He that from Holy Orders goeth back And by his Idleness becometh slack In Duties of his Calling or grown rich By Church promotions thinks it overmuch To execute that Function as he ought To which with wealth and honour he is brought Even he what fair excuse so ere he make Is justly said Gods name in vain to take For if he proveth guiltless he receiv'd A dispensation more than I believ'd A Prayer without Faith a formal mention Of Gods due praise without a due intention Yea vain or complemental Salutations Without Sincerity are prophanations Against this Law though many men have thought That these are signs of persons better taught Dissembling Fasts Thanksgivings mumbled out With babling Repititions and devout In nought but feigned Term or length of Time Do make men guilty likewise of this Crime Nay many Sermons of the vulgar strain Are taking of the Name of God in vain He that his Church or Chappel hath bedeckt And yet Gods living Temples doth neglect He that a love to those doth seem to carry Yet leaves defac'd his outward Sanctuary He that to bend his body is asham'd When he shall here his blessed Saviour nam'd He that without an inward Adoration Bows outwardly or with an Affectation To mimick Gestures or performs the same Unto the vocal sounding of the Name Or either practiseth or leaves undone Such Duties in Contempt of any one Even He though to be guiltless he pretends Against this Third Commandement offends But none this holy precept more have broke Than they who on themselves Christs name have took Yet live like Infidels excepting those Who guild Hypocrisy with Godly shows And under pious habits use to prey On those who being more sincere than they Are threatned and suppose all well bestown While these will take till nothing is their own God keep his Lambs from these as from the worst Of all Dissembers and the most accurst The Faults condemn'd seem nothing to have bin To this abhorred Hell begotten Sin Are Drunken Jollities vnbridled passion A wicked Custom Slight consideration And evil Narture but much blame is cast On Tutors and some Parents for the last All these must therefore shunned be by him That would not Swear For-swear Curse nor Blaspheme This must be likewise heeded that unless We still on all occasions do confess The Name of God and Sanctifie it too By such good Duties as we ought to do As in Relieving those who in his Name Shall ask without abusing of the same In swearing by it when just cause requires In suffering for it though by Sword and Fires When God may be dishonour'd by a base Forsaking of our Faith or of our Place Yea if we be not ready to our might In all Gods Attributes to do him right And honour him in Deed in Word and Thought In what we can although not as we ought We faulter in our Duty and 't is plain We do profess to bear Gods name in vain My Heart LORD GOD so settle in thy way That I this Law may never disobey Amen Commandment IV. IIII. Remember that thou keep holy y e Sabbath day c. 'T is not in the Common Creed That he gather'd Sticks for need Who for Sabbath breaking dy'd For all wants were so supply'd That it seems he did transgress By Contempt or Carelessness He commits the same offence ' Gainst this Precepts moral sence Who the Christian Sabbaths wrongs And a Plague to him belongs Command IV. To hallow do not thou forget Those times which God apart hath set YOu that our Christian Sabbath do despise Behold this Figure with regardful eyes For though on us this Precept doth not lay The Ceremonial service of the day Or to a Jewish Sabbath us confine It n'retheless a Duty doth enjoin Which no man living can be freed from Till to the general Judgment Christ shall come For Nature urges that convenient Rest Should be allowed both to Man and Beast Lest their corporeal substance should miscarry Before the time And 't is as necessary The Soul should have some leisure to attend His will on whom her being doth depend Freemen may rest their bodies when they please And Wise men know how for to take their ease But lab'ring Beasts and Men who are depraved Or they whom wants or Tyrants have enslaved Had restless lived till their life time ended Unless this holy Law had them befriended And they who to the flesh most favour show For Soul affairs but little time allow This God at first foresaw and for that cause Though in Mans heart he then ingrav'd his Laws Essential and long oblig'd him not To such additions as time since begot Yet when he found that error and transgression Had wholly rased out the first impression To stop Corruptions Growth he afterward To Rites to times and places had regard All men at first had liberty to take What daies they pleased holydaies to make Or for convenient Rest Nor did from all This freedom cease when God the Jews did call To keep their Sabbaths For to one set day No Nation were oblig'd save only they Nor had the Gentiles any other ties Save to observe it in a moral wise So far as might preserve unto the Creature The freedom and well being of its nature A Law concerning Rest and holy Dues Confin'd indeed the people of the Jews To one set day even one set day in seven To them were Ceremonies also given Concerning it which no man might transgress Save in great need without much guiltiness That Law which nature simply had received At our first being was to them derived With such like Accidents as might be best To keep them firm and bring in all the rest In Gods appointed season to embrace The Law of Nature in the Law of Grace Their Customs and their Ceremonial day With Christ was buried and so swept away When he arose from death that to renew And celebrate the Sabbath of the Jew We are no more obliged than to rear Their Temple and to build their Altar here And yet lest man's corruption and the lack Of Accidents might bring the Substance back Even to the first neglect Christ dist instate His Church with power to change or abrogate The Circumstances of this Law so far As needful seem'd Provided that it were Essentially preserved and in this She hath performed what required is For though the time be changed it retains The same proportion It for use remains The same in Essence and that being so The same obedience is now due thereto And to what Circumstance the Church thinks fit To help continue the right use of it Now therefore though that every day be free For works which truly necessary be And though those Worshipers which are sincere May worship any day or any where Yet none can without guiltiness despise The Places Rites or Times of Sacrifice Appointed by the Church while they accord What may be authorized by the word This Law is therefore broke
and Substance wasting to receive That from them which they had not power to give What were it unto thee but that our peace Thou lovest if we dayly shall increase Our vain will-worshippings till we devise As many Superstitious Fopperies As we have sensless Dreams Or if our daies We spend on Idols forging Puppet plays And false Ideas till all truth be lost And then which is effected now almost Fight brawl and preach to make up Sects and Factions To help maintain the Whimsies and Distractions Which fool us till we find some Chrotchets new Unknown to Christian Heathen Turk and Jew Moreover but that our own harm it were To know no power whereof we stood in fear And were it not a merciful prevention Of miseries of mischiefs and contention Which else would rage among us if we had No name in which with Reverence might be made Vows Oaths and Protestations Or if we Should not believe a Will and Power in thee To heed and punish it when wrong were done What benefit to thee ensu'd thereon For which thou shouldst vouchsafe to make a Law To keep the damn'd For-swearers hearts in awe What suft ' rest thou when mad Blasphemers rave Against thy holy Name that thou need'st have A Law to curb them Or what have they done More than those Dogs which bark against the Moon If they themselves or others of their kind No damage by those Blasphemies did find And but that sweetly provident thou art Ev'n for the meanest and least worthy part Of all thy Creatures what was that daies rest To thee which thou ordain'st for Man and Beast Their pain or ease Thy Rest augmented not Nor profit by the Sabbaths hast thou got Or by the Festivals ordain'd by thee For they not thine but mans advantage be Our Essence being of a double Nature And thou best knowing what best fits the Creature Requirest all men so their time to use That Soul and Body may receive their dues But what missalls to thee if any spends His Times in vain or to preposterous ends Some of us peradventure fancy may That thou hast honour by the Sabbath day And that it adds to thy contentment then To hear and see great multitudes of men Assemblies make to invocate thy Name And in their songs to magnifie the same Indeed this is our Duty and when this Upon thy days by some performed is Thou tak'st it as a honour done to thee That in such Dutys we might serious be Yet still the benefit is all our own Thy praise is neither more nor farther blown To thy avail nor doth our holiness Conduce to ought but our own happiness The days on which we memorize thy Graces And meet together in thy holy places Are much for our avail for then and there Thou teachest us our Crosses how to bear What to believe and hope there we may learn How we 'twixt Good and Evil may discern How Truth from cursed Error we may know What Path to shun or take what work to do And how and whom to love which is the Sun And height of all whereto on Earth we come Which manifests that only for our sake It pleased thee some days of Rest to make Sure ev'ry mean capacity is able To understand that in the second Table Mans welfare is immediately intended And that therefore those Laws be recommended To universal practice so to stay Our minds from running out another way For if our lives ambitiously we spend In brawls for honour If we set an end To all our kind by Murthers If we please To plague our selves with ev'ry foul disease And ev'ry grief of Heart which will arise From Fornications and Adulterys If all our Labours should be made a prey To Thieves till want had worn us quite away If we should plague each other by our Lies By slanders or in humane Perjurys Or if our hearts upon the Rack were set By lusting after what we could not get These madnesses our mischiefs only be But neither harm nor discontent to thee Except in this respect that having took Our Nature thy Compassion cannot brook To see thy Members injur'd by the Sin Which lawless people are delighted in Thou hast affirm'd the better to apply Thy workings to our mean Capacity That all things for thy Glory thou hast wrought And yet it is not therefore to be thought Thou wantest Glory and didst work for more Or that it gain'd ought wanting heretofore Nor may we think a power so truly wise Should work for that which we are bid despise But rather that thou honour dost expect To be to thee ascrib'd as an effect Of fruitfulness belonging to the Natures And undespis'd condition of thy Creature Yea I believe unfainedly oh God By what I from thy self have understood Thou wrought'st for Love. Not meerly to attain Thy Creatures love for that had been as vain Because indeed as little need thou hast Of their imperfect love as of the blast Of their weak praise Oh Lord thy love it was Thy Love essential which did bring to pass The works thou mad'st That blessed love of thine Which is thy Self Oh Essence most Divine For being All and all at full possessing In thy Self-being thou conceivd'st a blessing To be conferr'd on others not to add Ought to that Blessedness thy Essence had Thy wisedom infinite a passage found By thy eternal Power which hath no bound Distinct and finite Natures forth to bring without impairing or deminishing Thy perfect Essence which of thy perfection Should give some Demonstration by reflection Among the rest one Creature thou did'st name Compos'd of all which th' vniversal Frame Therein contained And the same did'st make Not only so as that it might partake Of all Created things and also be A certain Medium 'twixt them and thee But which is to the honour of it more Thine Image in it self it likewise bore And had â—â— possibility to be United undivisibly to thee A Species of this Creature Lord I am And for what end created we became As I conceive it here I mean to tell Oh teach me better If I say not well Thou being Love it self and therefore kind It was thy gracious and eternal mind Mankind a Sharer in thy bliss to make And grant him License also to partake That Glory which thou didst enjoy alone Before all other Beings were begun And this great favour Lord thou pleased wert As well became thy Wisdom to impart By Means Degrees and on the same condition Through which we best might gain the best fruition Of what was purposed and come to be United as I said before to thee To Adam this great Mystery appear'd Till disobedience Foggs in him had rear'd Which dull'd his Reason and his heart declin'd From Thee within himself this bliss to find The Law thou gav'st him was not as is thought By some of us that proof might so be sought Of his Obedience For thou knowest all Before it is and what shall still
when we despise The Fastings Feastings or Solemnities The Church appoints or if we shall deny Such daies to honour and to sanctify By rest from Common Labours whensoere We may without much damage them forbear Or if we vilify those Christian Rites Whereto the publick discipline invites Or them perform not on their proper day As often as conveniently we may This Law is broke if to our lab'ring Beast Or Servant we allow not so much rest As nature shall require and may conduce To keep them able for our lawful use Or if we shun not all occasious too Whereby we may against this Law misdo And they are these A hardned heart a mind Prophane and unto Greediness inclin'd A false belief false liberty false knowledge Frequenting of the Company and Colledge Off false believers From whom self will pride And Superstition no man can divide Let no man then that lawless freedom take Which may occasion strife or scandals make By needless Labours nor mis-censure them Who take some liberties which they condemn In things indifferent and shall not move In such gainst which their Governors approve And in their manners let them peaceful be Though they in their opinions disagree Let not those times the Church hath set apart To rest the body to instruct the heart And to preserve a due Commemoration Of every blessed means of our Salvation Be judged vain or that they do not draw Authority sufficient for this Law But let them know for Truth though not for news That all the Feasts and Sabbaths of the Jews Were but the Types of ours and that if they Shall for the Shades the Substance cast away They are unwise and guilty of offence Against this Precept in the moral sense Let those who for the bodies ease and pleasure Part of this time allow preserve the measure That 's justly due and in due manner too Do that which is allowable to do Not for the Soul 's well being caring less Than to prevent the Bodies weariness Let them who of the Soul most heedful seem Remember still the Body to esteem A Portion of that Manhood for whose sake Our Sabbath-maker did all Sabbaths make And give it so much liberty as may Make pleasant all the Duties of the day And since no private Spirit can impose A Rule for all let all be rul'd by those Who by a publick Spirit come to learn What may a publick body best concern Or if among us any one shall deem There is a truer way made known to him So let him walk that he himself approve To be in all his waies a Child of Love. For sure I am that if the common peace He keep until humility increase True knowledge in him he then plain will see Who best expounds this Law the Church or He. Come Holy Ghost so sanctify my heart That from this Law I never may depart Amen Commandment V. Honor thy Father and thy Mother c He that sought his Fathers death Sonless yielded up his breath He that would his Prince have slain Had his pardon sent in vain For although the King for gave Justice urg'd her due to have That Rebellious Children may Learn this precept to obey And the Subject stand in awe How he Sins against this Law. Command V. On them all honours due bestow Who by the Name of Parents go WHat of Rebelling Subjects will become And graceless Children view in Absolom For whose Offence the Earth did as it were Refusal make his Bodies weight to bear And Heav'n rejects it that they might present Him hanging for a dreadful Monument Through Ages all to warn and keep in awe The sleighters and Infringers of this Law. This foremost Precept of the second Table Unto the first in this is answerable They both enjoyn and Honour where 't is due Their differences are these which do ensue Here blessing follows there it went before One Parent that concern'd This many more He that shall break this Precept maketh snares Wherein to hang himself at unawares And overthrows as much as in him lies All Common-weals and all Societes Yet some affect it not but loudly cry For times which may erect a Parity And some who dream they keep it are to blame By being ignorant how far the Name Of Parent reacheth which we briefly show That they might better do and better know We from the Parents of our bodies have A natural being and they justly crave To be obey'd in all things but in those Which either may Superior powers oppose Or to some Being hurries us that shall Be worse than to have never been at all Beside these Parents we to many moe A Duty by this Obligation owe. The Fathers of our Country by this Law First claimeth of us Honour Love and Awe And from himself the same Prerogatives To his Inferiour Magistrates derives There is a Fatherhood in those that be Our Elders and our Betters in degree Our Masters also may have warrant here To challenge from us Reverence and Fear And Husbands also may infer from hence Good proof of right to their preheminence And if a witness wanted thereunto My Wife I know would say the same I do And that I give God thanks for as a blessing That is not founnd in every mans possessing Our Ghostly Fathers by whose careful pain We are anew begot and born again Ev'n to a life more excellent than that Whereto our fleshly Fathers us begat Have Honours due no less than those to whom We Sons and Daughters in the Flesh become Yea and our Fathers in some sort they be Who from Thrall Wants and Death hath set us free All these from us an Honour may command According to the place wherein they stand To some of them we do not owe alone That Honour which may outwardly be done Or that unfain'd respect which doth accord With bare Obedience But we must afford All helps whereby we also may prevent The Want the Shame the Harm or Discontent Which may befall them we should meekly bear Their words and blows ev'n when unjust they are We should not pleasure take in any thought With which dishonour may to them be brought Though they should curse us we must always bless Defend their lives and hide their nakedness We should not hear them wrong'd nor should our tongue To all men tell it when they do us wrong But pray and strive that blameless we might prove How crookedly so ' ere they please to move For he alone who thus obey them shall Hath an Obedience Evangelical Among those many who these Laws do break And pass unheeded any breach to make On this Command who greatly are to blame In being disobedient to the same The first and worst are that ill tutor'd sect Who Magistrates and Rulers contradict They who at all Superiors madly strike And fain would have us honour'd all alike Are deeply guilty and this just command They frustrate make if ought I understand The other sort doth Government forsake
is arriv'd at this contentedness And if to get this Grace our mind we set By Gods assistance we may compass it In that degree whereby attain we may To what we call perfection of the way But flesh and blood no further can aspire Until that Kingdom comes which we desire Strive what thou mayst affections to withdraw According to the straightness of this Law Thy Neighbours wife desire not then from him Though kind wise rich chast good fair she seem For most who have this way their longings gain'd Instead of Blessings Curses have obtain'd By coveting the goods to others due The beggary of many doth ensue And Servants gotten by anothers wrong Are seldom gainful to such Masters long Because by being lawlesly possest They either prove unfaithful or unblest But he that with his own remains content Shall gain much Bliss and many sins prevent That which doth give occasion to transgress Against this Law is want of watchfulness To heed the baits which our betrayer lays In every object and in all our ways The want of meditating in our thought What inconveniences are dayly brought On such as make no covenants with their eyes Nor bound these longings which in them arise For such as this way do their best endeavour May stumble but they shall not fall for ever Lord in my self I could not find the Will Much less the Power Thy statutes to fulfil But I now feel my heart to entertain A willingness Oh! be it not in vain Thy Grace alone renew'd this Will in me And I a worker now desire to be Who may if thou enable to proceed Improve my willingness unto the Deed Deny it not Oh God! but from this day Ev'n to the latest moment of my stay Vouchsafe unto me thy assisting Grace That I may run a warrantable Race And keep this Law and all thy Laws entire In work in word and also in desire Amen The Epilogue CHRIST IESVS Who is made vnto us Wisedome Rightousnesse Sanctification Redemption 1 Cor. 1. 30 the whole World lieth in Wickednesse 1. Ioh. 5. 19 Rom. 7. 24. O Wretched man that I am who shall deliuer me from y e body of this death Behold the Lambe of GOD which taketh away y e sin of y e world Ioh. 1 29 Deliuer him from going down to the pit I haue found a ransome Iob. 33. 24. Rom. 6. 23. the Wages of sinne is Death ii Timo. 2. 26. That they may recouer themselues out of y e snare of the deuil who are taken captiue by him at his will Though no flesh this Law obey In it self In Christ it may Though it frighteth us for sin Yet our peace it ushers in And in us prepareth place For the saving Law of Grace When this Grace hath taught to Love Hardest works will easy prove And that sin we shall abhor Which we doted on before THE Epilogue The Law from God 's meer love proceeds Though strict it seems and Terror breeds NOW having well observ'd this glorious Law A Creature cloath'd with Majesty and awe Methinks the Body of it seems to me Compos'd of such essential parts to be That he may find who rightly from them shall All as but one each one of them as all And that who ever breaks or keepeth one Observes or breaketh all in what is done As will appear to him who well attends How ev'ry Precept on the rest depends He cannot possibly or love or fear One God aright who willfully doth err In Idol worshippings in vainly using God's holy Name In holy Times abusing Or in permitting so perverse a nature As to abuse Himself or any Creature Belonging to this God with such a mind As may Contentment in such evils find And what is of this Law averr'd we may In ev'ry other Precept boldly say Moreover I conceive it cannot be Of less impossibility that he Who gives the Creature ev'ry way his right Should in his heart his good Creator slight Or actually offend him without sense And sorrow for so hainous an offence He that right Conscience makes to keep one Law Of breaking all the other stands in awe He that his Parents honours as he ought Can never favour Murther in his thought Or thirst for Vengeance never will his eyes Or heart or members act Adulterys No due from any Creature will he take He dares of none conceive receive or speak Untruths or slanders He will never crave Or by a secret longing wish to have What may not be desir'd Nor ought commit Which his profession may not ill befit But penitence will smite him for the deed And in his heart a faithful sorrow breed Much less will he grow wilfully to blame In Prophanation of Gods Days his Name His Worship or his Essence For in one Well doing all good Dutys will be done And this which from one Law is here exprest May really be said of all the rest The like we may as doubtlesly averr Of them who ' gainst one Law perversly err Begin at which you please they so are chain'd All sins are in the breach of one contain'd One wickedness contracts another still And that another either to fulfill Or hide the first until all guilt comes in And wheels him round the cursed Orbe of Sin. For what hath he to bar him from the rest Who but in one hath wilfully transgrest What other sin would he have left undone Which might have hindred his beloved one Or if perpetually he do not act All wickedness and ev'ry filthy Fact Why is it so unless perchance because His finite Nature cannot break all Laws At once in Act Nor his desires extend To ev'ry thing wherein he might offend For ev'ry sacred Law is in his Will Inclusively at least infringed still And Guiltiness would actually appear If power and fit occasions present were For as the Laws fair Body is compos'd Of portions qualified and dispos'd In such a manner that we plainly see The perfect Essence of the whole to be In ev'ry part so likewise hath our Sin An ugle Body and each Limb therein Containeth whether it be great or small Essentially the perfect Guilt of all And by this Body Death a means hath found To give to all Mankind a mortal wound But prais'd be God his Grace provided hath A Light a Guard an Armour and a Path By which we may be quite delivered from The Body of this Death and also come To walk the way of life which else had bin For ever barr'd against us by our sin The Lamb of God by whom we do possess Redemption Wisdom Justice Holiness With ev'ry matchless token of his Love The Guilt of that transgression doth remove Which woundeth first our Nature and from him We have a cure for ev'ry actual Crime He hath fulfilled what we could not keep He gives us power to walk who could not creep He paid the price of that which we had bought He got our Pardon e're the same we sought He bore the stripes