any of them precisely secundùm opera according to their works Indeed some there are that like well enough of the secundùm but can by no means away with the propter in this case But yet St. Gregory for this reason conceives otherwise and since the reward is ever beyond or on this side the work takes the propter to be more properly spoken than the secundùm opera But the truth is both are true and the reward shall be now given both for and according to their works not indeed in a strict Arithmetical adequation but yet in a proportion exactly Geometrical for bonis bona retribuet melioribus meliora God shall now give good things as Aquinas hath it unto the good and though not in precise equality unto the goodness of their works in themselves considered yet comparatively in what degree of goodness they exceed others the excess of their reward shall arise ever in the same proportion And so on the other side malis mala pejoribus pejora in like manner Neither will the Parable of the Labourers and their penny any way destroy this though we have not leisure at this time to consider it because of another difficulty arising from hence which as it shall be the last so it seems to be the greatest of all other For be it that good works are rewarded beyond their merit yet how should those that for short and momentany pleasures burn in perpetual and everlasting fires be said to be punished short of their desert yea how should not their desert rather seem much short of their punishment For that the Sins of a Mortal Man acted in an instant and the pleasure thereof perishing even with the act should be rewarded with infinite and interminable sorrows is more than earthly mans wit I suppose can easily reach unto And therefore is well termed by St. Paul Ira revelata de Coelo wrath revealed from Heaven as being without those brighter beams of Revelation not fully penetrable by the Star-light of reason For what reason may well be rendred why or from whence it should be that limited and finite works should arise and grow up to an infinite and unlimited demerit Is it that men are born in an aversion from God and but for God might they never die would never leave sinning and so in the proportion well deserve punishment without ceasing as St. Gregory would have it voluissent utique sine fine vivere ut potuissent sine fine peccare But no man is now judged for what he would have done upon suppositions but what he really hath done and that in the body otherwise Tyre and Sidon should have been saved and peradventure even Enoch himself have perished of whom the Wiseman affirms raptus est nè malitia mutaret intellectum ejus This therefore is but vain and for this reason the Learned Schoolmen rest not on it but relie rather on the common answer that the full estimate of sin is taken not from the person that sins or the time and continuance of the sin but from the object the person offended And this person being the infinite God the sin therefore deserves an infinite punishment But even this way is lyable to many and great difficulties For though offences do otherwise arise in proportion unto the dignity and greatness of the Person that is hurt or wronged by them yet it seems not so in this case where the party offended is infinite First because such a Person is clear out of the reach of Man out of danger of any real lesion or hurt by him or any of his actions Secondly for that infinity I conceive is a proper Attribute of God's and absolutely incommunicable to any creature unless it be where he communicates his own Essence and Person as in our blessed Lord by union hypostatical though yet even then he made not the Humane Nature infinite or yet gave the actions of that nature an estimate so much as morally infinite any other way but by assuming it into the unity of his Person which alone could make the sufferings of Man the passions of God also from whence only they receive the infinity of merit But between the act and the object there is no such union to affect that with a demerit as infinite on the other side And lastly à posteriori were the act after that infinite manner affected by the object how then should not all sins be equal and equally to be punished since in Infinites there is no inequality of magnitude nor can there be made any augmentation or diminution by any thing we can do or imagine unto them For to that which is once conceived as such nothing can be added to make it greater or taken away to render it lesser than before no not though we should take away finite parts or yet add one infinite to another For one infinite divided will but make two and two yea two thousand infinites clapt together would run all into one For as one indivisible point amounts to as much as a million so a million of united infinites will arise to no more than one because all those have not any and every of these hath all quantity in it He that once should conceipt an infinite number of Towers though his imagination should furnish every Tower with six Bells yet he could not with reason say for all that there were more Bells than Towers for more than infinite may not be imagined And this is alike true even in moral magnitudes as well as mathematical whether discrete or continued And as nothing is to be gained by Addition so Substraction on the other side will lose as little He must of necessity take half whosoever will take any thing from that which is infinite As the circle that hath no bounds is every where Center so an infinite line the Diameter of that Circle having no extremities is therefore all middle cut it where you list you shall still divide it into two equal parts and which is stranger both parts will be equal to the whole for either part will still be infinite in regard of one end and therefore of quantity immensurable and that can be no more which is infinite on both ends The Product of this will be not only that all sins are equal because infinite but that one sin is equal in demerit unto all to all that have been committed yea and to infinite sins too if they might be imagined As appears plainly in the sufferings of our Saviour which though of different degrees in regard of the sorrow and torment yet because infinite through his Person they were all equal in respect of the merit Whence it is that that satisfaction which was required for any one sin could even in strictness of Justice expiate all though never so many and that which had faln short of expiating all could never have given satisfaction for any one even the least sin that is mortal Neither will this be avoided by that
in usilitatem nostram de salvatore salutem operari imploy or make use of him for our best behoof draw his proper extract from him and work salvation out of this our Saviour But how may that be done sure no way better than as God in his infinite mercy this day gave him so we this day again in all thankfulness receive him otherwise we shall but evacuate the gift and dishonour the giver but abuse his goodness and lose our own benefit For it is not so ours but by our own neglect it may be lost For though all be ours because given us yet nothing shall be ours if not accepted Ours indeed he and all his are already by right and interest but they are never throughly ours till they be ours by possession and then they are ours indeed Possession then let us take but how or which way shall we take it no way so well as in the blessed Sacrament in the holy Mysteries instituted of purpose and ordained to no other end but for pledges to assure us and conduits to convey unto us this blessed Saviour and all his benefits There and there only we may be seised and possessed of both for there and there only are both to be received Thither then let us approach with all reverence and due regard to claim our interest in them and then be assured it shall never be denied He himself will presently meet and answer us with an Accipite Here take this is my body by the offering whereof ye are sanctified Take this is my blood by the shedding whereof ye are saved Take and receive them both and with them all the joyes and blessings they both have purchased or this Text doth afford for now after this all are yours in right and yours in possession none can bereave you of them You have the Author of all safe enough and fast enough with you nay within you It is no longer now Natus vobis to you is born a Saviour but in vobis in you he is born and in you he lives and will live for ever Ye may henceforth say with St. Paul jam non ego vivo fed vivit in me Christus it is not I now that live but Christ liveth in me and if he live in us now we shall live in him for ever hereafter For if whilst ye live ye do not live but Christ liveth in you why when ye die ye shall not dye but live in Christ in Christ the Lord of life and glory and joy and with Christ be made coheirs and Lords of them all and whatsoever other blessedness wherewith he himself is everlastingly Blessed Which the Lord God Almighty vouchsafe unto us for this our Saviour Christ the Lords sake who this day came to purchase them for us and to whom with the Father and the blessed Spirit three Persons c. be rendred all c. Amen Laus Deo in aeternum THE SECOND SERMON ON CHRISTMAS Day SERMON X. Upon GAL. iv 4 5. When the fullness of time was come God sent forth his Son made of a Woman made under the Law That he might redeem them that were under the Law that we might receive the adoption of Sons THE Text begins with the fulness of time but we may well begin with the fulness of the Text for it hath both fulness of time and fulness of matter the love of the Father the humility of the Son and the happiness of man arising from both are here at the full First the fulness of the Fathers love who so loved the world as he gave his only begotten Son When the fulness c. God sent his Son c. Secondly the fulness of the Sons humility not only vouchsafing to take on him our nature made of a Woman but also our miserable condition undertaking to satisfy the Law unto whose condemnation we were subject made under the Law c. Thirdly and lastly the fulness of our bliss and happiness arising from both as being now ransomed from the death of everlasting sorrow which the Law did threaten that he might redeem c. and not so only but adopted also unto that immortal life of glory which the Gospel doth promise that we might c. by the one we are freed from all evil by the other invested with whatsoever is good and both must needs make up the fulness of happiness That he c. So these three are here at the full and in the fulness of them doth consist the fulness of the whole Gospel whose foundation is wholly built upon the Son of God sent into the world of whom there is little to be known and by whom there was little performed and fulfilled which is not even in these verses fully expressed For you have here both foundation and roof both substance of the work and all the circumstances that belong unto it and you may see in it not only that he was a Saviour sent into the world which is the main but also who it was that was sent and by whom and in what manner to what end and in what time which are necessary adjuncts If you demand of it who it was that was sent it tells you the Son of God if by whom it answers by God his Father God sent his Son if in what manner it replies in a twofold made and made again twice made factum ex factum sub made of and made under made of a Woman and made under the Law If to what purpose all this it gives you a double end which is the comfort of all Redemption and Adoption unto men To them that were c. That we might c. Lastly if when it was performed you have it clearly and fully in the first words in plenitudine temporis in the fulness of time When the fulness c. So have you the sending and whatsoever may seem to belong unto it who was sent and by whom how and why and when not one the least circumstance is omitted but you have all so full it is and yet you have not all the fullness For should we inquire more particularly into the nature and person of this Saviour here they are all three one person and two natures or two natures in one person he is the Son of God see his Divinity but of a Woman see his humanity made of a Woman see their union in one person for God cannot be made Man but by making himself one person with Man This for his incarnation will you now inquire for the birth or nativity of the person so incarnate it's here too for as he was made so was he sent as made of a Woman so sent into the world made of a Woman by incarnation and sent into the world by birth and nativity God sent his son made of a woman Should we yet proceed a step or two farther after his incarnation and birth would you behold his life or contemplate his death see what he did in the one or
Father and this Father now became the Son of Man and made himself our Brother The Antient of days that sate on the throne in the 7. of Dan. whose garment was white as snow and the hairs of his head as pure wooll to shadow his eternity who hath neither beginning of days nor end of life This is he that is this day born a young and tender child even that mighty and Almighty God now a weak and swadled Infant This sure is new and marvellous rightly therefore still do his titles begin with wonderful whose person and birth may well be admired cannot be expressed for Quis enarrabit And yet this is not all the wonder that is in him strange and very strange it is that he should be the Son of Man and Mans everlasting Father that is God and Man but yet it is another new thing and little less strange that this God should be perfect Man and yet have no Humane Person A Humane Nature he had but a Humane Person he had not And therefore non solum actus est novus sed is qui nascitur est homo novus it is not only a new birth but he that is born is a new kind of Man the like whereof was never known having a Humane Nature but a Divine Person Nestorius indeed after the manner of other Hereticks not content to leave this mystery unto his Faith but seeking to comprehend it with his reason was so blinded with gazing upon a light too strong for his eyes as he would not acknowledge the thing because his weakness could not conceive who it should be how a Humane Nature should be and subsist without a created and Humane Person and therefore he impiously formed unto himself a double Person in Christ and so in effect two Christs one that had a Humane another that had a Divine both Nature and Person a great errour and pernicious For were it so were they not several Natures but two distinct persons the actions or passions of the one could not properly be attributed to the other since the one is not the other Christ the God could not be Man and Christ the Man could not be God but one God alone the other Man alone and so neither could have redeemed the world for God could not suffer nor Man satisfy Christ Jesus therefore our blessed Lord is but one one substance and hypostasis that hath two Natures Divine and Humane both knit and united in one and the self-same Person and therefore justly and truly may be said to be and is both God and Man and because Man could die because God could add an infinite price unto his death and so reconcile both God and Man But you will say how is it possible that a Humane Nature should subsist in a person and hypostasis not her own who may conceive who can apprehend it neither do I say you should but that you should believe it Had we reason to demonstrate it it were not wonderful had we example it were not singular But now when besides and above the whole order of created Nature a new Man and after a new manner with so great a miracle is born and brought forth having a created and Humane Nature subsisting in a Divine and uncreated Person we may truly say quis enarrabit And this for the person who or what he is that is born Now if we shall remove our consideration unto her of whom he was born peradventure we shall find neither less nor fewer marvels and miracles in this than in that other For certainly that God should become Man is very much but that he should be born of a Woman is yet much more For he might have created a Humane Nature out of the Earth as he did the first Man and had it pleased him assumed it in an instant and therefore needed not have lain nine months in the womb after that manner as we shame to imagine and is altogether unfit we should speak there is horror in the very conceipt of it and therefore well saith the Hymn thou didst not abhor the Virgins womb This would be very strange indeed could we apprehend the infinite Majesty of that God who was pleased for our sakes to descend so low That that sublime and excellent glory in presence whereof the holy Angels themselves cover their faces with their wings that Almighty Lord which sate on the circle of the Heavens and in comparison of whom the inhabitants of the Earth are but as Grashoppers and all the Nations of the World but as the dropping of a bucket that such and so great a God for our good and that we might have nearer affinity with him should disrobe himself of all his honour and be wrapped in films and skins instead of a Garment leave that circle of the Heavens and cast himself into the Dungeon of the womb not abhorring that dark place which we our selves abhor but to think on Astonishment may well seise the mind that shall truly meditate on it If it do not kindle your affection and devotion it cannot at the least but raise up admiration enforcing us to cry out with the Prophet Quis enarrabit Neither is this all the strangeness that God was born of a Woman who by this means was advanced into a strange affinity with her Maker becoming at once both the Mother of her Father and Daughter of her own Son It is strange too and a miracle in Nature that he was born of none but a Woman that he who before had a Father and no Mother should now have a Mother and no Father Three sorts of Generation or rather Production had passed before The first without Man or Woman so Adam The second of Man without Woman so Eve The third of both Man and Woman so we all their posterity But now to make all compleat and never till now the fourth is added of a Woman without a Man that so a Fatherless Son and a Virgin Mother might double the wonder this is it which my Prophet intimates in the first entrance of this Chapter he shall grow up as a pleasant plant and as a root out of a dry ground as a root springing of its own accord from that virgin earth untill'd unsown and unmanured by the hand of Man So sprang he from the maiden loins of his Mother and had no Mans assistance living for a Father who then shall declare c. And as he was begotten without a Father so that we may touch upon the manner was he born as it is likely without pain or hurt unto his Mother It is true a punishment it was and from the beginning and from the beginning until now hath it ever prevailed all Women naturally bringing forth in sorrow But our Saviour was no natural Man All things in him you see are miraculous and supernatural And why not this in his birth as well as so many things else why not born without sorrow as well as conceived without pleasure It is
demonstration of the intrinsick goodness that is holiness of the Lord that vouchsafed it For if the detestation of evil be an argument of goodness how full of goodness is he who that we might know how utterly he hates and abhors all sin and wickeness rather than it should escape unrevenged would incarnate the Divinity it self that so he might punish it and severely too even in his own Son which doth not only manifest his goodness but his Justice also and together with both the greatness and grievousness of our sins How far were our Souls gone and how deadly our Iniquities that must either draw God from Heaven yea dragg him to the Cross or plunge us in an everlasting Hell And unto that our blessed Lord vouchsafed to be brought that we might be delivered from this Who then shall declare either the heinous guilt of our sin or the infinite power the manifest wisdom or infinite both goodness and justice declared in his generations Especially his goodness unto us miserable sinners which we must ever especially think on but never hope to utter O what mind what speech shall utter say or conceive the great honour he hath this day done unto our nature how many and marvellous benefits he hath in it confer'd on our persons freeing us from all that is evil sin sorrow death and Hell and investing us with whatsoever is good Grace Joy and Glory everlasting in Heaven Say we then all with Pelergus Age O Christe Dei Verbum Sapientia Well then O dear Jesus the word and wisdom of the Father what shall we poor miserable Creatures return unto thee for all thy favours Tuae enim omnia à nobis nihil cupis nisi salvari for thou hast done all things for us and requirest nothing of us again but that we would suffer our selves to be saved nay thou givest us salvation and takest it kindly at our hands yea as a benefit unto thy self if we will but receive it O infinite goodness and that we may laud and praise and worship thee worthily for it add one more mercy unto all that is past and as thou wast pleased to be born in our nature so vouchsafe to be born again by thy holy Spirit in our Persons that we may once more say Quis enarrabit c. So we pass unto our last point from his Divine birth of the Father and his Humane from the womb of the blessed Virgin unto his spiritual in the Souls of all the faithful For it is not enough that the Son of God was born for us or in our nature unless he be also born within â—us and in our particular spirits by his grace that so as he was made the Son of Man by being united unto our flesh we might become the Sons of God by being united again unto him in the spirit By wihch spiritual union and mystical are conveyed and applyed unto us all the benefits and graces purchased by the personal And it is not the meriting of Mercy but the actual conferring of it that must do us good which is never fully done until he that was born for us be reborn again in and within us till he live in our hearts by Faith and his life revive in our conversation till his patience be stamped upon our Spirits and the rest of his Divine Vertues ingraven and formed on our Souls For so speaks St. Paul of this Spiritual Generation My little children of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you Gal. iv 19. And formed then he is in us not before when we can shape and form our hearts in some good measure according to the pattern and precedent he hath left us truly saying with the same St. Paul Vivo jam non ego sed Christus vivit in me I live now and yet not I but Christ liveth in me A birth and formation so full of marvel and miracle as we may no less say of it than of those other Quis enarrabit c For in the first indeed God is born of God in the second God is born of a Woman but in the third many Men and Women at once both bear and are born of God because Gods formation in Man is Mans reformation unto the image of God his generation in us our regeneration in him And so by the same act in which God is born in Man in the self-same both act and instant Man is born of God as St. John speaks And that by the insensible and unsearchable working of the Spirit which works so secretly as Man himself cannot observe and discern it though it work within himself and even in his own spirit The child is not more inobservably conceived in the womb of the Mother than Christ Jesus in the Soul of the Christian. And therefore the kingdom of heaven cometh not by observation saith our Saviour that it is come we find but how it came we perceive not and what we cannot discern how should we express who then shall declare c. Neither is it more secret than strange and powerful there being nothing of greater admiration than the wonderful work of God in the conversion of a sinner How marvellous is it that the hearts of wicked Men that were for so many years before domicilia Daemonum the habitation of Devils wherein the Foxes had holes and the fowls of the air their nests that is deceipt and ambition roosted and with them Luxury and Avarice Envy Wrath and Malice Prophaneness Falshood and all manner of filthiness until it became a den of beasts a cage of unclean birds and indeed a very Hell of impure spirits that such a Stable of filth Augeaâ—'s Stable should suddenly be cleansed and a Tenent of Grace Jesus as in that of Bethlem be born in it in an instant That so dark vaults of lusts and uncleanness should presently be transformed into Temples of the Holy Ghost That so impotent and inthralled Souls should be indued with power from above and inspired with such an Almighty and miraculous Faith as is able in a moment to cast out all those Devils To teach the prophane to speak with a new tongue the wrathful and vindictive with patience to suck up all the poysoned malice venemous stomachs can disgorge against them without hurt and not only to be good in themselves but by laying their hands on the sick by their charitable works unto the distressed not only relieve them but with their very example recover others that were sick of sin unto death Who can behold such a change such and so sudden a mutation and not say with David This is the Lords doing and it is marvellous in our eyes Sure it is digitus Dei the finger of God indeed the very power of his Spirit nay no other than another incarnation and spiritual birth of the Son of God in such a Soul And quis enarrabit A generation performed with so secret and yet so powerful an operation Which yet we
not then a Carnal presence but a Spiritual that doth link and associate unto Christ. To make up our union with him it is not needful that his humane nature should be drawn down from Heaven or that his body should be every where present on Earth as the Ubiquitaries affirm or that the Bread in the Sacrament should be transubstantiate into his body as the Papists imagin His dwelling in us is by his Spirit and his union with us is spiritual So himself in the same place where he speaks of eating his flesh and drinking his blood doth interpret himself the flesh profiteth nothing the words that I speak are spirit and life And his Spirit it is not his body that shall give life unto the Spirit when the body shall perish If Christ c. This touch shall suffice for the condition I proceed to the substance of the Text. The Body is dead It contains as I said an admonition of our frailty corruption and death and comforts against death It is but the body that is dead the Spirit is life First of our corruption and frailry The body is dead That we all tend unto death we all know but the Apostle's speech is more remarkable he says not the body is subject to death but by a more significant phrase of speech he presseth it homer The body is dead There is a difference between a mortal body and a dead body Adams body before the fall was mortal in some sort that is subject to a possibility of dying but now after the fall our bodies are so mortal as they are subject to a necessity of dying yea if we'll here with the Apostle esteem of death by the beginning and seisure of it they are dead already The forerunners and harbingers of death dolours infirmities and heavy diseases have seised already on our bodies and marked them out as lodgings which shortly must be the habitation of their Master But how near this manner of speech draws unto true propriety they best conceive who best understand how that malediction of God and curse of the Law The day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt die the death was fulfilled If God spared not the Angels when they waxed proud will he spare thee who art but a putrifying worm Ille intumuit in coelo erga in sterquilinio he was puft up in Heaven and therefore was cast down from the place of his habitation and if I wax proud lying on a dunghil shall I not be cast down into Hell So often therefore as corrupt nature stirreth up the heart to pride because of youth and health beauty and strength and the like perfections of the body let this consideration humble thee that though these are fair and beauti ful flowers yet they cannot but suddenly wither because the root from whence they sprung is corrupt and rotten and even dead already Neither is it more available to the cutting down of arrogance and pride than to teach us Temperance and sobriety What availeth it to pamper that Carcase of thine with excess of delicate feeding which is possessed by death already If Men took the tenth part of that care to present their spirit holy and without blame unto the Lord which they take to make their bodies fair and beautiful in the eyes of Men they might in short time make a greater improvement in Religion and Virtue than they have done But herein is their folly they make fat the flesh with precious things which within few days the worms shall devour but never care to beautify the Soul with holy and virtuous actions which shortly is to be presented to God Let us therefore refrain from the immoderate cherishing this proud and dead flesh meats are ordained for the belly and the belly for meats but God will destroy them both 1 Cor. vi 13. I might inlarge this point almost infinitely for the benefit of this consideration is not confined unto Humility Sobriety and Temperance or any particular virtues but it 's universal restraining from all evil and inciting powerfully unto all virtue and goodness Nihil sic revocat bominem à peccato quà m frequens mortis meditatio saith St. Aug. nothing can so recall a Man from his evil ways as the frequent meditation of death especially if he consider as the certainty of death so the uncertain time of his death and the unchangeable estate of everlasting misery if he die in his sins Would to God we were wise thoroughly to apprehend and apply this unto our own Souls It is strange that there is nothing so well known nothing of greater benefit and yet nothing so little regarded What a Prodigy is it that sinful Men should carry about their death in their bosoms and in every vein of their Bodies and yet scarce admit a thought of their mortality into their minds but live here as if they verily thought they should never die If we had no Religion yet reason would teach us that our strength is not the strength of stones and yet them even the drops of water weareth nor our sinews of Brass and Iron as Job speaks and yet these the rust and canker consumeth but a vapour but a smoak which the Sun soon drieth or the wind driveth away It was wittily said of Epictetus the Philosopher who going forth one day and seeing a Woman weeping that had broken her Pitcher and the next day meeting another Woman that had lost her Son Heri vidi fragilem frangi hodie video mortalem mori Yesterday saith he I saw a brittle thing broken and to day I see a mortal Man die And what difference of frailty between these two surely none unless Man be the frailer of the two For as St. Austin hath it Take the brittlest veslel of earth or glass and keep it safe from outward violence and it may last many thousand of years but take a Man of the most pure complexion of the strongest constitution and keep him as safe as thou canst he hath that within his own bowels and bones that will bring him to his end Nay I hear some say saith the same Father that such a one hath the Plague or the Pleurisie and therefore sure he will die but we may rather say such a one liveth and therefore sure he will die for diverse have had these Diseases and did not die of them but never any Man lived that did not die The Consumption of the Liver is the messenger of Death the Consumption of the Lungs the Minister of Death the Consumption of the marrow and moisture the very Mother of Death and yet many have had these Diseases and not died of them But there is another kind of Consumption which could never yet be cured it is the Consumption of the days the common Disease of all Mankind David saw it and spake of it when he said my days are consumed like smoke Psal. cii yea the Philosopher saw it and could say of it quicquid praeteritum est temporis mors
be subject to the higher powers But however this Spiritual power be not collateral simply but subordinate unto the Royal yet is it in regard of its original and derivation clearly independent as being not derivable into the Priesthood from any Prince or Potentate upon earth but immediately from him who hath it written on his Garment and on his Thigh The Lord of Lords and King of Kings And being thus distinct without derivation it is not possible the censures of the one should come forth in the name of the other but only indeed in Christs name and in their own persons who in this are the Ministers not of the King but of Christ as exercising no part of the power belonging to the Sword but only of those Keys that properly are their own and underivable too from any upon earth but those of their own Order However therefore these powers are subordinate yet two distinct powers they are and both as was said immediately from God and both therefore to be feared of men And sure this latter though the lesser yet not a little to be feared neither for though the Kings Laws bind the Conscience yet his revenge for the breaches of them cannot reach home unto the Soul His Sword is material and can but lash the Body though so lash it as sometimes to divide it from the Soul but St. Pauls Sword is spiritual and reacheth directly to the spirit dividing the Soul not indeed from its own Body but from the Church the Body of Christ and so from Christ too the head of the Body a power therefore in it self no way contemptible it is Christs own and he the more careful to vindicate it from contempt yea not it only but the power and person too of the meanest Priest amongst us for that of his concerns all He that despiseth you despiseth me and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me But yet all this were not that other Royal Power propitious upon earth I think would be of little force in these days to preserve them from contempt or confusion crushing confusion For did not the Sword of the Prince defend the Keys of the Priest they might well put them under their girdle if not under the door and be gone But blessed be God he that is the defender of the Faith and Doctrine of the Church in his Piety and Princely Goodness is pleased to be the Defender also of her Jurisdiction and Discipline Et defensoribus istis tempus eget for otherwise the Antihierarchical of these times and indeed Antimonarchical too as not well affecting any either Power or Prerogative but their own were it not for this would soon level all by their own Rule that is level with the ground lay all Power Ecclesiastick and Honour too like Davids in the dust if not rubbish even Monasterial But then they may do well to think of another dust too the dust of our heels which if but justly shaken there is one that assures us the sorrows of such Contemners will prove more insufferable than those of Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of Judgment It is but right therefore and well too that the Regal Power is the Superior that so as it is the Moderator and Governour of the temporal it might be also the Protector of the spiritual causing that fear and reverence which is due unto both to be paid also respectively unto either Neither in requiring this unto them do we divert from the right object of fear in my Text for it is but fear God still For God himself hath in a sort Deified Authority He hath given them of his own power and imparted his very Name unto their Persons I have said ye are Gods and ye are all sons of the most high And Gods indeed not only by appellation but in effect also for the great and universal benefit which they bring unto mankind For were not Man thus made a God unto Man Men would soon become Wolves unto themselves and devour one another And therefore to fear such Men is not to fear Men but God since the fear is not so much exhibited unto their naked persons as unto those beams and participations of the Divinity wherewith they are clothed And in this sort it is not amiss to say that God and not any thing else is to be feared And indeed he that thus fears God he only fears nothing else though the waves of the Sea rage horribly and though the Hills of the Earth be carried into the midst of the Sea nay as the Poet Si fractus illabatur orbis Impavidum ferient ruinae though the whole world should disjoint and fall he would be buried in the ruines of it without fear for he fears none but God and the offending of that God whom he fears That indeed he doth as desirous to obey him too as well as fear him and so we must all it is our Duty also for so it follows Fear God and keep his Commandments the second Part of our Conclusion keep his Commandments These two are inseparable ever and it is but just that they are not here only but so often joined together in Scripture The fear of the Lord saith David is the beginning of Wisdom and he subjoins but a good understanding have all they that do thereafter So God himself as Job testifies And unto man he said as if it were the product and total of all that is or may be said unto him the fear of the Lord that is wisdom and to depart from evil that is understanding The self same in substance with Solomon here Fear God and keep his Commandments Neither may it possibly be otherwise Nature hath linked them as close as Scripture for no man departs or can depart from the one the Law of God that doth not first depart from the other the Fear of God The soul and body of man have not a stricter union than these two the one the body the other the very soul of the new and interiour man And therefore the original hath it col ha adam for this is not the whole duty but the whole man the whole spiritual man indeed The outward works of the Law are wrought by the body and such righteousness of the body is but the body of righteousness but the fear of the Lord sanctifies the soul and the righteousness of the soul is the very soul of righteousness And the spiritual man created in holiness and true righteousness must have both these parts as well as the animal a soul and a body too Some mens righteousness indeed is all body do many things good and commanded but for ends upon by and vitious respects here is a Carcase of holiness but no soul to inform it only hypocrisy inhabits and gives it motion as the Devil sometimes they say doth the body of a dead man Others will be altogether Soul Fear God as much as you will every man likes it well and thinks he doth it
up themselves unto us in these particulars 1. The person filius hominis that here is his appellation The Son of man 2. The appearance of this Person once more unto the world venturus est he shall come 3. The form or manner of his coming in gloria palris in the glory of his Father 4. The end or purpose of his coming for retribution â— tunc reddet then shall be reward 5. The impartiality of it without respect of any mans person reddet unicuique he shall reward every man 6. And lastly the justness of his reward in due proportion to his desert He shall reward every man secaudum opera sua according to his works The points lie in the same order as the words do in the Text and therefore I shall handle them without any material transposition beginning first with the Person that here speaks this of himself and his appellation fillus hominis The son of man He that was both God and Man may stile himself as he please by either but yet our blessed Lord whether to intimate his love unto our whole kind or to instruct us in the imitation of his humility usually makes choice of the meanest of his Titles and though the Son of God yet seldom or never speaks of himself but in the Stile and Title Filii hominis of the Son of Man But yet as he assumes it it is no vulgar or common stile neither for he assumes it with a difference and distinction from all other the Sons of men whatsoever for it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The or That son of Man the son of Man after such a special and eminent manner as will make it a peculiar title an Attribute proper only unto himself and applyable unto no other As for our selves we are all Filii hominum Sons of Men indeed in the plural he only in the singular and therefore he only singularly Filius hominis the Son of man Homo hath both genders and here in the right sence it is only feminine and Filius hominis no more than semen Mulieris the Son of man than the seed of the Woman the Son of the she-man for Son of man but in this regard he was not as being that mighty stone in Daniel cut out of the mountain without hands and flos campi the flower not of the Garden but of the field growing up without setting for he who as the Son of God had a Father but no Mother as the Son of man had a Mother but without any Father and therefore by the Mothers side only Filius hominis the Son of Man There was indeed a woman once that was filia hominis Eve taken out of Adam without the help of woman as Christ our Lord filius hominis taken out of woman without the assistance of man And as Eve the daughter of man was both daughter and wife unto her own Father So Christ the Son of Man was both son and husband unto his own mother And being Son unto that Mother in Her he was the Son of her Ancestors of David and Abraham and others but not otherwise for no descendant from them or any other was ever or might be his natural and immediate Father Of necessity therefore the Son of Man can be no more than the Son of the blessed Virgin that is the son of a woman And however in relation unto God Christ though both God and man may not have two son-ships the one as man the other as God as God the natural and as man the adopted because the Relation of a Son adheres not to the Nature but to the Person and so having but one Person cannot have two â—iliations yet nothing doth hinder but that in reference unto some other this whole Person though the Son of God may rightly be termed the Son of Man also For when the Son of God vouchsafed not to abhor the Virgins womb he then received a new Relation and being brought forth into the world though otherwise the Son of God he now became really the son of a woman and she that brought him forth as truly Deipara the very Mother of God In regard whereof St. Peter being demanded by our Saviour who do men say that I the Son of man aâ— Answers Tu es filius dei viventis Thou the Son of man art the Son of the ever-living God Two Sonships and but one Person but in regard of two several relations and that unto two several Persons The prime Article This of our Faith and foundation of that Church against which the gates of Hell shall never prevail The Son of God then and the Son of Man too The Son of Man he was here before he went hence and as the Son of Man he shall return again For so it follows in the second place Filius hominis venturus est The Son of Man shall come And come indeed he shall nothing more sure but the when the Time of his Coming than that nothing more uncertain And therefore without all limitation is doubtfully delivered here and indefinitely only with a venturus est He shall come and no more Our Saviour would have all men stand upon their guard be vigilant and watchful for that hour have their Loyns ever girt and their Oyle always ready in their Lamps for that cry at midnight may come at unawares and for this reason he would have men aware of it That it cannot be long hence indeed he hath given sufficient warning shewn it clear unto all For a thousand years it is and six hundred since it was said These are the last times yea Horae novissima the last hour and Judex prae foribus the Judge is at the doors and that Judge himself in the last of the Revelation Ecce venio citò behold I come quickly and my reward is with me but how much time this Quickly hath in it how near or far off it may be this he hath not shown unto any yea hath refused to shew unto his own though desired by his own Apostles But keeps it as a secret reserved unto himself and to be reserved for ever in his own bosom The Angels in Heaven understand it not yea the Son of man himself that is to come as the Son of man only that is in his humane nature he doth not he cannot discover the time of his coming How vain then are the endeavours and enquiries of all other impotent and ignorant men And yet mans busy head must needs be working nothing can restrain his curiosity from prying at least and though he cannot possibly affrm any thing for certain yet he will be old to deliver his conjecture And conjectures indeed there have been many but all no less temerarious than vain The Astrologian and the Philosopher will needs have it fall out just in the fatal period of the great Platonick year when all the Sphears and Stars fixt and wandering shall return again unto their first points and positions wherewith they were
so now we are come to the true fulness indeed and we may not go farther not farther in our discourse it must needs stay where all words fail and every tongue of necessity is speechless Nay no farther in our desires this Adoption is the fulness of our option nay a fulness beyond our wish since we could not possibly conceive so great happiness to wish for it By this time then it is full Sea and all the banks are filled on every side It is now as Ezekiels waters that he saw flow from under the threshold of the Temple that took him first to the Ankles then to the Knees after to the Loins at last so high risen there was more no passage Ezek. iv 7. for just so it fareth here with the Text that by the like degrees runs on till at length it rise to an immensity of fulness not to be forded First from the fulness of his compassion God sent to release us Secondly from the fulness of his love he sent his Son who in the fulness of humility was content to be made and to make a full union with our nature made of a Woman and to make the union fuller yet with our sinful condition be made under the Law that we might receive a full deliverance from all evil by being redeemed and a full estate of all the joy and glory of his heavenly inheritance by being adopted Lo here is fulness of all hands And sure amidst all this fulness it were much unfit that we only should be empty for whom all was done If there be fulness of compassion in the Father if fulness of love in the Son to purchase benefits and blessings for us full above measure sure there should be in some measure at least a fulness of duty in us again to return unto them Otherwise if we neglect so great Salvation we may and shall notwithstanding this Redemption or Adoption either depart as empty of mercy as we are of goodness The Catholick Redemption is not so absolute but that many may perish for whom Christ died as the Apostle speaks The general and probationary Adoption is not so peremptory but that upon misbehaviour divers may be disinherited again Filii Regni ejicientur foras even the Sons of the Kingdom shall be cast forth saith our Saviour himself If thou then wouldst be a firm and constant partaker of these benefits being thus set free by so noble a Redeemer and at so high a price stand upon thine own worth value thy Soul at the same rate it was ransomed at do not again basely sell it and thy birthright for the poor pleasures of this world like Esau for a mess of pottage But as God is full of compassion full of mercy full of love so be thou full of Duty full of Piety full of Repentance and then Redemption and Adoption both shall be fully thine and thine for ever But yet these are but the general duties of our whole life if we would make it up full indeed we are to consider those that are special and proper to this time in particular and they are principally two Joy and Thanks that as the persons are two the Father and the Son and the benefits two Redemption and Adoption so that both might be fully answered the duties are two joyfulness and thankfulness unto the Authors from whence they proceed So these two will make up all full especially if they be in those full degrees if they be full in us in our selves And that so they shold be their very names do teach us Joyfulness and Thankfulness both ending in Fulness to shew that they may not be remiss but that we should be full and abound in them as at all other times so chiefly in this which is the fulness of time or the time of fulness chuse you whether And a time of fulness I am sure it will be in one sense of fulness of bread and fulness of bravery of fulness of mirth and pastime and so it may be and so it hath ever been a joyful time even in outward appearance only we must be careful that this outward joy eat not up evacuate not our spiritual joy proper to the feast Which then is truly spiritual when our spirits shall rejoyce not so much in external sports with the multitude as with the blessed Virgin in Domino salvatore in God our Saviour God our Redeemer as it is here And sure a Redeemer brings joy with him indeed we our selves acknowledge it in other matters if it concern the redeeming of our goods or of our momentany lives Tell an undone Man of one that will redeem his mortgaged and forfeited Land tell a lost Man cast and condemned under the Law of the Kingdom of a Redeemer that will purchase his pardon it is a welcom message the joyfullest news that ever he heard Shall those transitory things affect us thus and shall spiritual things and eternal affect us nothing Are our earthly estates so dear unto us and is the recovery of a celestial inheritance in a Kingdom of everlasting glory not worth the thinking on Are our animal and perishing lives so precious and shall the redemption of our Souls cast and condemned to the sorrow of eternal torment not be regarded Sure did we worthily conceive of it such a Redeemer would be welcomed with our best and fullest joy But however it go with us now when the destruction is not near enough to affect us sure I am the time will come when it shall In noviâ—â—imo intelligetis plane in the latter end ye shall fully understand saith the Wise-man At that day that fearful day when tribulation and anguish shall be upon every Soul that hath done evil when they shall vainly cry unto the Rocks and Mountains to cover them from the presence of the Lord then indeed ye shall understand and know that there is no joy in the world to the joy of such a Redeemer but alas then of a gracious Redeemer he will become a terrible and inflexible Judge And therefore beatus populus qui scit jubilationem blessed the people that now know how and wherein to rejoice And as we are to rejoice for the benefits we receive so we may not be unmindful of them from whence we receive them That were like swine that fat themselves on the mast but never look up to the hand that beats them down And therefore after our joyfulness or fulness of joy our fulness of thanks or thankfulness is to ensue We must sing both parts in the Christmas Carol of that blessed Woman of whom he was this day made My soul doth magnify the Lord as well as my spirit rejoiceth in God my Saviour To render our thanks then and to remember to do it fully to forget none to him that was sent and to him that sent sent his Son in this the Spirit of his Son in the next verse the one to procure the other to seal and assure unto us both
satisfaction He is the eternal wisdom of the Father and indeed none but the Fathers wisdom could have found out a way to shew mercy unto Man and yet give full satisfaction unto his own justice For Justice and Mercy Man offending were as it were at variance either pretending who should have him Justice demands him to be given to her for revenge Mercy opposeth and with all her might pretends for a pardon both strugling in the bowels of the Almighty that dearly affects both Justice proposeth but few only two arguments but they are powerful The first urgeth the Almighty with his own verity and truth Thou hast spoken the word the day that thou eatest thou shalt die the death And with thee there is no shadow of change therefore thou must not alter the thing that is gone out of thy lips The second with a precedent drawn from his former actions The Angels sinned and thou didst not spare them why be alike then unto all For why shouldest thou afford earthly men that favour which thou deniedst unto Celestial Spirits of far more excellent Nature But now Mercy on the other side cries out pitifully with that cry in the Psalm wherefore hast thou made all men for nought what though thou hast said the word it was but the word of legislation and thou art Lord of the Law the supream Lawgiver and therefore maist dispense with the Law which thou givest and in doing so thou dost but remit thine own right thou wrongest none other which therefore is without all wrong to thy Justice And for the Angels they were but some of them not all the Angels that sinned and they sinned willingly and wilfully of their own accord and without a Tempter their sin remaining in themselves not propagated to others and therefore they perished worthily in thy wrath and I made no intercession for them But Man was deceived and seduced by the subtlety of the Serpent his sin besides not cleaving to himself alone but passing forth upon all his posterity that pass from him And shall the whole generation and kind who sinned not of their own will but by being in his loins be eternally destroyed for one and that anothers transgression It is sufficient that Justice hath triumphed in those evil Spirits let me have my victory now in these Good reason there should be some regard had of me as well as of her she is thy Daughter indeed yet she is but thy Daughter-in-law I am thy natural it is thy nature and property to have Mercy and compassion Thus these two the very favourites and darlings of the Divinity contend together and who or what wit shall decide the controversy or give both content when they have contrary demands Herein then shines the infinite wisdom of God that in so difficult a case and perplext as Damascen terms it could discover a way find out an issue that should give full satisfaction unto either and not only so but manifest the glory of the rest of his Attributes of his power wisdom goodness and all and all at once and in one action by informing a piece of our clay and contriving himself and his whole Divinity into a trunk of Earth that so one person might be made of both A person on whom Justice might take her full revenge that Mercy afterwards might be shown unto the offender that so both death might be inflicted as the one urged and a pardon granted as the other intreated For being Man he could die and being God his temporary death could satisfy for an eternal And being God and Man he could dye and with conquest having satiated revenge rise again from the dead and proclaim life and grace unto the whole world So by the infinite wisdom of this work all strife ends and both are well pleased Mercy and Truth are met together Righteousness and Peace do kiss each other Yea so great is the wisdom of it that the blessed Angels themselves desire to pry into it profoundly Sure it exceeds the natural understanding of the wise and subtle Lucifer himself who for all his wit and cunning was clearly deceived and foil'd in this mystery whereby he was drawn on to bite at that heel which he little dreamt would crush his head even whilst he bit it For supposing to swallow the humanity which he saw he was suddenly choaked with the divinity which he could not comprehend So wisely God by Man restored Man and vanquisht Satan in theself-same nature he had conquered before And therefore who shall declare the wisdom of his generation But above all either power or wisdom the wonderful love and goodness of the Lord in this act shown unto the whole world especially unto wretched Man may well drink up admiration and confound the understanding of both Man and Angel For what an astonishing consideration would it be could we consider it as it deserves that such vile worms and wretches as we should receive such high and undeserved favour from that God whom we had so grievously offended and having offended never notwithstanding so much as sought or regarded That he for all this should seek us yea and assume our nature and become as one of us that he might the better find us That instead of hurling such rebellious sinners into the depth of Hell as they well deserved he descended from his own glory in the highest Heavens and took on him the infirmity and baseness of our earth that he might carry it thither and into that glory from whence he descended O the infinite goodness of this God to undergoe the wretchedness of Man that Man might be assumed to the blessedness of God that sinful Man to the blessedness of that God against whom he sinned and delighted only to sin O Lord saith David what is man that thou didst so regard him or the son of man that thou didst so visit him Surely homo est res nihili Man is a thing of nought of no worth no value yet such the eternal Son of God vouchsafed to become that he might advance this thing of nought far above all Principalities and Powers and Crown him with Worship and Glory Neither did he by this act glorify that particular humanity alone which he assumed but the benefit shall redound though not in that manner nor yet so fully yet in a marvellous degree unto all others that shall but glorify him for in him they shall be made partakers too even of the Divine Nature 1 Pet. 1 4. He was anointed indeed with the Oyl of gladness above his fellows not alone then anointed but above and more abundantly than any others As that precious Oyntment which was poured forth on Aarons head so Divine honours and graces by this union descended upon His which it most plentifully drenched but drencht not it alone for of his fulness we have all received and therefore it trickles down upon his beard and all men living that shall adhere unto him and not so only but from
thence drops on the very skirts of his rayment even the rest of the Creatures who have all some interest in his body and therefore in his glory Whereby we are given to consider not only the greatness but the large extent of the Almighty's goodness in this Act of his Incarnation For bonum est sui diffusivum goodness is diffusive and loves to communicate it self and that of God the supream good most of all other And indeed whatsoever we every where see whatsoever any where is or hath any being it is nothing else but a Communication of the Divine goodness from whence they have all that they have whatsoever they are But now in this mystery God did communicate a new goodness and a greater than ever before not only unto man but in a sort unto all his Creatures which all have some title in his person and shall in their time receive a benediction from it for man as he was Supremum Creationis colophon the last and supream work of the Creation so was he the sum and recapitulation of all that was created before him and all that was so created was but either spiritual as the Angels or corporeal as the rest of the world and in man who hath a material body with the one and an immaterial Soul sutable to the other both were bound up together in one Creature A Creature which hath being with the Elements whereof he is compounded life and vegetation with plants sense with beasts reason and spiritual existence with the Angels and therefore a little but compleat world within himself Nexus vinculum totius creaturae the very knot and band that holds together the whole Creation And therefore the whole world being united in man and man unto God every Creature of the world cannot but have some interest in the union who have a part in the Nature that was united Had he assumed the nature of Angels the rest of his works that are corporeal had been excluded Had he taken unto him a Celestial body and made his Tabernacle in the Sun the Creatures that have life and sense had lain unregarded and should any of these have been honoured with it those that are intelligent and spiritual men and Angels had been left out under contempt for ever Man therefore was the only creature in whom he could interest and honour all the rest as being both corporeal and spiritual and having in him being life sense intellect and whatsoever the rest have and are And mansnature therefore he only assumed ut dum una assumitur in qua reliquarum gradus continentur in una reliquae omnes quoad suos gradus assumerentur That so assuming the one wherein the degrees of all the rest were contained all the rest in that one according to their degrees might be assumed Wherefore that Cardinal Schoolman Cajetan said not amiss Incarnatio est elevatio totius universi in divinam personam the Incarnation is an exaltation of the whole Universe into the Divine Person Since by it man in whom all things are knit together is himself knit and united unto God that as man is all in one so God might be all in all And all from God receive not only elevation and honour but blessing and benediction in Christ Jesus the Son of God who is therefore the head both of men and Angels to them a Conserver to us a Redeemer and not unto us only but unto all other Creatures that were made for our use and become subject unto vanity through our sin that as they suffered by mans transgression so in man they might partake of mans Redemption And therefore the whole Creation saith St. Paul travaileth in pain together with us and together with us shall be delivered into the glorious liberty of the sons of God and therefore waiteth until they shall be revealed For which reason our blessed Lord fully is as he is termed Saelvator mundi the Saviour not of man alone but of the whole aspectable world and whatsoever is in it Thy truth reacheth unto the Heavens saith David of him and thy faithfulness unto the Clouds how excellent is thy name in all the World thou Lord shalt save both man and beast and what name is that which is so excellent in all the world but the name of a Saviour thou Lord shalt save both man and beast And therefore the prophet Esay calls unto Heaven and Earth the Forest and all the Trees that are in it that is the whole world and whatsoever dwelleth therein to sing and rejoyce together for this Redemption Sing O Heavens for the Lord hath done it shout ye lower parts of the Earth break forth into singing ye Mountains O Forest and every Tree therein for the Lord hath redeemed Jacob and glorified himself in Israel Esay xliv 22. And St. Paul gives the reason which is the same we have hitherto given because in this Redeemer all things in Heaven and Earth were collected and gathered together in one even in Christ Eph. x. 10. And not only gathered and collected but restored in him and renewed For nova jam facta sunt omnia all things are now made new saith the same Apostle Most worthily therefore at the name of Jesus the knee of every Creature both in Heaven and Earth and under the Earth is injoyned to bow and give glory as being by that name glorified in a sort and restored to more excellent perfection So great so universal is the goodness declared in this Act Yet this is not all But as it is great unto man and universal unto the Creature so is it the highest Communication of goodness in it self and the best demonstration of the intrinsick goodness of the Creator the highest in it self because in this he communicates himself which is not goodness but goodness it self Besides this there are but three degrees of communication Nature Grace and Glory but this fourth of hypostatical union infinitely exceeds them all on which all acknowledge their dependance for it restores Nature gives Grace purchaseth Glory Nature indeed and natural properties are a great communication of Gods goodness unto natural things supernatural Grace unto the Soul of man in this life a greater Divine glory unto body and Soul in the life to come greatest of all yet the best goes not farther than a Created quality for though being glorified we shall see God see his Essence and be blessed in seeing it yet we shall see it but per speciem by a Divine indeed but a created light but in this of Incarnation he doth not exhibit any shews or similitudes he doth not bestow any created gift whether of natural or supernatural order but he gives and bestows himself immediately unto his Creature who doth as immediately see and injoy him in himself being the self-same Person with him a communication of goodness wonderful above all other and not to be conceived had it not been revealed And as the highest in it self so is it the greatest
habet all our time that is past death hath seised on it and so much of our life is consumed Let me then warn you and stir up your meditations of your mortality in the words of Moses Deut. xxxii 29. O that men were wise then would they understand this then would they consider their latter end Sure we are unwise that we consider not the things past the evil we have committed the good we have omitted the benefits of God we have abused the time we have mispent and yet we grieve not because we think not yet whether we shall die More unwise are we not to consider the things present the deadness of our Body and uncertainty of our death the difficulty of Salvation and the small number of such as shall be saved and yet we shame not because we think we shall not yet die But most unwise are we that we consider not the things to come Death Judgment Hell all to come and yet we fear not because we think we shall never die But O that we were wise then should we understand then should we consider our latter end and considering it we should both prepare for it now and more cheerfully entertain it when it comes memorare novissims remember thy end saith the Wiseman in aeternum non peccabis and thou shalt never offend never do amiss Ecclus vii 36. So universal is the goodness of this consideration and therefore I have stayed the longer on it But now I pass from mortality to the cause of it from death to sin that first brought it into the world The body is dead because of sin Sin it is and only sin which is as the cause of all our dolours and calamities so of death it self that follows them without this there never had been there never could have been any death in the world Death were not death had it not a sting to kill but the sting of death is sin as the strength of sin is the law saith our Apostle The cursed apple of disobedience which our first Parents would needs eat sticks still in all our teeth it was poyson unto his nature and infected his blood and he hath derived the contagion to all his posterity who still continuing to feed on forbidden fruit as he did do perpetually strengthen the original Disease and draw death upon themselves more hastily and violently than either that sin procured or the prime corruption of nature for it doth inforce Hence then we may perceive first how foolish they are who living still in sin yet never consider that they are the Butchers and Murtherers of themselves according to that of the Psalmist The malice of the wicked shall slay themselves xxxiv 21 his own sin which he hath conceived brought forth and nourished shall be his destruction Every Man judgeth Saul miserable that died upon his own Sword but what better are other wretched Men whose sins and iniquities are the cruel instruments of death wherewith they slay themselves Souls and Bodies too Thus are they twice miserable first that they must die and secondly that they are guilty of their own death O the lamentable blindness of Men who albeit in their life they fear nothing more than death yet do they entertain nothing more willingly than sin which causeth their death In bodily diseases Men are content to abstain even from ordinary food when they are informed it will but nourish their sickness and this they do to eschew death only herein they are so ignorant that notwithstanding they abhor death yet they take pleasure in unrighteousness that brings it upon them And secondly which shall be the last use we will make of this point Since sin it is that did first bring and doth still hasten on death upon wicked Men what marvel is it if in these last and worst days the Lord strike the bodies of Men with sundry sorts of diseases and sundry kinds of death seeing Man by sundry sorts of sins doth not cease to provoke him unto anger He frameth his Judgments proportionable to our iniquities if ye walk stubbornly against me and will not obey me I will then bring seven times more plagues upon you according to your sins Levit. xxvi 25. He hath a famine to punish intemperance and the abuse of his creatures if the memory of our own corrupt and putrifying bodies cannot do it he hath a devouring sword to bring down the pride of our hearts If we have fiery and unclean affections he doth not need burning Fevers and loathsome diseases to punish them And now if the Lord after that he hath stricken us with such a dreadful pestilence shall renew his Plague amongst us or go on to finish that former destruction with the Sword of our enemies what shall we say but the despising of his former fatherly corrections or our stubborn walking against the Lord our God hath procured it justly unto our selves Quid mirum in poenas generis humani crescere ir am Dei cùm crescat quotidie quod puniatur what marvel that the wrath of God increase every day to punish Man when that doth daily increase which deserves that God should punish it But enough of this part it is now time to pass on to the second and most worthy part as of Man so of my Text from the Body to the Soul from the memory of death to the comforts against death for though the body be dead yet it is but the body the spirit which is the highest consolation of a Christian is yet alive Mans life it self But the spirit is life I cannot now stand to discourse of the excellent Nature of Mans Spirit and the wonderful union of it with flesh and blood for Man you see is no simple creature but compounded of both both a Body and a Spirit He is the abstract and brief compendium of all the creatures of God The world was corporeal the Angels spiritual and both were united in Man and made as it were into one creature A creature which hath being with the elements life with plants sense with beasts reason and spiritual existence with Angels that so the Almighty God first uniting all his creatures in Man and then uniting Man unto himself in the person of Christ might in some sort through Man communicate himself to all his creatures Worthily therefore did the Naturalists term him a little world and as worthily did St. Austin say of him that of all the miracles that were ever wrought amongst Men Man himself is the greatest miracle and that not only in regard of his two substances but especially in regard of their marvellous union that a mass of clay should be quickened by a spirit of life and both united into one person That as God himself hath diverse persons in one Nature so man hath diverse and those contrary natures in one person Commonly says Bernard the honourable agrees not with the ignoble the strong overgoes the weak the living and the dead dwell not together