the Kingly which later remained in Moses after he by the command of God had devolved the Priesthood which was originally in himself upon his Brother Aaron and so according to divine institution the Priesthood was to continue in the Family of Aaron separate from the Regal Power till the coming of our Saviour who reunited those Offices in himself and became a Royal Priest after the ancient Order of Melchisedeck For upon the separation of these Offices none could be a Priest of the Aaronical Order but such as were descended from the Family of Aaron and therefore Christ could not be a Priest of that Order because he descended from the Family of Iudah and being of the Royal Lineage he resumed the Priestly Office from the House of Aaron and joyned it to the Kingly Office again with which it was originally united by which he abrogated the Priesthood of the Aaronical Order and in its room restored the ancient Melchisedecan or Royal Priesthood And hence the Author to the Hebrews observes that Christ pertaineth to another Tribe of which no man gave attendance at the Altar for it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Iudah of which Tribe Moses spake nothing concerning the Priesthood Heb. 7.13 14. and therefore by being a Priest of a different Tribe from that to which the Aaronical Order was confined he disannulled that Order and erected another in the room of it viz. the ancient Order of Melchisedeck which was before the Aaronical Hence S. Ambrose in Loc. quomodo translatum est Sacerdotium Ex tribu ad tribum de Sacerdotali ad Regalem ut eadem ipsa sit Regalis Sacerdotalis intuere mysterium primum fuit Regale Sacerdotium Melchisedâ—ch secundum consequentiam hujus sermonis secundum etiam fuit Sacerdotale in Aaron tertium in Christo fuit iterum Regale i. e. How was the Priesthood translated Why from one Tribe to another viz. from the Sacerdotal to the Regal that so it might be both Regal and Sacerdotal and this is the Mystery the first Priesthood of Melchisedeck was Regal the second was Sacerdotal in Aaron the third was Regal again in Christ. For that which distinguished the Melchisedecan from the Aaronical Priesthood was not as some imagine the difference of their Sacrifice viz. that Melchisedeck sacrificed only inanimate things whereas Aaron sacrificed Animals also for that Melchisedeck sacrificed there is no doubt because he was Priest of the most high God but that he sacrificed inanimate things only such as Bread and Wine there is not the least intimation in Scripture only it is said that when he met Abraham he brought forth Bread and Wine Gen. 14.18 that is to refresh Abraham's Soldiers after their Battel with Chedorlaomer as the manner was in those Countries Vide Deut. 23.4 and Iudg. 8.15 and 6.15 And what is all this to his Sacrificing But that he sacrificed Animate as well as Inanimate things is evident not only because animal Sacrifices were generally used before the institution of the Aaronical Priesthood and it is very improbable that he who was so eminently the Priest of the most High God should never offer the accustomed Sacrifices but also because Christ's Sacrifice was an animate one who was a Priest after Melchisedeck's Order and not of the Order of Aaron Heb. 7.11 so that if the difference between these two Orders consisted in this difference of their Sacrifice Christ must be rather a Priest of the Aaronick than the Melchisedecan Order And how could the Acts of the Priesthood of Aaron be Typical of our Saviour's which is Melchisedecan as the Scripture all along makes them if they were of a different nature from those of Melchisedeck How could Aaron's bloudy Sacrifices be Typical of our Saviour's Priesthood which was after the Order of Melchisedeck if Melchisedeck's Priesthood admitted no bloudy Sacrifice As to the Acts of their Priesthood therefore for any thing that appears to the contrary these two Orders were the same but in this they apparently differed that whereas the Regal Power was united to Melchisedeck's Priesthood it was wholly separated from Aaron's who in all probability was the first High Priest in the World that was not a King as well as a Priest. The Priestly acts therefore of these two different Orders being the same we shall better understand the nature of our Saviour's Priesthood though it be of the Order of Melchisedeck by the account we have of the Aaronical than by that of the Melchisedecan Order because the former is far more distinct and particular than the later For of the Acts and Functions of Melchisedeck's Priesthood there is very little mention in Scripture whereas those of Aaron's are described at large in all their particular Rites and Circumstances The Priestly Office therefore in general consists in officiating for sinful men with God in order to the reconciling of God to them and obtaining for them his Favour and Benediction To which end there are two Offices necessary to be performed First to offer Sacrifice for them and thereby to make some fitting reparation to God for their past sins and provocations Secondly To present that Sacrifice to God and in the Vertue and Merit of it to interceed with God in their behalf in order to the Restoring them to his Grace and Favour And accordingly we read of the Iewish High Priest who of all their other Priests was the most perfect Type and Representative of Christ in his Priestly Office and this more especially in Celebrating the Mysteries of the great day of Expiation that on this day he was appointed to bring the Beast to the door of the Tabernacle which was set apart to die for the Sins of the People and to kill it there with his own hands by which action he did as the Peoples Representative offer a life to God as a reparation for those manifold sins by which they had justly forfeited their own lives to him after which he was to take the Bloud of it and present it before the Lord in the Holy of Holies sprinkling it seven times with his finger upon and before the Mercy-Seat by which action he interceded with God to accept that Bloud in lieu of the forfeited lives of the People and accordingly the whole performance is called making an Atonement for the Children of Israel for all their sins once a year Lev. 16 34. But for the fuller explication of the Priestly Office it is necessary we should briefly explain these two essential Acts of it viz. of sacrificing and presenting the Sacrifice to God by way of Intercession for the People As for the first of these the Apostle tells us that every High Priest is ordained to offer gifts and Sacrifices Heb. 8.3 And that he is ordained for men in things pertaining unto God that he may offer both Gifts and Sacrifices for sins Heb. 5.1 It is true indeed to sacrifice in a strict sence i. e. to kill the Sacrifice seems not to have been
no sorts of objects do so vigorously impress and affect him as those which strike immediately on his senses and hence it is that he so greedily prefers carnal before rational and sensitive before spiritual goods notwithstanding the later are in themselves infinitely greater and more eligible and that in his conceptions of spiritual objects he is so prone to blend and intermix them with carnal and Corporeal Phantasms because his mind is so estranged from spiritual objects by its continual intimacy and familiarity with sensual ones that it can hardly frame any Idea of them without disguising them into some bodily semblance God therefore being a spiritual and invisible Essence and upon this account far removed out of the Ken and Prospect of our sense our sensual and depraved minds must either be naturally indisposed to think seriously of and consequently to be duly affected by him which renders us prone to Irreligion or to sophisticate our conceptions of him with corporeal Images and Phantasms which renders us prone to Idolatry to prevent both which God in great condescension to this deplorable weakness of humane minds hath always thought meet to converse with us under some sensible appearance or visible Symbol of his Divine Presence Thus when God conducted his Chosen People through the Red Sea and Wilderness he went before them in a Pillar of Cloud by day and in a Pillar of Fire by night and when afterwards he gave them his Law he descended upon Mount Sinai in a bright and glorious flame overcast with thick and solemn clouds in which illustrious appearance he afterwards made his entrance into the Tabernacle where he made his constant abode and from whence he frequently exhibited himself to the Peoples eyes and senses in a body of visible light and glory which visible light is in holy Scripture very often called the Glory of the Lord. And since God in condescension to the weakness of humane minds thought it meet to present himself to the senses of men in some visible appearance there is the same reason why the Mediator should assume some visible substance to his invisible Godhead that therein he might exhibit himself to our sense and thereby at once affect our minds with a great love and dread of his divine Majesty and by vouchsafing us a visible presence prevent our framing Idols and false Images and Representations of him in our own minds Now of all sensible substance there was none so proper for this end as Humane Nature which is that above all others that we are most intimately acquainted with and most accustomed to love and reverence and obey It is true had his design been to Govern us by terrors and affrightments as he did the Iews it would have been more proper for him to assume that dreadful appearance of a consuming fire in which he was wont to converse with them but his design being to erect his Empire in mens Souls and to captivate their Wills into a free and generous obedience he could not have appeared to us in any visible substance so proper for this end so apt to oblige and aw to indear and terrifie us together as Humane Nature And accordingly as God dwelt of old in the Iewish Tabernacle and thence displayed himself before the Eyes of that People in a visible Glory so the Word as St. Iohn tells was made flesh and tabernacled among us for so the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies i. e. as in condescension to the weakness of the Iews he pitched his Tabernacle among them and thence frequently appeared in a visible Glory to their sense so in condescension to ours he pitched his Tabernacle in our flesh or nature from whence as he proceeds we behold his Glory i. e. at his Baptism and Transfiguration as the glory of the only begotten Son or in which the only begotten Son was wont to display himself from between the Cherubins Iohn 1.14 In short therefore since in Mediating for God with us it was very needful that in compliance with our weakness he should address to our sense in some visible appearance and since there was no visible appearance in which he could so advantagiously address to us as that of Humane Nature it hence evidently appears how requisite it was that he should assume our Nature to his Deity and be Man as well as God. And as it was requisite he should be God-man in order to his Mediating for God with us so was it also no less requisite in order to his Mediating for us with God because as I shall shew hereafter to Mediate for us with God implies first his making an atonement for our sins with his Bloud Secondly his appearing for us as our Advocate in Heaven Now as for the first it was highly requisite that he should be Man that so he might suffer for us his Divinity being wholly impassible and this reason the Apostle himself assigns Heb. 2.14 Forasmuch then as the Children are partakers of flesh and bloud he also himself speaking of Christ took part of the same that through death he might destroy him who hath the power of death and seeing he was to assume another Nature to his Divinity that so he might suffer for us it was most fit and proper that he should assume ours rather than any other For since God in mercy had consented to accept of another person's suffering for our sins it was very requisite that what he suffered for us should come as near to our own personal suffering as it was possible that so it might be more exemplary to us and more nearly affect us with dread and horrour for our sins and next to our own personal suffering is the suffering of our Nature and therefore since the punishment of our sins was to be transferred from our Persons it was highly fit it should be inflicted on our Nature which it could not have been had not he been Man who endured it And as it was requisite that he should be Man that so he might suffer and that so the Nature at least that had sinned might suffer so it was no less requisite that he should be God-man in one and the same person to render his sufferings a valuable Consideration for all that Punishment that was due to God upon the score of the infinite sins of an infinite number of sinners For how could the bloud of one man though never so innocent or excellent have amounted to a valuable commutation for the forfeited lives and souls of a world of guilty sinners Or what less than the bloud of God-man could have been any way equivalent to that Eternal Punishment that was due to God from the whole Race of Mankind And yet that it should be in some measure equivalent was highly requisite as I shall shew hereafter both to satisfie the divine Iustice for what is past and to secure the divine Authority for the future and accordingly we are said to be purchased with the bloud of God Acts
Spirit or Holy Ghost whom Christ hath substituted to carry on his Mediation for God with men in his absence is no other than the third divine Person subsisting in the eternal Godhead And indeed considering the mighty part he was to act viz. to Mediate under Christ for God with men the same reason which rendered it necessary for Christ to be God to qualifie him for this Office vide Page 24. do render it altogether as necessary for the Holy Ghost to be so And indeed how is it possible he should operate upon so many men together at such remote distances as he is obliged to do by his Office and at once move every member of that vast Body of Christ the Catholick Church dispersed over the Face of the whole Earth unless like an Omnipresâ—nt soul he be diffused through the whole and co-exists with every part and if he be Omnipresâ—nt â—e must be God. And now having given an account of the Person and Quality of this Divine Spirit I proceed Secondly To explain his subordination and substitution to Christ in this part of his Mediatorship for God with men In order to which it is to be considered that this subordination of the sacred Persons in the holy Trinity proceeds not from any inequality of Essence but from the inequality of their personal Properties For as to their Essence they are all of them God i. e. infinite in being and perfections and being infinite they must all be equal there being no such thing as more or less in infinity and then being equal in Essence they must necessarily be equal in essential Power and Dominion and consequently as such are no way subject or subordinate to one another But as to their personal Properties it cannot be denied but they are unequal for the Father who begot must in that respect be superiour to the Son who was begotten and the Holy Ghost who proceeded must in that respect be inferiour to the Father and Son from whom he proceeded and upon this inequality their subordination is founded For as there is a stated Number in the Trinity by which the sacred Persons are determined to Three so there is also a stated Order by which they are ranked into a First a Second and a Third which Order is not made by mutual consent or arbitrary constitution but founded in the nature of those personal properties by which they are distinguished from one another For as the Father being the Fountain of Godhead to the Son must be first in order of nature and as the Son together with the Father was the Fountain of Godhead to the Holy Ghost and therefore must be second to the Father and in order of nature before the Holy Ghost so the Holy Ghost proceeding from the Father and the Son must of the Three be in order of nature the Third For so the Scripture expresly asserts that he proceeded from the Father John 15.26 and also that he is the Spirit of the Son Gal. 4.6 and the Spirit of Christ Rom. 8.9 and the Spirit of Iesus Christ Phil. 1.19 And being the Spirit both of the Father and the Son he must be supposed to proceed from both And where-ever the Holy Ghost is in the Old Testament called the Spirit of God it is in the Hebrew Ruach Elohim in the Plural which seems to intimate that he proceeded not from one but from two divine Persons i. e. not from the Father alone but from the Son also So that though as to their Godhead they are all equal yet in order of nature and in respect of their personal properties the third is inferiour the second superiour and the first supreme and being unequal in those personal Properties by which they stand related to each other it is very reasonable that according to these their personal inequalities they should be subordinate to one another and consequently that the Father who is the Fountain of the Divinity should be supreme in the Divine Monarchy and that the Son who was begotten of him should minister to him and that the Holy Ghost who proceeded from the Father and the Son should minister to both And accordingly in all its external actions and administrations this hath ever been the Oeconomy of the Holy Trinity for the Father to act by the Ministry of the Son and the Son by the Ministry of the Holy Ghost For so before the Fall of man and consequently before this Mediation of the Son commenced it is evident that even in creating the World the Father acted by the Son and therefore is said to have made the World by him Heb. 1.2 and the Son acted by the Spirit who is said to have moved upon the face of the Chaos Gen. 1.2 for that by the Spirit of God there is meant the third Person in the Holy Trinity we have reason to believe because he is elsewhere said to have made man and to have garnished the Heavens as hath been already shewn And in the same Method of subordination the Godhead hath always proceeded in its transactions with the world and that more especially and remarkably in this great affair of Mediating with mankind wherein the Father hath always used the Ministry of the Son and the Son the Ministry of the Holy Ghost but in the matter of the Mediation it is evident that this subordination of these sacred persons was founded not only in these their personal inequalities but also in a mutual agreement between them in which the Son agreed with the Father that in case he would be so far reconciled to Rebellious Mankind as to grant them a Covenant of mercy and therein among other blessings to promise them his Holy Spirit he himself would assume our natures and therein not only treat with us personally in order to the reducing us to our bounden Allegiance but also die a Sacrifice for our sins upon which agreement the Father long before the Son had actually performed his part of it even from our first Apostasie granted his Spirit to mankind which Spirit was granted to this end that under the Son he should Mediate with men in order to the reducing them to their due subjection to the Father For all that heavenly influence which the Holy Ghost sheds forth upon the minds of men is wholly Mediatorial in God's behalf and in order to the reconciling men's minds unto him and therefore in this his Mediation he must be supposed to act in subordination to the Son who is supreme Mediator and accordingly as the Son hath been and will be always Mediating with men by this blessed Spirit even from his Ascension to the end of the World so I make no doubt but he always Mediated with them by the same Spirit even from the Fall of man to his Incarnation For so in the time of the Old World we read of the Spirit 's striving with men i. e. in order to the subduing their stubborn Wills to a due subjection to the Will of the Father Gen.
with each other And this being the standing Government and Discipline of the Catholick Church no particular Church or Community of Christians can refuse to communicate in it without dividing it self from the Communion of the Church Catholick I say refuse to Communicate in it because it is possible for a Church to be without this Government and Discipline which yet doth neither refuse it nor the Communion of any other Church for the sake of it A Church may be debarred of it by unavoidable necessities in despite of its power and against its consent and under this circumstance I can by no means think such a Church to be separated from the Church Catholick it is indeed an imperfect and defective part of the Catholick Church and if this defect of it be any way owing to its own negligence it is a very great fault in it as well as an unhappiness But though this instituted Government is necessary to the perfection of a Church yet it doth not therefore follow that it is necessary to the being of it For even in the Jewish Church wherein all things were determined by divine institution even to the minutest Circumstances there were sundry notorious deviations from that Institution which yet did not un-church them It was a great deviation in them to offer Sacrifice in their High Places after God had determined them to Sacrifice only at the Temple at Ierusalem It was another great deviation in them to make Priests out of other Families after God had determined them to the Family of Aaron and yet it is certain that neither the one nor the other did un-church them And if these deviations from divine Institution which were the effects of their negligence did not yet un-church them it is not to be imagined that such deviations from it as are the pure effects of necessity should un-church others For though no necessity can dispence with the Eternal Laws of good and evil because the observance of them depends wholly upon our Wills and there is no such necessity can happen to us as can put them out of the power of a willing mind yet as for positive Institutions there are a thousand necessities may occur any one of which may render them wholly unpracticable and then no man can be obliged to do that which is impossible as for instance the whole Family of Aaron might have been extinct and if it had it is evident that positive institution by which God required the Jews to chuse their Priests out of the Family of Aaron must have been wholly unpracticable and consequently the Obligation of it must have for ever expired and they must have been obliged notwithstanding that positive Institution either wholly to have dropt their Priesthood and with that their Publick Worship which was much more necessary to them than that their Priests should be all of such a Family or to have chosen their Priests out of other Families of the Tribe of Levi and if in this exigence they had done the later there is no doubt but that the Divine Providence which created the necessity must thereby have designedly dispensed with its own institution and so have left them free to make Priests out of other Families And by the same reason when ever the divine Providence doth by unavoidable necessity deprive any Church of its Episcopacy it thereby for the present at least and whilst the necessity continues releases it from the obligation of the Institution of Episcopacy and allows it to administer its Government and Disscipline by a Parity of Presbyters And therefore so long as it doth not renounce the Episcopacy but still continues in Communion with other Churches that enjoy it it ought to be look'd upon and communicated with as a true Member though a maimed one of the Church Catholick For the Catholick Church never denied her Communion to any Christian or Community of Christians upon any unavoidable deviation from positive Institution It was without doubt as great a deviation from positive Institution for Lay-men to Baptize as for a Parity of Presbyters to Govern or Ordain c. and yet in cases of necessity the Catholick Church always allowed the Baptism of Lay-men as deeming Baptism in it self more necessary than the administration of Baptism by persons in Holy Orders and therefore where such persons could not be had she thought meet rather to admit that Lay-men should administer it than to suffer such as were qualified for it to die unbaptized And why may we not reasonably suppose that the Catholick Church will admit Presbyters to Govern and Ordain where there are no Bishops to be had since it hath admitted Lay-men to Baptize where there are neither Bishops nor Presbyters to be had Since the later is as great a deflection from positive Institution as the former And if the Catholick Church may be reasonably presumed to allow it in such necessary cases we must acknowledge either that she hath not Authority enough to provide against her own necessities which supposes her to be very defective or that her allowance is sufficient to authorize such persons to Rule and Ordain as well as to Baptize in case of necessity as are not authorized by positive Institution But though a Community of Christians may be a true part of the Catholick Church and in Communion with it though it hath no Episcopacy yet it is plain case that if it rejects the Episcopacy and separates from the Communion of it it thereby wholly divides it self from the Communion of the Catholick Church For whether Episcopacy be of divine Institution or no this is matter of fact granted on all hands that for twelve hundred years at least all those Churches into which the Catholick Church hath been distributed have been subject to the Episcopal Government and Discipline and therefore they who now separate themselves from the Episcopal Communion as such must in so doing separate themselves from the Communion of all Churches for twelve hundred years together and then either all those Churches must be out of the Communion of the Catholick Church and consequently during all that time there must be no such thing as a visible Catholick Church upon Earth or else those Communities of Christians which separate from all those Churches must be Schisms and Separations from the Catholick Church SECT IX Concerning the Ministers of the Kingdom of Christ. HAving in the foregoing Section treated at large concerning the Nature and Constitution of Christ's Kingdom I shall in the next place shew who the Ministers are by whom he Rules and Governs it And these are all included under a fourfold Rank and Order First The first and supreme Minister by which Christ rules his Kingdom is the Holy Ghost Secondly The second and next to him are the Angels of God. Thirdly The third are Princes and Civil Governours Fourthly The last are the Bishops and Pastors of the Church I. The supreme Minister by which Christ rules his Kingdom is the Holy Ghost or
is actually and as they will be at the day of Judgment when the good are Crowned and the wicked consigned to that fearful Execution Then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that did put all things under him which necessarily implies that then he should enter into a different state of subjection to the Father from that wherein he was before Why Then shall the Son himself be subject to him Was he not subject to him before Yes doubtless he was and therefore either this then must be impertinent or then he shall be so subject to him as he was not before before he was subject to him as he was his Mediatorial King or Viceroy as he reigned under him and by his Authority but then he is to be subject to him after a different manner For the explication of which it is to be considered that now the Son considered as Mediator reigns under God in the right of what he did and suffered in his human Nature Hypostatically united to his God-head for it was because he humbled himself and became obedient to the death even the Death of the Cross that God highly exalted him Phil. 2.8.9 Now 't was as he was Man that he became obedient to death and 't was in the right of that obedience that God exalted him to his Mediatorial Kingdom so that now as Mediator he not only reigns in his human Nature but in right of the passion of his human Nature his Mediatorial Kingdom is the purchase of his Blood by which he both obtained the new Covenant for us and Regal Power to execute it upon us When therefore he hath executed it to the full as we are sure he will do at the day of Judgment this Regal Power of his which he purchased with his Blood will cease as having fully accomplish'd that for which it was given and intended And now he being to Reign no longer in right of the sufferings of his human Nature his human Nature will be subject to the Father in a more different manner than it was before Before it was subject to him as Authorized in consideration of its passion to reign and govern under him but then having delivered up its Reign and Government it will be subject to him in a more private capacity as the Presidents of the Roman Empire were subject to Caesar while they governed under him but when they rendered back their Character they became his Subjects in a more private station Not that the humanity of Christ shall be any way depressed or degraded by his delivering up his Mediatorial Kingdom but as an Embassador after he is discharged of the burthen of his Embassie doth still retain the honour and dignity of it so the Human Nature of Christ after he hath surrendered up its Mediatorial Dominion shall still remain as highly exalted in Honour Dignity and Beatitude as ever and Angels and Saints shall for ever render to it the same religious respect and veneration as they did before he surrendered it for it shall still remain Hypostatically united to his Godhead and so God shall for ever reign in it tho it shall not for ever reign with God so that it being still the Temple of the Deity and all the glorious atchievements it made during its Humiliation and Mediatorial Reign reflecting still the same honour and praise and glory upon it it will to eternity be as great and glorious throughout all the Heavenly World as ever it was in the full splendor of its Kingdom so that in this respect what the ancient Fathers added to the Nicene Creed is most true his Kingdom shall have no end because without possessing it he shall for ever enjoy the Glory and Honour and Beatitude of it 5. And lastly That the Son being thus subjected to the Father all Power and Dominion shall from thenceforth be immediately exercised by the Deity that is to say by God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Ghost for so ver 18. Then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that did put all things under him that God may be all in all Where the variation of the Person is very observable for it is not said that the Son shall be subject to him that did put all things under him i. e. the Father that he may be all in all but that God may be all in all that is the Triune Godhead subsisting in three Persons the Father Son and Holy Ghost for had he meant the Father only he ought according to the common rules of speech to have said he or the Father of whom he had been before speaking instead of God nor can it be reasonably supposed that after the resignation of the Mediatorial Kingdom the Father only shall act and reign and the Son and Holy Ghost sit still for ever and do nothing but the meaning is that this Mediatorial Kingdom ceasing in which the Son as Man as well as God now reigns there shall from thenceforth be no other Kingdom or Dominion exercised in that Celestial State but what is essential to the Godhead in which the Son and Holy Ghost subsisting together with the Father shall for ever reign together with him for this I take to be the meaning of that phrase that God may be all in all that is that he may rule and govern all things immediately by himself that his immediate Will may reign alone in all and be the proximate guide of all that blessed world that there may be no mediate or Mediatorial Governour between him and us to exact our obedience and convey to us his favours and rewards but that we may render all our duty immediately to him and derive all our happiness immediately from him so that as now Christ the Theantropos or God-man is all in all Col. 3.11 because the Father doth all things and governs all things by him having given him all power in heaven and earth so when this Oeconomy ceases God alone or the Triune Godhead shall be all in all because he shall do all things and govern all things by himself immediately Thus when the Son of Man is subjected to him that did put all things under him that one divine Essence whence all things did proceed and in which the Father Son and Holy Ghost subsist shall from thenceforth resume all Rule and Dominion to it self and only the Son of God together with the Father and the Holy Ghost shall reign But yet in this purely divine Government there is no doubt but those divine persons will still continue to act in subordination to each other according to that natural subordination in which they are placed by their personal properties For the Godhead being communicated from the Father to the Son the Father in the order of nature must necessarily be Prior to the Son and the same Godhead being communicated to the Holy Ghost from the Father and the Son both Father and Son must also in order of nature be Prior to
Spirit we could have no imagination of him because imaginations are nothing but the Images of sensible things we can now by the strength of our Imagination fetch him down from the Heavens when we please and set him before our minds in all that venerable Majesty wherein he sits at the right hand of his Father So that tho he be never present to our outward sense yet which is almost equivalent when ever we have occasion to converse with him we can make him present to our inward viz. our fancy and imagination into this spacious Gallery of the Pictures of sensible things our mind can walk when it pleases and there behold him in Effigie tho it cannot see him face to face and considering how much we are governed in this degenerate state of our nature by fancy and imagination as well as by sight and feeling it is doubtless a most advantageous circumstance of Gods Government of the World that he governs us by one whom we can fancy and imagine when we cannot see or feel him There are a great many men that never saw the King who yet are overawed by the imagination they have of his Majesty and greatness whereas were not the King a man but a pure invisible Spirit they could form no imagination of him the want of which would very much abate if not utterly extinguish their aw and reverence of his Person Considering therefore how much we are governed by our sense in this state of our Apostacy it was doubtless a wonderful wise contrivance of God who is a pure Spirit to assume to himself some sensible matter that therein by presenting himself to our outward or inward sense he might strike the deeper aw on us and thereby the more effectually rule and govern us But of all sensible matter none could be so proper to this purpose as a human form in which we are inured and accustomed to be governed and of which as was hinted before we have of all sensible things the greatest love and veneration during this our Degeneracy therefore by which we are so unqualified to be governed by God immediately God the Father hath most wisely contrived to govern us by God-man i. e. by his own eternal Son Hypostatically united to our natures But when once mankind is recovered out of this lapsed condition when our sense is perfectly subdued to our reason and all our faculties are reduced into their Primitive Order then we shall return under Gods immediate Dominion for then God-man shall deliver up the Kingdom and God shall be all in all II. God now governs us by his own eternal Son in our natures to cure and prevent the spreading contagion of Idolatry There is no one Vice to which our corrupt nature is more propense and of which it hath been more universally tardy than that of Idolatry for as for other Vices they have their peculiar Provinces and such a Vice is more predominant in such a Clime and Temperament of Air In one Nation Pride reigns in another Intemperance in another Treachery and in a fourth Malice and Revenge as for Idolatry it 's an universal Monarch to whose Empire all the World hath been enslaved and subjected and notwithstanding all the care which God hath taken to prevent it it hath spread like the Plague till it became the Epidemical Disease of human Nature Now to be sure such an universal effect must necessarily be owing to some universal cause and what other can that be than the universal degeneracy of human Nature from its primitive life of Reason into a life of Sense For while Man was under the Government of his Reason he was as much influenced by dry arguments as he is now by his Sense and the full reason he had to believe that there is an invisible divine Being presiding over all things did as vigorously excite him to adore and worship him as the sight of him could have done had he appeared to his bodily eyes in a Glory proportionable to the immense perfections of his Nature But when once his sense had usurped the Throne of his reason and enslaved him to its Empire the case was quite altered now Reason and Argument have very little influence on him unless it be back'd with some impressions on his sense and his predominant affections are those that are raised by the strokes of sensible objects upon the sensories of his Sight and Taste and Feeling which the divine substance and perfections can never touch they being purely spiritual by which means that communication and intercourse which was between God and man whilst man was governed by reason is mightily disturbed and interrupted tho it be not altogether stopt and intercepted for still our reason which was not extinguished by the degeneracy of our natures suggests to us that there is a God and inspires us with an awful sense of his divine perfections which still maintains in us Religious Inclinations and Affections whereby we are importuned and solicited to adore and worship but we being under the Government of Sense are thereby naturally inclined either to look upon God who is in himself a pure invisible Spirit under the notion of a sensible Being and as such to worship him for so anciently some adored the Sun for God others the universal material Nature others such particular parts of it and in this consists that gross Idolatry of worshiping false Gods or at least to blend our conceptions of him with corporeal Phantasms and then to express those Phantasms in outward visible Images by them to excite and direct our Worship to him for so in most Nations the supreme Numen was heretofore adored in Statues and Images of several shapes and figures copied from the several Images by which they represented him to themselves in their own vain and roving imaginations and herein consists that more refined Idolatry of worshiping the true God in a false manner Thus the general cause of all Idolatry is nothing but the general Apostacy of human nature from the life of reason to the life of sense by which we are naturally inclined either to transform God into a gross and sensible nature or at least to assist our selves in conceiving of and adoring and worshiping him by sensible and visible Objects To prevent which God hath been graciously pleased to assume some material substance and therein from time to time to exhibit to mens eyes a visible presence of himself which in Scripture is frequently called the Glory of the Lord and by the ancient Jews the Shechinah or habitation of God and consisted of a shining luminous matter which exhibited a glorious lustre of flame or light set off with thick and solemn clouds whence it is probable he is said to cover himself with light as with a garment Psal. 104.2 and in this glorious appearance he conducted Israel through the Red Sea and Wilderness came down upon Mount Sinai and was seen by Moses and the Elders of Israel and from thence removed into