in speaking of some it expresseth the Day of their death as we see in the history of the ten sons of Haman Esth 9. but of whomsoever it speaketh be they Patriarchs or Kings or private men or good or bad it never expresseth the Day of their Nativity though such a date may seem to import greatly the sacred Chronologie Now wherefore the Scripture never nameth the Day of the Birth of the children of Adam no nor one of them there is without doubt some reason though to us it be obscure But whatsoever that reason be the Birth Day of Jesus Christ is clouded in the same silence Wherefore Surely to the end that among other things which are common to him with the other children of Adam he might also be comprised among them in this point not to have his Birth-Day expressed in the holy History But what doth it concern us that this day is not expressed more then that of other men As much as it doth concern us that Jesus Christ hath been reckoned among sinners even from his Birth Neither doth it serve for an Objection that he hath been put into their rank more evidently when he was circumcised and when he underwent that purification which the Law imposed upon the first-born for this truth excludeth not others that second it though they be not founded upon expresse words of Scripture It is enough that they are implied This is out of doubt that the Scripture never said on what day a man was born It is also out of doubt that Jesus Christ is comprised in this universal rule The question is Wherfore If I have not found the true reason I have at the least pointed out a principle upon which it may be searched Adde to this that in stead of the Birth Day of Jesus Christ the Scriptures expresse that of his death That is among divers other reasons because he died on the same day on which Adam was created to wit the sixth day of the week The creation of the first Adam and the death of the second met in the same day The impurity of our birth which we have from the first had not been purged but by the death of the second Of the service which the Angels have done to the Son of God from his manifestation in the flesh until his Ascension Ten times they have served him in this space of time 1. They carried the message of his miraculous conception to the Virgin 2. They advertised Joseph whom the ignorance of this mystery had held perplexed 3. They published his birth unto the shepherds 4. They gave order to carry him into Egypt to avoid the fury of Herod 5. They had care to cause him to be brought back into Judea after the death of the tyrant 6. They accompanied him and ministred unto him after his temptation in the wildernesse 7. They comforted him in his agony in the garden 8. They rolled back the stone from the door of the sepulchre wherein he had been enclosed 9. They declared his resurrection 10. They instructed his disciples who looked up after him ascending into heaven that one day he would return Never did the Angels serve any person so often nor in so great a number of occurrences nor in so high charges nor through such diversity of means as they served the Son of God This also ought to be reckoned among the marks of the preeminence of our Lord. Of the Miracles which our Lord wrought so long as he conversed in the world Of the advantage of the New Testament above the Old in regard of the number of persons which have had the gift of Miracles IN all the extent of the Old Testament there are not above seven men to whom God gave the power of working Miracles Moses and his brother Aaron famous for the wonders wrought by them in Egypt in the Red-sea and in the wildernesse Joshua who stayed the Sun and Moon in their course Samuel who changed the whole face of the air in an instant affrighting Israel by thunders and miraculous rain 1 Sam. 12. A Prophet mentioned 1 King 13. who rent by his word alone the Altar set up against the Ordinance of God and scattered the ashes The same Prophet also healed the hand of Jeroboam which was dried up Elijah who shut and opened heaven caused fire to come down raised from death the son of the widow c. And lastly Elesha famous for divers great Miracles There have been none but these seven men upon whom this power hath been conferred The other Miracles which are recited in the Old Testament or which have gone before the coming of the Son of God have been wrought without the intervention of men There may be to speak this by the way some allusion or reference of the seven Angels of the Revelation working upon the Sun and upon all the elements to these seven men which have heretofore exercised this miraculous power But this matter concerneth not the present subject That which I have here to say is this That the New Testament hath been furnished with a greater number of persons endued with the power of Miraeles then the Old was yea with a very far greater number At one onely time the Lord ordained seventy men with power to heal the sick to cleanse the lepers to raise the dead to cast out devils to tread upon serpents and scorpions and upon all the force of the enemy And this without reckoning the twelve principal disciples who were also provided of the same gift and those which afterward had it as Saint Paul and others I account this point among the advantages of the New Testament that in it the miraculous power of God hath raised so great a number of instruments in comparison of them which it employed for the Old Testament Wherefore till the coming of the Son of God there have passed many ages without that any person hath had the gift of Miracles The last of all those which wrought Miracles before the coming of our Lord was Elisha Now from Elisha till that time when the Son of God began to manifest his glory by Miracles there passed welnigh eight hundred yeers In so long an interval of yeers there was not found a person that had the gift of Miracles although many had that of Prophecie Certainly the wisdom of God would that this great length of time should serve to make them desire that which had not been seen after so many ages to wit Miracles wrought by the hand of man as afterward those that were spectatours glorified God that had done this honour unto men in giving them this power Matth. 9.8 That it should dispose their spirits to the expectation of the Messiah who was to come with miraculous works That it should serve to make them the better to weigh the importance of his Miracles after so long a surcease of the gift of Miracles And lastly that which is the principal that it should serve to distinguish him from other
by Adam who departed by a natural death We are here to admire the dispensation of this great God and the Wisdom of his Spirit which dictated the Scriptures These three men whom God first withdrew from the world the diversity which is seen in their going out and the order held in it were a sample or epitome of that great piece which he would unfold all along the ages and which was to be extended as far as the last men that shall be found living upon the earth Why God who hath foretold and set down the measures of certain particular times hath not revealed how long the world should endure or when the day of Judgement should be God at other times foretold How many veers space it should be before the Deluge Gen. 6.3 How many yeers the slavery of the Hebrews should endure Gen. 15.13 How many yeers there should be of plenty and famine in the days of Joseph Gen. 41.29.30 How many yeers the Jews should remain in the Captivity of Babylon Jer. 25.12 and 29.10 Dan. 9.2 How many yeers should passe to the death of Christ Dan. 9.24 We know that some of these predictions have been given four hundred yea four hundred and ninety yeers before their time expired Now there might be all the way computed from day to day how many yeers yet remained to the end of the time limited by those oracles Yea God hath not onely given an account of yeers but sometimes hath punctually set down the very day on which a deliverance or other event should come to passe Dan. 12.11 12. But neither the Day of the last Judgement nor the Yeer nor yet the Age which is to make an end of all the rest was ever set down in any Prophecie whatsoever the curious can say against it Now among the causes of this silence we are to consider this When God hath foretold that such or such a notable event where the time could not be foreseen by any humane wisdom should come to passe in such a Yeer or on such a Day the principal scope of these predictions hath been to confirm the faith of them which should see them accomplished Joh. 13.19 For they that lived until that time and saw the Prophecie effected precisely at the day named even against all appearance had so much the more reason to believe in God for the time to come in so manifest an experience of his infallible truth and the same also was a means to convert unbelievers But at the last Day it will not be the work to make provision any more for faith in regard of things to come not will there be any more place for the conversion of miscreants So that a revelation of that Day could not serve for those ends and uses for the which God had revealed divers other Days remarkable The Wisdom of God doth not give us superfluous predictions It is necessary to know that there shall be a last Day but not to know precisely when it shall be Of the holy Ghost Four remarkable productions which the Scripture attributeth to the Spirit of God to wit two in the Creation two in the Redemption AMong so many great and divers effects of the Spirit of God the Scripture mentioneth particularly these four productions 1. That of all the species which were enclosed in the masse of the elements in the beginning of the world for to cause them to bring forth the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters Gen. 1.2 2. That of the Soul For the breath of God which made man a living soul was the Spirit of the Almighty Gen. 2.7 Job 33.4 3. That of the body of Christ which alone among all men was conceived by the holy Ghost Luke 1.35 4. That of the new man For to become such it behoveth to be born again of the Spirit Joh. 3.5 6. Why the Scripture representeth the holy Ghost and his effects under the names of Water of Fire of Anointing with Oil and of Sprinkling of Blood The true interpretation of these terms contained in divers passages The Scripture speaketh of Water and the Spirit by which we are to be born again Of the holy Ghost and of Fire with which we are to be baptized Of the Unction which we have from the holy One which is an effect of the same Spirit Of the Sprinkling of the Blood of Jesus Christ which is wrought also by the holy Ghost Joh. 3.5 Matth. 3.11 1 Joh. 2.20 1 Pet. 1.2 So that the names of Water of Fire of Anointing with Oil and of Sprinkling of Blood are used to denote either the holy Ghost or those acts which he worketh in us Now it is very easie for one of the vulgar to speak to this and to say they are similitudes Many Commentatours and ordinary Preachers content themselves to alleadge to us some resemblances between Water and the holy Ghost and likewise some conformities and analogies between the Fire which purifieth and consumeth and the holy Ghost which produceth the like effects But there are other depths to sound It is requisite therefore to know that all the Purifications of the Law which were figures of that Purification which we have by the holy Ghost were wrought either by Water or by Fire or by Oil or by Blood All things which had need of cleansing were purified by one of these four means 1. By Water as it was practised in divers occasions For we know that washings with Water were very frequent under the Law It is not necessary to produce examples 2. By Fire as when God commanded to purifie the spoil which they had taken from the Midianites he ordained that all that which could endure the Fire to wit Gold Silver Brasse Iron Tinne Lead should be cleansed by Fire Num. 31.22 23. 3. By Oil as it was observed in the Unction of the Priests and that of the leprous Lev. 14.16 17 18. 4. By Blood as it is notorious and we shall see by and by that almost all things according to the Law are purged by Blood Heb. 9.22 Now to shew that all that which is required to a true Purification all that which the Law prescribed to those ends is found universally in the power of the holy Ghost the Scripture representeth it with its effects under the name of the matters and all the acts which served to the Legal Purifications I might speak of other things concerning this subject but they will come better to purpose in the doctrine of Baptism for which I reserve them A catalogue of those actions which were celebrated with Aspersion of Blood in the time of the Law All the Law was written in Blood The Priest the people went not but thorow blood Now to comprehend these so many different actions in which Blood intervened it will be to the purpose to distinguish them and reduce them into ranks or categories We finde therefore that there are seven kindes of actions solemnized by the Aspersion of Blood 1. The first
us that the most bloody adversaries of the children of God are not dispensed but by his order Among the resemblances between Moses and Christ the one of which gave the Law the other brought the Gospel there is one notable likenesse that is that the birth of both of them was made memorable by the death of innocents That of Moses by the cruelty of the Egyptians who drowned in the water the children of the Hebrews That of Christ by the barbarousnesse of Herod who caused the cutting of the throats of the children of Bethlehem Why in War the people of God have been often beaten by their enemies and why a good cause hath been overthrown Run thorow the holy History All the times that the people of God have been overcome in War you shall finde that this hath come to passe through their own fault to wit either because they have undertaken a War without cause as Josiah who quarrelled with the King of Egypt Or because they have concluded upon a War without enquiring at the mouth of God as the Israelites against the Tribe of Benjamin Or that they have fought against the expresse prohibition of God as the Hebrews that set upon the Amalekites encamped on the mountain Numb 14. Or because they have abused a precedent Victory as the children of Israel who having purloined of the accursed thing of Jericho were presently after beaten by the inhabitants of Ai Or for having consulted with the enemy of God as Saul who had recourse to a Sorceresse to learn what successe the battel should have Or for having broken the faith given to the enemy as Zedekiah who brake the agreements past between him and Nebuchadnezzar Or in sum by putting themselves out of the protection of God as the Israelites in the days of Eli the Priest to whom the contempt of Religion caused the losse of that lamentable Battel in which the Ark of God it self was taken and carried in triumph by the Philistines In most of these examples we may see that a good cause hath been vanquished but with reason The justice of the cause hath come to nothing through the injustice of them that managed it or through the injustice of the proceedings Sometimes also two parties that make War together may both have a just cause in part although one of them may have the lesse right of the two The Wars which the Christians have moved against Mahomet have had for their cause the honour of the Name of Christ On the other side Mahomet declareth that he hath taken arms to avenge the honour of God defiled by the Idolatries of Christians This cause which is but too true in regard of many men hath given him so many Victories over Christendom Why God never sent above one Angel or two at most when he intended to destroy men and hath often sent many when he intended to preserve one man Three Angels came to Abraham to promise him the birth of Isaac but there were but two which went to destroy Sodom To protect one Elisha an army of Angels appeared in the likenesse of charets of fire but to put to death one hundred fourscore and five thousand men in one night in the camp of Sennacherib to cause to die of the Pestilence seventy thousand in three days by reason of the sin of David who had numbred the people to destroy all the first-born of Egypt in an hour God employed not above one Angel Whence cometh it that to protect one man alone God sendeth sometimes whole legions of Angels and to destroy thousands of men yea whole Nations he sendeth but one Angel Surely the Angels were created for the preservation of men not for their destruction And although God useth them for the execution of his judgements neverthelesse to shew that this is as by accident and beyond the scope of their creation he never employeth above one or two when the businesse is to destroy man where on the contrary he employeth many when it is to save The Psalmist was not ignorant of this Divinity For when he prayeth against his enemies he desireth that the Angel of God the Angel in the singular number might persecute them Psal 35. But when he promiseth to the faithful the protection of God He shall give saith he his Angels charge over thee We know that in another place he speaketh in the singular of the Angel that encampeth about them that fear him and that often God is content to send onely one Angel to defend a great number of men But withal he hath often used the service of many Angels to this effect whereas to destroy man he never would employ in any occasion above onely one Angel or two at the most If man had persevered in original justice there had never been Miracles but onely of one kinde Miracles have been wrought to convince the incredulity of man and therefore they had not been at all necessary if man had not first become incredulous Besides Miracles have been wrought to teach men that which all Nature together knew not how to teach them to wit the benefit of Redemption which presupposeth the fall of man Certainly if man had remained in his first integrity he had never seen the waters of the deluge nor Lot's wife turned into a statue of Salt nor any of all those wonders which have served to chastise man Neither had he seen those miraculous healings nor the dead raised for neither death nor diseases which have furnished the subject of these Miracles had had any place in the state of innocency The onely kinde of Miracle which God would have shewed unto man if he had stil persisted in his integrity had been according to all probability to transport him at the last from earth to heaven without passing thorow death And this is a notable point that after the Creation God wrought no Miracle till the translation of Enoch who was carried up from earth to heaven God began his Miracles with that kinde of Miracle which onely ought to have had place if man had still continued righteous Of JESUS CHRIST A consideration of the divers Names and Titles of our Saviour And the differences that ought to be observed in expressing them VVHen we name him sometimes we call him onely Jesus sometimes we say Jesus Christ sometimes we say onely Christ sometimes we call him Our Lord sometimes we joyn all these names together Our Lord Jesus Christ sometimes we say The Son of God Now it seemeth indifferent by which of these Names we call him and we pronounce the first that cometh in our mouth But howsoever all these names designe the same Person neverthelesse every one of these doth not mark out to us all the qualities and relations which we consider in that person rather one signifieth him in one regard and another hath to it self also a particular meaning So that these Names ought not to be used confusedly or without choice but we are to pronounce that or those
among them which have relation more to the subject of which we treat If we speak of him who hath saved us the name of Jesus is appropriate to him If the question be of the means by which he hath saved us they are comprised under the name of Christ If we mention his Commandment we should say This is the Ordinance of the Lord. If we consider him as authour of the communion which we have with his Father there presenteth it self to us the title of the Son of God There are also other subjects to every one of which there may be referred one or more of these titles It will be said upon this The Scripture it self doth not observe these distinctions useth these names indifferently upon every occasion Now I confesse that in so great a multitude of passages of the New Testament in which these names are repeated it is impossible to say why one is rather expressed then the other Yet there are some reasons And then when all these names or the greater part of them are found joyned together it is to expresse the plenitude and perfection of him to whom all these titles appertain In the History of the Gospel he is almost everywhere called Jesus without other epithet or attribute because this was the onely name which men gave him while he conversed in the world The man whom they call Jesus said the man that was born blinde Joh. 9.11 Sometimes the Apostles themselves call him Jesus of Nazareth but this is when they speak to the Jews who called him so This language would not be so convenient at this day I passe by a question which might be moved Why the Apostle Philip. 2. saith that every knee shall bow at the name of Jesus And why he doth not say at the name of Jesus Christ nor at the name of the Lord Jesus A reason might be given But for the rest We adore not the syllables but him that is represented by that name And the Name of Christ or the Name of the Son of God are no lesse venerable then then the Name of Jesus But I am to make an observation against the ordinary practice of Christians and of the greater part of Preachers themselves When they pronounce the name of Christ alone this is either by way of abbreviation or else by way of custom without thinking whether it be to purpose to say onely Christ or to say Jesus Christ or Our Lord Jesus Christ It is therefore to be noted that when the Scriptures speak of his sufferings and his death ordinarily they give him none other then the onely name of Christ Christ is dead Christ hath suffered It was necessary that Christ should suffer The sufferings of Christ c. This may be forasmuch as the name of Christ includeth that of Priest which is the quality in which Christ offered himself to death The Apostle Rom. 6.8 11. saith that we are dead with Christ but living in Jesus Christ our Lord. I know that there may be opposed some exceptions yet in every one of them there is a particular cause why one of those Names is rather used then another I will produce one example There is no man that thinketh he speaketh amisse when he saith The Supper of Christ or The Supper of Jesus Christ And of a truth this is not an heresie but neverthelesse it is an impropriety For if we will speak according to the Scripture we should say The Supper of the Lord not The Supper of Jesus Christ This is a particularity remarkable that in the whole description of the Supper exhibited by the Apostle 1 Cor. 11. and in all the discourse which he maketh of this subject and the authour of it he never giveth other name then that of The Lord. The Supper of the Lord I have received of the Lord that which also I have delivered unto you The Lord in the right in the which he was betraid took bread You shew the Lords death The cup of the Lord The body and blood of the Lord Not discerning the body of the Lord. I forbear to speak why in all this deduction the name of Christ is not once mentioned and that of the Lord is continually expressed But this example teacheth us that we ought to use discretion even then when we pronounce the titles of him to whom God hath given a name above every name Wherefore Jesus who received the Sacraments as well of the one as the other Testament had not that external Anointing which was given to Prophets Priests and Kings He received the Sacraments common to the whole Church to shew among many other reasons the communion which we have with him And for other causes he would not have that material Unction which was particular to certain persons Not the Royal anointing which was a mark of a temporal dominion whereas the Kingdom of Christ is of another nature Not the Priestly that was for Aaron for the Priesthood of Christ is not of that order but according to the Order of Melchizedek Not the Prophetical for when one Prophet anointed any other to be a Prophet by this action he declared him his successour So Elâ—sha was anointed to succeed Elijah But our Soveraign Prophet who preceded all the Prophets succeeded none of them and therefore ought not to receive their Unction Whence cometh it that divers discourses uttered by Jesus Christ seem to be without method And an admirable secret which ought to be observed The History of the Gospel reciteth unto us divers Sermons other excellent discourses which Jesus Christ made when he conversed among men Now we may observe that in the same discourse Jesus Christ passeth oftentimes from one matter to another which is very far distant and seemeth to be quite beside the subject It seemeth to us to see pieces brought from several places ill joyned and without any dependance or tie one with another Expositours labour hard to finde the contexture thereof but their ordinary Logick which they bring with all their Analyses can never attain it I passe by that Jesus Christ preaching had the perfection of Divinity We have but the shreds of this Science a little scantling of this great piece and some few drops of that Ocean but in Christ are inclosed all the treasures of wisdom Now he had the entire body and we have but a few parcels so his style hath other rules and other measures then ours But behold the secret which we ought here to consider Jesus Christ saw the thoughts and the hearts of those to whom he spake If an Oratour had this advantage to see the thoughts of them that hear him he would apply himself to them rather then to the ordinary rules of his Rhetorick which knoweth not this method This desultory style which we see in the discourses of Jesus Christ hath been often occasioned by the thoughts of his hearers According as these were formed in them he addressed himself to them and according as others thoughts
which were raised out of the dust Matth. 27.52 53. Afterward that of Tabitha Acts 9.40 And for the third example that of the young man Eutychus Act. 20.9 10 11 12. There are notable resemblances between the three that were raised under the Old Testament and the three which Jesus Christ raised before his death The first raised from the dead in the Old Testament was the onely son of a widow and the first raised â—n the New Testament was the onely son of a widow The one in Sarephta the other in Naim In both the Testaments God began the Resurrection of the dead by the demonstration of his Mercy as well as that of his Power Moreover the last of the three raised before the coming of Christ was already entered into the grave where he touched the bones of the Prophet Elisha and the last of the three raised by Christ to wit Lazarus had already stayed four days within the Sepulchre Why Christ rose not again the day after his death but suffered the whole Sabbath day to passe over before he returned to life I passe by the ordinary reasons which are brought concerning this and will onely observe a Maxime which I finde in this matter to wit That never any dead man was raised again on the Sabbath day The Son of God hath healed many sick on the Sabbath day but ye read not that on that day he raised any dead And in sum none of all those which were returned to life as well under the one as the other Testament and of whom we have considered the catalogue and the order according to which they are ranked hath been raised on the Sabbath day I shall verifie this when I shall come to expound the fourth Commandment of the Decalogue For the present question we may say that Jesus Christ who is the Head of the Resurrection would shew the communion which is between him and others that are raised in whom we have a preludium of the general Resurrection And forasmuch as none of them recovered life on the Sabbath day he also not to seem to disjoyn himself from them would not that his Resurrection should fall on that day This excludeth not the other reasons of the time of his stay among the dead A comparison of the time which God employed in the Creation with that which he employed in the Redemption And of the days of the one and the other The time of the Creation was six Days that of the Redemption was but of three Days which is the lesse by one half But the Wisdom of God hath divided the time of the Creation in two equal parts each of three days the first three being distinguished from the three following by a most evident mark The first three days of the world with their nights had neither Sun nor Moon nor Stars but preceded the being of all these lights in which they have been different from all other days that since have come As therefore the Creation hath had three days extraordinary so the Redemption in the which the world hath been as created anew hath had these three marvellous days in the which Christ continued among the dead It is to be observed that himself speaking of the three days of his stay within the bowels of the earth Matth. 12. which ought not to be understood of three entire days had regard to the history of the Creation which reckoneth the Evening and the Morning for a Day a part for the whole Gen. 1.5 8. The first and neerest cause of the three days detaining of Jonah in the whales belly The intention of God indeed was to present unto men in Jonah a type of the Resurrection of Christ as every one knoweth But there was first another reason for which the Prophet was not delivered before the third day The chastisement of the sinner oftentimes answereth to the fault even to circumstances This happened to Jonah His History telleth us that Nineveh was a City of three days journey chap. 3.3 For having refused to take this walk of three days in Nineveh he was condemned to keep prison three days within the whale The three days which he would not passe over in a great City among men it was necessary for him to passe in the intrails of a fish out of the sight of men and sun From this historical consideration we come to that of this great mystery which is enclosed in the detention and deliverance of Jonah The Resurrection of Christ figured in Hezekiah by a double resemblance It is sufficiently known that this Resurrection as touching the circumstance of the Third Day hath been prefigured in Isaac in Jonah in Hezekiah A Patriarch a Prophet a King have been the types Isaac destined to be offred an whole-burnt-offering and remaining as dead in the brest of his father is as returned to life on the third day Gen. 22. Heb. 11.19 And this for the more ample correspondence happened very neer the same place where Christ afterward was buried and where he rose from the dead Jonah issuing from the depth of the sea giveth the term of fourty days to the Ninevites And this figure which marketh out the Resurrection of Christ on the third day extendeth also all along the fourty days which Christ gave unto the world after his Resurrection before he left the earth The healing also of Hezekiah is considered as a type He was held in the rank of the dead and his bed was to him a grave He was raised up miraculously on the Third Day as it were surviving himself 2 Kings 20.5 But that which I observe concerning this last and which I adde to the observations of those which have gone before me is another correspondence which is found between the wonders that befell in this subject the one in the sicknesse of Hezekiah and the other in the death of Christ In both these there was a Miracle in the Sun For the Eclipse of this Luminary which happened at the death of Christ was supernatural as well as the going back in the sicknesse of Hezekiah So that this type meeteth with Christ dead and raised from the dead by a double resemblance But the shadow which returned ten degrees backward to foreshew the return of Hezekiah to the course of his life was not so miraculous as the return of Christ from among the dead verified by ten Appatitions by which as by so many degrees he shewed himself living again upon the earth before he ascended into heaven Why none ever was raised again the third day after his death but onely Christ Of all those whom God hath caused to return into the world after they were dead there is not one whom the Scripture saith to have been raised on the Third Day If there had been any one this circumstance had not been omitted in History All have been raised either before or after the Third Day after their decease but none on that day The son of the widow of Sarephta the daughter
of Jairus Eutychus were certainly raised again the very day of their death The son of the Shunamite he of Naim Tabitha and the man which was raised from death in the Sepulchre of Elisha most probably had not yet reached to their Third Day among the dead when they returned to life As on the contrary many others have been raised after their third day to wit Lazarus and the Saints that rose from the dust when Christ rose again This circumstance of the Third Day for the Resurrection hath been appropriated to Christ and marked out for him in the Calender of the Prophets to the end that among other signes which distinguish him from all others that were raised he might be known also by this as particular to him to wit that his Resurrection befell on the Third Day according to the Scriptures When Lazarus was dead our Lord let passe the Third Day before he raised him and stayed till the Fourth Joh. 11.39 Among divers reasons of this delay I reckon this The Son of God would not raise Lazarus the same day of his decease nor before he entered into the Sepulchre because he had already raised two dead which had not as yet been put into the earth to wit the young man of Naim and the daughter of Jairus which was deceased but a few hours before Now his intention was to extend his power yet farther to wit as far as within the grave as he did when from thence he fetched Lazarus But this dead man had not his Resurrection on the Third Day our Lord having deferred if till the Fourth and hindering the concurrence of it with his own in regard of this circumstance Three miraculous Sepulchres in the holy History The Scripture mentioneth three famous Sepulchres in the which God hath given life to the dead to wit That of Elisha whose corps served to raise another dead though himself returned not to life That of Lazarus which was raised from the dead but not by himself That of Christ who rose himself and at the same time raised many others whose graves he had opened at his own death Matth. 27.52 53. The two first were preparatories to the wonders of the third The Son of God raised others before he raised himself and again in coming out of the sepulchre he carried his power into the graves of others who were raised after him Four men that raised the dead before and after the coming of Christ The gift of Miracles was conferred upon divers who notwithstanding received not the power to restore life to the dead this kinde of Miracle being reserved to a small number of them The Scripture nameth but four who exercised this power two under the Old Testament and two in the New The two first are Elijah and his successour Elisha The one raised the son of the widow of Sarephta the other the son of the Shunamite The two other are Saint Peter and Saint Paul The one raised Dorcas the other Eutychus So God raised two instruments of the Resurrection before the coming of his Son and after he was gone out of the world Christ appeared between the two first and the two last as the Sun among the Planets spreading his quickning power over the dead of the one and the other Testament The continuation of the Article of the Resurrection of CHRIST His Ascension into Heaven His Sitting at the right hand of God Christ hath verified his Resurrection by all the proofs which could be given BEing come back from the dead he hath made himself known to be living Not to one person alone but to many men and women yea to above five hundred together Not at one onely time but at many and divers times Not for a little time but for the space of fourty days Not in one onely place but in many and divers in the city in the fields within the houses and upon the mountains Not afar off but in the same chamber in a close place Not by one means but by an infinite number of testimonies By the Hearing he causeth his voice to be known By Sight his lineaments and stature By the Touch the wounds of his hands his feet and his side By his Actions going coming and eating with his disciples he shewed that he was truely alive And beside all this by all the Scriptures beginning at Moses and going thorow all the Prophets he proved the necessity and verity of his Resurrection Why God never raised any person of note to converse among men except the Messiah Of all the dead which have returned into the world to sojourn there some space of time and frequent the company of men there hath not been except our Lord any Prophet nor any person otherwise famous Those whom God raised either were children as he of Sarephta and the son of the Shunamite or young people as he of Naim the daughter of Jairus and Eutychus or without any mark of eminent quality in the Church as he that came living out of the grave of Elisha Lazarus and Tabitha For as for the Saints which appeared on the day of the Resurrection of Christ they did no more then passe by and having shewed themselves stayed not at all among mortals neither are their names mentioned in the History Whereupon it may be asked Why being raised from the dead they stayed no longer time in the world that there might have been some time to converse with them And in sum Why none of the Patriarchs or of the Prophets have been called back from the dead to sojourn a while among men as Lazarus or Eutychus But without speaking of the Fathers of the Old Testament I will yet make this question Why did not our Lord raise John the Baptist who had been his forerunner and his contemporary in the days of his flesh Was it not to the purpose that that excellent Prophet so great a light of the Church and who had suffered death for the Truth should be returned unto life as well as the daughter of Jairus or the young man of Naim It is easie to conjecture why this was not done If Abraham or David or any one of the Prophets or any one of them who wrought Miracles in their life time had returned to the world there to make their abode there had never wanted those who would have honoured them excessively If Superstition made Idols of the dead bodies of Saints how much more would it have idoâ—ized the very bodies themselves living after their death This is one of the causes for which God liked better to raise an ordinary man who had touched the bones of Elisha then to raise Elisha himself For such a Prophet that had been so famous in Miracles had been adored by men if he had returned from the grave to be among them There was also another particular reason concerning John the Paptist It is known how high his reputation had been After his death that was ascribed unto him which was not For when the Son
nameth the number of young people raised from the dead is greater then that of aged persons of whom we have none but Tobitha and it may be him that was raised in the grave of Elisha Now this also is a short table or patern of the great Resurrection which is to be at the last Day For that shall raise far more young people then old This needeth no demonstration The number of them that die young hath still surpassed the number of them that die old How many human creatures die in their childhood or in their growth or in the flower of their age Those that go beyond all those first seasons of their life and arrive as far as the last are very few in comparison of them whom death intercepteth in the way As therefore the number of the younger sort is the greater among the dead so also it shall be the greater in the Resurrection of the dead And to represent this to us God would by a mysterious Preludium raise more of young people then of old Of the first Resurrection and of the second death mentioned Revel 20. And from whence those terms are extracted THis passage hath divers difficulties For it speaketh of a term of a thousand yeers during which the Saints must raign with Christ It is also said that the rest of the dead are not to rise till those thousand yeers be accomplished and this is the first Resurrection Concerning which the Expositours both ancient and modern have very different opinions And many renewing the opinion of the Millenaries figure to themselves a bodily Resurrection of the faithful which they believe must precede by many ages the Resurrection of other men Now I will not contradict the common exposition which beareth that by the first Resurrection is meant the Regeneration by which we rise again into newnesse of life And by the second Death that which is otherwise called eternal But that which I have to observe here is that these terms the first Resurrection the second death carry with them an excellent allusion which is not considered though it be very visible and that it giveth abundance of light in the obscurity of this text This therefore is to be noted that according to the literal construction of these words there are two Resurrections The one which is or already hath been performed in this world the other which is to be at the last day The one is particular the other is universal Now this is true historically and really For Lazarus Eutychus Tabitha and divers others mentioned in Scripture have been already raised once this is the first Resurrection and shall yet be raised once more to wit in the end of the world with the rest of the dead So that they have two Resurrections having already passed thorow the first This allusion is extended yet farther It is said touching them that have part in this first Resurrection that the second death hath no power over them Upon which it is to be considered that it is never said that Lazarus or any of all them which were raised from the dead died the second time It is very true that they died again for Christ is the first of them that rose to immortality Neverthelesse the Scripture which is so exact to set down all that which is worthy of consideration never relateth the second death of them which have been raised no not of one of them It did import as it should seem to know so much the consequents and the effects of the divine power which restored them to life that we should know whether they lived any long time after they were raised from the dead Yet their second death is not read in the Scripture A silence so constant and universal as well in the one as the other Testament is not without some great ground I think therefore that this omission is mysterious as divers others which are seen in the Scripture There is no doubt but that Melchizedek died as well as other men Yet as every one knoweth he is said to be without end of life Heb. 7.3 That is to say in as much as he is presented as such in the holy History the which reciteth not either the birth or the decease of this person but rather produceth him as a man eternal Accordingly howsoever those that have been raised have been returned to the grave yet this is not expressed The Scripture after having raised them leaveth them as living for ever without ever saying that they died afterward So that their second death is not found Where therefore it is spoken Revel 20. of those which have part in the first Resurrection that the second death hath no power over them it is evident that this expression is drawn from the history of them whom we read to have been raised from the dead which is the first Resurrection but we read not that they died the second time Thus the Spirit of God draweth matters Historical to frame the images of future events which it setteth to view in Prophecies This Book of the Revelation is all composed of such pictures whereof the stuff and colours are borrowed of that which hath come to passe really according to the letter but animated with a spiritual and mystical sense For it doth not follow that that which is literally in History ought to be understood literally in Prophecie On the contrary it representeth one thing by another quite different though there be a resemblance of one to the other These Prophetick terms that the second death hath no power over them which have a part in the first Resurrection expresse formally the history of Lazarus and the rest which already have had one Resurrection which we read not to have been followed by a second death Shall we therefore yet expect that some shall be raised before the last Day yea a thousand yeers before By the same reason it will be requisite that we expect two men which shall have power to shut up heaven to hinder that it rain not to turn waters into blood to smite the earth with all plagues to consume their enemies with fire coming forth of their mouth Revel 11.5 6. But this if we take it literally is as absurd as if we would make Moses and Elias to come again for this Prophecie is moulded upon their history By the same reason we must imagine Jaspers Amethysts Emeralds in the heavenly Jerusalem Rev. 21. where the magnificence of it is represented under the figure of those precious stones which were set in the brestplate of the High-Priest Exod. 28. And by the same reason we must rebuild the Altar and Temple of Jerusalem which represent the Christian Church Revel 11. Everlasting life The first and the last of all Miracles THe first Miracle that came to passe after the Creation is as I have already said the translation of Enoch And the last Miracle which shall be wrought in the world shall be the translation of the faithful which