this Easter Feast of the Resurrection of our Sauiour Iesus ouertake take the Resurrection of all his Saintes Grant this O Father for thy mercies Oh Christ for thy merites Oh blessed Spirite for thy holy names sake To whom three persons in glorious Trinity one onely true and immortall God in vnity be all power prayse maiesty and mercy acknowledged for euer Amen ENGLANDES SICKENES THE Second Lecture IEREM CHAP. 8. VER 22. Why is not the health of the daughter of my people recouered WE haue described the Person the Church of Israel as she is her own as shee is her owners what in regarde of her selfe what in respect of her God It remaines now only to enquire how shee is affected Shee is Sicke which is necessarily implied from Gods complaint Why is not the health of my daughter recouered She was sicke and so sicke that the Prophet complaines Her wound is incurable for it is come euen to the heart vnto Iudah Incurable in regard of her owne misery not of her Sauiours mercy She was low brought in the Babilonish Captiuity Except the Lord of hostes had left vnto vs a very small remnant wee should haue beene as Sodome and like vnto Gomorrah It is of the Lords mercies that wee are not consumed because his compassions though our obedience faile not But her honour lay in the dust when her Apostacie had forfeited her happinesse Superstition taking the vpper hand of Deuotion and the traditions of man getting the start and ascendency of Gods precepts When her disease grew too frenzy and her sicknesse so excluding from it selfe all recouerable hope that shee had slaine her Physitian and killed him that should haue carried her Whence it appeares that a particular visible Church might and may fall away from grace and haue the Candlesticke remooued The Papists bragge of their numerous multitude and promontorious celsitude Rome boasts that their Church stands vpon an hill So it doth on six hilles too many Shee is mounted high enough if this could iustifâ—e her She had better bate of her height and â—ise in her goodnesse There may be a locall succession but if not in faith and doctrine mole ruit sua her toppe-heauy weight ouerthrowes her May it not be said of her as Ieremie of Egipt Goe vp into Gilead and take balms Oh virgin the daughter of Egipt in vaine shalt thou vse many medicines for thou shalt not be cured It is no wonder then no wrong if we depart from her that hath departed from the truth of the Gospell and faith of Christ. I will not descend into the view of her apostacie though iust occasion may seeme heere offred but turne my selfe and speech to our selues who are sound in doctrine sicke in conversation but I trust not without good hope of recouerie But so soone as the Romish malignancie heares me say wee are sicke they instantly insult reproching our doctrine But doe men try the faith by the persons or the persons by the faith It is a silly argument à moribus ad doctrinam from the life to the doctrine Yet though we desire and striue to haue our owne liues better we feare not to match them with theirs Our sicknesse would be esteemed lesse if we would goe to Rome for a medicine For the Papist may better steale the horse than the Protestant looke on But so long as we haue approoued Phisitions at home what need we walke so farre to a Mountebanke It is a false rumour there is no sound ayre but the Romish Is it not rather true that thence comes all infection And that they who haue forsaken vs to seeke health there haue gone out of Gods blessing into the warme Sunne Our liues trouble them this they obiect this they exprobrate ad nauseam vsque But do they not stumble at our strawes and leape ouer their owne blockes cauill at our motes and forget or iustifie their owne beames The swelling on the Foxes head shall be a horne if the Pope will so iudge it a Catiline Lopus Garnet Faulx an honest man a Catholike a Saint if hee will so interpret so canonize him If I should but pricke this ranke vein how would Rome bleed Would not haec prodidisse be vicisse as Erasmus said of Augustines dealing against the Maniches the very demonstration of these things be a sufficient conuiction Vnnaturall and hideous treasons conspiracies against whole kingdomes deposing dethroning touching with a murderous hand Christos Dei the Annointed of God oathes vncleannesses periuries from whom are they produced by whom practised if not mostly if not onely by Papists They prie search deride censure the forepart of their Wallet wherein they put our iniquities whiles their owne sinnes are ready to breake their neckes behinde them The greatest euils wee haue are theirs father'd by those that will not be mother'd of our Church Haec non ad frument a Christi sed ad eorum paleam pertinent These belong not to Christs wheate but to the châ—ffe of Antichrist These are â—onsters bred of that viperous dam that haue shooke hands with humaâ—ity with ciuility though they reserue the forme of Religion Si quid in his possem facerem sterilescere matrem as one of their owne said It were well if either the children would forsake their kind or the mother become barren Yet must these men be Saints and stand named with red letters in the Popes Calendar red indeed so dyed with the Martyr'd bloud of Gods seruants But I am not delighted to stand vpon comparisons if their exclamations had not put me to them that like blown Pharisies they cry out with ostentation of sanctity God I thanke thee that I am not as other men are or as this Publican What age people Church were euer yet so holy that the Preachers found no cause of reproofe of complaint against it Chrysostome speaketh of his times Christians now are become like Pagans or worse Yet who will say that the Religion of Pagans was better then the Christians The Priest and Leuite had no mercy the Samaritane had yet their Religion was the true and not the Samaritans If some Papists amongst vs and those very few liue in more formall and morall honesty et this commendeth not their whole Church They are now in the time of their persecution as they take it though their prosperity and numbers euince the contrary wee are in our peace and who knowes not that an easie occasion of wantonnesse I deny not that wee haue grieuous offenders wee mourne and pray for them Doe the Papists reioyce at this Woe to him that is glad of Gods dishonour Let them brag their peruersion of some which were ours but such and so affected to viciousnesse If wee had lost more of Atheists sacrilegâ—ous Adulterers lâ—centious hypocrites we had as little reason to complaine as they to be proud We are the fewer they not the better We desire endeauour reproue exhort
and townes 〈◊〉 our gold and goods worldlings gods transporting our wiues children friends shrieking vnder the hand of slaughter we need not call for mourning women Ier. 9. to waile for vs our owne eyes would run downe with teares and our eye lids gush out with waters Let profanenesse lift vp his wicked hand against God to blaspheme his name despise his truth disallow his Saboaths abuse his patience deride his treatinges his threatnings his iudgements this we see and suffer without compassion without opposition But knowing the iudgement of God that they which commit such things are worthy of death not onely doe the same but haue pleasure in them that do them These Sicknesses may afflict a Church inwardly Shee may be sicke outwardly 1. by the persecution of man 2. by the affliction of God By persecution of man I need not call your thoughts back to elder times weary you with antiquities to iustifie this assertion This Church of ours so well remembers this sicknes in Q. Maries dayes as if she were but newly recouered whence discended those euils but à culmine Pontifieio as one cals it from the top tower of the Pope yet the Romists stick not to answere this laid to their charge by auerring paradoxically that their persecution was in loue as Sara to Hagar In loue they tyranized slandered beat imprison'd manacled massacred burned vs all in loue As Philippides cudgelled his father pleaded it was in loue If this were charity then sure the very mercies of the wicked are cruell their loue is worse then others hatred Nunquid ouis lupum persequitur aliqnando non sed lupus oueÌ„ Quem videris in sanguine persecutionis gaudenteÌ„ lupus est saith Chrysost. doth the sheep euer persecute the wolfe no but the wolfe the sheep whom thou seest delighting in the bloud of persecution let him plead what he will he is a very wolfe Wee tell the Papists as Augustine told the Donatists notwithstanding their distinguishing by tenses and pretenses that their persecution exceeded in cruelty the very Iewes For the Iewes persecuted Christicarnem ambulantis interra these Christi evangelium sedentis in caelo the flesh of Christ walking on earth the Papists the Gospell of Christ sitting in heauen But their cruelty is our glory we haue sprung vp the thicker for their cutting vs downe Plures efficimur quoties matimur Contrary to the rules of Arithmeticke our substraction hath beene our multiplication The Church of God morte vinit vulnere nascitur receiueth birth by wounding life by dying Occidi possumus vinci non possumus as the ineuitable inuincible truth hath manifested Wee may be killed we cannot be conquered For thy sake we are killed all the day long as Paul saith from the Psalmist to shew that both the Church of the old Testament and of the new giue experimental testimony of the truth yet in althese thing we are more then conquerours through him that loued vs If our plant had not beene set vp by the all-prospering hand of God the malignancie of these enemies would haue soone rooted it vp They haue verefied in their persecutions against vs what one of their own writes of the Turkish Alcoran Omnium quae in Alchorano continentur vltima resolutio est gladius The last resolution propagation propugnation of althings contained in the AlchoraÌ„ in the Popes decretals is not the word but the sword But blessed be our God that hath limited this rage and sealed vs our Quietus est Though they will haue no peace with vs wee haue peace with him that can ouer-rule them But haue we no persecutors still Oh that no Israelite would euer strike his brother There are two sorts of Porsecutors remaining Esau's and Ismaels nourished with the same ayre borne on the same earth and caried in the indulgent bosome of the same Church But nobis ignominia non sit patià fratibus quod passius est Christus neque illis gloria facere quod fecit Iudas Let it be no more shame for vs to suffer of our brethren what our Sauiour suffered of his then it is glory for them to do the workes of Iudas Some persecute with the hand others with the tongue Exercent hi sapientiam illi patientiam Ecclesiae The latter exercise the wisdome the former the patience of the Church We are secured from Ahabs and Herods and Neroes the teeth of the dogges be broken and the iawes of the wolues pulled out the Bonners and butchers of the Church are husht in their graues Oh that the Serpents also which hisse and spet their venime at our peace when all the birds of our ayre sing acclamations to it were at quiet But as then be that was borne after the flesh persecuted him that was borne after the spirit euen so it is now Now so and will be so We cannot see an end of these things without the end of all things Our turne is still to suffer we returne not blow for blow but in stead of sounding a point of warre we cry one to another patiamur potius Let vs rather suffer Let the Romane affections like so many pestilent riuers runne all in mare rubrum or rather in mare mortuum into the red Sea into the dead sea and snatching the sword of vengeance out of his hand that owes it quit themselues on their imagin'd enemies with â—loud and death Let him that is stiled the Seruant of seruants shew himselfe the Tyrant of tyrants Philosophy teacheth that externall accidentes change inward quality â—s but without an absolute mutation ipsius speciei they change no substances A Church may indeed at one time be better or worse disposed then at another more hote or more cold more sicke or more whole But as it were a strange fitte that should transform Apuleius into an Alie so it were a strange variation of accidents in a Church that should turne patience into cruelty humiliâ—y into pride a Tutour into a tormentour Let their motto be ferio the terme whereon all their arguments râ—lf let ours be fero It is far better to suffer then to offer wrong Let sauage persecution sit vnder the Ensignes of wolues meekenes and patience be our armes and armours This outward malady of a Church Persecution discouers the malignity of it selfe in many extentions Especially 1. in martyring her professors 2. in treason against her Soueraignes 3. in seducing her Seers 1 Martyrdome God hath in all ages of his Church suffred som witnesses of his holy truth to be purified like gold in the fire Though they are blessed that haue so suffered the Church hath in conclusion gained by this losse yet during the turbulent working of these thunder exhalations in our ayre we haue lamented miseram regionis fâ—ciem the miserable state of our country whose face hath bin scratcht and torne by the bloudy nailes of these persecuting beares Needs must the land be sicke where
they suffer is in them sinne the sinne they doe is from God a punishment There is nothing more wretched then a wretched man recking his owne wretchednesse Eyther they do not feele as blockes or they will not feele as Stoickes You know a seared conscience is not sensible and vsuall whipping makes some carelesse of the rodde except it bee a stroke that shall fetch bloud of the soule Indeed we are all of one mould but some are more cloddy and hard others more soft and relenting The best in their sorrowes may be more then Conquerors not more then men And let the Stoicke bragge his tetricall conclusions to the world that no paine can bring sorrow to a Wise man c.. Let him being put into that torturous engine of burning brasse called the Horse bite in his anguish smother his grones sigh inwardly and cry to the Spectators non sentio I feele not The wicked may laugh out lighter punishments and like the surde deafe and dead rockes of the sea not regarde the waues of easier iudgements beating on them letting fall no teares of repentance for so many blowes But when God sees that thou digestest his Physicke as dyet and with a strange kinde of indulgencie wilt neither grieue that thou hast offended nor that thou art offended God will strike home and sharpen at once both his blow thy sense Now thou shalt feele euen thy seared heart shall bleed In a word the wicked may be senseles Stoicks they cannot be insensible stones There is in all men an impossibility of impassibility But these remorseles wretches so spiritually sicke not of the stone in the raines but in the heart at least regarde not to offend God whiles God forbeares to offend them They speake softly they set their mouth against the heauens The reason is They are not in trouble nor plagued as other men At first they liberally sinne and spare not God lets them alone loe now they sinne and care not Impiety impunity impenitency thus swiftly follow one at the heeles of another There are some sicke of this disease but not so far gone of whose recouery there is a little but a little more hope These haue by the chidings of their accusing conscience a notion a rellish a ghesse of the number and nature of their own sins which because they suspect to be monstrous they would by no means admit a sight of Hence they flie the temple the society of the good the voice of exhortation whence soeuer it soundeth lest it should call the Soules eye home to glance at the own estate and so leaue it amazed Hence he hath animum inscium inscitum an ill sight an ill-sighted mind So timorous is this Patient that because he knows his wound deepe he will not suffer the Chirurgion to search it willing rather to kill his soule then to â—isquiet it Such is the folly of his partiall indulgence to his conscience that whiles hee would softer it he doth fester it They write of the Elephant that as if guilty of his owne deformity and therfore not abiding to view his snowt in a cleare spring he seekes about for troubled and muddy waters to drinke in This sicke wretch without question induced by the like reason refuseth to looke into the glasse of the Law or to come to the cleare springs of the Gospell or any perspectiue that may represent his euill conscience to his eyes but seekes to muddy and polluted channels Tauerns Theaters societies of sinne to drowne the thought of former iniquities with floudes of new And if he be enforced to any such reflection hee spurnes and tramples that admonition as Apes breake the glasse that represents their deformity He runs himselfe prodigally into so deepe arrerages and debts that hee cannot endure to heare of a reckoning Whiles he despaires of sufficiency to pay the old hâ—e reckes not into what new desperate courses and curses he precipitates himselfe And as it was in the Fable with the blind woman and the Physitian the Physitian comming often to her house euer carried away a portion of her best goods so that at last recouered by that time her sight was come againe her goods were gone So this wretch will not see the ransacking of his soule and spoile of his graces till his conscience be left empty and then hee sees and cries too late as Esau for his blessing 2 That other spirituall sicknesse for sinne befalling a reprobate soule is finall and totall desperation This is that fearefull consequent which treades vpon the heeles of the former sicknesse Presumption goes before Despaire followes after Cains fratricide Iudas treacherie presumptuous aspiring heauen-daring sinnes find this desperate catastrophe to cut themselues off from the mercy of God This is insanabilis plaga when the Physitian promising helpe of the disease the patient shall thrust â—is nayles into it and cry Nay it shall not be healed As if the goodnes of God and the value of Christs-all sufficient ransom were below his iniquity As if the pardon of his sinnes would empty Gods storehouse of compassion and leaue his stocke of mercy poore This is that agony whose throbs and throwes restles turbulent implacable cogitations cannot be quieted Let riuers of those waters of comfort which glad the City of God run with full streames vnto it they are resisted and driuen backe This is that sinne which not onely offers iniury and indignity to the Lord of heauen and earth but euen breakes that league of kindnes which wee owe to our owne flesh To commit sinne is the killing of the soule to refuse hope of mercy is to cast it downe into hell Therefore Saint Ierom affirms that Iudas sinned more in despairing of his masters pardon then in betraying him Since nothing can bee more derogatory to the goodnesse of God which he hath granted by promise and oath two immutable witnesses to penitent sinners then to credite the Father of lies before him Ianuas aeternae foelicitatis spes aperit desperatio claudit Hope opens the dore of heauen desperation shuts it As faith is heauen before heauen so despaire is damnation before the time Shall the bloud and death of Christ put sense into rockes and stones and shall man tread it vnder his desperate feet eneruate his crossâ— annihilate his ransome and die past hope did he raise three dead men to life one newly departed an other on the Beare a third swelling in the graue to manifest that no dgree of death is so desperate that it is past his recouery And shall these men as if twice dead and pulled vp by the routes deny to the grace and glory of God a possibility of their reuiuing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God and the vnfained repentance of their owne hearts forbidde it 3 Thus we haue heard the malignancy of spirituall sicknesses whetherin sinne or for sinne Now let vs take a short consideration how farre spirituall sicknesses are more dangerous then