sancti factum est ut quae obscura sunt in Scripturis per apertiora possunt illustrari says St. Austin God hath compounded easie places with difficile that you may have some fruit ready to reap and some to be gathered and expected hereafter unto the ends of the world As we read of Manna that it was saporous to all Palates and every man might taste in Manna whatsoever he loved to taste so the Scripture hath all good relishes in it taste and try and it wants nothing which is delightful for the soul unto salvation No Book in the world hath so many rewards for vertue no Edicts set forrh by all the Princes of the world so many punishments for iniquity no store-house among all the Papers in the world so full of consolation such lofty wisdom delivered in all simplicity such fortitude commanded with so much sufferance and patience such strict justice observed with so much equity and forgiveness is not to be found elsewhere beneath the Sun save in those Volumes of the Holy Ghost Let your eyes love to gaze upon this Fountain as the Doves in the Canticles are said to gaze upon the waters and if you will gaze upon them with a Dove-like innocency you will read them for these five ends First You see in my Text that Christ quotes them to repel the Devil He fought against the Flesh by fasting against the wicked World by retiring into the solitary Wilderness but against the Devil with the authority of the Word of God You shall seldom meet with an Apollos that is mighty in the Scripture with such a one as Antonius of Padua who was called Arca Testamenti by them that admired his cunning in the Scripture his memory was like the Ark wherein the Law of God was laid up seldom shall you find such a man but he will over-master at least the very criminal and notorious suggestions of the Devil Secondly Read them to learn Christ and his glory in them for this end our Saviour directed the Pharisees to Moses and the Prophets and the Beraeans are stiled more noble than those of Thessalonica because when Paul preached Jesus they searched the Scriptures whether those things were so Acts xvii 11. Thirdly Read them for the consolation of that glory which is laid up for you These things were written for our learning that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope Rom. xv 4. All the Traditions in the world beside leave the mind fluctuating and miserably uncertain into what state hereafter the soul shall be received Fourthly Read them to be instructed in the study of Piety and good Works to the glory of God Thou hast known the Scriptures from a child to make thee wise unto Salvation says Paul to his Timothy in that 2 Epist iii. 15. In all the exhortatives and Pandects of Laws which the Heathen made there was not only the omission of some excellent vertues but the permission the very institution of some notorious vices Fifthly Read the Scriptures not to engender questions as very many do but to produce Peace and to be the end of all Controversies To keep up Discords when the Law and Gospel is in our hand to decide them nay to enflame the more because we have waters from the Well of life to quench them is Satans imperial device he is now grown so cunning to wring what he list out of the sacred Text that he presumes Scriptum est shall little hurt him And to the end the Scripture may be more unapt to cut off Controversies the sharpest Controversies in the Church are raised upon the very Scripture As 1. upon the incorruption of the sacred Text. 2. Upon the validity of Translations 3. By augmenting them with Apocryphal Books that are not inspired by the Holy Ghost 4. By interposing they are an incomplete rule without unwritten traditions 5. That they prove nothing indubitably without the unanimous consent of pure antiquity 6. That all the Lay part or at least the unlearned are to be interdicted the reading and possessing them as well because of their obscure sense as because the ignorant may suck out of them the venom of Heresie 7. They jossle the Church and Scripture together which should be superiour 8. They have wrangled themselves almost into Atheism that they know no way but by an historical faith or mans testimony that this is the Writ of God Thus because the Scriptures are given to overthrow the Kingdom of Satan Satan hath done his endeavour by these bad instruments to overthrow the Scriptures But I say again Beloved let us read them not to increase the rent of the Church but to moderate contentions and to stop the gap Thus St. Austin in a sweet strain of concord to please both God and man Fratres sumus quare litigamus Non intestatus mortuus est pater c. We are brethren and therefore should not strive especially since the Will and Testament of our Father is before us to end all branglings Men fall out sometimes about the goods and inheritance of the dead but if a Will be found the quarrel is quickly taken up read how your Father hath bequeathed all things and you can ask no more Brethren we have the first and later Testament of our Father open them peruse them How do you read there Will you not stand to his Will and Ordination Why the Law will compel you As for a Father upon earth Jacet in monumento valent verba ipsius sedet Christus in coelo contradicitur testamento ejus He is rotten in his grave and yet his will given under the testimony of man quiets all suits Christ sits in heaven for ever and shall not his Testament confirmed by the Testimony of the Holy Ghost be an end of all Controversie So far I have pointed at the utility in reading and well using the holy Scripture because the Scripture is the seat of Christs Argument as I called it And more particularly he doth honour the Law so far as thrice together to quote none other but the words of Moses Moses whom above all the men in the world Satan hated as appears by his striving with the Angel about the body of Moses to advance the Text of Moses against Satan was lapides loqui not to turn stones into bread but to turn his words into stones and to cast them at him Moses is truly called Oceanus Theologiae the Ocean from whence all the Prophets since his time did borrow their divinity Aquo seu fonte perenni vatum divinis ora rigantur aquis Moses his Pen was the first that ever drew History For when Alexander the Great took Babylon his Preceptor Aristotle was most diligent to preserve and examine the most ancient Histories in the Babylonian Libraries and their Computations come short of Moses above two thousand years Moses his subject so admirable as none to be compared The Creation of the world the first foundations of
keep this Fast And let me tell you we do not keep the same time that our Saviour did The learnedst Calculators of time ascribe his Baptism to the sixth of January immediately he began his fast which continued to the middle of February For the most part we begin our Lent where he ended but many times later Ecclesiae consuetudo roboravit that is the answer the custom of the Church hath so confirmed it So the observation hath descended to us from hand to hand and our own Church treading in the steps of pure antiquity hath admitted it Beloved the days of the year which are of especial observance are either days of joy or days of fasting and sorrow The chief day of joy is that wherein Christ rose from the dead and it appears that the Apostles appointed it for the solemnity of Christian meetings weekly and called it the Lords day but God left it indifferent to the Church to appoint themselves their own days of fasting and mourning and repentance for we owe all our gladness to God but we owe all our griefs and sorrow to our selves And indeed Fasts are things to be dispensed with to sundry persons and upon divers occasions therefore Almighty God left these things to the discretion of Authority in particular places A great tyranny is exercised in this matter when the Roman Church which is but one particular of the whole will prescribe Laws of abstinence from meats to all other Churches The lesser Churches indeed for uniformity sake were wont to have a respectful regard to the Ceremonies and Adiaphorous Rites which Imperial Cities and Patriarchal Sees did follow Not I say as if the richer and mightier Church did or could bind the smaller to the prestation of her customs but because in things honest and without exception it was meet that the noblest places should be rather imitated than descend to imitate others But O the advantages that Pride will take courtesie in a while was turn'd to necessity and the Roman Bishops did dare to challenge all Churches for Heretical that do not profess uniformity with them in all Fasts and Ceremonies But all the Inke in Italy is not enough to blot out the Canon of the Council of Chalcedon consisting of six hundred Bishops that the Churches of Constantinople because the Emperours kept their chief Palace there should have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 equal Priviledges with the Church of Rome And it is a Story known to all Divines when Monacha St. Austins Mother came to Millain St. Ambrose kept Institutions of Fasts divers from the Church of Rome and was never quarrelled for it Look among all the reasons of the Fathers which perswaded the fast of forty days I find not one that says itwas expedient to be kept because so it seemed good to the Roman Pontifical Authority The Institution depends upon a custom received from one to another in particular Churches A Constitution it is then propagated unto us from age to age The next quaere is whether it be a lawful Constitution That is whether the Church hath power to make Laws for appointed times and qualities of Fasting That the Magistrate may bid a Fast according to the convenience of some seasonable occasion it finds no contradiction unless perhaps some Anabaptistical fury doth oppose it So did Ezra so did Esther so did the King of Nineveh so says Joel Proclaime a Fast call a solemn assembly and in all occasions of woe and calamity to forget our food for a time and to intend nothing but spiritual exercise I know no Christian Church in the world but doth practice it But admit there be no extraordinary woe apparently like to fall upon us either by Sword Famine or Pestilence may not certain times and revolutions of the year challenge an abstinence and parsimony in our diet if the Church will have it so as Friday in every week some Saints Eves in every Month the Ember Fast as we call it every Quarter the Lenten abstinence and prohibition of some meats every year I have said enough before the Primitive Antiquity was very constant and regular in these observations de facto now I will refer you to the proofs of holy Scripture that it may be done de jure Zach. vii 5. There it appears that for the space of seventy years while the Children of Israel were in Captivity in all that space as the year turn'd about they did solemnize Fasts in the Fifth and in the Seventh Month not by Gods Law we find no such Precept but by their own Ecclesiastical Ordinances When ye fasted in the fifth and seventh month even those seventy years did ye at all fast unto me even unto me Their hypocrisie is blamed because they did not humble themselves before the Lord as they ought but the Ordinance was irreprovable The next stone that I will move is that Text Luk. v. 33. The Disciples of John complain that they fasted and the Pharisees fasted but the Disciples of Christ did not fast What Fast is this which they object unto him For it can be no Statute of Gods Laws Who would have kept it sooner than Christ and his Disciples For he came to fulfil the Law and not to break it It could be no Fast of private devotion for it had been most injurious to cavil with Christ for pretermitting their private Fasts it follows therefore that they were Fasts publickly kept enacted by the Synagogue observed not only by the Pharisees but by godly men Johns Disciples Only Christ did dispense with his train because the Children of the Bride-chamber were not to mourn while the Bridegroom was with them and to shew that he was above the Synagogue Moreover it is very strongly probable that all the Jews were bound by their own rules and by no other to fast upon every Sabbath until the sixth hour of the day Josephus their own Historian testifies so much the Gentiles among whom they lived did deride them for it and the Scripture gives us some light for it Neh. viii 3. The ears of all the people were attentive to the Law from morning until noon-day and at the twelfth verse they were dismissed and went to meat But our judicious Hooker argues very learnedly upon Mat. xii 1. Christ walking through the fields the Disciples pluckt the Ears of Corn The Pharisees challenge them for doing that which was not lawful to be done on the Sabbath day The bodily labour to rub the Corn was no such great trespass that it should offend them wherefore nothing could displease them but the breaking of the Fast before the sixth hour and our Saviours answer doth apologize not for their bodily labour not for making bold with another mans Corn it was no theft for the detriment was not valuable but he defends them that they satisfied their hunger by the example of David when he eat the holy bread And thus the Scripture approves the Doctrine which I teach that it is lawful for the
that God is with us from the beginning to the end of our life in want and in abundance in liberty and captivity in evil report and good report and he will never forsake us The words of the Prophet Isaiah are sweeter than the dropping of an honey-comb Isa xlix 14. Sion said the Lord hath forsaken me and my Lord hath forgotten me Can a woman forget her sucking child that she should not have compassion on the Son of her womb Yea they may forget yet will not I forget thee I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands thy walls are continually before me St. Austin attributes so much to the power of faith against all the machinations of hell that he says the very Lesson of it being said by rote is able to defend us Ipsa recitatio symboli retundit inimicum The very repetition of the Creed doth beat off the enemy How much more mighty is the true feeling of faith when it lives within us If thou canst believe saith Christ all things are possible to him that believeth Mar. ix 23. Let Satan therefore keep his demur his hesitation his If thou be the Son of God unto himself Let him not take away your Garland by wavering for he that wavereth is as a wave of the sea sometimes rising aloft sometimes carried down to the Deep Let him not dry up the very fountain of grace So the Greek Fathers did always entitle faith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the mother the spring of all celestial gifts If any man say what faith what spring is this so much commended Briefly I will borrow this description to make it facile No man can have so much as an historical faith and well attend it but he must taste of some fiducial application that he is under the wings of the Almighty and looks for safety under his custody Nemo rectè potest credere Deo quin in Deum is no bad rule but I stand not upon that The faith of the Elect by which we shall be able to overcome our Ghostly enemies is not that which taketh all the holy Scriptures in the lump to be true but it is a willing a lively and an effectual assent to the Promise of the Gospel that Jesus the Son of the blessed Virgin Mary is the Son of God and is the Saviour of all those that repent and believe I say it is a willing and approving a rejoycing assent not forced like that of the Devils and wicked men who are convicted by the evidence of truth and with great horror and disdain confess it Moreover I said it was an effectual assent not a knowledge swimming in the brain informing the judgment but not reforming the heart such as hypocrites have But the understanding being enlightned by the Holy Ghost the will embraceth that which is good the heart is purified by it it works by love and transforms us into a new conversation answerable to that which we believe Now this belief in Christ which is the keeping the condition of Gods Promise doth imply three acts The first of assent that he is the Saviour of all those that believe in him which assent when it is lively and effectual is the proper act of that faith whereby we are justified before God The second act is of application when believing truly he is the Saviour of all that believe I therefore believe that he is my Saviour which is the act of that special faith by which we are justified in our own conscience The third act is of trust and assurance that because I do believe not only that he is the Saviour of the World but also my Saviour therefore I rest upon him for salvation So says our Saviour to his Disciples Let not your hearts be troubled ye believe in God believe also in me Joh. xiv 1. But this is not the act of faith as it justifieth us before God nor yet the proper act of special faith which doth justifie us in our own conscience but a fruit and consequent thereof and such a fruit as the Devil would pluck from the tree with this scrupulous injection if thou be the Son of God Now I will let you see as in a Map by pointing at spots of ground for whole Countries how faith is the fountain of all divine graces and therefore when Satan can make us reel and totter in our opinion whether we are the Sons of God there is not one Christian function in us stands sure but all the parts of true Religion are out of frame For first how can a man hope and wait for the performance of the Promises that doth not believe that they belong unto him Faith being the substance of things hoped for How can a man have true peace of conscience who is not perswaded that God is reconciled to him How can a man rejoyce in God who is not assured of Gods favour towards him How can a man be thankful to God who is not perswaded of Gods love and bounty to him They that have sinned how shall they be perswaded to turn unto him if they be not perswaded that his mercy is ready to receive them No man can perform obedience who is not perswaded that his endeavours are accepted of him No man can pray fervently who doth not assure himself that he shall be heard For so the Apostle How shall they call upon him in whom they have not believed Rom. x. 14. Who can patiently bear afflictions who is not perswaded that those fatherly chastisements proceed from Gods love and and tend to purge him as the Chaff is Winnowed from the Wheat Who can worship God with zeal and devotion who is not resolved and comforted that his service is accepted of him Hope Joy Peace Thankfulness Repentance Obedience Prayer Patience Worship all these will vanish away like a morningmist before the Sun if the Devil can make you distrust with such a tentation as this If thou c. And no marvel if in the first place and before all other parts of sin Satan labours to fill the World with little faith he can spare enough of that out of his own store to infect all the earth for who so great an Infidel as himself in this very tentation The words indeed come off very roundly and confidently that the Son of God with one word can command all the stones in the Wilderness to be made bread But to what end I pray you Whether you say for Christs sake or for the Devils sake every way it will chime Infidelity Argue in the first place why it should be done for Christs sake For if he were God what need he make bread of a stone that could make it of nothing Or though he were hungry what need he make bread at all Is not the bread of heaven able to live without material bread And Chrysologus revies it with his objection Nonne potest panem vertere in saturitatem qui potest in famem lapides immutare He
the first whose feet our Saviour washed to satisfie his aspiring ambition Sed quod lavit gratia inquinavit perfidia says St. Ambrose Grace would have wash'd him clean but that perfidiousness stain'd him like a Blackamore And could Judas lift up his heel against him whose precious hands had wash'd those heels in all humility Like Sciron the murderer who placed his Throne by the Cliffs of the Sea and constrained Passengers to kiss his feet whom he spurned down the Rocks and broke their necks Could those feet be swift to shed bloud Could they find the way into the High Priests Hall after they had been bathed and wiped with the hands of a mighty Prince which notwithstanding cast themselves under the Traitors feet What could the mighty God do more than to draw poor dust and ashes to him with this title Yea mine own familiar friend Thirdly and lastly the name of friend is not pluckt away from Judas because Christ stretched out his arms and was ready to receive him into friendship if he had repented Whither doth this lost man run with his thirty pieces of Silver Is there not an High Priest to go to greater than all the Priests in Jerusalem that he runs to Caiaphas to cast them before him in desperation As Tacitus said of Claudius Apollinaris a vain inconstant man Neque fidei constans erat neque constans in perfidiâ so Judas knew neither how to be faithful to Christ nor how to behave himself when he was treacherous When he had trained a Plot to betray his Lord he knows not how to make amends to renounce the treachery Had he but stood and wept among the Daughters of Jerusalem or ran to Golgotha to learn repentance from the converted thief then surely he that bore the iniquities of all the world upon his Cross would have felt no more burden if he had carried the sin of Judas And so much for the last reason because our Saviour is ready to be reconciled to every contrite man therefore he did expect this fruit from Judas and calls him his own familiar friend I proceed to the next branch of his crime He whom I trusted did lift up his heel against me But because our Saviour knew before what was in man or in the heart of man it must stand as a question to be debated why he would lay himself so low as this humility to trust in Judas 1. Bucer comparing this place of the Psalmist with the same as it is cited Joh. xiii 8. finds these words to be left out in St. John the man in whom I trusted and so rejecting Judas as never worthy of our Saviours trust applies himself to give no answer 2. Leo and Euthymius varying from some stories which cast infamy upon Judas that he slew his Father and was incestuous with his Mother to the end that he might honour our Saviours choice in the twelve Apostles inclines to that opinion that Judas was once good and worthy of our Saviours trust Yea Theophylact is willing so far to excuse the Traitor as if he did not sell his Master thinking to bring him to the death of the Cross but having had experience both at the brow of the hill when the people would have cast him down and likewise when he escaped stoning in the Temple by passing away in form invisible how it was in his power to delude his enemies I say Theophylact conceits of Judas that he did expect Christ would now have acquitted himself from the judgment of Pilate Beloved this is my rule Where men cite conjecture and not reason it is free to gainsay or incline to their authority But where the Scripture gives up a spark it is enough for us to light a Candle by Now says Christ very early after he had chosen his Apostles John vi Have I not chosen you Twelve and one of you is a Devil This methinks disables Euthymius his opinion and from the beginning there was no grace in Judas 3. The common current of Expositors confine the trust which this man had to the credit which was given him to bear our Saviours Purse of Alms and Charity What they say cannot be disallowed as improbable yet it seems Christ put little trust in such an officer for when a payment was to be made of Tribute unto Caesar the money was borrowed of a Fish and laid in the hand of his true Apostle St. Peter to disburse it 4. This is the construction of the Gloss Christ had that eye of trial over all things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and therefore it could not be verified in him that he put any confidence in so ungracious a practiser Sed membra crediderunt As Christ was persecuted in the person of the Church Saul Saul why persecutest thou me So he trusted in Judas in the person of the Church which did whilom believe in him for a true Apostle Yea Leo tells it with as much confidence as if he had seen it that no Apostle did cure more diseases or cast out more Devils than Judas and he passeth in old stories for no indiligent Preacher O how often do such false Teachers enter in passing for Seeds-men and sowing Darnel in the field So that the Church may say of such Labourers Yea mine own c. 5. St. Ambrose his judgment shall be the close of these opinions and as I conceive it carries weight Periclitari maluit judicium suum Christus quà m affectum Christ had rather we should conceive hardly of his judgment than to think he is not of the same affections with us He had undertaken our frailty and would shew it in this part of his humility He that hungred could have contented nature without meat he that slept in the Ship could have satisfied nature without a slumber he that is more inward to our heart than our own selves could have displayed the secrets of Judas openly yet it did please him otherwise to shew his agreement in civil commerce with the frailties of men St. Chrysostom preaching upon St. Paul being struck blind from heaven hath this Moral upon it Nemo meliùs videt quà m qui caecuttit No man sees better than he that hath been once blind According to which I say No man is more prudent than he that hath been once deceived Therefore that we may patiently suffer our judgment sometimes to be abused our Saviour put himself in the way to be a mirrour of that humility And his own familiar c. He that did eat of my bread Here is another Article to fill up the measure of Judas his Enditement What another obligation And yet betray his Lord I am ashamed to say there is so much iniquity in the nature of man But it is too true that a small kindness as it will work no good so it will work no hurt upon the worst men whereas a multitude of benefits provokes ingratitude to hate the Author Beneficia eo usque laeta sunt dum videntur exolvi
and his Conspiracy against King David And so much hath been spoken for the four just Conditions of the Vow of the Rechabites 1. It was a thing indifferent but reducible to the fulfilling of the Law 2. Let it be possible in the Sphere of our own ability 3. Let it be just and lawful 4. Let it be full of weight and moment to draw us to the fear of the Lord. The third part of my Text I have destined out to shew unto you that the Romish Monks whose strictness and devotion is so famous among our Adversaries that their Canons are not built upon the imitation of the Rechabites That any particular Church may have Religious Orders and Votaries I grant it That point shall break no peace between us In points not fundamental our Saviours rule must hold He that is not against us is with us But Vows undertaken wherein they do neither consult with the strength of man if they can be done nor with conscience if they may be profitably done nor with the Text of Scripture if they may be lawfully done this cannot but break out into a quarrel And in Essential points it is also a Maxim from our Saviours mouth He that is not with us is against us Whatsoever is in the world says St. John it is either the concupiscence of the flesh the concupiscence of the eye or the pride of life For the correcting of these three Tentations the Friers have propounded three Vows The Concupiscence of the Eye is remedied by Monastical Poverty say they and why not as well by a contented mind The Concupiscence of the Flesh is remedied by the Vow of Chastity says the Romanist I am sure experience doth tell us that Gods Remedy is the surest the Bed of Marriage The Pride of Life is remedied by Blind Obedience says the Papist and why not as well by humility and acknowledgment of our own unworthiness Wonder you so much that so many should retire themselves into Voluntary Poverty is this such news abroad when you cannot walk the Streets at home but swarms of Canters meet you who will not live by the hope of their labour but by alms and charity The poor Artisan the painful Plowman who cannot make his long days labour feed him and refresh him at night doth this man I pray you look like one who deserves relief or an obstinat Mendicant a Rechabite that watcheth night and day to feed his Flock or a Capuchin that trudgeth night and noon about the City to feed his belly Did Christ descend of the seed of Jonadab and Lazarus no but of Abraham a mighty Prince Crates and Antisthenes may cast their Silver from them and retain their vices true Christians give up themselves to God and with themselves they give up all things Cosmus and Damianus who grudged a Monk his Christian Burial because he had laid up a little Silver in his Study were too prodigal of their zeal and mist our Saviours meaning To leave Lands and Houses for his Names same was to beget an exercised mind for patience to prepare Worldlings to be ready to cast away their Burdens for the flight of persecution It is good for a man in some sort to depend upon Gods temporal blessings lest we grow careless of Prayer In Egypt where the River Nilus waters the earth and fats the ground without rain nemo oratorum coelos aspicit Pray who will they trust in Nilus Then I may contest against the Sectaries of St. Francis and the like that Voluntary Poverty is not built upon the foundation of the Rechabites and those idle swarms of the Cloisters have not left the World but civility But for the Covenant of perpetual Virginity there they think to bear the Bell away and that they only shall be the men who carry Palm Branches before the Lamb among the Virgins Rev. 7. It is in weak man to afford God as much chastity as he pleaseth Can our frail will cast anchor in the depth of concupiscence and say unto the surging waves of lust as Christ did to the Sea Peace be still So Xerxes threw chains into the Ocean to bind it but trow you the Tide was the calmer St. Paul durst not do so He would admit no Widows into the strict Orders of the Primitive Church under sixty years of age Yea says Leo the first of that name rather than want a College full I will entertain them at fourty nay says Pius the first what if they profess Virginity at five and twenty And now the Canons have opened the Market a little more every Girl may enter into a Cloyster at fifteen if she like them As Elias set the Sacrifice on fire when the Trenches were filled with cold water round about so unchast acts may get predominance of the will notwithstanding all the spiritual Scleragogie and exercise to tame the body Fasting humbleth Prayer is powerful honest Communication apparelleth the mind with good thoughts Watching tameth the flesh All this is spiritual but I am carnal Quoque magis premitur tanto magis aestuat ignis Is it not usual in the Court of Rome to grant Dispensations to supply the decay of Noble Families but they are never granted to entangle an ensnared conscience And do they love Virginity In the Council of Chalcedon it was decreed that there should be reserved for the Bishop 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the absolute authority of Indulgence to pardon a distressed Maid who disaccording to her Vow had married But such a Marriage by the Romish Doctrin now adays is esteemed worse than Adultery and do they love Chastity Finally it was the Discipline of Numa against a Vestal Virgin who had committed folly to bury her alive Such a fault in the Roman Monasteries is passed by either with a full connivance or with the smallest penance For wot you why it may be every mans case and do they love Virginity I am sure the Rechabites did honour Marriage and propagated a good Generation to the World They knew that the gift of perpetual continence is not a Grace of common course and extraordinary Dispensations are not presumptuously to be arrogated to the use of every regenerate Christian no nor for the command of any Prophet Why should St. Paul leave Trophimus sick at Miletum Why was Bishop Timothy his stomach weak Paul could not help it Grace allotted for extraordinary operations is not every mans portion nor always at hand for them who at some seasons have a taste of it and such is the Rose of the Garland the gift of Chastity Finally Obedience which in our Voyage in this World is like a sweet gale that fills the sails and makes our Vessel fly swift upon the wings of the wind yet as it is blind and Monastical it is like a Serena such a calm whereby the Bark can go neither backward nor forward and it is not built upon the foundation of the Rechabites not upon obedience to their own Father but upon the
upon their bare knees to procure them that happiness to be readmitted into the union of the body of Christ Rowl those words in your conscience which Christ spake to the Apostles Whatsoever ye bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven and it would gripe you as if the knot were tied about your Heart to be shut out of the Fold of Christs Flock by the Sentence Ecclesiastical They that are set over your soul have not the use of the material Sword but the words of Discipline that proceed out of their mouth are sharper than any two-edged Sword Having in readiness to revenge all disobedience says St. Paul 2 Cor. x. 13. In promptu habentes What so ready upon all occasions as the Tongue If this Mother be offended by the impenitency and contumacy of her degenerous Sons she will suddenly smite them with such a wound as nothing can heal but her own forgiveness and the grace of God But a Mother is soon intreated if the Child seek her with tears and lowliness It is a gentle caution which Bernard gives to them that sway the authority in spiritual censures Discite subditorum matres vos esse non Dominos studete magis amari quà m metui si interdum severitate opus sit materna sit non tyrannica Let not your severity be tyrannical but with the compassion of a Mother Thirdly Forasmuch as the Church is our Mother we must carry that venerable duty towards her that great heed must be had to her determinations of Faith not as if it were the rule of truth that is the prerogative of Sacred Scripture but because it holds out the rule of truth and the Ministry thereof is the condition subordinate under God to find out truth My Son forsake not the teaching of thy Mother says Solomon Prov. vi 10. Means he our natural Parent only Nay says Mercer Potes ad Ecclesiam si velis referre You may refer it to the Church if you will And a good reason why that not only it may be but most aptly it should be applied to our mystical or spiritual Mother for the blessings reckoned up in that place to those that will be taught by the wisdom of their Mother are so many as they are not like to be the fruits of obedience to a natural mother only To make my self way the sooner out of this vast Point by distinctive conclusions First If we call that Jerusalem that Church our Mother which St. Paul doth here the most Primitive Church which includes the Apostles Evangelists it is bootless to dispute in a thing so evident that it is to explain the sense and decide the meaning of all Articles of Faith for the Apostles spake as God did give them utterance who is the Author of all hidden and heavenly truths and we are to rest in him as the fountain of all illumination Secondly Excluding the Apostles Evangelists and others conversant with them who were immediately inspired to know all truth which makes a perfect Christian in their own person take the Vniversal Church from their days unto this time and I conceive that the uniform practice and general judgment of all Gods servants that went before us is a certain and undoubted explication of all those Points contained in Scripture that concern our salvation We are taught in the Articles of our Creed that this Church is a witness which we ought to listen unto I believe the holy Catholick Church It hath the promise that the Gates of Hell shall not prevail against it Also Isa lix 21. This is my Covenant with them saith the Lord my Spirit which is upon thee and my words which I have put in thy mouth shall not depart out of thy mouth nor out of the mouth of thy Seed nor out of the mouth of thy Seeds Seed from henceforth and for ever This is a Promise that the Church dispersed in all places and continued in all times shall keep the trust of saving truth inviolably So Tertullian so Vincentius Lir. upon this subject Quod apud multos unum est non est erratum sed traditum says the former That which is uniformly taught by many much more by all is no lie but a truth delivered by that Church to which God hath entailed his blessing that it shall not forsake it I do not say yet that this Vniversal Church is absolutely free from error but from such error only as would shake the stability of faith Some things that may be unknown without prejudice were ever concealed But the whole Church that is and was is so free from error and ignorance that it knows and possesseth all the truth which Christ hath revealed The Churches are the Golden Candlesticks in the midst whereof the Son of God did walk Rev. i. 12. Thirdly take the Church for all those Christians that are now presently living in the world and among those there will ever be some whom God will preserve from pernicious Error yet those some are not necessarily and always such as are in place of Authority or palpably notorious that we may have recourse unto them In a populous Congregation I have heard a Psalm sung quite out of tune by the greater part and those few that sung tunably could not be heard for a long time till at last their good harmony gained a considerable number to listen unto them and to imitate them So false Doctrine may spread far and the soundest judgments be silenced in the Plurality of opposition If their tunable Notes beget good Musick in others it is the working of God which is stronger than the violence of men But from hence I collect that there is no man living nor any Society of men living which hath such indubitable authority from God that they may pronounce a judicial definitive Sentence to oblige and convince the Consciences of others in Controversies of Religion To relie upon one mans Oracle it were a ready way indeed if it were a certain But that man whom we mean is of such little credit with those that cry him up that he cannot make his Partisans submit unanimously to him in his own cause And for general Councils the great Army of Jesus Christ his pitch'd battel since the former may be corrected by the later and have been corrected their judgment is so awful as may quel the resistance of private men but not so irrefragable upon their decision as to tie their Conscience You will say then hath God provided no certain and external judicial authority to Umpire differences of Religion in this or that present Age I answer First he hath given the complete and perfect Rule of Faith in holy Scripture which hath spoken so plainly in things necessary to be believed that it needs no Gloss to make it plainer As Aristotle says That Laws which are penn'd with the best wisdom do leave but little to the will of the Expounder Secondly We are not Brutes that know not our right hand from