one in the Gospel so strong that none could hold him no not the Chains wherewith he was tied but he brake them asunder Now this unhappy person of whom I speak was possessed with a Devil Mar. v. 4. The same evil spirit is entred into those robustious men who esteem them dastards who quake at the threatnings of the Law and faint at the terrours of death and judgment to come No fetters of Religious fear will hold them Are not these Sons of Anack mighty Giants And we that tremble and weep at the guilt of our sins are we not as Grashoppers in their sight You cannot be of that mind if you consider that it is not strength in the wicked but madness to carry themselves stubbornly before an infinite and omnipotent Majesty Gregory the Great is copious in a whole Sermon upon this subject that there is no such weakness as the fortitude of Reprobates Says he out of the Prophet Isaiah they are strong to drink Wine and mighty to pour in strong drink Is not that a weakness Ad inanem gloriam cum discrimine vitae perveniunt They will uphold their reputation in frivolous quarrels with the hazard of their lives nay with the hazard of their salvation and is not that a weakness They will endure attendants scorns base Offices for favour They will travel by Sea and Land in perils of Thieves in perils of Waâ—ers for the hope of Riches That is more than I can do says Gregory for this worlds good Profectò ego non sum tam fortis in ejus desiderio I am not so hardy to suffer so much for these transitory things Lastly Says he Contra flagella conditoris insensibiliter perdurant God threatens them and they do not weep he corrects them and they do not feel it There is a num Palsie in their conscience I may truly say they are dust Nullus pulvis est tam pulvis There is no moysture in them no living sap in their root if there were any thing of the life of grace in them they could not be so stupid Gregory concludes this Doctrine with a good distinction Reprobi sunt debiliter fortes boni sunt valenter infirmi Reprobates have great infirmity in their fortitude the Children of God have great fortitude in their infirmity Therefore it is more than manly it is Saint-like Apostolical Prophetical to weep because we have grieved the holy Spirit of God with our iniquities It is Apostolical by the instance of St. Paul Phil. iii. 18. There are many that walk of whom I have told you before and now I tell you weeping they are enemies to the Cross of Christ Even those superstitious ones that fall down before the sign of the Cross they are enemies to the Cross Many of them walk among us too many God help it their Idols and Images I fear will bring a curse upon the Land If St. Paul were alive he would tell us weeping that they are enemies to the Redemption obtained by Christ And weeping for sin is Prophetical Jeremy was never satisfied with weeping for the deplorable state of the Jews O that my head were waters and mine eyes a fountain of tears Chap. ix 1. Et quid nisi vota supersunt The most that we can do is to wish for such a tender and compassionate soul It is to be wish'd I say but few there be that can overcome themselves to perform it As Leo said of his days men are little touched with any thing that God doth to us in his Justice or his Mercy Nec de correctione compungimur nec de remissione laetamur We have neither spiritual joy when God forgives us our sins nor penitent compunction when he corrects us for our sins Whence comes this hardness of heart Hath Mary Magdalen left none of her generation behind her Says the Son of Syrach What is created more wicked than the eye Therefore it weeps upon every occasion Upon every occasion it is ready to shed moisture but not upon the best occasion for when will it weep for its own transgressions because it hath been wanton and full of lust As a Widow that did not love her Husband will follow his Coarse with dry eyes to his burial So Christ is the Husband of every soul which he hath espoused to him in Baptism If your sins grieve him and provoke him to depart from you either lament it with many tears or the case is plain that you never loved him But the Devil hath turned the River of our tears the wrong way A vain Interlude a Fable upon the Stage represented in due action will make the soft Spectator to wet his handkercher So the River is diverted from its natural channel for when we are put in mind of the damnableness of our sins our cheeks are as sear as the Mountains of Gilboa upon which no drop of dew did fall Do you wonder at your selves and ask the reason of this Philosophy will tell you that love is stronger than hatred and hath more command of our passions We have tears in readiness to bewail the death of our dear friends love hath such power over our tender affections but when we are upon mortification to deplore and hate our sins the drops of our eyes are not so easily commanded And this is marvelous in Nature that you shall sooner see fire sparke out of our eyes in hot desire of revenge than tears which are most proper to the eye for our grievous sins But will Philosophy assist us with no better reason Then hear Divinity which will tell you the truth It is presumption rank presumption that will not let our shallow repentance go on unto tears We are not altogether perswaded that God is in earnest when he threatens what manifold woes he will bring upon us for our rebellions That desperate courage which we assume to our selves upon great likelihood of impunity is that which mitigates our sorrow and suffers it not to break forth into any great measure of lamentation We dream that the bloud of Christ is medicinal even for impenitent sinners Thus Satan kills us with that Balm which is distilled out of his wounds to cure us But keep your faith from these impostures and fawnings of the evil one who would make you laugh your selves to death lik those that are bitten with the Tarantula The Stag when he is at the bay and knows there is no way but death for him falls a weeping And are we not surer that no tittle of Gods minacies shall fail than if we were at bay with the Stag and ready to be pluck'd down Believe that God is a severe Judge and that all his threatnings are true that there is a day to come when there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth And when you fear this indeed then you will practise my Doctrine without teaching If any great sickness hold you that you think death is at hand then your eyes will pay the tribute of sorrow to
consult with Nature ask her if she do not sometime use superfluity for the greater elegancy of her workmanship plura ad unum assumit sicut duos oculos Why might not man have been a Cyclops why might not Nature have spar'd an eye but if she will make pairs where a single instrument might serve why should we limit God's grace and scant it to just as much passion as would fit the turn since there is plenteous redemption with our God Seconly Per suavitatem peccavit homo per asperitatem maximam satisfecit it seems there was some delicious relish in the fruit forbidden as it was very pleasant to the eye The taste of Adam was of a most sapid and quick mixture the Apple was of the most refined composition being the food of Paradice and Gods own Plantation these could not but leave a touch upon Adams lips sweeter than the Honey-comb or Manna in the Wilderness Now set the Scale of justice in an equal poise the transgression was sweetness the satisfaction must be bitterness the transgression was pleasure in the highest degree the satisfaction must be grief in the very gall of bitterness but what so bitter as death especially the Cross that death of malediction Thirdly this is the Master-piece among Lombards reasons but a flower pickt from St. Austins Garden Deus justitiâ voluit Diabolum vincere non potestate the Dragon and his Angels do plead against Michael and his Angels that the Judgment might be proportioned to the Crime committed But what did Satan accomplish by his impleadment God doth not deal like Pilate and the corrupt Judges of the world shift the Law out of their sight when it doth not serve the turn and stand a tip-toe upon their Power and Prerogative He doth not deal with Justice as Festus did with Paul Go thy wayes I will speak with thee at another time Justitiâ ' vincere voluit non autoritate Satan is confounded by Gods Justice not by his Authority Fourthly and lastly as Draco the rigid Magistrate wrote his Laws in blood so Christ that innocent Lamb wrote the Instructions of patience in his own blood Let the great Rabbies of Divinity dispute it whether one drop of our Saviours blood could not save as many Worlds as there be sins in this World that is infinite yet he took his share of all sorts of persecution ut nobis praeberet exemplum patientiae that when we are persecuted and stung with fiery vermin we might look upon the Brazen Serpent in the Wilderness and be comforted with patience For now by the Examples of his Sufferings when my Soul languisheth with any calamity I will turn me to my Lord and lay my wounds to his wounds my tears to his tears and my mouth dipt in gall to his mouth and my disgrace to his reproaches Finally in all my afflictions I will seem as it were to read his Title upon the Cross Jesus of Nazareth the King of the Jews I have drawn out my Clue very far to enlarge the true testimony that Pilate gives of Christ though he forbore to open the trial of his integrity which had he undertaken his arm was strong enough to disarm his Persecutors and to delude his Enemies but compassion of our misery made him draw out a long line of torments to stripes to buffettings to death to consummatum est till all was finished We may well give his tender heart that honourable title which St. Chrysostom gave unto St. Paul a volume of charity Is there any weak conscience in this place that marvails at our Saviours proceedings and makes it his own case whether it be fit to plead innocency before the Magistrate or whether wrongful accusation should be endured without an answer for such a man I give this Doctrin for his resolution As the Passover was divided into two Portions part thereof was to be eaten and that part which remained to be burnt with fire so among the actions of Christ some are to be eaten that is drawn into example as his Prayers his Purse of charity for the Poor his converting of Publicans to the fear of God some are to be consumed with fire that is to be adored with faith and zeal but not to be drawn into imitation as his miraculous fasting his walking upon the seas and this compassionate silence before Pilat he would not speak to shun death that our hearts and tongues might be blessed through his name to praise and magnifie him for ever For as Caesar said of his Souldiers when they were offered conditions to depart with safety Caesaris milites salutem dare solent non accipere that they used to give such benefits not to receive them so Christ came into the world not to take his life as the gift of Pilate but to give life to every one that should repent and believe in the Gospel I have one bough yet to prune off in this branch and then I will proceed Great bundles of Wast-paper are printed every moneth and discharged against us by the busie-headed Jesuits to disparage the integrity of our Reformed Religion for the most part such slight and unlearned stuff that we may say in another sense than Christs Disciples did of Solomons Building Lord what manner of stones be these yet if every Scribler be not answered the Chalenger goes out of the field and cries victoria I think it was Crassus the Roman that replied not one word to a foul-mouth'd fellow who railed on him by the way till he came to his own dores Light him home says Crassus to his Servant and bring him to his Lodging Beloved it doth become our patience to shew the same contempt to these idle Pamphleters and it becoms our Profession to shew them as much curtesie that is to light them home to the Kingdom of Heaven if they will hear our Doctrin When Israel fought with Amelech but the victory was swayed by the hands of Moses held up by Aaron and Hur It was not the hand which fought says Nazianzen but the hand which did not fight that conquered Amelech And it is said of Scaevola non retentis sed amissis manibus he put the Etruscans to flight not by using his hand but by burning it off so though we give a Truce and respite to the Pen which should write yet the patience which doth not write and the mildness which neglects their bitter words shall confound our Adversaries We dare lanch into the Seas as the learned Writings of this Kingdom can testifie our Ship that is our Religion is sound and will hold out water against all objections It is our modesty to harbor sometimes in the Haven to shun Pirats and stormy winds lest we should encounter with ignominious Rabsheka's and be perswaded it is no loss of reputation unto us no gain unto our Enemies that we stand dumb like Jesus before the Jews and say nothing at the Bar of Pilate I have prosecuted my method thus far to avouch the
Spirit of grace into the Soul and is not discerned there it sanctifies there it reforms there it changeth the mind and yet we cannot understand what manner of quality it is a thing of no appearance and yet of infinite efficacy Our senses are the Cinque-ports of all humane knowledg if any thing come into us either it must enter by those passages or we have no means to know how it should enter without those passages But when we feel the agitation of grace in our heart nothing is left us but to say Lord how camest thou hither We know not which way thou camest The Jews were sealed outwardly in the Body with the Mark of Circumcision whereby every man knew his Brother but our Mark is privily imprinted upon the Soul the Holy Spirit whereby we are sealed unto the day of Redemption whereby God only knoweth his Elect. God knows it the Conscience of the faithful feels but if we go about to consider what manner of Essence or Influence it is it will amaze us that we cannot understand it Again do you wonder at things which are rarely found then marvel to see how sparingly the Grace of God doth grow upon the Earth To whom hath the Arm of the Lord been revealed and who hath believed our Report The Sun illuminates half the World at once with his Light and leaves the other half in Darkness but the tenth part of the Sons of Men are not beautified with the Light of Grace nay the sixth part of the Earth hath not heard whether there be an Holy Ghost It strikes me with Admiration how so many do want the Heavenly Calling for the Ravens and the Sparrows do not want the comfort of their daily Food Naturas rerum minimarum non destituit Deus the smallest things that be God doth not leave them destitute yet there are Millions of men and women that continue in a barbarous and unrepented life So that it turns to be the Subject of Admiration to find out those few that are the small Remnant of Jacob. Christ himself marvelled at the faith of the Centurion a Commander and so submissive a Gentile and so devout an Example seldom seen and the Lord did marvel at it So he lifted up his voice in Acclamation to the Canaanitish womans praise O woman great is thy faith a denied Supplicant and so constant a disgraced Supplicant and so patient Seldom doth the Grace of God inhabit where it proves so well But O love the Saints and magnifie God in their good success Such as serve God truly in spirit are no usual sight therefore the coming down of the Holy Ghost was matter of Amazement But above all the Effects and Benefits of it are so beneficial to mankind that it amounts to the highest admiration It opens unto us the meaning of the Scriptures without which the Eunuch may read but he knows not the interpretation it teacheth us to pray with zeal and faith without which our words are but babling it makes us hear the Word of God to our edifying and salvation without which it is lost in stony or thorny ground it puts the tast of Christs Body and Bloud into our mouths when we receive the Sacrament without which we eat and drink our own damnation it comforts us though we find the horror of sin in our conscience and tribulation in the world without which the vengeance of God and the wrath of man would overwhelm us it seasons our actions with piety and obedience without which nothing that we can do but is corrupted with the root of bitterness it intenerates the most stony Hearts it hath civilized the most barbarous Nations it hath brought in Nurture and the Use of Laws and Discipline among them that lived by nothing but rapine and robbery it hath made the Flesh of Man which was a Cage of uncleanness to be the Temple of God Upon whomsoever the Spirit of Grace doth rest the Lycaonians may say of them without offence Gods are come down unto us in the likeness of Men. You may justly extol it with a boundless Praise and a boundless Praise must needs close in with an Extasie of admiration You would bless your selves with wonder to see a mighty Cure wrought upon the Body by the Finger of God a Cure above nature and is it not more astonishable to see a supernatural Cure wrought upon the desperate Diseases and Distempers of the Soul If one that is born blind be made to see O then they cry out Never was the like seen from the beginning of the world Consider your selves I pray you in the better part are we not by nature blind and ignorant groping in darkness and cannot find a true step to Heaven The Spirit is eyes unto the understanding it makes us walk in marvelous light so that we shall not dash our foot against the stones and ruins of tentations which of these two is the greater Miracle To cast out a Devil from him that is possessed would make the Earth ring of the mighty virtue Doth not Grace cast out a Legion of Devils from the Soul To skip over all other instances but one no Miracle which Fame did publish with a lowder Trumpet than to raise the Dead chiefly to raise up Lazarus that had been four days dead Why a continuance in sin is the death of the Soul and no Paradox it is to say it is an immortal death Yet Christ rolls away the stone of impenitence under which it is buried looseth our hands and feet which were bound with the cords of Satan calls us forth from the Grave of Custom renews our spirit and makes us live unto holiness and you being dead in sins and trespasses hath he quickned Colos ii 13. So you see how hard it is to know the Spirit how rare to find it for totus mundus in maligno positus how copious and infinite in his Effects and Benefits it is above our capacity to measure it and most worthy of amazement to admire it Now as we know the Gift of the Holy Ghost better than these Jews so it is the more admirable to us by how much we know it the better but the persons of the Apostles were better known to the Jews than to us and that circumstance they fell upon as a strange thing which they could not dive into why the Lord did put so great a Treasure into such homely Vessels There was not a Moses among them skill'd in all the Learning of the Egyptians not a Joshua in all the cluster that could lead a Battel not a Samuel that had worn a Linnen Ephod from his childhood before the Lord not a Rabbi not a Pharisee not one of polite Education It is that which confounded the Multitude at the 7. verse Behold are not all these which speak Galilaeans There was some reverence done to them in that Character they might have said are not all these Fishermen Publicans and Ideots Truly if there were nothing else these
Apostolical Bishops from others according to the old Story of Austin the Monk who came into England in the time of King Ethelred 600 years after Christ and prest the West Britains of this Island to receive him as their Master and Governour because he was sent by the Bishop of Rome A learned Abbot of Bangor having no fancy to his Message consulted with an Hermit what they should think of this man and his Message from Rome hearken says the Hermit the next time you and your Brethren meet to attend this Austin in Synod observe if he shew any reverence or carry himself humbly when he comes before you but if he salute not and bear himself disdainfully receive him not for he is no Apostle of Christ At the next Synod the jolly Prelat entred among the Monks with a braving courage never stoopt nor vail'd his head but usurped the highest place in the Congregation as the Roman Legate at this the Britains disliked his Arrogancy and would not receive his Message Yet our good Bishop's humility appeared not only in his outward demeanour and verbal salutation which he knew were often forced and more then was required and that Rivers were not deepest where they overflow but in their own Channels but in paying all due respect to the deserts of others without reflecting upon his own perfections therefore it was not his fashion to undervalue other mens learning or magnify his own Upon frequent occasions he would confess his want of Eastern Languages but in such studies wherein he was conversant would by private letters give great help to many writers of books who have confessed in their returns to him that the books were not theirs but his and thereupon would have had him to have own'd them or at least to have suffered an honorable mention of himself in those books which he would in no sort permit that as Camerarius said of Melanchton he was like a Nightingale that with his singing sweetly affected all others but would not endure to hear of it himself Notwithstanding this great civility and sweetness of temper towards all people generally we must acknowledg a vanity and defect in all humane accomplishments and perfections it being not possible that almost 80 years should be spent in this Age of humane infirmity and that any mans actions should be all fine flour without mixture of coarser Meal and Bran to say so were not to commend but to flatter not truly to represent but to dawb our Bishop would often severely censure himself and said he best knew his own heart to be of sinners the chief most unthankful to God for many Divine Talents confer'd upon Him and most wanting especially in many grains of meekness and forbearance to his Neighbours Indeed he was by nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as most great wits are irritable and subject to great eruptions of anger oftentimes especially if he had met with bold and arrogant but slow parts St. Hierom acknowledges the like harsh disposition in himself and compares himself to an angry horn'd Beast and says that all the strict Discipline of Bethlehem and Watchings of Arabia could not mortifie this indecent passion in him God Almighty permitting these most holy and learned men sometimes to betray themselves in such palpable weaknesses does sufficiently convince us that humane infirmity cleaves to humane nature and absolute perfection belongs only to the Divine Yet I will add that as he was very irritable and apt to be offended so he was exceeding placable and ready to be appeased too generous he was to be vindicative and therefore though he would chide earnestly yet he ever censur'd mildly like the Apostles who had fiery tongues but gentle hands besides it was his judgment that if any man asked unreasonable things it was much better to chide him away from his house for his fault than give him good words and afterwards not do it minus negatur qui negatur celeriter and would alwayes advise other people if any thing troubled them to speak it out and never to retain a dry discontent and for the most part made his passion subservient to virtuous ends by his great natural inclination to anger becoming far more active and zealous in the carrying on his great projectments for piety and charity For any other censures of being illiberal and covetous which are so frequently and unduely cast upon Divines examin his life and few men will appear more incontaminat and free In bad times when he had lost his best Incoms and like the Widow of Sarepta had but an handful of Meal and a Cruze of Oyl left for himself and his Family yet he then thought Elias was worthy of one Cake out of it and accordingly has given a distressed friend twenty pounds at a time and would always argue that Times of persecution were the most proper seasons of charity and that charity was oftentimes the happy means to preserve us from suffering for Tyrants more commonly oppress the rich than their inopious Enemies as the Historian observed in the days of Nero Alium Thermae alium Horti trucidarunt many men might have fared better but for delicious Gardens and sweet Baths no man was safe that had a sumptuous Building or an envied Possession and therefore he believed it a prudent as well as a religious act in the Primitive Church at Jerusalem to surrender their Estates to the holy Apostles for pious uses rather than to leave them to a violent extension of prophane persons in a short time afterwards When he was made a Bishop no man was less lucripetous he desired to hold nothing in Commendam he renewed all his Leases for years and not for lives and upon very moderate Fines and spent a very considerable share thereof upon the repairs of his Cathedral often applying to the Church what the Orator said of the Common-wealth Non minori mihi est curae qualis futura sit Respublica quam qualis est hodie while he lived besides his constant charity to the poor of Lichfield City he enquired out distressed Cavaliers in his Diocess and lent them 50 or 100 l. for a year or two upon their own Bill or Bond and afterwards frequently gave it to them And thus he did sometimes to persons of a differing Religion with whom he held no Christian Communion but in this one thing of giving and never looking to receive again He reckoned that charitable Expences left to the power and managment of Executors were more theirs than the Founders and therefore was resolved to dispense his own in his life time and not be like the Whale that affords no Oyl till she die and must disgorge it To several Colledges in Cambridge he gave liberal summs of money to Clare-Hall fifty pounds to St. John's fifty pounds to Trinity Colledge he added a peculiar building call'd Bishops Hostle which cost him 1200 l. and appointed that with the yearly Rents of those Chambers Books should be
we are lead to place and persons of a little better condition to shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night from the shepherds by a manifest ascent to the Apparition of an Angel the Angel of the Lord from one Angel to a multitude which is much better a multitude of the heavenly Host from that noble Army to him who is greater than all the Angels a Saviour which is Christ the Lord And lastly from that Saviour on earth to his most excellent dominion in heaven Gloria in excelsis glory be to God on high And as in our Church Service we do or should shut up every Psalm with that devout Doxology Glory be to the Father c. as if that were it which gave every Psalm his tune and relish so glory be to God on high is a verse which may most fitly be said or sung to every circumstance which belongs to the birth of Christ He was laid in a Manger glory be to God on high for that humility proclaimed by Angels glory be to God on high for their attendance and ministry manifested to Shepherds glory be to God on high for instructing their simplicity finally to comfort our hearts that night and darkness are dispelled a glorious beam of light made the earth glister where they stood and therefore glory be to God on high for the comfort of that heavenly illumination and glory The Text which I have read unto you contains those particulars which are most natural to heaven and most proper to earth things most truly celestial are Angels and Light and glory all these did joyn together to solemnize this great Nativity when tidings came unto the Shepherds and that which properly savours of earth is fear especially 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 great fear and shepherds not able suddenly to entertain heavenly visions were sore afraid If you will fully know how and in what triumphant manner these tidings were declared from heaven and withal with what astonishment they did possess the earth lend me your attention to these four parts in general 1. Here is Gods Minister imployed to divulge the Incarnation Loe the Angel of the Lord. 2. The pomp and solemnity which the Angel brought with him the glory of the Lord did shine round about 3. Here are the persons though I have spoke largely of them heretofore I say the persons honoured both with that messenger and that solemnity the Angel came to them the glory shone round about them they were Shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night 4. How this Angel and that shining glory did affect these poor men they were sore afraid And for your parts dearly beloved so prepare your souls so to meditate upon Christs Birth that when you promise your selves after your dissolution the joy of Angels and glory shining round about you remember to temper presumption with the Shepherds fear and reverence and again when weakness and little faith are sore afraid be mindful that Christ was born to bring us to that light which knows no darkness and to everlasting glory So knit them into your heart as they are most divinely woven into my Text And loe the Angel of the Lord came upon them c. And first be ready to hear how Gods Mnister was employed to divulge the Incarnation Loe the Angel of the Lord came upon them touching whose Apparition five interrogatories must be answered Quis what Angel this was of all the heavenly Hierarchy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it should seem one of conspicuous glory the Angel of the Lord. 2. Quando when he came I believe instantly after Mary was delivered Ecce loe he came that note demonstrative expresseth the celerity 3. Quomodo the true substance of an Angel is not visible and apparitive to men he came in some fashion altered from himself ecce it was wonderful loe an Angel 4. Quo situ how he did apply himself to the Shepherd de coelo supervenit says one Translation he stood above them astitit juxta illos says another he stood near unto them we say he came upon them 5. Quare why men were not accepted to do this office to manifest the Birth of Jesus but loe an Angel of the Lord. 1. Quis and who was this Angel of all the heavenly Hierarchy modest ignorance is better than presumptuous knowledge doubtless the Holy Spirit had given him his Name in this place if it had concerned our edification yet he was no novice but St. Cyprian himself that ventured to call him Gabriel Veniunt in Bethlehem quam praedixit Gabriel invenitur Emanuel that is the Shepherds came to Bethlehem as Gabriel had taught them and there they found Emanuel who is God with us Surely so Divine a Father would not bolt out without a mark to aim at and I discern some colour for that conjecture out of a Grammatical Article Zachary was visited by a messenger from heaven as he was doing his office in the Temple Luke 1.11 There appeared unto him an Angel of the Lord but verse 26. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Angel Gabriel was sent to the Blessed Virgin in the City of Nazareth and as if he were to be known from that holy Spirit who came to Zachary by this emphatical Article being once named Gabriel from thenceforth he is spoken of according to his office the Angel of the Lord. Surely he was one of the most glorious attendants of heaven one of those principal Seraphins that stand always before the throne of God the business about which he came was of the highest nature that ever was sent from Heaven to Earth and therefore who should undertake it but as great a creature as the Heaven and Earth afforded But the School Doctors say otherwise who build upon the groundless curiosities of their adulterate Dionysius list to their speculation forsooth that Cherubins and Seraphins Thrones Principalities and Dominions are vertues of the highest rank and order always resident in the Orbs of Heaven never giving attendance to the Militant Church beneath But that commonly stiled Archangels and Angels in which degrees they place this Gabriel they have intercourse and messages as God appoints them to the world below A brave president if you mark it for their lazie Cardinal Prelates that the active Angels such as proclaim and preach Christ should be the underlings to the rest and to pretend that there are others of no such troublesome office and employment that are the superiour principalities Well as it is probable with St. Cyprian to say this welcome Messenger was Gabriel so it is more probable to hold against Dionysius his conjectures that this glorious Herauld who came to publish a Saviour to the world was one of the mightiest and chief of the Cherubins loe the Angel of the Lord. 1. The next interrogatory is quando at what time and season the Angel came Ecce venit surely he made no stay but came with great expedition after Christ was born if it were not in the same
minute or hour yet it was in a short space after for he tells them in his Message This day is born unto you in the City of David a Saviour which is Christ the Lord. When God was to destroy a people he thought it fit to make it known unto Abraham shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do Gen. 18.17 much more when he was to save a people he would immediately reveal the thing in hand and loe the Angel of the Lord as who should say shall I hide from these religious careful Shepherds the thing which I have done for their salvation Let us compare in a word Christ manifested to the Shepherds to the Wisemen of the East to Simeon and Anna in the Temple to the Shepherds he was made known the same day that his Mother brought him forth to the Magi of the East as the most ancient do collect twelve days after upon the Feast of the Epiphany to Simeon and Anna forty days after he was born when Mary according to the Law came to the Temple to be Purified The Shepherds were Jews and he was made known incontinently to them prefiguring that the first-fruits of the Gospel should be preacht before them at Jerusalem the bread of life should first be broken to the Children before the dogs had the Crums which fell under the Table Those Easterlings that brought gifts to his Cradle of Gold Myrrhe and Frankincense they were Gentiles and the Apostles were sent to them in a little distance of time after the Feast of Pentecost when it was illustrious that all Tongues and Nations should praise the Lord in their own Language Yet again there shall be another Revelation of the Gospel to the Jews after forty days numerus certus pro incerto when the Gentiles have had their part Simeon and Anna shall enjoy them that is in the fulness of time and in an hour that we do not think of a remnant shall be collected God will gather together the out-casts of Israel and the dispersions of Sion Once it was ecce Angelus Gods Minister stood in the midst of them in this Text pointing the Messias with his finger who then was in the City of David now after much attendance after many an ecce many a long look the glory of Israel shall be revealed unto them So much for the time of this Apparition 3. Loe or behold an Angel soft a while and let us ask in the third circumstance quomodo how we should behold him a Spirit hath not flesh to be seen or bones to be felt in what fashion therefore did he alter himself surely it well deserves Ecce Angelus a note of Admiration for the manner was wonderful Beloved if the Eternal Son of God did not abhor the Virgins Womb those ministring Spirits whom he commands could not abhor the shapes of men they appeared every way in the same form and fashion wherein we walk upon earth Yet thus we distinguish them from our selves our bodies are begotten theirs were created our flesh propagated from the loins of Adam their substance made extraordinarily not according to nature but by the finger of God our soul quickens the flesh which it possesseth and makes it live their bodies which they assum'd had not vivification by the breath of life but only serv'd them for motion and representation our bodies have the instruments of outward senses to convey sensible things to the fancy and so to the understanding they had eyes and ears and other sensible organs non ut sentiant sed ut corpus perfecte representent says the great Schoolman not to exercise those senses but for an ornament and complement sake lest their bodies should seem monstrous and formidable to the beholders Finally their bodies after they had appear'd to discharge their embassage vanisht into elements never to return again into that composition but our bodies shall revive out of that dust into which they were dissolv'd and live for ever in the resurrection of the righteous Some have so commented upon the Apparitions of Angels in holy Scripture as if they had not truly taken humane shapes the better to communicate their business to men but God deluded mens eyes and bred this thought in their fancy as if they had seen that which was not visible I confess there are prophetical Visions in holy Text when the fancy of certain Prophets was perswaded it saw that which it did not see it was a Divine passion which made Ezechiel think he saw beasts with wings and wheels under their feet chap. 1. It was a mere Divine passion which made Daniel suppose he saw the powerful ram push down all other beasts with his horn on the banks of Vlai Dan. 8. These objects were conceived by none but by them single Prophets no other eye could be partaker of it Now on the contrary that 's no prophetical Apparition but a real object which is equally visible to all spectators therefore the Apparition of Angels was not imaginary but substantial for loe the Angel of the Lord was seen of all the Shepherds and the Angels which Lot entertained were conspicuous not to Lot only who was a just man but equally to all the vicious Sodomites And so much for the fashion wherein he did appear not as a spirit but in the shape of a man and therefore Ecce Angelus loe an Angel of the Lord. 4. The next doubtful question is Quo situ after what manner the Angel took his place when he came unto them the Grammarians are at odds what 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 should mean whether he hover'd above their heads in the air or stood in the same level near unto them Beda prevented this quarrel and accepts of both interpretations Sunt juxta nos per amorem supra nos per authoritatem they stand near unto us by their love and they stand above us by their authority Surely if Christ had not been born to reconcile us to his Father we had not been worth the coming near we had been no company for those holy Seraphins but since he vouchsafed to take flesh and blood the nature of man came into respect and reverence the enemy shall not approach to hurt it but those auxiliary troops of heaven pitch their pavilions round about it supra juxta planting themselves as a fortress for our head and as a buckler for our arm And indeed those are the chief things that need good influence and assistance knowledge and action head and hand Some are secret inventors of mischief plotters and contrivers of disturbance their brain is a mint of oppression where is Angelus superveniens the Angel above Some know their Masters will but they do not do it nay quite contrary fear or favour wrings ill effects from them where is Angelus astans they want a good Angel at their elbow Where is Michael the great Prince Qui stat pro filiis populi tui which standeth for the children of thy people Dan. 12.1 But whether
hour the heart of man is cast down and presageth some evil to come when God and his Angels appear though they entreat us peaceably The main reason is this Ne dignam suis meritis accipiant retributionem our own sins rise up against us as unanswerable accusers and we ominate and conjecture that God appears for nothing but to judge and condemn us When God and his Angels presented themselves to Jacob in a dream he breaks out into these words Gen. 28.27 How dreadful is this place this is no other but the gate of heaven Peace Jacob why doest thou not cry out how comfortable is this place this is no other but the gate of Heaven but it 's certain that the very comfort of heaven was dreadful and unpleasant to men in the Old Testament and our nature is still corrupted the vessel is still unclean that receives these blessings and therefore we are afraid of the great mercies of the Lord as well as of the great punishments Alas O Lord for I have seen an Angel of the Lord face to face says Gideon and yet for all that fear Gideon is named a mighty man of valour Manoah the sire of that race from which Sampson came the very name of valour yet he said to his Wife We shall surely dye because we have seen the Lord. The charitable widow of Sarepta was no less afraid of Elias an extraordinary Prophet Art thou come to slay my son and to call my sins to remembrance finally Peter drawing a miraculous draught of fish into the Ship as Christ bad him cast out the net thought of nothing but his own sins and Gods vengeance Depart from me Lord for I am a sinful man But here 's a messenger in my Text that bids the Shepherds cashiere all these affrightments neither to be dismay'd at the light that shin'd about them nor yet that God was in the glory of that light First Not to be troubled at the light for it was to make this doctrine manifest as if it had been written with a beam of the Sun that Christ is the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world And why says Bernard did God ordain that light should be instead of John the Baptist to usher Christ into the world when he was born but because he would illuminate him without Qui interioribus ignorantiae tenebris obducitur who was overcast with darkness within In him was life and that life was the light of men John 1.4 Quae necdum infundi poterat at divina saltem circumfunditur claritas as the light was but spread about their bodies here so it was a sign that if they would believe in him that was come to be the Messias and to save them from their sins their whole bodies should be transform'd into bodies of light hereafter in the Kingdom of Heaven And as every living thing rejoyceth when the night is past and the Sun appears upon the earth so they and we have cause to rejoyce that the night of Ceremonies pass'd away and the clear evidence of truth did shine abroad Vnto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise Mal. 4.2 Therefore according to Bernards elegancy this is the Angels fear not drawn out at large timetis phantasma en adest veritas You are afraid of some spectrum or vision fear not behold we come with the evidence of truth You suspect this is the lightning that goes before a thunder-clap No no it betokens there is a light risen into the world which is the comfortable light of men You suspect death but I annuntiate life You fear the gates of Hell but the Heavens are opened and God is come down among you You conjecture some perdition but behold I preach a Saviour that shall save you from your sins This is the meaning of the light which did dance at Midnight about the air when Jesus was born and the Angel said to them that trembled at the Vision fear it not But what if God himself were in that light What if it were a fiery Apparition darted from the presence of his Majesty Why yet Nolite timere Fear it not Once it pleased our heavenly Father to keep a distance with man upon these terms no man hath seen God at any time and lived Now the day is come when you shall see he communicates himself more friendly to dust and ashes so St. John begins his Epistle That which was from the beginning yet we have seen it with our eyes we have looked upon it and our hands have handled the Word of life It is not from henceforth since Christ was born as it was with the Bethshemites that lookt into the Ark which represented the glory of God and died for it Now no man hath so much cause to fear his indignation as he that shuns his presence and fears lest the Lord should appear before him How did St. Stephen exult when he saw the heavens opened and Christ Jesus standing at the right hand of God Do you think the Martyr was amazed to see the sight No my Beloved ever since the Son of God vouchsafed to take flesh in the womb of Mary it is not a sign of death to see any part of Gods glory but a good ominous presage of everlasting life Therefore be it that God was in the light which shin'd about the Shepherds yet all is well says the Angel Nolite timere Fear it not Secondly They must take courage and not be troubled à propriâ indignitate because of their own unworthiness Indeed what might they think within themselves that they were vouchsafed to hear the first Proclamation of this Blessed Nativity To us these Congratulations To us poor Swains this heavenly Embassage To us miserable Shepherds these Tidings who are set with the Dogs of the Flock Tell them to Caesar or to Herod his Lieutenant or to the chief Priest Non nobis Domine non nobis We are most desertless Wretches and why should God bestow such a royal favour upon us Do you remember Beloved how Peter drew our Saviour near unto him by crying out Depart from me for I am a sinful man O Lord Luk. v. 8. The more he requested him to be gone the more Christ did abide with Peter so by how much the Shepherds did abase themselves before the Angel the more did the Angel raise them up and bade them be encouraged to behold the Glory of God He that did choose little Infants to be his first Martyrs and ignorant Fishermen to be his first Apostles and Mary Magdalen a woman and a sinner to be the first Witness of his Resurrection it may appear that his grace is manifestly toward them who have a quick feeling of their own indignity The blessed Virgin when she had conceived her Son came to her Cosin Elizabeth that God might prove her lowliness and thus she exprest it Whence is this to me that the Mother of my Lord should come unto me
with us than against us Our friends do exceed the number of our enemies therefore we may be couragious Besides the name of Gabriel supposed to be that Messenger that came to the Shepherds his name by interpretation is Fortitudo Domini the strength of God as if he were a great Bulwark on our side Quoniam bellum indictum est Daemonibus upon Christmas day began open hostility against the Devil therefore it is a good Omen a blessed presage that the trumpet of Gabriel blew these tidings abroad who is fortitudo Domini a valiant Prince such a one as Michael was that conquered the Dragon as his name is so is himself the strength of God Finally we may be sure that what he said to encourage us was solid comfort without flattery no false alarm no smoother of sweet words where there is no cause for there are Mountebanks in Divinity that will promise many sorts of remedies to a sin-sick soul where there is none at all As Jeremy describes those false blandishing Prophets They have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly saying peace peace when there is no peace Slightly or verbis leviculis says Vatablus with gibing frumps 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 read the Septuagint scornful despising them whom they seduced with lying hopes Periculosiora sunt animae secura quà m corpori adversa says St. Austin security is more perillous to the soul than affliction to the body But such messengers as my Text speaks of cannot publish a falshood because they are ever enlightned with the spirit of truth we may build upon a rock of confidence if they say Nolite timere fear not One touch more and this Point is done You hear that the Tongues of Angels are chearful comfortable Tongues their tidings are no flattery yet they are words of mirth and gladness Then it were good me thinks that discretion and the consideration of Christs merciful Gospel did mitigate their zeal who think they are bound to thunder nothing so much to the people as fears and terrors like the writer of Iambiques that spote anger and poyson to put Archilochus into desperation Let Vices be threatned but let the hope that accompanies true repentance go together Let Judgment be put home to the obdurate conscience but let Mercy be an Advocate for the broken in heart Let the strictness of Law and the Curse thereof fetch a tear from our eyes but let the ransom of our sins be set before us and that Christ will wipe all tears from our eyes St. Paul wisht himself at Corinth not to affright them but to rejoyce with the Brethren as it was said of the mild nature of the Emperour Vespasian Neminem unquam dimisit tristem he never sent any man from him discontent but gave him some comfort and satisfaction So the Gospel is such a sweet demulcing Lesson that if it be truly preach'd it must always revive the heart it cannot leave a sting behind it You see the Angel delights not to scare but to comfort the Shepherds Fear not I shall lead your patience no further than one thing more why they should not fear Propter nuntiatum that 's the most principal regard because Christ was born to be their comfort This is to be descanted at large hereafter upon the remainder of this Text and for the present I will prevent what I shall say hereafter but with this one observation that concerning all such as are terrified and perplex'd in mind we can do no more than the Angel hath done preach Christ unto them for their comfort if the joy of his Nativity will not allay their disconsolate melancholy desperation then there is no Balm in Gilead to help them that 's all the infusion of solace which the Angel did pour into the world when it was cast down with sin Poor soul that art terrified with a condemning conscience tell me to what end was Christ born but to seek and to save them that were lost Was not he partaker of flesh and bloud as thou art And dost thou surmise that he made any for condemnation whose nature he took upon him unless by their own infidelity they make themselves reprobates Did he come among us to bring great joy unto all people And wilt thou thrust thy self out of the number Did not he weep in his Cratch that thou mightest sing in heaven Did not he fly from Herod that thou mightest fly from Satan Was not he brought forth amongst us in great humility and misery that thou mightest be translated out of misery into glory Be not like Rachel that would not be comforted Fear not little flock it is your Fathers pleasure to give you a Kingdom Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect It is God that justifieth who shall condemn us It is Christ that was born and died and rose again to deliver us from all evil it is he that was made man that thou mightest be made a glorious Saint a fellow Citizen with Angels AMEN THE FIFTH SERMON UPON THE INCARNATION LUKE ii 10. Behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people IN the same Text where we ended the old year let us begin the new Jesus Christ last year and this year and the same for ever To speak of our Saviours Nativity says Bernard is as new at these days as it was in the first Twelfth-tide after he was born Semper novum est quod semper innovat mentes nec unquam vetus est quod fructificare non cessat That 's justly esteemed a new meditation which prepares us to newness of life neither can we say a tree grows old by standing long in the soil which fructifies continually as much as ever it did before In the imagination of our Faith Christ seems to be offered up again so often as we remember his Death and Passion in the Sacrament so he seems as verily to be born again so often as we do faithfully annuntiate his Incarnation Once we have done that work already in the day it self the time is not yet expired which belongs to that Solemnity now we are come once more to the same business to dispatch it that you may see the difference between the antiquation of the Old Law plucking out the sting of fear and the publication of the new Covenant the Gospel which breaths unspeakable gladness First I have preacht upon these words how we should purge out the old leaven of distrustful fear now I come to shew what it is to have a new heart created full of spiritual joy I observed unto you upon the whole verse that as much might be said from hence to extol the benefit which we receive by Christs Nativity as is usually delivered to express that everlasting felicity which we shall enjoy with God in the highest Heavens to that beatitude of the Saints say the Schoolmen very rightly two things must concur Omnis miseria excluditur omne
into mourning and never suffer you to see a joyful day more Take heed you use not your liberty for a cloke of licenciousness Take heed of mid-night revels The Shepherds were not dancing but keeping watch over their flocks The Poet Virgil hath billited the sinful joys of the world mala mentis gaudia with Famine and Poverty and the very Haggs of Hell and indeed a vicious pleasure is a devillish thing for lawful and moderate pleasure is the preservative of nature filthy and corrupt pleasure destroys the glory of our nature I mean the soul And so much for this point that the coming of Christ doth inhibit all extravagant voluptuousness but for spiritual and bodily pleasure which is lawful the Angel brought tidings of joy of great joy which shall be to all people Now I must speak of the two supporters of this joy 1. That it is great for the size 2. That it is of long continuance for the measure gaudium quod erit joy that shall be unto you Great joy says the Angel he pass'd it over without a word of comparison lest he should seem to the Shepherds to have boasted but yet he meant there was no joy like to this to attain to such felicity as to have a Saviour born Other things may make us glad this is only a vehement and intensive exultation Let a carnal man pamper his skin with gluttony satiate the desires of the flesh with filthy fornication decline all industrious labour in pleasurable idleness let him have all things wherein fortune can favour a sensual Epicure Suppose that neither War nor Famine nor Death nor Dishonour nor Poverty eclipse his content yet for all this there is a Melancholy Fiend of Hell that upon sundry frivolous occasions will fret his heart and break his sleep and make his passions jar within themselves and he hath no firm and stable argument to perswade his soul to get out of this heaviness But if any discontent creep upon him that hath set up a stedfast Faith as a pillar in his heart and hath engraven these words upon it Jesus is my Redeemer this supports the soul that it shall not be cast down but it recovers it self from all pensiveness even as David chid all anguish from his heart Why art thou so sad O my soul and why art thou so disquiet within me still trust in God for he is the help of my countenance and my God Vna est ratio vincendi inimicum laetitia spiritualis This spiritual gladness and festivity is the principal assistance to vanquish Satan and all desperate doubts with which he would perplex our conscience it is a royal joy which comforts us that we shall be heirs of a glorious Kingdom it is a sanctified joy which gives us promise that we shall not only be Kings but Priests for ever to offer up the sweet odors of our prayers to God it is a superlative joy which cries down all other petty delights and makes them appear as nothing it is endless joy of durance and lasting for ever and ever for my Text says it is Gaudium quod erit joy that shall be unto you All the joy upon earth is gaudium quod est now it is and anon it is not joy for a spirt and away Eccles vii 8. as the crackling of thorns under a pot so is the laughter of a fool Like a gol-sheave all of a flame and out again suddenly The end of mirth that is of worldly mirth is heaviness Prov. xiv 13. Times of feasting have a period every man is glutted at last he that hath his fill of sport is weary by the late of night and glad to take his rest But the joy that you have in Christ is with you all the year in all your sorrows in all your adversities it sleeps with you it grows old with you it will change this life with you and follow you into a better And my joy shall no man take from you says our Saviour John xvi 22. Christmas joy was not only for the first twelve days when the Son of God was born but for all the twelve months of twelve hundred years and many hundreds after them unto the worlds end So St. Peter doth solace us 1 Pet. i. 8. Though now ye see him not yet believing ye rejoyce with joy unspeakable and full of glory Eccles xi 9. Mark I pray you how much line this Syren world gives a voluptuous man to play with Rejoyce O young man in thy youth and let thine heart chear thee and walk in the ways of thine heart and in the sight of thine eyes but when the hook is in his jaws observe how it is twicht and snatcht up at last Know thou that for all these things God will bring thee unto judgment So that let the wicked speed never so well in his frolicks and jocundities he returns home as Theseus did with black sails of sorrow as if he had never made a saving voyage All their laughter is like the joy of Herod's Birth-day dancing and revels and offering of great gifts last for a while but before evening you shall see an alteration and when their surfeited Tables are removed away the last service in the platter is the Head of John the Baptist But the mirth which we have in the Mediator of our salvation is a song which hath no rest in it nor ever shall have a close We begin the first part here that we may sing the other part in Psalms and Hallelujahs with the Saints for ever As Christmas is celebrated part of the new year and part of the old so it is joy that is in this life and shall be in the life to come Our last peroration upon the Text is to meditate upon the persons to whom these glad tidings and great joy are directed Vobis omni populo to you and to all people And personally to those Shepherds the joy was great I do not question it for the Angel did not light upon them casually as if he took the first he met chance and fortune are words made by our ignorance things of no being in the providence of God but certainly they were pickt out rather than any others because they were men of just and holy conversation fit to receive glad tidings from Heaven they were of an humble and a lowly spirit not of a proud and stiff opinion that would dispute against the Scriptures which said Jesus was the Christ like the Scribes and Pharisees they were useful men to the Commonwealth in which they liv'd painful in their vocation and watching over their flocks by night Out of all these premises we may collect that God had a respect to them in particular unto such belongs the Kingdom of Heaven the good tidings fell upon their head They did apply the benefit of Faith to themselves and that Saviour which was born was their Redeemer And vobis Judaeis to you Jews the Text will bear that I am sure
Deum gubernat amoris omne regnum est Love did rule God himself love swayed all things in the world We know and admire the meaning that the love of the Son turn'd the enmity of the Father into peace it turn'd threatnings into forgiveness and death into life Poise every thing in a right scale and mark the heavy weight of our undeservings and the nature of man might stink in Gods nostrils which had so much offended him to believe a Serpent nay to believe the Devil in a Serpent rather then the lively Oracle of his own mouth Yet love took away that distastefulness which the whole Trinity had conceiv'd against sinful flesh and the second Person became flesh for our sakes and was made sin for our sakes by imputation that we might be made sons and righteous before God nay that we might be made the righteousness of God Rom. v. The Athenians were proud of Pompey's love that he would write his name a Citizen of their City for a princely person to accept a freedom in a mean Corporation is no little kindness how much more doth it aggravate the love of Christ to come from heaven and be made a Citizen of this vile earth to be born after a more vile condition than the most abject of the people 2. It is not so proper to say God did love us by Christ for God is love and in himself and for his own goodness sake he could not but love the work of his hands but this is the true and proper understanding of it that notwithstanding his love to his own justice through the merit of our Saviours humility he forgave us our sins therefore his love toward mankind and his love toward his justice went hand in hand and could not be parted He satisfied the vehemency of his love toward sinful man that he gave his Son to be born of a Virgin and to become our Mediator he satisfied the love he hath to his own Justice and the hatred he hath against sin when he did impose this office of a Mediator upon his beloved Son not without shedding of blood Justice cried out it was meet mercy should not rule all Adam and his posterity ought to dye or who will answer for them not an Angel or Spirit and therefore not the Son of God as he is God for God is a Spirit Meet it is every one should bear his own burden the nature that sinned let it bear the curse of its own sin Mans nature had sinned mans nature ought to suffer but that which our nature should bear our nature by a fit adequation of recompence could not bear Our sufferings were not enough to satisfie the wrath of God due to sin The Son of God is a most valuable person but not passible man is passible but not valuable the one nature ought to suffer but could not the other could suffer but ought not That he might be liable to all contempt he was born a Saviour and made a child that he might be able to pay the price he was perfect God as well as perfect man a Saviour which is Christ the Lord. 3. Love and Justice are mightily declared that a Saviour was born and the eternal Wisdom of the Father comes in for her part to be magnified It is beyond our understanding to say nay but that the Father might have made a creature fit to satisfie his Justice to have clearly paid the price of our Redemption and so to have spared his Son yea but wisdom interpos'd it was not fit that man should owe his redemption to any other than to whom he owed his creation for the value of that benefit would compel us to love our Redeemer better than our Creator So Bernard Plus nos ad charitatem excitat redemptio quam creatio Therefore God would not so dispose the mystery of our souls health that occasion should be given to love an Angel or Saint better than himself the King of Glory The Son that sits at his right hand by whom he made the worlds let him restore all things and the blessing of our Creation Redemption and all other good gifts shall meet in one center This is pretii difficilimi decentissima solutio say the Schoolmen a most convenient payment of a most difficult ransom 4. The boundless power and infinite virtue of the Godhead I confidently pronounce it did never appear so much in any other work as when a Saviour was born He that knew no beginning but was from all eternity to begin to be a man he that speaks to the world in thunder to cry in a cradle Verbum infans he that decketh himself with light as with a garment to be wrapt in swadling clouts he that opens his hand and filleth all things with plenteousness to suck for a few drops of milk at a womans breasts we are able to answer nothing to this but with the Angel to cry out Rev. v. 12. Dominion and power to the Lamb and to him that sitteth on the throne for evermore And so far of the second point The next word to be consider'd in the Text is like the flesh-hook which the Priest had to draw a portion of the Sacrifice unto himself To you a Saviour is born says the Angel Vobis natus the good turn shall be yours the blessing yours you ought to be affected with joy at this wonderous work for he is your Saviour Tell the Shepherds that a Saviour is born and they cannot but understand he is de nobis like unto us in nature but tell them unto you a Saviour is born that 's a great deal more than they understand that he is born for their redemption It is honourable to be made like us but advantageous in the highest degree that he was made for us Let us work upon this mine and here we shall find the precious mettal fit to pay the price of our debts to God in our steed when we were bankrupts First we learn from hence he was born to you and not unto himself to your glory to his own abasement and exinanition for his own part he was begotten of God before all times so noble a Nativity that when the Father bringeth in the first-begotten into the world he saith And let all the Angels of God worship him Heb. i. 6. Therefore for himself he needed no other birth to be born at all especially to be thus basely born in the manger of a stable He took a body as it were sown in dishonour that we might reap the harvest and be magnified Likewise he is called a Saviour not in respect of his own person indeed he was his own destroyer and our Saviour when the High Priests servants sought to lay hold of him in the Garden neither doth he go about to escape or to deny himself but whom seek ye I am he No man would put himself into the hands of barbarous enemies that meant to be his own Saviour all the salvation that he
to offer him up for an whole burnt Offering I conceive very well what a straight Abraham was in and that the bowels of nature were never at such a quandary what to do Yet he yielded at the first warning and said it should be done But this trial wherein Christ assayed what his fore-runner would do when he came to be baptized is more perplexful a great deal God proved his servant Abraham what he would do for his bidding with a mortal Son that must die Here God proves John Baptist what he will do to his own immortal Son by whom he made the worlds And to take away the life of Isaac was nothing so hard a case of demur as to make the least abatement from the glory of Christ When God offered so much was it not very disputable with man to bethink him how to take But howsoever this was the greatest appearence of scruple that could be imagined yet I must lay my hand upon my mouth and say with Job How should man contend with the Almighty The way of the Lord is equal though the best Saints on earth may fail in their judgment and know not how to find it out As none of the men of Timnah could guess at the meaning of Samsons Riddle but Samson himself revealed it so none could interpret the paradox of Christ why he would be baptized but Christ himself Suffer it to be so now For thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness So much as I shall narrate to you of this Story at this time consists of these two parts in general 1. How John Baptist lost himself in a doubt And comest thou to me 2. How Christ helps him out of it And Jesus answering c. John makes a question of that which Christ commanded Christ commands him again and puts it out of question The doubt of John is no pertinacious error but an admiration mixt of love and humility Comest thou to me Our Saviour accordingly deals gently with him not with the least check to betray any offence but after these two ways Sicut Dominus imperans sicut Preceptor docens First As his Lord he lays his strict command upon him Suffer it to be so now Secondly As his Preceptor he teacheth him cause for if For thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness His power to say the word and impose upon him had sufficed but he gives him reason likewise for his better satisfaction These are the particulars to be handled It is the small pittance which remains of my Text since last day how the Prophet hath lost himself in admiration Comest thou to me At which words I am now to enter my Treatise and shall soon dispatch them John puts his speech into a form of wonder how could he do less When he saw the Lord of heaven and earth put himself into the form of a sinner and into the condition of a servant Do you ever read in the Gospel that the Angels brought tidings of his low estate that he would be made flesh but that they cry out in their Preface Ecce behold as if they could not utter the message without admiration Faith is nothing else but a long continued astonishment which knows not how to utter it self because the Lord hath done such marvellous things for us But above all this exinanivit seipsum this exinanition and making himself almost nothing for our sakes it puzzles them most who are best able to consider it Something we would fain say to it and when we have brought it forth it 's nothing but wonder and exclamation So did Elizabeth the mother of this Prophet Whence is it that the mother of my Lord doth come unto me So doth the Prophet himself break forth when the undefiled came to the waters of cleansing Comest thou to me Dost thou wash my feet Says Peter to his Lord. Quis dicere poterit quantum inter hoc Tu illud mihi intersit discriminis says St. Austin O how far are those two words remote one from another Thou the great Jehovah and I an abject worm and dost thou wash my feet The self-same infinite odds John Baptist acknowledgeth between himself and the Messias The breadth of the earth may be measured the height of heaven may be taken but the distance between these two terms cannot be fathomed Thou and I Thou an incomprehensible God and I a small fragment of thy works And comest thou to me And let me add this to the rest John Baptist had greater reason than Peter to cry out at our Saviours humiliation and to say to this effect What meanest thou Lord This shape of a servant doth not become thee for Peter had seen long trial before that Christ was made poor that we might be made rich and made himself of no account that we might be exalted but John was put upon the first proof of all hence he began to depress himself and to communicate of those things which sinners did when he came to be baptized in Jordan Besides it is a greater sign of infirmity to come as it were to be cleansed among the polluted than to take the office to cleanse the defiled therefore it was a greater argument of humility to come to be wash'd in Baptism than to take a Towel and girt himself withal and to wash his Apostles feet It was no small thing therefore that made John Baptist speak like an astonisht man Comest thou to me Thus you see how not only an ordinary person such as we are but a great Prophet whose stile above all others was the Friend of the Bridegroom such a one may loose himself not only by searching into the height of Gods glory but by meditating likewise upon the depth of his humility St. Chrysostom says John Baptist should have taken the rise of his admiration a little further off not from the Baptism but from the Nativity of our Saviour The wonderful abasement was that the infinite God would be made a miserable man all other parts of humiliation fall in sweetly because he would be made in the form of sinful flesh When you consider how he would be inclosed in a Virgins womb be tempted be despised be buffeted be crucified 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 among so many sorrows and contempts never marvel if he would be baptized There were four things that might seem doubtful to John but to which of them may not a most answerable satisfaction be given according to the mystery of our Redemption which Christ had undertaken 1. Comest thou As who should say I am thy Messenger to go before thy face Why didst thou not send for thy servant but hast come unto him Let it suffice to say to this that the Sacraments must not be commanded except in case of necessity to wait upon us at home but we must come to them behold as the eyes of servants look unto the hand of their Masters and as the eyes of a maiden unto the hand of her Mistris
to favour the weakness of Infants we cast no more than a dew of water upon their face yet when young men converted from heathen Idolatry required the Baptism of the Church their whole body waded into the River even as they that came to John stood up to the neck in Jordan yea and in hotter countries Infants were dipt into the bottom of the Font this the Fathers called a resemblance that the old Adam was buried in the waters St. Paul makes it a mystery that we are buried with Christ therefore I find that some were wont especially to baptize on the Satterday wherein Christ lay in the Grave and a threefold immersion of the Child into the water was an usual Ceremony because Christ lay buried three days in the Sepulchre After the representation of burial in the outward Element the good use of that Sacrament tells us we should die unto sin I say first buried and then die for the end of being buried with Christ is that we should die daily unto sin This order is no hard thing to conceive for suppose a man by mischance sunk into the bottom of the water before he loseth his life and dies it is true to say that he is buried in the stream which is gone over his head therefore upon this burial-resembling baptism it behoves you to die unto the world and to mortifie your members upon earth The death of sin is thus to be conceived not an utter privation of all evil but a beating down of concupiscence it is a death to your Adversary the Devil when he cannot reign in your mortal body Weeds which are cut down perhaps will grow no more but their savour still stinks upon your dunghil So you may sheare down the viciousness of your life like an unprofitable weed lay it dead and let it grow no more but it will ever leave a noisom smell in our nature While we live in this world flesh is but a dunghil of corruption it made St. Paul have a great desire to be dissolved that he might be a sweet savour in Christ As we are buried and die with Christ in Baptism so we must rise with him through the faith of the operation of God Col. ii 12. For when Christ is given to us to be our life to what end should we die as it were with him in the Laver of new birth unless it be to rise up in a new life This meditation cannot choose but stick by you if you will always carry the remembrance of those words before your eyes Abrenuntio Satanae I renounce the Devil and all his works They are a part of your Indenture that you made with God and how will you answer the violating of your Covenant St. Ambrose declames thus upon it Tenetur vox tua non in tumulo mortuorum sed in libro viventium Praesentibus Angelis locutus es non est fallere non est mentiri This word is recorded not among the dead but in the book of the living The Angels were present in the Church when the Sureties in your name gave their faith to God therefore hold you to your word you must not falter you must not lie unto the Lord. Walk in newness of life that Phrase hath somewhat in it that is not said barely in a new life In novis vivendi formis let there be no kind of likeness and conformity to thy self as once thou wert a neglecter of Prayer a Traducer a Fornicator a Drunkard an Oppressor Here is a Temple built up new unto the Holy Ghost which once was a den of uncleanness that which is to come of my life is altogether consecrated to the glory of my Saviour look not therefore before me now but get thee behind me Satan You have now heard all the five Reasons upon the second part of the Text why Christ was baptized I said in the third place it was but a preparatory to greater matters which should follow therefore he went up straightway out of the water The Text says straightway as who should say he staid not long upon that Circumstance no more will we 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he did ascend out of Jordan and very presently both these are the crums of the Text and they must not be lost Literally it imports that Christ stood not upon the shore having a few drops of water cast upon him but he went with his whole body into the River to intimate that if God should not help the deep waters of our sins would take us up to the neck and the stream had gone over our soul So Philip and the Eunuch went down into the waters Acts viii 38. That great Courtier of Queen Candace stript himself of all his cloaths before his servants that he might wash from head to foot What was it to him to be naked in the sight of divers men He was so ashamed of his sins that he forgot all other shamefac'dness Thus he press'd close to the example of our Saviour who went down into the stream of Jordan and it being not the time of harvest when that River used to fill his banks he went up and ascended from the Pool St. Austin allegorizeth Confestim ascendit ut ostendat quà m gravi onere in baptismo liberamur He went up nimbly to the banks to shew that by Baptism we are lightned of the great burden of our sins and fit to ascend unto our Father Others fasten this observation upon it that Christ went straightway out of the water For his Baptism was done with more speed and expedition than the common peoples the reason is this Among the multitude every one was baptized confessing their sins that took up some time to detain them before they parted Christ staid for no more than the sprinkling of the River who had no sins to confess and straightway went out of the water St. Luke affords a pious conjecture Luk. iii. 21. being baptized he prayed Therefore to teach us with what reverence these great mysteries are to be entertained he made hast incontinently to the shore to fall upon his knees and pray unto his Father Adoremus coram creatore says the Psalmist O come let us worship and fall down and kneel before the Lord our maker If we are to worship him even as low as with the most humble prostration of our face upon the earth because he created us and gave us the life of nature then what knee can be so refractory as not to worship and fall down when we celebrate his infinite goodness in either of the Sacraments that he hath redeemed us from eternal death called us to the participation of grace and given us assurance in those blessed Seals of his Covenant that we shall enjoy the life of glory Remember what I said in the beginning beware of obstinacy Lastly He went up out of the waters to shew us every good deed is a step into another Do but enter into the practice of one good action and
in domo charitatis in a charitable Hospital family every man hastened to a good work as if he had flown like a Dove Was not Paul a brave wing'd Apostle that traversed much of Asia and preacht the Gospel in every place from Jerusalem to Illyricum Seventhly The Doves eyes are fixt upon the Rivers of waters Cant. v. 12. some say out of vigilancy to espy therein the gliding of the Kite that flies above and to save it self So the spiritual man looks backward to the first waters wherein he was dipt to the Vow which he made in Baptism There he remembers his Garment was made white and he must not stain it for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not only to wash away filth but to give tincture or colour to that which is died So in Baptism the foul spots of iniquity are taken forth and by sanctification a clear gloss is set upon our soul It was the exhortation of old at Baptism Accipe vestem candidam immaculatam c. Take this white garment pure and undefiled it was their Ceremony to put on such and keep it undefiled against the day of the Lord. Et grege de niveo gaudia pastor habet says Lactantius The Shepherd rejoyceth to see the fleeces of his Lambs fair and unspotted These are pennae deargentatae as the Psalmist says the Doves wings are silver wings and if they be bright Silver here it will be changed into a better Metal hereafter a Crown of Gold whose wings are silver wings and the feathers of Gold Lastly As it was toucht before in the days of Noah the Dove was a presager of a better world to come and in this Text likewise it is Nuncia futuri seculi the happy annuntiate that there is a better world to come when these evil days of sin and misery are ended So we are sealed with the holy Spirit of Promise which is the earnest of our inheritance the Spirit is a pledge of that possession which is purchased for us in the Kingdom of heaven whither he bring us c. THE SIXTH SERMON UPON THE Baptism of our Saviour MAT. iii. 17. And loe a voice from heaven saying This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased SPeak O Heaven and hearken O Earth unto the word of the Lord. The Earth must keep silence and give ear when God is his own Orator himself and utters his pleasure with his own voice As it is usual when some great Palace is raising fron the Foundation that the Master of the Possession will lay the first stone with his own hands So the Church being to be built up again in the New Testament not upon the foundation of Works but upon Faith not upon Moses but upon Jesus Christ Loe the mighty God publisheth the first tidings of reconciliation from his own mouth and himself in the Prophet Isaiahs Phrase doth lay in Sion a chief corner stone elect and precious for the Foundation which sustains the whole body of the Saints is no other but such as is contained in that brief Proclamation which I have read unto you This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased Some of the Fathers very aptly call the Text Gods ample testimonial given to his Son that the world might receive him gladly being about to preach the glad tidings of salvation Moses you know would not offer himself to the Children of Israel to be the means that should release them from Pharaohs bondage before he had a token of Credence who did send him to the People and the Lord said unto him Thou shalt say I am hath sent me unto you So our High Priest and anointed Saviour would keep that form to have a clear testificate to commend him to the World Now a Dove was but a dumb shew and might be interpreted many ways wherefore an articulate and a majestical voice was heard from heaven which would pierce the ears of all that were gathered together and could not be mistaken In that nature therefore as a Testimonial given to him that was now about to be the great Preacher of righteousness I will divide the Text 1. The Person that did bear witness it is the Father 2. The manner how he testified to the honour of his Son by a voice Loe a voice 3. The authority of that voice which was every way to be accepted because it was from heaven 4. The Person to whom the witness is born to a Son This is my Son 5. What is witnessed of him in respect of himself that he was beloved This is my beloved 6. What is witnessed of him in respect of our consolation that he is filius complacentiae in whom and through whom the Father is well pleased That is to say not only beloved in himself but procures us to be beloved likewise for his sake for all that by Baptism have put on Christ are unto God as Christ himself is Filii dilecti complacentes Sons beloved well pleasing So the Text is our Saviours Testimonial and our own Consolation And loe a voice c. The Father is become a witness to glorifie his Son that is the first consideration to be made upon my Text. The Spirit hath done his part before now the voice the Father is come to perfect this great solemnity and so the justice of God agrees with his own Law Ex ore duorum aut trium testium Out of the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall be established was ever any truth so strongly confirmed so undeniably maintained that the Father which made all things should ratifie it sensibly in the audience of men Never was it heard of but only in this case which is the top of all truth that Jesus was the Son of God Other truths we are well perswaded of which come from the light of reason or from the testimony of man yet reason may be blind and man may err but it is impossible that God should lie Heb. vi And admit it to be good for who can controul it that the Prophets and Apostles were inspired from God so that the contents which they have written are certain and infallible then his divine wisdom which gave them that instinct whatsoever he utters immediately from himself it may well stand upon comparisons that it is much more infallible So St. Hierom distinguisheth between that truth which is increate and which is infused and participate that the truth of the Saints is called a lie in respect of that verity which abideth in the Father Yea let God be true and every man a liar in which words says he it is implied that God alone is true even as he alone is said to have immortality for although he hath communicated immortality to Angels and to the souls of men yet it is not their own immortality but his love and favour to give it to them So the Prophets and holy men were inspired with true knowledge yet it was not their own truth
but his illumination Wherefore the Church by way of external testimony was ever the best approved and most faithful witness of Christ yet this testimony so much beneath his Person were unauthorized and fruitless but that it is always governed by the inward Spirit of the Father Aquinas in a certain Sermon upon the Pentecost hath drawn up those things which bear witness of Christ into a certain number and that the verdict is given from twelve the most principal things in the world God the Father in this Proclamation God the Son in his own Confession God the Holy Ghost in the Dove-like Apparition the Angels at his Nativity the Saints that rose from the dead the Miracles which he wrought the Heaven which was darkned at his Passion the Fire when he sent the Comforter in that Element upon his Disciples the Air when he commanded the winds to be still the water when he made the Seas to be calm the Earth when it shook and quak'd at his Resurrection and lastly Hell it self when the Devils did acknowledge him calling him Jesus of Nazareth and saying We know thee who thou art But above all this testimony in my Text enforceth credence upon us more than any other as St. Ambrose thinks Si dubitatur de filio paterno non creditur testimonio If there be any spice of unbelief in your heart run hither to take it out for will you not take the Fathers word for the excellency of his Son that this is the Sacrifice in whom he is well pleased Shew us thy Father says Philip and it sufficeth Joh. xiv 8. Much more resolutely might the Church say Let us hear thy Father and it sufficeth We ask no surer warrant to confirm our faith For as Abraham answered the rich man concerning his brethren that did not believe If they hear not Moses and the Prophets neither will they be perswaded though one arose from the dead So I may say to all that receive not the faith If they will not believe the Father in whom all the treasures of knowledge are hidden then they may question if there be light in the Heavens perspicuity in the Air life in their own souls every thing that flesh and bloud can alledge must be dark and doubtful to their capacity God spoke from above through the air and it received his voice and when he speaks in our hearts shall not we receive his testimony Thus St. Ambrose in a sweet strain upon it Credidit mundus in Elementis credat in hominibus credidit in exanimis credat in viventibus credidit in mutis credat in loquentibus The rude Elements of the world were taught to admit the doctrine of Faith then much more let men embrace it inanimate things took the Symphony from the Fathers mouth let things which live much more receive it the dumb things of nature were taught to embrace the voice let those things which have tongues much more praise God for glorifying his Son To the upshot of the Point I add this and have done John Baptist did bear witness to our Saviour but his witness was too mean for so great a Person Quo ad nos in regard of our apprehension the testimony and approbation of holy men is a great matter but in regard of the honour of Christ it was fit that the Father who is coequal should testifie of the Son and so doth the Son of the Father which is excellently knit up in one Text Joh. v. 32. There is another that beareth witness of me and I know that the witness which he witnesseth of me is true So by the voice of the Father we know the excellency of the Son and by the preaching of the Son we know the truth of the Father This is their mutual testimony In the second place the manner follows how the Father testified to the honour of his Son and that is by a voice Every Creature whether it live or whether it be inanimate every season of the year every blessing for our use that the earth brings forth though it be dumb yet I am not ashamed to say that it speaks aloud how there is a God that made us and preserved us To this purpose St. Paul spake to the Lycaonians Actc xiv 17. The living God left not himself without witness in that he gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons filling our hearts with food and gladness Since therefore all the Elements continually are dumb witnesses of the glory of God how easie is it for the Father Almighty to put a tongue into the air and make it speak I will not argue upon the strict terms of Logick how this can be called a voice being not uttered by the Throat and Palate and other Instruments of a rational Creature God is a transcendent above all the Arts in the world and many things proceeding from him are not to be examined by such rules this I may definitively say it was sonus articulatus an articulate intelligible sound of words as if it had come from the tongue of man And I would pass by this Point but that two things come in my way 1. How properly the Father is known by a voice 2. How well it expresseth the comforts of the Gospel Upon the first the School doth distinguish Efficientia vocis erat à totâ Trinitate declaratio spectat ad solum patrem Every effect belongs equally to the whole Trinity therefore this voice was as well the work of the Son and of the Holy Ghost as it was of the Father For so St. Austin beat down the blasphemy of the Arians who taught that the Father gave some honour to the Son which he had not nay says he Ille transeuntium verborum sonus non sine filio factus est alioquin non omnia per ipsum facta sunt That transient voice which was intended to glorifie the Son was made by the Son otherwise the Scriptures had not said All things were made by him and without him nothing was made But though the efficiency of the voice be common to every Person of the Trinity yet the signification of it was appropriated to the Father for he said the word and by it he made the worlds he spake and all things were created The Lord said indeed let the Firmament be made let the light be made and all things else not by oral prolocution but by the Decree of his holy will and as one said Facilius est Deo facere quam nobis dicere God can sooner make all things visible and invisible than we speak of it therefore the Phrase runs as if all things were existent at the uttering of a word And I know not if any similitude do speak that ineffable mystery of the Holy Trinity better than this from the manifest pronunciation of a speech wherein are these three things together which cannot be parted The voice begets a word spoken and there is truth in that word which was spoken by the voice
wherein so many run upon this Point I will give you my judgment in that method wherein I have always directed my self a method to give God the glory of all that which is good to make sinners humble because they have no good in themselves as of themselves and to make us all diligent in good works that we may not neglect the gift which is given us in Christ through sluggishness and security The grounds upon which I will insist are these 1. We must be led by the Spirit before we can work any thing which is good 2. I will unfold how we are led by initiating or preventing grace when we are first made partakers to taste of the hopes of a better life 3. I will shew how we are led by preparatory grace which goes before the complete act of our regeneration 4. With what great and mighty power the Spirit doth lead us in converting grace 5. How we are led by subsequent grace and sanctification which co-operates and assists us after our conversion To these heads I will briefly and peaceably reduce a volume of litigious disputation 1. I enter into all by this door before the Spirit come down upon us and lead us with his sweet motions our heart can produce nothing which is good The heathen are no competent witnesses in this cause how far nature is weakened in all vertue and how much it is prone to all evil they know no supernatural strength above nature and therefore could not acknowledge the efficacy of it In a word we must not believe man how far he is corrupted but God for man must not be judge in his own cause The Pharisees likewise shall not be heard to speak in this Point whose arrogancy made them enemies to grace You remember with what contempt they ask'd Christ are we blind Joh. ix 40. Alass of our selves we are all under that woe Vae vobis duces caeci Woe be to you blind guids Mat. xxiii 16. Whither will a blind mans feet carry him but into a pit or into a snare unless he have a leader By nature this dark blindness is upon us for else why have we a Leader Omne id naturae deesse intelligitur quod spiritus sancti operâ communicatur says St. Austin Whatsoever is put into us by the Holy Ghost manifests how much was wanting by nature The good Spirit may say of his direction as Job did of his charity I was eyes unto the blind and feet unto the lame Job xxix 15. The heathen erred from the truth through ignorance the Pharisees through arrogancy among Christians none offended more foully than the Pelagians partly through subtilty of wit partly through arrogance What shifts did they not invent rather than confess the truth Sometimes calling the endowments of mans nature even under this great blemish of depravation by the name of grace When that would not serve yet they would allow no grace to support mans free will but the external preaching of the Word and dispensation of the Sacraments 3. When this would not satisfie the Church they went thus far they did not hold there was grace of sanctification to prevent us from sin but grace of mercy to remit our sins Yet they stood under condemnation and at last this was all that could be wrung from them supernatural grace was necessary not simply to strengthen us to do good but only to do good with greater facility Whereas it behoved them to have accused nature in this present state of malignity so far that now it is become that accursed ground which of it self brings forth nothing but thorns and thistles There is not only a possibility in our will to sin as there was in Adam before the Fall but a violent and a precipitious inclination to transgress the Law The Saints and the heaven are not clean in Gods sight says Job How much more abominable and filthy is man which drinketh iniquity like water Job xv 16. The will of man is of that nature it cannot rest naked devested of all desires unfurnisht of an object and since in its own rebellion it hath forsaken God there is no relief but it will betake it self to the unlawful concupiscence of the Creature Mark how peremptorily St. Paul concludes against man as he is left to the will of his own flesh Rom. viii 7. The carnal mind is enmity against God for it is not subject to the Law of God neither indeed can be In the state of this miserable captivity under sin for we are servants to that which we obey the will of man is partaker of its own freedom which grows with it and cannot be parted that it is not held under necessity to commit this or that sin naming any particular act what you will but under sin it is held so that the evil which we would not we shall do and the good which we would we shall not do But Christ is our Advocate and he will speak for us more than we could or durst say for our selves hear his testimony Joh. xv 4. The branch cannot bear fruit except it abide in the vine no more can ye except ye abide in me Because these words are parabolical he speaks roundly in the next verse Without me ye can do nothing It is not meant of natural or animal works as eating drinking walking indeed we can do none of these things unless his omnipresency and omnipotency support us but here it is meant of such things as are praise worthy before God without me that is without the divine assistance and help which I have merited by my obedience ye cannot bring forth the fruits of righteousness to eternal life Yet I pray you mark one thing to qualifie some mens severe opinions Christ did not say whatsoever ye do without me even with the best moral rectitude and justice shall plunge you further into damnation Every thing which comes from a meer natural man is so bad and defective that it shall do him no good toward the attaining of everlasting life but some things have a moral honesty according to the law of nature which do not deserve Hell fire but rather they are such things as shall make their damnation more tolerable The branch can bring forth no fruit unless it be in the tree Frugiferum opus est quod ad vitam aeternam refertur That is a frugiferous work which God rewards in his Kingdom No such fruits can grow from nature which wants the conduction of the Spirit St. Paul very cautiously 1 Cor. xiii mustering up the works of an unregenerate man which want Charity says he If I do all these things and want charity they profit me nothing not simply that the continence of Socrates the temperance of Scipio should hurt them but they profit me nothing a natural man brings forth nothing which can profit him to eternal life St. Austin doth so diligently ponder every word of the Text now cited that I must impart his sweet labours unto
you Without me you can do nothing so our Saviour Had he said without me you can do little or without me you can do no excellent thing or without me it will be hard and difficult for you or without me you can perfect no good work then there had been some evasion for a man to trust in his own abilities but to say without me you can do neither much nor little greater things nor inferiour things with ease or with difficulty neither finish nor begin this chops off all boasting in the powers and industries of the natural man Without me ye can do nothing The Eunuch plainly felt this impotency and when Philip askt him Vnderstandest thou what thou readest Says he How can I unless some man should guide me As the sick person complained at the Pool of Bethesda he wanted some man to put him in when the water was troubled Verè homo fuit illi necessarius sed homo ille qui Deus est Says St. Austin He wanted a man indeed to cure him but no other than he that is God and man Jesus Christ So the Eunuch wanted no other man to guide him but he that was made the Son of man that we might be made the Sons of God And upon those words of the Eunuch thus St. Hierom. We come not to walk in the paths of life Sine praevio monstrante semitam Without celestial aid to prepare the way and go before us Let me strike these two strokes more upon this point and I have done with it first when I say nature is so unfit to produce any good so indisposable to attain the Kingdom of heaven let no man say Why should I strive then against the stream of my inbred corruptions I will give my self over to work all filthiness with greediness This is a devillish resolution But rather say I will be very instant in prayer with my God that he will take away this heart of stone and give me an heart of flesh For in the like case the Tongue can no man tame it is an unruly evil full of deadly poyson Jam. iii. 8. So St. James It is not his meaning that we should suffer this unruly evil to do what it list and permit it without any manner of reformation but with all contention of heart to implore the divine assistance that this member of unrighteousness may become an instrument to serve the Lord. Secondly Those Nations whom we perceive to be led by the viciousness of their own nature and not to be led by the spirit we cannot say without great error and obstinacy that these are appointed to everlasting life if the heathen had sufficient means of salvation what priviledge had we in the Church who have the Word and Sacraments and the infusions of sanctification to make them profitable Thou knowst Lord why these do sit in darkness and in the shadow of death Bonus es in beneficio certorum justus in supplicio ceterorum says St. Austin Thou art very good to those to whom thou art gracious thou art very just to those that are punished This is St. Pauls doctrine up and down Eph. ii 12. It cannot be controuled He describes the wretched estate of the Gentiles before salvation appeared unto them We were aliens from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the Covenants of promise having no hope and without God in the world How can it be affirmed that they want not help to bring them out of this captivity of sin When St. Paul says Spem non habentes they have no hope This is the condition of nature which is not aided by the Spirit 2. Now I will unfold how we are led by initiating or preventing grace when we are first made partakers to taste of the hope of a better life In this Point I will annex the explication of two things First That there is such an initial preparatory grace in them that are not yet justified and converted 2. That in the first entrance of it the Spirit doth produce it in us solely and entirely the will of man conferring no strength at all Concerning the former of these two conclusions I say there are many good internal effects wrought by the power of the Word and the illumination of the Holy Ghost which enter into the hearts of them that are not yet converted as some knowledge of the divine will sense of sin fear of punishment grudgings of sorrow some earnings to be delivered some hope of favour This is a middle state between natural corruption which is altogether enmity with God and between perfect regeneration when we are called to adoption of Sons I marvel this should not be easily admitted for these reasons The Philippians had fellowship in the Gospel St. Paul calls this the beginning of a good work in them and he trusts God would perform and finish it Phil. i. 6. Yet more clearly Heb. vi 4. he shews there are antecedent portions of grace in many before they are converted and made heirs with Christ yea in such as never were ingrafted lively in Christ he calls it thereby the name of illumination tasting of the heavenly gift tasting of the power of God tastings of the Word of God and in some wise being made partakers of the Holy Ghost Yet these having but these first preparations of grace may backslide crucifie the Lord of life and put him to an open shame The similitudes which are used to shew how grace doth possess the soul do plainly shew as much 1. As in natural generation there are many previous dispositions which go before the introduction of the soul into the matter So there must be many antecedent preparations of the divine blessing before our spiritual regeneration that we be born again and become the Sons of God 2. Gratia se habet ad animum sicut sanitas ad corpus Grace doth raise up the soul from sin as health doth affect the body and bring it out of sickness but there is a middle state of recovery before health be perfectly regained so there is a previous illumination and good direction in the mind and will which go before our conversion that we be actually made the living members of Christ Some are afraid to call this grace and yet they cannot avoid it for they are compelled to call it auxilium Dei a special help of God flowing from his providence Sometimes they abhor not the name but say it is gratia reprimens an assistance of God whereby such as are not converted may repress the occasions or commissions of some heinous sins Either they allow it to be as much as true grace or no better than nature for many evils may be avoided and repress'd by nature no good thing can be done without grace It is therefore that internal calling wherewith God doth seriously invite those to repentance and belief in Christ who have the tidings of salvation brought unto their ears I say I speak of those only who are
called to hear the word of faith and of none other God might have left them in their bloud as the Prophet Ezekiel speaks and given them over to the reprobate sense of their own mind but because he requires a new Covenant from all those to whom Christ is preached therefore he gives them new abilities lest he should seem to invite them in vain but being supplied with these internal excitations of supernatural help they are unexcusable This is the way to give God the glory and to make all the hearers of the Word know what talent they have received But the force of exhortations and expostulations were taken away if a sinner were converted by Enthusiasms and sudden inspirations If God would immediately bring a man to himself without feeling of his sin without hating it without desiring pardon it were superfluous to say We beseech you that ye receive not the grace of God in vain I marvel you are so soon removed from him that called you to the grace of Christ Gal. i. 6. They that heard St. Peters Sermon Acts ii 37. at the beginning of it were unbelieving and rebellious Jews before he had ended they were terrified felt the guiltiness of innocent bloud upon themselves desired freedom submitted themselves to direction Men brethren what shall we do All these were good internal effects but as yet they were not converted and regenerate as yet unbelievers for had they believed they had never made that question What shall we do They come to that in the next verse says Peter Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins Well they followed this counsel and then at the soonest and not before they were justified in Christ for thereupon it is said There were added unto the Church above three thousand souls So I have made that conclusion undeniable I think that Christ doth produce some effects of initial grace before conversion The next conclusion is that since the natural man hath no powers in the freedom of his will to do good therefore the first effects of grace that are brought forth in us the Holy Ghost doth produce them solely and intirely the will of man conferring no strength at all As the ground receives the seed which is cast into it so a natural man takes the good seed from God which he casts into him passivè receptivè only passively and by way of reception Even they that will not be beaten off from their tenet but that the will of man hath some cooperancy with Gods grace in the act of conversion yet they give their suffrage to this doctrine that this preventing grace or grace of preparation is res infusa not comparata a thing infused from above not gotten by our diligence or acquired even as the air doth not dispose it self to admit the light of the Sun but is illuminated by the presence of the Sun They are best known by the name of Semi-pelagians who would not admit this truth for it was taught in their School that the beginning of faith was from man and the increase from the power of the Holy Ghost But why did they teach that the beginning of faith was from man Because they imagined that the talent of grace was promised to them that used the talent of nature well Habenti dabitur to him that hath it shall be given But I would have them find me any such Covenant in all the Scripture which God made with man that such as negotiated the talent of nature well should have an increase of grace for their reward It is a trespass and a foul one to bely a man and to father Covenants upon him which he never made the offence is greater to alledge Covenants from God and yet no tittle leaning that way in all his Testament The powers of nature are blindness of understanding obdurateness of will perverseness of affections what reward can be due to these but eternal death When thou wert in thy bloud Ezek. xvi that is when thou wert under the loathsom filthiness of sin and under the condemnation of death I said unto thee live that is I began to extend my mercy of vivification upon thee The beginning and introduction of all Christian vertue is to think of God From whence comes this From any good parts wherewith we were born Go to the fountain of wisdom and ask there We are not sufficient of our selves to think any thing of our selves but our sufficiency is of God 2 Cor. iii. 5. The next a b c and first rudiment of goodness is to pray to God Is nature a sufficient Mistris to teach you that Is it not the Spirit which the Lord sends into us crying Abba Father I will pour upon the house of David the Spirit of grace and supplications and upon the Inhabitants of Jerusalem Zach. xii 10. Thus St. Austin proves that the very firstlings and proems of all our Christian dispensations are from God because St. Paul said I obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful 1 Cor. vii 25. Misericordiam consecutus sum ut fidelis essem non ut fidelior essem That I was made faithful or had any faith it was the benefit of God and not only by way of increase or augmentation that I was made more faithful otherwise we should lead the Spirit to take his aim from us and not be led by the Spirit a Passive Verb and fit to express that we are merely passive in the first preparations of faith I shall speak anon touching that efficacy of the Spirit upon the heart of man But touching the work of preparatory grace in the first onset it brings illumination with it it dispels darkness from our understanding it makes us perceive we are gone astray in our sins like sheep that are lost it makes us know God is to be feared it makes us discern that we are in a wretched estate this illumination cannot be resisted Mens nostra ipsum scire effugere non potest Philosophy doth dictate that we cannot repel the knowledge of a thing palpably demonstrated before us though we would it pierceth as easily into the mind as a needle through a thin cloath Yet I do not say this grace which first possesseth the soul and makes it willing to good motions which was most averse before doth compel a man or force him compulsion is a word of hostility rather than of favour It comes with that sweetness and authority together that it will not be said nay Thus we are led by the Spirit in the first introduction of preparatory grace The third thing to be considered is how the Spirit doth lead us all the while we use this preparatory grace before conversion St. Austin comprehended all in this short rule Primùm gratia Dei operatur bonam voluntatem deinde per eam First Gods grace doth effect a good will in us and then by that will so illuminated and excited it produceth
to them since some of their own do ingenuously confess of our Divines that we are Purioris antiquitatis retentissimi most retentive of purer antiquity In a word there is no necessity by Gods Word to keep a Lent of forty days therefore those Churches are not condemnable But because the use hath been propagated to us in so many Ages both in the Greek and Latine Churches I presume to say that our custom is more justifiable and more laudable One thing for the last relish the Quadragesimal Fast is grounded upon long custom of time upon Ecclesiastical Constitution and Political Confirmation therefore it is not like one of the arch Precepts of the Law fac vives do this and live man was made for those vertues of Faith and Charity to which Gods Laws do immutably bind him but the Lent was made for man and not man for it The Libertine is too scandalous that tusheth altogether at this Ordinance but they that terrifie weak consciences that do not punctually observed it at all times are too rigorous that I may not say too Pharisaical who lay such heavy burdens upon mens shoulders under pain of damnation The Laws of the King which belong to the especial good of the Kingdom or for advancement of piety cannot be broken without manifest incurring of a great offence before God but the Laws of Fasts concern not the main substance of Religion or the necessary welfare of the Common-wealth therefore according to the indulgence of the Supreme Magistrate it may well be thought that they are not rigorously to be understood but civilly that is we are to give heed unto them that we do not break them with open contempt or scandal or out of the humour of a Libertine or any such neglect for then it is sin unto thee But where such food cannot sufficiently be supplied or if infirmity grow upon us or where some honest or reasonable cause shall be offered neither contempt being in our hearts nor scandal given by our neglect they that do contrary are not held neglecters of their duty or contemners of the Magistrate As upon Feast-days we dispense with mens necessities for bodily labour so upon Fasts respect is had to our weakness lest we should suffer harm in doing good Thus much hath been spoken upon the continuance of Christs Fast forty days and forty nights I will be brief in the consequent He was afterwards an hungry The Devil is exceeding subtil and works much upon advantage no greater advantage for his tentations than penury and necessity Yet Christ would hunger when he was to be tempted as who should say I am in that plunge which the Devil wisheth and yet let him do his worst I know not how Satan came by the knowledge that he was an hungry unless Christ discovered himself by searching for food and making enquiry where it might be expected and finding none This is manifest his appetite was destitute and in some distress all the time of the forty days going before he was sustained by the divine vertue that he should not hunger afterwards he suffered nature to have its course This only may be thought a little strange that after Moses and Elias had ended their fast of forty days we do not read in Scripture that they were an hungry why should the Holy Ghost leave it written that there was more infirmity in Christ than there was in them Because no more is spoken of Moses and Elias than to shew how the divine vertue did manifest it self upon them but our Saviour did exhibite a proof that the vertue of God was in him and the infirmity of man Only remember that Christ had satiety and hunger in his own power to manifest them when he pleased Qui Dominus est totius terrae Dominus est naturae suae says St. Austin He that was Lord of the whole Earth know it and mistrust it not he was Lord also of his own nature it was in his power to lay down his life when he pleased therefore it must be in his power to hunger when he pleased Hunger and thirst pain and sorrow were as naturally in Christ as they are in us but with two marks of difference First Christus non contraxit defectus naturae sed assumpsit Christ took such defects upon him he yielded to undergo them but we do merit and contract them to deserve infirmity and to assume infirmity are two divers things Secondly Impotencies of nature do command us we cannot command them If we have watch'd and fasted any long time sleep and meat are tribute which nature calls for and must be paid but our Saviour had them under subjection quantum quando quomodo to take them not out of necessity but voluntarily in no measure but when he pleased at no time but when he thought fit in all respects according to his own wisdom and appointment Now to that God who was made poor that we might be made rich that was made exceeding sorrowful that we might rejoyce that did hunger and thirst that we might be filled with good things be Praise and Honour AMEN THE SIXTH SERMON UPON Our Saviours Tentation MAT. iv 3. And when the Tempter came to him he said If thou be the Son of God command that these stones be made bread OF four things hard to be understood one says Solomon is the way of a Serpent upon a stone or rock Via colubrina super petram Proverbs for the most part have some dark allusion in them rather than a literal meaning and so hath this Satan is the Serpent Christ is the Stone Tentation is the way of the Serpent and nothing more obscure than the way of that Serpents tentation upon this elect precious Stone in Sion the chief Stone in the corner as the Prophets call him Concerning this Verse which I have read it is debated by learned Authors what fetch the Tempter had Some say his scope was to satisfie his own distrust and to find out whether Christ were the very Son of God he found no sin in our Saviour he heard the voice from Heaven at his Baptism he had learnt what John Baptist testified of him behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world this was enough to convince all the Furies of Hell and to put it out of doubt yet Satan was extreme unwilling to be perswaded of that which would put him to so much sorrow and for all this he is no further than if If thou be the Son of God Some say the Devils drift was to draw Christ to offend God with some capital iniquity and if this project could possibly have succeeded the redemption of mankind had been utterly marred for no Sacrifice would serve our turn but a Lamb without spot that is undefiled Surely some sin or other was part of the intendment in this first Tentation because it is evident he counselled Christ to sin against heaven in the Tentations following Therefore in this
unnecessary daring Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God then Cast thy self down from a Pinacle of the Temple is unauthorized albeit the Promise goes He shall give his Angels charge concerning thee c. To dispatch this out of hand the misconstruing the Word of God is the beginning of all strife the true Allegation of it is the end of a Controversie Therefore upon the surging of Heresies the holy Fathers were wont to convene in Councils or great Assemblies Positis in medio sacris Scripturis the holy Scriptures ever lying in the midst they were the Center of all their opinions and by them they built up the Church in unity which was divided before By them the Faithful stopped the mouths of Lions that they could rore no more And as Socrates says when Babylas the Martyrs bones were buried near to the Oracle of Apollo the Oracle spake no more so the clamours of all Satanical men are husht by the sound of the two silver Trumpets By one blast of the Trumpet Satan was outed from his first tentation and by another blast in these words from a second tentation Rursus scriptum est Again it is written thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God I pass from these few gleanings in the first part of the Text to the full sheaves in the second A Medicine works upon a Disease to expel it partly by similitude partly by contraries So our Saviour provided an Antidote against the Devils pernicious counsel partly by similitude giving him like for like Again it is written partly by contraries resisting presumption with modesty with fear and reverence Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God This Precept is so full of cases and instances that it is like a thick over grown Wood and the ambiguities so many that I can light upon no man that hath made a clear path to go through and the reason is that there are such multiplicious significations in this phrase to tempt God that you cannot describe it in one Proposition The great Schoolman was fain to shuffle it up thus Tentare Deum est explorare an Deus sciat velit aut possit id quod ei proponitur To tempt God is to enquire unnecessarily what God hath folded up in his Knowledge or laid up to do in his secret Will or comprehended in his mighty Power You perceive plainly this is not to draw one straight Rule but to spread an ambiguous thing into many branches I am purposed therefore to impart my apprehensions upon the point unto you on this wise First how many ways God may be tempted without offence Secondly how many ways it is sin to tempt him Thirdly wherein the trespass doth consist to tempt the Lord. From hence the ordinary hearer shall learn some instances for his share and the intelligent Auditor may apply all cases which I must omit for brevity to these general Rules The first Doctrine to be pass'd over is how many ways the Lord may be tempted without offence One and the prime instance is when we cannot help our selves by any natural means where all the possibilities which humane Providence can imagine have failed us therein to cast our burden upon the Lord and to look for some extraordinary deliverance from his protection is a tentation of Faith and not of Presumption This Psalm xci from whence Satan drew his Text to inveigle our Saviour He shall give his Angels charge c. I say this Psalm goes very far to strengthen my observation for if you mark it those perils from which the most High hath promised to deliver us are not such things which we may avoid Proprio Marte by our own Arm but they are things quite out of our own defence as the snare of the Hunter the Pestilence the flying Arrow What good can we do our selves against such invisible mischiefs If we had means to help our selves thank God for that supply but his Omnipotency is for that time discharged But the Promise of the Psalm doth extend to them who fly to extraordinary Providence when ordinary industry will not serve the turn Luther says very well therefore that the Contents of that xci Psalm are not for every mans humour now adays he means it is not for those who will expect what the Lord is able to do for them in some strange way when necessity doth not thrust them upon it to have such expectation The usual similitude of the School is this he that gallops an horse only to mark how swift he is of pace Tentat equi virtutem he doth it to find out the metal of the horse but he that puts him to his speed upon a journey doth it not to find out the worth of the horse but to rid the way for his business So one man leaves the event of his affairs totally to Gods especial succour that he may try his goodness or his omnipotency another man flies to the same goodness and omnipotency because necessity hath inclosed him about the former tentation cannot be approved the latter cannot be condemned I will fit the Point with an example to make it easier Every sickness is not unto death and therefore the Lord hath appointed Drugs for the maladies of the body Altissimus creavit medicinam says the Son of Syrach The most High hath created Medicines and a wise man will not despise them therefore they chose an ill matter to commend who praised St. Agatha that she would never take any remedy for the infirmities of her body Habeo Dominum Iesum qui solo sermone restaurat universa this was rash adventuring Far otherwise that woman in the Gospel diseased with an Issue of bloud twelve years and had spent all her means upon Physicians when no receipt of mans skill would do her good she put her faith in a Miracle and came near to touch Christ to explore if she should be cured by laying her finger upon the fringe of his Garment and so it came to pass First the course of Nature had failed and then the Lord blessed her for relying upon a supernatural Medicine When we have nothing and see nothing like to fall unto us we may resolutely say with Abraham God will provide and as Jehosaphat said There is no strength in us to stand against this great multitude now we know not what to do our eyes are toward thee 2 Chron. xx 12. This is the declaration of the first instance that it is no unlawful tempting of God when it is not wantonness or curiosity but the last and most extreme necessity that puts us upon it The next instance is thus framed such as had commandment or Prophetical instinct from God to ask a sign from heaven or to look for some wonderful effect these did not offend by unlawful tentation The Disciples when they were sent abroad two by two to preach in several Cities had a Rule given them by Christ To take no provision with them for their journey they did so
the wicked Spirit out of thy breast by speaking hatefully and reproachfully to the old man within thee and to his corruptions The rod of the wicked shall not rest in the lot of the righteous lest the righteous put forth their hands to wickedness Psal cxxv 5. And though in many things we sin all and who can say he hath not offended Yet take heed ye commit not sin with greediness as if you delighted in the servitude of iniquity nay as if you did it with that full resolution that you saw hell fire before you and yet you will not be reformed This is to gaze the Devil in the face and to have no remorse of conscience But if frailty steals upon us yet extinguish not the ardour of zeal which would fain be delivered from that captivity let it cry out I am carried away with the violence of my depraved nature and the evil which I would not that I do This is to commit sin but with such a delight as is mixt with great unwillingness The love of God still abideth in us and we cry out against the Tempter Get thee behind me Satan Though a good man be carried back sometime in his pious endeavours yet he looks towards Gods glory he minds that chiefly and he will not cast his eye off He moves not willingly toward the Devil though the Devil tread upon his heel behind him and sometimes prevails to pluck him back from God But remember how David composed himself and with that I end I have set God always before me therefore I shall not fall AMEN THE EIGHTEENTH SERMON UPON Our Saviours Tentation MAT. iv 10. For it is written Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and Him only shalt thou serve THE Lacedaemonians had this Lesson in the private Instructions of their State and observed it as far as they could ut nunquâm cum eôdem hoste ter confligerent by no means to give battel three several times to the same Enemy for that Enemy encountring them so often might learn to overcome them by their own wayes and stratagems Why Satan hath this advantage to try masteries the third time with our Saviour neither did Christ varie one jot from his usual manner of defence he fights with the same sling and with a stone taken out of the same brook as before scriptum est for it is written the written word is all the refuge that our Lord did seek Satan knows full well at what guard He will lye doth then the adversary speed ever the better for this can he improve that knowledge to help himself Nay but far otherwise Christ is so surely fixt upon one true ground so constant to that rock of the Divine Law which is stronger than all the waves of the sea that some against it that his adversary discern'd at last the longer he strove the more unable he was to maintain the quarrel If the tempted entrench himself within the Scriptures indignation shall vex the tempter but he shall never prevail The Devil believes and trembles at it that all the Law is irresistable and shall triumph over the enemies of the Lord but this Text after which no more was said as if more could not be spoken it contains a more strict and high command than any other portion of the Law it extends not only to transgressors to hedg them in their duty that they may not start from it but to the blessed Angels that are confirm'd in grace to the damned Devils that are incorrigible in sin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 worship and adoration is lookt for at all these and every particular whether they be such as are comforted under mercy or such as are tormented under the Judges fury or such as sing praises for ever before the King of glory all must bend and do him homage At the name of Jesus every knee shall bow both in the highest region of souls in the middle region of the Militant Church or in the lowest region of Hell at that name every knee shall bow both of things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth Therefore Justin Martyr call'd upon all the Heathen with whom he disputed to receive this charge which my Text gives This says he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the greatest that is the most spacious Commandment of all other a Charter between God and all his Creatures That upon which David speaks on this manner thy Commandment is exceeding broad Psal cxix 96. this is a chain to which all the works of the Lord are fastned and therefore our Saviour was sure it would bend his opposite with whom he disputed that he should not reply Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him only shalt thou serve Where the Text is so clear I will not make it hard to be understood with dividing it The specials to be spoken of are these First the Lord God is to be worshipped Secondly the Lord God is to be served Thirdly He onely to be worshipped and served therefore fourthly whatsoever things they are beside to which men do offer religious worship and service let them mince and excuse it with what distinctions they please they run into flat Idolatry Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God let this be first the query upon the first point tu adorabis is there any emphasis in the Pronoun thou shalt worship Is the Commandment directed to the Tempter for that doubt I find in St. Chrisost whether it be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Precept or a Repulse a Doctrin or a Defiance Thou shalt worship I answer it in several conclusions First the outward act of worship and adoration is enjoyned continually even to the spirits of damnation and they must perform it God hath put all things under Christs feet the Grave and Death and Hell Who is meant by Hell but Satan and his Camrades that are sunk into that place of sorrow wherefore he was bound to pay worship himself where he call'd for worship and let all the Angels of God worship him Heb. i. 6. yea and the Devil forceth himself sometimes to pay this tribute unto Christ though much against his will and content but sometimes he doth outwardly worship him that he may not fall into greater torments For as a Servant that hath run away and is taken falls down at his Masters feet that he may not be beaten so this unclean spirit having entred into a man that lived in tombs in the Country of the Gaderens when Christ came into those coasts the Devil did not keep the man close out of sight but came forth to meet Christ and worshipt our Saviour Mark v. 10. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the very word in my Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luke vii 28. he fell down in that body into which he had entred before him and he besought him very much that he would not send him away out of the Countrey Indeed it is seen by the sequel
Happy is the man that feareth alway but he that hardneth his heart falleth into mischief Prov. xxviii 14. Now there is a fear of a finer thread which is timor filiorum this ariseth out of the love of God when we take care not to displease because He hath made us and poured all his benefits upon us because it is the best of all things to enjoy his favour Nothing so much to be loved as God therefore nothing so much to be feared that He be not offended they that love most abound with it This is a joyful fear which outlasts all the fears of this life The fear of the Lord is clean and endureth for ever Psal xix 9. This reverential fear is in the Angels the Cherubins standing before God cover their faces with their wings awing his glorious Majesty the Elders before the throne fall down prostrate and cover their faces with their wings As the New Testament calls God charity God is love saith St. John so the Old Testament calls him fear Jacob swears by the fear of his father Isaac that is by God himself Gen. xxxi 43. Fear therefore is a vein that runs through all Religion and whatsoever buds out of Religion may be called fear it is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of all piety the first and the last The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledg Prov. i. 7. and the end of all is fear God and keep his Commandments Eccl. xxi 13. The Lord threatens to the end we should be dejected that 's worship annexed to servile fear and the Lord multiplies his blessings upon us to the end we should bow down and be thankful that 's worship annexed to filial fear True fear doth continually worship our Redeemer desperate fear like the impenitent Thief doth blaspheme him and these two differ as much as sharp sawce that gives an appetite to the stomach and poison that destroys the vitals So far that the word fear in the Law is chang'd into worship in the Gospel for so it was fit to refute the Devil who said all these things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me And the worship of God is that Theme which without more circumstance now it befals me to handle What is it to worship God what is requir'd unto it every man knows that's the first question to be askt and I will make you a very satisfactory answer out of a devout example which is thus St. Matthew sayes there came a Leper and worshipped Christ saying Lord if thou wilt thou canst make me clean 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Math. viâ—i 2. that 's the word of my Text. You shall meet with this party again Mark i. 40. What find we there there came a Leper to him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 beseeching him and kneeling down to him yet another Evangelist says more to make it clearer Luke v. 12. Behold a man full of leprosie fell on his face and besought him saying Lord if thou wilt thou canst make me clean The collection from hence is this when these scatter'd members are put together that to worship the Lord is to kneel down unto him to fall down on our face before him and to beseech him by earnest prayer Be advertised in one thing that to worship to kneel before to bow down unto in reverence are media vocabula as we say terms for civil respects between man and man as well as for religious offices between God and Man a great confusion falls out thereby in the handling of this doctrine and it cannot be avoided Saies St. Austin in linguâ latinâ non habemus ullum vocabulum quod solùm dicatur de cultu Dei there is not any word betokening the worship of God in the latin tongue so proper to it that it may not be communicated to man all tongues are alike in that poverty of expression In the New Testament the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is constantly kept for the outward worship of God saving that Matth. xviii the Servant who feared to be sold away he and all he had is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Parable speaks of an earthly Master though the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Epiparabola come home to God in the English tongue the nearest word that is meant only of divine honour and a little too high for civil reverence is adoration If you say you adore an earthly man in our language we almost esteem it flattery But they are not words or outward gestures which can decide what it is which properly constitutes the essence of that worship which God claims The word adore I said might have a religious meaning with us but in no tongue else Saies Valla very well adorare includit orare supplicare voce uti plicare genu the word adore doth import the humble petition of the tongue and the supplication of the knee but these are things common and promiscuous to civil and holy uses All the reverent deportments of the body which piety ascribes to God civility without offence performs sometimes to Magistrates and Superiours It may be some Nations had their Customs to keep certain peculiar venerations of the body for God alone as the Athenians put Timagoras their Embassador to death quòd Regem Persarum tanquam Deum salutasset because he did obeisance to the King of Persia as to a God I know not what peculiar bendings of the body they appropriated to their Gods it was a national custom of their own and for my part I will not say a bad one but nature hath no such ground to limit the most humble gestures of the body to God alone Prophets in holy Scripture have faln on their face before Kings and great men have faln on their face before Prophets Though this doctrine be most true yet Cardinal Bellarmin did not pick out Abraham so luckily to make him the example of it He says that Abraham prostrated himself alike to God to Angels and to the Honourable men of the Sons of Heth. I say and will manifest it that the Scripture says he made a difference in his congees to them all Abram fell on his face and God talked with him Gen. xvii 3. When he went to meet the Angels he bowed himself toward the ground Gen. xviii 2. When he spake to the children of Heth Abraham stood up and bowed himself to the people Gen. xxiii 7. You hear he fell on his face to God he bowed himself to the ground to the Angels and he bowed himself without more addition to the people of Heth. But this distinction is not kept by other holy men who walked perfectly before the Lord therefore I stand upon my former ground that neither by simple terms nor by postures and bowings of the body can it be resolv'd what worship is proper to the Lord for my part I could never make an intelligible interpretation of that
quâ tanta sit fides ut speret omnia tanta devotio ut Deum videatur cogere let it be strong in faith to hope all things strong in patience to persist at all times and I know not what it is not able to effect to cast mountains into the sea says Christ to be transfigured says my Text into the glory of God to bring Peter out of Prison when Herod had locked him up within a brazen Gate yet then at the dead hour of the night did the Angel bring him forth and at the same time of midnight Peter found the Church at prayer for his deliverance Acts xii 5. Well I pray you remember that when our Saviour went up into the Mountain as well to be transfigured as to pray yet the Text names this only that he went up into the mountain to pray that name stands in chief and drowns the mention of the other business as if Prayer were a greater work than that resplendent Transfiguration And what needed he to pray but to bring us upon our knees humbly and frequently before his Father and our Father As Solomons Temple had three especial Ornaments the Golden Candlestick the Table of Shewbread and the Altar of Incense so three things of principal use do correspond to these in the Church of Christ the Word Preached which doth enlighten our darkness is the Golden Candlestick which is dearer says David than much fine gold Instead of the Table of Shew-bread we have the Communion of Christs Body and Blood the Table of the Lord. And instead of the Altar of Incense we have that which is much sweeter in Gods nostrils the Incense of Prayer Now abide these three to direct us in a good way says Bernard Verbum Exemplum Oratio the Word Preached the Edifying Examples of Holy men and Zealous Prayer but the greatest of these is Prayer Ea namque operi voci gratiam efficaciam promeretur for whether they be the actions of a pious life or the words of an eloquent tongue it is Prayer which accompasseth from Gods mercy that all should be effectual I have amplified this the more because some Ignaroes out of a preposterous zeal shuffle off this Christian duty with a most wicked and a regardless negligence if any man be transfigured from such a corrupt opinion by that which I have deliver'd it is that which I aimed at and which I desire of God yea it is that which our Saviour intended when he would be occupied in Prayer at that time and in nothing else when he was transfigured in glory Now in the fourth and last general Observation upon the Text as our Lord prepared himself with much humility in Prayer so in the consequent he was exalted in much honor the fashion of his countenance was altered and his raiment was white and glistering Beloved we are all like the Children of Israel standing below the Hill and dare not go up to pry in to the mystery of the inscrutable glory Let it suffice us to enquire into three things that follow which we may safely do since all Scripture is written for our instruction They are these 1. The Final Cause why Christ was transfigured 2. The Efficient Cause from whence this splendour was derived And 3. The Effect it self alteration in his countenance whiteness and glistering in his raiment In these three I will be brief without offensive curiosity to make us not only search but find out the cause why He would be transfigured I have regard to this rule of Damascens 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 every thing that Christ did in his conversation upon earth it is to be referr'd to the good of man First then I render this reason that the Redeemer of Souls lived in great humility upon earth nay like an abject worm to attract the love of the Church now he chang'd himself into this admired excellency to encrease their faith St. Peter pronounced a Confession of faith for all the Apostles Matth. xvi which their Master did exceedingly commend Thou art Christ the Son of the living God Yet they who did see the Majesty of God to be in him and did adore it were as yet ignorant of what glorification his body was capable which was the Veil of the Godhead He had suspended all outward appearance of Divine lustre that it should not shew it self in him To this meaning you cannot well choose but refer that of the Prophet Isaias chap liii 2. He hath no form nor comliness and when we shall see him there is no beauty that we should desire him that is he was pleased for a season not to look like one whose body had an illustrious influence from the soul and from the union with the Godhead he did suppress it till he was pleased to make it known Psal xciii The Lord is King he hath put on glorious apparel and in another place Thou art cloathed with Majesty and honour Indeed to have a brightness in his body as great or greater than the light of the Sun was as natural to that humane nature which is united to the Godhead as it is for the Sun to shine in the Firmament The Disciples marvailed that his face should glister this one time so that no Fuller on earth could make a thing so white whereas the greater marvel is that it was not so at all times Majus miraculum fuit hujus gloriae influxum reprimere quà m eam perpetuò retinere It was a greater miracle to restrain the apparition of this glory at any time than to have it alwayes dwel upon his face for blessed souls which enjoy God always have a virtue of claritude in them which redounds of it own accord into the body Therefore well might the Psalmist say of Christ whose soul was always blessed Thou art fairer than the children of men And though at other times his brightness was discoloured by humility yet now he removed the cloud and let his Witnesses see the fair beams of his Divine honor for a little time which is the first motive of his Transfiguration Secondly by this Apparition the three Disciples saw in what form he would come to judgment It is no dreadful thing to a good man either to see or to meditate with himself in what manner Christ will come in the Clouds at the last day to call the Quick and the Dead before him The Wicked that know they have crucified him again and trampled the blood of the Covenant under their feet will run into the dust for fear of his glorious presence and call for the Hills to cover them and the Mountains to fall upon them as for the Righteous that then shall be found upon earth in whose hearts he hath sealed the promise of his Holy Spirit they shall tremble with an awful reverence but when they have gain'd their memory to recall that he cometh with his reward in his hand they will praise that pomp of Judgment and say now our labour
is at an end we shall reign for evermore And because Christ did appear in Mount Tabor no otherwise than as he means to come to Judgment therefore he did qualify the light of his face to be no greater than the light of the Sun his body which is strange to consider shall have more resplendency than that mighty Lamp of Heaven but it is not for the Wicked to behold them they shall see him shine upon his Throne but with as little comfort as sore eyes gaze upon the Sun or with as little joy as we see flashes of lightning in a terrible thunder non dat lucem videntibus sed pavorem which is not sent to illuminate us in darkness but to agast us with the apparition Of this more at large hereafter But this is the second motive of this Miracle he transformed himself into that Majesty wherein He will judge the World Thirdly He did represent himself as the Argument and Idaea of that beautiful Reward which the bodies of the Just shall have in the General Resurrection The Pharisees required a Sign and Christ told them they should have no sign but the sign of the Prophet Jonas that a body being swallowed up in death should come to life again but these few Disciples over and above the Sign of the Prophet Jonas had the Sign of Transfiguration which is the dainty and delicate part of the Resurrection Say no more but that God will be the Redeemer of his Elect yet it would amuse a man to think what should become of this vile body every member whereof hath been a thousand times an instrument of iniquity well even this very naughty flesh shall have a beam of Divine mercy shine upon it it is impossible to make it ought in this life but a sink of corruption no Fuller upon earth can make it so white as God can In these days the Soul is full of bad concupiscence and the Body is made miserable Hereafter the Soul will be full of grace and the Body shall be made delectable And mark it that the Disciples had their item not to talk of these things till Christ were risen from the dead because the Transfiguration was intended to make up the complement of our joy touching the resurrection of the Body And to sink it deeper in our hearts that this brightsom alteration did not concern the Spirit but the Body his raiment was white and glistering which is no more than the shrowd of the Body In a word God did never reveal that He could take away the essential properties of a true Body and yet keep it a true Body they that believe so much believe beside the Book but in this Miracle appeared that God can add a celestial and beauteous form unto a Body so that the Sun in all his brightness shall not come near it This is the seed of that faith which St. Paul preacheth It is sown in dishonour it is raised in honour Praise the Lord therefore in Body and Soul since both shall be invested with a Royal Dignity to make them both fit for the society of Angels But herein we exceed the happiness of Angels they are glorious Spirits we shall be glorified both in body and spirit So the Prophet Isa lxi 7. They shall possess the double in their land everlasting joy shall be with them Duplicia possidebunt their Soul filled with the vision of God their Body transfigured in glory Fourthly this wants not a granes weight of a principal cause the Son of God in the dayes of his exinanition lookt like a person for this once of divine authority ut crucis scandalum tolleret that their minds might not be cast down with despair to see the misery of his Cross who had seen his glory upon Mount Tabor Now he lookt more Angelical than a Cherubin then he lookt more ruthful than the poorest Lazarus now the greatest in heaven did speak graciously unto him then the scum of the earth reviled him he than was glorified at one time could not be compelled to shame and ignominy but from his own patience and yielding would be crucified at another Sicut luctatores corpus inclinant sayes a Father Christ wrestled with Satan and though that old supplanter the Serpent did bruise his heel yet he could not get the Mastery Christ stooped low like a Lion couching for his prey and when he might seem to be cast down this was his feat to overturn his adversary Fifthly The fifth and last Reason hath a Moral Use There is an old man with his corruptions to be metamorphosed in us all sicut Pelias recoctus as the Fable goes that Medaea bathed the body of Pelias with certain magical drugs and from a decrepit old man transmuted him into a vigorous youth This is a figment for no man spent his young years so well to deserve at Gods hands in this world to be young again but there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a renovation in the spirit of our mind God will not know us in our own form and filthiness unless we put on the Image of Christ As Jacob obtained his Fathers blessing not in his own shape but in the Garments of Esau so we must sue our blessing having put on the righteousness of Christ then the Lord will receive his servant and say unto thee as Jacob did unto Esau I have seen thy face as though I had seen the face of God You have heard the final cause more wayes than one why this Miracle was wrought I may speak somewhat of the efficient cause how this splendor was derived and further than so I must not proceed now because of the time Many obscure points will come to light by asking this question Whether this lightsom beauty like the Sun did appear in our Saviour's face from the beatification of his humane Soul or from the union of his Divine nature First you must understand that the great School-man Aquinas took the best end of the cause into his hand when he answered to neither of those two members but rather to the purpose of the question in this wise fuit haec qualitas gloriae sed non corporis gloriosi quia nondum erat immortalis this Transfiguration was a quality of glory but not of a glorified body because He was not yet passed death and raised up to be immortal and impassible In this distinction is covertly included that it was not such a brightness as the Soul shall communicate to the Body when it is reunited in a joyful resurrection but was created at this time by the Divine power to foretel and shadow what would come to pass with much increase in the Kingdom of God Praelibatio regui Dei fuit haec transfiguration says Cajetan this was but the Landskip or Pattern of the true happiness which shall be in the Kingdom of Heaven It was a far more excellent splendour than that of Moses or Stephen upon earth but not so perfect or proper
But her tentation would not take he preferred to refuse this offer and return home to his own Country Pleasure is not a Goddess but a Sorceress which would offer us the like Bonum est esse hic this is a fair inheritance were it not a gay thing if this were heaven and you imparadised in this pleasant seat for ever O no says celestial love go out my soul go out take the wings of the morning fly away to thy Country above the heavenly Jerusalem and then rest for ever Philip that mighty Macedonian feasted many Wits at a Banquet and he propounded a question to be argued before him What was the greatest thing in Nature After many Opinions one collected all that had been said and concluded Neither was Philip himself the greatest of all things nor the Hill Olympus nor the Sea of waters nor the Sun in the Firmament Sed cor quod res maximas despiceret the greatest of all things was an heart that despised the greatest things which are in this world beneath Unclog your affections from all contents of this miserable life if Tabor it self transport you the best part of the Militant Church where Christs glory shines which by Gods mercy I am confident we enjoy yet forget that and yearn for the Church Triumphant Be willing to bequeath the earth to the succession that follows you and your body to the ground and your soul to God 5. I am ready to move the fifth question alas when I consider it how unfit is the natural man for spiritual things An bonum sit quod paucis solummodò est bonum Whether we should call that good which is appropriated to our selves and not communicated to many This is it for which Origen thinks that Satan stirred up Peter to utter these words to entreat him to bless that little company upon Mount Taber with his presence and to leave all mankind without redemption O too forgetful Nimiumque oblite tuorum both of the other nine Disciples and of all that people that sate in darkness and in the shadow of death It was the most Jewish maliciousness that the Jews had to challenge God that his mercies and blessings belonged to their Nation and to no other Kingdom but this contraction is far more unreasonable to beseech Christ to smother his glory in a private corner with Moses and Elias and three Apostles as if these were the five wise Virgins enough to enter into the Marriage Chamber of the Bridegroom If one member be honoured all the members shall rejoyce with it but when all the members of the body are honoured every member shall rejoyce much more Tolle invidiam tuum est quod habeo tolle invidiam meum est quod habes says St. Austin Be not you envious and that which I have is yours Let not me be envious and that which you have is mine A carnal man you see wisheth his own happiness with the consequent infelicity of all the world beside let me oppose unto this the stupendious example of a regenerate man that wished his own damnation for the salvation of a great people I could wish that my self were accursed from Christ for my brethren my kinsmen according to the flesh Rom. ix 3. Some have commented upon it that Paul was unadvised in those words and offended God Nay Beloved the Holy Ghost cannot be unadvised by whose instinct he wrote and he doth Preface in the beginning I say the truth in Christ I lie not St. Chrysostom cannot speak better than he did upon that verse Quia nos longè sumus ab hâc dilectione Pauli ideo intelligere ejus verba non possumus We want so much of that love to our brethren which Paul had to his that we are not able to make a good construction of his meaning Yet I will direct you in a few words Paul did not desire to be separated for his brethrens sake from the charity and friendship of Christ for then he should love man better than God but from the felicity and sweet fruit of that friendship He would perish for ever not as Christs enemy but as an offering for his Nation He doth not desire to be out of the love of Christ but out of the Vision of Christ The conversion of an whole people he thought was more for Gods glory than the salvation of one man therefore although Gods Election must stand and that was impossible which he desired yet so long as he loved his brethren in God and not against God it was no excessive love And that is the judgment of Calvin But to draw to the use of the Point you see that perfect charity squints not at its own benefit with the great detriment of others Bonum est nobis is bad divinity and bad civility it spoils Church and Commonwealth that which is good to one or to a few will never thrive if it be not good for many It is true he is one of the fools of the world that is not wise for himself but he is one of Gods Reprobates that is wise for none but for himself Nequicquam sapit qui non omnibus sapit When every man is his own end all things will come to a bad end Blessed were those days when every man thought himself rich and fortunate by the good success of the publick wealth and glory We want publick souls we want them I speak it with compassion there is no sin or abuse in the world that afflicts my thought so much Every man thinks that he is a whole Commonwealth in his private Family Omnes quae sua sunt quaerunt All seek their own Did St. Paul write it against us or against the Philippians Chap. ii 21. Can the Publick be neglected and any mans Private be secure It is all one whether the mischief light upon him or his Posterity There are some says Tully that think their own Gardens and Fish-ponds shall be safe when the Commonwealth is lost Doth he not call them fools by craft Away with this bonum nobis to intend our own good rather than the general it was the greatest error that St. Peter committed 6. To the last question briefly in a word An bonum consistit in aspectu humanitatis Christi Could it be the supreme good of man to behold the Humane Nature of Christ only beatified Surely the Humane Nature shining as light as the Sun was a rare object that Peter could have been contented with that and no more for his part for ever yet the resolution of the School holds certain that blessedness consists essentially in beholding the Divine Nature which is the fountain of all goodness and power and in the fruition thereof accidentally it consists in beholding Christs Humane Nature glorified and in the consequent delectation These things must not be enlarged now because I am prevented by the time To God the Father c. THE FIFTH SERMON UPON The Transfiguration LUKE ix
he called unto Moses out of the midst of the Cloud Some more veneration certainly redounds to the Divine Majesty by drawing a Veil before him that his glory may be kept secret The Mercy-seat from whence God promised the Children of Israel to tell them all things whatsoever they should do it was covered with the wings of the Cherubins that every rash eye might not behold it But this was not all that a shadowed darkness should beget veneration there was another reason that men might see no manner of shape or resemblance to make them figure the Lord in any form and commit Idolatry I will take Salmeron the Jesuit at his word in this Notation Ne si aliqua effigies videretur Deus pingeretur a Cloud did invelop the glory of the Father whensoever he spake that men might not say they saw his likeness and therefore paint or carve an image like unto him And since the Lord continues to speak out of a Cloud as well in the New Testament as in the Old surely his purpose continues the same to bridle our inclinations to Idolatry O that men knew what this Cloud meant and they would never be so forward to make the Images of God and they that will not learn that wholsom lesson from the Pillar of Cloud shall be consum'd by the Pillar of Fire Let us come from the substance of it to the qualities and certainly St. Matthew hath left us matter to work upon that he says it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a bright Cloud it seems it lookt like that part of Heaven which we see in a fair night and is called via lactea the Milky way which is the concurrence of the light of many small Stars as if it were a Lane made or paved with dimpling Stars Such a Cloud must needs be more delectable than the clearest Summer day which had no thickness in the air but were all serenity And such it must be in a great measure in Aquinas's interpretation for when Peter talkt of Tabernacles close shady Arbors to keep out the light of the Sun he was thus confuted says Aquinas that light did rather become the Saints than shady darkness Claritas mundi innovati erit sanctorum tabernaculum when there shall be a new Heaven and a new Earth bedeckt with infinite light that 's the Tabernacle of the Blessed which shall abide for ever But the chief reason was to fulfil that promise which David knew should be performed the Lord shall make my darkness to be light here was the true Light which lighteth every man that cometh into the World Jesus Christ it is He that came to bring a Lantern to our feet and a Light unto our paths that we should not stumble and fall In the Old Testament the Clouds where God appeared were densissima tenebrosae thick and dark Clouds Exod. xix 16. vapours and pillars of smoak in the New Covenant the darkness is dispersed and the Cloud remaines white and of a pure lustre For the first Testament is full of Ceremonies and Shadows of things to come the Covenant of Faith in the Gospel exhibits the manifest and open truth says Paschasius Ratbertus it was neither a fiery Cloud nor a dark Cloud but a brightsom quia non in igne terroris nunc venit non in caligine caecitatis sed in lumine veritatis the terror of fire is overpast the mistiness of Clouds is cleared truth comes forth like the morning and is ascended to the height like the Sun at noon day Nay as the things to be believed are clear so there are no mists and fogginess in their affections where the spirit of grace will abide Non calligat affectibus hominum sed revelat occulta says St. Ambrose Our depraved imaginations shall not make the truth a lie but God shall bring to light the hidden things before the eyes of all men What 's the whole Gospel indeed but nubes lucida a very Cloud in it self but made lightsome and perspicuous by the gift of interpretation For although the Veil of the Law is removed away yet even among the Evangelical Writers there are says St. Peter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 certain things hard to be understood the Incarnation of our Lord the Resurrection of the Dead the ineffable mystery of the Holy Trinity still we are in nubibus these are thick Clouds and it is impossible for the natural man with the dim eye of nature to see through them without doubt great is the mystery of godliness God manifested in the flesh Faith is a very mysterious thing but that the cloud is illuminated by the revelation of the Holy Spirit and as he that sees through the Water or through a Cloud suppose an Oar through the Water or the Sun through a Cloud will rather trust to his judgment than to his outward sense which would much deceive him so because we do all see the secrets of God through a thick Cloud let us rather trust to our faith than to our reason there are many strong delusions incident to reason because it looks through the clouds of sin and infirmity And Beloved as for the Priests that should keep the Key of knowledge what is their Office and Calling but to make Clouds appear bright And therefore Christ said of his Apostles Vos estis lux mundi Ye are the light of the world Though now adays it is the fashion of many to make that which was lightsom before appear as duskie as a Cloud Such as especially about Gods unsearchable decrees tangle knots and ravel Divinity that you shall find no end And after much is spoken or written you may say Incertior sum multó quà m dudum I was in a Cloud before that was dark now I am in a smoak that puts out my eyes All the light which some voluminous Compilers afford which would teach men Gods secret purpose in their Election and the way of their own heart in their Conversion both which are inscrutable it is like a Candle in a Thieves Lanthorn perhaps they see a little themselves but I am sure no body else shall be the better for their light Finally to end this Point God who can colour a thick Cloud with whiteness and make it transparent is able to lay the dark conveyances of our hypocrisie conspicuous and naked before him Laban could not find his Idols because Rachel had hid them in her Tent but God can discover those sins which are our greatest Idols though we have set them up in the inmost corner of our heart If the Spirit of Elisha went along with Gehazi when Gehazi ran after Naaman to take a Bribe then the Lord that gave that Spirit to Elisha traceth along all the Compacts of Simony all the fine conveyances of Bribery all manner of Corruption though it be dark as midnight The fire shall try every mans work of what sort it is 1 Cor. iii. 13. When it once catcheth fire it will be
all Saints must be glad at those news all hail to this day for all the Feasts and Sundays of the year borrow their festivity from Easterday This is the day which the Lord hath made c. It is an easie thing to make us break out into carnal and voluptuous joy but it is not easie to make us apprehend spiritual joy Christ spake the good word unto the women all hail 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 rejoyce There is somewhat in original sin which makes us great misdeemers it is not one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that will set us right though Christ himself pronounced it there were some signs which betrayed these parties that they were sore afrighted they said nothing for ought appears and therefore it is likely they were strucken dumb with the astonishment their countenance I suppose changed and every joynt of them shaked when they held him by the feet and therefore the gracious Lord adds be not afraid We may put it at large thus I come as a friend I have saluted you with peace and joy therefore be not afraid of me as if I were an enemy So Josephs Brethren being mistrustful of some great evil were enheartned by Josephs Steward Peace be unto you fear not Gen. xliii 23. The comfort of the salutation was reinforced by this consolation that there was no cause to fear When reason hath repulsed the fallacies of our passions by good arguments fear will diminish by little and little But here 's a case wherein reason could afford no succour for what could reason conceive touching the resurrection of the dead It is a dreadful thing to mans wit let it be never so dispassionated to see one come alive out of the Grave for it is a most natural thing for a man to tremble when he sees an accident far above nature therefore the exhortation must proceed from Christ and supernatural grace in such an instance as this Fear not The Angels said as much unto them before in the same syllables he is risen and be not afraid Comfortable speeches indeed yet they did not take it required a greater Doctor than they to inculcate that Lesson Christ preacheth it and it took effect they did remit of their fear for the Angels spake unto the ear and Christ unto the heart And when the conscience is enlightned by grace it cannot choose but see that the greatest avoider of fear is to know that Christ is risen from the dead Death is called the King of terrors by Job as being the strongest of earthly fears and yet this is quite assuaged in them that have an assured hope of joyful resurrection Wy boastest thou thy self thou Tyrant that thou canst kill the body death is not extinction but an intermission of life My bones shall be covered again when worms have eat my flesh and with mine eyes I shall see my Saviour It is the Whetstone of fortitude in battel and in all dangers scelus est rediturae parcere vitae who but a base mind will dastardly preserve that life which shall return again An application of the Holy Spirit will make a good Christian as stout as a Lion setting the most valiant object of the Resurrection before him Though the Pharisees would hate them to death that should testifie how Christ was raised in power though the Scouts of the High Priest were abroad to note them in the black book that travell'd about that errand though the Souldiers were grim and cruel and would spare none that should refute their falsehood that the Disciples had taken away the Body while they slept yet these weak women dare do any thing to confront the evil world since Christ had said unto them be not afraid After this they have a Commission to dispatch and depart Go tell my Brethren they must not stay and dispute it Lord whither should we go thou hast the words of eternal life send us not away from thee for in thy presence there is the fulness of joy If the Blessed Virgin was not happy that her paps gave him suck but that she heard the word of God and kept it then it was no happiness to see Christ or to touch his feet but to do his will and obey it It was not a time to feed still upon this gladness and to stay with him but go and impart it There was a season when Mary Magdalen was commended for sitting still at his feet and choosing the better part but now blessed are the feet that stir and walk upon this errand to bring glad tidings of salvation As the Samaritan Woman did well not to stay with Christ but it was better to go into the City and to tell her kindred that she had found the Messias Beside their Commission was a special dignity to go from him and to bring a Message to the Disciples neither did they pretext as Moses did we are ignorant women slow of speech let Aaron rather be sent unfit for the preaching of these mysteries Christ knew what sufficiency and aptitude was in them better than themselves and therefore they must undertake to go to the chief Princes of the Church to them that succeeded Aaron in his Bishoprick The Apostles lurkt at home for fear so that Christ was fain to find out new Apostles to preach him these Daughters of Jerusalem And as their Commission had dignity in it so it was very pleasing and full of sweet address to those that sat disconsolate Go tell my Brethren they that run away from him and forsook him did not look it may be for so sweet a Title No doubt their hearts did catch at it as soon as ever they heard it like those that came from the King of Syria thy Brother Benhadad The Angels did not give them this style but plainly thus Go tell his Disciples and it was well considering their fault that they did not lose the name of Disciples but Christ exceeds the Angels in loving kindness and is not ashamed to call them Brethren Hebr. ii 11. But the more he advanceth his Servants in title the more ought they to depress themselves the more he calls us Brethren the more let us cast our selves down before him as Servants to the Mighty Lord. This also they learnt into the advantage that now Christ was risen in immortality he had not put on another body or chang'd his nature he is still as we are in his fleshly substance and therefore calls his Disciples Brethren And this we are taught likewise that he doth acknowledg them for his Brethren after he appeared in glory even as Joseph claimed kindred of his Brethren in the top of his honour Haughty men will forget their old acquaintance when they rise unto promotion but in true morality amicitia non dissolvitur per fortunae accessionem a true friend will persist a friend though he ascend to a noble accession of fortune Christ being made the greatest that ever was upon earth calls these Fishermen his
mind but unless we intermix the solemn Service of God at those times and spend some hours with godly profit in the Church it is but the Feast of Fools or perhaps worse the Feast of Epicures So the Prophet mentions some Swinish Carousers that thought they did solemnize their Kings Day in a jovial manner with drinking healths till they lost their wit and their health In the day of our King the Princes made him sick with flagons of wine Hos vii 5. Such Tospots celebrate a Feast to the use of the Devil and not to the Glory of God But it was unto that Glory that this Song and this Day which is chanted and this Joy which is so chearfully profest are all dedicated This is the Day which the Lord hath made c. But how hard a thing it is to draw men and women with their good will to Church for some have stretcht all their wits and their learning to defie our Church because it hath appointed Holidays for solemn occasions of Prayer and Thanksgiving and the greatest part of the Kingdom not out of opposition but out of negligence and slothfulness doth omit the due observation which belongs unto them You give your selves over at such times to cessation from work it may be to Sports and Games and Interludes the Fields shall be all day full of loose persons and the House of the Lord empty It is true that rest from labour becoms an Holiday yet the very vacation from labour is not simply pleasing to God but the better to follow Religious Service and beware to confound rest and idleness as if they were all one they are idle whom the painfulness of action causeth to avoid that labour whereunto God and Nature bindeth them they rest that either cease from their work when they have brought it to perfection or else give over a meaner labour because a better and more worthy is to be undertaken therefore though some part of an Holiday is indulged to put gladness into the life of them that are toiled with continual work yet the substantial character of the day is to meet together in our Religious Convocations and to adore the Name of the Lord. I shall not be able at this fag end of the hour to traverse this point as I would some satisfaction I will give you now God willing and defer that which remains to a more spacious occasion My Doctrin which I lay down is this that it is lawful for any Church to celebrate what Feasts it will so all be done with order and edification And I say more that every Church ought to set apart Solemn Times to remember annually the extraordinary works of God though such designed and determinate Days are not commanded in Holy scripture And I put to this moreover that God doth accept what the Church in due consideration doth voluntarily consecrate to Religious use I will put two parts of my Proposition together that this was lawful to be done and that it ought to be done Nature did teach the Heathen God taught the Jews and Christ by his own practice while he was upon earth taught us that to meet at Extraordinary Times for the celebration of Excellent Things was just and righteous One doth eloquently and very truly commend the various fruit of keeping such Sacred Times in this full Encomiasticon Festival days are the Splendour and outward Dignity of our Religion forcible Witnesses of ancient truth agnizing of great Benefits received Provocations to the Exercises of Piety Shadows of our endless felicity in Heaven First I will begin at the last of these That there must be great consolation in the due keeping of an Holiday if you rightly understand it because it represents the joy which is laid up for us in the Kingdom of Heaven and it is a most comfortable expectation when the very outward countenance of that which we are about on Earth doth prefigure after a sort that which we tend unto in the everlasting Habitations Bear but this in mind that the Rubrick days in the Almanack do prefigure that celestial condition wherein being mixed with Angels we shall sing Haleluia to the Lamb for evermore having no worldly toil or vexation to distract us and this would make us most chearful to bear a part in a solemn Congregation The Kingdom of Heaven was but darkly revealed to the Jews in the Old Testament and yet to bear in mind the glory which is laid up for the Godly they devoted a portion of every Day to the Divine Service in the Morning and Evening Sacrifice a portion of every Week upon the Sabbath a portion of every Moneth upon the New Moon a portion of every Season of the Year the Passover in the Spring the Feast of Pentecost in the Summer the Feast of Tabernacles in the Autumn and in latter Ages the Feast of Dedication in the Winter Every seventh Year was a Solemn Year for the Cessation of all Plowing and Sowing and that 's a contracted Age Every Fiftieth Year was most solemn for the memorizing of the Grand Jubilee and that 's a long protracted Age. If they did so often represent their longing to be at rest in heavenly places much more doth it concern us under the Gospel who are nearer neighbours than they to that future glory Secondly such gandy dayes are most meet for the agnizing of great benefits received I esteem the more of this reason because it is St. Austins Ne volumine temporum ingrata obreperet oblivio by Festival Solemnities and set Days we dedicate and sanctifie to God the memory or his chief benefits lest unthankfulness and forgetfulness should creep upon us in the course of time Nor is it enough to remember some notable favour upon one day and no more with great pomp and splendor for the revolution of time will obscure that as if it had never been the constant habit of doing well is not gotten without the custom of doing well without an iteration of holy Duties Beside such as are weak and tottering in faith might imagin that we did set no high price upon the Nativity of our Lord upon his Passion his Resurrection his Ascension and upon the Coming of the Holy Ghost if we did not extol him for them with some outward and eminent acts of glory Thirdly the principal Articles of Faith are nailed fast to our memory by clothing great Feasts with some transcendent tokens of joy and holiness At the Feast of Christmas every simple body is put in mind that Christ took our nature upon him and was born of a pure Virgin On Good Friday even Babes and Children are taught that he died upon the Cross to redeem us from eternal death Easterday proclaims it that our Saviour rose again in his own Body from the Grave and will raise up our Flesh at the last day to be like his own glorious Body Ascension day or Holy Thursday rememorates every year that He is gone up into Heaven to
Gospel we must always rejoyce for the Kingdom of Christ Upon the establishment of this Kingdom all the Creatures are adjured to express their gladness Psal xcvi I quote that place for there is none like it to this purpose thus the Psalmist ver 10. Say among the Heathen that the Lord reigneth let the Heavens rejoyce and let the Earth be glad let the Sea roar and the fulness thereof let the field be joyful and all that is therein then shall all the trees of the Wood rejoyce before the Lord for he cometh for he cometh to judge the earth Tenerae militiae delicatus conflictus as Gregory says We call our Pilgrimage upon earth a Christian warfare a wrestling with Powers and Principalities an affliction of the flesh the sufferance of the Cross c. And are all those affrighting words converted into this Lesson Rejoyce and be glad He that will stick with God for the duty Jubeas miserum esse libenter let him eat the bread of sorrow let him live in misery and mourning when he need not Can the Children of the Bride-chamber mourn while the Bridegroom is with them Says our Saviour to the Pharisees when they grudg'd that his Disciples did not humble and macerate themselves with fasting But the days will come that the Bridegroom shall be taken from them and then they shall mourn Two things I deduce from hence Out of the latter words it appears that dismal times will befal the Church Evangelical by bloody persecutions by the venemous tongues of Hereticks sharper than any two-edged Sword Yet those woful Calamities result not out of the Gospel it self but are extrinsecal mischiefs that force themselves upon it And though the Bridegroom be gone he hath sent the Comforter and in the midst of sorrows his enlightnings do enrich the soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we converse says St. Paul among sad events as if we were sorrowful but in good earnest we are alway rejoycing But secondly it appears from the exordium of our Saviours Sermon Can the Children of the Bride-chamber mourn while the Bridegroom is with them That the Gospel in its own nature is a Bride-chamber or solemnization of a great Marriage wherein there is nothing but joyfulness and festivity Says the Apostle Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us that was the constitution of the Gospel Well what follows Therefore let us keep the Feast 1 Cor. v. 8. St. Cyprian reads it Festa celebremus let us keep the Feasts let us all days festival for Christs sake St. Paul alludes to the Feast of unleavened bread among the Jews which was held seven days continually without ceasing In like sort let us celebrate such a feast with the unleavened bread of sincerity and Numerus septenarius est symbolum universitatis to keep it for seven days is from the mystical number of eternity to keep it for ever and ever Clemens says Vniversa vita justi est quidam celebris ac sanctus dies All the life of a good Christian is holy day Pope Sylvester meant it so when he changed the common names of the week days and called them all Ferias Feria prima secunda and so forth Nay our own Church intends it so likewise therefore in our Cathedral Churches solemn praise are sung to the Organ all the year long with the voice of melody and in Parochial Churches every day of the year when Morning Prayer is read after the Confession and Absolution of our sins the Introitus or Introduction appointed is an Hymn and thus it begins Come let us sing unto the Lord let us heartily rejoyce in the strength of our salvation If I descend to some particulars wherein our Evangelical gladness consists I know it will be more satisfactory to the Auditory First It brings with it a spiritual delight Secondly An external gladness which opens it self in signs and tokens The spiritual delight which we treasure up within the soul looking stedfastly upon Jesus that died for our sins and rose again for our justification is heavenly and unutterable it is a superlative joy that cries down all other petty delights It is risus ex serenitate conscientiae as the Fathers call it not Sarahs gigling but Abrahams laughter when he believed that Isaac should be born and involved in the same belief that Christ the Redeemer should be born out of the stock of Isaac The external utterances of a pious joy are these 1. Days of rest from bodily labour for the meaner labour must give way when a better and a worthier is to be undertaken And while the mind hath just occasion to make its abode in the house of gladness the weed of ordinary toil and travel doth not become us therefore it is fit that ordinary labour should sometimes surrender it self up to the service of God 2. To laud the name of the Lord and to give thanks unto him are the only language of our thankfulness Says David I went with the multitude unto the house of the Lord in the voice of praise and thanksgiving among such as keep holy day Psal xlii 5.3 God doth not deny it but he that offereth him praise doth honour him but will you know how that honour is best exalted Make a chearful noise to the God of Jacob singing and making melody to the Lord with Psalms and Hymns and spiritual Songs If the Jews might justly say how can we sing the Lords song while we are in a strange Land while we are in Captivity Then we must acknowledge on the contrary how can we choose but sing the Lords Song being delivered out of captivity Singing of Psalms is a most proper exercise of our reasonable service Curious Musick upon costly Instruments is an admirable alarm for devotion in Cathedral and Collegiate places where such as are wise and skilful do come together to enjoy it Yet still the people have their Vulgar Psalms to solace their hearts and they that mock at such innocent harmony have great want of charity that they will not descend to the weakness of their poor brethren St. Hierom tells it of his days that as the people walk'd about the Market as they sailed in Ships as they wrought with their Needle they sung these holy Ditties Says St. Basil this is irksome to none but to the Devil let scoffers mark that for the evil Spirit went out of Saul when David played upon the Harp and David was no profane Minstril but an holy Singer 4. Another effect of Christian joy is to give because it abounds A joy that will not distribute to the needy is a shrunken withered joy nay a joy that will carry the curse of God with it because it wants fruits And a joy that will carry the curse of the poor with it because they are suffered to pine and languish in our publick gladness 5. And lastly all sorts of mirth and innocent recreation wherein our Substance is not exhausted nor our time trifled away are agreeable
things now whereof I have spoken when we have magnified the holy name of God and kept his Laws and duly reverenced his Sacraments and obeyed his Magistrates then are we mounted in Quadriga Domini in the Charriot of the Lord as Elias was to fly up to heaven But alas what are we when all this is done that we should be said to honour God When Homer described the Feasts of his petty Gods and what they did eat says an Heathen upon it Misellos Deos quando illis dimensum homines suppeditant the Gods were in a pittiful case if they had nothing to eat but what men afforded them so it were a disloyal opinion to think so of God that we could give him any honour which he had not before Manu tuâ tibi damus Domine says St. Austin We give thee O Lord but we took it from thine own hand to give thee All our reasonable service which we do to God is like an whole Burnt-offering which is quite consum'd and nothing of it remaining to feed the Lord. Rivers and Fountains innumerable run into the Mediterranean Sea Nec putant saporem maris nec remittunt quidem says Seneca they make not the Sea sweet nor one whit less brackish than it was before So it is with the service which we pay to God He was as glorious before Man was made as ever He was since so many Kings were created to praise him It is an argument of Excellency to have honour and our God is excellent above all things but it is an argument of some defect in nature to grow greater by receiving honour doth the Sun grow clearer or the Moon brighter or the World larger than it hath been Extollere se quae justam magnitudinem implere non possunt Whatsoever is come to its full growth cares not for more nor cannot enlarge it self So God receives no encrease of glory by all the piety of Prophets Martyrs and Apostles either in the Militant or the Triumphant Church but we shall receive a true increase of happiness by the honour which God hath promised in the second member of the Division propounded Honor à Deo all honour is from God wherefore He saith honorantes honorabo Honorabo I will honour I need not crave your attention to this Doctrine it is a word that will make more men cast up their eyes to heaven than all the ten Commandements the conversation of the whole world aspires upward and we are all like men clambring up an hill some are helpt up by their friends hands some by a prosperous wind some catch hold of the boughs and bushes no man despiseth himself to stay beneath The Bramble thought it self fit to make a King Judg. 9. The Thistle would have the Cedars Daughter married to his Son 2 King xiv The little Spider says Solomon would be in Kings Palaces and the proud Eagle builds his Nest in the Stars Obad. ver 4. Vain Astrologers that meddle with Heaven no further I am afraid but by star-light range among the Planets to find out honorabo what preferment themselves shall come to or those wise men that sent them to look It was an excellent answer of Cardinal Pool to this purpose and well known to many One skilful in Astrologie told him that he had calculated his Nativity and great things were portended him It may be so says the Cardinal but I was born again by Baptism and so you must calculate my Nativity from that day and then tell me if you can what honours shall redound unto me as who should say it is neither Nature nor Planets nor good luck but God alone that brings to advancement Ego honorabo I will honour Promotion says the Psalmist cometh neither from the East nor from the West that is says the Gloss neither from this House of Heaven nor that corner of the Planets or as another commenteth neither by the fall of one man nor by the rising of another but ego honorabo I will honour Let me declare this Blessing of God in particulars The Life of man is divided into three Ages First here is our Conversation upon earth whose Honours we call Political Promotions and Advancements but the days of this life are few and evil and the Honours are as short The second Life is the voice of Fame when we are dead according as we live in the good report of men or be quite forgotten And the last Life is the Life of Glory Tendimus huc omnes haec est domus ultima the first Life may be Obscurity and the second Infamy but our Soul shall be satisfied abundantly if the last Life be Glory Thus you see God hath dispersed his blessing of Honours 1. In Title and Preeminence 2. In a Blessed memory 3. In a Crown of glory Observe it in the first that there is a two-fold end why God gives honours to some peculiar persons in this life in utilitatem humilitatem first to derive some publick benefit from one man and secondly to work humility from a worthy spirit He that will be the greatest among you saith our Saviour Mark viii let him be as the least of all that 's for humility and as Servant unto all that 's for use and ministry The first end of every mans high calling is to be a helper unto many When God gave Moses and Daniel and David to the world he gave it a mighty gift but when he set these men with the Princes of his people it was as great a miracle in his love as with a few loavs to feed thousands in the Wilderness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Synesius and to place a good King in a Kingdom is the shortest and most compendious way in Gods providence to amend all men See what a wild fancy Plato had in this point but fit for the purpose He taught that the most pure and active Souls descended from Heaven and of their own accord took upon them the shape of humane Bodies upon earth only to make good Law-givers and Magistrates and having established a prudent Common-wealth return'd to God from whence they came there was honour undergone for the profit of others I would you did reign says the Apostle to the Corinthians 1 Cor. iv 8. that we might reign with you I hope no man thinks that Paul was ambitious all his aim was for the propagation of the Gospel Here was honour desir'd to do good to the Church Olim officium erat imperare non regnum says Seneca once it was a place of some employment not a bare Title to be honourable And in that one action for my part I did like Cato more than in any other when he sued to be Tribune of the People He was ever backward in seeking preferment but at that time the Common-wealth was in great distress and had need of an honest Magistrate A good man seeks for Honours for the good of others as the Moon gets nothing for her self but new labours
St. Austin Did you think to burn like chaff and thorns to be out with a blaze The Scripture never meant it Your torments shall belike a firy Oven Psal xxi where heat is furious without the blessing of light You shall be like the burning of Lime Isa xii where the fire encreaseth when you think to extinguish it Nay you shall be as Wax before the fire Mic. i. melted and heated but not consumed Aetna was never cold yet as if it were the stomach of the world Montes uruntur durant quid improbi hostes Domini says Tertullian Yea says the Atheist Hills are but dirt and dross without life they may last and burn Then say we the Salamander hath life and yet is not consumed in the fire So shall it be with the wicked True says the Atheist such Creatures may play in the flames because it is their nature and delight but can the wicked abide in pains unsufferable and not be consumed St. Austin in this point hath outgone their Logick says he Mirabile est dolere in ignibus tamen vivere sed mirabilius vivere in ignibus nec dolere That is the miracle above the other for the little beast to live unscorched without any pain among the burning coals rather then as the damned to continue so in torment Do you believe a vain story for the one then believe the Scriptures for the other But I leave those and many more the like Problems for the Schoolmen whose subtil heads have extracted such questions by distillation from Hell Furnace as if they did not dispute but conjure And I pass from this Song of deliverance how mischief lighted upon the Viper to Canticum Canticorum the Song of Songs even Deborahs song in this happy preservation He shook the beast into the fire and felt no harm This was not a brand snatcht out of the fire half saved half consumed Not like your bloudy Victories wherein the Conquerours may sit down and count their losses as well as the Conquered As Pyrrhus said very well when twice he vanquished the Romans but lost the flower of his own Army in the Victories Si tertio vicerimus if we overcome the third time we are undone for ever But it is Dalmaticus triumphus sine sudore sanguine The Viper left not so much smart behind it as the prick of a thorn or thistle He felt no harm How would a Stoick interpret this now Forsooth to be an obstinate contempt of grief I will not call it patience as if Paul were toucht to the quick but would not feel it So Taurus the Philosopher in Gellius excused a sick person of his Sect that seemed to groan in his disease Non est gemitus alicujus victi à dolore sed anhelitus viri enitentis vincere That is pain and disease did not make him groan as if it troubled him but he fetcht his wind short to over-master his sickness this is robusta stultitia madness not manhood and Philosophy to affect such stubborness Nature cannot but love it self and retire from pain and Reason will follow Nature And this is enough to satisfie the most curious that trouble their heads why our Saviour cast out those strong ejaculations of grief against the bitter cup Mat. xxvi Cum natura cogit etiam ratio data à naturâ cogitur As I said before Reason will follow Nature Wherefore to say that Paul felt no harm is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he did not suffer any He had been in the third heavens and in this one act God gave his body incorruption upon earth For so says Aquinas that many worthy Saints have had a taste of heaven upon earth not only by grace in their soul but by some other excellent quality shining in these vile bodies The properties of a glorified body are thus reckoned up by the same Author first that the Just shall shine like the Sun in the Firmament that is Claritas in corpore So the face of Stephen standing before the Council was bright as the face of an Angel The second ornament is agilitas in motu to be able to fly upon the wings of the wind thus Philip was carried by the Spirit from Gaza in the Desart to Azotus suddenly Thirdly our corruption shall put on incorruption as in this one act Paul suffered on his hand and felt no harm for the last attribute of a glorified body which is called spiritualitas I do not recknon it for according to the Schoolmens interpretation it doth quite destroy the nature of a body But let us remember to keep our bodies pure and undefiled since God hath given us a taste in this life that hereafter they shall be refined in greater glory O we doubt it not but we should all prove as holy as Paul himself if we were so dear to God as to feel no harm Our luxurious Courtiers would sing Songs unto the Lord with Shadrach Mesech and Abednego if the Son of God would walk with them in the firy Furnace and in the shadow of death that they might fear none ill Our wanton Ladies yea and their Handmaids also would play upon Timbrels unto God as well as Miriam if they might tread as safe upon the ground as she did and all Israel to fear none evil in the midst of the Sea No but if our danger did not come to be felt to tangit angit I fear we would be impudent and say there was no danger Like ignorant people who presume when beasts are tamed by discipline that they have no teeth because they bite not Jonah must be wakened to see the Tempest lest he sleep it out and deny it And if Saul miss nothing else yet he must lose his pot of water that he might acknowledge his own preservation and Davids fidelity As the Shepherd in Virgil was bitten by a Gnat to espy the hissing of a Serpent and we our selves try the edge of a Razor upon the nail of our finger and so come to know that if it should miscarry it would cut our throat And this is one cause why Paul did feel no harm because we are chastened with some feeling for they that be evil and feel no harm would be too too evil and feel no benefit But let my second reason be the answer and with your patience the conclusion for this time Such Miracles and such deliverances were required in the days of St. Paul the Apostle which are not now to be expected in these our days I call it a Miracle and so it is and in the nature of the greatest Miracles Small ones are but such as either seldom be seen and so come by their name so our Saviour wondred at the Centurions faith Or those which it is no news to see nor very hard to bring about but only it is above our reason perchance to know the cause as the turning of the point of the Loadstone to the North. But this is a more noble work and therefore
Conventicles which are the obstructions of Vnity and the decay of Allegeance and Loyalty They that live far from Court may perhaps see their danger sooner than the wisest that hear it and scarce hear all reports which threaten danger It is easie to spit out a spark but not a flame When Pliny in his Proconsulate in Asia wrote to Trajan that he found the Christians meeting in secret corners before day then they had no Churches and to be a harmless people that sung Psalms to Christ that confederated not to kill not to commit Adultery and the like Budaeus upon the Pandects is my Author that Trajan wrote to Pliny that he did not like to have them gather together in that privy sort for it might tend to conspiracy That thereupon the Christians certified of the Emperours jealousie refrained their meetings though as yet they had no publick places to assemble in for the Worship of Christ But try our Christians that meet in hugger mugger in houshold Congregations I doubt you will not find that inoffensiveness and modesty among them which was in our Primitive Brethren who would sooner observe the Edict of a Pagan Prince than these will the Defenders of the Faith Look upon this Point once more Noah called all that were about him together to the solemn Worship of God A good Spring sets all the Wheels a going with a true and an equal motion and it was fit this good work should be carried on in his person The Father of the Family the Master of the Houshold the chief Priest of the Church in Sacred causes the Supreme Magistrate in Civil causes in any of these respects but much more in all together he was to give a good example to his Relatives A good example let us look to it to whom it most belongs is a sweet savour to many far and wide to the whole World in the Twelve Apostles Upon which Gregory runs out in this exuberant eloquence The Apostles were flowers of all sweet smels as the flower of the Grape Doctrina praedicatorum inebriat mentes audientium their Doctrine did inebriate their Auditors with the Cup of Salvation there was in them the flower of the Olive in the sweet works of mercy the flower of the Rose in the crimson bloud of their Martyrdom the flower of the white Lilly in some by Virginity in all by pureness and chastity and the flower of the Violet in lowly growth or humility Holy conspicuous men are flowers of Paradise whose odours and colours are delectable an orient colour in their own conscience within a fragrant odour in their good name to those that are without Justus lilium est in se candidum sed proximo odoratum A just man is a Lilly that hath inherent whiteness to himself but sweet as a Rose to his neighbour by the edifying of his example that others may see his good works and glorifie your Father which is in heaven It is happy to live well thrice happy to lead well like Cesars Souldiers that were called an Army of Commanders St. Basil says that some in his time did sprinkle sweet Ointment upon the Wings of tame Pigeons and sent them abroad like our coy Ducks to fetch in the wild Flocks that they might take delight in them and follow them home So as he applies it the good Odour which may be sented from them that are exemplarily vertuous attracts the wild and dissolute to the Dove Coats or the Collections of the Saints of God All that have done eminently to abandon Profaneness suppress Superstition revoke Sacriledge discourage the Factious suppress Hereticks and Contentious Kings Potentates Prelates shall be renowned as Josias was that famous restorer of Religion there remembrance shall be sweet as honey in all mouths and as Musick at a banquet of wine Ecclus. xlix 1. Enough now of this Point that Noah before all necessaries of life and nature took care for the instauration of true Religion begun in a most divine unity and setled it by his great example Therefore the Lord smelled a sweet savour The third thing which in the Affirmative interprets the phrase of my Text is That God is mightily delighted with Oblations of thankfulness Noah had a very small stock of Creatures with him to begin a new Generation and when they came forth of the Ark none were appointed to be slain but had their Exeatis with this blessing Be fruitful and multiply on the earth Yet the Patriarch knew by faith how he that had preserved them so miraculously could multiply their paucity and the sooner if somewhat were gratefully repayed to God Let Elias have a little of a little and the Widow shall have the more These few Beasts and Fowls I speak of were the Reliques of the Old World and the Seminary of the New Now how well did a Sacrifice come in to divide between these two Points of Religion To give thanks for the remainder preserved and to bespeak their increase for the time to come So God is justly acknowledged in both his titles Servator reliquiarum multiplicator seminarii the conserver of the little remainder the multiplier of the total Seminary O give thanks unto the Lord for he is gracious The most material exception that a good man can make against the shortness of life is that we want space to run over all the benefits we have received Woe be to them that have time and spare little for such Meditations Some man who is not very practical in this duty will say question me not whether I praise the Lord for his great mercies for my Redemption for my Salvation How can I forget it Or had I been in Noahs case escaped a common Deluge I would have offered a Sacrifice I see God must buy our gratitude dear if he will have it and many times when he pays well for it he goes without it For some do premeditately except against the Publick Thanksgiving of women delivered from the peril of Childbirth as if it savoured of Jewish Purification The time is to come when such shall know that it is better to be a thankful Jew than an unthankful Christian This was St. Austins Divinity Liberata est uxor tua à periculo partus benedicis Dominum When thy Wife is delivered and well recovered thou wilt say The name of the Lord be praised The like will any man almost do that is come off from a bloudy Battel a raging Tempest a burning Feaver a malicious Conspiracy that he may not appear a rank Atheist But the Lord as I said buys such thanks at a great rate Do you think he gives common blessings like a vantage above the dozen which you shall not pay for Is it nothing that the Sun doth shine upon us and not burn us That the Seas flow and ebb again and not overwhelm us That the Cattel of the field feed us and not devour us Nothing should befal us without a retribution of praise In every thing
them That the Nazarites had any dwelling in the Temple Maldonat is mistaken no more had these Shepherds who lived in Tabernacles Again some constrain themselves to the observation of a Vow but for a time for never any but Samson that we read of was a perpetual Nazarite some oblige the Votary for ever such was this which I treat of in Tabernacles they must live for ever Fourthly Some stand upon conditions like that of Anna if she had a Son she would give him to the Lord. Some are absolute like the Vow of Baptism wherein there is no capitulation But were it a Vow in any rank of these which I have named yet the complexion of the matter must have these four conditions according to the Schoolmen We will take that which is sound and refuse that which is corrupt Esto say they res adiaphora possibilis licita faciens ad cultum Dei 1. The thing vowed must be indifferent and free from necessity 2. An atchievment possible and not out of the reach of humane frailty 3. Unless it be lawful we offer our service unto Devils 4. That which we vow unto God must not be every idle fancy of our own brain it must bear weight and moment if we promise it unto the Lord. To begin with the first A thing not commanded but indifferent to be done or not done is the first condition of a Vow says Aquinas Stay there a while Shall I believe Aquinas or the Patriarch Jacob For I learn that the first ground of making a Vow is in Jacobs example Gen. xxviii by the light of nature before the Law and he vows both res praeceptas that God should be his God and res adiaphoras where the Stone was set to build up an house to God Beloved be not deceived with the leaven of the Jesuits this is Diana of the Ephesians and their credit lies upon it Indeed such Commandments as literally forbid sin are negative and obligant ad semper the yoke of them is never off from our conscience and so it is easie to acknowledge that they are Commandments But whereas inclusively there are duties to be done quae non obligant ad semper which bind us but at times and seasons therein we may meet with many parts of Divine Worship which seem superfluous and as it were given into the bargain Especially we want a good inspection to make a difference between these three things 1. There is the end of a Christian life 2. The next and immediate means to that end 3. The remoter means and further off The end is Gods glory and we cannot oversee that point but that it is the first injunction which lies upon our Soul The next and the proper end to that means are the strict words of the Commandments and those we cannot gainsay it are a necessary part of Christianity But as for the remote means which are further of there we boast that we do pay that which we did never owe but supererogate with God O deluded Conscience hearken and consider purity of body and soul is the scope of the seventh Commandment The next means to avoid Adultery is in some men Marriage in some the shunning of lascivious talk and lewd Company there are means more distant to subdue the wantonness of the body by strict Fastings by Canonical hours of Prayer to shun the very Country where bewitching Beauties tempt our affections Should you tell me in this case that your Prayers your Fastings your Pilgrimages were more than measure and above the Commandment I would tell you you did lie against God and your Conscience against God who hath commanded all that you can perform by might and strength and against Conscience for whatsoever my heart tells me will give me advantage to serve the Lord conscientia in iis est regula faciendorum and it is sin to omit it I appeal to a Jury of the Schoolmen Why did Christ and his Angels vow no vow because they are the most perfect Creatures of reasonable essence full of the noblest speculation yet they keep the Law of God and observe it Down then with that blasphemy that the observation of the Law is but Milk for Babes and Vows are left to try the vertues of an excellent and heroick spirits greater Tasks for the Champions of the Militant Church The Law is like the Passover which must be eaten Devotions of indifferency when conscience doth prescribe them are like the sower herbs to be eaten with it If you think the Sawce better than the Meat the Herbs more costly than the Lamb they are fermentum in Paschate and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees You will say was not this res adiaphora was it not in the power of the Rechabites to drink wine or refrain yes but when conscience had set it down before them as an excellent disposition to serve the Lord conscience hath made that which was indifferent in it self necessary unto them and their Task in this very thing to please the Lord. If this Chapter be not strong enough to convince our Adversaries though they glory in the Example of the Rechabites let them take the Cause For although they restrained themselves to the poorest life of keeping sheep and dwelt in Pavillions and drank no wine yet it came not from these observations that they were acceptable to God no God himself reduceth their good service to the fifth Commandment in the last verses of this Chapter because they have obeyed their Father Jonadab in all things therefore there shall not want a man of that Race to stand before him for ever And so much for the first condition of this Vow the observations in themselves are of indifferency and liberty but yet media remota ad praeceptum they are reducible to the fifth Commandment In the second condition I concur with the Schoolmen that a Vow must be possible to accompass lest they that pass by shake their heads and say this man laid a foundation and was not able to build it up non est votum sed ostentatio it is no Vow but plain boasting and ostentation They deal as certain of the Sect called Druides among the Gauls that took much upon trust in this life to pay their Creditors in the Resurrection When St. Peter would trust his feet to walk upon the Seas to Christ the waves surged and had well nigh drowned an Apostle A good Emblem for those who finding their affections calm and even say to morrow will be as yesterday and vow for the years to come but in time our heart loatheth this Manna and what are we but Bankrupts unto God and Peter sinketh A true Votary says Anselm gives unto God the whole tree with the fruit root and branches the works of the will and the power of the will for ever But if the Thistle should vow and threaten to bring forth grapes would it not be trodden down by the Beasts of the field as it is in the
manner of superfluity The Morallists and Poets of the Heathen were wise men and when they character the best and happiest times of the World I am not presumptuous but confident of my knowledge that they all insist upon this that the men of that Age studied not for their Diet but took the voluntary Offerings of the Springs and Mountains Now we have left that praise and happiness to the Beasts and Fowls of the air who take the next thing they light upon to satisfie their thirst and hunger Non fuit noverca nobis natura ut homo sine tot artibus non possit vivere It is our own fault that we consume our Revenues and spend all our labour as the Wise-man says for the belly Nature is not so much a Stepdame to us alone that no less than two hundred Arts and Trades may be reckoned before his Table can be magnificently furnished This is the only conveniency of great sins which are very expenceful though not for the sin yet for the charge sake they use to vanish away by little and little I have the more hope my labour shall not be fruitless to exhort you to fall back to some laudable measure of ancient frugality Though it be a thing grown quite out of the constitution of your bodies to thirst for water as my Text says yet I would you would thirst less for wine and as one said though once our Saviour was so gracious to turn water into wine yet it were happy now on our part if he would infuse such temperance into us as to turn our wine into water See into what luxury we have sopt our Souls in the revolution of time see how we are metamorphosed in our appetite those Wines which were wont to be sold by the Apothecaries for a Drug are now become every Meals liquor at our Tables and Water which was the ordinary drink of man now it is never used but as a Potion and for some Medicinal operation So that which was our Physick is become our ordinary Drink and that which was our daily Drink is become our Physick Satis est populo fluviusque Ceresque though bread for hunger and water for thirst are but a bare enough yet such expressions from our Saviour who knows what is fittest for us will make the most of us I hope ashamed when we compare it with an Epicures too much But whether temperate or intemperate whether the poor Beggar that drinks of the running Brook or the rich Glutton that quaffs the bloud of the Grape at sundry times they feel a scarcity and want of moisture it is an affliction upon our nature that all men have their thirst The Schoolmen ask and which is more they contend among themselves whether hunger and thirst had befallen Mankind if they had never sinned against the Lord The Controversy comes to this issue This heavenly part of us which God breathed into the body it is both Anima and Spiritus a Soul and a Spirit and therefore it causeth both an animal life which consists in the faculties of nourishment augmentation of every part generation c. and it causeth by Gods gracious gift a spiritual life making this corruptible flesh of ours incorruptible and transfusing many more of its own excellencies into this gross substance and then it is a glorified Body These by the Divine ordination were appointed after a large space to be one after another so says St. Paul That was not first which was spiritual but that which was natural and afterward that which is spiritual It was necessary therefore while it was a natural body that sustenance must be taken and at such a time when man knew right well by his own constitution that it was fit to repair nature he could not err and be deceived in that in the state of innocency and at that time his appetite would call for it as a pleasant and wholesome thing to be taken for you know what a loathing thing it is to take meat and drink into the mouth without an appetite Here 's the scruple plainly laid down before you whether hunger and thirst did provoke such an appetite in man before he fell into disobedience I answer that this Controversy is but a bare mistaking of a word If hunger and thirst be largely taken for that sense which a man hath how the stomach must be replenisht for the maintenance of life so Adam before he fell had sensum indigentiae a far more exacting feeling than we have when nature was in indigency and must be supplied but strictly and properly hunger and thirst habent adjunctam molestiam cruciatum they come upon us with some molestiousness and torment and so they are only incident to wicked man where punishment is manifold ways inflicted upon transgression Where heat doth dry up moisture and parch the juyce of the veins there our thirsty soul doth gape like a barren and dry Land that is when one elementary quality doth feed upon another and consume it But before sin entred into the World there was such an orderly mixture of all parts in us that the Elements were at peace in our Body no quality did seek to over-master another and corrupt it but the pangs and girds of thirst did ensue upon just revenge Reason proved rebellious to the Law of God the sensual appetite grew rebellious to reason and the distemperature of the body grew rebellious to appetite Shall I need to tell you how the Israelites in a sore thirst were ready to renounce God in the Wilderness or how the strength of Sampson fainted till the Jaw bone besmeared with the bloud of his Enemies did run with water or how Darius in extremity of drought was glad to drink of a most putrified puddle Every man hath felt such anguish in himself at some time or other every little scarceness threatens death or is worse than death to them that want the friendship of God And as our appetite is never but sick of longing so the body troubles it with a perpetual craving that which it takes to day is forgot to morrow as if it never had been Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again That which nourisheth the Soul of man must be immortal like the Soul but that which nourisheth a corruptible Body it self is corruptible One lean Harvest in Egypt made seven rich ones be quite forgotten A short Fast will gnaw the bowels though Ahasuerus his long Feast had gone before it Whatsoever you taste the pleasure of it is not remembred in a minute the strength and virtue of it is gone in a few hours A man that is grown to the end of a full age if he would reckon by measure and proportion how much waste in threescore and ten years one Belly hath made it would make him wonder and say to himself am I run on the score so far for my daily sustenance is it not due that my Carkass should rot in the
is the portion which comes unto us and for which our Covenant is called the Gospel of glory For tribulations which did not accord with the Jewish Oeconomy if they be not above our strength we must not only expect them but rather invite them then avoid them Vre seca hic ne parcas Domine ut in aeternum parcas Prove me chastise me bruize me like sweet Gum till thou beest pleased with my savour pitty me not in these momentary afflictions that thou mayest spare me for ever As the soul is free from the prison of the body when it is dissolved in death so it is most free from the faeces and earthiness of the body when it is not wedded to the desire of transitory things Mushrooms that have no savour when we have enjoyed them but a day Briefly Jewish servility is an unbeliever like St. Thomas Nisi mittam digitum Let me touch let me feel let me grasp my handful or it is in vain to obey the Lord Christian liberty is ingenuous and heroical it hath swum out of this dead Sea in whose mud the unregenerate do stick and if the Lord will give us himself let Ziba take all The greater is our freedom because we know we need not the aids of fortune I have heard that a Cardinal being elected to be Pope his former State is rifled because his new dignity will supply him in abundance Just so when the Spirit comforts us that we are called to a Crown of glory pardon the similitude it is no worse than as Christ hath compared himself to a Thief that comes in the night but our confidence of our new Election to that Inheritance makes us easie to part with that which others keep for a while and leave it in a moment And thus when freedom hath struck inward to our affections pardon us if we speak despicably of the Jews for our Jerusalem alone is free The whole Charter of Jerusalems freedom is dispatcht Though the hour were to begin again I would not stick at the next question how we came by it We all know the procurer and what he did to gain it for us it is a flower that grew out of the bloud of Christ We were not protected as Joshuahs Spies were by a common woman nor set at large as Samaria was by the tidings of Lepers our Deliverer is more honourable to us than our freedom the Son of God was made a Servant that we Servants might become Sons As God made nothing in nature but by his Son by him he made the Worlds so he did nothing for the restauration of the World without him He is all in all He hath freed us from the bondage of shadows by taking a body From the Covenant of Works by satisfying his Fathers Justice From the dread of fear by the sweetness of his Mercy From the sordid desire of earthly things by the operation of his holy Spirit The purchase of our Freedom was carried in this sort so that the Jesuit à Lapide borrowed a fit name to call it by you know from whom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the gift of a King of David our King Imagine by a Prosopopaea that you saw the Devil and Sin and death defying us in the same words that Goliah did the Camp of Israel If you be able to fight with us and to kill us we will be your Servants but if we prevail against you then you shall be our servants and serve us Then David our Champion slew these Giants of Gath in our quarrel and from thenceforth we are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his purchased people as St. Peter says St. Austin says that by nature we were Pharaohs bondmen that is Satans and when we forsook him and fled away to serve God in the Wilderness he followed after us but no further than the Red Sea Quid est mare rubrum Vsque ad fontem Christi cruce sanguine consecratum What is the Red Sea that divided us from him The Fountain of Baptism consecrated to save us by the Cross and Bloud of Christ Bernard alludes to the words of Jacob and says that the Church is that portion which Christ won from the Amorite with his Sword and with his Bow Gladio praedicationis arcu incarnationis With the Sword of his Doctrine with the Bow of his incarnation where the shaft and the string make but one Instrument as his Godhead and Manhood make but one Person Thus he hath snatcht us from our Enemies that were made Lords over us and from the hard bondage wherein we were made to serve Isa xiv 3. Having seen the Copy of our Freedom and knowing how we got it it is a Lesson fit to conclude with that every mans memory may carry that away at the least how we should use it No blessing hath been more abused than this Under colour hereof the Galileans would be free from Tribute the Nicolaitans from the bond of Marriage the Gnosticks from all Justice and Temperance the Clerks of the Roman Church from the Courts of the Civil Magistrate and the Anabaptists from all Moral Duties No says St. Peter to all these As free but not using your liberty as a cloak of maliciousness but as the servants of God It was St. Austins by-word Dilige Deum fac quod vis You are free therefore love God and do what you will If ye love him keep his Commandments We are not so soon loosed but we are tied again both freed and bound at once Liberando servos nos facit says the same Father in Joh. viii We must recompence his goodness with our imperfect obedience it is the Law of Gratitude it is the Bond of Nature As we commonly say that nothing is more dearly bought than that which comes by gift so we owe the greater service to him of whom we got our freedom Nay we are bound to endure all for his sake Neque hoc facit stupor sed amor nec deest dolor sed contemnitur says Bernard We feel the pain as much as they that curse and rage in their sufferings but our love unto Christ doth overcome it A Free-man that will thrive follows his Trade as close as any Apprentice though not by austere compulsion So our Freedom will not make our hands slack from working if we mean to lay up a treasure in heaven Every piece of Land they say holds of some Lord so every man retains to some Lord either we serve God or sin and Satan If we count it Freedom to take our swing in all voluptuousness pity their frensie that can stir no where but as their intemperate appetite commands them and yet mistake themselves to live without controul who are the Vassals of the Devil While they promise them liberty they themselves are the servants of corruption 2 Pet. i. 19. Tully objects to Clodius that he set up the Picture of Liberty in his house in the habit of a Strumpet Says that approved Senator
against him Qui meretricibus voluptatibus inservit non liber est sed servus To be under pleasure is to be under tyranny and therefore the Statue of a Strumpet did better resemble servitude But happy are thy servants O Lord that stand before thee Deo parere libertas est you may think that Seneca had conferred with St. Paul when he learnt that Lesson that the service of God is perfect freedom who hath made us a Royal Priesthood and holy Nation Says Leo in the second Anniversary Sermon upon his own Assumption to the Papacy nothing so Kingly as a mind subject to God and Ruler of his own passions nothing so Priestly as to offer up the sacrifice of a pure conscience and the oblation of a broken heart There were ancient Ceremonies in Baptism as if the party to be baptized came to be inaugurated to a Kingdom when he professed himself a Disciple of the Gospel For it appears in some Rituals that they put a Crown of flowers upon the head of the Neophyte to which the Collect then used doth testifie We beseech thee O King of heaven for this dissoluble Crown to give him a Crown of justice and good works The same was figured by these Ceremonies in confirmation that is by the unction of their forehead and by the fascia which bound about their temples as a Diadem All these customs do border upon this phrase that our Jerusalem is every where in the Gospel called the Kingdom of heaven God is such a King whom none but Kings do serve none but Melchisedechs who are free from sin and at once both Servants of righteousness and Kings of righteousness Dignitate Domini honorata sit conditio servi He is so great a Lord that it is a Lordship nay a Kingdom to serve him In a word remember that our freedom is a strict obligation to all excellent vertue that being delivered from the hands of our enemies we may serve him without fear in righteousness and holiness all the days of our life Lord keep thy Jerusalem free from the bondage of sin that we may not be cast into the prison of utter darkness AMEN THE THIRD SERMON UPON GAL. iv 26. Jerusalem which is above is free which is the Mother of us all HAving drawn out the description of the Church in sundry lines of beauty that it is a Jerusalem a visible and glorious City for the external Communion a Jerusalem from above for her internal Graces a Jerusalem that is free for her Redemption through the bloud of Christ every man I suppose will attest thus unto it nihil addi potest huic bono nisi ut sit perpetuum O that it would last thus unto the worlds end by continual propagation for nothing can be added unto that which is so completely good but that it should be perpetual Lo I shall land you now upon that Shore and represent the Church unto you as a Mother that brings forth and is never barren whose fruitfulness continues her praise and happiness for ever she is the Mother of us all and of all those Generations after us that live by the faith of the Son of God as long as the World endures We are not in the condition of Xerxes who had as goodly a Train of Souldiers as ever marched into the Field but it drew tears from his eyes to think that in less than the space of an hundred years not one of all those thousands should remain alive They had not a Mother which brought forth uncessantly to repair their mortality That good which will not continue breeds great discomfort upon certain expectation of mutability But our Jerusalem shall never wain nor consume it is sown with the seeds of immortality If we were all included in one Isaac and he were slain upon the Altar for a Sacrifice yet Abraham were sure that God would restore him again being dead Jacob might faint and fear lest his Sons should miscarry one after another and he remain childless his despair was grounded upon the sadness of humane events if I be bereaved of my Children I am bereaved Gen. xliii 14. But the Church shall see her Childrens Children grow up by succession without end of dayes Christ should be put to death again and rise no more which is most impossible if she should quite disappear The root of the Tree of Life should die which cannot be imagined if her branches should all wither But this is a Lamp which is nourished with fresh oil from Heaven and shall never be put out it is the chiefest of all that is called good upon Earth and a constant perpetual good Therefore let the Children rise up and call this Mother blessed And as the Church hath taken upon it the proper name of Jerusalem yet without any Contract to the local and material building of Jerusalem so she hath taken up the appellation of a Mother yet without any respect to nature no way bending to natural causes or natural affections For not only our Parents in the flesh but the whole World hath quite lost us in this word As Moses remembred the great devotion of Levi that he said of his Father and Mother I have not seen them or I respect them not and of his Brethren I do not acknowledg them Deut. xxxiii 9. So by deriving our selves from this Mother we cast our fleshly Parentage aside and we say to her who did give us to suck from her Breasts as our Saviour did to the Blessed Virgin Mulier quid mihi tecum Woman what have I to do with thee Jerusalem is ours and we are hers Jerusalem which is above is free c. This remainder of the verse which is the dispatch of the whole Text requires our inspection into three particulars First To know our Mother that we may not be ignorant either of her fruitfulness or our own obedience He is a wise Son says Telemachus in Homer that knows his Father but he is a foolish Son that doth not know his Mother Secondly Note the unity and indivision of the Children of this Mother They are a cluster of Grapes hanging upon one Stalk a Brood of Chickens clockt under the wings of one Hen there is but one Steâ— and one Progeny one Nostrum in relation to this Parent Mater nostrum the Mother of us The third and last part puts us to observe that the note of Universality was large in Pauls days but now much more amplified than in those times mater nostrum omnium the Mother of us all First A Mother gives a being to those whom she brings forth and that which is brought forth owes a great duty to the Mother upon these two hinges this main part of the Text is turned the one is the Fruitfulness of the Mother the other is the Obedience of the Children And what being is that which Jerusalem above doth contribute unto us that she is called our Mother It challengeth no part in our specifical essence or the
Gospel He prosecutes the Trope from Ishmael the Son of the Bondwoman who was aliened from his Fathers house and from Isaac the Son of Sarah who was the Heir of the Promise And all this is curious and inlac'd like Mosaick work with most artificial correspondencies Thus Solomon delivered the Institutions of an honest life in plain and concise Proverbs but when he wrote upon the beauty of the Church he altered his stile into a polite and mystical Song And our Apostle doth frequently utter the things belonging to Justice and Temperance in lowly and vulgar forms of speech but when he goes about to describe the rights and graces of the Church then Paulò majora he is quite another man and handles that subject with many gradations of eloquence Witness my Text as in part I have unfolded it already which is a flower growing upon the stalk of this Allegory which I discuss the oftner to keep the Precept which David gives Psal xlviii Walk about Sion and go round about her tell the Towers thereof mark well her Bulwarks and consider her Palaces The Sion in that Psalm is the Jerusalem in my Text which consists of no ordinary Bays of building but all of sumptuous Architecture There is never a word in this Text but is either a Tower a Bulwark or a Palace of Jerusalem Mark them well go round about them says the Psalmist Her Towers rise up in state for Jerusalem is above she hath Bulwarks of safety for we are made free therein by the bloud of Christ Her Palaces are of large containment for she is the Mother of us all Out of six words in the verse I formerly considered six attributes of honour that belong to that Church which Christ hath purchased with his bloud 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1. She is a Jerusalem a visible fair City there is her external Communion 2. A Jerusalem above that is its internal Sanctity 3. A Jerusalem that is free which is her most proper Christian Badge and supernal Redemption 4. A Mother that is her fruitfulness 5. The Mother of us which imports a Brotherly Unity 6. The Mother of us all which expresseth the universality I have told and numbred the Towers of it and in a former day I proceeded to Jerusalem above Now I will mark her Bulwarks and consider her Palaces that she is free and the mother of us all Jerusalem which is above is free The precedent praise of the Church adheres unto this word for the consummation thereof If there be any that take upon them to belong to the New Jerusalem and to the City which is above let them shew the Copy of their Freedom that they are not led by the Spirit of Bondage but by the Spirit of Adoption There may be a plausible conversation of life in them that are out of the Pale of Jerusalem For Moral Vertues do not belong to Christian men as Christians but they pertain to them as men says Hooker There may be fair manifests of sanctity and the contempt of the world in their outward carriage whose heart is not above The sower morosity of the Pharisees would make you believe they renounced all vanities Pestilent Hereticks have exceeded that I may not say excelled in works of mortification Pelagius was of a demure honesty Vir ut audio non parvo profectu Christianus says St. Austin Severus Sulpitius says of Priscillian he was noted for many laudable parts of mind and body in fasting in humility in contentation So Anthimus and others Doth not this shew as if it were all for the world above And yet they had neither part nor lot in that matter The Reason because they had some bondage in them they were under a Captivity which they had not shaken off They had not liberale ingenium so that the last enquiry who belong to that Jerusalem above is upon this question Whether the truth hath made them free Joh. viii 52. For Jerusalem that is above is free It is a word that comprehends in it much favour and much duty And it shall pass under my hand with this examination 1. What this freedom is 2. How we got it 3. How we must use it Our freedom consists in a manumission from a four fold servitude 1. We are delivered from the Yoke of Ceremonies called the bondage of the Elements of this World in this Chapter verse 4. 2. We are most free for the New Covenants sake which is made with us For salvation is not offered us through the Works of the Law but through the Promise of grace We Brethren as Isaac was are Children of promise verse 28. 3. We have not received the Spirit of Bondage to fear but the Spirit of Adoption whereby we cry Abba Father Rom. viii 25. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Theophylact upon my Text the Gospel exhorts us gently it doth not affright us tyrannously 4. The rewards of the New Testament are not momentary things such as the Law propounded but heavenly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says the same Author we are not servants that do our duty for visible wages And all these together make the copy of a perfect freedom He that is under rudiments is under age he that is bound to the works of the Law is under condemnation He that is curbed by threatnings is under thraldom He that looks for momentary things from God is under base afflictions From all these Christ hath exempted us by the Gospel which is called the perfect Law of liberty Jam. i. in this complete sort our Jerusalem which is above is free First To be exempted from the incumbrance of well nigh a Million of Levitical Ceremonies will not appear so gracious a benefit as it is unless we take a great deal of leisure to mark it Never was any people so Paedagogically handled as the Jews were The observation of the greatest part of their days was calculated their meats were stinted their bread was prescribed They had Ordinances upon their Garments precise rules for the fruits that grew in the field directions for their building appointment for their Apparel Not so much but the very cutting of their hair was subject to a Commandment What strict Orders against Pollution What nice receits to cleanse pollution What tedious Traditions in their Oblations and Sacrifices What Punctilioes to be nicely kept in all the discharges of their Religion In Secular affairs they could do nothing wherein their soul delighted In Sacred affairs it was impossible for them to perform every thing which Moses enjoyned God knew how much addicted they were to their own inventions therefore he leaves them nothing either holy or profane to be managed by their own discretion but are quite rejected as unworthy to judge of the smallest matters and they had their hands full of these petty duties to leave no room to extraneous Superstitions Tertulliam adds Et Deus operosis officiis dedolaret God did plain and smooth the ruggedness of their nature with many
trials of obedience Yet though their number was so great and cumbersom their weight had been more easie if they had been plain and perspicuous but the people underwent much geare and I think not one among an hundred did know the signification The substance of Religion was so darkly involved in the Types that happy was that Prophet or Prophets Son that could crack the shel to eat the kernel Who of the Vulgar rank could penetrate into the moral signification of those vices which were forbidden in the unclean Creatures Vt homines mundarentur pecora culpatu sunt says Tertullian The Law did seem to loath some beasts that we might know what God did love Was not the Salvation in Christ propounded to them in Signes And his death resembled in a Bullock slain at the Altar And what small comfort was there in that Pardon which was not intelligible to the poor Offendor Luther says well upon my Text that mans knowledge is unshackled it is at liberty when he discerns the naked truth in it self Cognitio est ancilla quando subjecta est velaminibus figurarum Our Wisdom is made a bondwoman subject to the captivity of Ignorance when it sees nothing but in the dark Glass of typical Obumbrations Thanks be to God that we are Scholars of the New Testament We are called to the manifestation of faith and love in Christ that we do not grope in darkness but walk in light for the Gospel is like a Glade which is cut through the grove of ancient Ceremonies Let me speak to this point once more Beside their excess in number and their cloudy obscurity there were unpleasing remembrances in them some that seemed to be mysteries of grace were likewise mystical Exprobrations and therefore referred by good Expositors to the hand-writing of Ordinances which is against us Col. ii 14. For Ceremonies take them not as Sacraments or Circumstances of Evangelical Service but as Yokes of the Law Nihil aliud erant quà m miseriae humanae publica professio They were imprints of humane misery not Expiations but Confessions of our iniquity Circumcision it accused the Israelites that they were born in sin Their frequent washings did testifie that there was filthiness in the Object The life of the Sacrifice spilt upon the ground pronounced him guilty of death that brought it to the Lord. I go no further because I would be compendious and I have said enough for this discovery that the Law of Ordinances was our Adversary But thanks be to that Saviour who blotted out the hand-writing payed the grand debt which we did owe and discharged the interest likewise when he evacuated the Levitical Ceremonies which is the first mark of the freedom of Jerusalem Yet be advised that we do not claim more immunity by this Chatter than is granted for that is ordinary to stretch out the name of liberty like cheveril Leather to what length we please some have assumed that they have good ground to blow up all our Modern Ceremonies with this Mine because Jerusalem is free from the yoke of Ordinances It is true our Jerusalem is free and therefore we are free for partus sequitur ventrem the Church appoints her own Orders of decency now and is not appointed nothing is imposed upon it with bond of necessary and perpetual observation the principality is upon her shoulders to make her Children submit to her prudent Constitutions But if particular men might challenge interest in this freedom as if they had scope to serve God with what order and comliness they pleased this were an uproar and not a freedom and a looseness like that of mad men when they have broke their Chains Certainly the liberty which God hath granted in setting our feet at large from these things with which the Priesthood of Aaron was charged it was to accommodate us with great grace and favour but if this should repel the bringing in of those Ceremonies which are means to beget the greater veneration of Religion the bounty of God which cannot be would turn to a prejudice his blessing to a cross and such as love the welfare of Sion might cry out O Lord we are oppressed with liberty Touching the substance of divine Worship it is written with Gods own finger in holy Scripture we must not add unto it Only God is pleased to try our judgment how we will administer it in the particular fashion His Worship is the Bread of Life sent down from heaven and not invented upon earth but for the manner of his Worship 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Clemens says of humane Philosophy it is like the sauce in which the bread is dipt to make it savoury to this conditement Jerusalem is allowed to put her skil providing for comliness and honesty as a wise dispenser of the mysteries of God Was ever any thing of moment transacted without some graceful solemnity Or is man so governed by the Spirit that he can lift himself up to Heaven sufficiently by interiour Meditation I forget not that some will say yea the Body also serveth God by the tongue And I allow it for an excellent way to warm our zeal with the loud voice of prayer But this warmth will quickly cool unless some devout actions concur together and deeds are far more durable in the fancy than the memory of speech either to teach the understanding somewhat which it ought to consider or to move the heart to due reverence and regard which it ought to have in the performance of sacred matters Here let the new Jerusalem act her part this is her liberty to enjoyn such Ceremonies for the eye as may prepare the heart the better to feel the power of the grace of God and to prescribe such visible signs as will leave a deeper print behind them than bare exhortation I will add that by this power bequeathed to the Church some Jewish Ceremonies may be reteined as far as the state of the things will bear if they be followed only for outward order and not returning to that obstinately which must be disannulled because Christ is come in the flesh I confess that Spiritual Worship is best for it is most correspondent to his nature whom we worship God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in spirit This is the reason that he says he hates Incense and effusion of bloud at his Altar such kind of service hath no assimilation with him who is incorporeal give him the Sacrifices of righteousness of prayers and mercy and thanksgiving qui corpus non est umbram non habet Approach not to him with shadows for he is a Spirit and not a Body yet in respect of us though not of himself he entertains the lowliness of bodily Worship as it hath a conveniency and conjunction with our nature The Lord is a Spirit and he even he alone gives law how he will be worshipped in spirit but we that worship him are bodily creatures and
sakes But Cornelius à Lapide the Jesuit puts the infamy of an Anabaptist upon Calvin as if he had taught that the soul departed had no sense or taste at all of the glory of God Why did he not censure Ambrose and Bernard Why did he not spit his venom upon Pope John the XXII There was good reason for that if we may believe Gerson a most grave Author of their own part But Calvin was the first that ever I met withall who writ a voluminous Treatise to prove that the souls of good men after this life have their quartering and Mansion in Heaven that they are not insensible of their state or benummed in sleep or fettered with darkness but that they praise the Lord continually and Christ that redeemed them which is consonant to this Point of my Text that John saw the souls under the Altar Yet I like not their way who are so careful to teach the people that the souls deceased do not sleep that they keep themselves waking with a thousand Fictions and Impostures there is scarce one leaf written of any Saint in the Church of Rome especially of the modern ones but you shall meet with two or three sprinklings in it how his soul appeared in this or that manner to his friends upon earth their posthumous miracles after their death exceed the number of those which they did when they were living And if any thing be out of order it is straitway rectified with an apparition And from whence think you the Elf or Goblin comes that appears From a place where I am sure this good Apostle saw no souls from the correction house of Purgatory Their Larvae or night-walking souls are their best Doctors for the confirmation of that opinion Ask Gregory the Great else who could urge little beside to gain credit to his opinion for the temporary chastisements of the faithful after this life but as the dead came and made relation to their surviving acquaintance Some silly men were first affrighted out of their wits with a gastly Vision and then guess you who it was that taught them points of Religion But four ages ran out after Gregories time before this cousenage grew trivial and common Gregory the Fourth in the year 835. decreed that a Solemn Feast should be held over all the Church to the memory of all the Saints in heaven that whatsoever was not fully performed in the Feasts and Vigils of particular Saints might be consummated on that day this was nothing to the puling souls detained in the prison of temporary castigation But almost two hundred years after Odilo the Abot of Cluni in commiseration to them that were departed in his own Monastery dedicated a day for the relief of their souls not yet admitted into heaven And Pope Jo. XVIII anno 1007 taking light from Odilo commanded the Feast of all Souls to be general in all places The Devil wanted nothing but the opening of this door to beat down all opposites with apparitions And let the Readers mark it that from that Age not a Book was written not a Chapter of a Book but it relates what Nocturnal Mercuries appeared to bring tidings from Purgatory Some Jangler will catch at this and say Belike you reject all Apparitions of the dead for lies or Demoniacal Impostures If I should I had Tertullian to abet me Omnem mortuorum exhibitionem incorporalem praestigias judices All incorporeal Phantosms of the dead are juglings and delusions And if any point of doctrine depend upon the sleeveless Errands that the souls departed bring I do renounce them for delusions We have Moses and the Prophets and we are certain their Spirits are ever to be preferred before any Spirit that comes from the dead For the living to go to the dead says the Prophet Isaiah none of that but to the Law and to the Testimony Isa viii 19. Rabbi Maimon says that some superstitious Jews would burn Incense among the graves that the dead might come and talk with them And therefore God said that man should be cut off from among the people that sought the truth among the dead Deut. xviii 11. Yet I deny it not but that the divine power hath sometimes presented the Saints departed to communicate with the living as they that appeared in the holy City to testifie our Saviours Resurrection Mat. xxvii Likewise in the 2. of Mach. Chap. ult Onius who once had been High Priest he was exhibited being dead to Judas Machabaeus that is another instance if you have any stomack to that Historian But the upshot is that Souls have been seen in heaven that was the Vision of St. John so Souls may be sent from Heaven but not from Purgatory Through fire I confess these souls had passed which the Apostle saw yet not through that subterraneous fire which they imagine but through the fire of Martyrdom and persecution He saw the Souls of them that were slain for the Word of God and for the Testimony which they held And if it be true as none of the worst Expositors conjecture that the computation of the fifth Seal opened immediately before the words of my Text is rightly calculated at what time Dioclesian did cease to make havock in the Church it was a very fit time to see souls in heaven slain for the Word of God it was thwackt with Martyrs like an hive with Bees For burning of Churches for massacring of Christians for Proscription of Innocents no Persecution was ever like it It lasted ten whole years without ceasing and in the first year of his Reign in Egypt only an hundred forty and four thousand Christians were put to death beside seventy thousand that were banisht insomuch says Scaliger that the Epocha of Dioclesian is called the Epocha of the Martyrs in Chronology Who would have thought that the Posterity of Cham a Generation branded with dark and unlovely visages should have afforded so many sacrifices to be offered up unto the glory of Jesus Christ Well might the Church of Aethiopia sing the Canticle of Solomon I am black but comely O ye Daughters of Jerusalem And not only these but exceeding great numbers of Bishops Priests and People in all quarters of the habitable world a long bedroll of faithful men and women in this Island did taste of the bitter Cup under the same Tyrant Fathers lost their Children Children lack'd their Parents the Wife missed her Husband and one friend another whom St. John hath found altogether making up one Chorus of blessed Spirits and while Rachel the Church below mourneth for her Children Jerusalem which is above the Mother of us all rejoyceth for them Martyrdom is the way to sublimate death into a Cordial which was a poyson the means to make that a blessing which was a curse upon our nature A Traffick proper to none but to the Citizens of the supernal City to secure our whole adventure not by assuring but by losing their life It is not only the
greatest probation of faith but it changeth faith into another species of Religion than it was before St. Austin speaks to some holy people that were ready to die for the testimony which they held Mox aurei eritis nunc argentei estis Now you are Silver that is you are clean and sanctified but if you be tried in the Furnace of Martyrdom ye shall become Gold And as Gold is deposited in the best place of a mans Treasury so those golden Saints I mean those that are slain for the Word they are received into the most precious and costly Cabinets of the Kingdom of God Upon those words of the Psalm xxvii 5. He shall hide me in the secret of his Tabernacle says Bernard Christ is a Tabernacle of protection for all his servants but he reserves the Altar for the Martyrs which is the principal part of the Tabernacle In acknowledgment that they had won the chief Garland which was propounded to them that run the race the bones of the Martyrs anciently were wont to be buried in no common place of the Church but under the Altar So St. Ambrose of the bones of Protasius and Gervasius buried in his Church of Millain under the Altar says he Let these triumphal Sacrifices be brought to that place where Christ is sacrificed I had destined that plot of ground for mine own burial It is meet that the Priest should sleep in peace where he was wont to offer up the Peace-offering Sed cedo sacris victimis dexteram portionem locus ille martyribus debebatur but I resign the right hand of the Altar to them it is due to the Martyrs How their names were read at solemn times out of the Diptyches to renoun their passions how their requests which they made to the Church before they died were granted for the pardon of any delinquent how their reliques were held precious though not exposed superstitiously to veneration these and much to that effect were too long to recite it is measure heaped and running over that Stephen the Captain of the bloudy Army saw the Heavens opened to immortalize his sufferings and that in the first File of all that are blessed St. John saw those that were slain for the Word of God Yet this service is so rough unto our tender nature to part with life for the custody of the truth that all men had rather owe it to God than pay it him O but it is a good thing to put your self to the question secretly between God and your self and do it not easily or hypocritically admit I had supplied the room of Stephen of James of Justin Laurence Cyprian quanta nomina Should I have stood it out to the shedding of my bloud Or should I have fainted If you stick at it and cannot make a constant resolution go to a new scrutiny and that the flesh may not say that you deceive it with a superficial examination make the most that you can of the pains which you shall be put to under the hand of the torturer yet put all things in a right Scale that the pains to be endured are over in a pair of hours at longest for the most part in a pair of minutes that the truth which you defend is ten thousand times dearer than a corruptible body that the passions of this life are not worthy of the glory which shall be revealed solicite your self often with these meditations till you have concluded with a mature judgment as St. Paul did I count not my life dear unto my self so I may finish my course with joy And then I will pronounce you a Martyr in extraordinary for God accepteth the will for the deed But howsoever the preconsiderations of many be stout I fear they would grow effeminate upon the trial You cannot discharge a strict Lenten Fast how would your delicate bodies digest the hunger of an Inquisition The ground is too hard for your knees to pray upon what hope is there that you would hold out to lie upon the bare ground of a prison A throng in hot weather stifles you that you cannot endure the Church how would your flesh endure a flaming fire I believe you think this deaths-head hath been set too long before you And is there no smoother way to be a Martyr than by being slain Yes St. Paul says there is a living Sacrifice as well as a dead And St. Austin Pervenitur non solùm occasu sed contemptu carnis ad coronam You may receive the Crown prepared for them that fight lawfully not only by extinguishing but by mortifying the flesh Mine eyes do persecute my chastity ambition doth persecute my humility revengeful malice doth persecute my charity concupiscence is always persecuting my soul which way can I turn my self but that every thing is a Martyrdom to a Religious Christian But if I mortifie the deeds of the flesh if I abandon covetousness if I repress lust if I bridle malice if I trample upon the world whereas I was a Martyr in affliction before and sin did reign over me I have expulsed it by another Martyrdom by renovation and by crucifying the old man But alas for pitty how many Martyrs have we if they may be believed upon their own testimony How many whining passages in by-corners and Satyrical Sermons touching the persecution of the Saints God shield that Saints should suffer in so Orthodox and so mild a Church Sure they are mistaken Nay but they exclaim over and over that they suffer for their conscience For their conscience That is another thing Do they suffer for the Word of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Complutensian Bibles read my Text I love not to insult over misery with many words let them sift their own case and it will prove they are supprest for contemning Authority But there are others far more obstreperous against our state If Pictures and Almanacks and Martyrologies and Beatifications of Traitors will condemn us we are up to the ears in these Certificates for savage cruelty in killing the Saints Do they not mean Jesuites and Seminaries that were forbidden upon forfeiture of their head not to enter into his Majesties Dominions It is as clear as the light of the Sun then that they were executed for breaking the Statute-Law and not for the Word of God or for the Testimony which they held Every Malefactor will pretend that he dies in a good cause to make his judgment odious in mens nostrils Such as serve in the Gallies will never be known what crimes they are in for but complain that they wear their Chain for Faith and Religion Alass say their Abettors that canonize them that Statute is violated but by accident they come to instruct their own Proselytes and to execute the Function of their Priesthood therefore by consequent they are slain for the Word of God I will match their case with a full place of St. Cyprian and so answer them The Proconsul that