admit a division It was the commendation of David Josiah Jehosophat and Hezekiah in the old Testament that they sought the Lord with all their heart and it is Christs commandement in the new Testament that we love him with all our Heart for to love God with all the Heart is in effect as much as to give him the Heart but not the whole heart there is something more in the heart then Love for Discretion Perception Consideration and Meditation are affirmed of the Heart And all these are acts of the understanding and God is said to blesse Solomon to give him an understanding heart 1. K. 3. 12. the Heart is said to be the seat ofwisdom so that God in calling for the heart requires the understanding to know him as well as the affections to love him and he hath not the whole heart except he have both I will not dispute whether of the two is more usefull for us or acceptable to him hee requires both we can lack neither nor can the one well subsist without the other and the heart is not perfect where either is wanting Knowledge begetteth Love Love encreaseth knowledge if knowledge preceed not it is a naturall instinct not Love for how can we love God before wee know him It is a true Rule Invisa diligere possumus incognit a nequaquam Aug. apud Amb. de spiera ser 15. ignoti nulla cupido no knowledge no love It is the knowledge of the worth of the object of our love that spurres on the affections the judgement of the understanding goes before and there followeth the election of the will that discernes this chooses the understanding by discourse examines the object and having found it utile jucundum right and good commends it to the will which readily embraceth it under those termes 1. Jo. 4. 7. and so the better wee know God the more we love him and the more we love him the better we know him Love and be wise then the Apostle makes use of one word to signifie both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Col. 3. 2. by this manner of speech giving us to understand that our love to God must not be an irregular passion but a well ordered affection for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from whence the word commeth signifieth the mind or understanding to teach us that our love must not be directly bolted out from the will but must passe by the understanding and have there allowance before it break forth therefore first you must labor to know God and that knowledge will reforme your love love him entirely and that love will inform your knowledge for knowledge without love is vaine knowledge 1 Cor. 8. 2. puffeth up it is love that edifieth had a man all knowledge if he have not love it is nothing 1 Cor. 13. 2 the holy Scripture advanceth it above its fellowes gives the preheminence to it determins all in it as the perfection of all vertues and it is love that moves them all to their proper Acts that maketh faith believe hope rely patience endure temperance abstaine humility submit Yea in love there are two passions desire and feare A desire to please God in all things A feare to offend him in any thing The feare to offend God begets an awfull reverence to his dreadfull name The desire to please him incites to a cheerfull obedience of his heavenly will and the triall of obedience is the performance of our duty the duty here enjoyned is Give God that gives all requires something not by way of requitall or compensation for so man hath nothing to render him for all his benefits but by way of thankfulnesse or gratulation and so it is fit very fit that some present be tendered and given to him that hath given all to us and loe what it is the heart that must be given My Sonne give me thine heart And shall we then call this donum and not debitum our free gift and not our bounden duty Is it not he that hath made us and not we our selves and so he may challenge our hearts as his owne jure creationis by the right of creation as the maker of them It is he that hath redeemed and bought us at a deare rate the life of his Sonne pretio empti estis magno saith St Paul and thus the heart it his jure redemptionis by right of purchase as the Saviour and redeemer of it Besides in Baptisme we devoted ourselves wholy to him and so jure pacti by right of sale or covenant the heart is his and yet he saith give as if it were ours whereas he may justly take it as his owne may but will not he that made thee without thee will not save thee without thee and though Salvation be the free gift of God and a worke of grace yet there must concurre the act of mans will who if he would be saved must worke out his owne Salvation with feare and trembling It is certaine God can by violence take the heart of man but he will have it freely given drawing by faire meanes the will of Qui fecit te sine te nō salvabit te sine te Aust the flesh into conformity to the law of the spirit But doth not he who here saith give in the 4 chapter of this book verse twenty three say keepe thy heart with all dilligence and how can a man do both give and keepe for by a gift there is transitus rei ad alium a thing is made over to another And yet in temporall things we know the same thing may be both given and kept when a man makes over his right to another retayning the use to himselfe for a time but God in this case wil admit of no such reservation nor wil he be content to accept of the heart in reversion he will have it in present the very actuall and reall possession and when once Hieroms trans the heart by faith and obedience is consecrated to God he bids keep it not from him but for him the word is serva * save it for him sell it not to another omni custodia serva with all manner of keepe with watching fasting praying with watching that Sathan with his tentations ensnare it not with fasting that the flesh with it's lusts entangle it not with praying that the world with it's cares distract it not and thus to keep it is absolutely to give it Or if thou wilt not absolutely give it yet da mutuò lend it God bring it to his house and let him have the use of it here It may be the pleasures of Gods house may so affect thine heart that what at first thou didst barely lend afterward thou wilt most cherefully give And even present thy selfe before thy heavenly Plautus in Tri. father with the sonne in the comedy pater adsum impera quod vis neque tibi ero in mora Father command me what thou wilt loe
know that not here but in heaven where their Father is their inheritance is there must their hope be fixed on that their care placed and for these temporall blessings they must cast their care upon God and depend upon his fatherly providence who knows their wants and will supplie them your heavenly Father knoweth whereof you have need saith Christ and Matth. 6. you know it is enough for a father that is of abilitie such an one as is our heavenly Father to know the wants of his Children his owne goodnesse will supplie whatsoever is needfull or convenient It is not then against the honestie and it may well agree with the pietie of a Father such an one as God to owne a wretched if a contrite sinner for his beloved Sonne But all this while this Title seems to determine the Relation to one Sex seems but doth not for God who of the woman requires the dutie will his Justice permit her to be excluded from the Dignitie certainly no! the word is not to be restrained to the sex but extended to so many of the whole kind as truly beleeve whether they be male or female for God is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he maks no difference of sexes ages nations professions degrees estates or conditions of men but he that is Lord of all is rich unto all that call upon him male and female Jew and Gentile young and old rich and poore prince and people bond and free if true beleevers he ownes them all without difference for his Children And yet there is a difference amongst them both in respect of Gods grace towards them and his grace in them they are all beloved but not equally and that Gods grace and favour is more to this then that man is not from Gods final intention which is equall and alike to all his chosen Salvation and Happinesse but as men are said to love more where they conferre more and to favour most where they receive most so God in regard of some outward expressions of love and favour is said to love one more then another and in regard of mens apprehension to some having a greater sense and feeling of his love and favour then others And for his grace that is in them whether for the qualification of their persons or salvation of their soules If wee speake of the former some are better fitted and enabled for the execution of such offices and duties wherewith by their callings they stand charged wherein he that is most faithfull is most highly favoured If we speake of the latter the more grace God worketh in them the more gracious hee is said to be towards them and so the stronger their faith the ferventer their love the more unfained their repentance the more universall their obedience the more sincere their conscience the greater his love unto them the more he is delighted in them and such as in his love he hath gifted above their fellows he usually honoreth above their fellows and according to the excellency of their graces is the eminencie of their places And therefore though all the faithfull be Gods sonnes and in relation to him brethren and he the common Father of all yet for all this it will not become an inferior to affront his superior with a jam sumus ergo pares haile fellow well met for his communitie overthrows not that difference which nature civilitie and Gods owne ordinance hath made betwixt man and woman and one man and another nor will either state or Church or private families admit so absurd a paritie To lay all level no principalitie in the state no Prelacie in the Church no command in families were to ruine all an inconvenience which the seasonable fore-sight of Almightie God hath by his owne blessed Ordinance prevented nor did Christ at his comming unto whom God committed all rule and all Authoritie and Power divest the Princes of the world of that Regal and Soveraigne power wherewith God Per fidem Christi non tollitur or do justitiae sed magis firmatur Aq. prima secundae qu. 104. Art 6 conc hath invested them he abolished it not established it rather And thus though all men be alike in the first Adam made of the same mould And all the faithfull alike in the second Adam the Sonnes of God Yet the Lord for the singular benefit of mankind hath distinguished How son ser hab Oxon. 1602. them in great knowledge and made their wayes and reputations divers some of them he hath blessed and exalted as Kings and Princes Some he hath sanctified and appropriated to himselfe as Priests and Prophets Some he advanceth above their brethren and makes their fathers children bow downe before them and others hee leaves in the common rancke some he hath laden with honours wealth promotions and dignities and others he hath bestowed in meaner callings thus wisely hath God ordered the estate of this present world with the connexion of such variety of parts begetting a harmonie and bringing a perfect soundnesse and sweetnesse to the whole body Where all the strings are of one sound there is no musicke where all the members are alike there is no body but a bulke and even so there is nothing but discord and deformitie where there are not differences of degrees estates and callings of men and where God hath put a difference let man doe so too that mans estimation concurring with Gods ordination every man may be honored and respected according to his place and dignitie The stones in a building are not all of one syze The vessels in an house not proportioned all for one use The members of the body are not all of one fashion or for one office There are many stones in a building many vessels in one house many members in one body and in these many there is varietie not Identitie not many of the same but of divers syzes for divers uses of severall fashions for severall offices and this varietie of parts doth beget an unitie in the whole so we being many concludes St. Paul are one body and in a body composed of multiplicitie and varietie of parts there is more beautie greater safety and this not only in the natural Connexio totius corporis unam sanitatem unam pulchri tudinem Tacit. Leo. Ep. 8. cap. 11. body which is man but in the politicke body the state and in the mysticall body the Church beautified and strengthened with the severall offices orders degrees and callings of men diversly qualified making a distinction amongst men of the same Christian profession for a communitie of Religion induces not a confusion into Christian common wealths but confirmes them rather in peace and good order enjoyning every one by an Apostolical Canon 1. Cor. 7. 20. to abide in that calling wherein he is called propounding no new but perswading a more conscionable use of the old * and if there See Luke cap. 3. verse 10 11 12 13. be any that
hath no calling to get him one for he that hath no vocation is of no Religion There are in the world viri absque jugo * Anabaptists unruly men who stand upon their lawlesse libertie which they mis-name Christian untamed heyfers whom no pales or walles of law or discipline can keepe within the boundes of the Church or Common-wealth who abhorre that lawfull Authoritie or Christian Charitie should regulate their ill-governed libertie But surely this is no privilege of Gods Sonnes a character it is rather of the sonnes of Belial * Judg. 19. 22. 1. Cor. 7. 21 1. Pet. 2. for Saint Paul in one Epistle and Saint Peter in another teach another lesson thus much in effect that honour reverence obedience and service unto men may well consist with the libertie of the Sonnes of God The freedome Christ purchased for them is not civil from the obedience of the magistrate soveraigne or subordinate nor naturall from those respects and duties which children owe to their parents wives to their husbands c. But spirituall from sinne and Sathan death and hell this and not that is the freedome Christ purchased and Saint Paul fitly called the glorious libertie of the Sonnes of God from which happy libertie no beleever is excluded and unto which the meanest hath as good right as the greatest and be mens qualities and degrees in the world never so different God comprehends all under one common motion of Sonnes nor is it any worldly respect that makes a man ever the more favoured with God for a man to plead his birth breeding wealth wit learning beautie valour is more fit for a Coridon to his Alexes or a Phoebus to his Daphne then a Christian to his God It is not the proper man nor the rich man nor the wittie man nor the valiant man nor the learned man nor the noble man It is not any of these though all these deserve a civil respect that God is taken with his affection pitches on the godly man Psalme 4. 3. The Lord hath chosen to himselfe the man that is godly and now let no man disdaine Gods choyce how meane soever in outward appearance for whom his mercie chooses his love advanceth to the dignitie of his Sonne and whom his love hath advanced to the Dignitie from him his authoritie requires the duty of his Sonne and the duty here expressed is to give God his Heart which is the second part of my text My Sonne give me thine heart If wee be his Sonnes God is our Father there is his authoritie over us And if God be our Father where is his honour there is our duty to him Nobilitas ad virtutem obligat the greater honor God hath done us the greater are our engagements to him and therefore as wee have looked up with comfort to the dignitie so now let us looke downe with care to the dutie of Gods sonnes which is briefly sum'd up in two words Love and Obedience Where Obedience is there is nothing so difficult commanded that will not with diligence be attempted And where Love is there is nothing so pretious demanded that will not with cheerefulnesse be tendred here God tries our Love by our Obedience that he may see how much wee love him by that which we will doe for him And againe he tries the sinceritie of our Obedience by our Love that he may see how much we will doe for him by that which we wil cheerfully give him and as a pledge both of Love and Obedience he requires the heart My Sonne give me thine heart Cor tuum thy heart to God there is the thing required to testifie our Love Da mihi Give mee there is the dutie to be performed to expresse our Obedience The testimony of thy Love to God is thy Heart to God A Heart there is the quid the thing what it is that God requires Thine there is the cujus the proprietie whose it is First the Heart is the thing God calls for and what is that This small piece of flesh that beates in our mortall bodie No that were to require our lives God will have Mercy and not Sacrifice and craves not our life but our Love the Heart is the seate of Love that our heavenly Father requires of us his unworthy Children that we love him And not only our Love but in calling for the heart he calls for our feare and service too for whatsoever the curiositie of some Philosophers have determined to the contrary the heart is the seate of all the affections and passions the Gall Liver and Spleene give the occasion to stirre them up but in the heart they are seated the Heart is the Metropolis of the soule and often taken for the soule with all her faculties Besides the Heart is Omnis hona dispositio corporis reduci dat quodam modo ad cor ficut ad principium corporaliū motionum Aq. 1 2. q. 38. art 5 resp ad 3. arg Vide Aq. 1 2. q. 17. art 9 arg 1. 2. the first mover of all the Externall actions and every member worketh according to the motion inclination and will of the Heart It liveth first and dyeth last and therefore first and last and for all give God the heart for that is all All the faculties of the soule all the members of the body attend the Heart and follow it the Heart goes before and drawes the whole man after it And this is Gods delight the whole man he loves Integrity and in calling for the heart he requires every part thy head to know him thy tongue to confesse him thine eyes to observe him thine eares to attend unto him thy lips to praise him thy hands by good workes to glorifie him thy knees to bow before him and thy feet to stand in his Courts God is not served at all where any part is withheld from him or devoted to any other besides him sincerity and integrity are individuall companions If true devotion lodge in the heart humble reverence will shine in every part So sings David Psal 84. 2. Cor meum caro mea exultaverunt c. My heart inwardly and my flesh outwardly have rejoyced in the living God Thus the whole man must apply it selfe to the worship of God the outward aswell as the inward man by the outward 2 Cor. 4. 16 Oecum in locum man the learned * understand the body the inward man by St. Peter is expounded to be the hidden man of the heart that aswell as this this in private that in publike this with inward and spirituall that with outward and corporall worship In private then and in thine owne Chamber commune with thine owne heart the testimony of Gods spirit and thine own is sufficient But in publik in Gods presence Chamber the Temple it sufficeth not except the Church may see too that all may see and beare witnesse that God is in you of a truth and this cannot be except mens externall