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ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A64650 Immanuel, or, The mystery of the incarnation of the son of God unfolded by James Archbishop of Armagh. Ussher, James, 1581-1656. 1643 (1643) Wing U180; ESTC R7064 32,765 70

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IMMANVEL OR THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION OF THE SON OF GOD Unfolded by JAMES ARCHBISHOP of ARMAGH IOHN 1. 14. The Word was made flesh OXFORD Printed by LEONARD LICHFIELD Printer to the Vniversity 1643. THE MYSTERIE OF THE INCARNATION of the SON of GOD THe holy Prophet in the Book of the a Proverbs poseth all such as have not learned wisedome nor known the knowledge of the holy with this question Who hath ascended up into heaven or descended who hath gathered the wind in his fists who hath bound the waters in a garment who hath established all the ends of the earth What is his Name and what is his SONS name if thou canst tell To help us herein the SON Himselfe did tell us when he was here upon earth that b None hath ascended up to heaven but he that descended from heaven even the Son of man which is in heaven And that we might not be ignorant of his name the prophet Esay did not long before foretell that c Vnto us a child is borne and unto us a Son is given whose name should be called Wonderfull Counsellour The mighty God The Everlasting Father The Prince of peace Where if it be demanded how these things can stand together that the Son of man speaking upon earth should yet at the same instant be in heaven that the Father of Eternity should be born in time and that the mighty God should become a Childe which is the weakest state of Man himselfe we must call to minde that the first letter of this great Name is WONDERFUL When he appeared of old to Manoah his name was Wonderfull and he did wonderously Judge 13. 18 19. But that and all the wonders that ever were must give place to the great mystery of his Jncarnation and in respect thereof cease to be wonderfull For of this work that may be verified which is spoken of those wonderfull judgements that God brought upon Egypt when he would d shew his power and have his name declared throughout all the earth e Before them were no such neither after them shall be the like Neither the creation of all things out of nothing which was the beginning of the works of God those six working dayes putting as it were an end to that long Sabbath that never had beginning wherein the Father Sonne and Holy Ghost did infinitely f glorifie themselves and g rejoyce in the fruition one of another without communicating the notice thereof unto any creature nor the resurrection from the dead and the restauration of all things the last workes that shall goe before that everlasting Sabbath which shall have a beginning but never shall have end neither that first I say nor these last though most admirable peeces of worke may be compared with this wherein the Lord was pleased to shew the highest pitch if any thing may be said to bee highest in that which is infinite and exempt from all measure and dimensions of his Wisedome Goodnesse Power and glory The Heathen Chaldeans to a question propounded by the King of Babel make answer h that it was a rare thing which hee required and that none other could shew it except the Gods whose dwelling is not with flesh But the raritie of this lyeth in the contrary to that which they imagined to be so plaine that hee i who is over all God blessed for ever should take our flesh and dwell or * pitch his Tabernacle with us That as k the glory of God filled the Tabernacle which was l a figure of the humane nature of the Lord with such a kinde of fullnesse that Moses himselfe was not able to aproach unto it therein comming short m as in all things of the Lord of the house and filled the Temple of Salomon a Type likewise n of the body of our Prince of Peace in o such sort that the Priests could not enter therein so p in him all the fulnesse of the Godhead should dwell bodily And therefore if of that temple built with hands Salomon could say with admiration q But will God in very deed dwell with men on the earth Behold heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot containe thee how much lesse this house which I have built of the true temple that is not of this building we may with greater wonderment say with the Apostle r Without controversie great is the mystery of Religion God was manifested in the flesh Yea was made of a Woman and borne of a Virgine A thing so s wonderfull that it was given for a signe unto unbeleevers 740. yeeres before it was accomplished even a signe of God's own chusing among all the wonders in the depth or in the height above Therefore the Lord himselfe shall give you a signe Behold a Virgin shall conceive and beare a Son and shall call his name Immanuel Esai 7. 14. A notable wonder indeed and great beyond all comparison That the Son of God should be t made of a Woman even made of that Woman which was u made by himselfe That her Wombe then and the x heavens now should contain him whom y the Heaven of Heavens cannot containe Than he who had both Father and Mother whose pedigree is upon record even up unto Adam who in the fulnesse of time was brought forth in Bethlehem and when he had finished his course was cut off out of the land of the living at Jerusalem should yet notwithstanding be in truth that which his shadow Melchisedek was onely in the conceit of the men of his time z without Father without Mother without Pedigree having neither beginning of dayes nor end of life That his Father should be a greater than he and yet he his Fathers b equall That he c is before Abraham was and yet Abrahams birth preceded his well nigh the space of two thousand yeares And finally that he who was Davids Sonne should yet be Davids Lord d a case which plunged the greatest Rabbies among the Pharesies who had not yet learned this Wisedome nor known this knowledge of the holy The untying of this knot dependeth upon the right understanding of the wonderfull conjunction of the Divine and humane Nature in the unity of the Person of our Redeemer For by reason of the strictnesse of this Personall union whatsoever may be verified of either of those Natures the same may be truely spoken of the Whole Person from whether soever of the Natures it be denominated For the clearer conceiving whereof we may call to minde that which the Apostle hath taught us touching our Saviour e In him dwelleth all the fulnesse of the Godhead bodily that is to say by such a personall and reall union as doth unseparably everlastingly conjoyn that infinite Godhead with his finite Manhood in the unity of the selfe-same individuall Person He in whom that fulnesse dwelleth is the PERSON that
fulnesse which so doth dwell in him is the NATURE Now there dwelleth in him not onely the fulnesse of the Godhead but the fulnesse of the Manhood also for we beleeve him to be both perfect God begotten of the substance of his Father before all worlds and perfect Man made of the substance of his Mother in the fullnesse of time And therefore we must hold that there are two distinct Natures in him and two so distinct that they doe not make one compounded nature but still remaine uncompounded and unconfounded together But Hee in whom the fulnesse of the Manhood dwelleth is not one and hee in whom the fulnesse of the Godhead another but he in whom the fulnesse of both those natures dwelleth is one and the same Immauel and consequently it must be beleeved as firmly that he is but one Person And here wee must consider that the Divine Nature did not assume an humane Person but the divine Person did assume an humane Nature and that of the three Divine Persons it was neither the first nor the third that did assume this Nature but it was the middle Person who was to bee the middle one that must undertake this mediation betwixt God and us which was otherwise also most requisite aswell for the better preservation of the integrity of the blessed Trinity in the Godhead as for the higher advancement of Mand-kinde by meanes of that relation which the second Person the Mediatour did beare unto his Father For if the fulnesse of the Godhead should have thus dwelt in any humane person there should then a fourth Person necessarily have been added unto the Godhead And if any of the three Persons beside the second had been borne of a Woman there should have been two Sonnes in the Trinity whereas now the Sonne of God and the Sonne of the blessed Virgin being but one Person is consequently but one Sonne and so no alteration at all made in the relations of the Persons of the Trinitie Againe in respect of us the Apostle sheweth that for this very end f God sent his owne SON made of a woman that WE might receive the Adoption of SONS and thereupon maketh this inference Wherefore thou art no more a servant but a SON and if a SON then an HEIRE of God through Christ intimating thereby that what relation Christ hath unto God by Nature we being found in him have the same by Grace By Nature hee is g The only begotten Sonne of the Father but this is the high Grace he hath purchased for us that h as many as received him to them he gave power or priviledge to become the Sonnes of God even to them that beleeve on his Name For although he reserve to himselfe the preeminence which is due unto him in a * peculiar manner of being i the first borne among many brethren yet in him and for him the rest likewise by the grace of adoption are all of them accounted as first-bornes So God biddeth Moses to say unto Pharaoh k Israel is my Sonne even my first-borne And I say vnto thee Let my sonne goe that he may serve me and if thou refuse to let him goe behold I will slay thy sonne even thy first borne And the whole Israell of God consisting of Jew and Gentile is in the same sort described by the Apostle to be l the generall assembly and Church of the first borne inrolled in Heaven For the same reason that maketh them to be Sons to wit their incorporation into Christ the selfe-same also maketh them to be first-bornes so as how ever it fall out by the grounds of our common Law by the rule of the Gospell this consequence will still hold true m If children then heires heires of God and joynt-heires with Christ And so much for the SON the Person assuming The Nature assumed is the seed of Abraham Hebr. 2. 16. The seed of David Rom. 1. 3. The seed of the Woman Gen. 3. 15. The WORD n the second Person of the Trinity being o made FLESH that is to say p Gods own Sonne being made of a Woman and so becomming truly and really q The fruit of her wombe Neither did he take the substance of our nature only but all the properties also and the qualities thereof so as it might be said of him as it was of r Elias and the s Apostles that he was a man subject to like passions as we are Yea he subjected himselfe t in the dayes of his flesh to the same u weaknesse which we finde in our own fraile nature and was compassed with like infirmities and in a word in all things was made like unto his brethren sinne only excepted Wherein yet we must consider that as he took upon him not an humane Person but an humane Nature so it was not requisite he should take upon him any Personall infirmities such as are madnesse blindnesse lamenesse and particular kinds of diseases which are incident to some only and not to all men in generall but those alone which do accompany the whole Nature of mankinde such as are hungring thirsting wearinesse griefe paine and mortality We are further here also to observe in this our x Melchisedeck that as he had no Mother in regard of one of his natures so he was to have no Father in regard of the other but must be borne of a pure and immaculate Virgin without the helpe of any man And this also was most requisite as for other respects so for the exemption of the assumed nature from the imputation and pollution of Adams sinne For y sinne having by that one man entred into the world every Father becommeth an Adam unto his child and conveyeth the corruption of his Nature unto all those whom hee doth beget Therefore our Saviour assuming the substance of our Nature but not by the ordinary way of naturall generation is thereby freed from all the touch and taint of the corruption of our flesh which by that meanes only is prop●gated from the first man unto his posterity Whereupon he being made of man but not by man and so becomming the immediate fruit of the wbome and not of the Loynes must of necessity be acknowledged to be z that HOLY THING which so was borne of so blessed a Mother who although shee were but the passive and materiall principle of which that precious flesh was made and the holy Ghost the agent and efficient yet cannot the man Christ Jesus thereby be made the Son of his a owne Spirit Because Fathers do beget their children out of their owne substance the holy Ghost did not so but framed the flesh of him from whom himself proceeded out of the creature of them both b the hand-maid of the Lord whom from thence all generations shall call blessed That blessed wombe of hers was the bride-chamber wherein the Holy Ghost did knit that indissoluble knot betwixt