shall mortall man be more just than God It is as if he should say man hath no Justice at all compared with God shall man be more pure than his Maker Man compared with his Maker hath no purity at all not so much as a name or a shadow of Justice and purity compared with God though it be somewhat in it selfe yet it is nothing before him In thy sight or before thee shall no flesh living be justified or be just All that righteousnesse and purity which God hath put into the creature is but as the light of a candle to the light Humana justitic divinae comparata injuhitia est quâ—a et luâ—eâ—â—a in tenebrâ—◠〈…〉 cerniâ—u◠〈◊〉 in solis radio posita tenebratur Greg. of the Sunne the candle hath no light in it compared to the Sunne the candle enlightens the night but a thousand candles cannot a day or make the day lighter then it is Sun-light overcomes and swallowes up candle-light The Starres helpe us to see in the dark but in the bright day time the Starres themselves cannot be seene so all creature purity disappeares and vanisheth vvhen once vve looke upon the purity of God who is light and in vvhom there is no darknesse at all The Apostle Paul hath a parallel expression 2 Cor. 3. 10. speaking of the administration of the Jewish ceremoniall earthly shadowes and the administration of light in Gospell heavenly ordinances Even that which was made glorious had no glory in this respect by reason of the glory that excelleth I doe not deny saith he but there was great glory in the Jewish Church Gods institution stampt excellency upon the worship of the Jewes Their Ceremonies were made glorious but if you vvill compare Jewish vvorship to Christian vvorship it hath no glory in it at all that which was made glorious had no glory by reason of the glory that excelleth that is Gospell glory So vve may say man who vvas made glorious man vvho was made gracious and just hath no grace no justice no glory in him in comparison of that glory which doth excell namely that justice and purity which is in God God is so true that all men are lyars Rom. 3. 4. So righteous that all mans righteousnesses are a filthy Cajus participatione justi sunt ejus comparatione nec justi sunt Aug. lib. ad Orosium c. 20. ragge Isa 64. 6. Man who is just by participation from God is not just in comparison of God The fifth Conclusion is this and it is the principall point which we are to receive and attend from this Text. God is so just so pure in himselfe that he nether doth nor can doe wrong to any creature In this truth Eliphaz aimes to instruct Job chiefely for he supposed that Job had complained of God as if he had done him wrong wherefore he speakes reprovingly and chidingly shall mortall man be more just than God as if he should say art thou so grosse as to charge God with doing thee an injury It is impossible that God should doe any man wrong de Facto he doth no man wrong and de Posse he cannot wrong any man The power of God is seene most in this that he cannot doe any evill This impotencie if we may so call it is the strength of God yea the omnipotency of God consists in this that he can doe no wrong We have a Maxime of state amongst us and it is the glory of the Kings of this Nation we say The King can doe no wrong but it is not to be understood as this God can doe no wrong we know Kings are men and that 's enough to prove they may doe wrong As to say the Lord is God is enough to prove that he cannot Princes have a naturall power to doe evill but which is his glory God hath not The meaning then is the King hath not any civill power to doe wrong the Law hath so bounded ordered and directed him The constitution of the Kingdome hath given him the advice of Parliaments and Counsellours the assistance of Judges and Officers he acts by others so that The failings of his Ministers doe the subject wrong the regall power doth it not But when we speake thus of God we meane it of his naturall power which being essentially and infinitely just and good as well as soveraigne and supreme there is not the least imaginable seed in him which should be procreative of the least injustice Therefore the Scripture describes the Lord just and holy not only in his nature but in all his works and wayes Psal 145. 17. The Lord is righteous in all his wayes and holy in all his works And this implyes not onely that all the wayes wherein the Lord walks are righteous and the works he doth holy but that he can goe in no way but a righteous way nor doe any worke in the creature but a worke of holinesse Not onely is that just and holy which the Lord doth but let the Lord doe what he will that will be just and holy And here give me leave somewhat to enlarge this and plead for God against some objections which are made by the men of the world and some temptations which Satan will urge strongly upon the hearts of those who feare God by which possibly they may be so entangled and gravel'd that they know not how to extricate themselves or make out the justice of God in his administrations towards men For first it will be objected Is God so just that he neither doth nor can doe injustice to the creature How comes it to passe that both the righteous and the wicked fall under the same judgement if the judgement be right upon a wicked man surely it cannot be right upon the righteous man Is God righteous and just when they who differ as much as Heaven and Hell as light and darknesse doe yet meete as it were under the same act of God and are wrapt together in the same sentence If it be Justice upon the wicked if it be their portion how can it be the portion of the righteous or an award of Justice upon them As Abraham pleaded with God Gen. 18. 25. Shall the righteous be slaine or perish with the wicked that be farre from thee to doe in this manner shall not the Judge of all the earth doe right as if he should say if thou doest involve a just man and a wicked man in one and the same judgement this is not to doe as a righteous Judge farre be it from thee to doe such a thing Yet we see in frequent experiences that the same judgement falleth upon the righteous and the wicked By sword famine pestilence by stormes at Sea and enemies at Land both are overtaken and fall together Is this unerring Justice Justiee is to give every one his portion his due And God hath Justitia est suum cuiqueâ—â—â—buere given this exact distribution in charge to the Prophet he must say so
shortly will not be at all Hence some render the words thus Their hands cannot performe their wisedome that is they cannot bring to passe that enterprise which they had determined and layd as themselves conceived with so much wisedome and strength of reason Mr Broughton to the same sense Their hands brings nothing soundly to passe And the Chaldee exemplifies it in the Egyptians before mentioned who as the holy story informes us could not effect that which they had consulted with those depths of policie and principles of sinfull wisdome The destruction of the children of Israel Here then we may observe First That The wisdome of naturall men is nothing but craft or wit to doe wickedly The Prophet Jeremie gives us this character of them They are wise to doe evill Jer. 4. 22. And to be wise to doe evill is very ill wisedome the worst wisedome indeed meere folly better be a foole than to be but so wise And these have it from their father it dwels and is derived in their blood They are the seed of the Serpent as was toucht before and his subtilty was made the instrument of the greatest evill the tainting of that first created innocencie and the overthrow of man Now they are called the serpents seed because they are like the Serpent the Serpent was the subtillest of all the beasts of the field and these as Christ speakes of the men of the world are wiser in their generation than the children of light yet is but in their generation and their wisdome lasteth but for their generation if it last so long Elymas Acts 13. 10. being charged to be full of all subtilty and mischiefe is called at the next word child of the Devill Subtill to doe mischiefe is the Genius or disposition of the Devils children and they shall have the serpents the Devils portion For as the serpent who was once the subtillest of all the beast of the field applying his subtilty to mischiefe became the most cursed of of all the beasts of the field so they who are thus the subtillest among the children of men shall be the most cursed of all the children of men Jer. 18. 18. we find crafty men in consultation and under a curse Come say they let us devise a device against Jeremiah and let us smite him with the tongue Let us devise devices it is the same word in the text but doubled for greater emphasis These were their craftimasters To devise devices notes more then ordinary skill in that black art as to work a work Joh. 6. 28. notes great industry and intention of the mind in working Some play their works rather then work their works I must worke the workes of him that sent me saith our Lord Christ Joh. 9. 4. None ever laboured as Christ laboured therefore his was working a worke As I say to worke a worke notes great industry in working so to devise a device implies much cunning and skill laid out in devising Now as these men would be witty above others in devising evill so they are cursed above others in bearing evill The Prophet gives them their load ver 21 22. Therefore deliver up their children to the famine and powre out their blood by the force of the sword and let their wives be bereaved c. And it is most just that they should be deepest in the curse who are deepest in such craft for the truth is that Every sinfull act the more skill there is in it the more sinne there is in it it is best to be a dullhead a very bungler in doing mischiefe Wit commends and sets off other things bue it makes sin the more sinfull and deformed Secondly observe That Satan makes use of subtle crafty men and abuseth their parts for his own purposes He disappointeth the devices of the crafty God never disappointeth those whom he sets aworke If God disappoints the devices of men these devices were not of God Satan sets those aworke whose work God spoiles The Lord loves to breake Satans engines tooles and instruments Christ came to destroy the works of the Devill both his works within us and his workes against us All Satans works and workmen shall rue it when Christ pleases And here we see whom Satan sets aworke even men of the finest wits of the most reaching braines of the decepest judgements and richest endowments these he draweth in to his pay and makes serviceable for his ends that 's Satans designe such as are amongst men as the serpent amongst the beasts the most subtill of all these Satan makes use of The deepe policie of an Achitophel the Great Oracle of his times for counsell he desires to improve against a David The high parts and learning of a Julian he desires to improve and boyle up against the Christians such a one will not only Fire and sword but set hard to jeere and wit them out of the profession of the Gospell And it is observable that the seeds of the greatest heresies and errours that ever poyson'd the spirit of man or vext the Church of God have been sowne in that ranke soyle the wits of Philosophers Which gave Tertullian occasion to call Philosophers The Philosophi haereticorum Patriarchae Tert. Patriarkes of Heretickes or The Patrons of Heresies They were men of high conceits and apprehensions and in those fertile and rich grounds Satan with great successe cast the tares of errour When Christ came into the world he had most opposition among the craftie Scribes and Pharisees And Herod the Fox as Christ himselfe calls him for his subtilty was a notorious instrument of Satan to hinder the receiving of Christ Our Lord Christ sometimes chuseth the simplest the meanest the plainest men fishermen to do his worke But Satan chuseth the subtilest he can find in learned Throngs to send of his errand The reason of this difference betweene Christs choise and Satans is Satan cannot make a Mercury out ef every block he is not able to give a man understanding wisedome or abilities for his worke neither can he increase or improve any mans parts and gifts he must have instruments ready to his hand he can but put them forward and tempt them on He will give such as are strong and craftie many motives to serve him but he cannot furnish them with strength or craft to serve him But Christ can give gifts to men which they have not and raise the parts which they have He can make himself a Mercury a messenger out of any blocke Christ can send a foole of his errand and cause him to doe it wisely He can cause the stammering tongue to speake plaine and the plainest man to speake the highest Rhetorick When a Moses complaines of a slow tongue he can say I will be with thy mouth and teach thee what thou shalt say Exod. 4. 12. If he finds us not fit to doe his businesse he can make us fit If Christ please he can make a man master of his trade before
enterprise 'T is so all along therefore Psal 2. 1. it is said Why doe the Heathen imagine a vaine thing a vaine thing because a thing successelesse their hands could not performe it It was vaine not only because there was not true ground of reason why they should imagine or doe such a thing but vaine also because they laboured in vaine they could not doe it And therefore it followes v. 4. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh the Lord hath them in derision The Lord sees what fooles they are and men yea themselves shall see it The Prophet gives us an elegant description to this purpose Isa 59. 9. They weave the spiders web but their webs shall not become garments neither shall they cover themselves with their workes As if he had said they have beene devising and setting things in a goodly frame to catch flies they have been spinning a fine thread out of their braines as the Spider doth out of her bowels such is their web but when they have this web They cannot cut it out or make it up into a garment They shall go naked and cold notwithstanding all their spinning and weaving all their plotting and devising The next broome that comes will sweepe away all their webs and the Spiders too except they creepe apace God loves and delights to crosse worldly proverbs and worldly crase How many visible demonstrations have we of this in our times How many cunning but ruining devices lie by the wals at this day unacted They went through the Head-worke but they could not get through their Hand-worke We may say as in the Psalme 76. 5. None of the men of might have found their hands The men of craft sound their heads but the men of might blessed be God have not yet found their hands to execute up to the height of the divisers either wit or malice In this we see the glorious prerogative of God How many thousand thousand thousand thoughts do men loose The thoughts of many yeares are lost in a moment God never lost nor never shall loose one thought And therefore David puts these two together in a breath Having said Psal 33. 10 The Lord bringeth the counsell of the Heathen to nought he maketh the devices of the people of none effect In the next verse he subjoynes The counsell of the Lord standeth for ever the thoughts of his heart to all Generations And as the counsel of the Lord stands so he causeth the counsell of those to stand who consult for him He confirmeth the word of his servants and performeth the counsell of his Messengers Isa 44. 26. So that their hands shall performe their enterprise as the Lord encourageth the ancient people Zac. 4. 9 The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house his hands shall also finish it And againe Chap. 8. 13. Fear not let your hands be strong As if he had said Feare not goe on with your worke For your hands shall performe their enterprise you shall not beaten from your worke neither shall ye work in vain The Lord himselfe hath no barren counsels and he makes all the counsels which are for him bring forth in their due time desired fruit the longed for and beloved issue Lastly observe That It is a great and wonderfull worke of God to disappoint the devices and stop the enterprises of crafty men Eliphaz puts this among the wonders of God This is reported in a way of admiration concerning God Isa 44. 25. He frustrateth the tokens of the liars and maketh diviners mad he turneth wise men backwards and maketh their knowledge foolish The wisdome of God is most seen in defeating the wise as the power of God is most seene in overthrowing the strong While we consider that Theirs are secret devices and that they are subtill devices that they have many devices and that they have many wayes to bring these devices to passe it cannot fall below a wonder in our thoughts that their thoughts or devices are not accomplished Therefore the Psalmist concludes Psal 124. Vnlesse it had bin the Lord who was on our side c. we had bin swallowed up quick and taken in their snare As if he had said if we should have had any lesse then God to helpe us we had been gone all the world could not save us To passe through a place full of gins and snares and pits set and made on purpose to take a man and that man not taken is marvellous in our eyes Thus it is with the people of God they walk among snares and traps The trade of most wicked men is to be Trap-makers Snare makers if not Sword makers against the Saints of the most high They meet with devices upon devices and plots upon plots now that God shall disappoint all these and exalt his people to safety in the very face of death and dangers how admirable But some may object Yet we see that at least some of these plots are not disappointed at least some of these devices take and we have seen bloudy hands performing their enterprise I answer in a word First this text and the observation bottom'd upon it are to be understoood of what is often done not strictly of what is alwaies done The Lord very frequently disappoints the devices of the crafty But secondly their very successe is a disappointment and their prosperity is their curse For their cause is under a curse and so are their persons when both seeme most succesfull If outward judgements slay not wicked men Their prosperitie shall Pro. 1. 32. Thirdly all the successe which the devices of wicked craftie ones have tends to the fulfilling of Gods counsels more then their own So that though it be to the eye or in the letter success to them yet in truth and upon the matter it is success to the cause of God Craft prevailes no further no longer on earth then serves to accomplish the counsels of heaven and fulfill what infinite wisdom hath devised Therefore when you see any devices of the craftie thrive know that God is serving himselfe upon them and that they are but acting What his hand and counsell hath determined before to be done Act. 4 28. As Christ himselfe overcame by dying so doe they who are Christs they have successe in all their disappointments and these are disappointed in all their successes and die while they overcome No sinfull device of man ever did or ever shall prevaile beyond a contribution to the just and holy purpose of God All their prevailings are disappointments who intentionally oppose though they really accomplish the good pleasure and purpose of God JOB Chap. 5. Vers 13 14 15. 16. He taketh the wise in their own craftines and the counsell of the froward is carried headlong They meet with darknes in the day time and grope in the noon day as in the night But he saveth the poor from the Sword from their mouth and from the hand of the mighty So
same dungeon and be bound with the same chaine he may be slaine with the same sword burnt at the same stake eaten up with the same famine So that both in the materiality and likewise in the graduality of it it may be the same on both yet upon one it is a correction upon the other a judgement What then is this correction And where will the correction and the judgement part I conceive that the infirmities of the Saints and the sins of the wicked differ as judgements and corrections differ Now look upon those sins which we call the infirmities of the Saints they may be the same in the matter the same in kind yea possibly the same in the degree I meane respecting the outward rule given by God and the outward act committed by man with the sins of those who know not God or who in sinning go against their knowledge Then where doe they part Surely where corrections and judgements part And where is that Especially in two things First in the manner how 2. In the end why they are inflicted First the Lord never corrects his children with such a heart as he carries in laying trouble upon the loynes of wicked men The heart of God is turned toward his children when he corrects them but his heart is turned from a wicked man when he punishes him The Lord is even pained that I may speake as the Scripture often doth in this point after the manner of men I say the Lord expresses himselfe as pained as grieved as if every stroake went to his owne heart when he strikes his children When he is about to strike he is as it were unresolved whether he shall strike or no and as soon as he hath stricken he as it were repents that he did strike them All which motions of his heart the Lord shews us in the highest strains of passionate Rhetorick Hos 11. 8 9. But when he takes the wicked in hand to punish them we reade of no passion ascribed to him but these delight or joy and the effect of them laughter hatred or indignation and the effect of these mocking at them Pro. 1. 26. I will laugh at your calamity and mock when your fear cometh And when he resolves upon the destruction of his enemies he speaks as if then he had unburden'd himselfe and his heart were lighter then before Isa 1. 24. Ah I will ease me of my Adversaries and avenge me of my enemies Secondly the difference is as broad about the end When God layes the rod of correction upon his child he aimes at the purging out of his sin at the preventing of his sin at the revealing of a fatherly displeasure against him for his sin The Lord would only have him take notice that he doth not approve of him in such courses When these ends are proposed every affliction is a correction But the afflictions of the ungodly are sent for other ends First to take vengeance on them Secondly to satisfie offended justice justice cries aloud against them and they have nothing to interpose but their bare backs or naked soules The Lord comes as a severe Creditor and bids them pay that which they owe or suffer and to prison because they cannot pay Secondly observe A child of God is in a happy condition under all corrections As man in a naturall or civill capacity at his best estate is altogether vanity Psal 39. 5. So in a spirituall capacity he is altogether happinesse in his worst outward estate Happy is the man whom God corrects he is a gainer by correction If he looseth any thing it is but the drosse of his corruptions By this therefore Isa 27. 9. shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged and this is all the fruit to take away his sinne Corrections are not sent to take away his comforts but to take away his corruptions That fire which God kindles upon his children shall burne only as it did the materiall bonds of the three children in Daniel the spirituall bonds of their iniquity that they may be more free to righteousnesse Againe Crrections are not manifestations of wrath but an evidence of his love and of their son-ship Whom I love I chastise Rev. 3. 21. And if ye endure chastning God dealeth with you as with sons Heb. 12. 7. The love of God is better then life and to be a son of God is the highest priviledge of his love Where shall we be happy if not in that which assures us of such love and of love in such a relation Hence the Apostle concludes 2 Cor. 4. 12. So then death worketh in us death that is our daily sufferings and endurings He speakes indeed especially of sufferings for the truth from the cruell hand of man but it is true likewise of all sufferings under the correcting hand of God Those stroakes which are deadly to our bodies may yet worke for us And what worke they The seventeentth verse answers the question Our light afflictions which are but for a moment worke for us a farre more exceeding and eternall weight of glory The sufferings of the Saints are active and their passions opperative But how doe they worke Not by way of merit or earning Our blood cannot oblige God but by way of preparation The Lord sends afflictions to fashion and cleanse our hearts as fit vessels to hold an exceeding weight of glory Our bearing the heaviest afflictions doth not weigh so much as the least graine of glory yet they fit our hearts for an exceedingly excellent weight of glory We cannot say properly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they worke any glory but by an Hyperbole in speech we say they work towards an Hyperbole in glory And if any doubt can a man be happy when his outward comfort is gone Doubtlesse he may For a man is never unhappy but when he hath lost that wherein happinesse doth consist The happinesse of a godly man doth not consist in his outward comforts in riches in health in honour in civill liberty or humane relations therefore in the losse of these he cannot be unhappy His happinesse consists in his relation to and acceptance with God in his title to and union with Jesus Christ While he keeps these priviledges and these he shall keepe for ever what hath he lost if he loose all besides these He hath not lost any thing discerneable out of his estate Suppose a man were worth a million of money and he should loose a penny would you think this man an undone man No His estate feeles not this losse and therefore he hath not lost his estate If a man should buy a thousand measures of corne or cloath and should loose the given handfuls of the one or inches of the other would ye say that this man had lost either his corne or his cloath All the things of the world and they only are looseable which a godly man hath are not so much to his estate as a penny to a million They
I cannot heale you your troubles are past my skill to remedy or redresse Thus man is sometimes at a stand he cannot heale what men have wounded but God is never at a stand your old festred sores and wrankled wounds which have taken wind discourage not his chirurgery When a people are in such a pickle or pittifull plight as the Prophet Isaiah describes the kingdome of Judah in Chap. 1. 5 6. The whole head is sicke and the whole heart is faint from the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundnesse in it but wounds and bruises and putrifying sores they have not been closed neither bound up neither mollified with oyntment When I say the case of a people is thus and they can get no healer Yea though a people like the woman Mark 5 25 have had an issue of blood in bloody battels which is now almost Englands case many yeares and have suffered many things of many Physitians and have spent all that they have and are nothing bettered but rather grow worse yet if Christ doe but touch such a sicke diseased bleeding people in mercy and they touch him by faith they shall be healed and their fountaine of blood will immediately dry up Or if their condition requires some longer operation he can effectually take such a course for their cure He is abundantly furnished with all instruments and abilities for the making of a perfect cure It is well observed that three things are necessary for a Chyrurgion First He must have an Eagles eye one that is good at healing had need be good at seeing Secondly He must have a Ladies hand soft and tender to handle the sore gently Thirdly A Lions heart a stout strong heart for if he faint how shall his patient keep up his courage These three are exceeding necessary in Chyrurgery about naturall bodies but much more in Chyrurgery about Civill and Ecclesiastical bodies the healing of Churches and Kingdoms And where shall we find whither shall we send for Physitians qualified with this Eagles eye to look into all our sores and sicknesses with this Ladies hand to deal gently and tenderly with our wounds with this Lions heart stoutly and couragiously without fears and faintings to go thorough with the work Well if men should not be found thus furnished the Lord is He hath an Eagles eye an All-seeing eye seven eyes of providence and wisdome to look through our sores and into all our distempers He hath as in allusion we may speak a Ladies hand soft and tender to deal gently and graciously with a people He can dresse our wounds and paine us little scarce be felt while he doth it And he hath the Lions heart infinite courage and strength of spirit to undertake the most gastly wounds or swolne putrified sores Let us therefore rest our selves assured that whatsoever our personall or our nationall sores our personall or our nationall wounds be be they what they will or what we can call them desperate incurable such as have discourag'd many from medling with their cure or sham'd those that have yet our Shaddai the Almighty God can bind them up and heale them fetch the core from the bottome and close the skin upon the top so tenderly dresse and so perfectly cure them that a scarre shall not remaine unlesse it be to mind us of his infinite skill and goodnesse or of our own duty and thankfullnesse JOB Chap. 5. Vers 19 20 21. He shall deliver thee in six troubles yea in seven there shall no evill touch thee In famine he shall redeem thee from death and in war from the power of the the sword Thou shalt be hid from the scourge of the tongue neither shalt thou be afraid of destruction when it cometh ELiphaz still prosecuteth his former Argument to take Job off from despising the chastnings of the Almighty spoken of at the 17th verse And having shewed first in generall that they are happy whom the Lord corrects and secondly That the Lord heals as well as wounds is as ready to bind up as to make the sore he illustrates this by giving First An assurance of deliverance from evill and that 1. In the generall at the 19th verse 2. By an enumeration of particular cases of greatest dangers and outward evills And secondly to shew the happinesse of those whom God corrects he gives an assurance of positive blessings which shall in due time be heaped upon their heads whom God had before wounded with sorrows and loaded with afflictions The nineteenth verse is a promise of deliverance from evill He shall deliver thee from six troubles yea in seven there shall no evill touch thee To deliver notes here the snatching or pulling of a man out of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Spoltavit rapuit eripuit tanquam ab hoste â—ut malo Eripere praedam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Augustia interdum significat hostem quasi angustiatorem dicas the hand of an enemy out of the mouth of danger The Hebrew word for Trouble comes from a roote which signifies to straiten or to narrow a thing up in a little compasse and so by a metaphor to vex and trouble because they who are straitned in any kind are pained and troubled And when we heare of any in trouble we usually say such are in straits And this word is often translated a strait 2 Sam. 24. 14. I am in a great strait saith David when he was put upon that hard election between sword pestilence and famine So Judg. 11. 7. and 1 Sam. 13. 6. The holy language expresses an enemy or adversary by this word because an enemy puts us upon straits and so to much trouble And to raise the force of this word to the highest it is used to signifie the pangs and throwes of women in child-bearing in which the mother labours in grievous straits while the infant labours for enlargement Troubles ever meet us in or bring us into straits they may well change names which are so neere in nature I find the word so translated here in some books He shall deliver thee in six straits and in seven when thou art so encompast about shut in and incircled by evils on every side that thou knowest not which way to move or turne much lesse to get out then the Lord will give enlargement and either find a way out for thee or make one as he did for Israel at the red sea through those mighty waters In six yea in seven This phrase of speech is very considerable Some numbers in Scripture have a kind of eminency or excellency in them I intend not any large discourse about numbers only in briefe Those three numbers Three Six and Seven are applied to a speciall signification by the Holy Ghost A great number a perfect number is expressed by any one of these three numbers A three-fold cord that is a cord of many or sufficient folds is not easily broken Eccles 4. 12. Three times thou shalt
Fourthly Some of the Hebrew Doctors retaining the fore-going sense of the Verbe say that by tongue is meant Nations and people Sunt qui per linguam hic intelligunt nationes q d. quum grassabuntur longè lateque gentes populi omniaque depopulabuntur c. Drus When the tongue that is when a Nation shall goe about or march from place to place to destroy and over-runne a Land then at such a time thou shalt be hid It is frequent in Scripture to put tongues for Nations or tongues and nations for the same Rev. 7. 9. Chap. 17. 15. And there is a comfortable truth in the matter of this interpretation That when all tongues or nations shall be gathered to destroy us yet we shall be hid As if it should be said like that Psal 83. 6. Though the Tabernacle of Edom and the Ishmaelites of Moab and the Hagarens Gebal and Ammon and Amalek the Philistines with the inhabitantes of Tyre be confederate against thee or to take moderne names and Nations though Irish and Spanish French and Danes c. should at any time wander from their own lands to invade thee yet thou shall be hid when these tongues rove and wander spoile and pillaâ—e The matter I say of this interpretation is a truth and a very comfortable one but I would not charge it upon this Text. Fiftly and most generally and I conceive most truly by the scourge of the tongue is meant all and all manner of calumnies and slanders cursings or evill speakings false witnesses and accusations and from these the promise is thou shalt be hid It is said Prov. 14. 3 That In the mouth of the foolish is the rod of pride not that a foolish man will scourge pride he loves it too well but because the pride of a foole sets his tongue a scourging the wisest and the best a Maledicentia est famae hominis quod flagellum corpori nam laedit eam interdam accidâ—t hinc Graeâ—è 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dius Evill words are the same to the credit of a man that a scourge is to his back when slanderers speake openly then their tongue is compared to a sword or an arrow by day when secretly then to a trap or an arrow by night to a serpent which comes behind Gen. 49. and as here to b Flagellum dicitur quod in scapulas impingitur à tergo laedit ut non videas Metuentes patruae verbera linguae Hor. 3. Cor. Od 11. Nam Patrui multo quam patres incoâ—rupâ—iores esse so lent in judicandis objurgandis fratris filiâ—â—uÌ„ peccatis a scourge which is prepared for the back and is called in our language back-biting or we may call it back-beating The scourge of the tongue is all that ill which the tongue can speak And the c Verbera à verbis aut verba á verberibus dicta sunâ— quod auâ—es vox verbeâ—â—t Nonius Latin word for a word agrees well to this sense being derived as Criticks observe from a word which signifies a stripe or the word which signifies a stripe from that which signifies a word And we find that they who defame or over-severely reprove others are called barely d Qui dèâ—â—actoriis verbis famam alterius verberant percussore appellantur etiam suppresso nomine linguae Pined Nec sermone inutili conscientiam peâ—â—utit infiâ—morum nec centumelio suo garrulus perdat eum quem potuit medestia lenitate corrigere Hier. in Titus 1. 7. strikers And this as some of the ancients note according to Scripture language in those two Apostolicall directions 1 Tim. 3. 3. and Tit. 1. 7. where the Apostle gives the rule concerning a Bishop that he must be no striker This may be understood of striking not with the hand the Apostle could hardly think that quarrelsome spirits and sons of violence should be so much as admitted to a probation about that office but striking with the tongue by an undue an overhasty or an angry reproofe and censure The great instrument of a Bishop or a Minister is his tongue but he must use his tongue rather to heale than to wound or if at any time he useth it to wound it should be in tendency unto or in preparation for healing Therefore Let not a Bishop be a striker a striker with his tongue in passion much lesse in spleene or for selfe ends Thus we see what we are to understand by the stroke or scourge of the tongue But what is it to be hid from that scourge A word of that Thou shalt be hid Not as a Laâ—ebunt detractorem tua facta de quibus possiâ— detrahendi materiam sumere Aquin. One Thy actions shall be hid which might be as matter for slander to work upon nor as b Deficient detractoreÌ„ firmae Another though such actions appeare yet slanderers shall want proofe or sufficient witnesse shall not appeare against thee But First We may take it thus Thou shalt be hid from the scourge of the tongue that is the tenour of thy actions shall be so faire and probationes sufficientia indicia Cajet thy life so blamelesse that malice it selfe shall not find where to fasten an accusation Or secondly When other men are slandered and reproached thou shalt be free Or thirdly Thou shalt be hid that is though occasion should be given to malice and that our noblest and holiest actions use most to give yet malicious men shall not be able to come at thee thy person shall be secured in a chamber of secrecy and covered with a mantle of providentiall darknesse while the light of thy good works dazles and troubles the eye of the world But rather fourthly Thou shalt be hid that is Thou shalt be patroniz'd and defended thou shalt be set right and vindicated from all calumnies and false aspersions The Lord will so take care of thy credit and reputation that though many goe about to blemish it with lies and slanders yet thy honour shall be saved or the wounds of it healed by causing thy righteousnesse to breake forth as the light and thy just dealing as the noone day Some charitable medicinable tongue shall lick thee whole after all the stripes of those scourges or envenom'd scorpion-tongues Thus thou shalt be healed if smitten or else thou shalt not be smitten Psal 31. 20. Thou shalt keepe them secretly in thy pavilion from the strife of tongues The words of the Psalmist are an allusion to Kings who being resolved to protect their Favourites against all the clamours and accusations of men take them as it were into their own Pavillion into their Bed-chamber and bosome where none may touch Ad similitudineÌ„ regiae defensionis loquitur qua sâ— illi qui regibus chari sunt coram in ipsis aulae penetralibus in ipso regum conspectu versantes defenduntur securi vivunt Muscul in Psal them God also hath a
Eliphaz and Job I leave in your hands praying for a blessing from on high to convay truth home to every heart desiring earnest prayers for the Spirit of grace and illumination to be powred out according to the measure of the gift of Christ upon April 28 1645. Your very affectionate Friend and Servant in this worke of the Lord Joseph Caryl AN EXPOSITION Upon the Fourth Fifth Sixth and Seventh Chapters of the Book of JOB JOB Chap. 4. Verse 1. Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said 2. If we assay to commune with thee wilt thou be grieved But who can withhold himselfe from speaking 3. Behold thou hast instructed many thou hast strengthned the weak hands 4. Thy words have upholden him that was falling and thou hast strengthened the feeble knees 5. But now it is come upon thee and thou faintest it toucheth thee and thou art troubled 6. Is not this thy feare thy confidence the uprightnesse of thy wayes and thy hope IOBS complaint ended in the former Chapter in this a hot dispute begins Job having curs'd his day is now chid himselfe And he had such a chiding as was indeed a wounding such as almost at every word drew blood and was not onely a Red upon his back but a Sword at his heart Job was wounded first by Satan he was wounded a second time by his Wife a third time he was wounded not as it is spoken in the Prophet in the house of his friends but in his own house by his friends Zach. 13. 6. these last wounds are judg'd by good Physitians in soule-afflictions his deepest and soarest wounds Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said Eliphaz being as is supposed the elder and chiefe of the three first enters the list of this debate with Job concerning whose name person and pedigree we have spoken before at the eleventh Verse of the second Chapter and therefore referring the Reader thither for those circumstantials of the speaker I shall immediately descend unto the matter here spoken If we assay to commune with thee wilt thou be grieved c. The whole discourse of Eliphaz may be divided into three generall parts 1. The Preface of his Speech 2. The Body 3. The Conclusion The Preface of his speech is contained in the second Verse If we assay to commune with thee wilt thou be grieved c. The Body of his speech is extended through this fourth and to the last Verse of the fifth Chapter It consisteth especially of two members or two sorts of matter in which Eliphaz deals with Job The first is reprehensory by way of conviction and reproof The second is exhortatory by way of counsell and advice First Eliphaz reprehends Job This work of reprehension begins at the third Verse of this Chapter and is continued to the end of the fourth Verse of the fift Chapter And to shew that he did not reprehend him upon passion he grounds this reprehension upon reason and strengthens his reproofe with Arguments And there are four reasons or speciall Arguments which Eliphaz takes up to make this reprehension convincing the naming of them will give light to the whole before we come to particulars The first Argument is contained in the words I have read to the end of the sixth Verse And it is taken from the unsuitablenesse of his present practice to his former precepts Or from the inequality of the course he now took under affliction to the counsell he had given others under affliction His second Argument beginning at the seventh Verse and carried on to the twelfth is grounded upon a supposed inequality of Gods present dealing with him in reference to his former dealings with godly men Eliphaz thought thus surely Job is an Hypocrite otherwise God would have dealt with him as with an innocent Remember saith he I pray thee who ever perished being innocent I will convince thee by all examples by whatsoever is upon Record in the History of all Ages that thou art an Hypocrite a wicked person for see if thou canst finde an instance in any Story of an innocent person perishing That is his second Argument His third Argument is continued from the twelfth Verse to the end of this fourth Chapter and that he might make the deeper impression upon Jobs spirit he brings it in with a dreadfull Preamble a Vision from God at once terrifying and instructing him thus to reason downe the pride of man The Argument it selfe is coucht in the seventeenth verse It is drawn from an evidence of presumption in all such as shall dare to implead Gods justice or plead their own as if Eliphaz had said surely thou art a proud and a wicked person for there was never any godly man upon the face of the Earth no nor any Angel in Heaven that durst be so bold with God as thou hast been Shall mortall man saith he be more just than God shall a man be more pure than his maker Behold he put no trust in his servants and his Angels he charged with folly His fourth Argument begins at the fifth Chapter and ends with the fourth Verse and it is taken from the unlikenesse of Jobs carriage under his afflictions to that which any of the Saints in any age of the World did ever shew forth under their afflictions He that caries himselfe so as none of the Saints ever caried themselves gives an evidence against his Saintship Call now to the Saints either those now living upon the Earth or search the Records concerning all the Saints that ever lived consider and see whether thou canst observe or reade any paralell of thy complaints and unreasonable expostulotions So much for the summe of his convictions Then Eliphaz turnes himselfe to admonition and exhortation in the following part of that fifth Chapter and there are two Heads of his admonitory exhortation First he admonishes him to seek unto God and to call upon him Vers 8. I would seek unto God and unto God would I commit my cause I give thee no other counsell then I would take my selfe If I were in thy case I would not stand thus complaining and cursing my day but this I would doe I would seek unto God and unto God would I commit my cause This admonition is enforced by divers Arguments to the seventeenth Verse The second head of his exhortation beginneth at the seventeenth Verse and it is to prevaile with him patiently to bear and quietly to accept his affliction or the punishment of his iniquity in pursuance of this he shews him many benefits and blessings attending those who graciously comply with the correcting hand of God upon them Behold saith he Verse 17. happie is the man whom God correcteth therefore despise not thou the chastning of the Almighty he concludeth all from his certain knowledge and infallible experience of what he had said Verse 27. Loe this we have searched it so it is Back'd with a warranty that if he obey his own experience shall quickly teach him
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Impingere quod saepe consequitur ruere cadere stumble or strike the foot against a thing and so it is put for that which is the consequent of stumbling falling he that strikes his foot or stumbles at a thing is in danger of a fall So Isay 40. 30. The young men shall utterly fall it is this word but doubled falling they shall fall that is they shall utterly fall There is a threefold falling mentioned in Scripture 1. There is a falling into sinne Gal. 6. 1. If a man be overtaken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Praecipuè significat peccata actualia à 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ad verbum praeter cadere cuÌ„ scil ultra rectam justitiae lineam cadimus de erratis etiam levioribus usurpatur 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in compositione minuit sensum in a fault that word like this Hebrew in the Text signifies a fall taken by stumbling or by tripping upon any thing that lies in the way In this sense we understand the fall of Adam the fall of Angels and the fals of the Saints 2. There is a falling into affliction a falling into trouble So Prov 24. 16. The just man falleth seven times a day that is he meets affliction at every turn he fals into trouble almost at every step Seven times a day is very often in the day or often every day 3. There is a falling under trouble And of persons falling so we are chiefly to understand this Text. Many fall into trouble who yet through the strength of Christ stand firmely under trouble Others no sooner fall in but they fall under it The shoulders of some are not able to beare a light affliction and the afflictions of others are so heavie that no shoulders are able to beare them the back breaks the spirit sinkes under the load To such as these Job lent his hand his shoulders his counsell was as a staffe in their hands as ligaments to their loynes and knees Job was well skill'd in setting props and buttresses of holy advice to such tottering soules Thou hast upheld him that was falling We may take the words in all or either of these three interpretations yet most properly of the latter Thou hast strengthned the feeble knees The Hebrew word for a knee signifieth in the root to blesse or to pray because in blessing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Genu quod flecti solet in Benedictionibus et salutationibus and praying for one or in saluting we use to bow the knee And here what we translate the feeble knees is word for word the bowing knees because when knees bow and buckle or double under us it proceeds from weaknesse and feeblenesse hence the bowing knee is called the feeble knee Dan. 6. 5. it is said of Belshazzar his knees smote one against the other he fainted his spirits sanke within him then his knees as a Symptome of his feare beat one against another The hanging down of hands notes a kinde of despaire in regard of present evils and feeble quaking knees seeme to referre to some expected evill Taking the words with that difference Jobs work of love appears more full he not only upheld in present troubles but labour'd to strengthen against such as were to come Thou hast instructed many and instructed them many even all these wayes We may note First That to teach instruct and comfort others is not onely a mans duty but his praise for here Eliphaz speaks it in a way of commendation though with an intent to ground a reproofe upon it Job himselfe speaks of what he had done in that kinde as a defence of his own innocence Chap. 29. vers 21. c. Vnto me men gave eare and waited and kept silence at my counsell after my words they spake not againe and my speech dropped upon them and they waited for me as for the rain and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain This was his practise and this was the praise of Job That which the Apostle speaks as a speciall qualification or gift of a Bishop 1 Tim. 3. 2. is an excellent a noble qualification 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in any person of what rank or degree soever to be apt to teach Secondly Consider who Job was he was a holy man one that had much acquaintance and communion with God Now though his friends mistook what was in his heart yet they hit right upon his practise and we knowing both what his heart was by the testimony of God and what his practise was from the testimony of men may ground a second point upon it That such as know God in truth and holinesse are very ready to communicate the knowledge Quae autem est ceâ—â—â—or eleemosyna quod majus opus miserecordiae quam docere rudes segnes ad bene agendum extimulare labentem erigere maestos consâ—lari of God unto others They who know God themselves are desirous that others should know God too David Psal 51. 13. promiseth and professeth that he would communicate his experiences of Gods love in pardoning his sinne when he had tasted the sweetnesse of a pardon Then will I teach transgressors thy wayes and sinners shall be converted unto thee when my heart hath learned more of God others shall learne more of God from my mouth This is spirituall charity and it is the most excellent and noblest charity of all Charity to the soule is the soule of charity charity to the better part is the best charity In this sence also Job was eyes to the blinde and feet to the lame by guiding them to see Job 29. 15. and by directing their feet to walk in the wayes of God To give knowledge is better then to give Gold Instruction is the highest almes Thirdly if we consider Job of whom all this is affirmed as he was a great rich man we may note thus much That honourable and great men loose nothing of their honour and greatnesse by descending to the instruction of others though their inferiours Some think it belongs onely unto Ministers to instruct What we instruct They resent it as a disparagement they trust out that work wholly into the hands of others Where shall we finde an Abraham a great Prince in his time of whom God gave this Testimony I know him that he will command his children c. and they shall keep the way of the Lord and because he was willing to teach others God condescends to teach him Shall I hide from Gen 18. 17 18 19. Abraham that thing which I doe They receive most knowledge who are most ready to impart it And we finde before this Abraham so successefull in teaching that he had an Army of scholers in his house The Text saith when he prepar'd for that expedition to rescue his Nephew Lot that he armed three hundred and eighteen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gen. 14. 14. Prov. 22. 6. of his trained
ever perished nor were the righteous ever cut off And Eliphaz conceiveth this to be so clear a truth that he challengeth Job to give one instance to the contrary out of his own experience he appeals to experience which is a strong way of arguing Remember I pray thee who ever perished being innocent shew me the man and withall he professeth that he could give many instances or examples out of his own experience that wicked men have perished and were cut off this he doth in the eighth Verse Even as I have seen they that plough iniquity and sow wickednesse reap the same which he inlarges in the three following Verses by the blast of God they perish and by the breath of his nostrils are they consumed c. This in generall for the summe and substance of the Argument We will now consider the words and examine the strength of it in particulars Remember I pray thee He handleth Job tenderly in words he speaks gently and winningly to him Remember I pray thee To remember noteth often in Scripture a serious consideration of things present and before us Eccles 12. 1. Remember now thy Creator in the dayes of thy youth that is seriously bethink thy selfe at the present of God and his wayes and how thou oughtest to walk holily before him But properly to remember is the calling to minde of things which are past and so Eliphaz in this place directs Job to search the Records Goe and inquire into all the Monuments of Antiquity look the Registers and Histories of the Ages past and see if thou canst finde any such thing as this A righteous man perishing Memory is the soules store-house there we lay up Observations and from thence fetch them out as occasions invite Hence Christ Matth. 12. 57. compareth every Scribe which is instructed for the kingdome of Heaven to a house-holder which bringeth forth out of his treasury things both new and old This treasury is the memory there holy truths and profitable examples are stored and reserved Remember I pray thee In that Eliphaz sendeth Job back to former experiences we may note That it is our duty to lay up and record the dealings of God whether publick or personall whether with the godly or with the wicked It is our duty to observe what God doth Psal 111. 4. He hath made his wonderfull works to be remembred as if the Psalmist had said God hath not wrought such great things in the world whether respecting persons or Nations that we should write them upon the water or in the sand which the next puffe of winde defaces and blowes out but he hath made his wonderfull workes to be remembred hee will have them written in brasse with a pen of Iron and with the point of a Diamond that all ages may heare the judgements and loving kindnesses of the Lord he hath made his wonderfull workes to be remembred or he hath made them so as that they are most worthy to be remembred David was a great observer of experiences Psal 31. 35. he telleth us that he had as it were collected notes concerning Gods dealings all his dayes and it is to the very point in hand I have been young and now am old yet never saw I the righteous forsaken himselfe carefully observed the dealing of God in this Psalme and in the next Psal 37 35 36. he gives the like direction to others thus I have done doe you take the same course too I have seen the wicked in great power and spreading himselfe like a green Bay-tree then he goes on Mark the perfect man and behold the upright I have considered the estate of wicked men let all observe the estate of the godly Mark the perfect man and behold the upright The works of God expound his Word in his works his Word is often made visible That 's an excellent expression Psal 111. 7. The works of his hands are verity and judgement The acts of God are verity that is God acts his own truths As the works of our hands ought to be the verity and judgements of God every action of a Christian should be one of Christs truths so it is exactly with God himselfe the works of his hands are his owne verity and judgements When we cannot finde the meaning of God in his Word we may finde it out in his works his works are a Comment an infallible Comment upon his Word Yet we must take this Caution the dealings of God in the surface and outward part of them appear sometimes contrary to his Word contrary unto his promise but they only appear so they are never so When a man reads a promise and finds much good stor'd up in it for the righteous and then looks upon the state of the righteous and seeth it full of evill here is a seeming contrariety between the Word and the Works of God but it is onely a seeming contrariety as we shall see somewhat further anon Therefore in that Psalme 111. 2. where he saith The works of God are verity and judgement he addes The works of God are sought out if you will have the verity or judgement that is in the works of God you must not only look upon the outside of them but you must seek them out studie them studie them as you studie the Scriptures and then you will finde out the meaning of them and see how exactly they square with every part of the Word Why doth Eliphaz send Job to experience the ground is this the works of God are like the Word of God therefore if thou canst not make it out by experience from his works thou canst hardly make it out as a Position from his Word that righteous persons are cut off Remember now I pray thee who ever perished being innocent or where were the righteous cut off Here are foure termes to be opened perished cut off innocent righteous We will consider first what we are to understand by perishing and by cutting off Secondly whom we are to understand by innocent and righteus persons And then apply the whole sentence by shewing wherein the truth of this proposition stands that a righteous man or an innocent person cannot perish or be cut off The word which we translate perished hath divers significations 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 First a returning to nothing an utter consumption which is to perish as a beast Psal 49. 20. the Holy Ghost describing a man who is not acquainted with God in his great estate compares him thus Man being in honour and not understanding sc the things of God becommeth like the beasts that perish not that he perisheth as a beast doth but he is like a perishing beast the similitude is not in perishing but in his qualities who perisheth he hath but such qualities he is upon the matter even of as grosse a temper as a perishing beast Secondly to perish signifies to dye The dissolution of man or the dis-union of soule and body Isay 57. 1. is thus
is applyed to the preaching of the Gospel to the scattering of the Word in at the eares and into the hearts of men Luke 8. 5. A sower went out to sow Thirdly sowing is applyed unto the buriall of the dead 1 Cor. 15. 42. that which is sowne in weaknesse the bodies of men are as seed in the earth they shall spring up againe Fourthly sowing is applyed to repenting teares they that sow Psal 126. 5. in teares that is they that goe on repenting and mourning shall reape in joy they shall have sheaves of comfort And fifthly it is applyed generally unto any action good or bad Gal. 6. 8. He that soweth to the flesh shall of the flesh reape corruption and he that soweth to the spirit c. Sowing as ploughing is used in regard of doing good and evill sow to your selves in righteousnesse saith the Prophet and here on the other side They that plough iniquity and sow wickednesse Here is the progresse of sinne sinne goeth on gradually there is not onely a ploughing but a sowing sinne is the seed and there is a seminall vertue in every sin it will spring up againe and bring forth an hundred fold more in misery to the whole man flesh and spirit then ever it gave in delights unto the flesh The word which we translate wickednesse signifies wearinesse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Seminant dolo res Vulg. labour perversenesse because wicked persons weary and toile themselves in serving and satisfying their lusts Numb 23. 21. I have seen no perversenesse in Israel God did not finde them laboriously and industriously wicked at that time To do wickedly is a wearisome imployment a hard labour The vulgar Latine renders it by sorrow and sow sorrowes Reape the same The Apostle 1 Cor. 15. 37. telleth us That the Husbandman soweth not the same body that shall be how then is it said they sow wickednesse and reape the same when they come to the harvest what shall they have The same saith Eliphaz It is true A man that soweth doth not reape the same individually or numerically that is the very same particular seed but he reaps the same specifically the same in kinde that 's the meaning here their crop or harvest shall be like their seed time Gal. 6. 7 Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reape the same in kinde not the same in number Prov. 22. 8. He that soweth iniquity shall reape vanity It is not the sinne it selfe which is reaped but the fruit the product of that sinne that they shall reape the punishment of sin is the fruit of sin and it is called the same Punishment is a visible sinne Thy way and thy doings have procured these things unto thee this is thy wickednesse Jer. 4. 18. The bitter things procured by wickednesse are called wickednesse As the sweet fruits of our good workes are called our works Rev. 14. 14. Blessed are the dead that dye in the Lord for they rest from their labours and their workes follow them their workes follow them how Not their workes in kinde the very same individuall workes which they have done here follow them not for they are transient acts and have no subsistency but the fruits of those workes and the blessings which lie in the promise for such as doe those workes these fruits these blessings follow them the blessings annexed to faith obedience and holinesse these follow them So now when it is said of a wicked man what he ploweth and soweth he reapeth the same it is to be understood of the same thing in the issue and consequents of it those curses those treasures that harvest of wrath which lie in the threatnings against him these are rained downe upon him and are made the portion of his cup. Againe the same that is the same in degree if he have sowne much he shall reape much if he have sowne but little he shall reape but little he shall have his due proportion The justice of God doth neither commute nor compound penalties with wicked men as it will not wrong or overcharge so neither will it favour or spare them in their sinnes God spared not his Sonne when he was in the place of sinners Rom. 8. 32. much lesse will he spare any sinner who is not in his Sonne So much for the opening of these words We shall now observe some things from them Even as I have seen they that plough iniquity Hence we learne first That to be a wicked man is no easie taske he must goe to plough for it It is plowing and you know plowing is laborious Beliâ—l de luci potest à 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 q. e Non 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 q. e. lugam ut significatur impatienâ—ia Jugâ— Hieâ—on yea it is hard labour Wicked men in Scripture are called Sonnes of Belial that is such as will not endure the yoke they will not endure Gods yoke or the yoke of Christ though it be an easie yoke but they are content slavishly to yeeld their otherwise proud and delicate necks to Satans yoke to tugge and sweat at his plough all their dayes There is a promise in the Prophet of a time when Swords shall be turned into plough-shares and speares into pruning-hooks that is men shall leave fighting and goe to working they shall have peace and it is but too too discernable that many would break their swords into these mysticall plough-shares and their spears into sinning-hooks they would have peace why that they might leave fighting and goe to sinning that they might worke wickednesse more quietly and keep close to their trade the plowing of iniquity without disturbance Secondly observe That there is an art in wickednesse it is Plowing or as the word imports an artificiall working Some are curious and exact in shaping polishing and setting off their sin so the Holy Ghost intimates Rev. 21. 27. Whosoever worketh abomination 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and maketh a lye there is but one Verbe in the Greek and so we may reade it fully enough in our language Whosoever worketh abomination and a lye to worke an abomination or a lye is more then to doe an abomination or tell a lye As when we say such a man is a Clockmaker it notes art as well as action So to say such a man is an Abomination-worker or a Lye-maker notes him not only industrious but crafty or as the Prophet speaks wise to doe evill Thirdly note from these metaphors of plowing and sowing That wicked men expect benefit in wayes of sinne and look to be gainers by being evill doers They make iniquity their plough and a mans plough is so much his profit that it is growne into a Proverbe to call that whatsoever it is by which a man makes his living or his profit His plough And when we say there are many candles burning and never a plough going It is to tax unthriftinesse or carelesse spending without honest care of getting Every man tils
double according to her works it may seeme that her harvest of punishment must exceed in Rev. 18. 6. double proportion her seed time of sinning The Psalmist speakes yet higher Render unto our neighbours sevenfold into their bosome their reproach wherewith they have reproached thee O Lord. Render Psal 79. 12. sevenfold that is manifold That number in Scripture multiplies the sense into any number To render sevenfold may be rendred the greatest number I answer Babylons punishment shall be double respecting what Babylon shall have acted but not double respecting what Babylon shall have deserved Give to her double if it be possible let her have as much blood more to drinke as she hath spilt for she deserveth to drinke an hundred times more The blood of Saints is precious blood one drop of the blood of Sion is more worth than a whole ocean of the blood of Babylon therefore give her double though it be more in quantity it is not so much in value And so reward our neighbours that have reproached thee sevenfold it is not sevenfold beyond their deserts for one scorne that a wicked man powreth upon a childe of God and so upon God for that 's the meaning of the Psalme cannot be recompensed with ten thousand reproaches powred upon wicked men Reproach is the due of ungodly men here and everlasting reproach shall be their portion hereafter But the least reproach cast upon God is an infinite wrong and the reproach of his people is so much his that he reckons it as his own And will therefore take away all reproach from his people and render to their unkinde neighbours their reproach sevenfold and that 's but equall into their bosomes Lastly When it is said They shall reape the same We are taught That the punishment of sinne shall be like the sinne in kinde It shall be the same not only in degree but also in likenesse Punishment often beares the image and superscription of sin upon it You may see the fathers face and feature in the childe Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reape saith the Apostle Gal. 6. 7. If a man sowe wheate he shall reape wheate the harvest tells you what kinde of graine was sowed in every feild if a man sowes wheate he shall not reape tares and if a man sowe tares he shall not reape wheate Thus God often returnes the sin of man upon him sin comes to him in its own likenesse and he may reade the name of it stampt upon the affliction or by the judgement inflicted interpret the wickednesse committed This was openly confess'd by Adonibezek Judg. 1. 7. As I have done so God hath requited me just so and what was that He speakes out in the former words Threescore and ten Kings having their thumbes and their great tooes cut off gathered their meate under my Table there was his sowing his reaping was the same They caught him saith the Text and cut off his thumbes and his great toes The very first Law that was formally made and published after the fall was a Law of retaliation or of counterpassion Gen. 6. 9. Whosoever sheddeth mans blood what shall he reape by man shall his blood be shed he must reape the same The Judicials of Moses are plaine for this Exod. 21. 24. Eye for eye and tooth for tooth c. They have moved me to jealousie saith the Lord by that Deut. 32. 21. which is not God and I will move them to jealousie by those who are not a people Like as ye have forsaken me and served strange Gods in your Land so shall ye serve strangers in a Land which is not yours Jer. 5. 19. God payeth them in their owne coine Who so stoppeth his eares at the cry of the poore he also shall cry himselfe but shall not be heard Prov. 21. 13. And so concerning the preaching of the word contemned Zech. 7. 13. Therefore it is come to passe that as he cryed and they would not heare so they cryed and I would not heare saith the Lord of Hosts They reape as they sowed they would not heare that was their sin they shall not be heard that 's the punishment they shall see how good it is to be wilfully deafe when God commands by his being judicially deafe when they complaine The Sodomites had a fire of unnaturall lust among them and God sent a showre of fire unnature to destroy them The Egyptians killed the Israelitish children that was the seed they sowed they reape the same God slew their children even all their first-borne in one night Nadab and Abihu offered strange fire there was their wickednesse they reaped the same God by fire from Heaven in a strange manner slew them in a moment Yea we find the Lord sometimes dealing thus with his own deare servants he will cause them to reape that which they have sowen in kind David had defiled his neighbours wife therefore saith the Lord I will take thy wives from before thine eyes 2 Sam. 12. 11. and give them to thy neighbour and he shall lye with thy wives in the sight of this Sunne Againe The Lord tells him Thou hast slaine Vriah with the sword of the children of Ammon therefore the sword shall never depart from thine house You see here was sword for sword and defilement for defilement even holy David reaped the same which he had sowed It is very remarkeable which is reported in the history of the Church by Socrates concerning Valens the Emperour who was a great persecuter Socrat Histor Eccl. l. 4. c. 3. of the orthodox Christians and a maintainer of Arianisme The story tells us that in his warres against the Gothes he was overthrowne and hiding himselfe in a little cottage the enemy came by burnt it and him together Now see how God in this gave him to reape what he had sowen for when fourscore of the orthodox sayled from Constantinople to Nicomedia to treate with him about the points of Arrianisme and to settle the matter by way of dispute the Emperour hearing of their approach while they were in the haven and before they could come on shore caused the Ships to be fired wherein they were and so consumed them all here was burntng for burning And it is observed in the French Historie that Charles the ninth of France who was the Anno 15 72. contriver of that great Massachre in Paris wherein so many thousand Protestants were forced through a Red sea a sea of blood to their rest in Canaan this bloody King at last dyed himselfe by a strange eruption of blood from all the passages of his body thus he also reaped what he had sowne he had powred out blood and his blood was powred out It were easie to give you plenty of instances bearing witnesse of this accurate justice of God Examples were frequent in Jobs time you see Eliphaz had store of these in his note-booke Even as I have seene they that plow iniquity and
it is well with the righteous vvhen they are in the deeps of affliction for it is but to bring them off their Mountaines of pride that they may be exalted in the strength and love of God even upon the Mountain of his Holinesse and their glory for ever Thirdly Afflictions bring the Saints nearer to God Troubles abroad cause the soule to looke inwards and homewards Is there any hurt in being brought neerer to God It is good for me to draw neer unto God says David and it is good for us to be drawn neer unto God if vve vvill not come of our selves It is a desireable violence vvhich compels us heaven-ward Heaven is but our nearest being unto God and by how much vve are nearer God on earth so much the more vve have of Heaven upon earth Afflictions as in the Prodigals example put us upon thoughts of returing to God and the more vve returne the nearer vve are unto him returning thoughts vvill not rest but under our fathers roofe yea returning thoughts vvill not rest till vve are got into our fathers armes or under the shadow of his wing and this a happy condition indeed As it vvas vvith Noahs Dove Gen. 8. 9. vvhen she vvas sent forth of the Ark she could finde no place for the soal of her foot to rest on she knew not vvhether to go for the vvaters vvere on the face of the whole earth therefore she returneth back and comes hovering about the Ark as desiring to be taken in but after the vvaters vvere asswaged he sent out a Dove vvhich returned to him no more So when it is faire weather in the world calme and serene even Doves keepe off from God and though they goe not quite away from him yet they are not so desirous of comming to him but when we finde a deluge in the world such stormes and tempests of trouble that we know not where to fix our souls for a day then we come as the Dove fluttering about the Ark and cry to our Eternall Noah that we may be near him yea within with him Wicked men like the Raven which Noah sent out first Verse 7. and returned not againe care not for the Ark of Gods presence in the greatest troubles to be neare God is more troublesome to them then all their troubles But Believers like the Dove will look home at least in foul weather God is their chiefe friend at all times and their onely friend in sad times Is there any harme in this Christ sends a storme but to draw his back to the Ark That at the last where he is there they may be also Lastly we may say it is well with the righteous in their worst condition of outward trouble because God is with them It can never be ill with that man with whom God is It is infinitely more to say I will be with thee then to say peace is with thee health is with thee credit is with thee honour is with thee To say God is with thee is all these and infinitely more For in these you have but a particular good in God you have all good when God sayes I will be with you you may make what you will out of it sit down and imagine with your selves whatsoever good you can desire and it is all comprehended in this one word I will be with thee Now God who is with the righteous at all times is most with them in worst times then he saith in a speciall sense I will be with thee When thou passest through the waters I will be with thee When thou walkest thhough the fire thou shalt not be burnt c. Isa 43. 2. When a mighty winde passed before Eliah it is said That God was 1 Kings 19. not in the winde and when the Earthquake shook the Hils and a consuming fire appeared it is said God was not in the Earthquake not in the fire God joynes not with outward troubles for the terror of his people but he joynes with outward troubles for the comfort of his people So he is in the fire and in the winde and in the Earthquake and his presence makes the fire but as a warme Sunne the stormy winde a refreshing gale and the Earthquake hut a pleasant dance So much for the removing of this objection and clearing up the justice of God respecting the afflictions of the righteous If any shall look on the other hand upon wicked men as if God came not home in his justice vvhile he suffers them to prosper First I answer their prosperity serves the providence of God and therefore it doth not crosse his justice That vvas Nebuchadnezars case Isa 10. 6. I will send him saith God against an hypocriticall nation so then he must prosper vvhile he goes upon Gods errand but mark vvhat followes Verse 12. It shall come to passe that when the Lord hath performed his whole worke upon Mount Zion sc by Nebuchadnezars power vvho vvas but doing the just vvork of God vvhile he thought ambitiously of doing his own novv it is no injustice for God to give an instrument power to do his work and vvhen his bloody lust hath performed the holy vvork of God you shall see the Lord will take an order vvith him speedily For then saith the Lord I will punish the fruit of the stout heart of the King of Assyria and the glory of his high looks God let him alone to doe the work he had set him about and it was a righteous work of God upon his people though Nebuchadnezzar went about it wlth a proud and malicious spirit against his people Secondly the prosperity of wicked men serveth them but as an opportunity to shew how wicked and vile they are to act and publish the seven abominations of their own hearts Now as it is one of the greatest mercies under Heaven for a man to have his lusts quite mortified so it is a very great mercy for a man to have his lusts but restrained It is a mercy for a man to have that fuell taken away from his corruptions upon which they feed therefore it must needs be wrath and judgement upon wicked men when God in stead of restraining their lusts giveth them opportunity to inlarge their lusts and layes the reines on their neck to run whether and which way they please without stop or controule This is wrath and high wrath a sore judgement the sorest judgement that can fall upon them wherefore when vve thinke they are in a most prosperous condition they are in the most dreadfull condition they are but filling themselves with sin and fitting themselves for destruction Many a mans lusts are altogether unmortified which yet are chill'd and overawed by judgements And there is more judgement in having liberty to commit one sinne then in being shut up under the iron barres and adamantine necessities of a thousand judgements He that is Satans treasury for sin shall be Gods treasury for wrath Thirdly Their prosperity is the
not commit all to them he would not believe upon them We finde the word belief thus used Exod. 14. 31. when the children of Israel saw the great work that the Lord had wrought in destroying the Egyptians it is said The people feared the Lord and believed the Lord and his servant Moses he puts God and Moses as the joynt object of their faith as they had formerly been of their unbelief Except the servants of the Lord be believed the Lord himselfe is not And when they are believed the Lord is Believe in the Lord your God believe his Prophets saith good Jehosaphat to his people 2 Chron. 20 20. Moses had told them enough of the power of God before he had undertaken they should be delivered but they would not trust Moses upon his word nor would they trust the Word of God yet now when they saw this great deliverance present sight wrought faith for the time to come they perceived by this miracle that the Lord and Moses were to be credited they doubted not to credit them another time Though that faith which comes in at the eyes only seldome goes downe so low as the heart or sees further and longer then the eye Thus we may understand the first part of the Verse He put no trust no belief in his servants he gave no credit to them as knowing perfectly what their nature and power was what both could do that if left by God they would quickly leave God and prove unfaithfull I shall observe one point before I come to the latter part of the Verse for there the suspition of disloyaltie upon the Angels comes more fully to be considered from the title here given to the Angels His servants he put no trust in his servants Angels are the servants of God They are his servants as being altogether at his command and they are his servants as being fully conformable to his commands These great and glorious Spirits come under the same title and denomination with men who dwell in houses of clay servants of God To serve God is not only the duty but it is the honour of the highest creatures It is more honour to serve God then to rule the world The stile of the good Angels is Ministring Spirits Heb. 1. but the stile and title of the evill Angel is Prince of the power of the aire God of this word you would think these were weighty titles Prince of the aire God of the world but the additions diminish their weight yea make them lighter then vanity or rather heavie only with misery There is more glory in being a servant of God than in being a god of the world or a Prince of the power of the aire I might here enlarge my enquiry into the services of Angels in what they are servants and what their offices and duties are but I shall only touch Their service may be considered either in respect of the Church or the enemies of the Church Respecting the Church and people of God they have such services as these First they are as messengers to carry and reveale the minde of God They are as Tutors and instructors of the Churches Dan. 8. 9. God sent his Angel to teach Daniel the mysterie of those visions And Rev. 1. 11. an Angel was sent to instruct John Chap. 22. 16. I Jesus have sent mine Angell to testifie these things in the Churches Secondly they are sent as guardians and protectors of the people of God to take their part and to be on their side Psal 34. 7. The Angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that feare him Psal 91. 11. He giveth his Angels a charge over them lest at any time they should dash their feet against a stone Gen. 32. 2. When Jacob journied it is said the Angels of God met him an army of Angels was his Convoy Gods Hoast coming out for his protection and safeguard and therefore he called the name of that place Nahanaim that is two Hosts or Camps either because the Angels appeared in two bands and so made as it were a guard for Jacob to passe between them Or because the great Angelicall Royall Army quartered and marched with Jacobs little Army and so two confederate Armies appeared in the field together Angels are called Chariots Psal 68. 17. The Chariots of God are twenty thousand even thousands of Angels That is God useth Angels for defence of his people as Chariots in Warr. The ancient Prophets were called the Chariots of Israel 2 King 3. 13. and the Angels are the Chariots of God Our strongest Militia is of Spirits or of men spiritualiz'd Thirdly Angels suggest good things holy thoughts to us If the Devill who is an evill Angel a wicked spirit can suggest evill sinfull filthy thoughts and help on the heart in wickednesse then doubtlesse a good Angel can help on the heart in holinesse in heavenly thoughts and meditations Christ speaks of Judas that Satan had put it into his heart to betray him John 13. and Peter to Ananias Acts 5. Why hath Satan filled thine heart to lye to the Holy Ghost The nature of a good Angel is as fit his power given as great to deale with our spirits as either the nature or the power of an evill Angel That of the Apostle 2 Cor. 11. 14. gives a hint if not a proofe of it where he tels the Corinthians That deceitfull workers transforme themselves into the Apostles of Christ and no marvell for Sathan himselfe is transformed into an Angell of light and when is Satan in this change from an Angel of darknesse to an Angel of light even when He suggests good for evill ends or evill for good ends And if he is called an Angel of light for this reason then Angels of light good Angels suggest good for good ends otherwise Satan could not be said to imitate them in suggesting good for ill ends and under specious pretences of bringing glory to God tempting to transgresse the will of God Fourthly good Angels comfort strengthen and support in times of distresse anguish and trouble an Angel comforted Hagar Gen. 21 and Matth. 4. 10. after Christ had finished his terrible combat with that wicked Angel the good Angels came and ministred unto him Againe when he was in that most bitter Agony in the garden Luke 22. 43. an Angel appeared to him from Heaven strengthning him That which they do to Christ the Head they do to his members in their proportion Their fifth service is to conveigh and carry the soules of departed Saints to Heaven they are Heavenly Porters Luke 16. 22. Lazarus dyed and was carried by the Angels into Abrahams bosome Lastly they shall convocate and gather all the Elect together at the last day Matth. 24. 31. Their services against the wicked and all enemies of the Church have been many and great Angels assist Saints and oppose the opposers of Sion Two Angels were sent upon a message of destruction to Sodome an Angel defeated the
word for a rule but he hath given us examples as a rule to walke by He hath given us his own example that we looking unto him should be holy as he is holy in all manner of conversation be ye holy as I am holy God who is The holy one is the Highest patterne of holinesse And he hath given us his Son who is the expresse image of his person and the brightnesse of his glory to be our example The life of Christ is a faire copy indeed a copy without any blot or uneven letter in it For He also is The Holy one Christ is not only The principle of holinesse but also The patterne of holinesse to his people they that say they abide in him must walke even as he walked His workes excepting those which were miraculous and workes of mediation between God and us are our rule as well as his word Heb. 12. 2. Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith who for the joy that was set before him c. words of neere importance with those in the text to which of the Saints wilt thou turne thee Looke to Jesus when you are in sufferings and have a race of patience to run let your eye alwayes be upon Christ and draw the lines of your carriage both in your spirits and outward actions according to what you see in Him Looke to Him And ver 3. Consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners Which the Apostle Peter 1 Pet. 2. 21. gives us in plaine termes For even hereunto were ye called because Christ also suffered for us leaving an example that we should follow his steps We must follow his steps both in the matter and in the manner of our sufferings therefore Christ saith Take my yoke upon you and learne of me Mat. 11. 29. Christ calls it his yoke it is a yoke of affliction as well as a yoke of instruction And he calls it his yoke not only because he as a Lord layes it upon the necks of others but because he as a servant bore that yoke himselfe therefore he saith Take my yoke upon you and learne of me that is not only take my yoke upon you for the matter but learne of me for the manner how to beare that yoke Besides these grand leading unerring examples of God and Christ the examples of the Saints are also commended to our imitation both in doing and in suffering Whatsoever things were written and examples were written aforetime were written for our instruction Why hath the Holy Ghost set so many pens a worke to write the lives of the Saints why hath he kept a record of them in his own book but for direction to his people in after-times The Lord hath not registred any one act of the Saints but is usefull for us The acts of Noah Abraham Isaac Jacob Samuel David are full of practicall Divinity The sufferings and troubles of these and many others are full if I may so speake of pathical Divinity As the Apostle James his counsell doth more then intimate James 5. 10. Take my brethren the Prophets who have spoken in the Name of the Lord for an example of suffering affliction and of patience Hence those antient Saints and believers Heb. 12. 1. are called a cloud of witnesses A cloud because there is a directive or a leading vertue in them As there was a cloud that went before the children of Israel in the day to leade them so this cloud of witnesses leads us up and downe the wildernesse of our sorrowes and in the darke night of our sufferings Turne you to the Saints to that cloud of witnesses eye them and see what becomes you in sad times They have suffered joyfully the spoiling of their goods suffer you likewise if you come into the hands of spoilers They lived by faith in the midst of a thousand deaths live you likewise by faith in death when ever you come into the hand of that king of terrors And when at any time your own hearts or the wayes of others are out of course check and chide them for and from those disorders by sending them to the practise of the Saints Looke to the Saints from which of the Saints have you learned to be proud and high minded from which of the Saints have you learned to be earthly and covetous from which of the Saints have you learned to seek and set up your selves or to be impatient under the hand of God That man hath reason to suspect he hath done ill who doth that which a good man never did or ever repented the doing of it Observe further When God forsakes a man all the Saints on earth forsake him too Eliphaz lookes upon Job as a man forsaken of God and then he bids him get help if he could among the Saints He that opposes God shall be opposed by all who are Gods There is the same mind in the servants of Christ which is in Christ their Master They love where and whom he loves they hate whom he hates they are ashamed of those of whom Christ is ashamed If God reject a man the Saints will not undertake or answer for him So much of the first Argument ranking Job with the wicked because as Eliphaz thought he could not find any in the rank of Saints like himselfe The second Argument rises to a like conviction because in the same mans opinion he might easily see himselfe so like the wicked For wrath kills the foolish man and envy slayeth the silly one Here are two sinfull passions wrath and envy and here are two sorts of sinfull persons The foolish man and The silly one producing two sad effects which yet in effect are but one The one kills and the other slayes both are deadly and destructive wrath killeth the foolish man and envy slayeth the silly one There are severall sinnes and lusts which accompany as the severall ages and degâ—ees so the Omne pomum omne gâ—anum omne frumentum omne lignum habet vermem suum alius vermis mali alius pyri alius Tritici August severall tempers of men Rashnesse and intemperance hurry and inflame young men ambition blowes up riper yeares and covetousnesse often tyranizeth over old age Wrath takes hold of fools and envy seizeth the silly one These wormes strike the roote of such men and make them wither As there is a speciall worme killing speciall trees and consuming their fruits so there are speciall lusts which like wormes eate out and destroy the life of man wrath killeth the foolish man The foolish man He is A foole who hath not wisedome to direct 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Temerarius audax imprudens percitus ira himselfe but The foole is he who will not follow the counsell and direction of the wise The word signifies not so much a foole who hath no knowledge as a foole who makes no use of the knowledge which he hath such a one is a foolish man indeed Or it
notes a man hasty bold inconsiderate rushing on hand over head without feare or wit A man who either is master but of little knowledge or that which he hath be it little or much masters him It agrees fully in sense and is the same to a letter in found with our English word Evill Such the Prophet Zech. 11. 15. describes Take saith he the instruments of a foolish sheapheard he doth not meane the instruments of a rude and meerely ignorant sheapheard a man that hath no knowledge or learning but of a rash and imprudent shepheard or of a lazie and idle shepheard who though hath knowledge yet knowes not how or hath no heart to improve his knowledge for the good of his flock The Prophet Ezekiel gives us the character of such Chap. 34. 4. The diseased have ye not strengthened nor have ye healed that which was sicke nor bound up that which was broken c. but will ye know what work they made with furie and with crueltie have ye ruled them ye have been moved with fury not with pity and acted by passion not by reason much lesse by grace So in this place the foolish man whom envy slayes is not a meere ignorant one that hath no brains but one hare-brayn'd and uncompos'd Eliphaz hints at Job secretly in this word whom he knew reported for a man of great knowledge and learning according to the learning of those times yet he numbers him with Nâ—n his solum sed calamo iâ—os â—imur in scribendo eumque 〈◊〉 fraâ—gâ—mus pectoâ—â—s penecallo alcato res tesseris cuicunque instrumento quilâ—bet ex quo dâ—fficultatem se paâ—â— arbitratur August â—ra stultitiae comeâ— sooles because he conceived him wrathfull rash intemperate not having any true government of himselfe Anger resteth in the bosome of fooles Eccles 7. 9. A foole is not able to judge of the nature of things or times or occasions and therefore he is angry with every thing that hits not his nature or his humour He will be angry with the Sunne if it shine hotter then he would have it and with the winds if they blow harder then he would have them and with the clouds if they raine longer then serves his turne They that are emptiest of understanding are fullest of will and usually so full of will that we call them will-full Hence unlesse every thing be ready to serve their wills they are ready to dye by the hand or judgement of their passions Wrath kills this foolish man Wrath may be taken here two woyes either for the wrath of God or for the wrath of man In the former sense the meaning is That the wrath of God kills foolish men Which is an undoubted truth but I rather adhere to the latter which gives the meaning thus That the wrath of a foolish man kills himselfe his own wrath is as a knife at his throate and as a sword in his own bowels The word which we translate wrath signifies indignation anger teastinesse or touchinesse Properly wrath is anger inveterate anger is a short fury and wrath is a long anger when a man is set upon 't when his spirit is steeped and soak't in anger then 't is wrath Esau raked up the burning coales of his anger in the ashes till his Fathers Funerall The time of mourning for my father will shortly come then will I slay my brother But our word rather notes a servent heate and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 distemper of spirit presently breaking forth or an extreame vexation fretting and disquieting us within As Psal 112. 10. The wicked shall see it and be grieved that is he shall have secret indignation in himselfe to see matters goe so He shall gnash with his teeth and melt away Gnashing of the teeth is caused by vexing of the heart And therefore it followes he melts away which notes melting is from heate an extreame heate within The sense is very suitable to this of Eliphaz wrath slayeth the foolish or wrath makes him melt away it melts his grease with chafing as we say of a man furiously vext Hence that deplorable condition of the damned who are cast out of the presence of God for ever is described by weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth which imports not onely paine but extreame vexing at or in themselves Those fooles shall be slaine for ever with their own wrath as well as with the wrath of God Wrath killeth c. But how doth wrath kill a foolish man his wrath sometimes drawes his sword and kils others but is his wrath as a sword to kill himselfe Many like Simeon and Levi in their anger have slaine a man but that the anger of a man should slay himselfe may seeme strange The passion of vvrath is such an engine as recoyles upon him that uses or discharges it As the desire of the slothfull killeth him Prov. 21. 25. so the wrath of a foolish man kils him that place enlightens this how comes desire to stay the slothfull thus A man slothfull in action is full of desires and quick in his affections after many good things he would faine have them he longs for them but the man is so extreame lazie that he will not stirre hand or foot to get the things which he desires and so he pines away with wishing and woulding and dies with griefe because desire is not satisfied So in like manner wrath is said to slay a man first because it thrusts him headlong upon such things as are his death he runnes wilfully upon his own death sometimes by the dangerousnesse of the action whence casuall suddaine death surprises him sometime by the unlawfulnesse of the action which brings him to a legall or judiciary death Secondly his wrath is said to kill him because his wrath is so vexations to him that it makes his life a continuall death to him and at last so wearieth him out and wasts his spirits that he dyes for very griefe and so at once commits a three-fold murder First he murders him intentionally against whom he is wroth Secondly he really murders his own body and thirdly he meritoriously murders his soule for ever except the Lord be more mercifull then he hath been wrathfull and the death of Christ heal those wounds by which he would have procured the death of others and hath as much as in him lies procured his own And envie slayeth the silly one These two expressions meet neere upon a sense Envy is the trouble which a man conceives in himselfe at the good which another receives This disease gets in at the eyes and eares or is occasioned by seeing or hearing of our neighbours blessings In the 1 Joh. 2. All the lusts in the world are reduced to three heads The lust of the eyes the lust of the flesh and the pride of life Envy is the chiefest lust of the eyes and it is properly called the lust of the eye because a man seldom envieth another untill
or commanding stamps justice upon it as is clear in the case of Abrahams call to sacrifice his son and the Israelites carrying away the jewels of the Aegyptians If then the act of God whose will is the supream law makes that lawfull which according to the common rule is unlawfull how much more doth the act of God make that great which in ordinary proportion is accounted small Againe When it is said God doth great things we must not understand it as if God dealt not about little things or as if he let the small matters of the world passe and did not meddle with them Great in this place is not exclusive of Little for he doth not onely great but small even the smallest things The Heathens said their Jupiter had no leisure to be present at the doing of small Non vacat exignis rebus adesse Jovi things or it did not become him to attend them God attendeth the doing of small things and it is his honour to doe so the falling of a Sparrow to the ground is one of the smallest things that is yet that is not without the providence of God the haires of our head are small things yet as not too many so not too small for the great God to take notice of Christ assures us this The very haires of your head are all numbred Mat. 10. 29 30. We ought highly to adore and reverence the power and inspection of God about the lowest the meanest things and actions Is it not with the great God as with great men or as it was with that great man Moses who had such a burthen of businesse in the government of that people upon his shoulders that he could not bear it therefore his Father in law adviseth him to call in the aide of others and divide the work But how The great matters the weighty and knotty controversies must be brought to Moses but the petty differences and lesser causes are transmitted and handed over to inferiour judges And it shall be that every great matter they shall bring unto thee but every small matter they shall judge Exod. 18. 22. But God the great Judge of Heaven and earth hath not onely the great and weighty but small matters brought unto him the least motions of the creature are heard and resolved disposed and guided by his wisdome and power You will say What is this greatnesse and what are these great things I shall hint an answer to both for the clearing of the words There is a two-fold greatnesse upon the works of God There is so we may distinguish First the greatnesse of quantity Secondly the greatnesse of quality or vertue That work of God which is greatest in the bulk or quantity of it is the work of Creation How spacious huge and mighty a fabrique is Heaven and earth with all things compacted and comprehended in their circumference And in this work so vast for quantity what admirable qualities are every where intermixt Matter and forme power and order quantity and quality are so equally ballanced that no eye can discerne or judgement of man determine which weighes most in this mighty work Yet among these works of God some are called great in regard of quality rather then of quantity As it is said Gen. 1. 16. That God made two great lights the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night Sunne and Moone these are great lights not that there are no lights great but these or that both these are greater then all other heavenly lights for many Stars are greater then the Moon as the doctrine and observation of Astronomers assures us but the lesser of these is great in regard of light and influence excellency and usefulnesse to the world And as to these works of creation so the works of providence are great works When God destroyes great enemies the greatnesse of his work is proclaimed When great Babylon or Babylon the great shall be destroyed the Saints song of triumph shall be Great and marvellous are thy works Lord God Almighty just and true are thy wayes thou King of Saints Rev. 15. 3. Great and marvellous works why Because thou hast destroyed great Babylon and hast executed great judgement and powred out great wrath So great works of mercy and deliverance to his people are cryed up with admiration And hath given us such a deliverance as this saith Ezra Chap. 9. 13. when the Jewes returned from their captivity out of Babylon That mercy was a kind of miracle that deliverance a wonder and therefore he mentions it in termes of admiration Such deliverance as this How great So great that he had neither words to express nor example to paralell it but lets it stand nakedly by it selfe in its native glory Such deliverance as this The Spirituall works of God are yet far greater the work of redemption is called a great salvation the conversion and justification of a sinner the pardon of our sinnes and the purifying of our nature are works as high above creation and providence as the Heavens are in comparison of the earth Take two or three Corolaries or Deductions from hence As first It is the property of God to doe great things And because it is his property he can as easily doe great things as small things Among men Great spirits count nothing great A great spirit swallowes and overcomes all difficulties Much more is it so with the great God who is a Spirit all Spirit and the father of spirits To the great God there is nothing great He can as easily doe the greatest as the least 1 Sam 14. 6. 2 Chron. 14. There Animo magâ—â— nihil magnum is no restraint to the Lord to save with few or by many or it is nothing with thee to help whether with many or with them that have no power It is not so much as the dust of the ballance with God to turne the scale of victory in battell whether there be more or lesse Seeing all Nations before him are but as the dust of the ballance as nothing yea lesse then nothing So that whether you put him upon any great work or small work you put the Lord to no more stresse to no more paines in the one then in the other for he doth great things and to doe them is his property not his study his nature not his labour He needs not make provisions or preparations for what he would have done the same act by which he wills the doing of a thing doth it if he wills What great things hath the Lord done in our dayes We may say as the Virgin Luke 1. 49. He that is Mighty hath done to us great things and Holy is his Name and as they Acts 2. 11. We have both heard and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Magnalia Dei seen the great things of God done amongst us and I believe greater things are yet to be done It was a great work at the beginning
of time to make Heaven and earth and will it not be a great work to shake Heaven and earth That God hath said he will doe before the end of time Yet once it is a little while and I will shake the Heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land Hag. 2. 6. The words following seem to interpret this earthquake and Heaven-quake I will shake all Nations Againe It was a great work to make the old Heaven and earth and will it not be a great work to make a new Heaven and a new earth That is the businesse which God is about in these letter days as he promised Isa 65. 17. Behold I create a new heaven and a new earth what is that Jerusalem a praise and her people a joy When God reformeth the face of his Church and settles the affaires of Kingdomes and Common-wealths he makes new Heavens and a new Earth And if it be the property of God to doe great things then it is a duty in us to expect great things We ought to look for such things as come up to and answer the power and greatness of God we dishonour and as it were humble God when we look onely for low and meane things Great expectations from God honour the greatnesse of God As the Lord expects to receive the greatest services from us because he is a great King Mal. 1. 14. So we ought to expect that we shall receive the greatest mercies from the Lord because he is a great King It dishonours God as much and more when we believe little as when we doe little A great King thinks himselfe dishonoured if you aske him a petty suite he looks more what becomes him to give or doe in bounty then the petitioner to aske in necessity The Great Alexander could tell his suiter whom he had more astonisht then relieved with his favour That though the thing might be too great for him to receive yet it was not too great for Alexander to give If dust and ashes can speake and think at this rate O how large is the heart of God! Then it is not onely our priviledge but our duty to aske and believe great things we ought to have a great faith because God doth great things Is it becomming to have a great God and a little faith To have a God that doth great things and we to be a people his people that cannot believe great things nay To have a God who can easily doe great things and we a people that can hardly believe small things How unbecoming if some small thing be to be done then usually faith is upon the wing but if it be a great thing then faith is clogg'd her wings are clipt and we at a stand why should it be said unto us as Christ said unto his Disciples O ye of little faith It may be as dangerous to us if not as sinfull not to believe the day of great things as to despise the â—ay of small things Why should not our faith in a holy scorne baffle the greatest difficulties in that language of the Prophet Zech. 4. 7. Who art thou O great Mountaine before Zerubbabell thou shalt become a plaine There is another usefull consequence from this truth He that doth great works ought to have great praises As we ought to have great faith that he will doe great things so he ought to have great acknowledgments when he hath done great things Shall God doe great things for us and shall we give him some poor leane starven sacrifices of praise It is very observable that as soon as the Prophet had described the Lord in his greatnesse Isa 40. 15. he adds in the very next verse And Lebanon is not sufficient to burne nor the beasts thereof sufficient for a burnt Offering That is no services are great enough for this great God Lebanon abounded in spices for Incense and perfume it abounded with cattell for Sacrifice and burnt offerings To say that Lebanon had not spice enough to burne for incense nor beasts enough to burne for Sacrifice shews the Lord far exalted in greatnesse above all the praises and holy services of his people Lastly seeing God doth great works for us let us shew great zeale for great love unto the Lord. We should aime at the doing of great things for God seeing God indeed doth great things for us So much of the first Attribute of the works of God Who doth great things And unsearchable The Hebrew is and no search The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imports the search of those things which are most abstruce and secret As the heart which the Lord onely can search Jer. 17. 15. The heart lies too low not onely for the eye but for the understanding of man Hence it is used Psal 95. 4. to note the Foundations or deep places of the earth because they cannot be known but by deep searchings or rather because they are beyond the deepest Penetralia terrae ut Aben Ezra explicat quae sciâ—i nequeunt nisi exquisita per scrutatione vel potiùs quòd homini minimè sunt perscutabilia Deo autuÌ„ in prepatulo Buxtorf search of man And the same phrase we find Psal 145. 3. Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised and his greatnesse is unsearchable or according to the letter of his greatnesse no search as when the Psalmist speaks of the greatnesse of God in his nature and essence presently he adds and of his greatnesse there is no search so here when Eliphaz speaks of the greatnesse of God in his works the next word is they are unsearchable As God in himselfe is great and of his greatnesse there is no search so many of the works of God are so great that of their greatnes there is no search that is you cannot find out their greatnesse by any search God is in working and so are men the hand cannot act beyond the head as he is in understanding There is no searching of his understanding Isa 40. 28. Therefore there is none of his working This unsearchablenesse of the works of God may be considered two wayes 1. As that which cannot be found by enquirie 2. As that which ought not to be found or enquired There are some works of God which are not to be searched into Arcana imperij they are to be adored by believing not to be pryed into by searching and in that sence they are called unsearchable Rom. 11. 33. O the depth of the riches both of the wisdome of and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgements Many of his judgements that is his works of judgement are so unsearchable that it is not industry or duty but presumption to search into them As those unspeakable words which Paul heard in the third heavens were such as 2 Cor. 12. 4. is not lawfull for a man to utter so unsearchable judgements may be interpreted such as is not lawfull for a man to search Great Princes will
not have all their actions scann'd at least not by all They keep state in their works If all a mans actions be levell to the lowest his person will be so too The reason why the works of Antichrist were to be so mysterious and miraculous is because he was to be adored and Godded to be exalted above all in man that is called God or that is worshipped 2 Thes 2. 4. They who aspire to divine honour have or at least pretend to have many secrets Because secret things belong unto God things revealed unto man Deut. 29. 29. And as the Angell at once answers and reproves Manoah Judg. 13. 18. Why askest thou after my name seeing it is secret or wonderfull As if he had said thou must not enquire after my name for it is a secret Such prying into the works of God is as dangerous as prying into the Arke of God 1 Sam. 6. 19. It were more profitable for us and more honourable to God if we did search our own secret wayes more and Gods lesse There are other works of God which cannot be searched yet we may and ought to search them It is our duty to study them though we cannot finde them We may search and finde many of the workes of God with our sences there are others which we cannot finde though we search for them with our reason and understanding As some parts of the word of God 2 Pet. 3. 16. So some part of his works are so hard to be understood that unstable men wrest them to their own destruction The minde of God is legible in very many of his works and we may read them without a Comment or Interpreter Other of his works are mysterious and aenigmaticall very riddles insomuch that if an ordinary man looking on them should be questioned Vnderstandest thou what thou seest he must answer as the Eunuch did Phillip How can I except some man teach me And these works are unsearchable two ways First in regard of the manner of doing we cannot finde out the wayes and contrivances of Gods work His wayes are in the deep and his foot-steps are not known saith the Psalmist that is the way which God goes to the accomplishing of his ends are oftentimes like steps upon the water which leave no impression or track behind them Secondly his works are unsearchable in their causes or ends what it is which God aimes at or intends what moves or provokes him to such a course is usually a secret He doth such things as no man can give an account of or render a reason why Peter knew not how to construe or expound that work of Christ John 13. when he took a Towell with a bason of water to wash his feet Therefore Christ tells him What I doe thou knowest not that is thou knowest not what moves me to doe this for his eye taught him what Christ did but thou shalt know hereafter In due time this shall be interpreted to thee and thou shalt know the reason why I did this But it is said and that may be an objection against both text and Exposition Psal 111. 2. The workes of the Lord are great sought out of all those that have plesure therein To seek out notes a full discovery And in Psal 106. 7. Failing in this is charged upon the fathers and confessed by the children as a fault Our fathers understood not thy wonders that is the great things which God did for them in Aegypt How then is it said here The works of the Lord are great and unsearchable To clear this First I say there are some great works of God which are easie and plaine And it is our duty to be acquainted with and learned in these works of God as well as in the word of God Secondly those works whose text is hard we must search and labour to expound them so as to further duty but not to feed our curiosity We may search them with submission to the mind of God not for satisfaction onely to our own minds We may search with desire to honour God but not to humour our selves We may search them to make us more holy though not barely to make us more knowing Take two Corolaries from this First if the works of God are unsearchable then how unsearchable are the counsells of God the deep and secret counsels of God! The works of God are the cousells of God made visible Every work of God is the bringing of some counsell of God to light Now if we are not able to find out his counsells when they are made visible in his works how shall we find out his counsells when they lye hidden in his breast Secondly If the works of God are unsearchable then we are to submit unto the dispensations of God whatsoever they are though we are not able according to reason to give an account of them though we cannot search out either the manner how or the cause for which they were done yet we must reverence them And what we cannot believe by knowing we must know by believing It is our duty not onely to winke and believe shut our eyes and believe or believe when we cannot see but we must often believe where knowledge is shut out believe when we cannot understand Abraham by faith followed the call of God not knowing whether he went Heb. 11. 8. It is dangerous to follow men blind-fold how seeing soever those men are but it is safe and our duty to follow God blindfold how seeing soever we think our selves to be We must not be displeased as Joseph was at Jacob his Father Gen. 48. 17. when we see God laying his right hand upon Ephraim and his left upon Manasses doing things crosse to our thoughts much lesse may we take upon us to direct the hand of God as Joseph would Jacobs where we please The Lord knows as Jacob answered Joseph what he doth and it becomes us to acquiesce in what he doth though we know it not Some Romish Parasites have said of the Pope That if he should carry thousands to hell along with him there is no man must say to him Sir why doe you so They adore him so in the unsearchablenesse of his wayes and doings that it is enough for them if he doth them This abominable flattery of that Man of Sin is a sober truth concerning the holy God Though God east thousands of soules into hell no man may say to him what dost thou And though God turne Kingdomes upside down though he send great afflictions upon his own people and make them a reproach unto the Heathen though he give them up unto the power of the adversary and make all their enemies to rejoyce yet no man may say unto God why doe you thus His works are unsearchable It is beyond the line of a creature to put any question A why or A wherefore about the work of the Greatour Shall the thing formed say unto him that formes it why hast thou made me
thus Hath not the Potter power over his clay Some think they could doe things better then God hath done or at least that God might have done better if they had the power in their hands things should not goe thus and thus What an insufferable indignity is this to the wisdome and power of God that He whose works are unsearchable should be made accountable for his works That of Augustine when he was in a deep meditation about the nature of God may well be applied to the works of God who walking by the sea side in deepe thoughts of God either heard this voyce or was filled with this thought That he might as soone empty the sea with or comprehend the Ocean in one of those little cockle-shels which lay on the shore as with the narrow vessell of his Spirit comprehend the infinite greatnesse of the God of Spirits Marvellous things * Inscrutabile mirabile differunt inscrutabile est qued laâ—et perquiri non potest Miâ—abile est quod ipsum qâ—idem apparet sed causa ejus perquiri non potest Aquin. in loc Unsearchable things and marvellous differ thus Those things are unsearchable which lie hid and cannot be found that is a marvell whose cause cannot be found though 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it selfe be not hid This is the third adjunct or attribute of the works of God The word is derived from a root which signifies Seperated Disjoyned or Divided And marvellous things are exprest by that word because marvels or wonders are seperated or Separatus disjunctus Hinc significat mirabâ—lia quia talia sunt à nobis separata captum su erant ita ut ratione quis asse qui aut re praestare â—equeat removed from us three degrees at least They are seperated First from our knowledge or reason Secondly from our sense not that marvels are invisible marvels and miracles are wrought to be seen and the use of them lies in this from the sence to confirme faith or to convince of unbeliefe Which by the way quite overthrowes the Popish refuge of a miracle in their supposed transubstantiation of the bread at the Eucharist who tell us of a miracle but can shew us none But though in all miracles and marvails the thing wrought is plain to the sences yet both the power and manner of doing it are removed from the sences The marvell wrought is seene but the working of the marvell is not seen Thirdly Marvels are seperated or removed from our imitation we cannot doe such things The Lord stands alone working wonders They are seperated part and portion for God himself The Egyptian Sorcerers seemed to doe by their devillish inchantments what Moses did by the command and power of God But at the best they did but seeme to doe like Moses and presently they could not so much as seeme Exod. 8. 18. And the Magicians did so that is they attempted to doe so but they could not They that worke by the devils art or power cannot worke long They will quickly be at A Could not Both their religions and their miraculous workes are at best but in appearance at last they will not so much as appeare In these three respects marvels are rightly called separate Further the word also signifies sometimes A hard or a difficult thing because those things that are very hard and difficult have somewhat of wonder in them and cause us to wonder at them Deut. 17. 8. If a matter come which is too hard the word is which is too marvellous and wonderfull for thee c. And Gen. 18. 14. Is any thing too hard for me saith God the word is Is any thing wonderfull to me Nothing is wonderfull to us but that which is too hard for us There is nothing wonderfull to God who doth all wonders and is himselfe all Wonder It hath beene said concerning those lovers of and searchers after secret wisedome called Philosophers that it doth not become a Philosopher to wonder For admiration is usually the daughter of ignorance we marvell at most things because we know the causes of few things It was therefore a shame for a Philosopher to wonder because it betrayed his ignorance who would be thought studied in yea a master of all causes and able to give a reason of all things in nature But it is most certaine the great God never marvelleth at any thing For is any thing too hard for me saith the Lord. Wonders are things too hard for us and the same word signifies a wonder and a thing too hard There are three words of neare alliancec in the Hebrew Signes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Miracles and Mervails And they may be distinguisht thus A Signe is the representation of a thing present or before us A Miracle or Portentum as contra-distinct from the former shews forth somewhat future or that is to come A Mervaile as differing from both is any act of providence secret or separate from us in the manner of doing or producing it a thing to us unsearchable so Exod. 33. 16. Wherein shall it be knowne that I and thy people have found grace in thy sight saith Moses Is it not in that thou goest with us So shall we be separated I and thy people So we translate it or made wonderfull that is if thou goest along with us thou wilt doe such marvails for us as will make a difference betweene us and all the people in the world we shall be a people marvell'd at all the world over or a spectacle to the world Angels and Men. The presence of God with a people is their difference or will make them differ from all people with whom God is not under the Notion of Favour and Protection present Againe Marvels are taken sometimes for Miracles which are meerely and purely supernaturall For in ordinary acceptation of the word a Marvell is only the heightning and sublimating of nature or acting in the highest Spheare of nature but a Miracle is a crossing or a contradicting of nature A worke altogether above yea against Nature Now we are not to take marvels here in that strict sense for miracles for the great works of God are call'd marvels or wonders which yet are but either the ordinary constitutions of Nature or the extraordinary motions of nature as Psal 136. 4. O give thanks to the Lord to him who alone doth great wonders What are these In the 5 6 and 7. verses instances are given in naturall things as making the heavens and stretching out the earth above the waters The making of those great lights the Sun and Moon * Mirabilior est grani in terra multiplâ—catio quam illa quinque Panum August Tâ—act 24 in Joh in Quicquid mirabile fit in mundo profectò minus est quà m totus hic mundus Qua â—vis ilaque miracula visibiliuÌ„ naturaâ—um videndi assiduitate vile scunt tamen cum ea sapienter intuemur
inusitatissimis raâ—â—ssimisque majora sunt August l. 5. de Civ Dei cap 12. One of the Ancients discoursing upon that miracle in the Gospell The multiplying the loaves observeth that in naturall things there are very great wonders though we lightly passe them by They were astonished to see the loaves multiplying while they were eating To see bread grow upon the Table or between their Teeth made all wonder but there is as great a miracle wrought every yeare and no man takes notice of it That is when Corne cast into the ground multiplies thirty sixty a hundred-fold It is saith he a greater miracle for corne to multiply in the earth then for loaves to multiply on the Table And he makes a like Conclusion in his Booke of the City of God Whatsoever is wonderfull in the world is not so great a wonder as the world Yet men rarely wonder at the making of the world the Earth the Heavens the Sea the Aire every creature in them exceed in wonders the things we wonder at Ordinary works of Nature are marvellous First because they proceed from a divine power 2. Because man is posed to give a reason of most of them Canst thou tell how the bones grow in her that is with child saith the Preacher The bringing of an Infant alive from the Wombe is a wonder as well as the raising of a man from the dead And the budding of a Tree as well as the budding of Aarons Rod †Per multa sunt quae admirari nonsolemus propterea quod vulgo quotidieque fiunt Renova in solita commovetur animus The usualnesse of the one and the rarenesse of the other is though not the only yet the greatest difference And as the ordinary workes of Creation in making so of Providence in governing the world are full of wonders though they passe unobserved Such Eliphaz takes notice of in the words following The disappointing of craftie oppressors and the deliverance of the poore When God shall destroy Babylon the Song prepared is Great and wonderfull are thy works and Exod. 15. 11. from whence that is taken Who is like unto thee O God! Who is like unto thee glorious in holinesse fearefull in praises doing wonders The wonder was a deliverance the wonderfull deliverance of his people from Egypt and through the red Sea Works of judgement are often called works of wonder Deut 28. 59. I will make thy plagues wonderfull and Isa 28. 21. The Lord shall rise up as in Meunt Perazim he shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon that he may doe his worke his strange worke and bring to passe his act bis strange act What act was this An act of judgement upon his and his peoples enemies as is clear 2 Sa. 5. 20. and Josh 10. 12. where we may reade what God did in Mount Perazim and in the valley of Gibeon strange works indeed And these works of God are called marvellous not onely when God is in them alone and acts without the intervention of the creature but when he act with the creature above the strength of a creature so that little of the creature appeares in the act this also is a marvell What God doth more by a man then man can doe whether in strength or wisdome ordinarily assisted so much of a wonder shewes it selfe in what man doth And therefore no man is ordinarily to attempt any thing beyond his strength for that is to tempt God and call him to worke a miracle at least a wonder for us Lord saith David Psal 131. 1. Mine heart is not Non mae exâ—uli ad ea quae maeas vires aut ingenium suâ—eraret Eleganter Thâ—odoretus Meipsum meâ—â—ebaâ— quae me excedunt non aggrossus sum haughty nor mine eyes loftie neither doe I exercise my selfe in great matters or in things too high for me The word is in things too wonderfull for me that is I doe not ordinarily put my selfe upon things which are extraordinary or beyond my strength and parts I measure-my undertakings and my abilities together and would keepe them even I doe not put God upon doing wonders every day therefore I set my selfe to those things which are according to the line of man If God call us to it we may expect a miracle but we must not call God to worke miracles for us or with us I doe not exercise my selfe in matters too high for me Miracles or marvels are not every dayes exercise We ought rather to be above our worke or any of our designes then below them but we must be sure they are not above us It is the safest and holiest way for man in all his actions to be upon a levell We cannot but displease God and hurt our selves by clambering It is but sometimes that rhe Lord will work wonders to releeve our necessities and help our faith but he will never unlesse in wrath work wonders to please our humors or comply with our ambition Hence observe First When we see marvels done we must acknowledgc the hand of God Marvels are proper unto God Psal 75. 1. In that thy Name is neere thy wonderous works declare Wonderous works are an argument that God is neere When wonders are among us we may know who is among us and if so then this is a time wherein God is seene among us We may well apply that of the Psalmist to our selves Marvellous things hath the Lord done in our sight in Ireland and in the Fields of England Psal 78. 12. Mervails are rare things things seldome done or seene We have things amongst us which were never done or seene before in our Nation A Parliament which cannot be legally dissolved but by its own Vote An Assembly where neither Diocesan Bishops nor Deane as such can Vote The three Kingdomes of England Scotland and Ireland entred into a solemn Covenant approved by the Assemblies and authorized by the Parliaments of two Kingdomes May we not conclude of these in the language of the Prophet Who hath heard such a thing who hath seen such things Isay 66. 8 Surely we may say as Moses to Israel Deut. 4. 34. Hath God assayed to goe and take him a Nation from the middest of another Nation by temptation by signes and by wonders and by war and by a mighty hand and by a stretched out arme and by great terrors according to all that the Lord our God doth for us in England before our eyes To take a Nation out of the midst of a Nation is our case If England finding as now it doth her children strugling in her wombe should goe enquire of the Lord as Rebecca did Gen. 25. 22. why is it thus The Lord may answere as he did to her Two Nations are in thy wombe and two manner of people shall be separated frem thee A Nation fearing God and a Nation blaspheming God a Nation seeking Reformation and a Nation opposing Reformation Secondly If God work mervailes and we believe him not
after and he may say Can I any more doe those things I am not what I was my power is gone But come to God after he hath done this or that and a thousand great things he will not say can I helpe you any more can I deliver you any more can I destroy your enemies can I discover their plots and counsels any more yes Lord as thy works are unsearchable so they are innumerable and thou canst doe them for evermore The Lord saith sometime to a people as he did to Israel Judg. 10. 13. in anger I will deliver you no more But he never saith to any people out of weaknesse I can deliver you no more Psal 78. The people provoked God by making a question of this ver 20. Behold say they he smote the rock that the waters gushed out and the streames overflowed we acknowledge that God hath done a marvell but can he give bread also can he provide flesh for his people surely he cannot doe this marvell also what saith the text The Lord heard this and was wroth so a fire was kindled against Jacob and anger also came up against Israel What doe you think that I can doe but one great thing that I have but one blessing but one deliverance but one wonder Know that I who smote the rock can provide you flesh I who gave you water can give you bread I who have discovered one wicked plot of the enemy can discover all I who have given you one victory can give you a thousand I who have given you one deliverance can give you innumerable deliverances Therefore take heed of setting bounds to God of limiting the Holy one of Israel Men love not to be limited but God ought not We at once provoke and dishonour the Lord by thinking that our wants can renew faster then his supplies or that our innumerable evills shall not find innumerable good things to ballance or remove them from the hand of God We weary men when we come often to them to doe great things for us yea to come often for small matters will weary men But we never weary the Lord by comming often we weary God only when we will not come often How doth the Prophet not only complaine but expostulate because that unbelieving King wearied God take it with reverence by not setting him aworke and that about the hardest and most knotty peece of work that can be the working of a miracle and that as hard a one as himselfe would aske either in the depth beneath or in the height above Is it a small thing with you to weary men but will ye weary my God also Isa 7. 13. It is no wearinesse to God to doe innumerable miracles for us but he is weary when we will not believe he can doe them To be distrusted the doing of one is more laborious to God then to doe a million of Miracles To conclude this take heed above all that you limit not God in works of spirituall mercy As to feare to aske pardon of sin because ye have asked it often His great works of forgivenesse are as much without number as any of his works He multiplies to pardon saith the Prophet Isa 55. 7. And when the people of Israel had committed a new sin it is admirable to reade by what argument Moses moves the Lord for pardon It is not this as usually with men Lord this is the first fault Lord thou hast not been often troubled to signe their pardon But pardon I beseech thee the iniquity of this people as thou hast forgiven this people from Egypt untill now Numb 14. 19. as if he had said Lord because thou hast pardoned them so often therefore I beseech thee pardon them now It is a most wicked argument to move our hearts to sin because God will pardon often but when we have sinned it is a holy argument to move God to pardon againe because he hath pardoned often before For he pardons without number Secondly Seeing God doth innumerable great things for us let not us be satisfied in doing a few things at the command and for the glory of God Let us continue in acts of holinesse charity humility zeale and thankfulnesse without number Let us never stand reckoning our duties when we heare the mercies of God are beyond reckoning It is a noble rule in our friendship with men That curtesies must not be counted I am sure it is a holy rule in our obedience to God That duties must not be counted God hath no need of any one of our good works but he will not beare it if we think we have done enow or can doe too many Let out Amicitia non est reducenda ad ealculos Obediantia non est reducenda ad calculos hearts be like the heart of God as he doth great things for us let us doe in what we are able great things for God and good things for one another without number So much in generall of the proofe of Gods power by the Greatnesse c. of his works JOB Chap. 5. Vers 10 11 12. Who giveth raine upon the earth and sendeth waters upon the fields To set upon high those that be low that those which mourne may be exalted to safty He disappointeth the devices of the crafty so that their hands cannot perform their enterprise c. THis Context from the 9. to the 17. verse containes the second argument by which Eliphaz strengthens his exhortation upon Job to seek unto God The argument speakes to this efect He is to be sought and unto him our cause is to be committed who is of absolute power infinite in wisedome and goodnesse But such is God Therefore seeke to him and commit thy cause unto him That God is of infinite power wisedome c. was proved in generall at the 9. verse by those foure adjuncts of his works Great unsearchable marvellous and without number And now at the 10. verse he begins his proofe by an enumeration of the particular effects of Gods power wisedome and goodnesse The first instance is in naturall things God doth great things and unsearchable marvellous things without number And would you know what those things are You need not goe farre to enquire there are things very neere unto us and very common among us which yet if they be well looked unto will advance the power wisedome and goodnesse of God Every shower of raine drops down this truth that God doth great things He giveth raine upon the earth and sendeth waters upon the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Generale nomen est ad quamcunque plaviam Non desunt qui puâ—ant cognationeÌ„ habere cum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quod est humectari quòd pluvia liquesanâ—at humectet dissolvat dura Mercer fields There is not any difficulty about the meaning of these words which calls for stay in opening of them Therefore in briefe The Hebrew word for Raine in out letters Matar is so neere in
which God raiseth his people shall be if he pleases like a mountain of Adamant which cannot be melted or like mount Sion which cannot be removed A high place is seldome a safe place All high things are tottering Nâ—tare solent excelsa omnia and the more high the more tottering Then how unsearchable is the wisdome how great the power of God who can set his people very high and yet very safe who can make a man stand as firme and steady upon the highest pinnacle of honour as upon a levell ground or in a valley of the lowest estate and condition He exalts to safety And hence wee may draw downe a difference between Gods exaltation of his own people and the exaltation of his enemies and wicked ones Wicked men are oft times exalted and God exalts them though they know it not but how He exalts them to a high place but doth exalt them to a safe place No the Psalmist after a long temptation concludes Thou hast set them in slippery places thou castest them downe into destruction how are they brought into desolation as in a mement Psal 73. 18 19. Haman was exalted high but not in safety Many are exalted as Jezabel exalted Naboth high among the people but it was to stone him rather then to honour him It is said of Pharaoh he lifted up the head of his chiefe Baker he lifted up his head out of prison indeed but he lifted up his head to the gallowes also he lifted him out of prison but it was unto his death Such is the lifting up of wicked men they may be set on high but they are never set in safety How many have we seen suddenly advanced and as suddenly depress'd We are never safe but where God sets us or while God holds us in his hand Fourthly observe It is a wonder a wonderfull work of God to exalt those that are low and set mourners in safety The 107 Psalme is a Psalme recounting the wonderfull works of God O that men would praise the Lord for his wonderfull works is the burthen of that holy song And all those wonders conclude in this ver 39. 40. Againe they are minished and brought low through oppression affliction and sorrow what then He powreth contempt upon Princes c. yet setteth he the poore on high from affliction and maketh him families like a flock How wonderfull is this that the Lord will give Kings for the ransome of his people and to raise his poore will powre contempt upon Princes The highest must downe rather then his low ones shall not be set on high There are foure things which encrease this wonder and make it exceeding wonderfull First These poore have no strength Deut. 32. 36. He sees that their strength is gone Secondly Many times they have no hope no faith When the Son of Man comes shall he finde among low ones faith this faith to be exalted upon the earth Luk. 18. 8. Thirdly They have many enemies subtill enemies powerfull enemies confident enemies enemies above hope arrived at assurance that they shall keep poore ones at an under for ever Lord saith David how many are they that trouble me So many they were that he could not tell how many Fourthly They are supposed to have no friends none to appeare for them Let us persecute and take him say they for there is Psal 71. 11. none to deliver him Not a man no nor God as they conclude They say of my soule there is no help for him in his God I need not say it is a wonder to exalt a people upon all these disadvantages The fact speakes should you see a man trod upon the ground and many there holding him downe one by the arme another by the leg a third laying a great weight upon his breast were it not a wonder to see this man rise up and rescue himselfe from them all Thus it is with the Church and servants of God when they are low all the world is upon their backs the world of wicked ones hang about them one with his power another with his policie all with their utmost endeavours to hold them downe yet the Lord sets them on high who were thus low and exalts them to safety who were thus in danger Oh that men would praise the Lord for his goodnesse and declare his wonderfull workes to the children of men And this is further cleared in the 12th verse He disappointeth the devices of the crafty so that their hand cannot performe their enterprise As if Eliphaz should say would you know how God exalteth his people and setteth them in safety 'T is true they have many enemies many that plot and devise evill against them but the Lord breakes their plots he out-plots them He disappointeth the devices of the crafty c. And as this is a proof of the former so it is a further instance of Gods wonderfull works The first was in naturall things sending raine The second and third were in civill things first exalting his own people and secondly in defeating the policies and power of their adversaries so then this twelfth verse may be taken either as it hath reference to the former or as a further instance of Gods wisdome and power He disappointeth the devices of the crafty Or he defeateth the purposes of the subtill so Mr Broughton readeth it that their hands can bring nothing soundly to passe The Apostle in 1 Cor. 3. 19. sets the holy stampe of divine authoritie upon this whole booke by quoting this or the next verse as a proofe of his doctrine For it is written saith he He takes the crafty in their own counsell He disappoints the devices of the crafty saith Eliphaz and He takes the wise in their own craftinesse He disappointeth The word signifies to breake to breake a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 à radice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fractus contritus thing to peeces and by a metaphor to disappoint or to defeate because if an engine or instrument with which a man intends to work be broken he is disappointed of his purpose and cannot goe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Confregit dissipavit Metaphoricè irritum fecit Latinè potest reddiâ—abrogari on with his work So here He breakes the devices of the crafty the crafty frame very curious engines and instruments they lay fine plots and projects but the Lord breakes them and then they are defeated or disappointed The word is often used for breaking or making voyd the law as Psal 119. 126. Ezra 9. 13 because wicked men as much as in them lies would defeate and disappoint the holy purpose designe of God in giving those lawes They would repeale abrogate the laws of God that they might enact their own lusts They would doe that by the will of God which the Lord doth with their wills Null and disappoint it The devices The word which we translate devices signifies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 à radice 〈◊〉
unto us a place of broad rivers A river that shall not be drawn dry or sluced out as Euphrates was by Cyrus when he took Babylon but shall sill its bankes and shoares perpetually that is the Lord will be there a perpetual defence A river that shall never be impoverish'd but shall keep a full stock and treasure of streames and waters Dalilah had her name from this root and it carries an elegant allusion to the qualities of all Dalilahs or insinuating lascivious women they drayne the strength exhaust the purses dry up the credit wast the All of the mightiest Sampsons whose hearts are entangled by their flatteries or ensnared by their beauties The poore have hope The word hath been opened at the 6th verse of this Chapter to note strong and earnest expectation The poore man observing the wonders which God doth in the world cannot be out of hope though he be out of possession And though his own strength be gone yet he lives upon the strength of Christ he hopes strongly that 's the force of the word when he feeles no strength When I am weake saith the Apostle Paul 2 Cor. 12. 10. then am I strong that is I am strongest through hope in Christ when I am weakest through sense in my selfe More distinctly this hope may be taken two wayes 1. For the object or thing hoped for 2. For the act or grace of hope In the former notion of hope the sense runnes thus God having taken the wise in their own craftinesse and disappointed the device of the crafty having delivered the poore from the sword from their mouth and from the hand of the mighty now the poor hath the thing he looked for the thing he prayed for the thing for which he hath been seeking and waiting upon God So the poore hath hope that is he hath the mercy he expected salvation from the sword c. he is made partaker of his hope by those glorious administrations of the justice and mercy of God Hence observe First Gods poore hope for good in the worst times When deliverance comes these poore have but that which they looked for they looked for light when they were in the darkest condition When they were exhausted they knew God was not exhausted and when they were drawn dry they knew the Lord was not though their treasure was spent yet they were assured the treasury of Heaven was full When strength is gone and money is gone and friends are gone yet God is not gone and therefore they know the good may come which they hope for Turne ye to the strong holds ye priseners of hope saith the Prophet Zech. 9. 12. The people of God though prisoners are yet prisoners of hope that is they have hope of deliverance and enlargement in their greatest streights The power of God is never imprison'd and while his people can make this out their spirits are not Secondly observe It is no vain thing to hope in God The poore hath his hope The Prophet brings in the Jewes thus trumphing in God Isa 25. 9. And it shall be said in that day What day was that The former verse points it out A day wherein death shall be swallowed up in victory wherein teares shall be wiped away from off all faces c. And in that day the people of God shall thus boast of God and as it were shewing him to the world shall say Loe this is our God we have waited for him and he will save us This is the Lord we have waited for him we will be glad and rejoyce in his salvation vaine hopes fill our face with shame but hopes fulfilled fill our hearts with rejoycing The poore hath his hope he can shew his hope 't is visible As Hannah when she came to present her Son unto Eli For this child I prayed as if she should say Sir here is my prayer you could not heare my prayer when I was in the Temple you thought I was drunken but now you may see my prayer here it is for this child I prayed and the Lord hath given me my petition which I asâ—ed of him 1 Sam. 1. 27. So the soule saith In such a time of trouble personall or nationall I was praying and seeking God I was beleeving and hoping men knew not understood not the workings of my soule toward Christ yet now they may see them here is the thing I prayed for here is that I hoped for So first the poore hath hope Secondly The poore hath hope that is the grace of hope or the gracious actings of hope and taking it so the sense rises thus So that is God having done such great things in disappointing the devices of the crafty and in saving his poore by this meanes the poore come to have hope the grace of hope strengthned and confirmed in them Hence observe That The experience we have of Gods power and mercy in saving us out of former troubles breeds and nourishes hope against future times of trouble So the poore hath hope Though the poore man was in a hopelesse condition before yet now seeing the works of God he hath hope laid up for ever Psal 64. 9 10. All men shall feare and declare the workes of God for they shall wisely consider of this thing And what followes The righteous shall be glad in the Lord and trust in him that is if they have fail'd in their trust hâ—â—etofore and not given God honour by confiding in him yet these wonderfull works of God of which he speakes in that Psalme worke this hope Rom. 5. 4. Tribulation worketh patience and patience experience and experience hope Graces have a generation one from another though all have but one generation from Christ at once We have here the genealogy of hope in three descents Experience is the next or immediate parent of hope So the poore hath hope Thus it is begotten 2 Cor. 1. 10. God who hath delivered us from so great a death and doth deliver in him we trust that he will yet deliver us An armed daring Goliah should be looked upon as vanquisht already when we can but remember a vanquisht Lion and a Beare Againe The poore hath hope He doth not say God having thus destroyed the ungodly and saved his own people from the sword c. now they have liberty now they have peace now they have aboundance of riches and prosperity but he makes this the issue now they have hope Whence note That Hope is a greater and better possession unto the people of God here than all the great and good things which they possesse Put as much into their hands us you can there is more than that put in their hearts by hope The poore hath hope he lookes over all his possessions and pitcheth upon expectation as his portion The estate which a beleever hath in the promises is more than the estate he hath in possession Riches in the promise is better than riches in the chest And so the deliverances and
protections which are laid up for the Saints in promises are more than all the deliverances and protections received and enjoyed There is no enjoyment but that in Heaven where we shall enjoy all that ever was promised so good as hope for what is promised Alexander an Heathen had such a notion about an earthly hope which had no ground neither but the great things his own ambition promised him for when one seeing him give away all his present inheritances Perspâ—ctâ hac Dei providentia erga pauperes humiles maligni nocendi studiosi retrahent sese neque inter se amplias ineant prava iniqua adversus pios consilia Aquin. said what Sir will you make your selfe a beggar no saith he I will reserve hope for my selfe And iniquity stoppeth her mouth Here is the opposite effect iniquity the abstract is put for the concrete iniquity for men of iniquity wicked men these stop their mouthes And it is observeable that as before God made them active in their own destruction so here he makes them active in their own silence he saith not God stoppeth their mouthes but they stop their own mouthes that is the wicked seeing those wonderfull works of God have not a word to say nor a counsell to give more against the godly they are as mute as fishes as dumbe as dogs they know not how to slander or of whom to complaine and therefore they suspend and enjoyne silence upon themselves As that word of Christ Friend how camest thou in hither not having on a wedding garment Mat. 22. 12. so these works of Christ shall make his enemies speechlesse Iniquity stoppeth her mouth This stopping their mouthes is caused two wayes First from shame A man is sometime silent because he is asham'd to speake disappointments especially such as theirs before noted produce shame naturally and shame makes silent A man that blushes much speakes little and he that dayes not lift up his head will not be forward to lift up his voice Mich. 7. 16. I will shew marvellous things saith the Lord and what then The Nations shall see and be confounded they shall lay their hand upon their mouth their eares shall be deafe They shall see it and be confounded that is they shall be greatly ashamed confusion of face is but shame heightned and the Holy Ghost puts shame and confusion of face together in divers places Now this great shame layes their hands upon their mouthes and puts their fingers in their eares they are resolvedly both dumb and deafe at the sight of those marvellous things Secondly Admiration and amazement silence them The works of God being marvellous they shall stand admiring and wondring at them till they cannot speake Reade the like Isa 52. 15. and Psal 107. 42. where when the Prophet had reckoned up many wonderfull works of God he concludes as in the Text ver 42. He setteth the poore on high c. the righteous shall see it and rejoyce and all iniquity shall stop her mouth while the Lord seemes to doe nothing or to doe but little iniquity will doe nothing but talke or it talkes very much it is very talkative but if once God begin working iniquity has done speaking you shall heare no more of them till the next successe on their side Then observe First Wicked men will never cease slandering and censuring bragging and boasting till some eminent judgement stops their mouthes So iniquity stoppeth her mouth they will never stop their mouthes before Isa 26. 11. Lord when thy hand is lifted up they will not see but they shall see and be ashamed for the envy at thy people I will make the judgement bigger and greater write my wrath in fairer or rather in bloodier characters that they may see them As small judgements will not open the eyes of wicked men so small judgments wil not stop their mouths but when God begins to work wonders they are dumb they have done Secondly observe That God will doe such things for his people as shall put the crafty to silence The Saints ought to live so holily that by well doing they may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men 1 Pet. 2. 15. The Lord will do so justly and gloriously as shall put to silence the malice of the wisest men These two the holinesse of the Saints and the Justice of God are stopples in the mouthes or the stop-mouthes of ungodly men As they by unrighteous acts have stopped other mens mouthes and silenced them so God by terrible things in righteousnesse will stop their mouthes and silence them for ever They shall have nothing to say at last either against the justice of God or a gainst the innocency of his people against both these their mouthes chiefly open They impute and fasten unrighteousnesse on God you talk of God and boast of his promises where is he where are they The Prophet brings them in belching out such blasphemies Isa 5. 19. They say let him make speed and hasten his work that we may see it and let the councell of the holy One of Israel draw nigh and come that we may know it Words filled with as high a sense of spirituall wickednesse as wit and malice can infuse They jeere the patience of God as slacknesse and as if Justice it selfe were tired or too slow pac'd they spurre it on to ruine themselves You have often told us of the Holy One of Israel and what he would doe but threatned men live long we see You are nimbler of your tongues then your Holy One of Israel is of his hands Therefore let him make speed if he can and hasten his work that we may see it Will not the jealousie of the Lord awake at the noise of this hellish blasphemy will he not stop the mouth of this iniquity surely he will And the Prophet assures us he will at the 24th verse Therefore as the fire devoureth the stubble and as the flame consumeth the chaffe so their root shall be rottennesse and their blossomes shall goe up as dust But how doth the fire devour the stubble how doth the flame consume the chaffe even in a moment fire needs no blowing to make it take hold of dry stubble Stubble is at once flame and ashes So speedy shall the consumption of these men be who called the Lord to make speed Then I believe they 'l no more bid him make haste The mouth of this iniquity will be stopt for ever Our God shall come and shall not keepe silence A fire shall devoure before him Psal 50. 3. And then the wicked shall be silent in darknesse 1 Sam. 2. 9. The fire of wrath is all heate no light Lastly all their slanders against the innocency of the Saints shall be so confuted that the adversary shall have nothing to say against them Their innocency shall be made as cleare as the light and their justice as the noon-day Yea God will so order it that these crafty oppressours
necessary practise in Chyrurgery and to that the holy Ghost may allude in this place When they perceive a wound or a sore to which medicines Illa est vox Domini percutiam ego sanabo hoc faciunt medici Ferrum gestant câ—rare veniunt Clamat secandus secaâ—ur saevitur in vulnus ut homo sanetur Aug in Ps 50. Chyrurgus saepe vulnus infligit ferro sibi spatium ad commodam curationem aperit cannot well be appied and so unfit for healing either to make a new wound in the whole flesh or to make the first bigger The murderer wounds to kill and the Physitian wounds to cure He comes as it were arm'd with instruments of cruelty The patient whose flesh is to be launced cryes out but yet he launces him The patient whose flesh is to be seared cryes out but yet he sears him He is cruell to the wound while he is most kind to the wounded An ignorant man would wonder to see a Chyrurgion when he comes for healing make the wound wider yet so he must do and he doth it upon urgent reasons As when the orifice is not wide enough to let in the medicine or to let out the corruption or cannot admit his searching instruments to the bottome In such cases he saith Vnlesse I increase your wound I cannot cure it Thus often times the Lord is compelled to wound that he may heale or fit our wounds for healing Our wound is not wide enough to let out the sinfull corruptions of our hearts to let in the searching instruments and corrasives of the Law or the blame and comfortable applications of the Gospel We may observe from the sence of the words That The woundings and smitings of God are preparatories for our cure and healing It is said Isa 53. 5. of Christ that with his stripes we are healed and it is in this sence a truth that we are healed with our own stripes We are healed with the stripes of Christ meritoriously and we are healed by our own stripes preparatorily the stripes of Christ heale us naturally our own stripes heale us occasionally or his in the act ours in the event Prov. 27. 6. Faithfull are the wounds of a friend his wounds are faithfull because he wounds in faithfulnesse The healings of many are unfaithfull They heale the hurt of the daughter of my people deceitfully is the Lords complaint by the Prophet they skin over the wound but they doe not cure it Let the righteous smite me it shall be a kindnesse and let him reprove me it shall be an excellent oyle which shall not break my head Psal 141. 5. Much more may we say Let the righteous Lord smite me and it shall be a kindnes to me let the righteous Lord reprove and correct me it shall be as an excellent oyle which shall not breake mine head it shall heale my heart How healing then are his salves whose very sores are a salve Secondly Take the words in the plaine rendring of them noting onely thus much that God makes sore and bindeth up So we have two distinct acts often ascribed to God in a figure to set forth judgement and mercy the afflictions and deliverances of his people Hos 6. 2. Let us return unto the Lord for he hath torne and he will heale us he hath smitten and he will bind us up 1 Sam. 2. 6. The Lord killeth and maketh alive Deut. 32. 39. See now that I even I am he and there is no God with me I kill and I make alive I wound and I heale Hence observe It is the property of God to take care of all the sicknesses sores or evils of his peopls As God is the great correcter and instructer of his people so he is the great Physitian of his people If he make a wound he will take care for the healing of it He doth not make sores and leave others to bind up Mighty men wound but they take no care for healing they can impoverish and spoyle but they care not to repaire they can pull down and root up let who so will build and plant Shaddai the Almighty God doth both If he break thy head come to him humble thy selfe before him and he will surely give thee a plaister which shall cost thee nothing but the asking And whereas he doth not willingly afflict or grieve he doth most willingly comfort and heale the children of men Lam. 3. 33. He speaks of it as a paine to himselfe to make us sore but to make us sound is his delight and pleasure Satan is the Abaddon the destroyer and he only destroys he makes wounds but he heals none he kills but he makes none alive The second branch of the verse He woundeth and his hands make whole is but a repetition of the same thing yet with some addition to or heightning of the sence To make sore and bind up are not so deep either in judgement or in mercy as to wound and make whole The word used for wounding imports a dangerous and a deadly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Transfodit transfixit vel cruentavit wound or to make a man all gore blood It signifies to strike quite thorough and it is divers times applied to note that stroke which God gives his worst enemies Psal 68. 21. But God shall wound the head of his enemies or he shall strike them quite through the head Verse 23. He shall dip his foot or make it red in the blood of the ungodly And Psal 110. 5. The Lord shall strike through Kings in the day of his wrath Hence observe That God sometimes makes very deep and great wounds in his own servants Such wounds as by the sight of the eye you cannot distinguish them from the wounds of his mortall enemies He strikes thorough both heads and hearts of his own people Or as Simeon said to the blessed Virgin Mary Luke 2. 35. A sword pierceth through their soule also But then lastly note God never makes a wound too great for his own cure The power of God to save is as great as his power to destroy his healing power and his wounding power are of the same extent His justice cannot out-act his mercy both are infinite And not onely doth he heale the wounds which himselfe makes but he can heale the wounds which men make even all the wounds which the utmost power and malice of man can make He is able to doe more good to shew more mercy than all creatures are able to doe hurt or mischiefe We finde the state and condition of a people sometimes so wounded and sick that men have despaired of recovery Being consulted they may answer your sore cannot be bound up and your wound cannot be healed your estate is gangren'd and past cure So he said as was toucht before Isa 3 8. In that day shall a man sweare saying I will not be an healer for in my house is neither bread nor cloathing Alas I heale you
keepe a feast to me in the yeare Exod. 23. 14. Three times in a yeare all thy males shall appeare before the Lord ver 17. The candlestick had three branches Exod. 25. 32. and three cubits was the height of the Altar Exod. 27. 1. Three Cities of refuge were appontinted for the manslayer Deut. 19. 7. and the addition made is of another three ver 9. Three witnesses gave the compleatest evidence requireable as Two the least admittable in the law Deut. 17. 6. That besides a rule there was a mystery in most of these I think no man doubts though what the mystery was may be presumption in any man to determine Of this we are sure that the highest mystery and perfection of all numbers and things is found in One Three That Three in One The sacred Trinity And in the common speech of most if not of all languages Thrice happy Thrice great Thrice honourable note a man advanced to the very pinnacle of Happinesse Greatnesse and Honour The number Three or the Numeral Thrice imply a compleatnesse in all numbers That the number six notes perfection may be seene in the work of Creation The Lord could as easily have made the world in six or in one moment as in six dayes but the Lord saw it good to take a compleate number of dayes for so compleate a worke God threatens Gog his perfect and compleate enemy with a compleate punishment or with judgement in perfection The justice of God can be as compleate in punishing as the malice of man can be in sinning Ezek. 39. 2. I am against thee O God the chiefe Prince of Meshech and Tubal I will turne thee backe and leave but the sixth part of thee so we translate yet in the margin of our books we find the Hebrew thus I will strike thee with six plagues or I will draw thee back with a hooke of six teeth Seven is a famous number implying First multitude Secondly perfection The barren hath borne seven saith Hannah in her song 1 Sam. 2. 5. that is many she is a compleate mother she hath a flourishing family many children And in opposition to this Jer. 15. 9. She that hath born seven languisheth that is she that had many children now hath none Seven devils were cast out of the woman Luk. 8. 2. that is a multitude of devils So the seven Spirits the seven Churches the seven Trumpets the seven Seales the seven Vials c. in the Revelation speake the compleatnesse and perfection of each in their kind whether good or evill and that is appliable to the particular sense of the text Prov. 24. 16. The just falleth seven times a day that is he falleth often almost continually into trouble and yet he rises againe God delivers him The Hebrew word Shebange is neere in sound to our English seven and to note that seven is a compleate full number the same Hebrew word signifies seven and full seven and satisfied or compleate And the word to swear 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Septem 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Saturatus impletus abundavit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Juravit inde juramentem a Septenario numero ut quidam patant quod juramenta fieri debeant multis adhibitis idoneis multumque confirmatis testibus et causis is of the same extraction in that language with the word seven the reason is added because in or about an oath many and important causes and grounds are required But to passe from single numbers I shall consider them in construction or conjunction as here six and seven He shall deliver thee in six troubles yea in seven there shall no evill touch thee Some understand this strictly and precisely of those two numbers six and seven And expound the text by the enumeration of those six or seven particular evils made by Eliphaz in the following verses For having said in generall that God will deliver his in six troubles and in seven he reckoneth up severall troubles and gives us as it were a catologue or a particular of those evils by name amounting to six or seven As 1. Famine 2. Warre 3. Scourge of the tongue 4. Destruction 5. Evill beasts 6. Hurtfull stones here are six and if a seventh evill come upon thee in seven no evill shall touch thee But I rather take this expression six yea seven to be a fixed number put for an unfixed a certaine number for an uncertaine and that uncertaine number to be a great number the greatest number any number imaginable We find this kind of speaking frequently in Scripture In the thirty third of this booke of Job v. 29. Loe these things God workes twice and thrice which we translate these things God workes often-times when numbers are doubled with an increase in the latter it notes a mighty growth of the whole number Twice and twice we know is but foure times but twice and thrice may be more then five times twice and thrice is oftentimes no man knowes how often We find the number next above this in the same signification Three and foure are put for many very many Amos 1. 3. For three transgressions of Damascus and for foure Some understand it of three or foure speciall sins of which Damascus was chiefely guilty namely 1. Idolatry 2. Incest 3. Luxurie 4. Oppression Or Three may be taken for a Cardinal number and Foure for an Ordinal for the Fourth as if some fourth sin were so sinfull and had such a malignity in it as the Lord would not pardon Thus Foure is put for the fourth Prov. 30. 15 18 21 29. Three things are never satisfied yea foure things say not it is enough That is a fourth thing sc fire being the most insatiable of all the rest saith not it is enough The copulative particle and is often in Scripture taken comparatively for much more Psal 125. The mountaines are round about Jerusalem and the Lord is about his people So the Hebrew we translate by a comparative of similitude As So. But more emphatically to the scope of the place by a comparative of excesse Thus As the mountaines are about Jerusalem sc to fortifie and defend it so much more is the Lord about his people fortifie and defend them In this sense we may take the copulative And in Amos. For three transgressions the Lord would not turne c. but much more for a fourth would he not turne away the punishment thereof The former three were enough to provoke the Lord to destroy you but for this fourth he is resolved to be irreconcileable and will destroy you Others adde Three to Foure which make seven as if the Holy Ghost had said for seven that is manifold transgressions of Damascus I will not turne away c. But rather take the numbers distinct for Three and Foure that is for the many for the multitude of transgressions committed in Damascus I will not turne away the punishment thereof Not that the mercies of God are exceeded by any number
on both sides with moderation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and be cautious inclining neither one way nor other but as the merit of the cause fully heard shall sway her judgement à radice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Job desires that his calamity might be layed thus in the ballances Levavit sustulit nam qui appendit ali quid tollit lances in altum Drus before his sentence Laid The word is O that my calamity might ascend in the ballances And that manner of speaking is used either because in weighing the lighter scale of the ballances doth ascend or because when things are weighed the ballances ascend or are lifted up A man takes up the ballances in his hand to weigh So it is as if he had said O that these might be poised together and lifted up to see which way the scales will turne Together There is some difference in opinion about that word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pariter vel potius similiter Nulla ejus parte praeter missa Together whether he meaneth thus O that all my griefe and calamity were weighed you consider things to halves and leave out those points which are most weighty and material you should take in all together Or whether his desire be that his griefe and calamity both together might be put into one ballance and the sand of the sea into another and so an experiment be made whether his griefe and calamity or the sand of the sea were heavier Or thirdly Whether thus that his griefe should be put into one ballance and his calamity into another and then triall be made which of those two were heavier his griefe and sorrow or his calamity and trouble A learned interpreter conceives that Iob Mercerus wishes his griefe and calamity might both together be put into one ballance and all the sand of the sea if it were possible in the other supposing that his griefe and calamity would out-weigh that vast ponderous aggregated body His opinion is chiefely strengthned by some difficulties in the Gramatical construction unlesse this be admitted and yet if it be a greater difficulty is shewed by a second and therefore I rather take it thus O that Bolduc my griefe and calamity were laid in the ballances together that is O that my griefe were put one into one ballance and my calamity into another or O that my griefe might be weighed with my calamity and it would appeare notwithstanding your judgement of me that yet there is nothing so much weight in my greife as there is in my calamity that is I have not yet grieved or complained up to the height or weight of those calamities which are upon me So that if my sorrow were laid in one ballance and my affliction in another my affliction would outweigh my sorrow and it would appeare that I have complained not only not without a cause but not so much as I had cause And to prove that his calamity was heavier then his griefe he adds in the next words It namely his calamity thus weighed would be heavier then the sand of the sea As if he had said it is possible that in trying all heavy things somewhat might be found heavier then my griefe or my complaint hath been but I am sure nothing can be found of equal weight with my calamity for my calamity which is the immediate antecedent would be heavier than the sand of the sea then which nothing can be found more heavy That of David Psal 62. 9. is paralell to this expression in Job Surely men of low degree are vanity and men of high degree are a lye To be laid in the ballances they are altogether lighter then vanity The meaning is That if men of all degrees high and low were put in one scale and vanity in the other vanity it selfe would be weightier then the gravest and most weighty men Hence some reade They together are lighter then vanity Others to this sence Men and vanity being weighed together vanity will not be so light as vaine man As David to shew mans lightnesse makes him lighter then the lightest thing vanity So Iob to shew the heavinesse of his calamity makes it heavier then the heaviest thing the fand of the sea Observe hence first That it is a duty to weigh the sad estate and afflicted condition of our brethren thoroughly But you will say what is it to weigh them throughly I answer It is not only to weigh the matter of an affliction to see what it is which aman suffers but to weigh an affliction in every circumstance and aggravation of it The circumstance of an affliction is often more considerable then the matter of the affliction If a man would confesse his sins and confesse them throughly he is to confesse not only the matter of them as sins are the transgressions of the Law and errors against the rule but he must eye the manner in which sin hath been committed the circumstances with which it is cloathed these render his sin out of measure and out of weight sinful Likewise would a man consider the mercies and favours received from God would he know them throughly and see how much they weigh let him look not only what but how and when and where and by whom he hath received them There may be and often is a great wickedness in a little evil committed and a great mercy in a little good received As relations so circumstances have the least entitie but they have the greatest efficacie Now as there is often more in the circumstances than in the matter of a sin or of a mercy so there is often more in the circumstance than there is in the matter of an affliction therefore he that would thoroughly weigh the afflictions of another must consider all these accidents as wel as the substance of it As namely the time when sent the time how long endured whether a single affliction or in conjucture with other afflictions the strength of the patient and the dependencies that are upon him Secondly He that would weigh an affliction throughly must put himselfe in the case of the afflicted and as it were make anothers griefe his owne He must act the passions of his brother and a while personate the poore the sick the afflicted man He must get atast of the wormwood and of the gall upon which his brother feedeth In a word He must lay such a condition to heart The Prophet Malachy threatens a curse upon those who laid not the word and works of God to heart Chap. 2. 2 I will curse your blessings saith the Lord because ye doe not lay it to heart that is ye doe not consider what I say or doe throughly God cursed them throughly because they would not throughly consider His Laws and judgements So then to weigh the affliction of another throughly is to put our soules as it were in their soules stead Hence that we may be assured Christ hath throughly weighed all our
neither will I be alwayes wrath For the spirit should fail before me c. The spirit of a man that is his courage and resolution are farre stronger then his flesh namely his natural temper and constitution and yet that cannot hold cut for ever The Spirit will come down whether we will or no if God contend long with us how then must the flesh wither like a leafe before him And therefore the bodies the flesh and bloud of the damned who are to bear the wrath and contendings of God for ever their flesh and bloud I say are in a sence made spiritual that is they have more strength given them then flesh and bloud yeeld naturally otherwise it were impossible for them to hold out for ever under the wrath of God and the torment of their accursed condition Their strength is made the strength of stones and their flesh as brass they are made immalliable their sence of pain shall be admirably quicked and yet they shall continue as if they had no sence at all they shall be for ever wounded and never die of their wounds As it is in reference to that everlasting misery so in proportion to these temporal miseries There is no â—â—rength of man no flesh and bloud able to endure and hold out if God lets out his hand to afflict and puts not under his hand to support Vers 13 Is not my help in me And is wisdom driven quite from me This and the verse following are of a very difficult construction and understanding which caused a learned Interpreter to say If Locus difficilis siquis a lius in hoc libro quem ego adbuc non intelligo Drus there be any hard text in the whole book this is one and after all his thoughts about it he concludes with this ingenuous acknowledgment I do not yet understand the meaning of it First as we read it The text seems to carry a harsh connexion with the words fore-going There Job queries Is my strength the strength of stones And yet immediately to say Is not my help in me sounds incongruous For if he had help in him he had strength in him and such as might well be called the strength of stones extraordinary strength So then Iob having said with his last breath that he had no such strength how is it that here he should say and more strongly affirm that he had such strength so much this question implies Is not my help in me As if he had said do not I know which way to help my self How to extricate my self out of this condition Besides how is this a truth For there is no man that hath his help in himself not help enough in himself for any natural work much lesse for any spiritual work and most of all lesse for the holy carriage of the heart under affliction or to deliver himself from it Man hath no help in himself The voice of the Church is Our help standeth in the Name of the Lord and the voice of David was The Lord is my helper how then doth Iob say Is not my help in me Mans ruine is in himself but how unlike is this to the voice of truth to say My help is in my self We can undoe our selves fast enough but we cannot repair and make our selves up again Nor can any creature be our help no man no Angel can be our help God reproveth the Jewes Isa 31. For going down to Egypt for help though they were a strong people Certainly it is as bad for a man to make himself his help as to make another man his help How then shall we give a wholesome understanding of these words Is not my help in me And is wisdome driven quite from me For the clearing of it consider the divers readings Some thus Was not my help in me And so they make the meaning to Nonne auxilium meum in me sc fuit Vatabl. Nonne quoad potui me juvi minimè fui pusillanimus me quoad fieri potest erigo fussento be this Did not I help my self as much as I could Was I faint-hearted and cowardly Did I sink as a man of a poor spirit under the burden Did not I put my self forth to the uttermost that I could to stand under these troubles and afflictions There is much in that for some men do not help themselves as they might but their own spirits sinke and their hearts fail yea their hearts fail before their strength failes Job disclaims this I did not so I helpt my self while I was able I put out the utmost of my power to bear and set a good face on 't as long as ever I could Was not my help in me The Septuagint with the Greeks in general referre these words to God making Job speak thus Did not I trust in him But Nonne in ipso considebam sed adjutorium à me recessit negavit me miserie ordia visitatio Domini despexit Sept. my help is departed from me and the mercy of the most High hath with-drawn it self from me As if he had said I never put my trust in my self nor did I promise my self great matters as from my self for alas What is my strength I am acquainted well enough with mine own frailty but that which I onely trusted to hath left me I trusted unto God and unto his help now he seemes to forsake and with-draw his assistance from me But I leave this with the Authors it hath little authority with me or sutableness to the course and tenour of Jobs spirit under these afflictions The Vulgar translates the whole verse negatively and so it makes a plain and a good sense Whereas we read it interrogatively Is not my help in me c. He reades it thus Behold my Ecce non est a uxilium mihi â—â—n me necessarii quoque mei recesserunt à me Vulg. help is not in me and my friends who should help me are departed from me That which we translate wisdome Is wisdome departed from me He translates friends my friends who should be my helpers are departed from me And so the meaning of all is as if Job had said I cannot help my self and they who should have deserted me And so connects or joins it with that which went before What is my strength that I should hope my strength is not the strength of stones there is no help in me and they who should help me are departed from me I was once an eye to the blind and a foot to the lame Chap. 29. 15. When a man hath no help in himself he may have it in another If a man want an eye he may have an eye of his neighbour and if he want a hand his friend may be a hand to him but saith Job they that should be eyes and hands helpers unto me are gone and departed from me There is yet another rendering which makes a very clear sence What though I have no
the soule whereby we discerne or distinguish just from unjust truth from false-hood as sweet is distinguished from bitter by the pallate is elegantly called the pallate of the soul Cannot my taste discern The Hebrew is Cannot my taste * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Scriptura saepe linguae faucibus manibus tribuit quod men t is intellectus proprium est sc med tari intelligere Magna est rationis orationis cognatio understand perverse things It is usuall in Scripture to ascribe understanding not onely to the senses but also to the tongue and sometimes to the hand Understanding is ascribed to the tongue in the place before named Psal 52. where the tongue is said to de vise mischiefe The tongue properly cannot devise the tongue doth but utter mischiefe it is the mind or heart that deviseth The shop is within where mischiefe is forged and framed yet the contrivance of it is in that text given to the tongue There is a two-fold reason of it why the holy Ghost attributes the worke of the understanding to the tongue hand or senses First there is a great affinity beween reason and speech and therefore the tongue which is the instrument of speech is honoured with the worke of the understanding And so grat is the affinity beween reason and speech that no creature void of reason can speak Speech is a peculiar property of the rationall creature Speech is or ought to be the immediate issue or birth of reason Words are conceived in the mind and born at the tongue And words are the image of the mind We may see what work is wrought in the mind by that which is spoken by the tongue The shape of a mans heart when he speakes himself comes out at his mouth And therefore before a man speakes he meditates Meditation is the conception of words As speaking is the production of them Thus the Lord charges Joshua Chap. 1. 8. The book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth but thou shalt meditate therein day and night One would think it should rather have been said The book of the Law shall not depart out of thine heart but thou shalt meditate therein or if not cut of thy mouth then Ita meditaberis ut exipsa cogitatione mentis effervescente redundent ebulliant in ore verba thou shalt speak of it Meditation is too high a worke for the mouth Yet because there ought to be much meditation about the Law of God before a word of it comes out of the mouth therefore the Lord saith The book of the Law shall not depart out of thy mouth but thou shalt meditate therein day and night that is as oft as thou shalt speak thou shalt meditate thou shalt not speake rashly it shall not be the work of thy tongue alone but of thy mind and tongue together There is a second reason why acts of the understanding are ascribed to the tongue or to the senses because when a thing is well spoken or duly acted by any sense Reason is the guide and the bodily Organ is under the dictates of the minde or understanding So Gen. 41. 14. when old Jacob in giving the blessing unto Josephs children Manasseh and Ephraim laid his right hand upon the younger and his left hand upon the elder the text saith he made his hands to understand we translate he guided his hands wittingly there was so much reason such divine reason in that act of Jacobs hands in laying his right-hand upon the younger that the Prudenter egit manibus sun ac siiplae manus mysteriorum consciae erant Onkel Hebrew gives it with this elegancie he made his hands to understand which one of the Jewish Writers learnedly expounds thus He order'd his hands wisely as if they had been made acquainted with that great mystery of Gods counsels that the greater blessing was the portion of the younger sonne And so the Psalmist Psal 78 72. speaking of Davids raigne and government saith He governed them by the skilfulnesse of his hands The Hebrew is by the understanding of his hands and more the understandings of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In intelligentiis manuum vel volâ—rum his hands Or as one renders it The discretions of his hands or the prudency of his Palmes ascribing all kind of politicall knowledge and understanding unto David David in the outward administrations of the kingdome acted with so much reason and justice that his very hands are said to understand His hands understood more than the heads of other Princes As Davids hands so Jobs pallate or taite had an understanding Cannot my pallate understand Yet further it is frequent in Scripture metaphorically to translate things which are only acted or apprehended by the inward senses to the outward Taste properly is of meat and drink the humour or moisture which is in meats sutable to the salivall humour in the mouth causeth pleasantness of taste Here Job speaks of Doctrines or of actions Cannot my taste discerne perverse things If a thing be perversly or properly truely or falsely spoken cannot I taste it quickly And hence the word of God is compared to those things which are the object of taste as to milk and to strong meat 1 Cor. 3. 2. I saith the Apostle have fed you with milk and not with meat That is with easie and common truths not with the more mysterious parts of Gospel-knowledge because ye were not able to bear it The taste of such mysteries was too strong for your pallates The same Metaphor is enlarged by the Apostle Heb. 5. 12 13 14. And in this Book we find it more than once Doth not the eare trie words and the mouth taste his meat Job 12. 11. Chap. 34. 3. That is doth not the eare try words as the mouth tastes meat Cannot my taste discern Perverse things That is words ill spoken or wrong placed The word signifies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 also any calamity or sad accident And so Mr. Broughton renders it Cannot my pallate declare all kind of heavy sorrowes Do ye think I have lost my judgment of things and that I cannot tell when I am pinch't or pain'd First in that he saith here Is there iniquity in my tongue Observe The tongue oft-times discovers the iniquity of the heart If there be iniquity in the heart it will one time or other break forth at and blister upon the tongue He that is rotten at his heart is commonly rotten in his talk Matth. 12. 34. Out of the aboundance of the heart the mouth speakes And when there is aboundance of iniquity in the heart there is seldome a dearth or scarcity of it in the mouth especially in times of trouble that iniquity and corruption that disease and plague of the heart will break forth at the lips As Evill words corrupt good manners So evil words discover that our manners are corrupt There are few men but as the Damosel spake to
stormy they are appointed times The whole life of man on earth is ordered in heaven Fourthly if our lives are for an appointed time we should be willing to die when God cals All the time we would live beyond that is of our own appointment and we should be willing to live till God cals for all that 's appointed time As it is sinfull not to be willing to do though it be burdensom what God appoints so is it likewise not to be willing to live what time God appoints though it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mercendarius a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 coÌ„duxit Mercenarius est qui in certum tempus conduâ—itur saepe in die quem ideo Graeci vocant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sicut in unico die operario quamdiu lucet sol noâ— est ulla requies mercenario constituâ—aÌ„ ita dum luce hujus vitae fruimur nulla nobis requies expectauda est be painfull and troublesome And are not his daies like the daies of an hireling An hireling is he who works a set time for a set reward And so this latter clause of the verse is the same in sence with the former Is there not an appointed time to man and are not his daies like the daies of an hireling That is are not his daies set as an hireling with whome we agree for so many daies or for such a day An hireling We may take him either for a hired souldier a mercenary in warre or for an hired servant a mercenary in work An hireling in either notion is called to labour sorrow and sweat Such is the common condition of man His daies are as the daies of an bireling God threatneth Moab by the Prophet in this language Isa 16. 14. Within three yeares as the years of an hireling and the glory of Moab shall be contemned that is within three years which shall be like the years of an hireling troublesome years laborious years vexatious yeares wearisome yeares and then the glory of Moab shall be contemned and utterly despised As if he had said Moab is now in great glory but near great desolation You shall see three years trouble will staine all the glory of Moab and wither all her beauty we feele this truth England was a Nation of great glory you see how two or three years like the years of an hireling troublesome years years of affliction years of hard labour and travell have almost spoil'd the glory of it And yet here Job makes a generall description of the life of man It is not the lot only of some poore afflicted hard-wrought servants that their daies are as the daies of an hireling he speakes of man-kind of the master as well as of the servant His daies are like the daies of an hireling We may note from it First That Except we labour we ought not to eat For the dayes of man are as the daies of an hireling the hireling shall not have his meat except he worke for it neither ought he that hires or sets him a worke The master is in this sence an hireling The Saints are in this sence Hirelings The Apostle speakes to believers and reproves them 2 Thess 3. 12. There are some which walke among you inordinately working not at all now them that are such we command that they work and eat their own bread and ver 10. If any man work not let him not eat even they whom Christ hath made free are to account themselves as hired servants that is they must not eat the bread of idlenesse we steale all the bread which one way or other we labour not for and therefore the Apostle bids the Thessalonians work that they might eat their own bread It is not our own bread which we buy with our mony unlesse we pay in what we can and are called to labour for it also As we eat that bread pleasantly so we come by it honestly which is dipt in our owne sweat Secondly we are hence taught That We ought to take our travels well we must not murmur at our labours or complain over our work and say what a wearinesse is it As the Lord cannot bear it that any should murmur at spirituall worke or say with them in the Prophet What a wearinesse is it so it is very displeasing to him to say of our callings and the burdens of them What a wearinesse are they Why It is the common condition of man Why then should we quarrel with that law of labour which is become the portion of our mortality The corruption of our nature hath led us into this condition and made us all as hirelings Mans innocency had businesse but sin hath brought him to sweat and changed his labour into toile Man was put into the garden as Lord of it to dresse and till it but now he is put there as an hireling to sweat and toyle at it There is a stampe of servility and drudgery upon all the labours which the children of men take under the Sun That argument which the Apostle uses to support us in the bitternesse of affliction hath alike strength in it to comfort us in the toile somenesse of our labours As there is no temptation hath taken hold of us but that which is common to man 1 Cor. 10. 13. So there is no labour laid upon any of us in our lawfull callings but that which is common to man Even the Saints whom Christ hath made free and separated from the world are not freed from service while they are in the world And while Christ would not have them carefull in any thing he would have them industrious in every thing That Canon of the Apostle is clear for it 1 Cor. 7. 20. Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he was called that is your spirituall calling doth not void your civill When you have learned to drive a trade for heaven you must still drive your trade on earth While there is any thing of sin in us there must be somewhat of the hireling in us There is not the most ingenious no nor the most spirituall labour we goe about but there is somewhat of the hireling in it in the duty of prayer in the duty of preaching there is somewhat of the hireling that is there is bodily paine and wearinesse a waste upon our strength and expence of our spirits Though in these things the Saints worke not for wages but their very works is their wages and their labour their reward though there be nothing mercenary in their spirits yet they feel the effects of a mercenary worke upon their bodies even wearinesse and waste of naturall strength and spirits Thirdly Seeing the daies of a man are as the daies of an hireling Observe There is a reward or wages somewhat followes the labour and travell of this life The hireling labours all day but at night he hath his reward Mat. 20. Christ compares beleevers even in their spirituall capacity unto labourers in
shadow to get under a tree or a bush a little to refresh himself Or Thirdly the shadow may be taken for the house to come into a mans house or under a mans roof is called a comming under his shadow Gen. 19. 8. Therefore they are come under my shadow saith Lot to the men of Sodome that is under the covert of my roof The shadow is used often in Scripture to note protection and mercy Shadows are substantial mercies and the promise of a shadow â—â—bra id significat quod proteâ—endo custoâ—â—endo obâ—mbrat is a real favour Isa 4. 6. The Church hath a promise under this notion There shall be a Tabernacle for a shadow in the day time from the heat Isa 25. 4. A refuge from the storm a shadow from the heat And Isa 32. 2. The Lord promises that he will be as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land unto his people And David flies to this shadow for safety Vnder the shadow of thy wings shall be my refuge till these calamities be over-past Psal 57. 1. So Psal 17. 8. Psal 91. 1. So that in these words As a servant earnestly desireth the shadow Job means that which is most refreshing and desirable by a servant And in those Eastern hot Countries shadows were very refreshing and much desired Jacob reporting his labours in keeping Labans sheep saith In the day time I was consumed with heat or parched with heat Therefore a servant hath reason to desire the shadow And as an hireling looketh for the reward of his work There are two things which a servant or an hireling desires much Rest and reward Shadow and pay When he is hot the shadow refreshes him And when he is hungry his pay refreshes him while his hand is at work in the day his heart is upon the wages he shall receive at night Hence the Lord in compassion to servants made a gracious provision for them by a law Deut. 24. 14 15. Thou shalt not oppress a hired servant c. at his day thou shalt give him his hire neither shall the Sun go down upon it for he is poor and setteth his heart upon it lest he cry against thee to the Lord and it be sin unto thee Job puts the instance in both As the hireling looks for the reward of his work c. He looketh The word signifieth to expect a thing with an eye 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 toward it what we earnestly expect our eyes move after it David in his waiting upon God saith Mine eyes are towards thee I lift up mine eyes and my heart to God The same word is here used The hireling looks For the reward of his work So we translate it The Hebrew is He looks for his work 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Why he had work before he had his work all day long his Master shewed him his work he needed not look for that then his work is the reward of his work In the Scripture the word work signifies three things 1. The very act of labour 2. The effect of labour the thing wrought or that which is the product of labour When a man hath laboured what he labour'd about is visible and that we call his work as well as the act of his labour 3. The reward or the wages which a man receives for his labour Levit. 19. 13. we read a plain text for it The wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night until the morning The Hebrew is The work of him that is hired shal not abide with thee So Psal 109. 20. Let this be the reward of mine adversaries Obus est fructus seu merces oberis quae pro labore datur ber Metonymiam from the Lord The Hebrew is Let this be the work of mine adversaries from the Lord. And Jer. 22. 13. we have the word in the same sence work for wages As it is usual to put prayer for the thing prayed for a petition for the thing petitioned or for the thing obtained by petition The Lord hath given me my petition saith Hannah 1 Sam. 1. 27. that is the child for whom I did petition It is usual also in Scripture to put sin for the punishment or reward of sin Gen. 4. 13. My sin is greater that is my punishment is greater than I can bear And the Master is forbidden to detain the servants wages least it be sin to him Deut. 24. 15. that is least he be punished for detaining it Thus also it is usual to put the work for the reward of the work The hireling expects his work that is he earnestly looks that he shall have wages in the evening for his work Now saith Job as these wait the servant and the hireling for the shadow in the day and for their wages at night So I am made to possesse months of vanity c. I shall note a point or two in passage from the words as they contain a general truth before I examine them in this application Take the words as they are a direct proposition A servant desires the shadow and an hireling looks for the reward of his work Hence observe First The condition of a servant is a very laborious and a wearisome condition He longs for some rest he earnestly desires the shadow Observe Secondly The servant must have a reward Ther 's all the reason in the world he should Observe Thirdly The hireling hath earnest thoughts upon his reward His reward is in his eye It is the reason given why the wages of the hired servant should not be with-held Deut. 24. 15. The Lord the righteous judge between Masters and servants gives this account or ground of his Law Thou shalt not detaine his wages for he setteth his heart upon it Poor man he hath been working all day and he hath had his heart upon his wages the hopes of that gave him some relief and ease in going through his hard task and service therfore thou shalt not keep it from him his heart is set upon it But it may be questioned Is not this a sin in the servant to set his heart upon his wages A charge is given Psal 62. 10. If riches increase set not your heart upon them and is it approveable in a servant to set his heart upon his wages or encrease There is a great difference and it is worthy our notice between those two Scriptures The word in Deutronomy speaking of the poor servant notes the lifting up of the soul He hath lifted up his soul unto it so we read in the margin of our Bibles But in the Psame where he speaks of the covetous rich man the word imports the letting down or setling of his heart upon it A poor man hath but a little and his wages it may be is above him his wages possibly is more than he is worth therefore he lifteth up his mind to it as a mercy and a blessing from God for the
similibus locis Scriptura in telligenda est de statu mortuorum in morte quis consitebitur tibi post resurrectâ—onem pii laudabunt Deum sed ante illam quamdiuerunt in sepulchro nemo confitebitur ei anima corpore simul Drus Iuxta raturae cursum hic loquitur regans rediturum â—ominem ubi hine excessit Reâ—urrectio mortuorum divinum supra naturam opus est quo hic non respicit nutuâ—e tantum consuctum ordinem afferens quomodo intellïgendâ— sunt qâ—aecunque talia in hoc libro in Psalmis alijs Scripturae libris occurrunt Psal 115. 17. The dead praise the not c. there is no work device or businesse at all in the grave Eccl. 9. 10. The hand works not the tongue speakes not The eye shall no more see this good Iob expresses himself by an act of the eye which carries the greatest strength for refreshing to the whole man All the joy and pleasure we shall have in Heaven comes in by sight we shall see him as â—e is The heholding of God in Christ is the beatificall vision much of the good which we have in this world comes in by the sense of seeing and all the good of the next is placed in seeing therefore he doth not say I shall no more taste good or no more feele good but no more see good * Per Analogiâ— ad summi boni possessionem quae in visione consistit aliorum honorum possessio rectè dicitur videre bona because the chiefest good eternal good consists in vision therefore proportionably our present good doth so likewise Sick Hezekiah speaks in the language of sick Job I said I shall not see the Lord even the Lord in the land of the living I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world Isa 38. 11. When Hezekiah thought he should die he describes the state of the dead by a deprivation of all those comforts which are taken in by the sight of the eye But you wil say how saith he I shal not see the Lord He doth not say absolutely I shall not see the Lord But with a modification thus I shall not see the Lord even the Lord in the land of the living But did Hezekiah see the Lord in the land of the living or while he lived Yes as Moses saw him that was invisible so did Hezekiah God makes himself visible to the Saints in this life Though God cannot be seen in his essence in Heaven much lesse on earth yet he is seen in his works in the acts of his providence and in his ordinances we may see the goings of God in the Sanctuary and behold the beauty of the Lord while we enquire in his Temple Psalm 27. 4. So that when Hezekiah saith I shall not see the Lord in the land of the living his meaning is I shall not behold God in his great works and in the ordinances of his holy worship and in the Congregations of his holy people In all these God is visible and most in the last and therefore he saith I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world God is visible in all creatures but most in man and among men most in his Saints and among his Saints most when they meet in the comely order of his house and worship The ignorant and unlearned coming into such a sacred throng sees so much of God that he is convinced and goes away reporting that God is in them of a truth In Christ is seen the brightnesse of his Fathers glory and in the Saints much of the beauty of it is seen Christ is the express image of his person and in the Saints so meeting much of his image is expressed First in that Job betakes himself to God O remember that my life is wind c. Observe That In our distresses it is better to cry to God then to complaine to creatures God is usually the last but he is alwayes the best refuge when we have told over the story of our sorrowes and sad condition and powr'd our wants into the bosomes of our most faithfull friends yet this Apostrophe is sweetest to the soul when we can turn unto God O remember me It is said of Hezekiah in his sicknesse that he turned himself unto the wall and prayed he turned from the people from those that were about his bed unto the wall why what was the wall to him Or what could the wall doe for him surely nothing As good turne to an Idol for helpe or ease as to a wall yea such a turn to the wall turnes the wall into an idol Good Hezekiah had no thought of the wall nor had he any message to any image hanging there But as 't is probable many of his loving Subjects and servants were weeping about the bed of their sicke King and he had been discoursing of his disease and telling them of his sicknesse but at last he turns to the wall that is he leaves speaking to the company and turnes away from them that he might have communion with God and his first word of prayer is the same with Jobs Remember now O Lord Isa 38. 3. Creatures are but creatures and when they have done their best for us it may be they can doe no good for us when they have tried all their skill and all their strength and stirred the utmost of their abilities to give us counsell and ease we must say to them all stand by and come to Iobs Turne O Lord remember That man is most to be bemoaned who can make his moane to man only He who knows not how to complaine to God or to speake out his sorrowes and his griefes in the eare of Christ shall gaine little though he receive much by complaining to the creature But so long as we have a God to turne to and spread our cause before though men turne from us yea though they turne against us and forget us yet it is enough that we have said O Lord remember Secondly from the matter which Iob puts God in mind of namely his naturall frailty and fleeting condition that he was a passing wind Observe It is an argument moving the Lord to compassion to mind him of the frailty of our condition There is no argument from our selves so effectuall to draw out the bowels of Gods compassions toward us either in regard of our spirituall or temporall estate as this to tell him how fraile we are The Psalmist shewes this the motive of mercy often to that ancient people the Jewes Psal 78. 38. He being full of compassion forgave their iniquity and destroyed them not yea many a time turned he his anger away and did not stirre up all his wrath But what moved the Lord to deale thus with his people What was it out of himselfe We know the inward moving cause was his own free-grace but what did he look upon abroad in the creature He remembred that they were but flesh
of the goodnesse of God to man When I behold the heavens the work of thy fingers the Moone and the Starres which thou hast made Lord what is man God in the work of creation made all these things serviceable and instrumentall for the good of man What is man that he should have a Sun a Moon and Stars planted in the firmament for him what creature is this when great preparations are made in any place much provisions layed in and the house adorned with richest furnitures We say what is this man that comes to such a house when such a goodly fabrique was raised up the goodly house of the world adorned and furnished we have reason admiring to say what is this man that must be the tenant or inhabitant of this house There is yet a higher exaltation of man in the creation man was magnified with the stampe of Gods image one part whereof the Psalmist describes at the fift verse Thou hast given him to have dominion over the works of thy hands Thou hast put all things under his feet all sheepe and oxen yea and the beasts of the field the fowle of the aire and the fish of the sea c. Thus man was magnified in creation What was man that he should have the rule of the world given him that he should be the Lord over the fish of the sea over the beasts of the field and over the foules of the ayr Again man was magnified in creation in that God set him in the next degree to the Angels Thou hast made him a little lower than the Angels there is the first part of the answer to this question man was magnified in being made so excellent a creature and in having so many excellent creatures made for him All which may be understood of man as created in Gods image and Lord of the world but since the transgression it is peculiar to Christ As the Apostle applies it Heb. 2. 6. and to those who have their bloud and dignity restored by the work of redemption which is the next part of mans exaltation Secondly Man is magnified or made great by the work of redemption That exalts man indeed Man was laid low and his honour in the dust notwithstanding all that greatnesse which he received in creation Though Sun and Moone and Stars the fish of the Sea and the fowles of the ayre c. were made his servants and himselfe a companion of Angels yet by sin he fell below all these priviledges and was made a companion for Devils a citizen of hell Therefore the second magnifying of man was by the work of redemption And what was man that thou shouldest redeeme him when he was a captive raise him when he was downe build and repaire him when he was ruin'd when he was lost seeke him and when he was bankrupt and undone give him a better stock and set him up againe What was man that thou shouldest doe all this for him How did the mercy of God magnifie his servants when he gave his Son to pay their debt to his own justice If man was magnified when the Sun and Moone and heavens were made for him how was he magnifyed when God was made man for him how was he exalted when the Son of God was humbled for him Thirdly Man is magnified or made great in the work of regeneration wherein God re-stamps his Image upon him in those shining characters of holinesse and knowledge The first creation being spoiled occasion'd redemption and redemption purchased a second creation Every one that is in Christ is a new creature 2 Cor. 5. 17. Our dignity is far greater in being new creatures then in being creatures Lastly Man is magnified by those severall acts of favour and grace which God casts upon him every day smiling upon him embracing him in his armes admitting him to neere communion with himselfe watching over him tending him guarding him with Angels directing him counselling him comforting him upholding him by his spirit till he bring him unto glory which is the highest step of preferment that mans nature is capable of What is man that thou shouldest magnifie him in all these things Observe hence first That All the worth and dignity of man is out of himselfe What is man As if he had said man hath nothing of his own to commend him to or to ingratiate himself with God God hath put something upon him he hath magnified man and given him a reall worth because he would Free grace exalts man Hence Psal 90. 20. the Psalmist prayes Let the heathen know themselves to be but men As if he had said man who is high in his own esteeme conceits himselfe to be somewhat above man he judges of himselfe beyound his own sphere and border Therefore Lord bring their thoughts within the compasse of their own condition let them know that they are but men A man that is acquainted with himselfe will be humble enough A meere man is but meere earth The Prophet tells him so thrice over with one breath Jer. 22. 29. O earth earth earth heare the word of the Lord. Man is earth in the constitution of his body that was framed out of the earth he is earthly in the corruption of his mind that muds in the earth The Apostles stile is earthly minded men And he will be earth in his dissolution when he dies he returnes to his earth A naturall man is earth all over earth in his making earthly in his mind his spirit earthly earth gets into this heaven his upper regions and the body his lower region shall moulder to earth againe Then what is man Hence I say it is that when man at any time would exalt and lift himself up he thinks himselfe above man he hath some notion or apprehension of an excellency beyound the line of a creature He conceits he hath or is a peece of a deity The first ground of hope upon which man raised himselfe against God was that he might be a god he was not satisfied in being made like unto God he would be which was the highest robbery Gods equall and stand by himselfe this thought was his fall There is such a principle of pride in the hearts of all men by nature They are not contented in the spheare of a creature they would be somewhat beyound that The truth is all the true worth and dignity of man is in what he hath beyound himselfe his excellency is in Christ and his glory in being made partaker of the divine nature It abased man when he aspired to take a divine nature to himselfe but it exalts man when God inspires him with a participation of the divine nature What is man that thou doest thus magnifie him Christ makes us very great and glorious by the dignity which he puts upon us as he tells the Church Ezek. 16. 14. Thy beauty was perfect through my comelinesse which I had put upon thee thou hadst no comelinesse no beauty of thine own
not question me upon the least infirmity From the former proverbial exposition Observe first Afflictions are continued upon some without any intermission Iob had not so much whole skin as one might set a pin on nor so much whole time as a man might spit in Every hour brought a wound with it and the renewing of every moment renewed his affliction Observe secondly A short refreshing may be a great mercy Dives in hell desires not a large draught but a drop of water which alas could not have eased him so long as a man is swallowing down his spittle The eternity of pain in hell shall not find so much abatement as that either in time or in degree Every affliction in this life by how much it is with less intermission by so much the more like it is to hell and every comfort by how much the more it is unbroken and without stops by so much it is the more like to Heaven Consider then your mercies who have un-interrupted mercies dayes and years of ease and not pained so long as a man is swallowing down his spittle your mercies are like the glory and the joy of Heaven From the latter proverbial exposition Note That God observes the least the most secret motions of man He tels our steps our wandrings and those not onely corporal but moral and spiritual He knows how many steps our hearts fetch every day and how far they travel Thou hast searched and known me saith David Psal 139. 1 2. and this search is not made in the out-rooms onely but in the inner parlour and closest closets Thou understandest my thoughts and those not onely present or produced but to come and unborn thou knowest them a far off What can scape that eye which a thought cannot And he that sees man swallowing down his spittle how shall not he both hear and see him coffing up and spitting out the rottenness and corruption the filth and flegm of his sinful heart JOB Chap. 7. Vers 20 21. I have sinned what shall I do unto thee O thou preserver of men why hast thou set me as a mark against thee so that I am a burden to my self And why doest thou not pardon my transgression and take away mine iniquity for now shall I sleep in the dust and thou shalt seek me in the morning but I shall not be JOB having in the former part of this Chapter contested with his friends and expostulated the matter with God now turns himself into another posture even to humble his soul and make confession of his sin He had justified himself against the accusations of men but now he accuses and judges himself in the presence of his God He will a while forget his sorrows and bethink himself of his sins I have sinned what shall I do unto thee O thou preserver of men The words may be taken two waies 1. As a confession or a prayer 2. As a confession or a grant I shall first open them under the notion of a repenting prayer and confession of sin I have sinned As if he had said Lord if thou holdest me thus long upon the rack of this affliction to gain a confession of me to make me confess here I am ready to do it I do it I have sinned The word signifies to miss the mark we aim at or the way wherein we would walk And so it is put strictly for sins of infirmity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 significat errare aberrare declinare deflectere a via vel scope when the purpose of a mans heart is like the Archers when he draws his bow to hit the white or like the honest travellers in his journey to keep the right way and yet he miscarries and is drawn aside I have sinned But is this a sufficient confession What! to say only in general I have sinned Did not hard-hearted Pharaoh Ezod 9. 25 False-hearted Saul 1 Sam 15. 24. and Traitor-Judas Matth. 27. 4. make as good a confession as this Every one of these said I have sinned and what doth Job say more It is surely no great cost nor pain to sinful nature to bring up such a confession as this I answer First a general confession may be a sound confession It is one thing not to express particular sins with the circumstances of those sins and another thing purposely to conceale them I grant implicit confession may be as dangerous as implicit faith And to digg in the earth and hide our sins in the Napkin of our excuses is worse than to hide our Talents in the Napkin of our idleness And as it is most dangerous knowingly to conceale sin from God so it is very dangerous to do it through ignorance or inadvertency Some confess sin in general termes only because they know not what their sins are or have quite forgot them As Nebuchadnezzar called the Astrologers and Sorcerers and Chaldeans and told them he had dreamed a dreame but he could not tell what it was For the thing was gone from him Dan. 2. 5. Some such there are who can or will only say They have sinned they have sinned but what they cannot tell or they doe not remember Those things are gone from them That which is written of the learned Bellarmine a great Cardinal and a Champion for Auricular particular Confession of sinne to man seemes very strange That when he lay upon his death-bed and the Priest after the Popish manner came to absolve him he had nothing to confess at last he thought of some sleight extravagancies of his youth which was all he had to say of his owne miscarriages We see a man may de a Schollar in all the knowledg of the world of nature and of Scripture and yet not know his own heart nor be studied or read in himself He that is so in a spiritual notion can never want particular matter in his most innocent daies to confesse before the Lord and to shame himselfe for What though he hath escaped the pollutions of the world and is cleansed from the filthiness of the flesh yet he knowes that still in his flesh there dwels no good thing and that in his spirit there are at least touches of many spiritual filthinesses as pride unbelief c. besides his great deficiencies in every duty and in his love to Jesus Christ which is the ground of all So then in any of these sences to confesse sin only in general is a sinful confession And yet Job made a holy confession here and so did the Publican Luk. 18. when he smote his breast and said onely thus God be merciful to me a sinner For secondly though to speak a general confession be an easie matter and every mans work yet to make a general confession is a hard matter a work beyond man As no man in a spiritual sence can say Iesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost 1 Cor. 12. 3. so no man can say in a Holy manner I have sinned but by
sence we may observe First That The holiest man on the earth by all his sufferings and doings cannot satisfie the justice of God for one sin I have sinned what shall I doe unto thee When the Angels had sinned what could they doe unto God in this respect These three negations lay upon them and doe lie to this day and shall to all eternity They sinned but once yet could they not escape out of the hand of God Though spirits and powers yet they could not maintaine their state against the power of God and are therefore cast into prison and reserved in chaines of darknesse to the judegement of the great day They could not pacifie the wrath of God towards them God is as highly displeased and his wrath burns as hot against them as ever Now if sinning Angels could doe nothing to God what can sinfull man doe The Question is put Micha 6. 6. Where with shall I come before the Lord And bow my selfe before the high God Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings with calves of a yeare old will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams or with ten thousand rivers of oyle shall I give my first-borne for my transgression the fruit of my body for the sin of my soule These Questions are denials come not before God with any of these Then what is it that God doth require He hath shewed thee what is good to doe judgement and righteousnesse to walk humbly with thy God But why these things What though I cannot make a price for my sin with calves and rams and rivers of oyle though my children will not be accepted as a ransome for my transgressions yet can I make a price for them out of justice and righteousnesse and humble walking No not out of these neither The Lord doth not require these for the paiments of our debt as we are sinners but for the paiments of duty as we are creatures There is a double debt to God a debt to the justice of God for sins commited and a debt to the law of God for duties enjoyned The former no man is able to pay but with eternall sufferings The latter the Saints through grace do pay by their dayly holy actings There is a three-fold deficiency in al that man can do to satisfie the justice of God Frist all is imperfect and defiled our services smell of the vessell thorough which they passe and taste of the caske into which they are put There is a stampe of our sinfullness even upon our holy things And can that which is sinfull satisfie for sin Secondly whatsoever we doe is a debt before we doe it All our duties are owing before we performe them And can we pay the debt of sin by those duties which were due though sin had never been commited Thirdly The greatest deficiency is this our works want the stampe of Gods appointment for that purpose God hath no where set up mans righteousnesse as satisfaction for mans unrighteousnesse Hence if it should be supposed we had performed perfect righteousnesse according to the whole will of God commanded yet we could not satisfie the justice God offended unlesse God had said that he would accept that way of satisfaction it is the appointment and institution of God which renders what we doe acceptable unto himselfe Surely all that Jesus Christ did or suffered for us in the flesh had not satisfied the justice of God if God had not appointed that Christ should come to doe and suffer those things for the satisfying of his justice It was the compact between Christ and his Father which made him a Saviour Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire Sacrifices were refused by God it being impossible that they should purge sin Heb. 10. 4. Then the eare of Christ was opened or bored as a servant according to the law in that case Exod. 21. 6. to receive and doe the will of his Father Or as the Seventy interpret which the Apostle follows God prepared him a body Then Christ undertakes the worke And said loe I come to doe thy will O God Why In the volume of the booke it is written of me That is thou hast decreed and ordained from everlasting The record is cleare for it that I am he whom thou hast ordained to doe thy will Hence the Apostle concludes at the 10th verse That we are sanctified that is saved by that will through the offering of the body of Jesus once for all As inserting that the very offering of the body of Jesus Christ could not save us but by the will and ordination of God His hanging and dying on the crosse had not delivered us from death unlesse it had been written in the volume of the Booke There is nothing satisfactory but what the law or the will of the Law-giver makes or agrees to accept as satisfactorie In the volume of the booke there is nothing written which appoints man such a work and therefore he cannot doe it There is some what to be done by way of thankfullnesse but nothing can be done by way of paiment That question Psal 116. 12. affirmes as much What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits We must render unto the Lord for his benefits but we cannot render to the Lord for our sins We ought to take up the Cup of Thanksgiving but Christ hath and he alone was able and he alone was ordained to take and drinke the Cup of Satisfying Secondly observe which depends upon the former That pradon and forgivenesse of sinne come in at the doore of free-grace Free-grace doth all What can I do J can doe nothing O thou preserver of men J can only nor that without thy helpe acknowledge my sin it must be thine infinite goodness to pardon it When a man hath travell'd through all duties and doings he must at last sit downe in Gods love and rest in this that God is mercifull to poore sinners Isai 55. 1. Come unto me O all yee that are thirstie come without money or without price There is nothing in the creature that God requires as a price of his favor his milk and his hony his bread and his water are al gifts and bounties unto his people He cals us to buy these because we shall have them as willingly from God as any things from man for our mony he cals it a buying without mony because no value can be set upon it high enough nor any heart receive it freely enough To offer mony that is to think to obtain any of that favor by what we do is the most dangerous offer in the world We read how dreadful the issue was to Simon Magus when he offered mony for the gifts of the holy Ghost and yet those gifts were such as a man may have and go to hell with them for they were but gifts of miracles and of healing and the like But this gift of the favour and love of God in the pardon of sin is such