mercy because he is infinitely willing and ready to pitty the miserable Jer. 33.11 So his wrath because he is inclinable in his will to punish sinners So his purity sheweth his will is bent to love holinesse but to hate all filthinesse both of flesh and spirit 4. His power sheweth that he is infinitely endowed with efficacious faculty to do whatsoever he will for there is no limit to his power but his will Therefore we cannot doubt of his promise or despaire in adversity Psal since his will is to help and his power followeth his will Mathe. How may we consider of God before the world in which he revealed himselfe to man Phila. God before the world lay hid both in his essence and subsistence yet being a Trinity coessentiall in Unity with afflux but determined in time to shew himselfe to be Unity in Trinity by emanation and by energeticall operations in nature grace and glory the Father appearing as the fountain of nature the Son as the fountain of grace and the Holy Ghost of glory both in giving the earnest of it and then working us to the consummation of it so that God is to be considered absolutely in essence and unity relatively in subsistence and coessentiality In consideration of which subsistency I conceive that the world by these divine persons was contrived the being preserving and translating of nature which nature consisted of intellectuall creatures as Angels and of rationall creatures as men and of bruits as the sensitive of vegetatives as plants and of other entities and realities that have neither of the former faculties Now those things that wanted those faculties of Will and Understanding they needed nothing but his providence to preserve them in being or to change them as they waxed old But as he determined to make natures intellectuall and rationall consisting of will and understanding so he determined that either he must be made absolute to stand by their own innate power which none can do but the Creator or else they must be forcibly supported by his power to stand against the naturall liberty of their will and this had been to stand whether they would or no which had not been an estate competible to an intellectuall rationall and voluntary service requisite to such a creature Therefore the most wise God intended before the world to make Angels and men Bern. Non in tuto sed in cauto not in a secure but cautionary estate not in absolute stedfast glory but in designation to it i. conditionally they kept their created estate but foreseeing that this cautionary estate must necessarily depend upon the freewill of that creature and that freewill would sway them to depend on themselves or somewhat else beside the Creator for happinesse he consults how some of them at least might be saved to glorifie him and be glorified of him This consultation was concluded by the eternall Son of God by an eternall covenant with the Father 1 Pet. 1.20 that those intellectuall and rationall creatures which shall depend upon his grace and favour shall be preserved in their estates as they were created or else redeemed if they fall from it This stipulation is accepted of the Father and he is set as the first born of every creature Colos 1.15 not that he was first created himselfe as Arrius thought but set so in regard of excellence of priority by eternall generation Colos 1.16 and of superiority the whole family of heaven and earth depending upon him for creation and the creature intellectuall and rationall for adoption So Rom. 8.29 he is called the first born among many brethren Now the Covenant being made and the whole family of heaven being created by him and for him he is first proposed to the Angels for their worship and dependency Lucifer and his complices and faction Heb. 1.6 liked independency better and chose rather to stand by their own created perfection From whence arose the battell of Michael and his Angels Revel against the Dragon and his Angels which St John saw had been and would be to the end of the world in a mysticall sense and that in time he should be cast out of the heaven of the Church as he was once out of the heaven of the blessed The other Angels stood by depending on favour and grace and doing to him as to their chiefe Lord sute and service and these are called the Elect Angels 1 Tim. 5.21 because God in his Son elected them to be conserved by him These Angels are at his disposition and therefore are said to be sent forth as ministring spirits to the heirs of salvation Heb. 1.24 Mathe. Whether are all Angels of one and the same degree Phila. No for they have divers names given them Col. 1.16 thrones dominions principalities and powers So Angels and Archangels Cherubins and Seraphins which argueth divers degrees or effices Trithem Cor. Agrip. Some learned men have written that God hath committed the ordering of the world to seven chiefe Angels especially as he hath subjected natural bodies to the seven planets in chiefe Indeed we read of such in Scripture Dan. 10. Luke 1. as Michael and Gabriel who saluted the blessed Virgin Mary And St John in Rev. 1. wisheth the Church welfare and peace from the seven spirits before Gods throne which doth not lead us to worship them but only that we may wish health to the Church from God Drus Beza Not. in N. T. and all the instruments he useth to that purpose Mathe. What determined God of man before the world Phila. Surely as the Son of God did stipulate with the Father to be the conservator of Angels so also that he would redeem mankind if he fel. This was the mystery hid from ages Col. 1.26 and Rom. 16.25 from the beginning of the world performed toward the end of the world when Christ in due time died for the ungodly which St Paul tels Titus was the hope of eternal life Tit. 1.2 which God who cannot lie hath promised before the world began If you ask to whom God could then promise it I say it was promised reciprocally of the Father to the Son by acceptation of the Sons offer of himselfe to satisfie for those that were elected according to the foreknowledge of God the Father 1 Pet. 1.1 Mathe. What use may we make of this knowledge Phila. To labor to know God who knew us before we were and gave us so full a perfection in Adam as a creature was capable of and foreseeing that we being left in the hands of our own will we would chuse our own way yet he before the world by an eternall covenant with his blessed Son in his bosome ordained a means to save us by a full and plenteous redemption that so if we could not be happy by obeying yet we might by beleeving if not by justice yet by mercy if not by our deserts yet by Christs merits by
53.8 and made his soule an offering for sin Isa 53.10 After sixty two weeks said Daniel shall Messiah be cut off but not for himselfe Dan. 9.25 26. that is if you mark the verses the Angel allots seven weeks for rebuilding of the Temple which is forty nine years reckoned of the Jewes but forty six years Iohn 2.20 because they reckoned not the first three years when the foundation was but laid by Cyrus his edict and the work staied again by Artaxerxes Longimanus Ezra 4.7 till they had got a second Edict Ezra 6.1 from Darius Nothus Then the Angell allots to the former seven weeks sixty two weeks more which is about 434. years in all 483. or thereabout in the end whereof Christ suffered on the crosse to make an end of sin and finish transgression and to make reconciliation for iniquity and to bring in everlasting righteousnesse This scourging wounding and piercing was foreseen also by Isa 53.5 he was bruised for our iniquities and chastised for our peace And saith Zach. 12.12 they shall look on him whom they have pierced for a souldier pierced his side as well as others did his hands and feet when they nailed them to the crosse So his very carrying of his crosse John 19.34 was typed out by Isaac carrying the wood to sacrifice himself upon Gen. 22.9 10. And as Abraham stretched out his hand to slay his son so God loved the world that he gave his Son Iohn 3.16 and he himself became obedient to the death of the crosse Numb 21.9 And as Moses lifted up the brazen serpent in the wildernesse for the curing of the people upon a pole John 12.32 John 14. so was Christ lift up on the crosse for the saving of us who were bitten by Satan and sin also So also his Resurrection had a type as Isaac taken from the Altar and restored safe and sound to Abraham the third day after that he was assigned to death Gen. 22.4 of whom it is said that Abraham received him again in a figure Heb. In what figure but only of him that was to come of his seed in whose death and resurrection all nations should be blessed So Ionah the first Prophet who lived in the time of Ieroboam the second 2 Kin. 14.25 and the first Prophet sent to the Gentiles to Niniveh who because he diverted to Tarsus was swallowed of a great fish in whose belly he remained till the third day after and for so long time the grave swallowed Christ but then he arose and so his flesh saw no corruption Psal 16. and that might well be without a miracle if the body be not accidentally corrupted before it be dead as in violent deaths commonly men are not Now Christ lay not in the grave above 40. hours and commonly dead bodies corrupt not til about seventy hours and this sheweth that he rose within three daies and so saw no corruption as the Psalmist said Psal 16. which is expounded plainly so by St Peter Acts 2.31 And as Isaiah had also foretold that the dead men should live and with Christs body they should come so they did Mat. 27.52 53. Thus Christ conquered death in his own Kingdome as said Hosea 13.14 and death had no more dominion over him Rom. 6.9 because he was now swallowed up into victory 1 Cor. 15.55 And thus as God spake to the great fish and it cast out Ionah on the dry land Jon. 2.10 so the temple of Christs body which the Jewes destroied he rebuilt in three daies And for his Ascension as it was prophecied so it was accomplished Eliah was a type of it 2 Kin. 2.11 being taken up in a fiery Chariot so Christ was taken up out of his disciples sight into heaven Luke 24.51 as was prophecied in Psal 68.18 Thou hast ascended up on high and led captivity captive So he was taken away his disciples beholding it at first Acts 1.9 but after a cloud took him out of their sight And now he sits on Gods right hand foretold Psal 110.1 and averred in Mark 16.19 And from him the Holy Ghost like a most gracious rain from heaven hath fallen upon his Apostles Acts 2.15 16. and upon many thousands of beleevers as was foreprophecied Joel 2.18 and typed forth by the spirit of Eliah resting upon Elisha 2 Kin. 1.13 5. Even so God hath sent forth the spirit of his Son into your hearts baptizing us with the Holy Ghost and as blessed fire from heaven giving some the gift of tongue Acts 2.4 others to prophecie some to teach others to learn and increase in faith and the love and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ Mathe. Now as you have shewed the Promises Types and Prophecies and history of Christs Conception Birth Death Resurrection and Ascension shew me also the mystery of godlinesse intended thereby in relation to Christians And first of all I desire to understand rightly his Conception for therein lieth a great mystery wherein our understanding is easily lost if we be not rightly directed For how can one person in the Trinity be conceived or become incarnate without the other two seeing the divine nature is not divided but is in each person totally Phila. The divine nature cannot be divided for substance but in the manner of subsistence it is distinguished For it is after one manner in the Father i. unbegotten After another manner in the Son 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because in him it is begotten i. communicated by divine generation After another manner in the Holy Ghost because proceeding from both John 15.16 Now we are to beleeve that the humane nature is assumed by the divine nature as considered only in the Son as he enjoieth it being the perfect image of the Father Heb. 1.1 2 3. and so being the naturall Son of God was most fit to be the son of man and so thereby restore the sons of men by adoption to be made the sons of God Yet we are to beleeve that all the Trinity had a hand in it John 1.12 for the Father wrought it by the holy Ghost but the Son only assumed it as three folks may make one garment and yet but one of the three wear it Mathe. But the Conception is applied to the Holy Ghost and so I am apt to beleeve that the Holy Ghost was his Father Phila. He was conceived by the Holy Ghost effectually not materially he caused it to be but gave not any matter out of himselfe to the nature of Christ so that he was conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost uniting the natures divine and humane together Bernard Damascen not by generation but by institution and benediction and operation not spermatically as other fathers beget children So it is said Rom. 11.36 all things are of God yet not of his substance but by his power so that we are to beleeve that he was conceived by the Holy Ghost in regard that his humane nature
can there be no ground for imputation and so it cannot passe but by propagation Mathe. But how prove you Christs soule not immediatly created Phila. Because he was to take mans nature body and soule that both by him might be redeemed Therefore he took whole humane nature of the blessed virgin as was promised The seed of the woman shal break the serpents head and Rom. 1.3 He was made of the seed of David according to the flesh Beside if soules and so his soule were immediately created of God then Adams sin must be imputed to him as he was man as well as to us and so he should be a sinner but sin was not imputed to him but only reputed his And then if it came not by immediate creation then it came by formation in the womans seed as ours by propagation And if we understand it not thus that it was immediately formed in the first conception i. when the holy Ghost separated that part of the blessed Virgins seed for his Manhood to the soule whereof the divinity was immediatly united to the body This dilemma will trouble us namely that either his divine nature was united to a bruit body or else the body subsisted by it selfe our of the Divine nature Mathe. But if Christs humane nature were thus formed or propagated I see not yet how he can ever the more escape the taint of originall sin Phila. I suppose you beleeve that he was conceived by the holy Ghost and so the matter of his humane nature was sanctified and purged from that stain Mathe. I beleeve he was conceived by the holy Ghost yet I know not how to beleeve that that conception was sanctifying or purging away of sin from his humane nature nor his humane nature from sin but only a separation and consecration of that part of the blessed Virgins substance to that holy work and endowment of it with all graces fit thereunto For there can be no sanctification without a Mediatour and there is but one Mediator 1 Tim. 2.5 by whose blood all are cleansed from sin yea the holy Ghost cleanseth none but by his blood so that if Christs nature did need sanctification then it also needed a Mediatour and then he must be a Mediatour for himselfe which he could not be for a Mediatour is not a Mediatour of one Phila. You say true and have almost wound your selfe out of this labyrinth For indeed the holy Ghost in this conception did not cleanse Christs nature from sin but did separate that substance which was not sinfull from a sinfull person for a person only is sinfull substance is not Now Christ did not take her person but substance only leaving the accident of sin which adhereth only to a person and so though Christs nature were in Adam and so in the Virgin who was of that sinfull line yet his person was in neither for he was the eternall son of God who in that instant that the humane nature was conceived or separated by the holy Ghost from the blessed Virgin Mary did assume it into himselfe to be one person and thus his nature could never be tainted with originall sin for his humane nature before that was never a person and when it was a person it was propagated not after the ordinary and naturall way and so without sin Nay more the substance of his humane nature though it were sinfull subsisting in the blessed Virgins person yet so it could not be Christs because personality cannot be imparted but it was made his by separation from her by the holy Ghost and his own immediate assumption and so great is the mystery of Godlinesse 1 Tim. 1.16 The not conceiving this rightly made the Marcionites and Manicheans say Christ had no true body and Apollinaris to say he had no humane soule Mathe. I thank you for these solutions but yet one thing stichs namely how the soule can be said to be immortall if it be propagated Phila. Consider that mortality proceeds not from generation so much as malediction of God for Adams sin who if he had not sinned his body might have been as immortall as the soule so that the propagation of the soule doth not make it meerly mortall but the act of Gods immediate power in the production of it makes it immortall because whatsoever is so produced cannot be dissolv'd but by the same power by which it first took life though the body may because it is bred only by the power of nature beside the soule is not made of any corporall matter and therefore is not corruptible though congenerate with the body Mathe. Now being somewhat satisfied about the soule I pray tell what principles are there to lead it to felicity Phila. Some principles there be which God hath given to nature and left in nature to seek felicity but as some know what happinesse is so others make no use of those principles Mathe. I pray what is felicity Phila. Mans soveraign and chiefest good consisteth in the enjoiment of God which confers to man concurrence of all good without any contrarieties which is opposed to that misery into which he is fallen by the first mans sin namely blindnesse of mind fondnesse of affection stubbornnesse of will inclineablenesse to all evill way wardnesse from all good for which cause we are subjected to vanity corruptibilitie all miseries of body and soul temporal and eternall death and damnation Now mans felicity is an estate contrary to all these After this many learned Philosophers searched but could not find it and why Because they knew not God from whom it proceeds and is the giver of it by redeeming man from all misery and from death to life by his free grace in Christ which is life eternall and true felicity to know aright John 17.3 Mathe. What principles lead thereunto Phila. Not the principles of nature only for they teach no further than there is a felicity but not what it is which made the Philosophers in such a labyrinth about it some placing it in pleasure some in poverty Vid. Varro some in knowledge some in riches some in honours as many people doe now For as some aim at no end or mark at all but like foolish children shoot their arrowes up in the aire some aim at a bad end in which can be no happinesse some at a seeming good which is not good in it selfe some at felicity in generall but go blindly and lamely about it wanting right leading principles The principles are such therefore as God hath revealed who is in himselfe the chiefest good and therefore can best ordaine the way whereby man may enjoy him This way is set down in the holy Scriptures for which Scriptures sake the world was made that so in time that might be revealed Polanus which in God was hidden at the beginning namely that Christ should come and redeem mankind from the wrath of God the slavery of Satan and the dominion of sin and death which
the people but thrice in the name of the Lord Deut. 6.24 The Lord bless thee and keep thee intimating the protection and providence of the Father 2. The Lord make his face to shine upon thee and be gracious to thee i. in pardoning thy sin by the gracious redemption and favour of the Son well expressed by St Paul 2 Cor. 4.6 calling it the light of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ 3. The Lord lift up the light of his countenance upon thee and give thee peace i. the joy of the Holy Ghost and peace of conscience in gods promise which the Holy Ghost sealeth to us Eph. 1.13 So the Seraphins pronounced God thrice Holy Holy Holy Esa 6.3 So we see in Christs baptisme 1. The Father speaking from heaven 2. The spirit descending and 3. The Son suscepting baptisme Mat. 3.16 And our Savivour affirms but three persons John 16.36 saying when the Comforter is come i. the Holy Ghost whom I will send i I the Son who proceedeth from the Father i. the first person Mathe. Is there any reason to prove this Phila. As much as any reasonable man can desire and that is the impressions of it upon his works and his gifts and in the minds of men 1. He hath given three principles of all bodies airie watry Chymists say Salt Sulphur and Mercury and earthy matter and three kind of lives or souls the vegetative or growing life or soule to plants The sensitive with vegetation to bruits the rationall with both the former to men but especially the Image of God in the first man argued the three persons immortality wisedome and freedome So to the rationall soule three principall faculties the Understanding the Will and the power of acting So Arts which are Gods gifts some of them sheweth his unity as Geometry draweth all lines from one point and Arithmetick from a unite draweth all numbers so Astronomy all motions from the first mover so Musick a rare gift of God ariseth from unison and three concords and discords arguing a unity in Trinity 2. But above all these three Arts by which we expresse our souls which have an impresse of the Deity sets forth the Trinity as they proceed one from the other For Grammer is the fountain of them by letters which makes words Logick of words frameth sence and Rhetorick by help of both maketh an oration So the Son is the word of the Father and the Holy Ghost proceeds from them both and therefore the Cabalists said that before God revealed himselfe in his operations he was like a dark solitary letter Aleph tenebroâ— sum of which we could make nothing But now we know by his word and his works not only that he is but what he is 3. He hath imprinted this Trinity in the minds of men as well as the unity of the Godhead Which made some learned men say Pythago Trismegist in Pimand Dial. 4 that all things are terminated in THREE Others that one begat one and by reflecting on each other begat a third Not that these men did apprehend the Trinity as we do by Scripture but this argued them to have a confused knowledge of it as Caiaphas had of Christs death when he said It was necessary one man die for the people Aquin. Non è â—â—titia sed ex officie so prophecying as he was high Priest that year so these spake by naturall instinct Another that may be urged to prove the three persons in the Godhead is Bonum diffusivum Because God being the chiefe good is of a diffusive nature and so must communicate himselfe by some subsistency that is capable of the whole divine essence communicated everlastingly from one to the other John 10.30 therefore Christ saith I and my Father are one that is in the essence communicated not the personality So he saith I am in the Father John 14.10 and the Father in me that is by mutuall immanency in the same essence So he saith I came forth from the Father that is first By his divine and eternall generation and by his temporall mission into the world John 16.28 So he saith all that the Father hath is mine therefore I said he shall take of mine and give it to you i. the holy Ghost John 16.15 By which is understood the communication of the divine essence one to another and the communication of gifts of men A similitude of this divine reflection and procession God gave in the first marriage He made Adam one then he joined him to another made out of himselfe of these two he produced a third i. children Beside he makes all things but by a threefold vertue his Power Wisedome and Love a representative of the three persons Nor is there any more then three principall efficient causes from whom by whom and through whom a thing is Rom. 11. And so all things are from the Father by the Son through the Holy Ghost who receiveth and giveth a procession to things so that there is but one God the Father 1 Cor. 8.6 and we in him and one Lord Jesus Christ and we by him and one Holy Spirit and we through him Mathe. But this is hard to conceive right and dangerous to conceive wrong I desire a rule or two to direct me aright in the conceiving hereof Phila. 1. That you are to beleeve the divine essence to be one yet the persons to be three and every person to be God and Lord and yet but one God because but one essence as there is but one humane nature though divers persons therein 2. That these persons are not before one another in time but in order nor greater then another but coequall 3. That these three persons communicate the divine essence one to another but not their personality for the Father is not the Son nor the Son the Father 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet Esa 9.6 the Son is called the everlasting Father but not in regard of his person but his essence which is all one with the Father 4. That in those works of the Trinity which are wrought towards us though one person be entitled to it more then others yet all of them hath an hand therein though one more especially As the Father creates yet so as by the Son through the Spirit The Son redeemeth yet so as sent from the Father and conceived by the holy Spirit The holy Spirit sanctifieth yet so as through the Father by the Son breathing his holy graces into us 5. That the Father is the fountain of the personality but not of the essence for therein they be coeternall 6. They all flowe from one and the same essence as the light of the Moon and that of the air is from one Sun and as three rivers from one fountain 7. That they have a mutual emanency one in the other and an eternall emanency one from the other for they be
death for us Then consider Gods wisdome in contriving a way to save mankind who by sin against God was lost and coming so in debt to God none ought to pay it but man that had offended and yet none could pay such an infinite debt but God Upon this the attributes of God seem at variance His wisedome would save him his mercy would damn him His wisedome moderates and finds a way whereby what man could not pay in nature he might in person For God assumes manhood in the unity of the person and so satisfieth himselfe upon which the attributes are reconciled Psal 85.10 mercy and truth met righteousness and peace kissed each other For the offence which was infinite in regard of the object God was satisfied by the infinitenesse of the subjected surety Christ Again this union teacheth us in practice to be like him in our selves and to one another In our selves to partake of him that hath stooped so low to partake of us If he of our properties then we should desire much more to partake of his graces So we should desire to be like him one towards another not pleasing our selves but rather our neighbours for their good to edification Rom. 15.1 2. that the same mind may be in us which was also in Christ Phil. 2.4 5. From this union we may receive also much comfort As that our nature is taken into the society of God in Trinity by which our nature is not only highly honoured but comforted in all distresses because he took our whole nature with all our infirmities sin only excepted and therefore as he can help us because he is God so he will because he is man and so one of us So it will encourage us to pray and to made our wants known unto God who certainly will deny us nothing fit for us because Christ in our nature pleads for us yea how can we despair of glory since he became the Son of man that we may be the sons of God Mathe. I conceive then that this Conception of Christ by the holy Ghost was a production of humane nature from the blessed Virgin Mary and uniting of it to the second person assuming it But had she no part in this conception Phila. Yes but her part was more spirituall then naturall For she first received the blessed message by the ear from the good Angell Gabriel as a counterpoison to the first temptation that Eve received from the devill 2. She conceived it in her heart to be the blessed will of God by faith 3. She resolved to be obedient to it though she knew not how it could be 4. She contributed of her naturall substance to that divine and effectuall operation of the holy Ghost by whose power she was overshadowed and that part of her substance conveyed to the vessell of conception in regard whereof Christ was called the fruit of her womb Luke 1.42 So that as Adam was asleep while Eve was formed so blessed Mary was as it were overclouded while the humane nature of Christ was by the Holy Ghost united to and assumed by the Son of God Mathe. It is hard to conceive this point 1. In regard of the manner how he was conceived by the Holy Ghost 2. In regard of what she conceived 3. In regard of Christ conceived whether according to the divine essence Phila. Therefore you are to understand and beleeve that in regard of the matter conceived it was Christ man but in regard of the person conceived it was the second person in Trinity the Son of God Luke 1.35 whom Isa calleth Immanuel not that the blessed Virgin gave the divine nature to Christ though she was a mean of uniting the two natures but the Son of God received the humane nature in her womb 2. In regard of the manner how by the holy Ghost it is not utterable farther then the production of the substance of humane nature from her and uniting of both natures in one person i. Christ which he did not as a father though as a divine agent For he did it not materially by giving any thing out of himselfe but effectually according to divine appointment 3. In regard of Christ conceived Bern. whether according to the divine essence It is true that every person in the Trinity hath the whole divine essence but in a severall manner of subsisting For the first person hath it as the Father the second as the Son Now Christ is said to take the humane not according to the essentiality of the Godhead but the personality and subsistence of the Son or second person or else he could not be a mediator between two because the essence of God is but one Gal. 3.20 Mathe. Whether did not sin cleave to this conception for it is said he was made sin for us Phila. He was made sin for us 1. By imputation because our sins were charged upon him 2. Because he was made a sacrifice for sin so some sacrifices were called sin offerings Lev. 4.34 but he had no sin in his nature for he was not in Adam in respect of propagation by which originall sin is conveyed but in respect only of humane substance so that though he was from him as others are yet not by him as others are for he came into the world by this wonderfull conception by the Holy Ghost and a woman without man Which woman though a sinner in her personall subsistence as comming by generation from Adam yet her meer naturall substance simply considered out of that subsistence cannot be called sinfull which substance was only taken of Christ into his person and the accident of sin left cleaving to her own person of which Christ cleareth her as being her Redeemer And this appears more plain if we consider that neither actions nor affections though called sinfull as they proceed from the person of man yet are not sinfull in themselves much lesse is meer substance so neither can a part of mans substance be sinfull if not the totall but his person only And thus Christs nature stands cleer of being infected with originall sin in it self though separated and consecrated by the Holy Ghost for Christs assumption thereof So that the old Hereticks the Manicheans and Marcionites had they rightly apprehended this conception might have avoided the error of thinking that Christ had only an incorporeall body from which only passed through the blessed Virgins body thereby to avoid the stain of originall sin Nor Apollinaris need not have denied Christ an humane soule and feign the Deity to supply that place to avoid the same taint Nor the Papists need not say to avoid Christs sinfull conception that the Virgin Mary was conceived without sin for then her parents must be so too and theirs also and so up to Adam which is absurd to think Nor need some think that Christs humane nature by this conception was sanctified or cleansed from originall sin for if it had ever been sinfull it could not have been
sanctified from sin without the blood of the covenant Heb. 9.22 and Ephe. 1.7 and so there must have been another Mediator beside himselfe which St Paul denieth 1 Tim. 2.5 there is but one Mediator even the Man Christ Jesus the High Priest who is in himselfe holy innocent and undefiled and separate from sinners Heb. Mathe. But if Christs humane nature came from the blessed Virgin and from Adam he could not avoid the taint of sin no more then he could death Phila. We are to consider as I said before that sin cleaving not to substance alone but to persons and considering that he took no person of the Virgin but her substance which was immediately united to his Godhead in subsistence and only so made a person it will follow that though his substance yet his person was never in Adam and so never sinned in Adam and so never tainted with originall sin For as it could not be propagated by his manner of conception so neither could it be justly imputed to his person which was both God and man And for his death it was voluntary Death did not by his own power prevaile over him but he laid it down John 10.17 18. Nor did death fall upon him as a sinner but as the surety for sin Mathe. What effect worketh this conception for us Phila. 1. It hides the impurity of our conceptions from Gods anger because this satisfieth Gods justice for originall sin for the righteousnesse hereof is imputed to us and by it is constituted holinesse of nature for in this he was qualified with all habits of grace and vertue which by his spirit he powreth also upon us For this purpose he took an humane body because sacrifice and offerings would not satisfie Psal 40. and Heb. 10.5 2. This conception worketh a spirituall life and conception in us For our nature in him being conceived and quickned by the holy Ghost in the womb from thence proceeds the power of our regeneration from him that is the originall of spirituall life in our nature for the spirit that formed him in the womb doth beget us again to live in him and so doth justifie us before God from the evils that cleave to our nature Mathe. He is oftentimes called in the Gospell even by himselfe too the Son of man how then shall I conceive his conception to be more then humane Phila. His Conception and Birth are full of wonder yet may be discerned with distinction for it seems a new creation For as he was the Son of God no woman was his mother and as he was man he had no father He is called the Son of man because he took our nature of the blessed Virgins substance Yet he is called the Son of the most High Mat. 1. because he is the second person in the holy Trinity Which title is given to the nature assumed because it had no subsistence but in his person that was the naturall Son of God In which regard the blessed Virgin is called the mother of God not of his deity but of this union of God and man yet his person was not circumscribed in her womb though the humane nature was But as his body is heaven locally and is in the Word substantially and in the Sacrament mystically and in the heart of a beleever spiritually so it was in her body naturally Mathe. How am I to conceive of the birth of Christ Phila. He was born three waies of his Father of his Mother and in the mind of man Of his Father eternally of his Mother temporally and in mans mind spiritually For three things have relation to his birth Deity Flesh and Spirit Of his Father he is born God for ever of his Mother flesh once and in mans mind he is born Spirit figuratively often In respect of his divine nature he had a Father without a Mother in regard of the humane nature he had a Mother without a Father in respect of his spirituall nativity he hath both Father and Mother i. they that do his will Paul saith God was manifested in flesh 1. From the bosome of his Father in whom he was concealed 2. From the shadowes of the Law in which he was prefigured 3. From the womb of his Mother in which he was covered This was the greatest and the most gracious work considered in all the consequences of it as his death and resurrection which without this could not have been that ever God wrought who for these humiliations gave him a name above all names Jesus the Saviour Phil. 2.9 Which name although others had as well as he in the Old Testament yet they were but figures of him yea the name Jehovah signifieth but essence i. God as he is the author of being but Jesus signifieth God our well being a Saviour then which there is no other name of salvation given Act. It was the name of the eternall Word incarnate it contains in it the whole oeconomy of the work of redemption wherein the attributes of God are united wisedome justice peace Psal 85. mercy and truth This was well called his great work of a woman compassing a man And wonderfull great it was in effect For in the Creation God made man in his image and so earth was honoured but in Christs birth God made himselfe in our image and so heaven was debased In creation God made all without resistance he spake but the word and they were made Heb. 12. But in redemption he suffered contradictions of sinners against himselfe In this work he did both speak work and suffer speak graciously work wonderfully suffer unworthily In creation the Word made flesh but in Jesus our Redeemer John 1.3 the Word was made flesh John 1.14 In the creation God took man out of the earth and placed him in Paradise In the redemption he took man out of hell and placed him in heaven through Jesus the Saviour Mathe. What were the effects of his birth Phila. Many For among the heathen voices were heard saying that the great God was about to be born At Rome a woman was seen about the Sun having a child in her arms And the Sybil told Augustus the Emperour that that same child was greater then he and bade him to adore him He would never after be called Lord. The Temple of peace fell down at his birth because he brought better peace to the world The Oracles were all struck dumb by the birth of this eternall Word Jupiters Oak in Dodona was shaken the Caldron smitten with the rod in the hand of Jupiter The Tripode in Delphis Nazi in Julian annotat Nomi the Laurell and fountain of Daphne and the ramfaced image of Jupiter Ammon could utter nothing so that one effect of Christs birth was Gods glory and Satans confusion But further another effect was the good mans peace and salvation For he was born to bring both to passe 1. His salvation being he was born to be a King a Priest and a
everlasting Heb. 7.24 A Sacrifice he was in his manhood not Eucharisticall but expiatory offered up whole like the Holocaust for sin which was burned up to ashes by the fire of Gods wrath And his Godhead was the spirituall Altar called the eternall spirit by which he offered up himselfe Heb. 9.14 yet the Crosse might be taken as a materiall Altar upon which his body was laid for though the Altar sanctifieth the gift as it is the utensill of Gods instistution yet he that sanctifieth himselfe may sanctifie the Altar too by his own oblation the fruit whereof made a blessed attonement by the sweet savour thereof Eph. 5.2 for all those that are crucified with him by crossing their own corrupt natures and that look upon Christ by faith as on the brazen Serpent that cured the people Iohn 3.14 and also to consecrate themselves to God as a living sacrifice to his service Rom. 12.1 Mathe. I pray shew me the reasons why he was erucified in such a manner Phila. He was crucified naked to satisfie for Adams losing the garment of innocence and might uncloath us of mortality of which the skins given to Adam for cloathing was an Emblem and cloath us with his merits also that he and we might enter into heaven naked as Adam did into earthly paradise so to comfort us that when the world and death strips us naked of all we have to suffer it joyfully for we shall find a cloathing from heaven 2 Cor. 5.4 when mortality shall be swallowed up of life and therefore to be content in the mean time Lignum mortis Lignum vitae that the world be crucified to us and we to the world Again he was fastned to the wood that death might be driven out of the world by a tree as it came in by a tree and life brought back to us again He was laied on the crosse as Isaac on the wood and nailed as foretold Psal 22.17 they digged my hands and my feet also that all bils and bonds of law against us might be nailed with him to his Crosse 1 Pet. 2.14 Then he was lifted up that he might carry our sins from the earth and conquer the spirits that rule in the aire Col. 2.15 He was crucified with his hands spread as reaching them out to embrace both Jewes and Gentiles that are not a gainsaying people His blood was shed on the Crosse to answer all the sacrifices of the Law without which there had been no remission Heb. 9.18 whereas it is now an universall medicine for all our soules languishing 1 John 17. and obtaineth for us eternall redemption Heb. 9.12 Beside he was crucified between two theeves 1. Because it was foretold that he should be reckoned among the transgressors 2. Esa 53.12 That he might sanctifie the death of repenting malefactors for his death in effect was to be divided among sinners of whom at last he would be Judge while some stand on his right hand and some on his left as the bad and repenting Theefe hung Now while he hung on the Crosse alive he suffered beside the paine 1. The division of his garments and casting lots on his vesture as was prophecied Psal 22.19 2. To shew that his very enemies should partake of his graces 3. Into four parts to shew that his good grace should edifie the four parts of the world So the not dividing his other coat shewed that his righteousnesse should be applied whole to every beleever And the casting lots for it argued that no man had his merits by their deserving but by the meer gift of God Col. 1.12 who disposeth of the Lot To all which misery they added derision Mat. 27.39 wagging their heads and upbraiding him with his words of destroying and building the Temple in three daies Yet it was truth in his sense of his resurrection ut praedixit sit revixit and mocking at his miracles saying he saved others but himselfe he cannot save Others mocked at his trust in God Others at his praiers as if he called upon Elias to save him which he suffered that we might know the abominableness of our sins that heaped such contempt upon the Son of God Also that we might be delivered from the scorn of this world and enjoy the comfort of our repute from God and a good conscience Heb. 12.3 without reviling the world again Nay more they blasphemed God as if he could not deliver him as the wicked said Psal 22. with whom they join issue and so condemn themselves to be of the wicked crew even like theeves who also did the same But beside all this he suffered great torments both in body and mind In body by hanging on the Crosse by his nailed hands and feet so that his heart might be rightly said to be melted like wax Psal 22.15 This was undergone to satisfie for our despising the threatning and the power of God in punishing those sins we had committed in the body also to free us from eternall torments and to sanctifie whatsoever pains we suffer in the body by diseases or from persecutors So he suffered anguish in soule when he cried out my God my God why hast thou forsaken me which some writers take to be meant of his descending into hell for now God seemed to desert him by deferring his deliverance and by withdrawing from his humane nature the divine support of comfort that he being sensible of them we might be delivered from them by his meritorious suffering them Yet we are not to conceive that the divine nature of the Sonne did forsake the humane but that the union was obscured or eclipsed nor that God the Father forsook him quite but permitted his humane nature as surety to feele what was due to the principall And this first confutes those that think he suffered not in soule though the Prophet say he made his soule an offering for sin And if not in soule his bitter cry argued more impatience then the Martyrs had It also may comfort men in their distresse of mind since Christ was forsaken for a time and surely it should work in us a feare of sin that made God thus to deale with his only Son whom he spared not being only the principall how terrible will he be against unrepenting sinners whom he will forforsake for ever and to make us consider with commiseration those that are troubled in mind a wounded spirit who can bear No wonder if many of them cry out they be damn'd of whom we are to judge charitably since Christ complains of Gods forsaking him through fear whom yet he calleth his God by faith Lastly he through paine suffereth thirst and they to adde to his misery gave him vinegar and so they fulfilled the Scripture Psalm 69.22 and he compleated our redemption saying it is finished Mathe. But did he only suffer on the crosse without any glorious testimony of his roialty and Deity Phila. No God left him not without witnesse For Pilats
superscription Jesus that Nazarene that King of the Jewes God would not it should be altered being a plain affirmation of his glory which otherwise Pilate might possibly have done as well as to crucifie him at their importunity Now in that God doth thus acknowledge his name Jesus upon the Crosse he thereby testified that he accepted him for our Saviour as Jesus signifieth Mat. 1.22 and will not deny those that beleeve on him yea God exalts him in that name which the Jewes despised so that he will honour those whom the world reproacheth yea he will have him now known to be that King his first born higher then the Kings of the earth and at this time of his disgrace too to shew his Kingdome stands not in outward observation nor is his roialty lost by outward abasements for even now like a King he paied the blood-roiall-ransome for his elect even among the Jewes themselves of whose repenting people he was King by whose power they were converted Acts 2. This title was written in the three generall known languages to shew that every tongue should confesse to his glory of Jesus Phil. 3.11 when the Gospell should be preached to the nations This title Pilate would not alter in one tittle to shew that we should not lose one jot of the faith of Christ and indeed whosoever doth it or suffers it to be done by Hereticks or Sectaries are worse then Pilate himselfe Again God honoured him by making nature suffer an eclipse of darknesse as if to shew the Sun of righteousnesse did now set and that the Jewes should be left in blindnesse and all others that did not beleeve in him Also that nature abhorred the fact and that God hereby did threaten the sins of men as Joel 2.10 and that he that now suffered was more then a man for whose sake such a miracle was wrought Next he was glorified by one of the malefactors conversion and confession which shewed Christs power and mercy and justice his power that he did and could work on him in the midst of his anguish his mercy that he would save one at the last gasp that none may despaire and his justice that he would save but one that none might presume upon late repentance Lastly he was glorified by the vaile of the most holy place rending of it selfe which shewed that God did now abhor the Jewes Temple and dissolve their religious rites and utterly rejected them for rejecting Christ his Son And that now we have free accesse to the mercy seat Heb. 4.16 Aequaliter pater arca calestis Helv. Yea heaven is set open to us which before was shut against sinners of Jewes and Gentiles but now open to both Mathe. But what necessiâ—y uas there of Christs death Phila. First to satisfie Gods justice who determined death to be the wages of sin Rom. 6.23 Christ therefore being mans surety Rom. 8.3 and taking on him the similitude of our sinfull flesh God condemns sin in his flesh by putting him to death and satisfieth his justice for all the elect by one who though he was but one yet being both God and Man his death is of infinite price to make satisfaction to Gods infinite justice who had told the first Adam that if he eat of the forbidden fruit he should die that day And that day he became mortall Rom. 5.12 for then death began to seize upon him and all his posterity But Christ comming in Adams stopped the issue of spirituall death by the merit of his death And this he did also to fulfill the prophecies of himself Esa 63.7 that he should be lead as a sheep to the slaughter as also to ratifie the New Testament which was as his last will whereby he grants by covenant with God all the blessed Legacies of spirituall and eternall happinesse to his Church Heb. 9.15 which Testament is of no force without the death of the Testator Also that he might destroy the power that death and the devill had over us Heb. 2.14 even to bring us under eternall death which death though he never suffered himself yet prevents it in us by the worthinesse of his person suffering externall death for us that beleeve upon his precious death which is of more value for one houre then the eternall death of all men in the world And so by this means he hath given us an antidote against the reigning power of sin that it shall not have dominion over us Rom. 6.14 but that by the vertue of his death we might die to sin Rom. 6.2 and that he might purchase life for the world of his elect who by the doctrine of his death receive the seed of eternall life and become the seed of Christ Esa 53.10 Mathe. But how did Christ die in his natures or in his person Phila. Herein you must beware what you conceive for if you think he died in both natures divine and humane or in his whole person as God and man you erre from the faith and prophane his divinity therefore you are to beleeve that though the flesh of Christ only died in respect of the nature that died yet this death having relation to the eternall word by union the Lord of life and glory may be said relatively to suffer in which respect his blood is called the blood of God Acts 20.28 Therefore though death made a separation of his humane soule from his humane body yet both ever subsisted in the divine nature firmly united For if there had been a new manner of subsisting then Christ must be conceived to have two persons as well as two natures Mathe. How shall I reconcile St Paul who saith Christ was slain towards the end of the world Heb. 9.26 and St John saith he was slaine from the beginning of the world Rev. 13.8 Phila. He was actually slain toward the end of the world namely in the year of the world Scalig. 3982. and in the 34. year of his age and on Friday the fifth day of our week which that year was the fifteenth day of the Jewes month called Nisan which that year was the seventh day of our April as some account yea at the ninth hour of that day the time of the evening sacrifice Mat. 27.46 But he was flain from the beginning of the world in Gods determination Gen. 3.15 for all that beleeved on him to come to whom his death proved as efficacious as the composition of a surety doth enlarge a debter out of prison though the debt be not paied a long time after Thus Christ was slain from the beginning in type of Abel slain by Cain and in all the sacrifices offered for sin which were as evidences to the faithfull of things not then seen Mathe. But the Evangelists take notice of many occurrences in his death of which I can find no great reason nor mystery infolded as that no bone of him was broken and that his side was pierced and the like Phila.
or concoct before they can mix to make a perfect conception yet no doubt the spirituall parts being more quick and active do move in a lesse time and are conceived at the first meeting of the parents seed and so become the form of man from his very beginning which if the seed should want the generation comes to nothing because it wants a form to inform and dispose the matter towards quickning But then you will say Obj. the soule must needs be weak at first but it groweth and increaseth with the body and then it must decrease and die with the body To this it is answered Ans That the soul of man is at first what it will ever be but wanting organs and fit means to exercise her power she lyeth still as seed in the ground for a season till the means to expresse it selfe be administred yet the vegetative soule of the seed is as perfect in it at first as at last and so is the soule in man for it being the essentiall form of the creature and the prime act it must be perfect at first as well as in the processe or else it cannot give perfection to the other parts of the creature because it is not perfected in it selfe Mathe. But all this that you say doth but yet probably set forth that it is so but doth not directly prove it Phila. You say true for indeed the generation of mankind is more wonderfull then any other creature as in Psal 139.6 14. David confesseth the knowledge too wonderfull for him But when I conceive how that some main points of Christian Religion depends upon this opinion I had rather speak something against reason then any thing against Religion Mathe. Make that forth namely that the production of humane souls by propagation hath ground in Christian Religion Phila. If it be found in Scripture or by just consequence drawn therefrom then it may be founded on true Religion And that it is so I find 1. By Gods institution Increase multiply and fill the earth Gen. 1.27 i. not with bodies only but with persons of men consisting of soule and body or else other creatures had power to preserve their own kind and not he who is the best of all 2. We find that God so ordered nature in the creation that every thing in nature should persist by themselves and multiply their kinds that he might make no new creatures after that he ceased from all his work which he had made 3. So we read that God took Eve out of Adam yet no mention is made of a new soule infused into her Nor can I understand lesse in Gods promise That the seed of the woman should break the serpents head but that a person should come of the womans seed who should do it which person must consist of a soule as well as a body or else Christ redeemed mankind by a body without a soule Mathe. Was not Christs soule created immediately of God Phila. No otherwise then ours is and that ours is not we have proved in part and will prove it farther and next that Christs soule was not First that ours is not is plaine from the description of Adams begetting Seth after his own likenesse Gen. 5.3 if by likenesse and image we understand the spirituall form rather then the bodily frame as it is said When God made man after his image Gen. 1.27 So when God said to Abraham I will be the God of thy seed it must be understood of an informed seed not a seed inanimate for God is not said to be the God of a senslesse no more then of a livelesse or dead substance Mat. 22.32 To this purpose also I conceive that the Scriptures say so many souls came of Jacobs loins which if some say it is figuratively spoken yet I know not how a man may be said to be a father of that to which he contributeth the least and more base part of substance Nor is that of Zachary the Prophet to be neglected which saith Zach. 12.1 The Lord formeth the spirit of a man within him for it sheweth first the Lord to be the externall efficient without whose immediate act of providence the soule cannot be traduced and the word forming which is not creating sheweth the manner of it as done by his power yet not created only as not propagated only but formed within man of the spirituall matter of the parents informing their seed in this regard it is said of David Psal 51.5 Ps 51. in sin my mother conceived me not my body sure but my whole nature So when our Saviour saith that which is born of the flesh is flesh John 3.6 he meaneth the whole man and if so then the soule which if immediately created of God cannot possibly be called flesh nor properly fleshly that is sinfull beside if the soule be not propagated how may originall sin be possibly conveied for by one man sin entred and by him therefore it must be conveied to his off-spring for the doing whereof propagation is the most apt and likeliest way because every like begets his like so sinfull man begetting man propagates with him a potentiality of sinning from the first mans privation of originall righteousnesse and inclination to evill but this cannot be unlesse the soule be derived from the parents for the body is not the subject of sin but the whole man for if the soule be immediately created of God it must be good and pure and if so then he cannot justly cast it into an evill condition without a first guiltinesse Gen. 18.25 nor can the soule but unwillingly unite with the body to become sinfull But surely I understand not if the soule be immediatly created how it can be corrupted or made sinfull for from whence should the corruption arise from the soule it cannot being created good from the body it cannot being meer matter neither capable of vertue or vice because it wants intellect will and affection If you say it ariseth from union how can that be if the soul be created good and the body be uncapable of evill If you say it comes by imputation you make God to do and undo to give good and take it away again without cause and so an unjust at least a vain work to give goodnesse to the soule and presently to take it away again by infusing it or uniting it to the body by which it should become sinfull I know some will say God may impute it to man for Adam's fall as well as righteousnesse to us for Christs merits but friend the case is much unlike for imputation of righteousnesse is a work of mercy which is to be done without cause but the imputation of sin is a work of justice which canot be done without some cause but if the soule be created pure and the body untainted with sin both because it is meer matter and sin of a spirituall nature which cannot taint meer passive matter then
all things One called it a mind the other nature i. such a Nature as doth naturate all things else and limits all things in nature therefore he cals God * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hom. in Hym. Dion Halic Antiq. Rom. lib. 2. circumspection And I conceive upon the same grounds the Greeks worshipped a god called Jupiter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jupiter the limiter And so did the Romans worship Jovem terminalem the bound-setting god all which sheweth that God is the bounder of nature and that which boundeth nature is God And indeed if there were not such a limiter as God is mans appetite naturall sensitive and intellective nature could never be satisfied for all the labour of man is for his mouth Eccl. 6.7 and yet the soule is not satisfied with good why because such a man looks not in using the creature upon the chiefe good which is God For the righteous eateth to the satisfying of his soule because he makes Gods glory the end of his eating but the belly of the wicked wanteth true content Nor could mans sensitive appetite be ever satiated Pro. 13.25 not the eie with seeing nor the ear with hearing nor the heart by having what it desireth Alexander hearing Democritus pretend more worlds grieved that he had not conquered one Nor can our intellectuall appetite or our desire of knowledge be satisfied in the search of things since the place of wisedome is not found either in height or depth and that the son of Syrach saith Job 28.14 Eccles 24.21 that he that eateth of wisedome shall have the more hunger for the more we know the more we see something we know not so that to read much is a wearinesse to the flesh and that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow therefore there must be something above all naturall science to satisfie this desire or such desires are given in vain Again there must be a God because there must be a cause of things for nothing can make or beget it selfe without something that was in actuall being before which must be a selfe essence or being and that is God or nothing and of nothing comes nothing Mathe. The being of a Godhead being so evident and plain how came Atheisme or the denying of a God into the world Phila. By neglect of naturall principles which manifests a godhead to resist which is not only foolish but impious So Rom. 1.21 when they knew God they did glorifie as God 2. By setting wit above wisedome and disputing against principles which may not be denied though being prime truths they cannot so easily be proved no more then we can give reason why fire should burn rather then water though we know it doth so and he that will not beleeve it because one cannot prove it should even be burnt to convince him 3. By mistakes of men who writing against the heathen gods have been thought to deny all Godhead So Diagoras rather denied the Athenian gods than denied the true God So Theodorus said that he was misunderstood because he delivered his words with the right hand but his auditors took them with the left Morn c. 1. de Relig. And Protagoras rather voided the disputing of the question then denied a God to be I beleeve there have been as bad if not worse Atheists then they As those that fall into Antatheisme making their belly their god Phil. 3.19 or their pleasures Eurip. 2 Tim. 3.4 and some pretend there is neither God nor Devill heaven nor hell like the Poets Cyclops Arnob. lib. 8. cont genti who wil not leave their impudence til they be thunder-struck or be transfixed by the darts of the divine wisedome and vengeance Yet there are some closer Atheists who say that policy first brought in Religion And this too many children have by rote by reading Poeticall Tragedies and some other books and so suck in that while they are children which they ruminate on too much when they be older As Euripides brings in one Siphysus relating that men being full of vices the wiser sort were fain to make Lawes to bridle their exorbitancies but yet could not suppresse their secret evils at last a crafty man told them the way was to put into the peoples head that there was one called God Lue. in Treg who heard saw and understood all things This man was a close and cunning Atheist like Lucian who brings in a carping Cynick and an Epicure disputing against Jupiter as if he had no hand in it himselfe And I beleeve there be many who will not denie God in publick Tull. de Nat. deor l. 1. Sen. lib. 2. nat Q. c. 24. who yet are content among weak and witty men to consent to it Some learned Romans thought Religion but a witty invention to keep men in awe and it may well be said so of their Religion and such as their Numa set up by the help of the Nymph Aegeria But these men understood nothing of the Jewish or Christian Religion set forth of God and his Son Jesus Christ Euseb Eccl. Hist l. 2. c. 2. And therefore as the Romans refused to receive Christ as God in open Senate in the time of Tyberius so God gave them up to worship Simon Magus a conjurer for a god in the time of Claudius Let no man therefore think Religion a fiction lest he think God also a figment Mathe. As there is a God so I pray tell me is there no more but one Phila. If there be any God at all he can be but one for these reasons 1. Because whatsoever is God must be the chiefest good from which word good the word God is derived Now there cannot possibly be two chiefs or superlatives nor more then one superiour from whence the Great Turk takes his Axiom one God in heaven and one Sultan upon earth yea the Pope would have but one Catholick Bishop and one Catholick King which is but a tyrannicall usurpation For God that is one above all in heaven and earth never gave any such dignity to any either in heaven or earth but only to the Son who is one with the Father 2. Whatsoever is God must be the first of all things Now there can be but one first and so but one god for what is first is but one Now nothing cannot be first for then nothing must be second and so consequently no world no creatures But such seconds there are and therefore there must be a first thing sprung of it selfe making all but made of none no not himselfe i. not the subject matter of himselfe and so framed of some other being but this one ariseth from himselfe and can be resolved no farther then into himselfe 3. If there were more gods then one then one must differ from the other in some essentiall property and so one God must have that which the other hath not and so one or both are imperfect and so there can be but one God
time for Shiloh to come and set up another Kingdome that never should have end For he began with death where all Empires do end and riseth again in despite of death and so reigneth over the quick and the dead which Kingdome is everlasting and never shall end as God promised David Mathe. But what necessity is it that Christ should be born of a Virgin Phila. I say First It was so And secondly It must needs be so First it was so you may see in the Prophet Isa 7.14 Behold a Virgin shall conceive and if he had meant a young woman Betuloth the Hebrew word given of Rebekah signifying one ripe for marriage or Ishah a virago a match for a man as was given of Adam to Eve might have served Alamoth is writ with â— clausum so Jacob called him Sbiloh the son of the Secundine which belongs not to a man 1 John and not Alamoth a covered virgin And indeed such an one she must be that he may be of womans seed not mans Nay more that he may be a fit Redeemer For if we suppose man a sinner against an infinite God either he must be subjected to infinite wrath or satisfie that wrath some other way If a man doubt that he be a sinner and so deceive himselfe by conceiving that sins are nothing but mans properties and inclinations which beasts have and yet sin not let him consider that meer nature will do nothing to destroy it selfe Prov. 1. though depraved nature will An horse drinks no more then will do him good but man will In vain is the net spread in the sight of any bird yet men are caught by that they know and which they wilfully offend This argueth something of sin by which we remain not in the honor of our creation but became worse then the beasts that perish Now for this sin all men must suffer eternall wrath except God can be satisfied Now Angels cannot for they be not of our kind or if they were they be so many severall personalities as there are Angels and as the sin of one taints not anothers nature except there be a personall consent so neither can one merit for another though there be consent And for the other creatures irrationall they cannot because they are of lesse value then mans nature The blood of buls and of goats and sheep Heb. 10.4 5. and birds though sacrificed yet that was not to satisfie but to shew what man deserved and in reference to a more full satisfaction to be done in due time For which cause God dispensed with such sacrifice for a time Heb. 9.22 for mans relative instruction that without bloodshedding could be no remission Therefore this redemption must be made by a man because that man had offended so in the old law a brother must redeem But he must be more then a man too for no man that is meerly a man can redeem his brother out of Gods hand of justice Psal so then he must be one that is equivalent with God that the sword of justice must be exercised upon Zach. 13.7 Awake Osword against him that is my fellow Therefore if he must be a man then he must not be begotten by the ordinary way of generation by man and woman for then he is a sinner in the first conception Psal 51. and so had need of a Redeemer himselfe Nor by a man only for nature hath denied conception breeding and bearing to a man Then he must of necessity be made of a woman without a man and then she must needs be a virgin and though this Virgin her selfe came of a sinfull line yet sin being but an accident is left and the substance of her was only taken and immediately united to the divine nature by the power of the Holy Ghost so making both natures one person by which he becomes so meritorious a Redeemer for all mankind Mathe. What Prophecies are there of his Death Resurrection and Ascension Phila. Not to trouble you with heathen oracles or the prophecies of those twelve Exotick women the Sybils though such be enough to confute the heathens who deny Christ and have been used by some ancient Doctors to that purpose yet because I would that your faith should neither be diabolicall nor historicall but divine I shall only commend Scripture to you Therefore as his Nativity was prophecied by Jacob Gen. 49.10 under the name of Shiloh and fulfilled Mat. 2.1 in the daies of Herod the King And the place of his birth prophecied by Micah Mic. 5.2 Thou Bethelem Ephrata out of thee shall come the Ruler of Israel i. the Israel of God in a spirituall sense and government Rom. 9 6. for all are not Israel that are of Israel by nature no more then they are Jewes that are so outwardly by Nation or Country Rom. 2.28 Which prophecy of Micah was fulfilled Mat. 2.1 when Jesus was born at Bethelem And the condition of his Mother prophecied by Isaiah 7.14 Behold a Virgin shall conceive fulfilled also Luke 1.27 The Angell Gabriel was sent to a Virgin called Mary espoused to Joseph but not carnally known by him Mat. 1.25 yea his very name Immanuel was foretold by Isaiah which was the name of union God united to man Isa 7.14 and so the beleevers as it is said should call or apprehend him Mat. 1.23 But in regard of the effect of his redemption his Mother should call his name Jesus Mat. 1.21 and so she did Luke 2.21 And thus as Isaiah said cap. 9.6 To us a child is born and to us a Son is given Luke 2.7 so to us he was born Luke 2.11 that was wonder by his wisdome and miracles the everlasting Father by his divine essence not subsistence and the Prince of peace by his reconciliation of God and man And this birth of his was not only sanctified by circumcision on the eight day Luke 1.21 as Isaacs figure was Gen. 21.4 but also it was graced by a star foretold by Balaam Num. 24.17 and fulfilled Mat. 2.9 which conducted the wise men out of the East to Jerusalem and then to Bethelem where they worshipped him and offered precious things to him which was foretold Psal 45.12 the rich among the people shall do thee homage and the daughter of Tyre shall be there with a gift And Kings shall bring presents to thee Psal 68.29 And the Kings of Arabia and Saba shall bring gifts Psal 72.10 And to him shall be given of the gold of Arabia Psal 72.15 and all this was fulfilled Mat. 2.11 when those great wise men of the East did worship him and offer to him gold incense and myrrhe So also was his death prophecied of First by God himselfe Christs death Luke 22.53 in Gen. 3.15 saying to the serpent thou shalt bruise his heel And this was done by the power of darknesse when he was betraied into the hands of sinners and cut off from the land of the living Isa
was produced from the blessed Virgin by his power and united to the divine but assumed by the Son the second person upon the Holy Ghosts preparation of the Virgins seed and carrying it to the place of conception which Luke 1.42 is called the fruit of her womb that is the whole man or humane substance without the accident of sin which followeth only generation not this wonderfull conception Therefore our sin was to him imputed not by nature imparted and death therefore seized not upon him by necessity but he gave his life voluntarily and it was taken away violently by others sin not his own Mathe. What necessity was there that Christ should be conceived in so holy manner and what are the effects of it Phila. He must be conceived on his mothers part that he might be a man and so fit for a surety for us yet by the Holy Ghost that so the substance might be separated from the accident of originall sin by his power who in the moment of conception united it to the second person with whom it made but one person which was no person before though it consisted of a soule and body and so though it came from Adam and was originally in Adam yet it never sinned in Adam because it took not personality from Adam though it did nature which nature was made so holy by this union that it needed no other sanctification as other men do who are to be sanctified by the blood of the Covenant through the operation of the Holy Ghost which not being warily observed hath made many heresies For the Marcionites and Manicheans not well understanding the conception of his manhood supposed that Christ had an incorporeall body and only passed through the blessed Virgins body And Apollinaris thought Christ had no soule because he understood not how he could take sinfull flesh as Rom. 8.2 3. and not be sinfull and so he determined him to be but halfe a man and that his divinity supplied the place of the soule Others stumbling at the conception of the Holy Ghost say that in this Christs nature was sanctified by the Holy Ghost which cannot be but his humane nature by the Holy Ghost was separated in respect of the substance of it from the blessed Virgin Mary and in the same moment of conception was united to the second person and was holy in it selfe for if it needed sanctification it needed justification Now the effects of this conception and personall union are many As 1. A communication of those properties to Christs person which are in themselves only proper to either nature Mat. 9.6 as to say the Son of man can forgive sins which is proper to the divine nature so to aseend where he was before so to say when he was on earth that the Son of man is in heaven Iohn 6.62 and his blood is called the blood of God though proper only to man 2. Effect of this union was a reception of gifts in his body and soule for his body received the highest degree of perfection that any body could attain unto though it was not much revealed till his resurrection save in his transfiguration after which it became impassible and now shineth in heaven far brighter then any other creature doth or can do So upon his soule was poured knowledge and love beyond the measure in any creature by vertue of this union For his knowledge was such by the light of nature that he knew thereby all things that could be known by it not only by experience of some things but by reasoning he could tell all those things he had no experience of for his own sufferings he could tell all that we suffer Heb. 2.18 And in this wisedome he did grow and increase Luk. 2.52 and by this knowledge he knew more then any man Beside this Christ had a knowledge of infusion or revelation by which heavenly are understood by the light of grace By this he discerned spirituall things more clearly then any man Isa 11.2 for the spirit of wisedome and counsell understanding and knowledge did rest upon him Again he had the knowledge of vision to see God as the blessed do in heaven yet exceeding them all he being the cause of bringing men to this blessednesse and also because his soule is more neer to God by this union then any others are And as knowledge was poured out on him by this union so was divine charity more then upon all men either just or good Rom. 5.6 7. As for faith or hope he had them not farther then as to depend on God and expected those things he saw by the knowledge of vision for he both saw God and enjoied him But faith is an evidence of things not seen and hope argueth no present possession of things hoped for Next he had the grace of office by this union of both natures for hereby he was made a fit mediator between God and man to reconcile us to God yet so as that the actions of the divine and humane nature were not confounded but each nature performed what was proper to it selfe by the assistance of the other As the humane nature was given as a sacrifice for us but the divine nature made it acceptable being offered up by the eternal spirit which therefore might be rightly called the Altar which sanctified the gift rather then the crosse which only bore his body crucified Lastly he had the grace of honour and worship due to his humane nature as it was united to the divine in one person for alone and separated it cannot lawfully have divine worship given to it but so far as it is directed to him that is God and Man Mathe. What doth the knowledge hereof profit to a Christians life Phila. A Christians life consisting in the meditation comfort and practice of what Christ hath done This union may move us first to admire the work it selfe And secondly to consider the glory of God therein And thirdly what comfort redounds to us thereby 1. To admire this work in which both mortality and immortality meet in one person That the same person is uncreated and created without beginning and yet takes a beginning a man in nature and yet God manifested in flesh 1 Tim. 3.16 In his divine nature he makes man in the humane nature he delivers man Aug. The Son of God becomes the son of man not by changing what he was but assuming what he once was not taking what was ours yet not diminishing what was his for in this union the divine majesty did not consume the humane nor the humane diminish the divine This high mystery is rather to be beleeved then argued namely that it was then how it was Next we are to consider the glory of goodnesse and wisedome in this work 1. His goodnesse who not only gave nature to us in creation and grace to us by participation of his Image but gives himself both to us and for us in nature to us in