due in Religion we hust have him both for the Object and Appointer of our worship The Apostate Israelites of old and Antichristians since are said to have worshiped Divels not for that they did at least ordinarily direct their worship unto Divels but for that at least more commonly they followed their suggestions in the devised manner of worshiping though even the true God As in directing our worship unto him alone we honour and acknowledg his Majestie and Fatherhood as being our Father in heaven so in receaving it from him as the onely Institutor we honour and acknowledg both his love in providing and his wisdom in contriving and his authoritie in commanding the manner of his service and means of our salvation thereby This Religion is the means of Gods worship and withall of mans happinesse which two main ends God in great wisdom and mercie hath joyned togither inseperably that the desire of the latter might provoke to conscience of the former and the exercise of the former effectually promote and further the obtaining of the latter And this being the onely way to happinesse ought to be common to all men rude and skilfull base and honourable high and low And so all Chistians are one in Christ and Christ one in and unto them For though the terrene and worldly state of the persons who are Christians be verie different yet is their Spirituall estate of Christianitie all one There is one Lord Christ through whom and one Faith by which they are justified and that equally one Spirit by which they are sanctified though in different degrees One calling of God begun and perfited by the same Gospel and Ordinances thereof No mans highnesse of worldly estate can set him above the lowest part of it or them nor anyes mean-nesse keep him down from flying as high a pitch of Christianitie as any other An afflicted outward state stands in need of Religion to sustain it a prosperous to perfit it in eternall happinesse besides the moderating of it in the mean while And seeing our Religion is to God alone and onely the manifestation of it to men we ought to be alike grounded in it and resolved of it and zealous for it whether we enioy the fauour of the times or the contrarie All things requisite for the performance of Religious exercises are not parts of Religion but some are of naturall necessitie others for civill order and comlinesse The former need neither be taught nor commanded being imposed by absolute necessitie which is the strongest Law and most pressing Master that may be The other are such as without which all exercises of Religion would be confused and unorderly and like the Chaos which God made in the beginning void and without form and whose face darknesse covered For these the generall rules of the Word with common sence and discretion are sufficient Notwithstanding though things be not therefore comely and orderly because they are done of custom or commanded by authoritie but are therefore both used and commanded lawfully because they are comely and orderly yet if either custom commend or authoritie command things that are such indeed wise godly and peaceable men should hold themselvs even therefore the more bound unto them Religion is the best thing and the corruption of it the worst neither hath greater mischief and villanie ever been found amongst men Iewes Gentiles or Christians then that which hath marched under the Flag of Religion either intended by the seduced or pretended by Hypocrites The Iews in zeal of God such as it was persecuted Christ himself to the death and Saul in a kind of zeal of the Law was no lesse then a blasphemer persecuter and oppressor Pompey the Roman having erected that arcem omnium turpitudinum would not call it the stage or stews as it was but the Temple of Venus And what shall we think of the Spaniards Romish zeal who by their own Bishops relation in his first instance of Spanish cruelty hanged upon one Gallows thirteen innocent Indian women in honour of Christ and of his twelue Apostles But God is not pleased with good intentions exercised in evill actions much lesse either pleased or deceaved with the vizzards of impietie and inhumanitie But as he will repay unto the wicked according to their evill works of all kinds so will he render double vengeance unto them who under the liverie of Religion seek countenance for impietie and wickednesse A man hath in truth so much Religion as he hath between the Lord and himself in secret and no more what shews soever he makes before men and makes sound proof of his Religion both before God and men so far as he is forward and readie to everie good work especially to the works of mercie towards them that need Pure Religion and undefiled before God the Father is this to visit the fatherlesse and widows in their affliction and to keep a mans self unspotted from the World There are many civill Hypocrites who if they converse honestly and kindly with men presume of great acceptance from God though they have little care to know his will in his Word and lesse to observe his Precepts and Ordinances of Worship There are also Religious Hypocrites not a few who because of a certain zeal which they have for and in the duties of the first Table repute themselvs highly in Gods favour though they be far from that innocencie towards men specially from that goodnesse and love indeed which the Lord hath inseperably joyned with a truly-Religious disposition Such persons vainly imagine God to be like unto the most great men who if their followers be obsequious to them in their persons and zealous for them in the things which more immediately concern their honours and profits do highly esteem of them though their dealings with others specially meaner men be far from honest or good But God is not partiall as men are nor regards that Church and Chamber Religion towards him which is not accompanied in the House and Streets with loving kindnesse and mercie and all goodnesse towards men Such are also stuffed with selflove in their verie service of God and do but flatter him for their own advantage For if they love not and that in truth and deed their brother whom they see how can they love God whom they see not Besides they sacrilegiously divide the two Tables of the Law one from another making the two great Commandments which Christ saith are like one to another to be unlike in effect In these Pharisaism lives and Faith is dead who as they shame Christianitie and Christ in it what in them lyes so shall their recompence from him be answerable at that day when everie man shall receav honour or shame according to the works specially of mercie and goodnesse that way which he hath done or not done in the flesh The common saying As good never a whit as never the better
Tongues in an Expositour judgment in things That Translation is most exact which agreeth best with the Originall word for word so far as the idiom or proprietie of the Language will bear so as for words or phrases in the Originall proper or common simple or figurative perspicuous or doubtfull words and phrases of the same sort proper or common and so of the rest be put and retained in the version lest the Interpreter bring his own Commentarie for the Scriptures Text. On the contrarie the Commentarie is best which shews most clearly the sense scope and meaning of the Text in what words soever As the Law-maker best knows the meaning of the Law and how it is to be expounded so for the exposition of the Holy Scriptures the Spirit of God as the Authour thereof is first and most to be consulted with by faithfull and earnest prayer from a good conscience that God may fulfill his promise made of giving his holy Spirit to them that ask it and of revealing his secrets to them that fear him And so some speciall Instruments of renuing the Gospels light in the former Age have professed that they learned more this way by prayer then by much studie otherwise There is in a Scripture but one proper and immediate sense others are rather collections from it relations unto it or illustrations of it then immediate senses The literall sense is to be followed as being most naturall what may be and not to be refused if it may stand without danger without blasphemie and according to other Scriptures And here it must be noted that Christ and his Apostles in expounding Moses and the Prophets did not onely infallibly expresse their conceptions and meanings but the meaning of the Spirit speaking in them and that by reason of their more plentifull measure of the same Spirit and experience withall in some particulars as I conceav further then the Prophets themselvs understood albeit they alwaies knew the immediate drift of the Spirit and meaning of the things which they spake and were not as the Pythonists or other the like Instruments of the Divell uttering Oracles which they themselvs understood not The Lawyers have a rule and the same competent to the matter whereof they treat that Laws of fauour are to be extended as largely as may be but odious Laws as they speak as much straitned and confined within the narrowest bounds of interpretation But all Gods Laws and Instructions must in honour of the Lawgiver be expounded in the largest sense that they can beare that so they may reach as far and binde as fast as may be This the infinitenesse of his wisdom challengeth in directing us of his authority in commanding us of his mercy in promiseing and justice in threatning Which by so interpreting and applying his word we acknowledg and honour as is meet And as they are blame-worthy who out of a scrupulous fear lest they should ad to the Scriptures allow them no further meaning then the words expresse so is their sin greater and full of presumption who shorten and straiten the Scriptures instruction to that which is expressed in so many words that they may make room thereby for their own devises A Scripture commandeth promiseth or threatneth whatsoever is contained in it though not expressed And that is contained in it which can truly and iustly be gathered from it though by never so many consequences or inferences though the fewer the lesse dangerous by reason of our weaknesse of discourse Particular words and phrases more obscure are to be interpreted according to the scope mind of the speaker the Holy Ghost in the place which is both in time and excellencie before the thing spoken and that for which the Spirit speaketh as it doth in the place neither is the Scripture profitable except the scope be first found And to hang upon a word phrase or sentence in a Text without looking to the main drift is if any other the character of an hereticall disposition With this that other most necessarie rule hath affinitie namely that the words are to be understood according to the subject matter the words of Law and Gospel according to the different nature of Law and Gospel the words of an Historie Historically of a Sacrament Sacramentally and mystically and accordingly notes of universalitie according to the extent of the matter or person spoken of As we oft finde out learn mens meaning by some of their companie of such as are about them which we could not learn of themselvs so may we gather the meaning of a Scripture otherwise hard to be understood by marking the things which accompanie it and which are above and below as the Iews use to speak and Christians with them Like as the Lamps in the Golden Candlestick did one help anothers light so doth one place of Holy Scripture anothers And though a thing found in one place if in one indeed be as true binde as strongly as if it were a thousand times written yet so to insist upon any one place in a difference as to neglect others is the high-way to error and to loose the right sense by breaking the Scriptures golden chain whose links are all fastened together And as one place must be expounded by another so must the more brief and obscure by the more plain and larg and not the contrarie crosse way for that were not to lighten the darknesse of a Text but to darken its light according to that of the Father The fewer must be understood according to the more and one saying must rather be taken according to all then against all Touching precepts affirmative and negative First They are usually either kept or broken together He who doth not what he should do commonly doth what he should not do If a man be drawn away from God he is easily ensnared by his own lust On the contrarie he that doth his dutie faithfully hath as it were a Supersedeas from the Lord against the temptations of sin and Satan The way not to fulfill the lusts of the flesh is to walk in the Spirit Secondly The receaved rule that affirmative precepts binde alwayes but not to alwayes as negatives do is true being rightly understood We are to take no time for doing evill and but some time for the doing of the best good to wit as we have opportunitie and abilitie Thirdly In the prohibition of an evill we must ever understand the command of the opposite vertue and so on the contrarie He that saith expresly Thou shalt not kill means also as well Thou shalt preserv thy neighbours life Lastly There is both more vertue more vice practised in affirmatives then in negatives It is more good to do good then not to do evill and more evill to do evill then not to do good though both the tree that brings forth evill fruit and that brings forth no
with application to the present state of things is not to hold decorum but hath an appearance more oratour then preacher-like We are never simply to desire crosses because they are naturall evils nor to abhor from them because we know they work together with our election calling justification and sanctification for our good Not as causes thereof as the forenamed are for the effects of sin cannot be the causes of righteousnes or happines nor yet as means properly as are the word sacraments prayer and examples of good men but onely as occasions capable of sanctification to our use which sins properly are not as having no good in them as such whereas afflictions have a morall good in them as they are of God and by him inflicted Though to speak of crosses most properly God sanctifies us to them in giving us grace to make a right use of them And considering how it is both good for us to be afflicted and that God hath promised that no good thing shall be lacking to them that fear him we are thus to make account that God afflicts us as he doth not onely in justice for sin but in faythfulnes also that is both in mercy and in truth of promise and must accordingly confesse with the man of God I know O Lord that thy judgments are righteous and that thou in faithfulnes hast afflicted me and so must learn to take our severall crosses at Gods hands not onely patiently but thankfully We have cause to thank our selvs and our sins that wholesom things both for body and soul are for the most part bitter and greivous to our nature and to thank God that makes afflictions bitter-sweets by turning deserved curses into fatherly corrections to us It is commonly receaved for truth that in all adversitie the greatest miserie is sometimes to have been happy But we must here use a distinction If we onely respect the time in which we are in miserie apart from the former time we are both more sensible of our present miserie by remembring our former happines and also more tender and delicate and so lesse able to bear it But if we consider our whole life together then the lesse time we are afflicted the lesse our afflictions are in that respect and so must be mynded of us It is not nothing that God hath given us to passe over some part of our dayes in peace and with comfort neyther must we be so unthankfull as to account it no benefit because it is past but we must contrarywise something quiet ourselvs in our present affliction with the remembrance of Gods goodnes in our former peace as did our example of patience who in the extreamitie of his present distresse sayd shall we receav good at the hand of God and shall we not receav evill Reason teacheth this except in a case when God lifts up a man on high that he may the more violently through him down how much more fayth which perswades the godly mans heart that the Lord loves him as well as much in his after afflicted estate as he did before in his prosperous as the gold-smith esteems his gold as much though melting in the furnace as glittering in the shop and that the same God will both give patience and strength of fayth according to the tryall and encrease of strength if he encrease the affliction as also full deliverance in due time He will redeem Israel from all his trouble As even good men perform their whole duetie to God with some corruption mingled among so God promiseth and performeth accordingly the good things of this life with exception of the crosse and tribulation If we could amend the one God would leav out the other The Lord who tryed Abraham in his son Isaak whom he loved and the rich young man in his riches which he loved knows well in what veyn to strike a man that the blood may follow The more we love any earthly thing we are the more in danger to be crossed in or about it Not that God envyes our delights as one man often envyes anothers but eyther because we do or lest we should surfet in affections towards it Most men are moved too much with their own miseryes in this world melting in them as wax in the sun so as they are unapt to hold any impression eyther of fayth or reason but are too litle moved with other mens calamities not affoarding them so much as a compassionate affection Yet may and doth the contrary extream of over pittying others also prevayl with some Against both which it is good to consider that eyther we and they reap spirituall benefit by our afflictions or no. If the former that may and ought to moderate the greif If not there is cause of greater greif for after greater afflictions to come upon us and them A man may much encrease or lessen a crosse by the course which he suffers his mynde to run in it seeing all crosses have some conveniencies joyned with them as all commodities have some discommodities If a man set his thoughts a work upon the inconveniencies and discommodityes alone which are in it he shall heap sorrow upon sorrow But if on the contrary he draw into consideration such conveniencyes as usually fall in with their contraryes he shall alwaies finde some matter of ease and sometimes that meat comes out of the eater and that which at first seemed a crosse is rayther a benefit It is a most dangerous thing for any to deem his afflictions extraordinarie least by so doing he prejudice himself against ordinary comforts which we should with readynes and thankfulnes embrace and not look for angels from heaven to comfort us or for manna from heaven to feed us CHAP. XXXIIII Of Injuries AN Injurie say the Lawyers is whatsoever is not done justly In one and the same act may be found both sin against God and injurie against man And therefore in cases of wrong done either by violence or deceit the offender under the law was bound both to make restitution to the wronged and also to bring his trespas offering to the priest to make an atonement for him before the Lord. Sometimes the sin is taken away and the iniurie remayns as when the person which hath wronged another truly repents but is not able to make satisfaction Sometimes on the other side the injurie is taken away and the sin remayns viz. when the offender makes satisfaction by compulsion or for shame but repents not before God Sometimes both are taken away and sometimes neyther as both or neyther satisfaction to men and repentance towards God is performed Between the injurying and offending of a man there is this difference that we may injurie him that is altogether ignorant of it but can offend onely him that takes knowledg of some evil in truth or appearance done by us whether with injury or not The more power any hath to
indeed he is in a miserable case considering unto how many calamities all mortall men are subject against which they can neyther promise themselvs before hand nor finde in time other sufficient remedy then this of patience which is a salv for all soars and the same also so approved that though it make not miseries cease to be miseries yet it keeps the person that hath it and suffers them from being miserable Yea as deadly poysons may be and are so mixed and tempered as they become in cases more wholesom then meat so do calamities deadly in themselvs tempered with patience become better then their contrarie delights Sicknes with this is better then health without it and poverty so tempered then riches otherwise and so all the works of Gods justice unto which the faythfull are lyable are better to them then any work of his mercy to others Lastly so absolutely necessarie is this grace and the use of it for all Christians as that the Apostle tels the beleeving Hebrews and other beleevers in them that they had need of patience that having done the will of God they might receav the promise With which accords an others exhortation that patience may have its perfit work in the Saints that they may be perfit and intire lacking nothing A man would think in reason that he who hath done the will of God and been carefull in all things to keep a good conscience towards God and men should have nothing lacking for the receaving of the promised reward But the wisdom of God tels us that we must first doe our duetie in all things and then afterwards suffer evill with patience before we receav the reward promised In which our patient suffering for or in the way of righteousnes we please God more if it may be then in our former weldoing as Christ our Lord performed the greatest work of his obedience unto his father and of our redemption therein by his innocent and patient suffering of death Of all manner of crosses none are so hard to bear by Gods servants without despayr as those wherein the Lord seems to theyr sense and reason to be their enemy by reason of some strange and unusuall working against them as we have Iob for an example Nor any so hardly born by them without inordinate stirring and spurning again as those in which a man must be a meer patient using as they call it that passive patience and may or can say or do nothing in defending himself or offending an adversarie A blow or wound receaved in fight or action is scarse perceaved But if a man must sit still and suffer himself to be bobbed on the mouth or as the Prophet sayth must give his back to the smyters and his cheeks to them that pluck of the hayr or must be coupt up alone in a dungeon or prison where none may come at him this goes near him and tryes his patience and how he hath hearkened to the Lord God the holy one of Israell saying In returning and rest shall ye be saved in quietnes and in confidence shall be your strength Where mens injuries are joyned and concur with Gods providence in a crosse there the flesh and fleshly passions take more libertie I haue known some who have atteyned to a good measure of patient bearing calamities and crosses by other ordinarie hand of Gods providence and yet have been most impatient of any prejudice or damage by mens injurious dealing And this may seem not to want reason To be stirred against God for a crosse is divelish against unreasonable creatures brutish but hath a shew of manlines for a man to be stirred against a man that injuries him But be the shew what it will the truth of the ground for the most part is that pride causeth this swelling of the heart against him who is deemed to injurie us specially if we conceav it to be out of contempt whereof all men are impatient Against the pang of impatiencie this way it is best we labour not to overvalue our selvs nor easily to think that others dispise us and as we have Iob for a pattern of patience so to follow his steps who looking through the violence and wrongs of men the Sabeans and Chaldeans beheld by the eye of fayth which sees a far of Gods providence as the soul of the worlds body and ruling all things in it and thence took instruction for quiet and patient submission unto the Lord seeing saying in all the outragious practises against him by the divell and wicked men that God who had given had taken away CHAP. XXXVI Of Peace THE Hebrews by comprehending under the name of peace all both safety prosperitie whether bodily or spirituall do shew therein how both pleasant and profitable a thing peace is for all persons and societies And though to strive contend yea and wage war also be in cases and at times not onely lawfull but also necessarie yet are they never so much as tolerable for themselvs but onely for peace as the launching of the wound is for the cureing of it From peace with God through the forgivenes of sins by faith and a good conscience aryseth peace with a mans self with the angels with all men after a sort yea with all creatures in the world Such a one is in league with the stones of the field and at peace with the beasts of the field sayth Eliphaz Yea his very enemies sayth the wise man are at peace with him I add that though he be burnt in the fire drowned in the water or otherwise killed yet that fire water and other instrument of his bodily destruction and therewith all other creatures are in a kinde of secret league with him and do even in killing him bodily work for his spirituall and eternall good And if they which are at peace with a king have his subjects at peace with them how much more shall Gods servants and people have all the creatures in heaven and earth at peace with them for their true good by the favour of him their absolute king and Lord. God to shew how peaceable man should be hath denyed him such instruments of offence and naturall weapons as many other creatures are furnished withall of which some have horns some hoofs some paws some tushes some talents But alasse how hath sin armed man with hatred and mallice and they with weapons of violence and destruction so as more men are destroyed by men then by all other creatures When the Lord would shew himself to Elijah he did it not in the great and strong winde nor in the earthquake nor in the fire but in the small still voyce which came after them And when he would have a temple built to dwell in he would not have David build it because his hands were full of bood though of Gods enemies but Salomon the king of peace In the building of which there was
as that in cases they bynde us in conscience both for judgment and practise to that which indeed is not true nor due but wherein we are altogether deceaved As when we receav a matter for truth which yet indeed is not so upon the clear testimonie of two or three witnesses worthy of credit so far as we can discern or when we esteem an hypocrite cunningly dissembling for good and godly as did Phillip Simon Magus It is a fortunate sin to suspect him without apparent cause that dissembles and an infortunate vertue to be deceaved in him The appearance of evill by the Apostles prescript is to be absteyned from Which yet we must not understand absolutely of whatsoever seems evill unto others for then we should absteyn from all or the most good whereof there is litle but some or other misdeem it But the meaning is properly that in prophesying of which the Apostle speaks as we are to hold that which is good and proved so to be so if any thing be delivered of which we have a sinister suspicion as fearing that some poyson cleaveth to it though not plainly so discerned by us we with-hold our assent till by fayth we can receav it And in the generall that if a thing appear amisse and evill unto others especially unto weaker brethren though it be not such of it self yet we forbear it except eyther conscience of duety simply binde us unto it or that some greater conveniency appear in doing it then is the inconveniency of or to others in misconceaving of us and our doings If it be a good thing to appear good how much more to be so indeed It is also the readiest way and most compendious for any to appear and be thought wise vertuous or godly to be in truth such For God will both so far as it stands with his glory and the persons good give occasion of manifestation of that good which is and also provide that others may accordingly take knowledg of it And though many things be secret in the mean while yet when the Lord shall come he will both bring to light the hidden things of darknes and make manifest the counsels of the hearts and then shall everie one have prayse of God The Lord bestoweth his graces upon men not onely for their own good but for the good of others also and that as otherwise so for the manifesting and shewing forth the vertues of him who hath called them out of darknes into his marveylous light Who must therefore provide carefully both to be as they appear for their own comfort and to appear as they are to the glory of God and good of men Yet so as their first and greatest care herein be that their appearances be not above their existences and that they make shew of no more then they have As in the outward estate it is the high way to povertie or worse for a mans expences to exceed his receipts his layings out his comings in so in the spirituall course to overstreyn in outward manifestations is a way tending to all impudent and desperate hypocrisie under a form of godlynes without the power thereof And for other gifts as knowledg wisdom learning eloquence or the like he that in the manifestation of them will streyn above his reach may easily crack his credit and make himself ridiculous to others like the stage-player who with too much wypeing of his borrowed beard puls it from his face and so bewrayes his bare chin And though a forth-putting man play his part so well as many do that he not onely satisfy but draw into admiration his simple spectators who cannot discern between shadow and body yet shall he hardly or not at all escape the censure of vayn-glorious and arrogant by more judicious men We are oftens angry and offended at others for wronging us by conceaving a worse opinion of us then we deserv whereas in right we should be angry at our selvs for giving them occasion so to judg by our ill and suspicious appearances For albeit thereby he whose heart and way is upright in Gods sight loose not his comfort with him who sees the heart yet by his misappearances made in word or deed he may justly forfeyt his credit with men to whom it apperteyns to judg of the tree by the fruit or leavs or any other outward mark or note rayther then by the sap Cunning naughtines hath oftens more credit in the world then unadvised honestie CHAP. XLV Of Offences IT must needs be considering mans frailty Sathans mallice and Gods providence that offences come sayth Christ our Lord but wâ— be to the person by whom they come Wo be to him first that gives offence next to him that takes it where he should not as the same our Lord teacheth els where saying Blessed is he whosoever shall not be offended in me that is who takes not occasion of stumbling to hinder himself in the way of godlynes eyther at my person or doctrine or works or followers or at the persequutions and contradictions raysed against me and myne by myne and their adversaries And considering how many such like stumbling stones are in the narrow way of Christ which leads unto life he is a happy man indeed that hath eyther power to remove them or wisdom to decline from them or nimblenes of grace to leap over them Offence may be given where none is taken as in such evill actions as whereby others may or might be but are not provoked to evill and so Peter was an offence or scandall to Christ Or offence may be taken where none is given and so Christ and the gospell were a stone of stumbling and rock of offence to both the houses of Israel and so are many good and lawfull things yea necessarie also to many now Offence also may both be given and taken in the same action and that eyther in things simply evill as when one provokes and an other is provoked to evill by false doctrine corrupt counsayl ill example or the like or in things of indifferent nature but unseasonably used to the effectuall hindrance of others in the way of godlynes In such cases as I last mentioned offence is given through want of charitie and taken through want or weaknes of fayth in the particular God would have us walk in fayth towards him and love towards men that so doing we may neyther offend God nor men But these two which the Lord hath joyned together Sathan would not onely disjoyn in many but so oppose as eyther may oppresse or destroy other Hence some are so strong in fayth and zealous for faythfulnes towards God as they are lifted up above charitie towards men not considering how they ought to receav the weak and bear and forbear them yea apply unto them in many things and drive according to their pace as fearing to offend one of those litle ones And though we may