other note but onely the bloud of Jesus Christ That is indeed better bloud then that of Abel and so speaketh better things then that of Abel Heb. 12. 24. It cried for Mercy and for Mercy to the very Murtherers whose souls some of them at least were washed with that very bloud which their hands had shed Act. 2. 23. with 38. The efficacie and vertue of that Prayer of our blessed Saviour Father forgive them for they know not what they do made that pretious innocent bloud a soveraign bath to cleanse their souls who had shed it And so the bloud of Christ did out-crie even the bloud of Christ that is The voice of Christs bloud as Mediator did crie louder for Mercy then the voice of Christs bloud as an innocent Sufferer did cry for vengeance Thus that bloud cried and still doth crie for Mercy but all other innocent bloud having no merit in it self to cleanse souls doth cry for vengeance and will never leave crying till it be revenged The souls of those that lay under the Altar Rev. 6. 9. who were slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held cried with a loud voice saying How long O Lord holy and true dost thou not judge and avenge our bloud on them that dwell on the Earth Not as if those blessed souls were Vindictae Cupidi or had the least malice or desire of revenge against their Murderers Such an opinion will not suit with that happy state of bliss in which they are But as the bloud of the Sacrifice saith Grotius which was poured at the foot of the Altar did Grot. in Apoc. 6. 9. as it were mind God of the Sacrifice which was offered up to him upon the Altar So the souls of thâ—se Martyrs which are said to lie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 under the Altar do as it were continually put God in mind of their innocent sufferings and stir up his justice to take vengeance on their Murderers So did the bloud of our Royal Martyr crie and that under the Altar too being slain for the Testimony which he held and it cried so loud that all his Kingdoms heard it from one end to the other and shook at the noise and could never have rest till God heard the crie of it and avenged it 5. Once more and I have done with the first part of my Text. A voice a voice of bloud of brothers bloud and that crying bloud not whispering but olamouring for vengeance Now lastly From whence doth it cry Why clamat de terra it crieth from the ground which had received it from the Murderers hand As if the Earth it self had shewed some compassion in drinking of it in when the Murderer shewed so much cruelty in the letting of it out Or rather as if the Earth would have hid the bloud or Cain would fain have hid it in the earth but yet it could not be for when it was covered in the earth yet still it did crie and when it could not be seen yet still it was heard Thus vengeance pursues Murderers and as the Poet could tell us Raro antecedentem scelestum Horat. deseruit pede poena claudo when such bloudy sins do march in the Front vengeance will not fail to bring up the Rear The very Barbarians themselves had it either from Experience or from Natural Light that Murderers could not go unpunished which made them say one to another when they saw the Viper hanging on S. Pauls hand Act. 28. 4. No doubt this man is a Murderer whom though he hath escaped the Sea yet vengeance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Goddess of Justice saith Vatablus suffereth not to live They acknowledged that there was a Nemesis a Vindictive power somewhere that would not fail to execute vengeance upon men of bloud the bloud wil cry still when the man is dead and buried that owned it And thus it is here Vox de Terra a voice out of the earth but yet a voice that like the crie of Sodoms sin reacheth up to Heaven and a voice that pursues the Murderer down to Hell John Baptist was the voice of one crying in the Wilderness Isa 40. 3. but this is the voice of one crying in the earth and crying out of the earth That voice out of the Wilderness called for Repentance but this voice out of the Earth calls for Justice We read of the Wizards in Isa 8. 19. that they did peep and mutter out of the earth Forerius saith that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there rendred Familiar Spirits Forer in Isa 8. 19. were spiritus in sepulchris mortuorum locis subterraneis qui Rogati voce stridula respondebant some subterranean spirits lying in the sepulchres of the dead which gave answers to those that consulted them in a strange kind of hissing voice But now as if Necromancie and Witchcraft were but a petty sin to this the bloud of the Innocent doth not peep and mutter but cry and roar out of the earth And when the Murtherers think 't is safe covered and there shall be no more tidings of it when they have hid it and buried it and hope it is forgotten even then there is spiritus in sepulchris mortuorum a spirit in the sepulchres of the dead that lifts up its voice afresh and cries out in the words of Job O earth cover not thou my bloud Job 16. 18. And thus we have found it true by experience there was spiritus in sepulchrâ— Regis a spirit of vengeance that cried out of the Kings Grave and never left crying till the curse came a dozen years after upon the shedders of it Which brings me from the Cry to the Curse the second part of my Text And now art thou cursed from the earth which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brothers bloud from thy hand Cain was cursed presently though the curse did not presently overtake him in all the parts of it so are all Murderers so especially were these No sooner is the stroke given but the curse falls as the Bullet is at the Mark in the very instant that the Powder fires so saith God Nunc maledictus es Now at this very instant thou art cursed c. But before I come to take notice of the Curse it self and to compare the curse of Cain with the curse of King-killers I shall crave leave a little further to compare the Persons and Dispositions of these men with the Person and Disposition of Cain that when we have seen how well they agree in their Qualities we may the more admire the justice of God who hath made them to agree so well together in their Curse 1. It is observed by the Jews that Cain was grown upon the matter an Atheist before he slew his brother There is in the Jerusalem Targum a Dialogue of what passed between Cain and Abel in the field Cain said to Abel There is no judgment nor Judge nor any other World after
this there shall no Reward be given to the Just nor revenge taken of the Wicked the World was not created by the Mercy of God nor is it governed by his Mercy why else was thy offering accepted and not mine And Abel answered There is a judgment and there is a Judge and a World to come and a Reward for the Just and vengeance for the wicked The World was created by the Mercy of God and is governed by his Mercy because my works were better then thine therefore my offering was accepted and thine not Thus they contended together in the field and then Cain rose up against his brother and slew him Jonathan Ben Uzâ—el adds Fixit lapidem in fronte ejus interfecit eum He beat out his brains with a stone So that I say taking it upon the Authority of these ancient Paraphrasts it appears to be at least their Opinion that the Devil had first tempted Cain to Atheism to a disbelief of judgment and the World to come before he could tempt him to Murder And truly I think our King killers were of Cains Religion that is of none as arrand Atheists as he It seems to me impossible that such a sin should have been committed by men that did believe a judgment to come or had any thing of Faith or of the fear of God left in them So that as S. Bernard saith of Cain Nec dum fratricida fideicida fuit he had Bern Ser. 25. super Cant. cut the Throat of his own Faith before he killed his brother We may say the same of these men They were fideicidae before they were Regicidae Men of no Religion before they could act a Villany that was so contrary to all Religion 2. Cain talked with Abel his brother before he slew him ver 8. Some understand it thus That Cain for the present dissembled his Anger and gave his brother good words that he might get him out into the field and have the fitter oportunity to kill him And then here is in Cain a notable example of a bloudy hypocrite who fawns and flatters that he may kill and destroy So Joab took Abner aside in the gate to speak with him quietly and smote him there under the fifth rib that he died 2 Sam. 3. 27. And as if our King-killers had learned this craft from their Father Cain himself they held the King with pretended Parlees and Treaties and a seeming desire of accord even when the hearts of many of them were fully set to murther him God deliver us and the Kingdom from such Crocodiles who weep over the head when they have a mind to feed upon the brain from such Judas's who have oyl upon their tongues whilest they have murder in their hearts whose words are smoother then butter and yet they are drawn swords Psal 55. 21. 3. Josephus tells us That Cain after he had killed his Joseph Antiq. lib. 1. cap. 3. brother and was gone out from the presence of the Lord turned Robber and so became the first Robber as well as the first Murtherer in the world And here certainly our King-killers have out-gone him As the whole world cannot match them in bloud-guiltiness so neither can it equal them in Robbery The Tartars themselves among whom Theevery is tolerated by a Law were never so great Theeves as these They Robbed three Kingdoms of their lawful Soveraign and they robbed the lawful heir of his Kingdoms and they robbed the Church of its Revenues and in doing so they robbed God Mal. 3. 8. They robbed the People of their Pastors and they robbed the Pastors of their maintenance they robbed the Nation of infinite summs of Money and they robbed hundreds of Families of their whole Estates And which was worse they did what they could to rob us all of that which is dearest to us our Religion and Christianity Never were there such Robbers in the world as these here Cain himself lies behind and cannot come near them 4. And as they were more Notorious Robbers so they were more impudent Murderers then ever Cain was He drew his brother out into the field a private place his Conscience being it seems so startled at the Guilt of his sin that though the World was so thinly peopled that there were none but his near Relations on earth yet he durst not commit it openly but drew him into a secret place thinking to conceal the Murder and probably to have made such an excuse to his Father as Josephs brethren did to their Father Jacob That some evil beast had torn him in pieces Gen. 37. 33. so hainous a sin is Murder in the eyes even of wicked men that it is ashamed to walk bare-faced though the sword of Humane Vengeance be not drawn to pursue it But these wretches acted their villany in the most publique place of the Kingdom as if Murder were now become Meritorious and the greatest of Crimes durst impudently proclaim it self to be a Vertue They poured out this sacred bloud upon the top of a Rock and poured it not upon the Ground to cover it with dust that it might cause fury to come up to take vengeance Ezek. 24. 7 8. so that Cain was a modest shame-fac'd Murderer compared with these men S. Hierom tells us from the Tradition Hieron in Ezek. 27. of the Hebrews that the place in which Cain slew his brother was the Field of Damasous which thence took its name Sanguinem Bibens Drinking Bloud And there was as much reason that the place where this sacred bloud was shed should have been called Aceldama The field of Bloud had there not been some kinde of Expiation made by shedding the bloud of some of the Murderers near the same place And so the curse fell upon them in a most exemplary way as if God had said to every one of them in particular as he did here to Cain And now thou art cursed from the Earth from that very same Earth which hath opened her mouth to receive c. which brings me about again to a more particular survey of the Curse it self and the correspondence that may be observed as well in the Punishment as in the Sin of Cain and these Murderers Maledictus tu à Terrâ that 's a heavy Curse You may observe the difference between Adams curse and Cains Adams was Maledicta Terra propter te Gen. 3. 17. the curse lighted mainly upon the earth but Cains curse came home and lighted upon his own person Maledictus tu à terra cursed art thou from the earth That was Cursed be the earth for thy sake but this is Cursed be thou for the earths sake When God curseth a mans Goods and Possessions it is not half so much as when he curseth himself his soul and body But Cains was both a double curse he was cursed and the earth too Cursed art thou there 's the curse upon his Person and the earth shall not yield her increase there 's the curse
My punishment saith he is greater then I can bear or as others read it My sin is greater then can be forgiven He that before could not be brought to Repentance with the sight of his sin is now upon the sight of his punishment driven to desparation And this S. Bernard calls the greatest Bern Ser. 3. de S. Andr. of Cains sins Grande illud scelus evomuit major est iniquitas mâ—a c. He vomited out saith he that great blasphemy My sin is greater then can be forgiven A sin that is injurious 1. To the Mercy of God for it makes God to be weaker then Sin weaker then the Devil as if his Mercy must be triumphed over and led captive by Satans malice And therefore S. Bernard having repeated those prodigious words of Cain My sin is greater then can be forgiven cries out Mentiris Latro Thou lyest Villain Major enim est Dei pietas quam quaevis iniquitas for the Mercy of God is greater then any iniquity of man 2. To the Merits of Christ For it is to charge the Death and Passion of Jesus Christ with weakness and impotency and insufficiency as if the Devil were more mighty to destroy then Christ is to save To which the same Father Bern. super Câ—â—t Ser. 61. replies again Quid tam ad mortem quod non Christi morte salvetur What sin is there so deadly that Christs bloud cannot heal Yea but Cain saith he was not a member of Christ and therefore had nothing to do with the merits of Christ He could not say Quod mihi deest usurpo mihi ex vesceribus domini I will fetch honey out of the howels of the Lyon of the Tribe of Judah quoe viscera per vulnera patent whose very bowels you may see through his bleeding wounds 3. It is utterly destructive to true Repentance and so a sin against the very Remedy For this is it which makes wretched sinners desperate when they look upon God as all Fire and Fury Wrath and Indignation Vengeance and Terrour but they apprehend nothing of Mercy and Compassion in him This was it that made Judas hang himself and Cain run from God And truly I am afraid this Curse fell upon many of the Regicides too upon some the curse of Desperation upon most of them the curse of Obduration that same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a hard and impenitent heart Rom. 2. 5. S. Gregory saith Greg. Mag. in Psal 51. 11. upon this speech of Cain that he committed the sin against the Holy Ghost I dare not say this was that sin but if Aug. Expos inchoat Ep. ad Rom. we may judge by S. Austins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who makes it to lie mainly in final impenitency joyned with desperation I doubt many of the Regicides came as near to it as Charing-Cross is to Whitehall None of them that ever I heard even when they came to Execution manifested any great signs of Repentance for this horrid Murder some died stupidly others justified it others excused it They that are yet alive have their hearts hard enough were their hands but strong enough to act over the same sin again So that here too is Cains Curse right The plague of an impenitent heart is fallen upon them 4. Cain was afraid that every one that met him would slay him such was the terrour of his guilty conscience that he took himself to be an Anathema an execrable devoted person an Outlaw that any one might kill that would Nay not only so but the word may be read in Fagius in loc the Neuter Gender Quicquid invenerit me c. whatsoever doth meet me will slay me And so he was afraid not only of men but of the beasts and creeping things and fowls of the air He was afraid lest God should arm the very irrational creatures to be the Revengers of this bloud As you know God sent Hornets to drive out the Canaanites Exod. 23. 28. and commanded Bears to tear in pieces those lewd children that mocked the Prophet 2 King 2. 24. And this very terrour of Cain lest every thing that met him should slay him lay upon the hearts of our King-killers too A Panick fear surprised them as it is the property of the Workers of Iniquity to be afraid where no fear is Ps 53. 5. They were scared with their own shadows and if Report lye not with their own dreams the very thoughts of their hearts were as so many Scorpions still stinging them and that in the time of their greatest Prosperity They lived in perpetual Frights and Fears as wretched Cain did And so this part of the Curse fell upon them too They were afraid that every one that met them would slay them 5. The Lord set a Mark upon Cain which was partly to secure him from his fears of being killed by the next he met and partly to warn others by his example to take heed of shedding bloud What this Mark was is very uncertain Some of the Jewish Writers have a fansie that it was a Dog which always kept him company and suffered no person to come near him A fansie that will suit well enough with our King-killers who no doubt had a Dog to wait upon them ever after they were dogged with the terrours of their guilty conscience which followed them still close at the heels till vengeance overtook them Others say it was a truculent bloudy aspect that frighted all that came near him so that they would say Fugiamus hinc iste est crudelis ille homicida qui fratrem Fag in ver 16. suum occidit let us flee hence this is that cruel Murderer who killed his Brother Others again say It was a perpetual trembling of all his members which they gather from the Septuagints Translation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he should go up and down the world groaning and trembling Lastly others will have it to be a continual trembling of the earth under him so that it made all persons afraid to come near him and this they gather from the Land of Nod that is the Land of Trembling in which he dwelt ver 16. Whether the earth did shake under Cain I know not sure enough the whole Kingdom shook under the Murderers of the King Be the Mark what it will it was that which made him an Example and Terrour to others and a greater terrour then his death could possibly have been Our Law condemns Notorious Murderers to be hanged on a Gibbet there to rot and this in terrorem Now suppose Cain had been served so in less then twenty years there had been no Mark nor Memory of such a Person nor perhaps of such a Sin But now that Cain was driven up and down the world for the space as 't is conceived of several hundred years with Gods Mark upon him as a living walking Monument of vengeance this was such a punishment as was most likely to effect the ends for which
the bloud of all his Posterity of all the Families and Generations that should have come out of his Loins if he had not been murdered The bloud of Abel should have run in the veins of many others that were to descend from him so that it was the bloud of families the bloud of Generations the bloud of seeds which now by being shed lost its prolifical vertue God it seems takes notice of this and in this respect Cain was a Murderer not onely of one but of many You may see this more clearly in 2 King 9. 26. Surely I have seen yesterday the bloud of Naboth and the bloud of his sons saith the Lord and I will requite thee in this plat saith the Lord. We read of none but Naboth that was put to death no mention of his sons being murdered with him in all the history of his Trial and condemnation and execution 1 King 21. 13 14. How then was it the bloud of Naboth and the bloud of his sons I suppose they are in the right who do understand it De filiis nondum ab eo natis sed qui geniti fuissent si diutiùs Vide Munsterum in 2 Reg 9 26. vixisset Not of those sons which he had but of those which he might have had if he had lived longer And so though his sons were not murthered with him yet they were murthered in him And God calls Ahabs family to account not only for Naboths bloud but for the bloud of his sons too which he might have had had he not been murthered To bring home this to our present purpose The Murderers of his late Majesty shed more bloud then they were aware of blessed be God not the bloud of all his seed so far the Divine Providence would not permit them to go He hath been pleased to preserve the sacred branches of that Royal Root and to make them flourish again to keep alive that great Name in his Posterity And yet for ought we know the bloud of some of his Posterity was shed in his This we may truly say That one unhappy stroke let almost all the bloud of his three Kingdoms out of his veins and 't was Gods great Mercy that the whole Land which in his fall was left almost lifeless and bloudless and spiritless had not bled it self to death which would surely have come to pass had not God himself been pleased to stop the issue of that blond with his own hand in the Restauration of our Gracious Soveraign So 't was vox sanguinum the voice of blouds But whose bloud was it that is the next thing 3. Vox sanguinum fratris tui the voice of thy brothers bloud That was an horrid act of inhumanity indeed To kill a stranger is a savage act to destroy the Image of God in any person living without just cause is a grievous sin but to kill a brother this dies the sin of Murder of a deeper bloud-colour then ordinary and leaves a double guilt upon the soul To kill a brother is as it were to let the bloud out of a mans own veins when as it is the self same bloud that runs in his brothers A brother in the Greek Tongue is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because brethren do lye all in one Womb in one Belly And how inhumane is it for those that drew bloud and breath from the same Parents to take away that bloud and breath one from another so to kill a brother is hainous but to kill a pious innocent brother more hainous yet When a man is persecuted for his Piety and murthered for his Innocencie and slain for Righteousness sake this is not onely to strike at the Image of God and destroy that in the man as every Murderer doth but it is to strike at God himself in the man When a Christian is thus wounded Jesus Christ bleeds Act. 9. 4. The bloud of Innocents doth cry but the bloud of Martyrs doth shrick in the ears of the Almighty And thus was Cains sin aggravated in the person whom he slew But alas Cain was a Saint to these men we are now speaking of He shed the bloud of his brother these of their Father even the Common Father of their Country If we should alter the words a little and in stead of fratris tui say patris tui in stead of thy brothers blood say thy fathers blood we should make the matter a little worse but it would still fall short of the savage barbarity of these Tragical Murtherers Had they with Romulus killed their own brother or with Oedipus their own father had they with Medea chopt their children in pieces or kickt the child out of their wives bellies with Nero or ript up their Mothers bowels to see the place they lay in before they were born all this had been a sort of Piety to what these Monsters did To be short Fratricide is a hainous sin but Regicide is far more hainous then that To kill a man is homicide to kill a father is parricide but to kill a King is Deicide that 's but Manslaughter but this is a sort of God-slaughter God himself calls them Gods and man is forbid to curse them much more to kill them he must not use his tongue to their dishonour much less is he permitted to take up a sword for their destruction Thou shalt not revile the Gods nor curse the Ruler of thy people Exod. 22. 28. You see then in respect of the person whom they slew how far these men have out-gone Cain in villany and you shall see the same in other respects by and by Thus we have seen bloud and we have heard bloud The sight of bloud is no pleasant sight and the voice of bloud is no pleasant hearing especially if you consider to whom it cries and for what purpose which is the fourth particular 4. Clamat ad me saith God it crieth unto me The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here used doth signifie exclamare vociferari to whoop or hollow to cry out with abundance of earnestness and violence as one that is in any great danger would do for help and that generally not with any articulate significative voice that 's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but onely with a great noise as if the voice of bloud were that which would even fill the ears of God that he should hearken to nothing else till that were avenged So then it is not a small still voice but a loud fearful shricking voice and clamat ad me saith God it crieth unto me that is it is a voice crying for Justice to the Judge of all the World a voice crying for vengeance to him to whom vengeance belongeth 'T is a voice of bloud calling and crying out for bloud that they who have shed bloud may have bloud to drink Rev. 16. 6. Thus doth all innocent bloud cry and shriek in the ears of the Almighty No other innocent bloud that ever was shed in the world hath any