst it was yet dark saith S. John with a valour more than a womans to this place there rather to expect and stay for her company For this S. Johns particular story of her as also our Lords appearing to her alone before the other mentioned also by S. Mark Mark. 16.9 He appeared first to Mary Magdalen seems to intimate But here some of the Evangelists writing things more compendiously in which others are more copious and some with more others with fewer circumstances and so for persons also some mentioning more than other do wherein yet is no contradiction whilst I give the substance of what these Sacred Historians have delivered I desire your pardon if I do not or cannot punctually observe the order of every thing done in this so small a time and yet so very full of various occurrences since as S. Jerome on Mat. 28. observes particularly of these women there seems to have bin several excursions to and returns from the Sepulcher made by them and perhaps not of all of them together Crebro abeunt saith he recurrunt non patiuntur a Sepulcro Domini diu abesse aut longius Mary Magdalen then coming thither thus alone when the soldiers were already fled away of whom she knew nothing saw the great stone rolled from the Sepulcher and our Lords body taken thence at which surprized with great wonder and grief she ran back into the city to the house where S. Peter abode with S. John and the Blessed Mother of our Lord probably all the Disciples not lodging together to tell them the sad News See Ink. 24.9 12 24. that the Monument was thrown open and no body there These two the chief of the society and between whom seems to have bin a more particular friendship who also had
a certain number weight and measure and the precedent works exact patterns of the succeeding and nothing here casually hapning especially the numbers of six and seven have bin very mystical and Sacred ever since the work of the creation in six and rest on the seventh day § 143 Before this time then was expired the Eleven Apostles and some other Disciples also and the Galilean women with the Blessed Mother of our Lord and his Brethren were now returned to Jerusalem and there remained together probably in the place where our Lord had celebrated his last Supper and which our Lord had first made choice of in the house of some wealthier Disciple when he sent Peter and John to provide the Paschal Feast for the more commodious transacting of all these affairs And there our Lord the last time shewed himself unto them and having discoursed several things concerning the Kingdom of God and their publishing and proclaiming to all Nations the universal power and Glory that was now given by God to him he promised before their going abroad in his service to endue them also speedily after his Ascending with power from on high by sending upon them the promise of his Father he had so often told them of which you may see promised of old in Joel 2.28 cited for it by St. Peter Acts 2.17 Zach. 12.10 Ezec. 36.26 Telling them that John baptized only with water but that they not many daies thence should be baptized with the fire see Mat. 3.11 or flame of the Holy Ghost for so in the likeness of a flame at Pentecost it descended and was poured forth upon them and so charging them that they should remove no more from Jerusalem till this thing was accomplished § 144 The Disciples hearing our Lord speak of things pertaining to his kingdom Act. 1.3 as also before in Galilee that all power was given to him in Heaven and Earth of their receiving power also from on high and a charge not to depart as yet from the Royal City joined perhaps with what he had formerly said unto them of their sitting on twelve Thrones things not then understood so spiritually by them as they ought but they imagining some temporal dominion of the Jews now to be restored in our Lord to the race of David over all other Nations like to that of Solomon the quite contrary to which followed shortly after namely their utter ruine A thing that ran in the mind of these two Disciples also that went to Emaus Luk 24.21 presently asked our Lord whether now the time was come of his restoring the Kingdom to Israel This they inquired notwithstanding our Lord had so often told them the contrary and informed them that his Kingdom was not of this world and that as it had treated him their Master so should it them the servants that they should be persecuted banished killed for his name sake and for the Gospel preached by them Our Lord therefore not too much to contristate them and knowing them not well prepared as yet for the communicating of such secrets in which by the Descent of the Holy Spirit he more fully instructed them afterwards and at how great a distance his Kingdom was in such a sense as they meant it when the Twelve were to sit upon twelve thrones did with great prudence and as much meekness and supporting of their infirmities return them only this Answer That it was not for them to know the times or the seasons which his Father had put in his own power much what so as he had answered to the Mother of James and John concerning who should sit at his right hand Dabitur illis quibus paratum est a Patre meo Mat. 20.23 and to Peter inquisitive concerning John Si eum volo manere c quid ad te And indeed there are many futurities with which it is better that our human weakness be not preacquainted as perhaps fit here that hope deferred might not too much contristate them for the Disciples as yet to be ignorant of such a long revolution of many ages as was to be before the day of Doome and our Lords return to take possession of the kingdom or before that prosperous and flourishing condition of his Church which was at last to precede his Kingdom Which coming of his in Glory many as appears by St. Paul 2 Thes 2.1 2. 2 Pet. 3.4 9. perhaps by understanding Mat. 24.34 and 1 Thes 4.17 expected even in the Apostles daies and the great terror in those that heard St. Peters first Sermon in the Acts shews that they then apprehended it not far off But saith he ye shall receive power after this Holy Ghost promised is come upon you and shall be witnesses unto me and preach this my kingdom boldly to all the Nations of the world § 145 After such discourses past in that large Caenaculum at Jerusalem the time of his return to his Father being fully come he led them first out of the City through the plain about a mile in breadth as far as Bethany that was at the foot of the Mount of Olives his Friends of that place making also part of his Train and so ascended to the top of the Mount of Olives But we may imagine this their procession out of the city was by his miraculous power in such a manner ordered as that neither himself was seen by others save them at least in a known shape nor so great a company perhaps by dividing themselves much noted Arrived at the top of the Hill he lift up his hands which shewed in the midst of them the dear marks of his suffering for them towards heaven from whence all Blessing comes and therefore this an usual gesture in all Invocation and Prayer and gave them his Benediction after his redemption of man as God the Father also did after his Creation Gen. 1.28 And as Aaron the former legal High Priest according to the Divine command Numb 6.23 is said Levit. 9.22 to have lift up his hands toward the people and blessed them before his going into the Sanctuary when also the fire descending afterward from the Lord upon the Sacrifice typified the Descent of the Holy Ghost And so saith the Evangelist he was parted from them and ascended slowly and by degrees so as they might keep their eyes upon him and discern his Motion till at some height a Cloud received him out of their sight to put an End to their further gazing after him Thus our Lord who was clothed with so much Splendor and glory at his Transfiguration and who had Moses and Elias waiting upon him and a bright Cloud of rays compassing himself and his Disciples and who Acts 22.6 when he was afterwards seen by St. Paul Acts 22.6 11. appeared in such a glory at Noon-day transcending that of the Sun that the light thereof struck him blind yet now entring upon the real possession of this glory admitted no alteration at all in his external appearance
An Historical Narration OF THE LIFE and DEATH OF OUR Lord Jesus Christ IN TWO PARTS Printed at the Theater in Oxford 1685. A brief account of what is contained IN THE FIRST PART of The History of our SAVIOURS LIFE § 1 OUR Saviour came about the year of the world 4000 § 2 when the Scepter of Judah was in the hand of Herod a stranger § 3 S. John Baptist being sent before § 4 an extraordinary person both as to his birth and manner of living § 5 but especially as to his preaching § 6 Virtues actions § 7 and sufferings § 8 Our Saviours conception in Galilee § 9 Of a most pure and holy Virgin § 12 of mean condition § 13 espoused to an husband § 14 and informed by an Angel of this great favour intended her by God § 15 whereupon she went to visit her cousin Elizabeth mother of the Baptist § 16 conversing with her § 17 three months § 18 Whence she with some apprehensions returned to her husband § 19 but he being a very discreet righteous and holy person whilst he was thinking of dismissing her privatly § 20 was admonished by an Angel not to do it because that her conception was by the Holy Ghost § 21 to whom Joseph most readily obeyed and continued to cohabit with her § 22 at Nazareth till the time of her delivery drew neer which was § 23 to be at Bethlehem § 24 whither an Edict of Augustus forced them to go § 25 and there they were necessitated to lodg very meanly § 27 in a Stable § 28 where our Saviour was born § 29 A great exaninition and humiliation of the Son of God! § 31 his parents onely being present and adoring him § 33 Mean-while an Angel published this birth to certain Shepheards there in the field watching their flocks § 35 and was seconded by many more § 36 who glorified God for this birth in a song § 36 as all the host of Heaven rejoyced for and in it § 38 The Shepheards immediatly came to Bethlehem to see and worship this new-born child § 39 Gods great wisdom in thus ordering these affairs § 41 The shepheards relation was a great consolation to both the Parents § 42 But his Mother especially kept this and such other favours of God to her self and pondered them in her heart § 43 our Lord was Circumcised § 46 to 55 A Digression concerning circumcision the nature and effects of it § 55 to 61. Of the giving him the name Jesus and his saving his people from their sins § 61 to 71. The history of the coming of the Wise men § 71 to 77 Of the presentation of him in the Temple § 77 to 80 whom Simeon took up in his arms and openly confessed § 80 as did also Anna a Prophetess § 81 Which publick testimonies alarmed Herod § 82 wherefore the Parents being returned to Bethlehem with him § 83 the Angel of the Lord warned Joseph to flee with them into Egypt § 84 to 89 which they did immediatly and 89 to 94 whilst Herod out of great fury slew all the children in Bethlehem hoping thereby to have slain our Lord himself § 94 they arrived safe in Egypt § 95 where they staied not long till § 96 to 100 Herod miserably died and 100 Joseph was commanded to return into his own countrey § 101 Who hearing that Archelaus reigned in Judea durst not go thither but retired into Galilee to his own city Nazareth § 102 Which seems foretold by the Prophets § 103 and prefigured by Samson § 104 Little written of his life or actions there till 30 years old § 105 Tho he was then also filled with all wisdom and knowledg § 108 onely at 12 years old he went up to Jerusalem where he § 109 staied after his Parents were gone away § 112 For supposing him in the company they went homeward without him but returning § 113 to Jerusalem found him among the Doctors § 114 Whereat his mother wondring demanded why he had so used his Parents to whom he answered that he must be about his Fathers business § 115 which answer they seemed not fully to comprehend but his mother § 116 laid this up in her heart where the Doctors and learned men seemed to take notice of his great wisdom After this he went § 117 to Nazareth with his Parents was obedient to them and increased in wisdom but the entire history of his life and actions from this his return to Nazareth till his baptism is not written by the Evangelists § 118 yet by some passages in scriptures divers particulars may be collected § 126 In that time seems to have happened the death of S. Joseph § 127 Our Lord being shortly to manifest himself and enter upon the exercise of his calling John Baptist was sent whose mission and preaching in described § 137 our Lord being to enter upon his ministery went to John to be baptized of him § 139 thence immediatly retiring to prayer the Father gave testimony to him by a visible descent of the Holy Ghost in the resemblance of a Dove and by an audible voice from heaven § 141 Which voice was afterwards several times reiterated and § 142 himself often urgeth it in his preaching § 143 But our Lord in the vehemency of the same spirit newly received departed immediatly into the wilderness where he remained in fasting prayer and other spiritual exercises till § 150 The Devil came to tempt him which he failed not to do divers waies till being foiled in all he departed and § 163 John continuing his preaching and openly testifying of our Saviour § 165 our Lord returned out of the wilderness § 166 shewed himself unto John and § 167 the next day entertained two of Johns Disciples one of them S. Andrew § 168 who brought in his brother Simon and § 170 shortly after our Lord himself called S. Philip and he Nathanael § 172 to whom our Lord forerepresented his future glory § 173 Our Savour going thence to Galilee arrived at Cana § 174 where he wrought the first miracle of changing water into wine § 176 thence to 〈…〉 § 177 with his Mother brethren and Disciples § 178 some whereof also were women § 179 Thence he went up to Jerusalem § 180 Where he first clensed the Temple and afterwards preached to the people § 181 Some of whom desired of him a sign for the confirmation of his authority § 182 But he onely told them that if they destroyed the temple of his body he would raise it again in three daies § 183 Yet some did believe in him § 184 particularly Nicodemus a Ruler with whom our Lord held a long discourse § 186. After the Paschal feast our Lord not trusting to the Hierosolymites went and preached in the countrey of Judea § 187 and ordered his converts to be baptized § 188 Whereupon John withdrew further towards Herods Jurisdiction § 189 Meanwhile there growing a little emulation of some of Johns Disciples seeing
and Devotion all the Desarts also thereof being filled with multitudes of persons who having cast-off all secular cares and having all things common were wholly employ'd in the Divine service and Contemplation From which the rest of Christianity derived the first pattern after that exercised in the Acts Act. 2.44 and Rules thereof And thus the Divine Majesty the more fully to shew himself now by his Son reconciled to the whole world sent him so soon as born to that Country especially toward which of all others he had formerly shewed his greatest wrath and displeasure and on which formerly he had powred out so many plagues § 85 Of this gracious visitation of Idolatrous Egypt by our Lord much is foretold by the Prophet Esay chap. 19. where it is said vers 1. That the Lord shall come thither on a Cloud in corpore quasi in nube vectus and the Idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence and the heart of Egypt shall be melted tn the midst of it And vers 18. That the Cities thereof shall speak the Language of Canaan Of which Cities one mentioned is Heliopolis in or near which our Lord is supposed to have sojourned there And in that day that there shall be an Altar unto the Lord in the midst of the Land of Egypt and Sacrifices offered and vowes made to him In that day that Israel shall be the third with Egypt and Assyria and a blessing in the midst between them whom all which three the Lord of hosts shall bless saying Blessed be Egypt my people and Assyria the work of my hands and Israel my inheritance This Blessing and pitty and reconciliation purchased by himself this Infant now rejoyced to carry to them and to make them capable also of Altars and Sacrifices before the Gospel restrained to Jerusalem § 86 By our Lords removing also thither and leaving his own Country so early was presignified the course and progress of the Gospel that it should pass first to the Body of the Gentiles and so when their fulness come-in return to the whole Body of the Jews when Antichrist of whom Herod was a type should be first destroyed and then be a third fulfilling of the prophecy of Hosea Out of Egypt have I called my Son For these joyes set before him this Royal Infant despised this cross so early laid upon his tender shoulders and took so long a journey with as much jubilation in obedience to his Father as his Parents with compassion of him § 87 S. Joseph being summoned for his and the Blessed Virgins appearance at Bethleem when she very great with Child and unfit for travelling on foot probably had procured an Asse to carry her thither and kept him there till their shortly-intended return home And so by the service of this poor beast which was very ready at hand as lodging in the same Roome this long journey was some-what eased the Holy Virgin riding thereon and carrying our Lord in her lap and S. Joseph leading him perhaps laden also with some tooles proper to his trade wherewith he was to get his and their living and very opportunely had the Magi presented them with a little gold to defray the charges of the way till somewhere settled in Egypt he might subsist by his labours § 88 And now leaving these holy travellers on their way making all possible speed the childs age could suffer and such a beast perform and S. Joseph using the greatest diligence and fidelity toward such a double treasure he had care of the Child and his Mother and He and She passing their time partly in a reverend silence and Devotions to God partly in discoursing and calling to mind all the wonderful things they had hitherto heard and seen concerning their litle one which afforded them great consolations in the treading those tedious Desarts Let us now return to Herod He seeing the Eastern strangers had thus deceived him and being yet more incensed by reflecting on the former Labours of his new-gotten Kingdom not being of the race of the Jews On his vast expences on many Sumptuous buildings and especially on their Temple the more to ingratiate himself with that Nation On the Title of the Messias which some of his flatterers had already conferred upon himself and besides this being made very jealous by many former conspiracies for which he had also already put some of his own children and wives to death much disgusted also with the chief Priests who asked by him where the Messiah should be born instead of naming him to this honour and disclaiming any other answered without studying in Bethleem and produced the clear words of the Prophet concerning it § 89 All these things I say rowling in his mind removed from him all humanity or demur touching his intended slaughter And therefore without any inquisition first that is mentioned either to what place or house the Magi when come thither repaired Or what Nobility there of Davids race by having a Son lately born was more liable to such a suspition tho had such a quest bin made Our Lords Stable and Cratch were now very advantagious to have escaped such a search and none was conscious of the motions of the Wise-Men but the Star he sent his souldiers all on a suddain to sorround and surprise the Bethleemites when expecting or fearing no such thing and who had they fore-known of such a body of armed men coming against them yet could not have imagined this to be intended only against such persons as were not yet capable of being accused of any fault and therefore had none provided for their safety and die slaughter was yet more cruel being done by a multitude of Soldiers every where dispersed as it were all at once A cruelty surpassing all belief had not Herod bin the Actor famous also for the killing of his own children and of whom Josephus relates not long after this a like inhumanity Viz. his designing the murther and Destruction of all the Jewish Nobility of which more hereafter To make also the surer work which was but necessary against a down-right prophecy he caused not only those born a litle before the Sages arrival at Jerusalem but all whatever born within two years before to be slain and that not only of those born in the Town but in the territories or Coasts of Bethleem having asked and learnt from the wise-men punctually at what time the Star first appeared to them From which we may collect the Star to have bin observed and admired by them for some two years before as Comets use to precede for some time the events they signify but the certain indication and design thereof to have bin only then revealed to them when the child was already born § 90 The cry and lamentation of the poor Bethleemites and especially of the Mothers all so suddainly bereft of their children was so great that S. Matthew declares it to have bin specially foretold by the Prophet Jeremy in
Spirit as when afterward he repaired into the Desart and these abode for the three daies next ensuing § 110 In the Temple about the Court of the people were certain Porches or Exedraes or Chambers called also Gazophylacia for the Goods and Treasure of the Temple reposed in them such Roomes were belonging to the Priests see Jer. 35.2 4.36.12 26 and in these the Doctors of the Law assembling at certain times or Hours of the day expounded the Mosaick law to the people and instructed the youth such as applyed themselves to learning disputed also among themselves and stated the hard questions and difficulties therein Who also beside the Temple used Synagogues and had likewise beside these many Schooles instituted for the fame purpose Of which Schooles and Synagogues there are said to have bin in Jerusalem 480. Sigon ius lib. 2 cap. 8. So Act. 19.9 is mentioned S. Paul's reasoning or teaching at Ephesus in the Schoole of one Tyrannus Act. 24.12 He pleads his not having disputed with any in the Temple Act. 6.9 are mentioned those of the Synagogue of the Libertines Cyrenians c. disputing with Stephen Jerem. chap. 36.10 Baruch is said to have read the words of Jeremiah himself being in restraint in the house of the Lord in Gazophilacio Gamariae Scribae in vestibalo superiori in introitu portae novae domus Domini audiente omni populo which perhaps was done out of some eminenter place in the roome to the people standing in the Court See also Jer. 26.10 11. So our Lord John 8 20 is said to have preached to the people in the Temple in Gazophylacio and another time in Porticu Salomonis Jo. 10.23 In these places also where the Doctors taught their Schollars or the people were some Chaires placed for themselves and some lower seats or Mats spread on the floore for their Schollars or Auditors So S. Paul saith Act. 22 that he was taught at the feet of Gamaliel according to the perfect manner of the law of the Fathers § 111 In this Conference of the Doctors then the Holy Child Jesus presented himself on the third day after his with-drawing from his parents for it is not likely that he appeared in this assembly more then once which would have caused some greater inquiry after him contrary to the predesigned privacy and obscurity of his Education after he had spent the two former daies as is said of Anna in the Temple in praier and fasting and so as when he was in the Desart or at some times in going forth and in humility begging from other's charity what was necessary for his sustenance Here then the Text saith our young Lord sate in the midst of them they being placed in a semi-circle among other persons perhaps not much elder who were then present and sate at their feet to hear and learn Here our Lord attentively hearkned to their discourses and in things difficult or not sufficiently explained asked them as perhaps other their Schollars did with a modesty becoming his age his questions but then some of these at least being such as they could not well resolve like those afterward Mat. 21 25. whether Johns Baptism was from Heaven or of Men and How David called Christ his Lord the Lord being his Son He to give them some light so much as his Father permitted what person He was and to shew them manifestly in those immature years that his wisdom was from above and that he asked such things not for his own but their learning He being that Eternal wisdom that composed those laws and inspired those prophecies which they expounded gave them also the solutions to those questions wherein they were deficient He sate saith the Text in the midst of them not only hearing but asking them Questions And not this only which Schollars usually do but giving answers also answers probably not only to their Questions but to his own when they could not resolve them and such answers as that all that heard him were astonished saith the Text at his understanding All which shews something very extraordinary and divine in this his appearance Where also Himself guiding these discourses as He did when He went up into the Chair at Nazareth the opening of the Books at such a place as spake of Himself we may imagine the subject was some thing concerning the Revelation and coming of the Messias whose gracious speeches there delivered as with the modesty of a Child so with the gravity and authority of a Law-giver sent from Heaven and now also not as the Scribes but with strange force and inward conviction to his Auditors filled them and the others his hearers with strange admiration And this admiration probably would have produced a further inquiry after him had not in the height of such their astonishment the entrance in of such mean people as his parents conduced on the other side to abate their great esteem of him and served to draw a veil over the faces of such either lazy searchers or already envious Rivals that they could not discern him When as the meanness of his Education should have rather increased a diligent quest after him the more they saw no human way of his attaining either such science or Spirit and Confidence § 112 But leaving him here thus employed in iis quae fuere Patris let us return to the sad Mother and her Husband who perceiving the Holy Child strayed from them at their going out of the City and after some search there-about not finding him imagined him to have bin gone a little before in the company of some of their friends and Kindred and so made the more hast for this out of Town and went so much the faster from the place where he was to overtake him upon the way After having finished thus in a longing expectation their first daies journey homeward and not having found the Child at night as they had hoped among their friends they fell now especially his tender Mother into no small solicitude and jealousie concerning him Now came into their minds the first noise and discovery of him raised by the Shepheards and afterward much more by the Magi and then again S. Simeon's and Annas proclaiming him in the Temple the Hereditary malice of Herod's family and Party and who ever governed his not enduring a Rival the secret intelligence and Spies that might have bin set upon him and them and some discovery of his removal into Galilee their own negligence in not more carefully attending on him and all his motions whom God had so honoured and entrusted with the Guardianship of his Son and perhaps their fault in carrying him to Jerusalem when as the law dispensed with his age as yet for performing this Holy Ceremony Such thoughts as these might much afflict them besides such their love and affection to his most amiable person and obliging behaviour as could not with any patience endure him to be out of their fight In that sad night
resorting to him as also Philip and Nathanael Galileans We find also Acts 19.3 some Brethren living at Ephesus and Apollo of Alexandria to have received Johns Baptism which argues also a resort to him from forraign parts unless we imagine an authority of Baptizing either commited by him to or at least assumed by some of his more eminent Disciples Hither also came the Publicans and the Soldiers and those that were esteemed the most notorious sinners to hear his Sermons made of Repentance and remission of sin which seemed to concern such persons most These therefore terrified with his words made humble confessions of their former sins to him Mat. 3.6 Mark 1.5 as those other Converts in the Acts did to S. Paul Acts 19.18 promised amendment of their lives were baptized by him in order thereto Lastly asked his advice and directions concerning their Duty in their several Vocations and Employments where the Gentleness and tenderness wherewith he treats the Soldiers and the Publicans yet the instruments of sustaining the Roman Power is very notable not bidding them presently to desert or change their Profession or proposing to them any high perfections as he did to some others but admonishing them according to their present capacity of avoiding those faults to which their employments more tempted them the Soldier to do no violence to any nor falsly accuse them to make way for plunder but to be content with that gain their wages afforded them and the Publicans that they should not enhance the Taxes upon the People nor require more than was appointed them instructing them first in acts of Justice and doing no wrong to their Neighbour whilst he exhorted others to acts also of charity § 133 And lastly hither also came the learned and highly-esteemed Scribes and Pharisees Many of them as appears by what our Lord saith Luk. 7 30. though perhaps not all moved with curiosity to see and observe the strangely habited person and not with compunction for their sins as others or the believing what he was or said no more than they did afterward our Lord himself to verify our Lords speech Pauperes evangelizantur These bearing a show of sanctity and accordingly reverenced among the people so soon as the Baptist beheld seeing and knowing all their interiour by the Holy Spirit he entertained not them with the same mansuetude and indulgence as the poor Publicans and Soldiers as the one appearing to him interiorly clothed with humility and Contrition the other with Pride and Hypocrisy but presently fell into a sharp reprehension of them before all the people knowing this the proper way if any for their cure calling them a generation of Serpents which was also our Lords language afterwards denouncing to them the Novissima the great wrath to come and such fruitless Trees and chaff their being cast into an unquenchable fire unless a speedy repentance for their sins and reformation of their manners prevented it And seeing them from the approaching Messiah he foretold expecting much contrary to what he said at his coming as heirs of the promises made to their Father Abraham all Glory and prosperity and Dominion over the Gentiles he fore-signified to them by using a similitude from the Rocks and Stones that lay about him that God upon their incredulity and impenitency abandoning them could raise unto Abraham another seed i. e. out of the yet stony-hearted and unbelieving Gentiles As indeed not long after he did § 134 The Baptist thus had for some time executed his Office and made a preparatory commencement of the Gospel according as our Lord saith Mat. 11.13 that the Law and the Prophets were till John but that from his daies the Kingdom of Heaven or of the Gospel suffered violence i. e. whilst whole multitudes and crowds of people Soldiers Publicans Sinners came flocking in to it Though indeed the Apostles of our Lord consummating the preaching of this Evangelium with the Holy Ghost descending on the people baptized with it by them and doing of all sorts of Miracles in confirmation of what they divulged far transcended the beginnings of the Baptist and so the least of them in this respect was greater than he as our Lord saith Matt. 11.11 John then was a prodromus preaching so as our Lord afterward the Kingdom of Heaven at hand and judgment and wrath to come on the impenitent and unbelieving Confession repentance and so remission of sin not by Johns Baptism this being only with water and to be consummated in the other but by the Baptism of him that was to come after him who should baptize them with the Holy Ghost Jo. 1. and who was the Lamb of God that should take away the sins of the world and in whom they were to believe Act. 19.4 § 135 Whereby it appears that there was an obligation also remaining on all who possibly could procure it after Johns Baptism of receiving Christs which effected a perfect regeneration by conferring the Holy Ghost and that whatever assistance also of the Holy Ghost may be supposed in those predispositions to this perfect regeneration effected by the same Spirit as in Confession of sins repentance and bringing forth the fruits thereof and believing on the Messias Act. 19.4 which things were caused in the people by Johns preaching this also we have from the power and virtue only of him that was to come after him And that those true penitents who died under Johns baptism only and without our Lords became partakers of the Holy Spirit and of salvation in the same manner as all the righteous deceased under the Law i. e. through the merits of Christ in their using the typical Ceremonies relating thereto whatever they were according to the divine appointment § 136 John therefore told them that our Lord who came after not he should baptize them with this Holy Ghost and St. Luke adds baptize them also with fire Where fire may be taken in a double sense either for the fire of the Holy Spirit elegantly opposed by John to his water or as some rather understand it the fire of the Divine wrath For S. John's Spirit had some of that of Elias and the context seemeth to favour this sense for there it follows Luk. 3.17 whose fan is in his hand and the chaff he will burn with fire the one or the other baptism shew that of the Holy Ghost or of fire was to be received by every one Thus after John had began first the preaching of the Gospel and using the new Ceremony thereof Baptism but deferred all the power and virtue thereof to Christ that was then at hand And great multitudes from all parts were now gathered unto him and a very great number as appears by the expression Luk. 3.21 at least of the common sort were baptized by him and were in great expectation what would be the end of these things since he plainly and often told them that himself was not this Christ nor shewed he any miracle at
and harmless the request here seemed to be the more dangerous the temptation Whilst hereby the Devil hoped to allure him for the glorifying of his humanity to shew some superfluous and vain-glorious act of his power as he mingled with our first parents taking the forbidden fruit a vain ambition of knowing good and evil and to make some breach of his former resignation and obedience in this his state of humiliation to his heavenly Father as the impatient Israelites also in the Desart when pinched with hungar presently became clamorous against Moses and would not attend Gods good time and leasure for making provision for their wants § 153 Our Blessed Lord standing upon his Guard and acting all things according to the present design of his coming into the world Viz. to do entirely and only his Fathers good will and pleasure through whatever sufferings though he might here with his most Soveraign authority have presently banished Satan from his presence as he did at the last and have dismist him with some sharp reproof Yet to give us herein an example he chose rather to answer him though such an one in the Spirit of meekness and according to what S. Michael the Arch-Angel did Jude 9 or our Lord not indulging himself so much not medling with the person of the tempter chose to reply to the Temptation And here also he preferred to frame all his three replies out of the word of God A direction which the Apostle hath left us Tak saith he the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God as for the most powerful way of repelling this evil Fiend by our shewing to him Gods command contrary to his suggestions As also our Grandmother Eve when yet in innocency at first answered Satan tempting her Gen. 3.3 That she had a command from God to the contrary This well but she stood not firm to it § 154 To this first Satanical temptation therefore that he should presently with an extraordinary hand make the Stones about him bread to satisfie the hungar of such a Supreme Lord and one so dear to God he as it were reflecting on the former miscarriage of Gods people when an hungred and thirsty in the Wilderness in their presumptuously demanding a Miracle before its time returneth to this Tempter those words of Moses in Deut. 8.3 spoken by Moses concerning the Manna given to them so miraculously from heaven telling Satan it was written there That Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God The context there runs thus He humbled thee and suffered thee to hunger and fed thee with Manna which thou knowest not that he might make thee know that Man lives not by bread only but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord. Intimating that we are for any our wants with patience to depend on the Divine providence and provision who is all-sufficient and able with a word to supply our necessities as he did that of his people in the Desart with Manna as also that his meat and drink and life was the observing his Father's word and command and the yielding a punctual obedience thereto As if our Lord had said here to Satan what elsewhere to his Disciples Jo. 4.32 34. I have meat to eat that thou knowest not of My meat is to do the will of him that sent me But lastly what need of a Miracle here where he could as he pleased satisfie his hungar by other ordinary means either by feeding on Johns food in the Desart at hand or by speedily quitting the desart receive it elsewhere Yet this our good Lord who would not here at such a person's request relieve his own forty-daies-fast with a Miracle did afterward out of compassion and also to hew thee who he was with a Miracle supply the peoples fast though suffered only for a day or two Mat. 15.32 Thus the Devils temptation instead of elevating our Lord to some pride by which himself fell or curiosity in shewing vain-glorious and superfluous wonders or sensuality in lusting after food produced in him only an act of humble submission obedience and resignation to his Fathers good pleasure and Orders § 155 The Devil finding no entrance of Pride or self-exaltation into our Lords humanity this way presently devised another Our Lords hungar being also thus longer continued until all his temptations were finished and removes our Lord out of this privacy and melancholick recess into a place of greater State magnificence and resort and so taking him up saith the Text carried him speedily out of the Desart into Jerusalem Which taking him up the Preface to the temptation following is to be reckoned also no small temptation and trial of our Lords humility and annihilation to suffer himself to be hugged upon the shoulders or embraced in the arms or touched with the pawes of such an horrid and accursed Beast as our Lord in whatever external shape knew him to be For the transportation seems to be literally understood and real not representative only in a Vision Which Vision would either imply that our Lord's humanity must be so far imposed-upon and deceived by Satan as to think it real or if this transportation known to our Lord to be only a shew must much weaken the Temptation § 156 Brought hither he carries him streight to his Fathers house the Holy Temple sumptuously built by Herod and sets him on the very highest place thereof one of the Pinacles we may imagine of the Porticus or tower which was raised higher than the rest of the Fabrick and which faced the Courts Here Satan supposing the place might some way also sublimate our Lord his thoughts if it did not work the other way upon him that his danger of falling might beget some fear in him and diffidence towards God Here I say he minds him again of his being stiled the Son of God and that if he was so he would shew to him and perhaps to all the people that stood in the Courts if such his station was visible to them who he was and would by an act of his power provide for his safety in securely casting himself down from thence and relying on the support of his Servants the Angels waiting there to catch him an hand he had much rather fall into than those of Satan Especially when from this summity where he was placed there were no stairs or other passable descent And because also it appeared by our Lords last answer that he made his Fathers word his Rule Satan now also produced Scripture as he usually doth to those he deceives but misapplied that God had given his Angels charge concerning him and that in their hands they should bear him up c. which place if not particularly meant of him alone yet spoken in General of all Gods Servants must also be truely extended to his Son § 157 Our Lord still remaining fixt upon the basis of his humility and
verifying of our Lords most patient and meek answer that man lives and subsists not by bread alone but every word that proceeds from God God sent his good Angels to minister food to this his Son as also he had before in the Desart supplied with the bread of Angels the anhungred Israelites tho their murmuring and impatience did not so well deserve it and as afterwards he sent by an Angel in a desart place provision to Elijah § 163 Meanwhile the Baptist continuing all this time his preaching and Baptizing and reiterating in our Lords absence the Messias his being already come into the world and upon it such a multitude of men flocking to him the Chief Council of the Jews troubled at his high and reiterated Eulogium concerning the Messias and also grown envious of his great Fame sent some Delegates who were of the Sect of the Pharises to examine from him by what authority He in such a strange guise and Habit assumed such a publick Office of preaching and gathering Disciples to him and by a new erected Baptism admitted them as it were into a new Sect of Religion Who coming to him questioned first whether he pretended himself to be the Messias of whom he spoke so much and whom that Nation had so long expected ready if he had affirmed it to have required some Celestial evidence and sign thereof from him as they did afterward from our Lord. To this he answered with much asseveration Jo. 1.15 to remove such an abhorred mistake from them and from the people who also much debated in their hearts saith S. Luke chap. 3.15 whether he was the Christ or not That he was not He but only his fore-runner and Messenger This denyed by him they asked him then whether he was Elias whom being only translated hence and yet alive they expected according to the prophecy of Malachy to return to them in the latter daies before the Advent of the Messias which also denyed by him For indeed he was not that person of Elias which they meant and who most probably according to that prophecy will return before our Lord's second coming for a new Conversion of that Nation to the acknowledgment of Christ Then asked they him whether he was some one of the Prophets returned again to life according to that fancy Mat. 16.14 Mark 6.16 or as others more probably understand it whether he was that Prophet spoken of and promised by Moses Deut. 18.15 18 that should appear like to him and so the people charged by him with most strict Obedience to all he should say unto them Which Prophet indeed was the Messias and this last but the same Question with the first but the Jews are said to have imagined this Prophet should be a Companion of the Messias or his chief Minister This again denyed and he further importuned to declare himself what he was He told them he was neither Elias spoken of by Malachy nor the Prophet spoken of by Moses but The Voice of one crying or proclaiming in the Desart spoken of by Esaiah that they should prepare the way for this their Messias and make his paths straight and so for this that he preached repentance and amendment of life for their more worthily entertaining him § 164 Upon this they questioned him again why being such an inferiour Preco and Messenger and none of those persons named he took upon him to institute such a new Ceremony and Baptize Of which new Ceremony of Baptism for remission sin to be used at the coming of the Messias they had heard something in the Prophets Ezek. 36.25 26. Zech. 13.1 2. To which he answered that his Baptizing also was only a Preparatory Baptism with water unto repentance not that solemn one which was to follow that should enter the People into the Kingdom of Grace and should be with the Holy Ghost and conferred by the Messias himself whom he proclaimed now come Of whom he proceeded further to tell them and all the people That though he came after him yet he was before him even from all Eternity the latchet of whose shoe he was not worthy to unloose that he was the only begotten Son of God Jo. 1.15 that came out of the bosome of his Father there knowing all his secrets and of whom he only had also alwaies a clear vision and fruition to declare to the world all his will That as the law and mystical Figures and Types came by Moses so Grace and Truth by him and that all men received what Graces they had from his fulness though indeed it is somewhat uncertain whether here the latter part of this discourse be not rather the Evangelists than the Baptists yet see the Baptists like discourse Jo. 3.31 Lastly that he was already come and even then standing among them Or that but a little before Viz. at the time of his Baptism standing among them though they knew him not § 165 For our Lord was returned again from the wilderness to the place where John baptized there first to chuse some Disciples to attend him out of those prepared by John and so to enter on his Office wherein John for a time also was to assist him till a restraint should be put thereto by his imprisonment And thus the Divine Providence ordered things that by this Embassy of the Sanedrim Johns testification of the present appearance of the Messias should be immediatly notifyed to the chief Rulers of the People Though the Messengers were so stupid and full of unbelief that they otherwise so inquisitive touching this matter of greatest concernment I mean the presence of the Messias made no farther search at all nor took any notice of it which indeed had they prosecuted it might have occasioned their questioning and persecuting of our Lord out of the due season appointed for it but departed the same day to Jerusalem being not above 〈◊〉 miles distant from Jordan to relate the Baptist's answer to those who sent them § 166 The next day after these Messengers were gone our Lord appeared and shewed himself to John probably standing at some good distance and mingling himself among the people that came to hear his Sermons Upon the sight of whom John after a due Adoration performed and replenished with joy such we may imagine as when at our Lords former approach when not yet born he sprang in his Mothers womb and again as when he said to his Disciples that the Bridegrooms friend rejoyced to see and hear the Bridegrooms voice John 3.29 Contemplating also the divine Meekness and Modesty but mixt with Majesty that appeared in his countenance fell on proclaiming to the people that stood about him Behold ye the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world this is that Sacred person I told you yesterday that doth so far transcend me the Lord of his Church Nor had I known him but that in my baptizing God sent and revealed him to me and also manifested him as to
me to the people by the Holy Ghost in the shape of a Dove sitting upon him and I saw and now bear record that this is the Son of God c. § 167 Upon which speeches concerning him remaining at some distance t is probable that our Lord intending the disclosing of himself only by certain degrees without any nearer approaches to John presently left him and the multitude admiring but not yet following him and retired himself where God his Father had provided him an entertainment till the next day toward evening When as two of Johns frequent Auditors and Disciples were standing with him which Disciples our Lord meant to receive into his own service he again on a suddain shewed himself Jo. 1.36 Whom John beholding as he walked at a distance iterated his former testimony concerning him And joyfully said to them that there went the Lamb of God whom and not him the world was to adore and follow So that his two Disciples one of which was Andrew Simon Peters Brother the other not named by John is supposed to be himself especially since he so punctually relates the Circumstances as if himself present much moved herewith and perhaps also expresly directed by the Baptist to apply themselves to this most Holy Master so much excelling him with much reverence straight made toward and silently followed our Lord not presuming as yet to say any thing to him but observing his motions that they might not lose him and this perhaps might be because the day before upon Johns like Encomiums he had suddainly with-drawn himself from the People Our Lord looking back upon them asked them whom or what they sought for they calling him Rabbi a Title given to no ordinary person Mat. 23.7 desired to know his lodging and where they might repair to him it wanting then only two hours of night since they had heard from the Baptist such a Testimony of the supreme dignity of his person and were by him referred to his conduct He courteously invited them to it and there they staid with him the short remainder of the day where by his heavenly Discourse to them we may imagine such as to Nicodemus concerning the Kingdome of God and his comeing into the world for the Redemption of man they were exceedingly confirmed in the belief of John's testimony and had their hearts enflamed by his discourses in such a manner as those that went with him to Emaus as may be gathered from Andrew's language afterward to his Brother Peter Jo. 1.41 § 168 The next morning or perhaps the same night Andrew repairing to his Brother Simon Peter For it seems their extraordinary piety as also it seems a special Divine Providence had brought both of them from their fishing-trade for a time to hear and follow the Baptist told him the joyful news of their having found the Messias upon their Masters the Baptists indication of him and the familiar entertainment they had received from him Simon with his wonted fervour presently desired to be brought to him Our Lord at the first sight of him to increase his faith called him by his name and told him whose son he was and also then prophecied the fore-seen good pleasure of God his Father concerning him that he should be called Cephas and should be the principal Foundation-stone of his Church as our Lord more at large expounded it unto him afterward in Mat. 16.18 § 169 Here were now three Disciples gathered to our Lord sufficiently confirmed in their belief from his manifesting to them his knowledg of every thing concerning them the like to which they had not seen in the Baptist This day probably spent in instructing these Neophyts the next morning our Lord to check a little for the present the spreading of his Fame this Sun of righteousness being sometime to shine forth and then again to be veiled and so by degrees to discover his glories as not to hinder his sufferings which were also to be fulfilled and to leave John a more free Testimony of him in his absence purposed to withdraw himself for a while from so great a conflux of People and from these parts so near Jerusalem into Galilee for the consolation of his Holy Mother and kindred after a long absence and whither also the domestick affairs of his newly admitted Disciples Galileans as well as he made them most ready to accompany him Who also had already learnt either from himself or the Baptist his Name Parents Education at Nazareth c. § 170 Setting forth this day for his journey our Lord cast his eies upon Philip a Galilean also and fellow-Townsman of Peter and Andrew perhaps then found in their company as a familiar acquaintance and with whom they had already entertained some discourse concerning Jesus otherwise Philip could not have bin so punctual in that which he said to Nathaniel Our Lord seeing his faith and interiour inclinations presently called and admitted him into the Society who was afterward a chief person among the Apostles by whom the devout strangers that came to Jerusalem to worship Jo. 12.20 made their addresses to our Lord. He presently set all on fire to carry it more forward went to seek out Nathaniel an intimate friend of his and it seems also a man of letters Who is probably conjectured from his early calling here and from Jo. 21.1 14. to have bin one of our Lords twelve Apostles called Bartholomew so as Simon Peter is Bar-Jona in which Roll of them he is still coupled to Philip. See 2. Part. § whom espying alone under a fig-tree perhaps at his Devotions he called him to him and told him the Messias that Moses and the Prophets had spoken so much of was come into the world and that this person was Jesus of Nazareth the son of Joseph For thus much he and the rest had learnt concerning our Lord's secular condition Nathaniel as the more learned commonly are less credulous put a check to Philips forwardness especially when naming Moses and the Prophets to him telling him that surely there was no Prophet that foretold the Messias should come out of Nazareth which thing indeed was a great blind not only to Nathaniel here but generally to the learned Jews that they would not believe Jesus the Christ and so darkned in this proceeded to fulfil the other prophecies in working his death Philip without farther disute bid him but approach to him and he would be abundantly satisfied So soon as our Lord beheld him he manifested to him his exact knowledg whom he saw wavering in faith of all the former course of his life and that he saw him and what he was doing when alone under the Fig-tree before Philip called him To this omniscience of our Lord Nathaniel now as Simon Peter a little before astonished thereat yeilds up himself and contemning his scruple about Nazareth made a most noble Confession of our Lord doubtless from the same Spirit of God in him as S. Peter did afterward Mat.
16. chap. saying Rabbi thou art the Son of God for so the Baptist also before had several times stiled him thou art the King of Israel that hath bin so long expected by this Nation § 171 Our Lord upon Nathaniels mentioning his Kingship answered that they should hereafter see much greater Confirmation of this their faith and that the time should be when they should behold the Heavens opened and Angels ascending and descending upon the Son of man for so our Lord usually out of humility shall I say or rather a strong love to his Creature man stiled himself ascending and descending upon him as he being alwaies in Heaven as well as on Earth and the sole Mediator between Earth and Heaven who also only had traffick with Heaven and knew all his Fathers secrets there and again when they should see infinite numbers of them attending on him in his appearing at the last day in the full Glory of that his Kingdom which Nathaniel now confessed alluding in all this to the Honour that was done to their fore-father Jacob after his lying in the field alone so desolate and forsaken As also but a little before when our Lord was in the Desart the Angels had descended and ministred unto him In the same manner after this when his Judges asked concerning his being the Son of God he answered them that hereafter they should see the Son of Man coming in the Clouds of Heaven i. e Clouds of Angels flying and waving about him Mat. 26.64 Jo. 6.58 62. And elsewhere some of his followers wondring at his speech of his feeding them with bread which came down from Heaven What and if saith he ye shall see the Son of man ascend up into Heaven where he was before And so his young Schollar Nicodemus wondring at his Sermon of mans being born again of the spirit he tells him of things of greater wonder Viz. of the Son of Mans ascending up into Heaven again as he had descended from Heaven Jo. 3.9 44. and also was then in Heaven § 172 Thus our Lord often represented to his Disciples and others his future Glory his Resurrection Ascension Coming in great Majesty to Judgment and that their faith in him might not languish from the mean appearance of things present And also this suddain and resolute Confession of Nathaniel who but now disputed the matter must needs be a great corroboration and consolation to the four former Discipies gathered to our Lord. All these five being persons of much zeal and piety tho most of them not wealthy had left their daily imployments and trade for a season to come and hear the Sermons of John receive as his penitents baptism from him and some of them at least were admitted into some more familiar acquaintance with him and by this had more notice of our Lord and God looking upon such their sincerity conferred on them the honour after thus prepared by John to be the first Disciples and Attendants on his Son § 173 In this our Lords journey into Galilee he arrived at Cana Nathaniels Town not far distant from Nazareth and about a daies journey from Capernaum as may be gathered from Jo. 4.47 compared with vers 52. which Cana also our Lord took in his way in the second journey he made from Jerusalem into Galilee See John 4.46 Now so it fell out that on this day he came thither was solemnized a Marriage and hither also were assembled our Lords Mother and his Brethren invited to this wedding probably of some of their near kindred the care our Lords Mother had concerning the Wine and her colloquy with the Servants shewing she had some particular interest therein Hither therefore our Lord coming with his new chosen Disciples they were also invited to the marriage And all this seems punctually so ordered by the Divine Providence that whereas our Lord had led his former life so obscurely Now the dignity of his person and Mission from Heaven and his Father there might be manifested in the first place to these his nearer Relations according to the flesh for the rectifying any their former misapprehensions and their believing on this common Saviour and being made partakers of so great a joy and that also his inauguration into and entrance upon his Office might be celebrated with a festival and this marriage signify that which he was one day to consummate with his Spouse the Church and therefore is he very Emphatically by the Baptist stiled the Bridegroome on whom himself attended Jo. 3.29 that whereas John came with fasting he might enter upon his Office with a feast and the children of the Bride-chamber rejoyce with him therefore also his Miracle here was corresponding changing water and penance into Wine and mirth answerable to Johns baptizing with water and he with the Holy Spirit § 174 To give an occasion to our Lord's first Miracle whereby in this publick meeting he was to manifest who he was whether by the multitude of Guests more than were expected among which was our Lord and his company or by some other disappointment for there being a Governor of the feast besides the Bridegroom and a good attendance of Servants and Wine supplyed in so great a quantity for the Guests are signs that that the Married were no very poor or mean persons it happened so that at the end of the feast there wanted Wine Our Lords Mother perceiving it and solicitous of their credit to whom she had so near relation presently told our Lord of it expecting he should relieve them herein either from his doing formerly some such domestick and private miracles upon some necessity in his youth at Nazareth or from the Holy Virgin 's having some prerevelation concerning this future fact By our Lords reply we may conjecture that this was spoken by his Mother before some of his Disciples or Kindred and perhaps in the midst of some Discourse when as our Blessed Lady imagined some urgent necessity thereof Hereupon our Lord for their Edification returned this answer to her What is it to me and thee woman in this matter my Hour or time is not yet Signifying his already well fore-knowing by his omniscience this want or wine and the due time of supplying it and that he was not to be sweyed in his actions by any human relations or respects how near soever but must act all things only according to the will of his Heavenly Father And thus frequently he takes occasion to Vindicate his Divinity and heavenly Original to beget early in his followers a right apprehension of his person and authority and omniscient conduct Some such answer as here he gives also to his Kindred Jo. 7.6 when they minding him of going up to Jerusalem at the feast and shewing his strange works there saying my time is not yet come So after his desputing with the Doctors he answered his Mother when she told him that they had sought him sorrowing why did they so since he was
most unreasonably a further sign from him and urged that Moses had given them Manna from Heaven and there also in like manner our Lord presently told them of his Death and his feeding them with his Flesh and Blood and then of their having everlasting life by it and his raising them up at the last day things at which some of them also then took great offence So here also they whether misconstruing his words as if he had said first that he would destroy their Temple for this at his Death they urged against him and the false witness Mark. 14.5 to speak home interposeth that he said he would destroy the Temple made with hands and in three daies raise up another made without hands and then that he in three daies would build it again a Temple that they said was forty six years in building in the one made him impious in the other ridiculous and so turned his mention of this his greatest work for the salvation of mankind into a great scorn and flighting of him and into the cause of a quarel against him till at last they contrived his Death the destroying of the Temple he here speaks of and brought these his words against him to justify it and so He in raising up again this Temple of his Deity thus destroyed exhibited to the World this great Sign which at this beginning of his preaching he engaged here This was the success of our Lords first Sermon and appearance amongst them as to the Pharisees and their followers already much degusted with him and filled with envy § 183 Yet many others there were that seeing his Miracles believed on him at least that he was some great Prophet sent from God among whom was Nicodemus But our Lord saith the Evangelist did not commit himself unto them admitting them not into his familiar society nor relied on their fidelity for he knew well what was in them and that several of them would fall away and especially in his last tryal most unworthily desert him Therefore our Lord usually when at Jerusalem after his publick teaching them in the Temple and his daies work there done withdrew himself and had no private meetings and conferences as he said at his tryal that in secret he had said nothing and many times at night removed with his Disciples out of the City neither though several in the Country are mentioned do we hear of our Lords admitting any entertainments in the City though we may presume he wanted not some Invitations And all this was but necessary for deferring the Conspiracies of his enemies till the due time of his offering-up appointed by his Father § 184 Our Lord continuing his publick teaching in the Temple and doing Miracles during the Paschal feast Nicodemus a Pharisee a ruler of the Jews as he is stiled here vers 1. One of the Sanedrim and a person studied in the law for our Lord chap. 3. vers 10. stiles him a Master in Israel shewing also herein to him that he knew who he was and on that account blames his ignorance being already a Convert as it is said Jo. 12.42 many other among the chief Rulers were afterward but timorous to confess him came privatly to our Lord by night for fear of losing his Reputation with his fellow-Rulers which shews a great envy and hatred toward our Lord already kindled in them to be farther instructed of him in the matters of the Kingdom of God and life eternal confessing to him that his Miracles had convinced him that he was an extraordinary Teacher sent from God Our Lord very courteously received him and in a few words manifested to him fully who himself was and the whole substance of the Gospel At the first he began to acquaint him with the first Foundation of the Christian Religion Regeneration which at the beginning he proposed some what obscurely perhaps to humble Nicodemus his too much conceit of his own knowledg telling him that to enter into the Kingdom of God one must necessarily be born again which word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 translated here again signifies also from above which Nicodemus much wondring at and speaking of entring again into our Mothers womb our Lord graciously explained it to him that he must be born again not of a woman or the flesh which would produce nothing but flesh but of water the external Ceremony appointed by God to be used in the new birth signifying a being cleansed and purifyed from former sin and of the Spirit which might render a man spiritual and enabled therewith to bring forth good works which spirit inspires as it pleaseth 1 Cor. 12.4 Mark 4.27 unperceived by sense and being as the wind of which we know not whence or whither it goes but by its effects do discern the presence thereof and then gently reflected on Nicodemus his ignorance so to render him more docible and humble that he being a Master in Israel should know nothing of this For this Holy Spirit and our Renovation by it is frequently spoken of in the Old Testament and so also many types of Baptism and of the Sacraments of the new Testament found there See Psal 50.12 13 14 9. 142.10 11. Ezec. 11.36 1 Cor. 10.2 3 4. Further told him that these things he now spake to him were the lowest matters but that there was much higher that he came to reveal to mankind from Heaven and from God his Father For that he was the only begotten Son of God descended from Heaven and again ascendeth thither and which also according to his Divinity remains alwaies there who spake nothing but what he knew and had seen with the Father See the like vers 32. and Jo. 8.38 5.19 30. Because God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that men might not perish but have everlasting life i. e so many as believed in him and that as Moses lifted up the Serpent in the Wilderness so he was to be lifted up See the like Jo. 8.28 So acquainting him but obscurely with his death sufferings That whosoever stung with sin beheld and believed on him might not perish but that those whoso did not believe on him were already condemned by occasion of his preaching to them not for their former sins which he came to take away but for their disbelief See Jo. 9.39 12.47 48. without which belief in him no forgiveness of Sin That he was the Light that was come into the world avoided only by those whose works were evil and so who feared the discovery of them by it and therefore made such opposition to him But that he that did truth would come to it as not fearing the manifesting of his deeds by it § 185 All these things he gratiously revealed to Nicodemus which delivered with his accustomed Majesty and Power must needs elevate Nicodemus into the highest admiration and reverence of his person love and gratitude towards his mercy and familiar condescendence especially having already seen his mighty
to them and to be an accidentary diminution of their present pains Yet again the absence of good Angels from the Court of Heaven and the glorious appearance of Gods Majesty there when they sent hither is recompensed with the joy they have in doing Gods will and succouring his Servants here below so the relaxation the Devils have from their low imprisonment seems counterpoised in their ascent with the gnawing grief they have here by reason of their malice its being so frequently defeated and the good Angels and also Holy men ruling over them and Gods continually bringing his greater good and Glory out of their evils and by their punishment after the last day to be increased according to the evil also they have done on earth As for souls departed hence the return of them hither out of those places of joy and repose above or of torment below wherein they are received till the last day is much more uncertain especially concerning the damned And the frequent apparitions that are made here of Saints departed or if any such have bin of some souls that are in hell all these may be represented by the ministery of Angels good or evil Pardon this digression Now to go on § 212 The Devil thus supplicating our Lord not to destroy them adds further that he well knew him who he was the holy one of God as the Devils did frequently at other times See Mark 3.11 where they also fell down before and worshipped him and Luk. 4.41 the Devils saith the Evangelist came out of many crying out and saying Thou art Christ the Son of God for they saith he knew that he was Christ See also Acts 16.17 18. He being either made to speak this truth out of constraint and against his will or out of flattery hoping so to find some favour from him who was neither able to carry his prey away or himself to quit the place Our Lord first commands him silence as elsewhere Luk. 4.41 and as also the Apostles Acts 16.18 not accepting any such testimony from the Father of lies which Author also might render it suspicious and therefore speak it that it might not be believed and charged him also to leave the person So roaring out again amain as if dreading those greater sufferings to which he was remitted or at least the loss of his prey he threw down the person in the midst of the people and so left him without any further hurt This is the first Devil that is mentioned to have bin cast out by our Lord as still greater works by degrees are shewed by him and the first Confession made by them of his person and of their subjection to him upon which the people much admiring cryed out what virtue and power hath this man that the Devils streight obey his commands § 213 After this our Lord departing from the Synagogue with his four Disciples entred into the house of Simon Peter at noon there to take his dinner See Luk. 14.1 where it seems was his ordinary abode when in Capernaum Here Simon Peters wives mother lay sick of a Feavor probably seizing on her but the night before otherwise our Lord would have bin importuned for her sooner whom he presently healed with only touching her with his hand and rebuking and commanding the feavor to depart from her who presently arose and helped to provide necessaries for them For the rest of the day being the Sabbath he was free from the multitude till the evening after sun set But then saith St. Mark all the City were gathered about the door bringing their sick to be cured as also several possessed with Devils whom trembling and confessing him as the former had done in the Synagogue that he was Christ the Son of God he presently silenced them both as unwilling to borrow any testimony from such vile and detestable wights and as these unseasonable now discovering the Dignity of his person which tended to the prevention of his sufferings and contradictions he was to undergo as also proposing himself in a pattern to us of modesty and humility in not permitting any thing to our own praise to be said in our presence § 214 All people thus flocking after him the next morning for preventing the like concourse and likewise for preparing himself for his intended journey and circuit about Galilee he arose a great while before day and before the Disciples were awake or aware of it and departed into a solitary place and there betook himself to prayer probably giving thanks here to God his Father for the gracious benefits afforded to mankind by his ministery and petitioning for his Auditors their bringing forth worthy fruits thereof and also for the future like success thereof in those other parts of Galilee of which he now intended a visitation And here in such his retiring into solitude and that by night a time not encombred with other employments giving us also an example how we may best perform our devotions without distraction by night-watching and retirements S. Peter and the other Disciples when risen and missing him in the house went out after him and having found told him that all men sought for him And by this time also the people had discovered where he was and so importuned him for a longer stay and that he would not depart so soon from their City But he answered them that he must preach the Kingdom of God also to other Cities and people for therefore was he sent § 215 So leaving Capernaum for a time Our Lord departed to preach the Kingdom of God in the other Cities and Towns of lower Galilee doing this especially in their Synagogues on the Sabbaths And then after his Sermons and cures applyed to their souls ordinarily healing their sick and freeing the possessed attended meanwhile with his Disciples and followed by great multitudes of people and by several of the Scribes and Pharisees some as his Converts others as spies upon his words and actions their envy toward him increasing with his fame and applause As for the following History of our Lords Travels Sermons and Miracles in Galilee which are more fully related by the three first Evangelists there seems a great uncertainty as to the time and place of several of them these all endeavoring brief relations and chiefly intending the matter but not the Order as a thing of less consequence Nor is the contexture of these stories in the Harmonists though gathered by them with a most diligent and scrupulous observation of the circumstances and of any necessary connection expressed in any one of the Evangelists yet so evident or agreeing with one another as that there doth not remain probable arguments of ranging several of them otherwise Therefore I shall without much solicitude or anxiety in a matter which seems by no industry clearly decidable nor an errour therein much damagable chuse to follow that Method wherein the most of them do consent and have already pitched on § 216 Our Lord then
left all rose up and followed him Luk. 5.28 But the Glory and wisdom of our Lord was exceedingly set forth in this passage whereby he first shewed them again what he had said before that he had power to forgive sins and what he said to them afterwards that he came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance that by the example of his own humility condescendence and mercy to the most despised conditions endeavouring to abate the Pharisees pride and encourage like the Baptist before him all penitents in what ever state of life to apply themselves to him not breaking a bruised reed or extinguishing the smoking flax but above all whereby he shewed that he did not find but make fit for his service those whom he admitted to it and acted all things with a great Majesty over mens spirits like a God and himself this operation upon the mind of the Publican in the midst of his business being a greater miracle than that done but now upon the Body of the Paralytick § 232 St. Matthew much overjoyed and so his fellow-Publicans with this singular favour done him streight quitted his Bank and the same day invited our Lord and his Disciples to his house and there made him a great feast saith S. Luke though S. Matthew himself passeth over the matter more slightly only with a factum est cum occubaret in domo without an ipsius and so also when he names himself he adds Publican and Matthew the Publican chap. 10.3 which Feast also served for a farewel entertainment to his friends and former acquaintance a many of which were Publicans and so also these sate down at the Table and eat with our Lord and his Disciples in which matter of eating and drinking the Jews especially used the greatest caution of any defilement and therefore the Pharisees refused the invitement or to mix with such a Society And now their displeasure growing to the height began to break into words which before was smothered in their thoughts § 233 They then after this entertainment question yet not with out Lord himself but his Disciples first why they and especially their Master a man of so much Sanctity did so familiarly converse and eat arid drink with Publicans and sinners By sinners meaning the common sort of people not so strict in their lives nor wary for their conversation nor diligent in their purifications nor frequent in their fasts and Devotions nor strict in their tithes and other severities as the Pharisees were therefore reckoned by them unclean besides those who were scandalous for other faults Luk. 7.39 Upon which account the Pharisee elsewhere wonders that our Lord would suffer Mary Magdalen to touch him and from his companying with such liberty they aspersed him as a glutton and a wine-bibber Our Lord overhearing them or otherwise knowing their words then as their thoughts before first answered them as usually in a Parable that they that are found and whole need not the company of the Physitian but they that are sick And thus he justified such his conversation upon the account of his being a Physitian and sent not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance so his disciples were excused as being there not for theirs but his company But otherwise doubtless for these that are not spiritual Physitians but themselves also sick such company ought most carefully to be declined 1 Cor. 6.10 2 Thes 3.14 all sin being very contagious and also by our withdrawing from it to be discouraged This account given for himself He also knowing the Pharisees great defect herein zealous in their shew of service toward God but failing in their charity and mercy toward their neighbour bids them learn better the meaning of that saying in Osee Chap. 6.6 I will have mercy and not Sacrifice God preferring mercy to our Brethren before Sacrifice to himself By which most prudent answer of his those poor penitents that surrounded our Lord received much consolation and the Hypocritical Pharisees an inward conviction and confusion § 234 Silenced here they proceed again to question our Lord and to expose him to some publick shame in a matter they supposed yet much less defensible in which also to make their party the stronger they joyned with them the disciples of John the Baptist notwithstanding the great disesteem they had both of him and his followers Now these disciples also had an emulation of the great fame of our Lord and also had learnt of their Master the frequent practice of fasting and had also received from him certain forms and directions for prayer see Luk. 11.1 as our Lords disciples afterwards did from him and from the erant jejunantes Mark 2.18 some think this was one of their fasting daies These therefore rather chosen to be the speakers more to aggravate the matter from the rules and prescriptions of the Baptist one so much commended by our Lord applyed themselves now to our Lord himself but questioned him only concerning his disciples as before they asked the disciples concerning him And it was at a very seasonable time too when they both came but now from a feast their demand was why whenas both they and the Pharisees used frequent fasts his Disciples did not so but did eat and drink thinking hereby to force him either to condemn fasting or his own followers for omitting it § 235 Our Lord neither discouraging the Disciples of John nor prejudicing his Order nor as yet discovering the Pharisees Hypocrisy in their fasting which he well knew see Mat. 6.16 answers them again in a Parabolical manner first that the children of the bride-chamber could not mourn and fast whilst the Bridegroom was with them in a time of joy and a ready supply from him all-powerful of all their requests and desires but that the daies would come when the Bridgrome should be taken from them and then they should fast in those daies Fast and also make praiers in such a superlative degree as that those of the Baptists disciples and of the Pharisees were no way to be compared to what hath bin practised since in the Church of Christ And among the Christian fasts our Lord also is thought here to have had a special regard to the solemnizance of Lent which the Church should observe for ever specially relating to this Bridgroome at that time his being taken away from her by a most cruel death But after this reason of his disciples not mourning and fasting for the present the joyful presence of the Messias Our Lord adds another but this also delivered in Parable viz. that a new piece of cloth was not to be sowed on an old garment lest the rent should thereby be made worse nor new wine poured into old bottles lest so they should be burst and the wine spilt intimating that for the present before their renovation by the Holy Spirit his Disciples were not as yet so capable of receiving or practising the strictness and severity
take up his bed and walk Upon which the impotent man was instantly cured and carrying his bed on the Sabbath was presently questioned by the Jews probably these inquirers being either the Pharisees great zelots for the Sabbath or some of their Disciples for the breach of it in so doing who answered them that he was bid to do so by the person that cured him But our Lord there being a throng of people in the place he presently conveyed himself away and returned into the Temple All which occasioned the cure to be more taken notice of and the person looked after that had done it nor could the poor man give any account of him But a little after he repairing also to the Temple probably there to render more solemn thanks to God for his cure Our Lord now discovers himself to him and minding him of the mercy he had received exhorted him to amendment of life least a worse thing yet should happen unto him in die irae if not in this Rom. 2.4 5. yet after this life § 245 The man after he had paid his due adoration and thanks hasted to the former busy enquirers after the Author of his cure and told them it was Jesus doubtless thinking he should advance his honour and esteem with them thereby But it happened much otherwise for instead of this they sought his death for his own breaking in doing this cure and causing the other man also to break the Sabbath Our Lord then questioned by them concerning it as he was often for the like and made them great variety of answers and defences for it by which they were still silenced at this time answers them as absolute Lord of the Sabbath that he was to do the works for which God his Father had sent him among which was restoring the lame giving sight to the blind c. Mat. 11.5 whether this were on Sabbath or week daies or whoever should suffer scandal thereat But his answer now again was made by them worse than his fault collecting hence an higher accusation for destroying him because faith the Text he not only hath broken the Sababth Jo. 5.18 but said also that God was his Father and made himself equal with God which equality had the Jews miscollected from our Lords words as the Arrians say they did probably our Lord or the Evangelist would have reflected on it § 246 But our Lord well knowing his time not yet come of being delivered into their hands with the same undaunted courage and infinite charity and zeal after their salvation prosecuted his former discourse and took this opportunity to declare to them plainly and fully who he was his Union and intimacy with God his Father and why he was sent by and from him into the world and with what authority and power that all might provide for their Salvation by the believing in and the honouring of him as they did the Father See his Sermon made to them Jo. 5. The chief Contents whereof were these That in nothing he sought his own will our Lord having the same natural affections as other men but these in all things subjected to the Divine good pleasure and disposal but the will of his Father That he did nothing of himself but what he saw his Father do and that as he heard of him so he judged that all judgment also was by the Father committed into his hands see the like Mat. 11.27 Jo. 3.35 and the power of doing whatever the Father doth That every one who heard his words and believed that God had sent him should not come into condemnation .i. e. for his former sins now remitted in him but was passed from death to life speaking of death and life spiritual and eternal and of their regeneration thereto by the Spirit See 1 Jo. 3.14 that they who marvelled now so much at the present works he did namely in curing of diseases c. should yet hereafter see far greater from him namely upon the hearing of his voice by the Archangel all that are in their graves coming forth and receiving from him their final doome the good to the resurrection of life the evil to the resurrection of damnation the like things of his hereafter coming in the clouds c. he told to them before his passion Mat. 26.64 and to Nathanael Jo. 1.51 Angels waiting upon him and going hither and thither as he sent them that therefore it was the Fathers pleasure that all should believe in and do honour unto the Son as they did to the Father whose words and actions were the same and they saw and heard God the Father in the Son And concerning his being such a person and the words he spake to them Truth that they had an abundant testimony though considering his person his own was sufficient Jo. 8.14 16. First from his Father 1 both that which he gave them from heaven concerning him at his Baptism the like to which was done twice afterwards at our Lords tranfiguration before three witnesses Mat. 17.5 which is mentioned again by S. Peter 2 Epis 1.16 17. and at his solemn entrance into Jerusalem before his passion God the Father then from heaven speaking to him Jo. 12.20 23. perhaps for a testimony also to the Greeks or Gentiles see Jo. 7.35 who then first admitted by the Apostles came to worship and to make their humble addresses to him which foresignifyed salvation to be shortly after communicated to them by his now approaching death And a-again 2ly that testimony which his Father gave to him in the Miracles which he wrought by him which testimony he frequently urgeth See Jo. 10.25 38. 15.24 2ly A Testimony from John the Baptist though having that of God he needed not that of men which John was sent before him amongst them as a burning and shining light till the time he was to be eclipsed and silenced and they some of them at least were willing for a season to rejoyce in his light 3ly Testimony also from the Scriptures in which they thought were contained the way to eternal life which Scriptures had they duly searched they might have found them abundantly witnessing of him Lastly testimony from their lawgiver Moses in whom they had so much confidence who also spake clearly of him Jo. 1.45 Deut. 18.15.18 where upon petitioning that they might not hear again the voice of God nor see that terrible fire c he tells them that God would raise them up a Prophet like unto him and would put his own words into his mouth c and to him they should hearken whose words would sufficiently accuse unto God his Father their infidelity though our Lord should hold his peace But that notwithstanding such witness and evidences they would not believe because they had not the love of God in them nor as our Lord did sought the honour that only cometh from him through whatever worldly disesteem but was envious ambitious which shews he spake chiefly to the Pharisees and
for seasoning the insipidness and unsavoriness thereof towards God and for preserving it eternally from corruption and that they were the light of the world for illustrating its darkness And lastly a City or Society in which all the world were to be joyned and collected and to become Subjects and members thereof and one Body or Corporation one Faith one Spirit c being therein Eph. 4.4 that therefore they were to provide that this Salt should not become unsavory or insipid for then wherewith could that which is to season all others be seasoned it self And that this light should not be put under a bushel nor this their City hid as it were in a vale or such which should not be eminently discovered for then how could the world know where to joyn themselves to the communion thereof Lastly that also their light and their doctrine were to be accompanied with their good works that people might see the one as well as the other though such good works not done to be seen of men nor that themselves but their heavenly Father working such Sanctification in them might be glorified thereby 2 Cor. 8.21 Rom. 12.17 Their example and practising of their doctrine being much the more difficult and this much more effectually converting others than teaching doth 1 Pet. 2.12 3.16 And that at the last day many of them should come unto him saying Lord Lord and telling what great matters their preaching and prophecying in his name had effected yet should they be rejected on this account that their works were evil And that every tree thus bringing forth ill fruit should surely be cut down and cast into the fire § 276 He told them likewise and herein also gave a precaution to the people that there should arise among them many false Prophets and Teachers who should come in sheep's clothing and counterfeit much Sanctity and use much fair language c. but yet within were very wolves 2 Cor. 11.3.13 and that there was one sure test by which they might know them Viz. by the fruits they bare for that as the tree was bad or good so would the fruit certainly be Which rule our Lord seems to have given them upon a double account Both because truth and goodness or Holiness proceed from the same Holy Spirit within us the fountain of both and are eternally linked together and so errour and vice So that all things truely weighed no true doctrine can ever tend to an evil life nor errour to a good and Holiness alwaies suffers not gains by a lye Therefore also are truth and iniquity frequently opposed -1 Cor. 13.6 Rom. 2.8 1.18 So that no mans wickedness can be the effect or consequent of any truth he holds though who holds the truth may still be wicked from another principle in him That therefore thus true and false teachers may be known by the fruit of their doctrines in their Auditors if these tend to the infusing into them higher degrees of all kinds of piety and charity Or on the contrary do infuse any seeds of impiety injustice uncharitableness sensual liberty uncleanness or sedition and disobedience to Dignities and Superiors This as to the fruit of their doctrines But secondly because as to their persons the root in such false teachers alwaies is evil i. e. their affections and intentions are perverted which perverse affections at last manifest themselves in their lives and practices these either for secular ends teaching doctrines not believed and known by them to be false purposely to deceive which ends and hypocrisy will certainly discover themselves in their works or tho the doctrines taught are also believed by them yet there are some vicious inclinations respecting secular interests which do induce such a beleif especially where they depart from the Traditions of the Church and former Superiours and such secular interests will appear in their works and manners and the heart bad in one thing will be so in another Therefore the Apostles do describe frequently such false teachers as vitious in their lives and seducing with their fair speeches when in their sheeps clothing See Rom. 16.17 18. Phil. 3.19 -2 Cor. 11.3 13. -1 Tim. 4.2 Tit. 3.11 -2 Pet. 2.3 10. c. in which texts they are represented as Sibi placentes gloriae sitientes assentatores invidi maledici obtrectatores ventri dediti suis temporalibus commodis avaritiae servientes suum negocium agentes some way or other non veritati noting them specially as covetous sensual speaking ill of Dignities But here note that by false Prophets are chiefly meant those who know their doctrines to be false and intend to deceive and teach in Hypocrisy and live in disobedience to a Superiour Church-authority Otherwise some good man may teach an errour and some bad truth But as these have or want the Grace of God in their heart and have their will and affections sincere or corrupt so will their fruit mostly be good or bad and among other things their teachings and instructions will have a relish thereof After this our Lord concluded his whole Sermon thus that the Foundation of Happiness was their good works and their not-hearing or teaching but doing what he taught which was laying the Foundation upon a sure rock so that no storms should shake the building raised upon it But that the Hearer of his words and not practicer was like a fool building his house on sand Upon which a time would be when the raines should come and the winds blow and the floods arise and the storms beat vehemently upon it and the fall thereof should be very great and terrible And thus ends our Lords great and famous Predication in the Mount to his Apostles and to all the People who saith the Evangelist were much astonished as at his doctrine so at the manner of his delivery thereof For he spake to them all these things with a kind of Majestical Authority and not as the Scribes An Historical Narration OF THE LIFE OF OUR LORD JESUS PART II. Beginning after the prayer recorded Joh. 17. § 1 GREAT was the present malice of the Devil in this hour of trouble approaching against the rest of his poor Disciples to gain possession of them also as he had already of Judas Jo. 13.27 and Satan had desired Luk. 22.31 32. c. concerning them as he did concerning Job That God who keeps a continual restraint upon this hater of mankind not only for his hurting us after sin but also for his tempting us unto it would but now let him have the sifting of them a little after all the great works they had seen done by this their Master and all the gracious words they had heard from him to try their fidelity to him Our Lord therefore foreseeing the great temptation that at this time they also foreseeing his Fathers permission to these Powers of Darkness were to undergo and how greivously they might otherwise miscarry in it interceded to his Father
God to save thee become the Son of man by which name to express the state of his humiliation our Lord usually stiled himself to death with this dearest expression of love to him Tu unanimis meus notus meus Who but now simul mecum dulces capiebas cibos and but this day in domo Domini ambulavimus cum consensu as the sad Psalmist in Spirit foreseeing this Tragedy aggravates it After which said and this Satan-possessed miserable creature no way relenting our Lord moves forward towards the Band that was coming on to apprehend him his Disciples following And asking them first with great Majesty whom they sought for there and they answering for Jesus of Nazareth upon his speaking two words Ego sum as if it had bin the terrible name Jehovah or Ego sum in Exodus they all recoiled as if repulsed with some mastering force and fell flat upon their backs before him so that he and his company might not only have gone from them but marched over them if they had pleased In which action he sheweth to them and to the world his All-Powerful Godhead and that oblatus est as the Prophet quia ipse voluit Esai 53.7 and that not by their force but his own meer good pleasure it was that he would be taken bound and led away by them as also used this act of his power as a means to reduce them to their duty and prevent their Guilt and make them next to turn to another prostration forward in a due reverence and honour to his Sacred person Jo 7.32 46. moved with the like Spirit as those were who came formerly to apprehend him in the Temple But they after a while by his permission recovering their strength made toward him a second time perhaps thinking their former fall an effect of his Magick or black Art able to procure a Blast to throw them down but not to hold them there and full ignorant that they rose again onely by the strength he infused Again he asked them the same Question And answered by them as before he next layes a powerful command on them which though assaulted by his Followers they punctually obeyed That seeing he was the man they sought they should dismiss and not touch the rest of his company mystically shewing thereby his sufferings to be our ransome and his apprehending our freedom He in the yeilding up of himself yet taking most tender compassion as S. John observes of his poor sheep Jo. 17.12 That though they might be scattered yet cone of those whom his Father had given him might be lost by falling into that storm which he well saw now all the Powers of Hell were let loose that none could withstand but himself and that Satans sifting them at that time would have turned to the ruin of their Faith and all of them bin if not as Judas Betrayers yet Denyers of him For if Peter when at free liberty and only asked the question by a Maid did so what may we imagine would he or the rest have done under Restraint and tortures § 22 Yet the Disciples well acquainted with this his omnipotency on several occasions and strongly animated also by seeing the former sudden Prostration of his Enemies had so much courage as to draw and ask him leave to use the few Swords they had in his defence and Peter had such an hasty Valour also according to his usual zeal and late promise to our Lord as without expecting an answer he made a blow at one of the High Priests servants one of the forwardest of the company to lay hands on our Lord upon his Masters instigations thinking to have cleft his head in sunder with it But our merciful Lord diverted it onely to the lopping off one of his ears which had too facilely received his Masters wicked commands and then presently compassionating this mischance desired permission of his Enemies thus far as to touch him and set it on again Thus returning good for evil and preventing the accusation of any resistance or harm done by him or his to the Ministers of publick justice as also in this demonstrating his love and charity to these his Enemies as he had before his power over them § 23 After which turning back towards Peter he bad him to put up his Sword telling him those that used it i. e. without a just Commission as he then did and especially against the ordinary Ministers of the secular Powers Gen. 9.6 and of Justice as those sent then to apprehend him were should incur the old Lex talionis mentioned in Genesis and perish by the Sword Adding also that he needed not his nor any others defence having at his command more than twelve Legions of Angels and had he pleased to have opened theirs as he did the Servant of Elisha his eyes they might have seen all these celestial Armies now environing him but what needed this when they saw the late powerful effect of his breath only in the pronouncing of two words enough had he pleased to have unmade the whole world as also it was made only with a word After which he concluded his speech with those gracious words full of patience humility and resignation after his usual manner to the good pleasure of his Father The cup that my Father hath given or appointed me shall not I drink And if I now make such a rescue how shall that which is written of me be fulfilled Taking care that not one syllable of his Fathers good pleasure declared in the former Scriptures concerning him should fall to the ground and accepting these his sufferings with all willing submission not as from the hands of the Enemies but of his Father § 24 After this addressing his Speech to the chief Priests and Captains of the Temple and Elders that were come to apprehend him Luk. 22.52 he expostulateth with them thereby to reduce them to some remorse of their fact why they came against him thus by night as against a Theif and a Robber and one that sought concealment who indeed was not a Destroyer but the Saviour of mankind and who conversed amongst them all the day publickly in the Temple at what time they had nothing to say to him Then presently as it were recalling himself from this arguing with ungrateful men and resuming the sweet contemplation of the divine preordination But saith he Luk. 22 53. This is your hour Intimating that only by the divine Dispensation and his own full consent to it the Powers of Darkness were now let loose upon him and these their wicked Instruments licensed to act in a time sutable to their designs § 25 So our meek Lord patiently yeilded himself into their hands who took and bound him their first Dejectment and fears now serving only to increase their present fierceness and rougher usage of him as imputing their former prostration to a feat of his Magick or black Art able to play some pretty pranks but
too weak to do them any real mischeif or affront But indeed this only Son Isaac was bound by his Father not them in obedience to whom and thirst after the Redemption of mankind by it this Lamb of God offered himself to be Sacrificed on the Altar of the Cross the next morning and thus freely yeilded up his liberty into the hands of sinners § 26 With this rough usage of theirs the Disciples much dismayed and terrified now forgetting their resolute promises formerly made him all fled away for their safety at least to a competent distance from these Troops Jo. 16 32 And that prediction of our Lord but some hours before was fulfilled venit hora ut dispergamini unusquisque ad propria me solum relinquatis Onely a young man lodging in some house adjoining that awaked with the noise arose out of his bed and throwing a sheet loosely about him came forth to see what such tumult meant had the courage to follow our Lord and so was laid hold on by them who leaving his sheet in their hands escaped away naked a lively prerepresentation of our Lords escape from them after their stripping him of his Garments that was to be three dayes after at his Resurrection leaving his Syndon behind him § 27 Now it must needs be very late and drawing toward Midnight considering it was already night when Judas went forth from Supper to gather his body together Jo. 13.30 After which followed our Lords long Farewel Sermon made to his Disciples Jo. 13.31 c. to the chap. 17. and Prayer for them after it Jo. 17. his Journey to the Garden about a mile off his prayers and Agony there and his Disciples there falling a sleep and all the Circumstances of his Apprehension and the young mans rising out of his bed The night it seems though the Moon then at the full was much overcast and dark sutable to the work Thus bound they joyfully led away our Lord through the valley into the City now silent and quiet and carried him first to the house of Annas probably in the way to Caiphas his Pallace and he a great Encourager of the design and some think that Judas there received his reward his treason having now given them full Possession of his Master Annas also though some years before deposed from the office of High Priest by the Roman Governour who in those daies disposed of it yearly as seems to be implyed by those words Jo. 11.49 Caiphas being High Priest that same year and Luk. 3.2 Annas and Caiphas being the High Priests i. e. by turns or after what time he pleased yet still retained the title Luk. 3.1 and still had some special interest and sway in it from Caiphas's marrying his Daughter and from his having a son also Eleazer that had born the same office before Joseph Antiq. Jud. lib. 18. cap. 3. Who was also a cheif Member of the Council then met in Caiphas's Pallace and likely was called on to accompany them thither The officers also might have had order to House our Lord assoon as they could for prevention of any tumult or resistance § 28 None appearing without any longer stay made there Our Lord in the silent night was conveyed to Caiphas his Pallace where as hath bin said the Council the High Priests those being alwaies after stiled so who at any time bore that office frequently changed Scribes and Elders Mark 14.53 assembled together expected them Our Lord being set before them the High Priest instead of producing a charge against him and hearing his Defence and Answer to it fell on Questioning him about his Doctrine and his Followers whom as they had said elsewhere Mat. 22.16 they knew free to speak truth and as to this regarding or fearing no mans Person to see what he would confess and if confessing any thing liable to their censure thence to draw up an Indictment when as indeed this seemed very great oppression to apprehend bind make a man a Prisoner and bring him before the barr of Justice there to gain from him something for which to question him Our Lord having many times before bin thus examined by them or their order who he was who sent him what authority he had c. answered them briefly That both for Doctrine and Disciples they had seen who these and heard what that was and indeed if the latter his Doctrine good the more Disciples the better That he had taught publickly in the Temple and in their Synagogues and in private said nothing but what abroad That therefore if he were any way faulty in sowing Errors or plotting sedition they might have enough to bear witness of it and upon their legal testimony proceed to condemn or acquit him and therefore that they should not ask him but ask them that heard his words and saw his actions even amongst which were many of themselves that then sate on the Bench or stood before it and amongst these the very Officers sent formerly by them to apprehend him Who indeed throughly convinced of his Innocency and Sanctity had returned to them with a Never Man spake like that man § 29 Our Lord thus by a prudent declining any new account of himself whom his great thirst to dy for mankind made little sollicitous to plead for his life much disappointed the High Priests expectation and breifly thus referring his cause as was just to the testimony of others one of the officers which stood by him struck him over the face in the presence of all the Court for answering the High Priest in that manner To whom our Lord whose patience here none can rightly measure who doth not well consider his person and power meekly replyed That if he answered well there was no cause he should be strucken for it or if ill not strucken by him who was only to bear witness of the evil and leave the vindication of it to the Judge Thus when he suffered as S. Peter observes 1 Pet. 2.23 he threatned not and we may imagine with great charity said this to reduce that poor Wretch to a sence of his fault And it is a wonder that herein those Judges or some of the Assessors did not prevent our Lord in the censure and castigation of such a wicked and impudent act § 30 Our Lord having thus appealed to witnesses and the testimony of his Auditors concerning his Doctrine and conversation These were at that time of the night not prepared but looked for And many they found but as it ordinarily happens in lyes their witnessings did not agree well together nor inferred the Crimes to be Capital These standing up in the Court spake vehemently against our Lord and as fast as they spake contradicted one another and destroyed each others testimony Defecerunt scrutantes scrutinio mentita est iniquitas sibi as the Psalmist Our meek Lord continuing all the time with most profound silence enduring as the Apostle observes such contradictions of sinners unprovoked
meo custodiam cum consisteret Peccator adversum me Psal 37.13 Opprobrium insipienti dedisti me And obmutui non aperui os meum quia tu fecifti Qui inquirebant mala mihi locuti sunt vanitates dolos c. Ego autem tanquam surdus non audiebam sicut mutus non aperiens os suum And Factus sum sicut homo non audiens non habens in ore suo redargutiones Ego in flagella paratus sum dolor meus in conspectu meo Quoniam iniquitatem meam That of the whole world taken upon me annuntiabo cogitabo pro peccato meo i.e. meorum § 34 This silence as the High Priest much wondred at so he little imagined the reason of it seeing the great advantages he had of a Reply And convinced already without his Plea of the vanity and contradiction of the accusation deviseth another way that might succeed better and being the main matter upon the stage that had bin many times undoubtedly heard from him and which either affirmed or denyed must equally ruin him And that he might no way be defeated by his silence he solemnly adjures him by the living God a custome amongst the Jews in their Courts where wanting some other Evidence see 1 Kings 8.31.32 Numb 5.19 1 Thess 5.27 to declare then openly whether indeed he was the Messias and the Son of God Which if he now denyed having before professed it he might pass for a grand Impostor and Deceiver formerly or if he confessed it with the Court it amounted to blasphemy and the punishment thereof Death and which the divine Wisdom then so ordered That what our Lord had so often declared in his life and confirmed with Miracles he might also witness before all the world at his Death and seal this great truth with his blood for the greater confirming of true Believers and greater conviction of all Opposers at the day of Judgment § 35 Thus therefore our Lord presently confessed openly what he was without those qualifications with which formerly he was wont sometimes to veil it thereby not to prevent or anticipate his sufferings His answer there Thou sayest that I am being amongst the Jews a modest way of Asseveration concerning a thing that includes some self-dignity or commendation Thou sayest that I am being as much as thou sayest that which I am See the same language used by our Lord before to Judas Mat. 26.25 and the High Priest his renting his clothes for Blasphemy shews our Lords Answer to be understood as a clear confession Therefore S. Mark puts instead of it more breifly I am And it may be here observed that when as he said the same thing often in his life time and they upon it had charged him with blasphemy and so went about to stone and kill him see Jo. 5.18 Jo. 10.32 c. He there confuted them and stopped their mouths by many proofs that this was no falshood or blasphemy viz. by his so many miraculous works by the Testimony of the Holy Baptist by the immediate testimony of his Father from heaven lastly by the infallible Scriptures calling those Gods to whom God had given some extraordinary commission or authority whereas himself had received beyond them such a Plenitude of Sanctification appearing by the Descent of the Holy Ghost upon him at his Baptism by the Purity of his life and Doctrine and mighty works see Jo. 5.20 21 33 37. the 10.33 37 yet here at their crying Blasphemy he repeats no such defence notwithstanding all the Nation could witness the truth of it but retireth again to his former silence as loath to disappoint their purpose now his hour was come § 36 Only in great pity and charity to his impious oppressors and to remove the scandal taken at that which ought to be infinitely admired his present voluntarily-assumed humiliation he modestly tells them that although these titles he owned might seem somewhat disfutable to his present low condition yet one day their eyes should behold this now so mean a Son of man exalted to sit on the right hand of Power as David had foretold of the Messias Psal 109.1 which Messias his sitting on the right hand of Power and so being Davids Lord the Pharisees could not reconcile with the Messias being also Davids Son when our Lord asked them this question Mat. 22.44 No more than they could now his bonds with it and that they should also see him come in the clouds of heaven as Daniel had foretold of the Messias Dan. 7.13 to judg the world and even them his then Judges Of which he had also in his preaching told his auditory many times before see Mat. 16.27 Where advising them not to mind the gain of this world but to save their poor Souls in the next he tells them that the Son of man for so he stiles himself also there shall come in the glory of his Father which shewed him the Son to another higher than man with his Angels and then reward every one according to his works And this his premonition here given to his unjust Judges shall again bear witness against them in that his day of Judgment when saith the Prophet Zachary chap. 12. Aspicient in eum quem transfixerunt And Ecce venit in nubibus videbit eum omnis oculus qui eum pupugerunt saith S. John Apoc. 1.7 Nay a-modo saith S. Matthew chap. 26.64 very suddenly within three daies after his saying this they should see the beginning of this his Exaltation and Glory He being exalted by the right hand of God saith S. Peter Acts 2.33 after his Resurrection and Ascension hath shewed forth this ye now see and hear In which speech of our Lord thus standing at the bar we may observe that his singular modesty was accompanied with a great freedom Authority and Majesty Nor had their treatment any way daunted him or remitted the resolution and courage belonging to an innocent person to the dignity of his office and to the necessary confession of truth as appears in his whole carriage at his apprehension Are ye come out as against a Theif c. I sate with you teaching in the Temple c. And here at his appearance before the High Priests and Jewish Courts Askest thou me ask them that heard me And afterwards before the Roman Governor sayest thou this of thy self c. And for this cause come I into the world c. And every one that is of the Truth heareth my voice And Thou couldest have no Power against me but what is given thee from above Jo. 19.11 § 37 But this forewarning them of his Exaltation and judgment to come which should have struck some fear into them and in which his Servant S. Paul had better success Acts 24.25 their malice made also ill use of and improved it so much more to compleat his blasphemy And presently the High Priest fell a rending his clothes as it was the manner
their King because indeed he was so all the people now engage themselves also in the like guilt as the High Priests and Elders before and publickly renounce our Lord meekly standing before them for the Christ or their King and cry out also against him Crucifie him Crucifie him not only demanding Justice but impudently prescribing to the Judge the manner of his punishment and that the cruellest could be named And when also before all the people the Governour now the third time declared that he could find no fault at all in him they a second time redouble their clamours and cryed out more exceedingly saith the Text Mark. 15.14 Crucifie him Crucifie him § 70 The Governour now at a great stand who before had mentioned the chastising of him and was now defeated of his design concerning Barabbas seeing no way but one possible to save his life viz. to satisfy their malice to some degree with some lesser torments inflicted on him presently gave order for scourging him which also the more severely it was done the more necessary he supposed in the issue it would be for preserving him from such an horrid death The Roman manner of scourging offendors is said to be this To strip the person naked and tye him by his hands and feet to a pillar with his face towards it and so beat him with a whip made with cords or thongs of leather that wound much worse then rods A very sore and ignominious torment it was and therefore no citizen of Rome whatsoever or any having this priviledge might be so punished See Acts 16. 37 22 15. Facinus est vincire civem Romanum scelus verberare prope Parricidum necare quid dicam in crucem tollere saith Cicero in Verrem orat 5. § 71 Our Lord was committed by Pilat to the Roman Soldiers for executing this punishment who took him into the Praetorium Mat. 27.27 Jo. 19.4 or atrium Praetorii saith St. Mark chap. 15.16 And to do this and the rest of their pranks the more solemnly after they had seen the sport Herods men had made with this Jewish Prince and perhaps some of them that also of the High Priest's officers over-night and not meeting with such a joculary object every day they assemble the whole Cohort consisting of some hundreds to come and perform their homage to him some of them looking on whilst others acted By whose obsequiousness as servants use to go beyond their Lord's Commission we may imagine his stripes were laid on without any regret or common humanity in such a multitude of military Spectators till he being rendred all in a gore blood excepting only his face and head was made a fit spectacle to shew to those Adamantine-hearted Jews And indeed if what we owed in this kind was undertaken to be paid by him as it was and that without his speaking a word to decline it we may hence measure the greatness of his sufferings from that of our demerits Multa flagella Peccatoris saith the Psalmist and our Lord pronounced as it were against himself That our knowing his Fathers Will and not doing it deserves many stripes which at last came to that That he himself must defray for us And thus also were all the Prophecies fulfilled by him to the uttermost which the Scriptures long before had delivered Psal 34.15 Adversum me laetati sunt convenerunt congregata sunt super me flagella ignoravi for what cause Subsannaverunt me subsannatione frenduerunt super me dentibus suis Quem tu percussisti persecuti sunt super dolorem vulnerum meorum addiderunt Psal 68 and again Psal 37.18 Ego in flagella paratus sum dolor mens my stripes in conspectu meo semper And the reason follows Quoniam iniquitatem meam i. e. meorum taken on me annuntiabo cogitabo pro peccato meo And again Psal 128.3 Supra dorsum meum fabricaverunt peccatores prolongaverunt iniquitatem suam Or as the Hebrew supra dorsum meum araverunt arantes prolongaverunt suleum suum For doubtless his back was strangely furrowed and plowed-up And now was that chiefly verified Esay 53.2 c. Non est species â—i neque decor vidimus eum non erat aspectus Languores nostro ipse tulit dolores nostros ipse portavit Et nos putavimus eum quasi leprosum with his broken skin percussum a Deo humiliatum Ipse autem vulneratus est propter iniquitatâ—s nostras attritus est propter scelera nostra Disciplina pacis nostrae super eum livore ejus sanati sumus And after Propter scelus populi mei percussieum And of this also particularly he several times foretold his Disciples saying that his own People should deliver him to the Gentiles to mock and to scourge and to crucify him Mat. 20.19 Mark 10.34 § 72 After this to fulfil the illudendum as well as flagellandum our Lord foretold and to prepare him further for the shew their Master intended they thought fit to dress him like a King as Herod had done before them and so pulling off his garments again now cleaving to his scarifyed back if perhaps these were at all put on after his whipping they arrayed him with an old-cast purple cloke and wanting yet a Crown for this King they took a bunch of thorns and platting them together made a wreath thereof and pressed it about his Temples whereby his Sacred face and head also hitherto blood-free became of the like dye with the rest of his body pierced every where with the spikes of the thorns of which Sacred head now compassed with a bunch of thornes when God saved Abrahams only Son yet so loved the world as not to save his own the head of the Ram which so Abraham took and offered for him all entangled and wrapped in thornes seems to be a lively type Then for a Scepter also sutable to his Crown they took a reed and gave it him in his right hand This done for his Inauguration they fell on their knees and worshipped him saying Ave Rex Judaeorum God save the King of the Jews And then that their merriment and mockery might not end without strokes they rose oft their knees and fell a beating him with their fists and spitting in his face mingled their excrements with his blood and took the reed out of his hand and said him over the head with it and so nailed his Crown closer to his Temples And by this time Pilat calling for him they put the reed again into his right hand which he meekly held so as they placed it and so brought him forth all imbrewed in blood head face and body with his Robe Crown and reeden Scepter and presenting him on the Gallery or Terrace-walk before all the Jews Pilat said Jo. 19.4 I bring him forth to you again that ye may know that I find no fault in him being thus ill treated by Pilat not for his but their crimes so to have
the Governours fears or rather increased them so that still he was more induced to procure his releasment For which purpose he went forth and proposed it once more to the Jews when at last they brake out into that speech which quite subdued this timorous Judge and now begat in him another quite contrary fear which drove out the former the base fear of displeasing Cesar or perhaps also losing his place expelling that noble and just one of shedding the blood of an innocent person and of crucifying the Son of God And as he feared offending Cesar when he had no just cause thereof For all Religions and Magistrats desire the protection of innocency to he afterwards suffered that which he feared being upon the same Jews complaint ejected by Cesar for cruelty who here feared offending him by being too indulgent and merciful They cryed out unto him therefore that if he dismist that man he was no friend of Cesars for surely he who so pretended himself a King of their Nation spake and acted against Cesar's title and Right § 76 Upon this he caused our Lord to be brought forth out of the Praetorium where he had left him as perceiving that the sight of him did but more enrage them and so sitting down on the Judgment-Seat which it seems by what St. John saith was in an open Gallery on high conspicuous to all the people to pass his final sentence upon him a suddain message came to him from his wife see Mat. 27.19 sedente illo pro tribunali dehorting him from having any thing to do with that Just man This great Lady whose name Nicephorus Lib. 1. cap. 30. saith was Procula and whom the Greek Church honour as a Convert of our Lord's doubtless had heard the report of our Lord's Miracles of his late solemn entrance into Jerusalem at which all the city was generally moved saith the Text of his apprehension condemnation by the Jews and at last remission to Pilats Tribunal and had her thoughts much troubled in his behalf as that Sex useth to be more tender and compassionate and averse to such cruelties Upon which that morning she had also a dream or vision that much affrighted her perhaps of her Husbands being accessary to his death and of the Tragical end he should incur after such an impious fact ejectment out of his government banishment and at last making away himself like to that of Judas as Histories do relate the Event and upon this sent such a resolute message to him in the midst of so publick action and in the sight of all the Jews In all which God shewed an extraordinary favour to Pilat though not signified to his own person yet to another the nearliest related to him and most prevalent with him to have prevented his guilt and kept his hands from being embrued at least in this divine and Sacred blood which were afterward washed in vain And this message which she sent either being audibly delivered in the Jews presence to Pilat or at least presently spread amongst them by Pilats Courtiers another admonition this seems to have been also to the cruel Jews after that of Judas § 77 This message also perhaps delivered with many more Circumstances shewing some thing extraordinary in it made it seems no small impression upon her husband as appears by his so solemnly washing his hands presently after Therefore producing our Lord and setting him once more before them in his former dress he made a new application to them and as before he had said to them Ecce Homo representing our Lord at his lowest to which he humbled himself meerly for our sakes thus inviting their compassion so now by the special divine Providence directing him as Caiphas before he changed his Note and said Ecce Rex vester as it were demanding their subjection alluding in this to the Robe Crown and Scepter with which he appeared before them as in his former to the miserable scourging and stripes Pilat in all probability being really perswaded upon the several motives forementioned that he was their Messias and their King in that sense our Lord confest it and therefore he persisted afterwards in making his title on the Cross exactly such notwithstanding their importuning him for the alteration of it § 78 Upon this second sight of him they all set up a new clamour Tolle Tolle Crucifige And he again iterateth to them our Lords Messias and King-ship saying what must I take and Crucifie your King Here the cheif Priests like good faithful loyal Roman Subjects cryed out they had no King but Cesar And this their renouncing him so formally and expressly for their King or Messias so often inculcated to them by Pilat and of which they had had so many infallible proofs exceedingly aggravates their guilt and will doubtless rise up against them at the great day of Judgment Neither though alwaies they have expected have they had a King of their own but served under forraign Princes ever since to this day § 79 Lastly the Governour seeing no good to be done upon them but rather saith the Text a tumult to be made thinking he had sufficiently done his part in so often protesting before them his Judgment of our Lords innocency and looking on himself as not faulty in this matter because they much more see Deut. 21.6 called for water and washed his hands in the sight of all the Jews telling them he was innocent of the blood of that Just person using the same Epithete concerning him as his wife before and that they should look to it God herein also warning them by him of the sad consequence thereof But indeed as to the Governour 's act this was but a foolish fancy that the washing thus of his hands could any way cleanse his conscience or his professing the persons innocency any way compensate his delivering him up to death and not rather the confessing it double the iniquity of his injustice proceeding from a cowardly fear of Cesar and a sordid compliance with the Jews To this their rage and fury even all the people saith the Evangelist not the High Priests alone returned that fearful imprecation His blood be upon us and upon our children which blood accordingly came upon them and upon their children at the set time after seven sixes of years i. e. forty years as also Nineve was threatned after forty daies and that such vengeance as never fell on any Nation since the Creation nor the like ever read in any other story One of their own Nation that was present in the action writing it exactly Where amongst other their sufferings he relates Joseph de Bello Judaic lib. 6. cap. 12. when pressed with famine great Multitudes of them fled out of the City to the Romans for some releif Romanos Milites illos verberatos modis omnibus excruciatos contra murum cruci diversis modis suffixisse ira odio ludibrii causa donec propter multitudinem quam
some other speedy death but there fastned to remain till near the going down of the Sun and then taken and buried that the land might not be defiled by his being above ground Gal. 3 13. See Deut. 21.23 as hath bin said already § § 83 Secondly because our sins deserved the utmost torments and even these eternal and our Lord in this case undertaking the satisfaction of Gods Justice for them this death by crucifying was chosen as being of all those ordinarily inflicted on Malefactors the most dolorous and tedious being only a wounding or piercing of exterior parts the hands and feet that approach not the principal or vital members the Head or Heart and so preserving an integrity of sense Nor was any great effusion of the blood caused by such wounds so to exhaust the spirits for the nailes still filled the holes they made but on the other side this piercing being made in the most nervous parts which Nerves are the Organs of sense produced a most acute pain and so the person was left in this posture fastned hand and foot on the rack abandoned to the Fowles or to Famine if a fever caused by these extream torments did not dispatch him sooner the body usually remaining in such torment for many hours if not daies Our Lord hung so for three hours before he expired in a Miraculous patience resignation and silence all the words he spake scarce taking up three or four minuts of it and when this time was run out the Roman Governour wondred if he was dead so soon and both the other Malefactors were then still alive Therefore the Apostle speaking of this our Lords death puts such an Emphasis upon it That he was obedient to the death even to this death of the Cross By the greatness of his sufferings therefore our Lord would have us learn the true weight and heinousness and desert of our sins the cancelling of which cost him so dear As also such exquisite pains both he and God his Father chose to shew their great love to man and his salvation and if there were no absolute necessity for the Son of Gods satisfaction for us by such exquisite torments the least prick of whose finger would have bin a ransome for a thousand worlds yet surely the more he suffered for us the more he shewed he loved us and the less of his pains were necessary for any satisfaction the more these so greivous demonstrate the greatness of his affection § 84 Thirdly such an horrid and lingring death was chosen by our Lord to remain for ever an example and pattern and consolation to all his followers in their sufferings again for him so often as they call to mind that he endured first far greater for them and that God doth not treat us servants and sinners so severely as he did his innocent and only Son and that we might be ashamed of our tergiversation or impatience of any small sufferings having seen his resignation and alacrity and voluntarily undertaking for us of so much greater § 85 Fourthly setting now aside the extream torments thereof this death seems to be chosen in many other regards For next by it this Evangelical Sacrifice hath a nearer resemblance to all those former made under the Law that were only Types of it Resemblance In our Lords being laid and spread when they fastned him with nails on the wood of the Cross to be consumed on it by degrees so those Sacrifices laid on the wood of the Altar but this on the Cross during much longer before it was consumed the heat of which torture also forced a sitio from our Lord. So saith S. Peter 1 Pet. 2.24 Ipse pecâ—ata nostra pertulit in corpore suo super lignum And S. Paul Eph. 5.2 Tradidit se ipsum pro nobis oblationem hostiam Deo in odorem suavitatis Again in our Lord 's being elevated and lifted up toward Heaven as those also were on an Altar raised up in Salomons Temple ten cubits high 2 Chron. 4. and ascended by steps and the Sacrifice also upon this Altar was elevated or heaved up again and waved before the Lord in the hands of the Priest and the Altar of the oblation of incense was made also of wood Again this death seems the most convenient also for the pouring out of the blood of this Sacrifice even the whole Mass of it gathered to the heart in a great stream at the foot of the Cross as the Priest did to that of the legal Sacrifice at the foot of the Altar as it were all at once by the Soldiers lance instead of the Priests knife but this not till such tedious and lingring torments for several hours first endured whereas the legal was presently dispatched out of its pain and lay a long time indeed to be consumed on the Altar but after it was first deprived of life and sense This death most convenient also for this Lamb of God fulfilling the type of the Paschal Lamb and the prophecies whereby God signified that he would not have a bone of his only Son to be broken nor his body any way mangled or divided any further than four holes made in his hands and feet and a wound in his side whilst meanwhile his stripping and then his long and scorching pains suffered from the fire of Gods wrath against our sins falling all upon him which he endured on the Cross answers to that Lambs being first flayed and then whole and entire stretched out at length and by degrees rosted by fire Thus then this Evangelical Sacrifice in this manner of the offering thereof most resembled the legal § 86 Fifthly this death on the Cross was a death most visible to all and publickly exposed in which could be used no personating fraud or concealment the body nailed up on high naked to be surveyed by the eyes of whatever Spectators for many hours nay examined and discoursed with so that there could be here no pretension of a delusion or cheat And if notwithstanding this so many Hereticks even in the Apostles daies thinking this too great a disparagement to the Son of God have denied the reality thereof what would they have done had our Lord suffered in some other manner less conspicuous § 87 Sixthly a death of those that are violent the most convenient and proper for those pious and charitable words and actions that were to be performed at his death In his making his Will as it were and disposing of his afflicted Mother his great care to the provision of his best beloved Disciple In testifying his free forgiveness of his Enemies Revilers and Torturers by his Praying to his Father also for their pardon In receiving to Mercy at the same time by the vertue of that his death on the Cross the penitent Robber a symbol of his doing the same to all sinners whatever that should at any time repair to him for salvation through those sufferings In manifesting his patience obedience and love
ordained this accident thus significative also of a greater matter viz. That our Lord would not bear his cross alone but that all his Followers for ever were to bear their parts of it § 92 Whilst our Lord passed along in this solemn Procession to his offering up the divine Majesty provided that amidst so many stony-hearted Jews that thirsted after his blood wherewith the Psalmist Psal 21.13.17 describes him compassed about with so many ravenous Dogs and fierce Bulls there should not want those that accompanied such sufferings with their tears and lamented and deplored these pittiless and undeserved cruelties for a testimony against the others as before Joseph and Nicodemus and Pilat's wife and Judas also when too late were Many persons there were of the more devout and compassionate Sex and more secure from the soldiers affronts that followed and lamented him Luk. 23.27 So holy and innocent a person from whom they had heard so many charming Sermons and in whom seen such mighty works Among whom we may imagine were those Galilean Women that in his former life time had waited on and ministred unto him and his beloved Mary and Martha All whose exceeding affection to our Lord doubtless had so conquered their fears as to run thither wherever they could have a sight of him of whom they were likely so soon to be totally deprived § 93 These probably before had stood with the rest of the people in the common Piazza before Pilats Tribunal and there saw and heard all that sad Tragedy that had passed between our Lords own people persecuting and the stranger-Govervour defending him whose miserable usage there still heightned their love and compassion and in them added to all the former endearments of him as it did in the people to their rage and fury Especially amongst these the Blessed Virgin his afflicted Mother who could not be absent from him in life or death where she could have any access and who here most diligently observed all her Son said or did or that was done to him as the Evangelist saith Luk. 2.19 she formerly did those even in his minority and childhood she I say especially may be supposed to be wounded at the heart not only when she stood by the Cross but during all this time with those Sword-points of most pungent Grief which Simeon foretold her of in her and the rest of her Friends hearing their away with this fellow and their crucifiges and their acclamations for Barabbas before the Son of God And the sight of him so used when Pilat cried Ecce Homo and again Ecce Rex Vester that had no operation of pity upon the hard-hearted Jews I may say had too much on them But that we are to believe his Holy Mother as being full of Grace and of the Holy Ghost to have bin indued with a most perfect patience and resignation and silence and her carriage also to have bin an edifying pattern to the rest Thus was our Lord in all those his former sufferings beheld and lamented by his Friends But now after his Condemnation and the Jew's cruelty according to the divine Will satisfied the tide in the people also began to turn and these of our Lords former acquaintance to have many Companions of their Grief and such a mind began to repossess some of them at least as they had had when but two daies before they heard and admired him in the Temple and as they had on Palm-Sunday and those also of the people who all this while retained the same affection toward him his safety now despaired of began more to shew it And thus a great multitude attended our Lord his death and Funeral full of bitter lamentation though amongst these the more or more open in their grief were those of the female Sex On whom our Lord lifting up his all-bloody and disfigured Countenance in great comiseration not of himself suffering nothing but what he pleased but of them being infinitly afflicted for the sins of his own people to whom he came in such love and they received him not but were now casting him the only Son and heir out of his Vineyard and killing him and for the unparallelled judgments of God that he saw now approaching upon them for this fact brake out into that passionate and prophetick speech ye Daughters of Jerusalem weep not for me but for your selves and your children telling them the daies were now at hand if their tears at least of their own particulars prevented them not wherein they should bless the barren that never had any children prepared for such a misery wherein they should wish the Mountains to fall on them and the Hills to cover and bury them deep from the face of the divine vengeance Hos 10.8 Is 2 10 19. Apoc 6.16 descending from above on that people For if the flames of Gods wrath meerly for their sakes and sins brake out now in such a manner upon him a Tree alwaies green and flourishing and fruitful and no way deserving or qualified with any cumbustible matter for them to feed on what would this fire do where their impenitence should make them unworthy of his blood to quench it upon their dry dead fruitless wood serviceable for nothing else and so well prepared for it The consideration of which had but a few daies before drawn tears also from himself when the Evangelist saith he in the midst of his triumph from Mount Olivet beholding the City wept over it saying with sobbs interrupting his speech If that thou hadst known even thou at least in this thy day c. Luk. 19.41 This then our Lord in pity to them said to procure the application of their tears not to his sufferings but rather to the cause of them to their own sins and the sins of their people as doubtless from his powerful words many of them afterwards did apply themselves and found mercy obtaining salvation by his blood within the arms of the Church and so when the time came fled from the face of that fire and escaped in the time of that destruction when the Romans the same Instruments the Jews employed to consume this Green-wood were used afterwards by God to burn the dry For it is observed that those Jews of the christian Profession warned from our Lords prediction by their retiring betimes out of the City and out of Judea were generally preserved § 94 Thus this Anathema for us was conveyed out of the Holy City or that should have bin so as an accursed thing for as the devoted Goat laden with the iniquities of the children of Israel was carried out of the Holy Camp Lev. 16.10 and the bodies of those beasts which were offered for expiation of sins and whose blood was carried by the High Priest before God into the Sanctuary were burnt also without the Camp It is the Apostle's observation Heb. 13.11 12 13 so was it to be here in the prototype whose Blood was afterward carried into the Heavenly
Psalms and elsewhere foretelling this So omnes saith the mourning Psalmist videntes me deriserunt me locuti sunt labiis moverunt caput aperuerunt super me os suum sicut Leo rapiens rugiens subsannaverunt me subsannatione frenduerunt super me dentibus suis dilataverunt super me dixerunt Euge Euge. Psal 68.25 Sustinui qui simul contristaretur non fuit qui consolaretur non inveni Psal 108.2 Locuti sunt adversum me lingua dolosa sermonibus odii circumdederunt me and so Psal 30.14 Audivi vituperationem multorum commorantium in circuitu Et ego factus sum opprobrium illis viderunt me moverunt capita sua Where also their very words Mat. 27.43 He trusted in God Let him deliver him now if he will have him for he said I am the Son of God are set down Psal 21.9 Speravit in Domino eripiat eum salvum faciat eum quoniam vult eum And so Psal 3.3 Multi dicunt animae meae non est salus ipsi in Deo ejus and so in Wisdom chap. 2.16 Gloriatur patrem se habere Deum videamus ergo si sermones illius veri sine Si enim est verus filius Dei suscipiet illum liberabit illum de manibus contrariorum Contumelia tormento interrogemus eum probemus patientiam illius Morte turpissima condemnemus eum erit enim ei respectus apud Deum ex sermonibus suis i. e. if we may believe his words Thus the Holy Ghost foresaw and foretold these their Blasphemies and whilst such ungrateful treatment added to his anguish the fulfilling these prophesies yeilded him great consolation Thus was he exclamed on by all manner of people sustinuit qui simul contristaretur non fuit by the cheif Priests and Scribes and Elders saith the Evangelist who not satiated with their former cruelties it seems came hither also to see him dy by the common people by the Roman Soldiers acting here the second part of that they had done in the Praetorium to this their mock-king by the Passengers on the high way our Lord being crucified near the road that passed to Shiloh and Gibeon Lastly by the very Thief in the midst of his like torments by all these jeering at his pretensions of being Christ and the King of Israel taking Pilats superscription also for a mock at his making himself the Son of God and his constant faith and trust in him and that since he had so near a relation to God they would fain see now if his God would deliver him jeering at his former good works and Miracles and that since he was so bountiful of them toward others they would fain see him now do one upon himself unpin his nails and descend from the Cross at his vain boasting to destroy the Temple and rebuild it in three daies for it seems this for want of worse was spread amongst all the People for his great crime for it was the passengers on the high way that twitted him with it whilst indeed they themselves were now acting that thing he foretold of their destroying the Sacred Temple of his Body that now therefore he should repair his own ruines Ah thou that destroyest the Temple and buildest it in three daies c. jeering at his being Jesus the Saviour of the world that now therefore he should shew it and save himself Such were their scoffings somewhat like Satans former jeers in the Desert whose also these were That since he was Gods Son he should make the Stones there Bread and he should throw himself down from the pinnacle to be held up by Angels and such as those wherewith he usually afflicts the Members of Christ when on their death-bed representing in those their present sufferings their former hope and Faith in God as vain The Thief also hanging by him in the midst of his own like torments could not forbear now despairing of the hopes he had of deliverance by him famous for Miracles but fell also on mocking him and asking him if he were the Christ why he did not save himself and them But the penitent Malefactor on the other hand whose heart God had touched amidst so many blasphemies to Glorify and confess our Lord seeing his silence fell on rebuking his Fellow and asked him if he at least whilst others at liberty said what they pleased had no more fear of God especially being himself in the same sad condemnation and justly for his wicked deeds and so near his End than to fall on railing upon an innocent and just person that had done nothing amiss instead of acknowledging and confessing his own Guilt And this said to his Fellow Theif he with a strong faith beleiving our Lord to be indeed what he was the Christ the Son of God the Saviour of the world the King of Israel began to make his humble Addresses to him and desired that he would remember him when be came into his Kingdom A stupendious faith and divinely inspired now when he saw our Lord upon the very lowest step of his humiliation now when faith perhaps failed his very Apostles Yet there wanted not also some external excitements that might partly raise such a devotion in him to our Blessed Lord as perhaps the great fame of his former Sanctity and Miracles and also many circumstances which he beheld of his passion his divine patience and meekness his compassionate and prophetick speeches to the women of Jerusalem which lamented him his praying for his enemies when they nailed him to his Cross his admirable silence to so many unjust reproaches and particularly to that of his fellow-thief To whom our Lord graciously promised and that with an Amen that he should be remembred and that very day be with him his Lord in the heavenly Paradise appointed for the reception of all blessed Souls till the Resumption of their bodies applying the merits of this his passion to that poor Wretch which first humbly acknowledged his own sins and demerits in saying and we ind edjustly and then confessing our Lord's innocency and personal dignity implored his mercy And thus was the saving of this believing Thief the first fruits as it were of the infinite benefits to mankind of these our Lords sufferings and the early pledg of that eternal mercy which all penitent sinners should receive from him to the worlds end All this while stood first at a greater distance then nearer the Cross as their fears or the Soldiers fierceness or the crowds of people grew less the Holy Virgin the sad Mother of our Lord and the Women our Lords former Attendants that accompanied her among whom was Mary Magdalen and Mary of Cleophas our Blessed Lady's sister-in-law her husband being brother or else she sister to Joseph which Mary was the Mother also of James the less and Joses and Simon and Judas that were called our Lord's Brethren i. e. near Kinsmen by the relation they had to Joseph For if
Elias was yet alive in his body and was to return among them to rectify all things before the coming of the Messias the darkning of the Sun also filled them full of wonder and expectation of some other strange things their hearts also now being somewhat mollified and beginning to entertain another opinion of our Lord than not long before § 103 After this our Lord entring into his last Agony said I thirst as if it were to accomplish the drinking up the last dregs and portion that remained of the cup of Gods wrath against sinners remembring the words that follow in the same prophetick Psalm vers 16. Aruit tanquam testa virtus mea lingua mea adhaesit faucibus meis in pulverem mortis c. and Psalm 68.22 potaverunt me aceto And there being a vessel of vinegar or small sour Wine with which mingled with water the Soldiers and common people used to quench their thirst one of the By-standers running and drenching a sponge in it put this upon the top of a long reed and so applied it to our Lords mouth the darkness now diminishing to refresh him and prolong his life a little in expectation of what perhaps Elias would do for him whether he would come at last and take his Fellow-prophet down from the Cross After our Lord had received the Vinegar which was as it were the last dregs of the bitter cup prepared for him by his heavenly Father to drink he said those precious words so full of consolation to poor sinners consummatum est that all was finished a Passiones consummavi now as he said an opus consummavi before he entred on his passion Jo. 17. All the prophecies being now fulfilled the Sacrifice offered and the Ransome of mankind from Gods wrath and the Prince of Darkness and from eternal Death fully paid And so with another loud and strong voice like the former recommending his now departing Spirit into the hands of his celestial Father in the words again of the Psalmist changing Domine there into Pater and exhibiting this as the last act of his dutiful submission to all his Will he pronounced those last words of his on the Cross In manus tuas Pater commendo spiritum meum Psal 30 And so meekly bowing down his head which perhaps hitherto was held erected towards heaven in prayer see Heb. 5.7 gave up the Ghost not when the torments of death forced it away but when he pleased seeing all now fulfilled voluntarily to regive it Shewing in his strong out-cries his miraculous power and strength to have kept it longer in being about the ninth hour the time of offering up the Evening Sacrifice and in the end of the sixth day of the week as entring into his Sabboath of rest The two Malefactors that suffered with him being both yet alive not that our Lord any way abbreviated for himself the torments of this cruel death but that the barbarous usage of him all that day and the night precedent without any sustenance refreshment or repose and the loss of so much blood under his coronation and scourging had so debilitated and exhausted him which was also seen in his fainting under the Cross that these his last torments on the Cross must needs have a speedier period unless he should have continued his life by miracle § 104 All the passions of our Lord thus at last come to an End and his bloody Sacrifice for our redemption finished the Sun which seemed this while to have sympathized with his sufferings began to recover its strength and now the infernal powers of darkness their hour expired to quake and tremble and with them the Earth also to shake in such a manner that the Rocks were rent asunder with it and particularly that of Mount Calvary where our Lord suffered cleft asunder some two or three foot from the hole wherein our Lords Cross was fastned from one side of the Hill to the other to be seen at this day gaping about an hand breath and the depth of it not to be sounded Yet the infinit mercy and long-suffering of God who to shew his displeasure rent the rocks forbare to take present vengeance on the Murderers of our Lord giving them longer time to repent as some of them also did The veil of the Temple also remote from this place and standing at the other side of the City was rent in two saith the Evangelist from the top to the bottom Which veil divided the Sanctum Sanctorum where was the Ark the symbol of Gods presence from the outer Temple and into which the High Priest entred only once every year carrying in thither the blood of the Sacrifice to sprinkle it before the Ark on the solemn day of Expiation The renting of which Veil at this time was very significative of the effects of our Lords passion 1. To shew now an end and consummation and so Abolishment of all the former Typical Ceremonies of the Mosaical Law this new High Priest succeeding and abrogating now the former Aaronical Priesthood who having offered the only pleasing Sacrifice to God on the Altar of the Cross was to enter with the blood of it into the celestial Sanctum Sanctorum and there with it sprinkled before God's Throne to make an atonement for the sins of the whole world Who saith the Apostle much prosecuting this matter in his Epistle to the Hebrews took away the first covenant that he might establish another following and dedicated to us a new and living way of access to the throne of Grace and entrance into the Holy of Holies through the veil of his Deity that is his Flesh which veil also was rent on the Cross the members of the body rent first and at last his soul also rent from the Body And chap. 9.11 c. Who saith he an High Priest of good things to come by the Holy Ghost offered himself unspotted to God and so by or through a more ample and more perfect Tabernacle not made with hands i. e. the Heavens vers 24. nor by or with the blood of Goats or Calves but by his own blood entred into the Holies eternal redemption being thus found and effected 2. Again to shew that the Partition was now taken away between Jew and Gentile and his service no longer confined to his Temple at Jerusalem but that it was to be every where equally accepted of him and his Church to be spread over the whole world and a general and free access admitted for all people to God the Father and to the Divinity through this veil of our Lords humanity Neither Jew nor Greek saith the Apostle Gal. 3.28 neither bond nor free c. now But all one in Christ Wherefore our Lord foretold to the Samaritan woman Jo. 4. That the time was coming when they should neither in that Mount of Samaria the Temple of Garizim nor yet at Jerusalem worship the Father but the true worshippers should worship him every where not with
with our persons Heb. 10.19 § 109 Together with this stream of blood gushed out also another very Miraculous stream of water distinct from it for otherwise by reason of the strong tincture of blood this water could not have bin discerned if mingled with it A Type of which was Moses his smiting the rock and the water gushing out whereof the Apostle also speaking saith the rock was Christ 1 Cor. 10.4 And these two the water and blood lively represented the two Sacraments left by our Lord to the Church for the cleansing of sin and commemoration of his death the Sacrament of Baptism and of the Eucharist And thus as out of Adams side when lying a sleep was formed his Wife Eve so by the water and blood issuing out of Christs lying in the sleep of his death was formed in these two Sacraments his Spouse the Church regenerated in the one by Christs Spirit and nourished in the other with his grace redeemed by the shedding of blood and cleansed by the water § 110 St. John a spectator all this while and diligent observer of all that passed takes great notice of this with these words concerning it And he that saw it bare record and knoweth that he saith true that we might believe By which he saith the Prophecies were fulfilled that the Executioners should pierce his Sacred body but not break a bone and saith that this water and blood in the two Sacraments and the plentiful effusion that was not long after accomplish'd at Pentecost of the Holy Ghost and which also continues to the end of the world begetting and nourishing children to God joined with them are the three Witnesses that here on Earth give testimony continually of this redemption which the same Evangelist that saw this prosecutes also thus in one of his Epistles 1 Jo. 5.6 8. This is he that came by water and blood Jesus Christ not in watâ—r only but in water and blood and in these it is the Spirit that testifyeth that Christ is the Truth For there be three that give testimony in Earth the Spirit Water and Blood Thus S. John Meanwhile abstracting from this contemplation we may imagine what a ruful Spectacle this was to our Blessed Lady and the women with her in beholding such barbarous cruelty used to her Son even after his death and his most precious blood so spilt on the ground § 111 Whilst these things passed Joseph of Arimathea a noble Senator and one of the great Council of the Sanedrim a good man and a just saith S. Luke chap. 23.50 of him one who had not consented to their Counsel and doings but expected the Kingdom of God formerly a Disciple also of our Lord but secretly as also was another great man Nicodemus for fear of the Jews their estates and their Esteem lest either should be lost making them more timorous this Nobleman residing constantly in Jerusalem and rich had in a garden of his close by the place of our Lord's execution newly caused to be hewed out of the soft rock of the hill a Monument or Sepulcher for himself but ordained by the divine predesignment for the interring of our Lord's body near hand so that all things might the better serve for the evidence of his ensuing Resurrection He therefore though so timorous before and who had now also a special reason of not touching or coming near a dead corps because of eating the Paschal Lamb at even prohibited to any unclean as those were to be for seven daies that touched a dead body Numb 19.14 yet probably much animated both by our Lords patient and innocent sufferings and besides his former Doctrine and Miracles the many signs he saw now from Heaven and Earth of the transcendent dignity of his person and that he was what he believed him to be having heard also of the order of the persons executed their being presently taken down or perhaps being one of them also that procured it boldly saith the Text went in to Pilat to beg our Lord's Body of him though well foreseeing he must incur a great hatred from the cheif of the Jews his acquaintance herein Pilat after he had called the Centurion and certainly informed himself of his being already dead and no design herein of saving his life freely gratified him with it and commanded it should be delivered him not prohibiting him a decent Burial whom he had alwaies esteemed an innocent person That Joseph might not undergo this sad office alone without a companion and for the greater honour of our Lords funeral the time of whose humiliation was now expired with his death Nicodemus another great person one that had formerly by night conversed with our Lord and also in the Council spoken in his defence John 7.51 and probably more familiarly acquainted with Joseph by reason of their condiscipleship joined with him in this service mutually encouraging one another against the Priests and Elders of the Jews who must needs be much displeased with this fact as upbraiding them with the Murther if not of the Messias or a Prophet yet of a just person Joseph therefore suddenly prepared fine linnen for a Syndon and Nicodemus a great quantity of Spices about an hundred pound weight saith the Text and so coming to Calvary by the Governours authority took down the naked body from the Cross and removing it into Joseph's Garden close by probably there performed to it all the usual Ceremonies before burial washing his stripes and wounds and cleaning it from all those indignities the malitious Jews and Soldiers had done to it anointing it with sweet Oyles and wrapping it in the linnen filled with the spices and sweet odours and binding a Napkin about his head used for hindring the falling of the Jaws all to make good that in the Prophet Esay 11.10 Et erit Sepulchrum ejus gloriosum In which office we may imagine these great persons were assisted as with their Servants so with the help of the blessed Mother of our Lord and S. John more punctually relating this story than the rest who we may not think left our Lord after expired but waited still in the same place to observe how God would dispose of his Sacred Body and no doubt were much comforted in seeing that authority committed into the hands of those honourable persons our Lords Devotes and formerly known to them as such § 112 The Body thus decently and sumptuously accommodated was presently carried by this small train of Mourners and laid in the new hewn Sepulcher near at hand a place as convenient for the future events of our Lords Resurrection so a Monument durable and not subject to ruin as other the noblest Sepulchers ordinarily are For what more permanent than a Cave made in a Rock but such as also the place wherein he first lay when he came into the world the Manger that might continue to all posterity and such as remains to this day and is continually visited by a great confluence of devout
often so heavily accused our good Lord. But all this their diligence by the Divine providence was turned quite contrary to their intents and rendred our Lords Resurrection much more clear and evident whilst this very Guard were the first witnesses of it and that to the High Priests themselves and quite took away the pretence which else they might not only have reported but verily believed of his Disciples carrying away his body Which witness of the Watch doubtless confirmed the faith of many who would not give so easy credit to the Disciples Testimony of it and was a means of converting some of the High Priests also And their testifying likewise our Lords prediction of it before Pilat still added more to the truth and reputation of this Event Of all which Daniels being cast into the den of Lyons and the entrance into it being sealed by his Enemies that no fraud might be used in his deliverance out of it seems to have bin a prerepresentation and type § 114 The Sabbath the day of rest thus passed over the time was come that the grave the belly of the Whale that had swallowed him could detain our Lords body no longer nor the sealed Sepulcher or Guards hinder his Resurrection according to his many predictions early in the morning of the third day that is after the six daies wherein the world was created and the seventh wherein was to be its rest the eight day or the first day of the new Creation of all things the day wherein after a week of daies compleated all things shall be perfected in the general Resurrection that shall be A day advanced ever since this act into the solemn Festival of Christians in an eternal memory of the joy of this day Early on this day our Lord resumed and clothed with immortality that most Sacred body of his that had before so highly merited it by passing through so many cruel torments Here also great Multitudes of Angels attended on this our Lord in their white and shining Robes as may be gathered by their frequent apparitions within and without the Sepulcher and the women's discription of them And since a multitude of the heavenly Host appeared praising God at our Lords Nativity and the beginning of his Humiliation we cannot imagine less solemnities at the beginning of his Exaltation and triumph whom also we had found before waiting on him at his former conquest over Satan with prayer and fasting in the Desert And if they shew their Joy at the conversion of a sinner how much more now did they at the Redemption of the world And by these or by our Lord at his rising and for a clear argument also of it the linnen clothes wherein our Lord lay the only prey which a Robber would have looked after were decently folded up and the Napkin about his head as if taken off after them laid in a diverse place from the rest At the same time as before at our Lords death happened a terrible Earthquake And an Angel of great Majesty his countenance like lightning saith the Evangelist and his raiment white as Snow was seen by the astonished Guards to descend and roll away the stone so to expose the open Sepulcher to every ones view after our Lords glorious Body had already passed through it when yet shut up and sealed The All-glorious Angel when he had done this sitting down upon the stone that he had rolled away as if he would now be the sole Guarder of that place So terrible was this sight as also the Earthquake that the Soldiers though they fell not into a sleep as they afterward reported yet fell into a swoon and became for a while saith the Evangelist as dead men Mat. 28.4 After some time recovering a little strength and seeing the Sepulcher thrown open the body gone and only the linnen clothes and spices wrapt up and left behind which though it had bin much for their interest or excuse in raising a report of its being stolen away as well as profit to have taken and their necessity but two daies before had shared his former garments yet they durst not touch but from the Angel's presence speedily fled away and in a great fright some of them came to the chief Priests and related all that had hapned our Lords Body gone the Sepulcher empty the linnens and spices left behind touch them he that durst the terrible apparition of the Angel with an Earthquake breaking their seal and rolling away the stone and there staying and sitting upon it § 115 The chief Priests not a little concern'd in this news of our Lords being revived to which also his Predictions now added some credit who had their hands already embrewed in his blood now repent their late diligence to prevent it whereby the very Soldiers could witness it against them and presently assembled all the Ancients of the Jews before whom on this occasion the Guards relate the like things the Divine Providence thus effecting a great divulging of it and that by such Witnesses as they could not but believe The result of this consultation was that a large summ of mony probably taken out of the same Church-Treasury as also Judas his was should be given to them to report that in the night whilst they were asleep our Lords Disciples came and stole away his Body And because the negligence of these Guards confessing themselves to sleep when they should have watched if coming to the Governours ears was highly punishable the chief Priests engaged also that in any such accident they would satisfy the Governour and secure them considering well if they could not smother and hide the truth in this matter the publick odium and loss of reputation which they should incur both with the People and the Governour in their prosecuting so vehemently against the inclinations of both these the death to say no more of so just and innocent a person Thus one sin to justify it self where no repentance engageth us on another and still makes the sinners condition more desperate Thus were the wily taken in their own craftiness and by their setting the Watch those truths are now declared both to the people and themselves not by the Followers of our Lord but their own Officers and Servants which otherwise they might with some shew of a good conscience have disbeleived and endeavoured to suppress but now acted purely against it § 116 This of the Soldiers flying from the Sepulcher and testifying in the City our Lords Resurrection but besides these were also some other extraordinary witnesses thereof For in the great Earthquake and at the same time as our Lord's were other Sepulchers and graves about the city opened and out of them also by vertue and in honour of our Lords Rising came forth the revived Bodies of many other formerly deceased Saints That as his triumphant Soul entring into the innermost bowels of the Earth brought a multitude of other overjoyed Souls attendants upon it from thence
that the Glory quite took away his fight Resembling spirits also in passing how soon and whither they please without any gravity or retardment or impediment of solid bodyes interposed we may imagine according to the swiftness of a Sun-beam or of our thoughts with which we render our selves in our imagination present in places most remote and acting there what we please Mary as commanded hasted to the main Body of the Disciples that remained together and told them this joyful news as they mourned and wept saith S. Mark chap. 16.10 11. But they saith he aggravating their great incredulity and disconsolation when they had heard that he was alive and had bin seen of her yet believed not and so she hasted again toward the Sepulcher to meet with our Lord again or at least the women her companions § 121 Meanwhile the other Galilean women also were arrived therewith great store of spices prepared much sollicitous by the way how they should remove the stone from the Sepulcher such men as were our Lords Friends not daring to appear or herein to assist them and seeing the great Stone that troubled them so much rolled away presently went into it where they saw the body gone and an Angel in the form of a yong man clothed with a long shining robe sitting as Mary's Angel did on the right side of the Sepulcher where our Lord had lain at which sight being much affrighted he bid them take courage he knew whom they sought our Lord that was crucified but that he was not there they saw the place empty but was risen again as he had often told them which now they well remembred when he was with them in Galilee that they should presently carry this joyful news to the Disciples and to Peter particularly named as the chiefest of them and the most respected by our Lord and perhaps as was said before he and John not lodging with the rest telling them that after such a time they should depart into their own Countrey Galilee where was the greatest frequency of his Disciples and Followers and most liberty for their meeting together from the disturbance of the Jews and there in such a Mountain apart and at such time assembled they should all together see him and enjoy the consolation of his presence The holy women filled with great fear and joy to whom also by this Mary Magdalen had joined her self and related her happy adventures also hasted with this second message to the disconsolate Disciples who dared not to stir abroad or see themselves how things were And upon the way as they were going our Lord suddainly appeared to them also saying All hail to them too Before whom they presently fell down and took hold of his feet and adored him A thing which to Mary when all alone he would not permit but here indulged perhaps that this might the more confirm to them as also to the Disciples to whom they carried the news the reality of his person And so them also he presently dismissed to go and tell his Brethren as he stiled them that he was risen and in Galilee they should all have a full view of him and vanished again out of their sight § 122 Come to the Disciples their message was also entertained with the same obstinate incredulity as Mary Magdalen's and perhaps also St. Peter and St. John's Relations For St. John saith of himself that when he came to the Sepulcher and saw how things were there he believed But the rest of the Disciples would credit nothing as sorrow is loth to be deceived lest such deceit discovered should redouble it and this perhaps because the reports brought them were only of suddain apparitions and these presently vanishing again though they touched him not able to detain him which they might take either for the delusion of some spirits for such things they could not imagine of a solid body or else strong imaginations of the fancy advanced by our Lords former predictions and by a longing expectation especially this thing hapning only to the women and first to her that was most transported with love and also they presuming that our Lord if truly risen would have honoured his holy Mother of whose visit to her or Peter they as yet knew nothing or them sooner with his presence than these others or rather would have returned in a more publick manner manifesting himself to all the world as now being Death-free and so above all the effects of his Enemies malice and would have entred upon the administration of his kingdom for such a thing ran in their mind and such thing they were harping upon Act. 1.6 Whilst on the other side our Lord this while afforded his presence to others and withheld it from them to try and give occasion to the greater operation of their faith a thing in us ever most highly prized and valued by him as who had bin more particularly instructed by him concerning this reviving than others and should have needed less conviction for the perswasion of it and yet in this outdone by the High Priests who much suspected it and therefore at St. Peter and Johns repairing to the Sepulcher no Angels appeared nor was the message there delivered by an Angel to the Disciples but women But this was done also to shew them their great weakness and hardness of heart which also in his next apparition in the Evening he objected to them and had a good effect for preserving in them the greater humility without which no person can be gracious to him the courage of these women meanwhile well deserving those manifestations of our Lord of which their fears were unworthy But indeed the Divine providence also seems thus to have disposed things that their Testimony who were to publish to all the world the Gospel of our Lords Resurrection might be rendred the more credible from the great averseness and difficulty themselves had at first to admit or believe it as also S. Thomas his standing out and trying further experiments after all the rest convinced served for the same ends This also much more illustrated the wonderful operations of the descent of the Holy Ghost upon them that was shortly after obtained of his Father by our Lords Ascention shewing all their spiritual strength and courage to have bin from its efficacy Who though now full of fears and incredulity they hid themselves and despaired as it were of the Divine Omnipotency and Goodness then proclaimed to all the world the Magnaliae Dei and feared neither Prisons nor death for the Testimony of Jesus Quales Doctores Sanctae Ecclesiae ante adventum bujus Spiritus fuerint scimus post adventum illius cujus fortitudinis facti sunt conspicimus saith S. Gregory § 123 The same day also before any other of the Apostles our Lord appeared to S. Peter at some time when alone Luk. 24 34. 1 Cor. 15 5. An Apparition mentioned by St. Paul and St. Luke some think it might
be at his return from the Sepulcher whilst John as swifter on foot was then also gone before him to tell the Disciples the strange and joyful news For he doubtless together with John had much argued the case as knowing the Soldiers report of the Disciples a fable and that Enemies in spoiling the Tomb would in the chief place have taken the linnen and spices and friends not have stript the Body of them and from this also had called to mind the predictions of our Lord and of the Scriptures concerning his rising again intimated by St. John chap. 20.9 and so returned full of joy faith and hopes to see and reenjoy him But this appearance to Peter seems to have bin later being not known to the rest whom this Apostle would immediatly have acquainted with it when the women brought the same news nor yet when Cleophas and his companion took their journey to Emaus who knew nothing of it To this Apostle our Lord first appeared both as being the chief of them by whom he would have the rest confirmed in this faith before he further manifested himself to them and also as being one that more exceedingly loved him see John 21.15 and so more passionatly lamented the absence and loss of him as he also appeared to Mary Magdalen before the other women And also to him as one more dejected and disconsolate for so late and cowardly a denial of him at which also he might think our Lord having taken some great Displeasure withheld that gracious sight and fruition of him from him which he vouchsafed to the women for which denial so soon as our Lord was pleased to comfort his grief with this most beatifying sight we may imagine he straight fell down at his feet and with many tears begg'd pardon And so after our Lords suddain departure who now glorified entertained no long conversation with Mortals he hasted to the rest of the Society to confirm his Brethren herein as one of the greatest Authority with them and the first man that our Lord made choice of to preach the Resurrection to them But several of them still to force as it were our Lord to a more open and publick discovery of himself and not to entertain a joy hastily which defeated again would so much more deject them remained incredulous both after the testimony of Mary and of the women and of Peter see Mark 16.13 nor at first did they believe when he himself appeared to them For the apparition of spirits ran still in their mind see Luk. 24.37 and not seeing as too much of seeming human reason usually darkens-faith why our Lord if risen and having conquered Death should thus appear and disappear a sign the Apparition had no reality in it and should not come along with Peter to them and shew himself either to his friends or also to all the rest of the Jews to consolate the one and confound the other else who would credit a report of him risen that was not forth-coming or to be seen § 124 The same day two of the company in which were several other Disciples and Followers of our Lord besides the eleven Apostles consulting concerning the present affairs expecting no better news wept in the afternoon about some business into the Country to a Village called Emaus lying Westward some seven or eight miles from Jerusalem and not in the road towards Galilee One of these was Cleophas who was thought to be Brother to Joseph and so our Lords Uncle and his wife to be Mary of Cleophas Jo. 19.25 who is also called there sister to the blessed Mother of our Lord and who was one of the women that stood with the Blessed Virgin by the Cross and that this morning had visited the Sepulcher and brought the good news from thence who was also the Mother of James Jude Joses and Simon or Simeon All which were called our Lords Brethren and who probably all lived in the same family at least after the death of Joseph the Blessed Virgins Husband and lived at Capernaum after our Lords residence there see John chap. 2.22 Luk. 8.19 20. Mat. 12.46 of which sons of Cleophas and this Mary two James and Jude were chosen Apostles James in relation to the other Apostle James the Son of Zebedee being called James the less Mark 15.40 and Jude in the recital of the Apostles names Luk. 6.16 Jude 1. called his Brother so that those texts Mark 3.21 and John 7.3 5. are to be understood of his kindred or friends more remote or with exception at least to these only James there being called the son of Alpheus Alpheus is imagined to denote the same person with Cleophas or if this be not admitted we must stile this Mary not wife but Daughter of Cleophas and Alpheus to be Josephs Brother and her husband This Cleophas or Alpheus then we see had a near Relation to our Lord two of his sons being Apostles James and Jude and two of them afterwards Bishops of Jerusalem James first and after his Martyrdom his Brother Simeon § 125 He and his companion discoursing by the way of the things of which their hearts were full the merits of our Lord the Injustice and cruelty of the Jews and the defeatment of all their hopes by his death our Lord in the disguise of a Traveller overtook them and seeing them much dejected chearfully asked them what they were talking of that rendred them so disconsolate and sad upon which familiarity Cleophas thinking he could be no stranger to what had hapned nor to our Lords well known merits fell on deploring to him his cruel sufferings and all their hopes cut off by his death who had thought he a Prophet so mighty in word and deed should have bin the person that would have redeemed Israel Moreover that this was the third day after his sufferings on which formerly had bin some speech of his rising again that some women of theirs also going early to his Sepulcher there found not his Body and also said they had seen a Vision of Angels that told them he was alive and that some of their men also repairing thither found what they said true concerning the empty Sepulcher but no tidings or appearance to them of our Lord at all Whereupon our compassionate Lord representing himself also as a Disciple and great Admirer of Jesus freely and with a certain authority shewed them in running through the Books of Moses and the Prophets that those sufferings of the Messias and of his Death things which so startled them were necessary before his entring into his Glory and were every where presignified and foretold in the Scriptures Here he shewed them how all the legal Sacrifices were only Types of the killing and Oblation of the Messias and expiation of sin by his blood Here he remembred them of the representation of this only Son of God his being offered up by his Father by Abraham's offering of his only ion Isaac of the roasting of
the Paschal Lamb his Type without a bone of him being broken Of Moses his smiting of the rock and so water gushing out of it of his nailing a brazen Serpent on a Pole that all who looked with faith upon it might be healed as our Lord also came in similitudine peccati of Aarons dry and withered Rod afterwards rebudding and flourishing of Jonah lying three daies in the Whales belly and afterwards cast up now also he expounded to them Daniels weeks remembred them of Hosea's chap. 6.3 vivificavit nos post duas dies in die tertia suscitabit nos and of Davids Psal 15.10 Non dabis Sanctum tuum videre corruptionem And de torrente in via bibet propterea exaltabit caput Of Zachary's chap. 13.6 7. Quae sunt plagae istae in medio manuum tuarum and his Percutiam Pastorem dispergentur oves These and all the forementioned descriptions of his passion especially in the Prophet Esay chap. 5.3 and in the Ps 21. and 68. he set before them and many more in these Books than man's weak apprehensions hath bin able to discover the whole History and Prophecies of the Old Testament principally prefiguring and representing the great Mystery of the salvation of mankind that was in the latter daies to be wrought by the Son of God These things our Lord discoursed continuing his Speech till they were now arrived at the Village where their business called them whilst their hearts were all on fire in hearing what he said according to that of the Psalmist Ps 18.15 Ignitum eloquium tuum c. Our Lord making as though he would have gone further gave them occasion to shew their hospitality and so importuned by them to stay and eat with them or also to stay all night the day being near an end and they infinitly longing after more of his conversation and discourse he yeilded to their request and so sitting down at Table he took the bread blessed brake and gave it them suddainly appearing to them in his own likeness or also performing this Ceremony in some singular manner of benediction as was formerly his custome well known at least to Cleophas Josephs Brother used to the same table Or because we may imagine our Lords actions done in the most perfect manner in this breaking of bread celebrating with them the memorial of his Passion after his long discourse thereof in the holy Eucharist sometimes expressed by breaking of bread see Acts 20.7 2.46 after he had first sufficiently instructed them in this great Mistery wherein he now when personally departing yet would continue a miraculous presence of himself to his Church to the end of the world After which given them and their hospitality thus amply rewarded upon eating it their eyes also were no longer held but that they clearly discerned with great reverence his Sacred Majesty now in his own form and likeness and knew him and after this he suddainly departed out of their sight § 126 The two Disciples ravished with what they had seen and heard yet by our Lords suddain withdrawing himself their joy not unmixed with some sadness presently returned back that Evening to Jerusalem and told the company there assembled all that had hapned their being two together rendring their testimony more credible where they found the Disciples also relating our Lords appearance to Peter They reported also to them his Sermon and the types in the law and the Prophets presignifying such his sufferings before his entrance into his Kingdom notwithstanding which though many of them were much perswaded yet some others saith St. Mark chap. 16.13 still remained incredulous probably arguing from our Lord 's presently vanishing both from the women and from St. Peter and last from these two at Emaus that it was some Spirit only appearing in his likeness For the same conceit they had also by and by when our Lord appeared to themselves Luk. 24.37 § 127 After so many messages and ocular Witnesses of his Resurrection sent to them for the trial of their faith and all by some of them still discredited now late at night as they were after Supper sitting and debating these things and some it seems still contradicting the doors being fast shut for fear of the Jews who also had spread a report of them that they had stoln away our Lords Body our Lord himself suddainly appeared in the midst of them at which they were at first much affrighted thinking him some night-walking-Spirit knowing the doors to be firmly bolted and perceiving him descending rather then entring in among them But our Gracious Lord soon allayed this astonishment saluting them with a Pax vobis the usual and Antient salutation of the Jews but this pax of his extraordinary and not sicut Mundus Jo. 14.27 working in the Soul the effect whilst he spake with his mouth the words Then mildly reprehended them that they had remained so obstinatly incredulous to the Eye-witnesses that came to them in a matter also so often foretold them nor yet believed their own eyes at present but took him for a Spirit then proceeded to discover and shew them the scars of the wounds he had received in his hands feet and side those noble scars which his glorified Body in heaven still retains eternal Witnesses of his love to mankind and with which he will appear at his second coming for the greater confusion of his Enemies when saith S. John Apo. 1.7 they shall look on him whom they have pierced and whose tender of mercy after it they also rejected He bad them also to feel and handle his true flesh and bones different from Spirits therefore saith the Apostle not only Quod audivimus quod vidimus but manus nostrae contrectaverunt de verbo vitae Then what only remained for their satisfaction whilst the excess of their Joy and wonder still suspended their full assent and belief he called for meat and eat also before them of that poor fare which they were provided of though in this great Feast and to which our Lord also had bin most accustom'd a piece of a broild fish and of an hony-comb the one plentiful in the woods of this countrey and the other a common food among Fishermen perhaps the relicks of their Supper but now ended Of which after he had eaten he gave to them the remainder saith the vulgar in S. Luke chap. 24.43 Et cum manducasset coram eis sumens reliquias dedit eis To partake of what he Sanctified and that they might say they had eat and drunk with him as also those at Emaus See Act. 1.4 After he had thus eaten before them and by all these waies satisfied them excepting only Thomas absent of the truth and reality of that the Testimony of which they were to spread abroad through all the world and for which afterwards to lay down their lives he made much what to them the same Sermon or Discourse as to the two Disciples that went to Emaus instructing them in
what they were afterwards to instruct the Jews and all other Nations expounding to them the Law and the Prophets shewing them the many predictions concerning the Messias his Sufferings Resurrection and so entrance into his Glory a many of which they mentioned afterward in their Sermons in the Acts opening their understandings to understand the Scriptures § 128 Afterward more particularly addressing himself to his Apostles he told them in this and several other apparitions made to them before his Ascension that he was very shortly to go into Heaven to his Father and leave them here behind him That all power both in Heaven and Earth was given to him that therefore by this his Authority he also sent them to preach the Gospel to all Nations and witness to them the things they had seen and heard from him but beginning their predication first at Jerusalem and to Gods former people the Jews That they should preach to them repentance and remission of sin thro his name and also the observation of all those things which he had commanded them And that they should also Baptize them In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost instructing them that who so believed in him and were baptized which was the Sacrament instituted for washing away their sins for conferring on them the Spirit of regeneration and for initiating them into his Church should be saved and the unbelieving damned And that great signs also should follow them that believed and were of the Christian profession which signs should bear witness to the truth of their faith and Religion That in his name they should speak strange languages cure the sick cast out Devils and have a special command over all the powers of the Enemy as they are called Luk. 10.19 in taking up or treading on Serpents or in hapning to drink any poison not to receive any hurt from them Not that all Believers should do such Miracles but that these should still remain in the Church or Congregation of true Believers Testimonies and Evidences of Gods special favours to and presence with them § 129 At last he proceeded to their solemn Ordination wherein after he had pronounced a second Pax vobis and a sicut misit me Pater ego mitto vos He breathed upon them with his most Sacred mouth and said these words used ever since by them and their Successors in the ordination of others Receive ye the Holy Ghost whose sins ye shall forgive i. e. by Baptism or for those committed afterwards by Absolution upon confession and repentance or penance they are forgiven them and whose sins ye shall retain i. e. by not baptizing or absolving or further binding with Church-censures the impenitent and obstinat they are retained And so solemnly promised to be with them and their Successors with his power and protection till the end of the world and the time of his return to judg it § 130 This said he disappeared also to them as he had done several times already to the other which caused in them now less wonder at the former leaving their hearts replenished with great consolation After this done on the second day of the Feast and the first of his Resurrection he absented himself from them till the Eighth when that solemn Festivals Octave was fully ended and the people were upon their return to their own countreyes and habitations Where for this time our Lords glorious Person was together with those other Saints whose Bodyes were raised with him till his Ascension would be too much curiosity to inquire It seems he was pleased to observe the fixed laws of the Divine wisdom for Souls or Persons already translated to the next life viz. to have no more familiar or long-during converse with those of this for so neither did Elias and Moses make any long stay with our Lord in the Holy Mount. As for other good ends so perhaps for this the greater merit of our faith here concerning the life and affairs of the world to come § 131 S. Thomas one of the eleven was absent when our Lord thus appeared where some imagine from the fear he formerly bewrayed John 11.5 that he might not be as yet returned to the Society since their dispersion on Thursday night at our Lords apprehension and so might not have heard as the rest of our Lord 's former appearings at all to the women and to Peter c He whether the same night or afterwards being come to them and informed of their having seen our Lord yet for a greater manifestation still of our Lords Resurrection and for begetting in this Apostle more humility continued in the same incredulity as to their relations though so many as they had done to the other likely perswaded by the Circumstances of his appearing in the night coming through Doors shut and making scarse any stay at all with persons to whom he had formerly shewed so much affection but suddainly vanishing again that it might be some airy spirit subject in his motions to the order of a Superior power And though they related to him also their having seen his scars and touched his body or at least invited to do it yet he fancied that this was not done to purpose but ought to be better examined and that if he had bin there he would have thrust his hand into the Gash in our Lords side and his fingers into the holes made by the nails c Notwithstanding that this person besides his hearing our Lords many predictions to them of his Resurrection was present with the rest at our Lords raising from death after laid upon the Bier the widdows son at Naim and again at his raising of Lazarus out of his Sepulcher when he had lain longer time there than our Lord had done But this too-much suspicious and despondent inclination of his had appeared also several times formerly that we may see what materials our Lords Grace wrought upon and not to be discouraged as in those words of his at our persecuted Lords return into Judea for the raising of Lazarus Jo. 11 16. He then presently resolving that there our Lord and they must lose their lives and in his words again John 14.5 where our Lord telling his Disciples of his departure shortly and that they knew the place and the way whither he went Thomas dejectedly replied that they knew not whither he went and how could they know the way thither To whom our Lord answered that his Journey was a Return to Heaven to his Father whence he came and that He himself believed-in was the way thither Yet after the descent and renovation of the Holy Spirit this Apostle especially was made choice of to be a most eminent Assertor of the same Resurrection and Propagator of the Gospel throughout India and the remotest Nations of the East fulfilling our Lords words Acts 1.8 Et usque ad ultimum terrae and there at last laid down his life for it § 132 Our Lord then
on the eighth day of his Resurrection observing punctually the same day of the week as before thus to recommend the solemnity thereof to all Posterity for which it hath ever since been solemnly honoured also in the Church and called the Lords Day see Apoc. 1. when this great Festival was now concluded and the Disciples were all together again at Even whom perhaps business in the day time had divided purposing now their return into Galilee and Thomas now with them being also a Galilean where we find him afterwards going on fishing with St. Peter and others our Lord I say about the same time of night and the doors shut as before appeared again in the midst of them and after his usual salutation Pax vobis He according to his zeal John 17.12 Quos dedisti mihi custodivi nemo ex eis periit particularly addressed his speech to St. Thomas and when shewing his omniscience he had repeated to him the incredulous words spoken by him in his absence with a most gracious condescendence to his weakness invited him to examine his body freely to put his finger hardily in the holes of the Nails and his hand into the larger wound made in his side and at last become a true Beleiver and joine his Testimony thereof to the world with the rest of his Apostles St. Thomas doubtless upon such an appearance and speech to him much confounded and being already sufficiently perswaded and convinced of his error and fault needed now no further experiment for the confirmation of his Faith had not our Lord pressed him to it After which as it were elevated into another extreme he cried out My Lord my God and acknowledging more than these scars evidenced to him not only the Resurrection of his true body but the Divinity of his Person which effected it equalled that confession of the highest Apostle Mat. 16.16 Upon which our Lord gently reprehending such an obstinat and resolute unbelief as had formerly lodged in him uttered those gracious and comfortable words for all those that by reason of his suddain removal from the Earth could not have St. Thomas his lot to see feel or touch him that he indeed believed because he had seen him but Blessed they who have not seen and yet have believed leaving this Benediction on the greater virtue of their faith for ever who in latter times not having the like Evidence should nevertheless persevere in the like faith and adherence to him In the constitution of which faith a pious affection of the will is indeed a principal ingredient according to Quod volumus facile credimus and that which God most valueth and rewardeth § 133 Thus our good Lord in condescension to our weakness and for laying a foundation of the Christian Faith the freer from all contradiction and dispute was pleased to retain the breaches of his sufferings still in his glorified body and to suffer one of his dear Disciples to fall into such a gross and obstinate incredulity as the searching of these only could cure And these honourable marks received in that infernal and bloody war with the powers of Darkness are still retained by him at this day with these he appeared before the Throne Agnus tanquam occisus saith S. John Apocal. 5.6 and with those he will appear in Majesty at his second coming to Judgment for the greater confounding of those Beholders who inflicted them and of all the wicked when he then represents to them the great things he suffered to have saved them See Zach. 12.10 and 13.6 compared with Apoc. 1.7 Behold he cometh with Clouds saith St. John and every eye shall see him and they that pierced him and they shall bewail themselves upon Him and those his scars he now sitting at Gods right hand perpetually shews to his heavenly Father for mitigating his wrath to sinners and these himself also daily looks upon to mind him how much out salvation cost him and so the more to perfect preserve and take care of so dear a purchase For which gracious ostentation of them they seem also to have bin placed in the most visible parts of his body so that he cannot now stretch forth an hand or move a foot without shewing these holy Relicks of his infinite love to mankind Therefore are they so quickly observed by the Prophet Quae sunt plagae istae in medio manuum tuarum Zach. 13.6 These also remain to be hereafter to all his Saints in the beholding of these plagae quibus plagatus est as he answers in the Prophet in domo eorum qui diligebant eum wherewith he was wounded in the house of his friends or who had reason to be so an eternal incentive of their love and gratitude toward him as also now the meditation of them an excitive of a penitent grief in us for our sins that caused them as the same Prophet foretold chap. 12.10 alluded to by St. John Aspicient in eum quem confixerunt plangent eum planctu quasi super unigenitum dolebunt super eum ut doleri solet in morte primogeniti the only begotten Son of God slain for us Magnus planctus sicut planctus Adadremmon in campo Mageddon i. e. like the mourning for the pious Josiah the great Darling and last good King of Judah shortly after which the Nation of the Jews was delivered up into captivity as it was also after our Saviour slain Yet here we may not imagine that these piercings of our Lords Flesh that now still remain unclosed are any Deformity to that Sacred Body but rather are represented therein with some extraordinary splendor and beauty and become a singular ornament to it § 134 These scars then were thus perused by St. Thomas and after such his confession and Doxology he honoured with the same Commission for publishing this Gospel to the world as the other Apostles had bin that day sevennight After which our Lord appointed a certain day and place in Galilee see Mat. 28.16 when he would yet more publickly shew and manifest his Resurrection from death not only to them now well confirmed therein but also to the rest of his Disciples and Converts most numerous in that Countrey of his most frequent residence and preaching and where also such a concourse of them might be with the least noise or notice of the State And so the Paschal Feast ended the Apostles as also our Lords Mother and the other Galilean women that had 〈◊〉 on him returned with great joy to their ordinary abodes there expecting the time of this happy revisit and publishing to all his Followers especially the glad news of the revivification of our Lord and at what time and place they also might be made eye witnesses thereof § 135 Though the Apostles had already received a Commission from our Lord of publishing the Gospel and our Lords Resurrection and kingdom to the Jew and Gentile of Baptizing them yet were they not to enter upon this
office till they were endued with further Gifts from on high to be procured for them by our Lords Ascension In expectation therefore of these things and of his reappearance to them in Galilee many of them continued together as also our Lords Holy Mother probably in Capernaum the place of our Lords former ordinary abode at S. Peter's or also Zebedee's house and spending their time there as afterwards at Jerusalem Act. 1.14 in Praier and Praises and holy discourse and frequented by many others that had bin former Disciples and Admirers of our Lord to whom privatly they communicated his Resurrection and confirmed them in the faith § 136 After not many daies St. Peter whom the rest much observed and complyed with mentioned one evening to those with him his purpose to go out on fishing for which the calmness and darkness of the night whereby the fish are less frighted with their Nets as the best season used before by them see Luk. 5.5 some think because our Lords apparitions were usually on the first day of the week his Resurrection day that this was the Evening after the Sabbath was ended and when they had bin two or three daies in Galilee This employment St. Peter might undertake for the present but without all thoughts doubtless of any continuance of it not to seem void of business or ashamed of his former Trade as also to make some better provision for their necessary sustenance The Disciples that were present consented also to go with him probably all or most of them also formerly Fishermen The Persons were Zebedees two sons James and John Between the latter of which and St. Peter was a more intimate affection and they seldom parted from one another Thomas Nathanael and two others not named some conjecture these might be St. Andrew Peter's Brother and St. Philip his Fellow-townsman And Nathanael here who is not mentioned by this name but only by St. John being a Galilean a familiar acquaintance of Philips and called at the same time with him and who then made such an early and noble confession of our Lord Jo. 1.49 acknowledging him the Son of God and King of Israel and then also declared by our Lord so sincere and upright a Person and here also joined with them by the name of Disciples here Jo. 21.14 being meant Apostles is supposed to have bin one of the twelve and in the other Evangelist called by his Fathers name Bar-Tholomew as Peter Bar-Jona which Bartholemew in reciting of the Apostles names is also joined and placed next to Philip Mat. 10.3 and Mark 3.18 The Ship and Nets they used probably were those which in their former constant attendance on our Lord were left to the management of their near Relations and friends old Zebedee and his Servants and perhaps St. Peters Wife and his Mother for their better lively-hood by some hired servants still continued the trade Which Ships or Barkes also were on several occasions made use of by our Lord whilst he passed to and fro upon the the Lake to the Regions and Towns adjoining These Persons then being many of the chief of the Apostles seven of them in all which is a number much celebrated in Scripture went out together on fishing and that they might be the better prepared for the next mornings Miracle all that night though labouring hard caught not a fish as it also hapned to Peter before at our Lords first calling him from his trade Luk. 5.5 and he might imagine this a punishment of his return to it now so long deserted when designed for another employment The next morning our Lord standing on the shore but unknown in his former loving and familiar way calling them children asked them if they had any meat as if he would have bought some fish of them to whom they answering they had none he directed them to cast their Net on the right side of the ship and they should find some which they very obsequiously did perhaps suspecting something concerning the Person by his language of calling them children he making choice of this dearest term of love and affection rather than others of subjection and frequently using it See Mark 10.24 children how hard is it and John 13.33 little children yet a while I am with you c which word also the Apostles used to their Disciples and Converts 2 Cor. 6.13 Gal. 4.19 perhaps also they calling to mind the former Miracle our Lord had wrought in this kind after they had laboured so another whole night and caught nothing This was no sooner done but they perceived their Net so ponderous with the fishes it had enclosed that not able to lift it up into the ship they were forced to drag it along toward the shore Upon which St. John said to Peter that certainly it was our Lord either by his quicker sight better discerning him or from this great Miracle perswaded thereof Peter according to his wonted fervour and courage and moved by an extraordinary love he bare to our Lord impatient of the slow motion of the Ship dragging gently the laden Net girding only close to him his Fishers coat without further apparelling himself threw himself into the Sea it being not far to the shore Methinks this action somewhat resembling these two Disciple's behaviour at our Lords Sepulcher where John first discovered and Peter first entred where after his having adored our Lord and the others now arrived he went up again into the Boat to help them to land the Net full of great fishes in number one hundred fifty three yet without the least breach of the Net The former story of the Apostles fishing at their first call to follow Christ and so to become Fishers of men and the Miracle then done by our Lord varying in several Circumstances from this gave occasion to St. Austin in Johan Tract 122. knowing no casualty to be in our Lords Works but all as Parables significative and predesigned with an infinite wisdom more than we can for the present discover to conjecture these two fishings to represent the two states of the Church before and after the Resurrection when all things will be perfected In the first therefore he observes That the Disciples were bidden by our Lord then in the Ship together with them to cast their Nets but not so particularly on the right side of the ship That the fish caught were some great some small not drawn to the land but taken into the ship that by the Multitude of them the Net was broken and by their weight the ship in hazard to be sunk no certain number of them taken no feast or entertainment of the Fishermen after their toil But in this latter Our Lord is standing on and calling to them from the shore the Apostles being seven that is a compleat number are bidden to cast their Net and all the fish are taken on the right side of the ship these a certain number all great ones drawn to land no Net broken or
ship hazarded sinking by them no tempest rising as formerly in St. Peters passing thro the Sea to our Lord All things now made ready before hand here by our Lord for the Apostles Entertainment and they here feasted by him and eating of the fruit of their labours c The first of these therefore seeming more generally to represent in the present Sea of this world the gathering of Nations by the Net of the Preachers of the Gospel into the external profession of the Christian Faith where some also break these Nets and are lost and by their factions also hazard the Church the Ship that carries them c. But the latter seeming to represent at the end of the world when our Lord is on the shore the collection of the Elect the children of the right hand whereof there is a certain number none lost out of the Net all great and considerable the number of which also exprest viz. 153. which number as St. Austin observes is the summ of a computation of all the numbers from 1. to 17 and as S. Gregory the product of 17. multiplied by 9. or 3 times 3. contains in it some mystical signification which whether relating to the several Nations or to the most eminent Saints converted by them or to some other thing remains to be manifested hereafter where it is observed that the number of people of the Nations that were found in Israel in Salomons daies and by him made Labourers in the building of the Temple came to 153. thousand see 2 Chron. 2.17 not reckoning the Fraction Lastly after all follows our Lords entertaining these his Servants with eternal Joyes and Festivals prepared by him for them See such a fishing alluded to by our Lord Mat. 13.47 in his comparing the Kingdom of Heaven to a Net which at last is drawn to shore and the good gathered into Vessels but the bad cast away And see such an Entertainment mentioned Mat. 12.37 The Lord of the Feast ministring to his Guests Mat. 26.29 8.11 Apoc. 19.9 Assoon as landed they all saw clearly it was our Lord but in great reverence and fear perhaps his appearance being also more full of Majesty than formerly durst not ask him any curious questions who he was where he abode from whence he came thither concerning his stay with them his kingdom c. There also they saw a fire already kindled on the shore and fish of our Lords own providing laid thereon and bread all things miraculously prepared for their entertainment without any necessity of their provision or assistance and that our Lord could feast them from his own store and called to them from the shore to supply their wants not his But also he bad them to bring some of the fish they had taken that they might partake of their own labours and he also receive an Entertainment from them so after his usual Benediction he took the bread and fish and divided and distributed these unto them sitting with him in very great reverence and silence And of this taking their repast with him or that on the night after his Resurrection it seems to be that St. Peter speaks to Cornelius and his company Act. 10.41 That they did eat and drink with him after he rose from the dead § 137 After Dinner and our Lord 's thus by a Miracle feeding of them as it was his usual manner to transfer the Discourse to spiritual matters see Jo. 4.10 6.27 7.37 8.34 38. 9.5 he began to speak of their feeding his sheep as also after their former great and miraculous draught of fishes Luk. 5 he discourseth of their catching of men and here he addressed his speech also particularly to Simon Peter as he did after the other miraculous draught Luk. 5.10 Simon fear not from henceforth thou shalt catch men and frequently elsewhere see Luk. 22.31 32. Mat. 26.40 Simon Peter being both the cheif of them and also one who now had shewed an extraordinary love and devotion to him when being as yet hardly discovered by him he threw himself into the Sea not minding his fish for hast to come to him Him then he kindly bespake on this manner Simon Bar-Jona lovest thou me more than these As thou hast often Mark. 14.30 31 Luk. 22.33 and now particularly by this last action of thine made great profession of it To whom the Apostle modestly answered passing by any companion with others That our Lord well knew he loved him If thou dost saith he now I the chief Pastor am quitting this world and leaving them to others feed my Lambs these little ones who as yet are but Neophytes in and newly acquainted with the Christian Faith our Lord shewing herein the bowels of his affection not only to the twelve but also those others formerly instructed by him And Qui redempti sunt pretio magno 1 Cor. 6.20 Now to St. Peter our Lord commits here more particularly the feeding of them because he was ordained by God his Father to be the chief and prime Pastor of them under Christ And therefore elsewhere at the first sight of him no doubt from the divine ordination he gave him the name of Cephas Stone or Foundation Jo. 1.42 though Andrew the first called and some say the Elder Brother And again upon the Catholick Confession he made by God the Fathers revealing it to him Mat. 16 17. of our Lords Divine person he further expounded the reason of this name that upon this Cephas he would build his Church And again at his Passion Satan being permitted by God to tempt our Lords Disciples he made some particular intercession for the not failing of S. Peters Faith in such temptation For though Satan laying his closest siege to this cheif Apostle he failed in his confession of our Lord out of fear which was a great fault yet not in his heart out of any infidelity and his conversion from this fault immediatly followed with bitter weeping And as here he enjoines him the feeding of his sheep so there also he recommends to him the confirmation of this faith in the other his Fellow-shepheards of these sheep Tu conversus confirma fratres And to this special Commission here given to Peter over our Lords Flock S. Paul seems to relate Gal. 2.7 where he saith that the Apostles saw the Gospel of the Circumcision committed to Peter which we see it was in this place our Lord then having no sheep or flock when he said this to Peter save the Circumcision in which respect also our Lord himself is stiled by the Apostle signifying his first employments Mat. 25.24 the Minister of the Circumcision Rom. 15.9 and God also more eminently wrought by St. Peter than by the rest the great signs and wonders in converting of the Circumcision as appears in the Acts as he did by S. Paul more than by any other for the conversion of Gentiles Tho for the Gentiles also the honour of the first conversion of them was given to S. Peter
miraculously fed the Multitudes Mat. 15.29 and which was more convenient for the assembling of his Converts of which see what is said before § 251. P. 1. And such a place our Lord seems to have chosen for the greater Eminency Solitude and Privacy thereof free from Buildings High-waies or Passengers he purposing no general manifestation of himself to the Jews or to the World but only to some chosen Witnesses that some contradiction might add the more virtue to the Christian Faith Here then were assembled with many others the eleven Apostles with the Mother of our Lord and doubtless the other Galilean women who carried the first message both from the Angel and afterwards from our Lord himself to the Apostles of his meeting them in this place To whom our Lord first shewed himself at some distance from them upon which they presently fell down and adored him Mat. 28.17 but some of them saith the Evangelist unless he intimates here the doubt not that was then but had bin formerly viz. not of the Eleven but of the company had some doubt whether it was he i. e. at the first yet which by his nearer approach and discourse with them was presently after removed Our Lord then approaching told them that the time of his Exinanition being now finished all Power the exercise of which was suspended before see Mat. 11.27 Jo. 3.35 was given to him by his Father in Heaven and in Earth and upon this he renewed his charge unto his Apostles that they should go forth in his name and by his authority and proclaim him Lord of all and deliver his Laws and Commandements taught to them not only to the Jews but all other Nations that they should baptize Believers in the name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost declaring to them that such as believed and were baptized should be saved but the unbelieving damned then further promising them That he though corporally departing yet in his Grace and Holy Spirit would remain with and assist them and their Successors to the end of the world that he also gave them Authority over all the Power of the Enemy of mankind and in his name to do all sorts of wonderful works repeating here again what he had formerly said to them in his first Apparition at Jerusalem which see before Sect. 127. P. 11. Lastly commanding them to bid an Adieu to their country and return to Jerusalem in which place they were first to begin their work Where they should also after a few daies re-enjoy his presence and take their last leave of him his so often-foretold Ascension into Heaven to his Celestial Father being now at hand and necessary as for his own Glory so for the further promoting with him the business of their's and the world's salvation § 141 After this publick manifestation of our Lords Resurrection made not only to the Apostles but to the general Body of his former Converts and Believers most dwelling in Galilee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 15.7 afterward our Lord appeared singly to St. James i. e. our Lord's Brother shortly after made Bishop of Jerusalem perhaps out of a singular honour to him or also for negotiating something with him relating to his office whose constant residence was to be at Jerusalem and who was a Person of special Eminency among the Apostles as appears Gal. 1.19 2.9 and Acts 15.13 19. But the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 used by the Apostle perhaps may not signify afterward in that Text as denoting a Posteriority of time to the appearance in Galilee But only besides as it is used by him 1 Cor. 12.28 and the apparition to James be rather in some part of the day of his Resurrection see St. Jerome de viris Illust in Jacobo between whom as being a Domestick in the same family and our Lord passed a more intimate familiarity and from his appearance to James we may also much more presume of his frequent particular apparitions to the Blessed Virgin his Mother though none mentioned § 142 Forty daies was the time predesigned of our Lord's stay upon Earth for the manifestation of his Resurrection and for the preparing of his Apostles for their future employment of propagating the Gospel and advancing the Kingdom of Christ in mens hearts over all the world A number frequently observed in Scripture for the accomplishing of any great work made up of six the number of the daies God spent in creating the world seven times multiplied as the number of 7. is a number of perfection and rest after the finishing such a work answering to the 7th day the Sabbath only in 42. the last two are usually cut off to make it a round number So Gen. 7.4 in the flood the rain descended for forty daies and after the abating of it Noah stayed forty daies and opened the window of the Ark Gen. 8.6 For thrice forty years God had patience with the old world before he destroyed it with the flood Ten times forty years the children of Israel were to sojourn in Egypt Forty two Generations were to pass between the coming of the Messias and the promise made to Abraham thereof of which forty two generations two sevens were to run out before the Kingdom of David and two sevens again in this Kingdom before the captivity and two sevens till the coming of Christ See Mat. 1.17 Acts 7.23 Moses when forty years old visited his Brethren and would have undertaken their protection and ibid. vers 30. after forty years more was sent by God to them for this purpose Again forty daies he stayed in the Mount for receiving the Law and for this time was continued his fast as also that of Elias and of our Lord. During forty daies were the persons deputed to view the land of Canaan Numb 13.25 and during forty years were the children of Israel appointed to do penance and bear their Iniquity for the Evil account given of it and murmuring concerning it Numb 14.33 34. Forty daies were allowed to the Ninevites for a time of Repentance before their City was to be destroyed Forty daies after the womans bearing of a Male child and twice forty daies after a Female were to be accomplished before their coming into or presenting their Son in the Sanctuary In the Judges we find whether rest or troubles given to the land of Israel ordinarily for the space of forty years The Prophet Ezekiel Ezek. 4.5 6. is appointed to do penance by lying on his side for forty daies for so many years of God's patient suffering the iniquities of Judah and for so many years again God forbare the wickedness of the Jewish Nation after their crucifying our Lord and persecuting Christianity until the destruction of Jerusalem And forty two Months i. e seven sixes of Months is the time prescribed for the duration of Antichrist and the last great affliction of Gods Church This to shew that all Gods works are pondered before hand and contrived in
and Susanna that afterward followed our Lord and ministred to his necessities Luk. 8.3 to have also bin his wife § 206 Our Lord after some time leaving Cana came to Capernaum where he made his most ordinary residence Of the situation of which and the great conflux of people thither the frequency of Cities in those parts by reason of the extraordinary fruitfulness of the soil some of that part called Decapolis from the many cities there the convenience of passing any whither upon the Lake and the remoteness from Jerusalem and from the molestation of the Pharisees and chief Priests things well serving our Lords designs Of all these I say see before § § 101 102. Here saith the Evangelist Mark 1.14 and every where as he passed along the Country our Lord began to preach the Gospel of the Kingdom of God telling them that the promised time of the coming of their Messias was now fulfilled and this Kingdom at hand that therefore they should repent and believe his Gospel And it seems Jo. 4.45 that this meaner and ruder people or Galilee received him now at the first with much more honour and attention to his doctrine than the Judeans attracted also therto by his miracles Here his Disciples Peter and the rest returned home and not as yet invited to a closer attendance as also for the better providing for the necessities of their families betook themselves to their former trade off fishing and meanwhile our Lord by his Miracles and healing their sick brought in daily greater flocks of people to hear his Sermons this latter being his chief design for salvation of their souls as the other theirs for releiving their corporal necessities And his fame was suddainly spread all abroad throughout all Syria saith S. Matthew and there followed him great multitudes from the other parts of Galilee he had North and from the East side of Jordan and the Lake and from Judea and Jerusalem more South in fine from all Quarters round about So that it was necessary our Lord should recollect to himself the Disciples he had formerly called and add some more to them that should depart no more from him but give a perpetual attendance on his affairs and assist him in his predications after they themselves had first as his constant Auditors received from him all necessary instructions therein He also had now an intention for some time of leaving Capernaum and making a peragration throughout Galilee as to the places not already visited and after this of crossing the Sea of Galilee and passing to some remoter parts being after this to present himself at Jerusalem in the Paschal feast now not far off In which travels the attendance of his Disciples was necessary to Him Which circuit also he began in the entrance of the week following § 207 As our Lord therefore was walking one day by the side of the Lake and much pressed by the multitude that followed him crowding to hear the gracious words that came from him Simon Peter and his brother and the two sons of Zebedee who were their partners and had bin fishing all the former night but caught nothing had there as he passed drawn their Ships to the shore and were washing drying and repairing their Nets Our Lord therefore entred into Simons Boat and desired him to put off a little from the winding of the Land that from thence he might with more convenience finish his discourse to the people After which ended to reward Simon for this courtesy as also to presignify first to him and his fellows in their catching of fish the miraculous success hereafter of their catching of men he bid Simon to launch out into the deep and let down his Net for a draught Simon telling our Lord that their former night-labour more seasonable for that purpose had caught nothing yet in confidence of good success did as our Lord commanded and presently so great a number of fish were inclosed that the Net broke which accident also was a type of the ruptures by Schism and Heresies which should afterwards happen also in the Church and in Simon and the rest their catching of men whereupon he called for help from their partners James and John that were in the other ship both the Ships being loaden therewith so as they were near to sinking this also signifying that the purity of the Christian Religion should be much endamaged by the multitudes of bad as well as good entring into the external profession thereof And as elsewhere he likens the Kingdom of Heaven or Gospel to a Net catching fish of all sorts but many of these afterward cast away Mat. 13.47 § 208 In all this our Lord seems to have done a particular honour to Simon Peter To whom it was that he spake first to thrust out his Ship a little from the land and to let down his Net for a draught by him that this great draught of fishes were caught and others called in to help to him that the promise was first made of his catching men and the post haec capies bomines said to Peter singly here as the pasce oves was after our Lords resurrection He also much astonished hereat falling down at our Lords feet acknowledged himself unworthy so great a favour or that our Lord should vouchsafe his presence or conversation to so sinful a person And this profound humility and reverence of his made way for our Lords further bounty and kindness and himself still taken nearer unto him the farther distance he imagined he ought to keep from him bidding him not to be afraid for the Majesty of our Lord from some extraordinary discovery from God Peter had thereof such as that in Mat. 16.17 when he was enlightened by God the Father to know his Son had strangely daunted him for that he would have him from henceforth wholly to quit his former employment and constantly to be with and attend on him and his ministry for that he would make him now a fisher of men together with the rest of his companions and partners Andrew James and John All whom upon this gracious invitation immediatly quitted their Boats and Nets and the great draught of fish he had but now bestowed upon them leaving also the care of their servants unto Zebedee the Father of James and John and so followed our Lord now without any more departure from him as before Transported with this honour he did them mean fishermen when also they saw the whole world and even the great ones thereof so admiring and running after him They left all saith Jansenius Non ut nullam amplius cum suis haberent consuetudinem sed quod nulla amplius eis esset rerum suarum cura nullaque possessio omnibus quae habebant relictis potestati propinquorum And we may gather from S. Peters words to our Lord Mat. 19.27 that they left all in some such manner as the sad rich young man being advised to it refused and by our Lords