indeed the custome upon such cures to offer up two Turtles or two young Pigeons at least This he bids him doe for regard to the letter of the Law but mystically sends him to the Priest to shew himself that is to teach us we must shew our Consciences our Sins to the Priest which sins are many times the causes of our corporal diseases and yet with this difference that the Mosaick Priest could onely declare the cure whereas the Evangelicall Priest effects or works it by absolving actually from â—in Goe therefore saith the Text shew thy self to the Priest and offer up thy gift that as thereby they may see thou art cured so they may testifie the same to the world the reason why he was bid Goe to the Priest in the singular number and why it was said doe this in testimony to them in the plurall was in regard there came alwayes one officiating Priest by turnes and he for that time was called the Chief Priest that is the then officiating Priest but what was done by him was to bee made known to all the rest of his company who were in their turns to officiate as well as he Now wee are here to note a Triple Testimonie meant in this place The first is that of the Leper to the Priest shewing his body sound unto him and in sign thereof giving up his offering The second was the Lustration or Lotion of the Priest applyed to the party cured testifying thereby he was capable of being admitted into the company of others as a sound man who had now been washed by the Priest with the legall Lustration or expiation of water taking off the ceremonie of his Legal irregularity by reason of the Leprosie The last and chief Testimony which Christ alludes unto here was that of the miracle done upon this Leper who was to shew the Priest by telling of him how he was cured That Christ was the Messias and by this meanes hee gave indeed testimony to the Priest of that Deity in Jesus which had wrought this cure upon him 5. This is the second Miracle which Christ wrought in confirmation of his doctrine upon the mount as abovesaid and no marvell the Leper was the first because he was a Jew but the Centurion was a Gentile a Commander or captain of an hundred men belonging to the Roman Militia yet whether he were himself a Romane or a Spaniard some doubt â—uffice it he was a Heathen converted by this miracle upon his son principally but formerly much attracted by the reports of other our Saviours Miracles so wee see here he comes strong in Faith even to Christs own admiration some say this mans son was that Oppius a Centurion also who having the command of the Military forces that attended at the crucifying of our Saviour was then and not before converted to the Faith of Christ seeing what prodigious signs were at that time in the heavens and upon the face of the earth Note this miracle was done at our Saviours entrance into Capernaum that City where hee chose to doe many signall wonders but wee are to observe that S. Luke recounts this passage otherwise as saying the Centurion sent first his servants then his friends both which consist with his after going in person upon Christs coming into the town and upon his childs neer approaching unto death though some explicate this place as if it imported onely that the Centurion went to meet him not personally but as S. Luke sayes by mediation of his friends yet lesse probably in regard the personall faith of this Centurion is that which makes the whole storie remarkable Again whether this were the Centurions son or servant is not certain S. Luke calling him servant this Evangelist son to the Centurion or boy who was though a servant dear at least as a son for so were many of the servants in those dayes esteemed of by their masters and provided for as their own children but this makes noâ— much to the purpose certain it is that both the Evangelists tell the undoubted truth of the same Miracle bee their circumstances differing or not it imports but little Hence wee may solve the seeming contradiction of S. Lukes telling us the Centurion sent for Christ to come to his house about this cure and of Saint Matthews saying here he onely required his word not his presence as holding himself not worthy of so much honour for both may stand in a divided sense that is first inviting him by the Iewes his own Countrymen to doe a Gentile that honour but after coming in person and saying O Lord I am not worthy being a Gentile that thou the most Blessed among the Jews shouldest doe me so much honour seeing wee Gentiles are held an unclean people not worthy the company of thy select and chosen Natives the Jewes 6. As to the Paralytick or sick chiâ—d ill tormented with his disease we are to know There are two sorts of Paralyticks some are such as run not danger of death but may hope for cure as those where the resolution of the nerves is but in part of the body taking away sense and motion in some part onely others desperate of all humane help and such was this boyes case whereby the miracle appeared to bee the greater and the more undoubted for here was a totall resolution of the nerves accompanied with a Convulsion leaving the whole body almost quite insensible and unmoveable of it self 7. It seems Christ was well satisfied of this Centurions Faith when immediatly upon his demand he promised to go and cure his sick child 8. Bee this saying of the Centurion Courtship or reall agnition of his unworthinesse it boots not certain it is hâ— had reason to say as much in civility being a Gentile seeing our Saviour a Jew come neer his house and offer to goe in but much more certain it is by the whole context of the following Gospel that he did believe Jesus was able to cure as well at a distance as by personal touch Note this temporall comportment of the Centurion is an excellent pattern for us of the like spirituall behaviour when we receive Jesus not onely into our house but even into our soules in the B. Sacrament each of us to cry out then O Lord I am not worthy c. 9. See here how really the Centurion argued against Christs giving himself the trouble of going to his boy in person and believed his power was abundantly sufficient without his presence when he not onely bids him spare his labour but instanceth how himself being a man under Authority so sayes the Text but means a man of power and command was able in vertue of his power to doe as much as if he applyed his person to the action Though withall the Centurion calls himself a man of power over his little troop and under power of his head Commander both at once and therefore useth an argument from the lesser to the greater as saying if
Parents will to have him lost If then beloved we see the piety of the B. Virgin Mother of God was short of that which must be our guide how can we hope with lesse than heavenly piety to render our actions our desires gratefull to his divine Majesty And who can now complain there wants connexion in this Prayer unto the other service of the day if any doe let him see how to comply with the heavenly piety of his Eternall Father Jesus was Thirty years together subject to his Temporall Mother and then we shall soon find out a way how to sweeten the sour of our humane actions by having no desire to any of them less than heavenly nor to doe them with less than heavenly piety The Epistle ROM 12. ver 1. c. 1. I Beseech you therefore Brethren by the mercy of God that you exhibite your bodies a living host holy pleasing God your reasonable service 2. And be not conformed to this world but he reformed in the newnesse of your mind that you may prove what the good and acceptable and perfect will of God is 3. For I say by the grace that is given me to all that are among you not to be more wise than behooveth to be wise but to be wise unto sobriety to every one as God hath divided the measure of Faith 4. For as in one body we have many members but all the members have not one action 5. So we being many are one body in Christ and each one anothers members The Explication 1. THe Apostle had in his former Chapter told them much of the mercies of Almighty God and shewed them how though the wicked were justly condemned yet even the Blessed were most mercifully saved hence by that mercy so much inculcated immediately before he now conjures them that as they had now received from him the rule of Faith so they would frame their manners their actions and lives according to that rule see what is said of this Rule in the next Sundayes Epistle Rom. 12. v. 6. But to the present Text wherein the Apostle here beseecheth them by the mercy so much above recommended to live good lives answerable to their rule of Faith and to exhibite their bodies by action as well as their souls by Faith a living host to God There are many who loose the literall sense of this place by contenting themselves with the divers and those excellent mysticall meanings thereof as first by saying our bodies are living when our lives are vertuous Secondly when we are charitable because charity is the life of all vertues Thirdly when we have received the Sacrament of Christ his Body and Bloud but in very deed the literall allusion here is to the antient bloudy Sacrifices both of Jews and Gentiles made of beasts dead bodies whereunto the daily unbloudy Sacrifice of the Evangelicall Lamb is diametrically opposite first of the living Body and bloud of Christ next of living chastized but not mortified bodies of Christians being as the Apostle adviseth offered up to the service of Almighty God since such chastizements leave the bodies living by a naturall life again they live by the spirituall life of good works done in obedience to their soules command for so operating besides by corporall mortification or pennance the body is made truly a living host because it is mortified alive by becoming subject to the command of the Spirit for all mortification is a kind of living death whilest it makes the body dye to concupiscence and live to grace but these our bodies must further be holy Sacrifices that is to say imployed in holy not prophane or impure works not worshipping Idols as the Gentiles did but God as befits good Christians not polluting their bodies with unchast actions but keeping them pure and undefiled for this purity is by the Apostle 1 Cor. 7 called sanctity and is such indeed Again this bodily host must be pleasing to God for it may be living and holy in it self and yet not pleasing to God if the offerer be displeasing since many there are who fast goe in pilgrimage to holy places doe other corporall pennances and yet not rectifying together their souls obliquities their passions of the mind are nothing pleasing to God Lastly he concludes exhorting that our offerings to God be seasoned with the salt of wisedome that is be alwayes a reasonable service not fond childish curious indiscreet or singular but such as we may ever render a reasonable account of even to God who will not allow of indiscretions for reasons though indeed the Apostle here alludes to the irrationall offerings among the Gentiles who made their Idols their Gods and dedicated their services to Stocks and Stones whereas he would have Christians be more reasonable and instead of dead beasts to offer their living bodies joyntly with the acts of their believing hoping and loving souls to be a perpetuall Sacrifice or service to God all their life time and thus the whole creature will become not a corporall not an irrationall but a spirituall and reasonable Sacrifice 2. The Apostle hath pleased to make a disjunctive recommends of this entire creature in way of Sacrifice to God while in the former verse he insisted cheifly on the corporall part of the creature which we are and so advised how to render our bodies a living Sacrifice to God but in this verse he tells us how to render our better part the soul of man an acceptable oblation to the divine Majesty and since Christian perfection consists as well in declining evill as in doing good therefore this verse begins with removing evill out of our way that so we may doe good which the Apostle understands when he bids us take heed we doe not conforme our actions to the course of this unconformable world and this we shall performe by avoiding the evill that we see in men for we shall then best shew that we doe not conforme unto sinfull men when we fly their company and avoid such actions as renders them sinners and having thus followed the negative part of this counsell we are the better prepared to put the positive part thereof in execution for by not conforming to the world we whose bodies are made up of the old worldly metall shall be reformed in the newnesse of our minds by setting them henceforward on heavenly which heretofore were imployed wholly upon earthly cogitations so the Apostle by bidding us not conform to this world did not mean to forbid us making use of it but not to figure our selves like unto it that is not to become vain proud idle and the like as the world is for so we make our selves figures of this world or variable as worldlings are whereas the Apostle desires us to avoid becoming mutable or transitory figures and wisheth us to become persisting formes rather which are of a permanent nature namely spirituall formes of Saints not worldly figures of men and here reformation imports in truth
of the holy Altar and the touch of all their Omnipotent Powers in the Sacrament of Confession See now Beloved how aptly we doe pray to Day to have the Right-hand of the Divine Majesty extended over our infirmity when the Preachers tell us by the touch of the Deity we are cured of all Diseases On the fourth Sunday after the EPIPHANY The Antiphon MAT. 8. ver 25. O Lord save us we perish Command and cause O God tranquilitie Vers Let my prayer c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer O God who knowest us to be set in so great dangers that we cannot through humane frailty subsist grant unto us health of minde and body that what we suffer for our Sins thou helping us we may overcome The Illustration THe last Sundayes Prayer exhibited the horrour of sin unto us under the notion of diseases This of dangers which we finde so great and wherein we are so openly set that humane frailty considered wee are not able to subsist And therefore against these extrinsecall dangers we beg of God this day as an intrinsecall Protectrice health at least of body and of mind that since in punishment for our sins wee must suffer to be thus exposed to dangers we may be able Gods holy grace assisting us to overcome them This may suffice to render unto every soul the sense of this delicious prayer what remains will be to shew how apposite it is to the Epistle and Gospel of the day which Two are generally allowed to have a pious report to one another and consequently if the prayer be set to the tune of either it must agree with both by the undeniable rule of Schools When any two things are one and the same with a third they must both be so with one another but here the Prayer agrees cleerly enough with the Gospel therefore it cannot be discordant to the Epistle and indeed what more pat to the Gospel relating th Apostles dangers in a tempest at Sea than this prayer altogether deprecating dangers so the difficulty will be to make a harmony between the Epistle and it wherein there is no sillable of danger openly expressed and yet upon reflection we shall find regard enough to danger therein for first the grand Pellitorie the most potent repeller of all dangers meets us in the Van of this Epistle Love whereof S. Paul sayes It is the chaser of all fears out of doors and consequently must needs bee free from all dangers which ever inforce fears upon us timorous Leverets of corrupted nature but further see a prohibition palpable in our eyes in the next Verse of this Epistle Thou shalt not commit Adultery and prohibitions are ever opposites to dangers indeed preventers of them so 't is a sign the Epistle hath regard enough to those dangers which the Prayer deprecates but the last verse comes home to this sense telling us The love of our neighbour worketh no evill that is no danger for evils are the greatest of all other dangers therefore love is the best buckler against dangers in regard it is the fulnesse of the Law which is never made but to prevent the dangers we incurre by the prevarication thereof For to the Iust there is no Law put 1 Tim. 1.9 And thus wee see from first to last a totall exhausting of the Epistle and Gospel by the admirable Piety of this dayes Prayer The Epistle ROM 13. vers 8. c. 8. OWe no man any thing but that you love one another For he that loveth his neighbour hath fulfilled the Law 9. For Thou shalt not commit advoutry Thou shalt not kill Thou shalt not steal Thou shalt not bear false witness Thou shalt not covet and if there be any other Commandment it is comprized in this word Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self 10. The Love of thy neighbour worketh no evill Love therefore is the fulness of the Law The Explication 8. SOme misunderstand this place as if it did argue obligation to pay the debt of Love but that all other debts were with all speed to be payd whereas in very truth the sence of this place is quite otherwayes and imports as much as if the Apostle had said what other debts soever you are able to discharge yet never esteem your selfe quit from the debt of Love which you must alwayes owe unto your neighbour though you clear all other accounts debts or scores with him because when this debt in part is payd it inflames the reckoning for the part behind just as fire being blâ—wn or made use of doth more and more enkindle whereas if rak't up in the ashes it soon dies So the more we use charity the more we enkindle and increase it therefore the Apostle saies well that we can never be out of this debt to our neighbour since if we pay him the Love we owe unto him for this day to morrow we shall find our debt of Love inflamed and and grown greater by the very agitation of that divine fire which is the mutuall Love of one another To which purpose S. Augustine Epist 62. ad Coelestin hath an excellent saying SEMPER DEBEO CHARITATEM QUAE SOLA c. Love I must alwaies owe which of all debts though payd yet still keeps a man in bonds And againe CHARITATEM LIBENS REDDO c. I do willingly pay Love and as willingly take it in payment it is a thing which when received I count not my self fully satisfied nor when I repay it discharged Hence we may see how absurdly the Anabaptists and Trinitarians Heresy exploded by this Text all debts of Justice and onely required the debt of Love to stand due for if Charity oblige to doe ultroneous and voluntary good deeds how much more to do Justice but so perfect a payment of all debts is commanded by this place as we see the Apostle saies Who loveth his neighbour fulfilleth the Law because we cannot love him but we must love God for himself and man for God's sake as we love our selves 9. And to confute further the Heresy above mentioned see how this whole verse insists upon Acts of Justice to our neighbour rooted in the commanded Love to them aforesayd Whence some conceive the Apostle alludes onely to the law of the Second Table because here is no mention of any one of the three precepts belonging to the First Table importing our duty to God but S. Austin contends that the love of man being but subordinate to the love of God 1 John 4. v. 7. imports and includes both grounded on those words of S. John Children love one another repeated over and over againe to his friends and being asked why he did so he replied because it is the Precept of our Lord and if this alone be done it is sufficient For our love to God and man is like the lines drawn from the Center to their Circumference be the Center God the Circle man the Lines our affections see then how they
suites unto the rest of this dayes service also because all these were figures of our Baptisme in Christ of our being fed with the Manna of his Blessed Body and with the drink of his precious Bloud and lest it should be with us as the Epistle ends by telling us it was with the Children of Israel in the greater part of whom God was not well pâ—eased because they requited those signall favours with their murmurings ingratitude and other hainous crimes therefore holy Church this Day with more than ordinary reason bids us all pray as guilty it seemes of like ingratitude that we who for our sinnes are justly punished for the glory of Gods Name may be mercifully delivered from the same that so having prayed away Sin the cause we may be quit of the effect our just punishment for Sin And this for the onely reason whereupon we can hope it meerly to glorifie the Name of God who if for his own glory he should not forgive us could have no title or motive from us to doe it and for that cause this Prayer doth presse him home for Mercy when it mindes him of his own Glory in the being mercifull as being indeed the end for which he made mankinde that by him he might be glorified and fill up the places of the collapsed Angels The Epistle 1 COR. 9. ver 24. c. and Chap. 10. ver 1. c. 24. KNow you not that they that run in a race all run indeed but one receiveth the price so run that you may obtain 25. And every one that striveth for maistery refraineth himself from all things and they certes that they may receive a corruptible crown but we an incorruptible 26. I therefore so run not as it were at an uncertain thing so I fight not as it were beating the aire 27. But I chastise my Body and bring it into servitude lest perhaps when I have preached to others my self become reprobate Chap. 10.1 For I will not have you ignorant Brethren that our Fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the Sea 2. And all in Moses were baptized in the cloud and in the Sea 3. And all did eat the same Spiritual food 4. Aad all drunk the same Spirituall drink and they drunk of the Spirituall Rock that followed them and the Rock was Christ 5. But in the more part of them God was not well pleased The Explication 24. THE Apostle had in the foregoing verses spoken of his disinterested evangelizing without the least mixture of sordid gaine for his so doing but meerly out of zeale to Soules and love to God and in this verse he similifies between an Evangelizer and one that runs a race having first stated his businesse that the Evangelizer must be a man voyd of all proper Interest or ends ayming onely at Gods honour and the salvation of Soules so to this purpose he tels us first litterally of Evangelizers that though all of them doe runne yet it seemes not alwaies all with one ayme or end not for one and the same prise some for true zeale and they win the race others for self interest and they though continually running yet loose the match because they runne by the bowe not by the string they would fayne carry with them the compasse of their own desires and yet think to get heaven too so they take perhaps more paines and yet to lesse indeed to no purpose Mystically the Apostle meanes the same of the lay-people who all pretend to runne for the prize of heaven but he that is to say such onely winne it who runne right on and make no Maeanderous circles of mixed ends which retard their speed And that he meanes not onely one person but all such as runne equally that is to their utmost all for one pure simple and impermixed end the following words avow when he saies so runne yee that yee may obtaine that yee may winne the race the prize the kingdome of heaven the Crown of Glory Here he speaks in the plurall number to shew that heaven is not reserved onely for the best of Christians but that every good Christian may by running reach it but then he must be alwaies running as continually racers are since the least interpaulation or intermission of running is to cast ones self behind and therefore by so running is here meant running with all speed possible since when we doe all we can unlesse God reward our uttermost endeavours with adding spirituall wings to our leaden heels we shall come short Hence it is S. Austine saies very well Not to goe forward in virtue is to goe backward So S. Bernard too Epist 254. therefore if to advance be to runne not to runne is to loose ground and in the same place he brings in a similitude of Jacobs ladder whereon there was no angel at all stood still but every one was in perpetuall motion either upwards or downwards The ascending Angels importing the blessed soules and the descending the damned whence it is that not to rise in virtue is to fall to vice shewing there is no finall medium between good and bad between heaven and hell 25. Here the Apostle alludes to his own refraining all sinister or propper interest in his Evangelizing least they might retard his speed in that race he was running for his crown of Glory as Racers refraine from all such meats as doe obstruct or shorten their wind and feed upon those things as dilate the lungs or lengthen wind which is of greatest use for Coursers and thus he doth to confound those sordid Soules who will abridge themselves here of many pleasures and delights meerely to gaine the temporall reward of popular applause and yet will not refraine the least of their sensualities to gaine the eternall reward of praise from God and Angels but if we shall gather one principle which will serve to all purposes in this kind let us here fix our eyes upon temperance as most conducing to healthy and vigorous soules as takeing away all lustfull humours and supplying us with chast spirits that render our soules sound agil active and victorious 26. See how prettily S. Paul compares sinister ends in Gods service to men at cuffs with the ayre or running at hazard whether they shall win or loose that is by mixing humane with divine ends by rayling at the world and the devill as if they were our onely enemies and yet pampering the body which is indeed mans greatest adversary in regard neither of the other two can hurt us if we be sure the body be subdued Because we are not tempted as angels by pure intellectual motives but by sensual or corporeall ones 27. And that this was the Apostles sence in the verse above see how he now speakes in clear termes to the same purpose saying I chastize my body and bring it into servitude as if that were indeed the maine enemy a man had and truely so it is for nothing saith Aristotle enters into
the soule or understanding but first it must passe the sentinels of our outward sences and they if loyall will keep out all sinne whatsoever but if corrupted or treacherous to their sovereigne the soule then they welcome any traytour sent by the world or the devill to surprize their Prince and indeed all resistance to forreigne enemies is vayne if we first subdue not our domestick foe our own bodies by forcing them to obey the commands of reason for unlâ—sse we bring them first to this obedience all our resistance to sinne is like artilery let flye at crowes in the ayre when an army of daring men are ready to run into the mouthes of our Cannon and might be taken off if levelld at whilest our bullets fly in vaine above their heads by a mismounting our Artillery that is to say by roaring and crying out against the distantiall world and devill when indeed the flesh is the storming foe that scales our walls unresisted at the same time we pretend a maine resistance to our mightiest foes this fond way of fight the Apostle tells us of when he shewes his own close guard to be the safer defence namely the chastizement of his own body and if we aske what that chastizement imports we shall find it to be not onely a correction or slight rebuke but an absolute subduing or captivating of it to the soules command by fasting prayer and other corporall austerities as haire-shirts disciplines or worse tormenting instruments such as holy men have taught us the wholsome use of upon all notable occasions of temptations or dangers to the soule nay these meanes the Apostle used amidst his greatest spirituall labours least as he sayd while he preached to others he might himself become reprobate by the assault of pride or vain-glory how much more then oght those to mortifie their bodies who do not wast them in spirituall indeavours as S Paul did but above all how fondly do Hereticks shake off the use of corporal mortifications the exercise of good works under pretence of Faith alone to be sufficient when the greatest master of Spirit in the world S. Paul dares not hold himself by Faith secure without good works much lesse did he boast as they doe of a revelation that he should be saved noe nor relye upon his being confirmed in grace but wrought his salvation with feare and trembling which did accompany his hope not his presumption thereof Heare Saint Ambrose how he speaks against hereticks opposing this doctrine and practise of Saint Paul in his Epistle to the Vercellan Church I hear saith this Doctor-Father some men say there is no merit of abstinence and that those are mad who chastize their bodies to make them subject to their soules which certainly Saint Paul had never done if he had held it to be madnesse To the same effect all the rest of the Fathers abound with like sentences which for brevity sake I omit to transcribe but not to admonish the Christian reader of especially the hereticks whom it most concernes I say not who they be least I offend persons while I onely oppose their errors cut of charity to them and zeale of their soules salvation Cap. 10. vers 1. Here the Apostle seems to divert from the Corinthians to the Jewes but indeed makes this seeming diversion an approach to them againe whilest he puts them in mind that it is not onely Faith with Abraham nor to be baptized with Christians will suffice to get the goale of heaven unlesse we run continually thither upon the speed of our perpetuall good works for saith he I will not have you ignorant that our Fathers namely the children of the Synagogue the Israelites wanted not Faith nor the figurative Baptisme of the cloud and the red Sea types of our true Baptisme yet because they did murmur at God and sinne in the desart deserting thereby the necessary adjunct of good works to merit their arrivall at the land of promise of six hundred thousand onely two men Joshua and Caleb did arrive at and enter the said land In like manner Christians be they never so firme in their Faith never so deepely dipt in the true Baptisme of the red sea of Christs passion unlesse they hold on the speed of good works while they are running the race to the heavenly Canaanâ— they shall never enter that heavenly land of promise which is the price they runne for But we are here to note how Calvin corrupts this place of S. Paul saying the Jewes received no lesse the truth and substance of Christ and his benefits in their umbratile and figurative Sacraments onely than we Christians do in our reall Sacraments which are the true substance of the Jewish shadowes For the Apostle doth not say they and we eat all one meate but that all they among themselves did eat of the figurative body of Christ the Manna in their desart raining down upon them and drank of his figurative bloud the waters flowing out of the rock strucken by Moses as a Type of the bloud and water the matter of our truer meates issuing out of our Saviours side peirced by Longinus as Jesus hung upon the crosse The cloud here mentioned is that we read of Exod. 13. shadowing them in the day from the scorching Sun and shining like fire to guide them in their nightly marches through the desarts as prodigious a thing as was the division of the red-sea by the switch of Moses his wand as he marched on before them 2. Note this verse doth not assert the Jewes to have been baptized in Moses as in a signe of their beliefe in the Mosaick Law but that by this precedent miraculous kind of Baptisme they were induced afterwards to believe in the â—aw of Moses so in this the figure differs from the thing figured for though this their umbratil Baptisme previous to their Faith be a Type of our true Baptisme yet our Faith in Christ is precedent thereto whereas the Jewish Faith was consequent to their shadow of baptisme And whereas the divided sea stood as two brasse walls to secure the children of Israel a dry passage through the wet element of the waves yet joyned againe to overwhelme the Aegyptian forces that presumed to persecute the children of God so the red sea of Christs passion divides it self to secure the children of grace but closeth to drown the children of the devill originall sinne in infants originall and actuall too in the adult being those who are at years of discretion As therefore our Baptisme is the thing praefigured by this divided sea so Christ is by Moses so the holy Ghost by the cloud cooling the scorching sun of concupiscence in us and inlightening our darkned soules by his holy Grace 3. We were told in the exposition of the first verse of this Chapter that they did all eat the same figurative food onely with us that is Manna wich was a figure of Christs body our spiritual food in the Sacrament of
the holy Altar not his reall body as we doe so the true sence of this place is that as they all did eat one figurative bread and had one faith in God so doe we but yet as their faith and food did not carry them all to Canaan so will not faith alone carâ—y us to heaven without good works 4. This verse is harder than the former in regard it will not be easy to shew how they drank of that rock that followed them unlesse we allow they drank of Christs bloud as well as we now doe since Christ is truely the rock that did follow them or came after them and issued out his pretious bloud for us really to drink againe Christ was a spiritual rock as here is said not a reall rock of stone for the true understanding therefore of this place we must know by spirituall rock is here understood a mysticall or typicall rock and such was the reall and naturall rock out of which Moses commanded water with a stroak of his rod and yet that reall rock was but a mystery type or figure of Christ and so in regard of that mystery is called here spirituall because it did praefigure the rock of Christ some therefore say with the Hebrewes that this rock did miraculously follow the children of Israel even to the land of Promise grounded in that text Numb 21. ver 16. Others conceive this to be verified by the water of the rock following the children of Israel at least till they came where plenty of more water was others think following them is veryfied by the obedience the rock shewed to issue out water once at Moses command so by follow they understand obey but this falls short of the gramatticall signification of the word follow so the true and genuine sence of the Apostle is that this rock as it was a type of Christ so the following of this rock is typicall and not reall Spiritual and not naturall as who should say Christ who corporally followed them many yeares after did spiritually now follow them that is in his sacred Deity or as he was God not man marched with them from the beginning to the end and so by his providence still supplyed them with water which was in effect to make the rock follow them so here Christ his divinity was the thing signified by the water out of the rock which did represent the same and to clear this sence the Apostle sayes in plaine termes the spirituall rock here meant by the material or natural rock was Christ Those are his words But the rock was Christ as who should say what we mean by this spirituall rock following them was Christ his divinity for his humanity was not then in being when spiritually he did follow them nor doth it urge against this truth what is further objected they did drink of this rock but the rock they drâ—nk of was the materiall rock therefore that material rock was not onely a type of the spirituall but was truely the spirituall rock since as the drink was materiall water so the rock must be the maâ—eriall rock for it is answered the water they drank was typicall because it was a figure of Christs Deity and so the materiality of both rock and water hinder not the spirituality of Type or Figure in them both To conclude the Allegory of this place holds thus Christ was this rock who was therefore sayd strucken by Moses because the Iewes were of the Mosaicall Synagogue who struck Christ to death by the Rod of the holy Crosse the bloud of which rock was satiating drink to the true believers and was water of contradiction to the Incredulous Iewes who will not believe in his deity and misbelieving hereticks that deny the reality of his blessed body and bloud in the Sacrament of the holy Altar by whose virtue we are carried through the desart of this world into the heavenly Land of Promise nor will it follow that therefore these words of Christ saying this is my body are to be understood as hereticks pretend This is a figure of my body as here we say this is a spiritual rock that signifies This is a figure of a spiritual rock because Christ doth not say this is a figure of my body or this is my body spiritually meant no but this is my body absolutely and really the same which shall be crucified for your sinns upon the crosse as it was indeed not onely figuratively but really besides the sixth verse of this Chapter cleares all doubt of this point saying in expresse termes These things were done as in a figure to us so here is a plaine profession of a figurative speech in the Apostle we find none such of any figurative speech of Christ when he said This is my body 5. This fifth verse confirmes what was said before That Faith alone without good works was not enough to bring the children of Israel into the Land of Promise and consequently much more are good works necessary to bring us to heaven lest as the greatest part of the Hebrew people perished in the desart so the greatest part of Christians be damned if they lead not lives answerable to their Faith and Religion The Application 1. FRom the first Sunday in Advent to the Nativity of our Saviour the Churches service represents the senility or decrepit age of Judaism weary of old expectation and longing for the coming of new hopes in Jesus Christ Yet to shew the Jews were dear to God he gave them a happy period a glorious Catastrophy in John the Baptist 2. From the Nativity to this Septuagesima Sunday the Holy Church hath fed us with the admirable doctrine of out Infantile Christianity beginning with the Infant Jesus and teaching us how to walk religiously as so many Infants and children of grace 3. From this day to the end of Lent the service runs upon another strain minding us of the forfeiture of our first Father Adam made of that Repose and Rest he was created in and of the toil and labour hee drew upon himself and his whole Posterity by his disobedience so the vicility or perfect man-hood of humane nature is the state wee are now taught to perfect And therefore this Epistle brings us into the school of vertue to day neither as decrepid men nor as new born Infants but as active youths all running of a race to win the Prize of heaven and this to verifie the curse imposed on our Father Adam of eating his bread in the sweat of his brows So that toyl and labour is wee see most justly inflicted on us for the punishment of sin and all the rest we can hope for must be by the meer mercy of our Lord who yet is ready to give us an eternall Rest in the next life for a short race here for a little labour taken to glorifie God by loving our own souls Say then beloved the Prayer above as the fittest Petition for the performance of our present
this Rapture yet Saint Thomas disputing this question purposely to declare the naturall truth determines him to remaine alive because God doth not kill men to honour them by his conversing with them so Saint Thomas concludes his soul was in his Body and consequently resolves that which the Apostle will not determine saying this Rapture was when Saint Pauls Soul was in his Body whence he was alive though he did not know so much But many doubt what this Third Heaven meanes unto which the Apostle was elevated but the common consent runs to affirm he was carryed up even to the Empyreall Heaven the highest of all that where God shews himself in his greatest glory and concludes this is called the third not as to averr there are but three heavens in all but as to include all be there never so many by the briefest way which is by saying three for all Yet the common division of the heavens into Aereall Aethereall and Empyreall will serve literally to this Text making the ayre the first heaven so birds are called the Inhabitants of Heaven The second the Aethereall which includes all the voluble Orbs above us and the Empyreall to be that of the Blessed to which last understand the rapture of S. Paul to have been The greatest doubt is whether he were rapt both bodie and soul up so high some think no and that this rapture may bee understood to be imaginary onely or Intellectuall wherein he had a revelation or vision of stranger things than were lawfull for him to speak or then were in his power to utter if it had been lawfull and this they ground out of the 1. verse of this Chapter and out of the 17. both which mention visions yet it is much more probable that he was really rapt both soul and bodie First because it was as easie for God to doe both as one Secondly because the Apostle doubts whether it were so or not as we see in this second and third Verse where he professeth not to know which in his sense is to doubt whereas those who have visions or revelations doe not doubt but know they are upon earth for all those Visions which onely make a rapture of the soul but none of the bodie so it is probable as Moses went corporally up to the mount Sinai where he was rapt out of the sight of the people by interposition of a cloud snatching him from their eyes and had delivered into his corporall ears the words of the Law in like manner Saint Paul who was to be the heavenly Doctor of all nations had corporally delivered to him such secret words as he mentions even in Paradise to have received and thence to bring back to earth such a Magazine of spirituall commands as he hath filled the whole world withall though he neither have told nor could tell all hee heard and therefore S. Paul after he had spoken of the third heaven adds the mention of Paradise to shew he was rapt not onely in his understanding but also in his will above the pitch of nature and even into that place of heaven which is therefore called Paradise because it ravisheth the wills of the Blessed with an infinite delight of loving as well as of seeing and understanding God So Divines allow in the vast Empyreall heaven a kinde of place apart called Paradise for the variety of pleasure it affords And hither they allow S. Paul to be rapt yet doe they not therefore say he did see God face to face as the blessed souls there inhabiting doe because he was not to remain there with them yet S. Thomas and other Divines thinke it probable he might have a transient sight thereof 2 secundae q. 175. a 5. but more probably it was not so since to Moses was onely granted to see the back of the Angell representing God and since 1 Tim. 6. v. 16. we read No man ever did see God that is to say with corporall eyes as here the Apostle was corporally rapt For if of the Angel it were said in Gods name to Moses No man shall see me and live how much more probable is it that Paul living after this rapture did not see God himself though no man doubts but he might see the glory of Christ and not unlikely heard from his own glorious mouth those secrets which he could not utter however to render his calling or Apostolate undoubted he had it conferred upon him personally by our Saviour in heaven as he upon earth did personally call the rest of his Apostles to his Service Of this Gal. 1. v. 12. the Apostle makes mention saying Christ revealed unto him the doctrine that he preached and then most probably was this Revelation made when he therewith revealed his glory too and those secrets he speaks of here may be partly certain Attributes of the Deitie assuredly the Ranks and Orders of Angels and their natures which S. Dennis seems to have drawn more particulars of from the Apâ—stle than himself utters in his own enumeration of their nine Orders and therefore in his celestiall Hierarchy S. Dennis this Apostles Disciple tells us of higher matters belonging to the holy Angels than ever any man else durst venture on Lastly we may piously believe S. Paul had told unto him by Christ in this rapture much of the course of divine providence in governing the world especially the holy Church much of the conversions of nations by himself and the rest of the Apostles which his modesty would not permit him to boast of 5. â—ee how he distinguisheth himself rapt from himself in the ordinary condition of man even as if he were not the same man for of him that was rapt hee proâ—esseth to glory still in the sense as above not vainly but of him that was not rapt he boasteth not at least not in this place to shew how great a difference there was between his rapt and not rapt condition and therefore as of his usuall self he boasts onely that he is infirm namely that he is lyable to affliction and miseries which are â—nconsistent with the state of rapt creatures for their rapture exempts them from the pain of sense and so from grief or pain which is meant here by infirmity as it is when our Saviour is called the man of griefes by Isaiah cap. 53 v. 3. which he explicates by adding these words Knowing infirmity that is to say lyable to all torture misery or pain 6. We read in the Acts cap 14. v. 10. that the Lycaonians held Paul and Barnabas for Gods To avoid vain-glory in this hee tells them he will not be understood above what he is above a man lyable to all misery and persecution which gods are exempted from nay lest they should thinke him an Angell though not god he speaks sparingly of those prerogatives of his rapture An excellent example for them to follow who are indeed nothing extraordinary and not boast themselves as more than ordinary men which yet
common practise of the devill when he cannot tempt to open sin to flatter by pretence of sanctity and so to draw us into the trap of selfe-conceit and dangerous vaine glory thus he in vaine attempted Jesus Christ thus he deludes the soules that he tempts to sin by telling them they are Predestinated to be sav'd and cannot finally be damn'd do what they will the least humility is remedy to this vaine glorious disease Thou shalt not tempt thy Lord thy God our Saviours way to kill that devill of vaine glory Saint Paul hath such another Hee that thinks he stands let him beware he fall not Religious feare and trembling is the firmest footing to hold us fast upon the highest Pinnacles of Grace 3. The latter end of all Temptation shewes the Temptors aime the ruine of the tempted soule This is designed under faire pretexts such as doe tickle natures appetite Riches pleasure honour and command but see the choaking Hooke arm'd with alluring baites behold Idolatry coucht under Gratitude It seemes a reasonable homage to adore the giver of so great a gift as all the wealth and pleasure of the world but 't is a huge injustice to receive them from the hands of an usurper who hath as little power to give as we to take the stolen gift And mark how this usurper then pretends to give when the right Owner takes away by a command of Abstinence Christ came not here to raigne but to bestow on us a Crown of glory to rob us then of heaven the devill proffers us the scum thereof the rubbige swept away from thence and cast into the common shoare the sinke of nature Earth O how sordid earth appeares when I behold the beauty of the heavens thus holy David thus we ought to say and more with Jesus bid the fiend avant so shall we by religious adoration of Almighty God accompany'd with holy Poverty this time of Lent forbear to covet riches and by them to Idolize unto the devill adde then these good workes to the Fast they will accomplish So shall we render our selves the Purified soules we pray to be by fasting On the second Sunday in Lent The Antiphon 2 Cor. 17. v. 9 c. THe vision which thou hast seene thou shalt tell to none untill the Sonne of man doe rise from death Vers To Angels God hath c. Resp That in all thy wayes c. The Prayer O God who doest behold us voyd of all strength guard us we beseech thee exteriorly and interiorly that we may be defended from all corporall adversities and purified from evill cogitations of our soules The Illustration THe last Sundayes Prayer laid our Lenten Fast for the chiefe ground of all the Prayers in Lent This fixed on that ground lookes to the end of the aforesaid Fast our purification of the whole creature which we are and so confessing here first that we are void of all strength to guard our selves we begge of Almighty God a guard both for the exterior and interior man that thus our bodies being outwardly defended from all corporall adversities particularly sicknesse to tempt us from our Fast our soules may be purified from all inward evills of filthy cogitations and this with regard to what Saint Leo told us last Sunday was required for the integrity of a Fast namely to withdraw our minds from sinne lest in vaine we did else take meat from our mouths and hence we shall finde little excuse by what casuists tell us the end of the precept is no precept to us though the meanes to that end be of absolute command for example in this present case they say t is no breach of our Lenten Fast to commit a sinne in Lent though we are commanded to use the meanes of fasting to the end we may avoid sinne and so render our selves the purified creatures which holy Church intends by this forty dayes Fast to make us for truly casuists in this may seeme to favour us but yet upon reflection it is no favour because sinne being at all times prohibited under strict command we never sinne mortally but we breake some precept of Almighty God greater then this of the Church by any other kind of mortall sinning which at all times is forbid us and then much more strictly when we are actually under a wholesome cure for sinne the holy Fast of Lent so it will not be to render soules scrupulous but religious to tell them that sinnes are aggravated at least when committed at that time we are commanded to take Physick for preventing sinne as now when holy Church injoynes a Fast expressely for that purpose But to our maine designe let us see how this dayes Prayer suits to the Epistle and Gospell of the day as well as to the season of Lent why truly very well to the former because this Lenten Fasting is one of the Apostolicall precepts mentioned here by Saint Paul to the Thessalonians and in regard Fasting is one of the best of remedies against that carnall sinne which this dayes Epistle dehorteth from as also it is the best step to that walk recommended to us from vertue to vertue that we may by abounding more and more therein please God by the fulfilling of his holy will which is as Saint Paul to day calls it our Sanctification and that particularly by the gift of chastity of purity both in body and soule which altogether comes home even to the letter and full sense of this dayes Prayer nor is the Gospell of the Transfiguration read to day for any other end then to mind us of being spiritually transfigured from Polluted to Chaste bodies from Sinful to Sainted Soules for so shall we appeare to our Saviours eye with faces shining like the Sunne and bodies pure as the whitest Snow as himselfe appeared on Mount-Tabor to his Apostles and as the expositors conceive Moses and Elias did appear so too thus to shew we cannot by our vertuous lives approach neer to God without being Transfigured to the world and made mirrours of admiration to men and Angels and such indeed ought to be our Lenten Fasters How exactly then is this dayes Prayer set to the other service of the day when by saying it in order to performe our Lenten Fasts it brings forth in us the effect of Sanctification which the Epistle aimes at and that of our Transfiguration from Sinners to Saints which the Gospell points unto The Epistle 1 ad Thes c. 4. v. 1 c. 1. For the rest therefore Brethren we desire and beseech you in our Lord Iesus that as you have received of us how you ought to walk and to please God as also you do walk that you abound more 2. For you know what precepts I have given to you by our Lord Iesus 3. For this is the will of God your Sanctification that you abstaine from Fornication 4. That every one may know to possesse his vessell in Sanctification and honour 5. Not in the Passion of lust
as also the Gentiles that know not God 6. And that no man over-goe nor circumvent his brother in businesse because our Lord is revenger of all these things as we have foretold you and have testified 7. For God hath not called us into uncleannesse but into Sanctification The Explication 1. THe Apostle fitly vseth the word walk insteed of live in this and most places since it is not a posture suitable to the present life for Christians to stand still we remember our Saviour rebuked those that did it Matth. 20. v. 6. Saying why stand ye here the whole day idle as if to stand still were to be idle and loyter so the posture of a good Christian is and ought to be walking moving going on from vertue to vertue Psal 38. untill at last he arrive to the rewarder and source of all vertues God himselfe for by bidding us to walk so as thereby we may please God and abound more and more we are bid to accumulate vertues upon vertues so long as we live in this vicious world and that we may know how to doe this the Apostle bids that we follow his rule for this purpose framed to our hands as it was to the Thessalonians since what he writ to them was with intention it should be handed over from age to age even to us and to those that should live in the very last of times 2. His meaning is that he gave them this rule of perfection by Authority Commission or inspiration from our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and this rule was not to tell them onely what he had observed in our Saviour to this purpose making himselfe an example of perfection to us all but also what by inspiration of the holy Ghost himselfe as an Apostle intrusted with the care and charge of soules had upon occasion found expedient to prescribe unto them and this Authority as it was given to the Apostles so it descendeth from them unto their successors the Fathers and rulers of Soules especially the governing party of the Church the Pope and Bishops thereof 3. By the will of God is not here understood that will which is commonly called the will of his Beneplacitum or holy pleasure to doe himselfe what he pleaseth but the will of his signe mark or token what he would have us to doe and that not in generall for so his will is we should have perfect and universall Sanctity in all our actions but in particular he points out here for us the Sanctification of chastity so we may see by all the following verses as who should say God was particularly pleased to point out his Signall will unto us that the vertue which is most suitable to his infinite simplicity and purity namely chastity should be aimed at by all Christians that even those who were marryed people should by tempering their carnall passions and desires partake in some measure of this divine vertue and those who were not marryed should have an expresse prohibition from the foule impurity of Fornication since it seemes the Apostle forbids it here not onely under the generall rule the prohibition thereof in the commandements but with a specially preamble that he doth by name forbid this sinne as having it specially declared unto him that it was the signall will of God he should doe so 4. This place is commonly understood as prescribing a rule of moderation to marryed people that they so use the lawfull bed of pleasure as they forget not to Sanctifie themselves even by and in the use thereof remembring God hath elevated that corporal communication so much coveted and delighted in by Flesh and Bloud that he hath raised the wonted civill contract of marriage to be now a more holy thing even a Sacrament or conduite-pipe of his holy grace into the Soules of such people as make religious and not lustfull use thereof for of the latter we see sad examples in the seven husbands of Sara snatched from her bed because they marryed her purely for lust not for any limited or regulated love and so againe by a pious abstinence upon fasts or feasts from corporall knowledge of each other specially when marryed Christians receive the Sacrament they use their vessels in Sanctification of themselves and honour of God thereby for reverence to whose blessed Body and holy Sacraments they abstaine from their otherwise lawfull pleasures yet there is a deeper and more universall application aimed at by the Apostle in this place even to all Christians whatsoever married or single since though to marryed persons their mutually betrothed bodies to one another are their vessels properly here specified yet to single persons by their vessels are meant their single bodies which containe their soules within them as so many precious liquors in the sight and to the Palat of Almighty God who is jealous lest any of that liquour should be drawne out and given to creatures that is lest by following the impulse of sense they should poure out the affections of their soules upon their own corporall pleasures or the delight of any other body whatsoever for pure respect to the creature and not so stand upon their guard as not to part with the least drop of their soules affections either to themselves or any others which are all due to Almighty God for this is to possesse each one his owne vessell as Rom. 6 v. 19. Saint Paul adviseth and to possesse it in Sanctification of himselfe by acts of love to the divine Majesty and in honour of Almighty God by so doing and contrary to this counsell doe all those who make their bodies possesse that is to say command their Soules whereas the soul is to possesse her body in this sense of commanding it as finally she shall doe in the kingdome of heaven and as at first Adams soul did even here on earth 5. This verse prosecutes the sence of the former by representing unto us the bestiality it is in Christians to proceed like Gentiles who are called a people that is no people because they are more like beasts then men and such the Apostle accounts Christians who follow the passions of lust the full swinge of their carnall desires without any religious limit thereof even when carnall pleasure is lawfull because to doe thus is as if we knew no God for whose sake we were to refraine our inordinate appetites not onely in carnall pleasures but in those meats drinkes or companies that propend us thereunto 6. In this place the Apostles sense lyes lyable to a very easie mistake and the words sound as if he did leap from the Subject of lust to that of fraud deceipt or injury but indeed he prosecutes his former sense in this whole Epistle So he must here be understood by businesse to forbid Adultery as above he hath forbidden Fornication not to overgo is here meant literally forbidding any man to goe over his neighbours marriage bed and thereby defraud him of his due which is to have
us whose guilty consciences tell us we deserve a famine in punishment of our sins rather then such a Feast as joys our hungry souls And as by this we see a joyful Communion is an accomplishment of our Lenten Fast so before that Communion we are fitly taught to premise such a Prayer as may first strike into us an act of Contrition and then compleat our Ioy. Say then the Prayer above and see if it be not most propper to this purpose And say it also to force out of us further yet the vertue of Gratitude such as these people shewed to Jesus when they thought to make him presently their King O let us make him the perfect Commander of our hearts-affections he will not fly from that Soveraignty because he doth affect it On Passion Sunday in Lent The Antiphon John 8. v. 56. YOur Father Abraham rejoyced that he might see the day he did see it and was glad Vers Deliver me O Lord from the evil man Resp .. From the wicked man deliver me The Prayer VVE beseech thee Almighty God propitiously behold thy Family that thou giving we may be governed in body and thou reserving we may be preserved in soul The Illustration IUst as your ebbing waters meet yong floods so doth the Edde stream of Lenten fast fall to the banks to day and leaves the Channel for the Churches Prayers to bring the red Sea of the Passion in upon us whence we cal this Passion Sunday Yes yes beloved This is very true and yet I do believe few have observed this to be so God grant that all may see it when 't is made appear out of the Prayer above which I confess was to me as hard as if I had been forc't to pick a lock whereof the proper key was lost and truly where to finde a mention of the Passion in a proper term in all this Prayer I know not but yet this help remains a common key will do as well when proper keys are missing Take therefore the propitious look of God upon us which to day we beg and then believe the door is open to our Saviours Passion for what is that but a propitiation for our sins which we implore when we beseech Almighty God to look propitiously upon his Family and though we use this phrase at other times as well as now yet that forbids not a common key to open a private door nay rather this is indeed the particular key unto the Passion and made common upon all other occasions because that sacred Sea flows over all the other works and mercies of Almighty God gives force and value to all our actions and so is here properly applyed however it hath become a common stile in all our Prayers Now by this key we shall open all the doors of this days Epistle and Gospel for why is Christ his blood a more powerful Sacrifice then that of Oxen Goats and Heyfers in the old Law as this Epistle tells us but because theirs availed onely to a nominal purity This to a real propitiation for all our sins that onely leads us into the Tabernacle of the Arke this into the Tabernacle of glory to conclude this propitious look we begge to day unlocks the Cabinet of the Gospel also and leads us after a long contest between Jesus and the Jewes whether he or they were devils whether he or Abraham were the greater person unto the very first entrance into his Sacred Passion where we should finde them stoning him to death but that he miraculously preserves himselfe for a more ignominious Sacrifice upon the Altar of the holy Crosse for whilest Jesus thus expostulated with the Jewes certainly he did looke propitiously upon the Gentiles in whose behalfe hee so much exasperated the Jewes as they menaced his death And this may suffice to bring our new floud in See now how the Lenten edde meetes the Passion Tyde in a way as strang as true while we are bid begge our sparing meales out of Gods ample giving hand and the preservation of our Soules out of his reserving from us whereas fasting requires a hand which will take away rather then give food to the body and our soules preservation depends upon Gods ever giving hand his adding more and more to his former graces bestowed on us all this is true in one sence and so is the contrary in another for we begge in this Prayer a rule and government of our bodies and that according to the time of Fast whence it follows our meat should be now given us with the same regulating hand of God that knowes best how to proportion food fit for a Fast which we doe not know nor doe we aske absolutely the full-giving hand of God to be extended to us but that which may so give as to reserve withal and hence we pray that thou giving us little food for our bodies they may be wel governed and thou reserving the former plenty we may enjoy at other times our Soules may be preserved from the guilt of those past excesses and so prepared as vessels empty of worldly trumpery to be the more capable of those heavenly treasures that are Sayling towards us upon the red Sea of thy bitter Death and Passion O Blessed Saviour now flowing in upon us The Epistle Heb. 9. v. 11 c. 11 But Christ assisting an High Priest of the good things to come by a more ample and more perfect Tabernacle not made with hand that is not of this creation 12 Neither by the blood of Goats or of Calves but by his own blood entred once into the Holies eternall redemption being found 13 For if the blood of Goats and of Oxen and the ashes of an Heifer being sprinkled sanctifieth the polluted to the cleansing of the flesh 14 How much more hath the blood of Christ who by the Holy Ghost offered himselfe unspotted unto God cleansed your consciences from dead workes to serve the living God 15 And therefore he is the Mediator of the New Testament that death being a mean unto the redemption of prevarications which were under the former Testament they that are called may receive the promise of the Eternall Inheritance The Explication 11 12. HItherto the Apostle in this Chapter had described the manner of the High Priests officiating in the old Law as also he described the Exod. c. 25. c. 26. Tabernacle wherein were placed the Candlesticks the Table and the Bread of proposition and this Tabernacle was called Sanctum The Holy but behinde a Curtaine at the back of this Sanctum there was yet placed another Tabernacle which was called Sanctum Sanctorum or the Hoâ—y of Holies unto which none but the High Priest could goe who there was to offer Sacrifice while the people remained all without praying for themselves as the Priest did for them all and here stood a golden Thurible the Arke of the Testament all guilded over wherein was a golden Shrine which had in it the Manna the two
expositors as above because it was a thing unheard of that the dead should rise againe so that Faith is here recommended to us for the vertue which the Scribes and Pharises were too blame not to allow of at all but conceived good workes without faith were enough to save their soules as in like manner the Heretickes of this Time are equally too blame to think that faith alone is sufficient without good works whereas Catholikes are taught both are absolutely necessary and therefore Pray as above that we may retaine in our lives and manners that is to say in our good workes the faith we have in the Resurrection of our Lord. The Gospel St. Iohn c. 20. v. 19. c. 19 Therefore when it was late that day the first of the Sabbaths and the doores were shut where the Disciples were gathered together for fear of the Jewes Jesus came and stood in the midst and saith to them Peace be to you 20 And when he had said this he shewed them his hands and side The Disciples therefore were glad when they saw our Lord. 21 He said therefore to them againe Peace be to you As my Father hath sent me I doe also send you 22 When he said this he breathed upon them and he saith to them receive ye the Holy Ghost 23 Whose sins you shall forgive they are forgiven them and whose you shall retaine they are retained 24 But Thomas one of the twelve who is called Didymus was not with them when Jesus came 25 The other Disciples therefore said to him we have seene our Lord. But he said to them unlesse I see in his hands the print of the nailes and put my Finger into the place of the nailes and put my hand into his side I will not beleeve 26 And after eight dayes againe his Disciples were within and Thomas with them Iesus commeth the doores being shut and stood in the midst and said peace be to you 27 Then saith he to Thomas put in thy finger hither and see my hands and bring hither thy hand and put it into my side and be not incredulous but faithfull 28 Thomas answered and said unto him my Lord and my God 29 Jesus saith to him because thou hast seen me Thomas thou hast beleeved Blessed are they that have not seene and have beleeved 30 Many other signes did Jesus in the sight of his Diseiples which are not written in this Book 31 And these are written that you may beleeve that Iesus Christ is the Son of God and that beleeving you may have life in his name The Explication 19. That this apparition of Christ was his first to his Apostles and to them for fear assembled all but Thomas together in a Chamber in Hierusalem is most undoubted by this Text which yet may seeme to clash with what the Angels said to the Maries as Saint Mark cap. 16. v. 7. reports in the close of last Sundayes Gospel For by that verse it seemes the Maries were to goe after the Apostles into Galilee as if they had been fled for feare from Hierusalem and as if Christ had promised his first apparition after his resurrection should be in Galilee but upon deliberate examine it will be found the Angell spake of that apparition in Galilee as the most celebrated because it was before so great a number as well of Disciples of Christ his friends as before his Apostles who were not onely his chosen servants and his friends also designed to be imployed in a higher service namely that of Apostolate So this considered there is no scruple of contradiction in the Evangelists if here we finde Saint Iohn say this apparition of Christ to his Apostles assembled ten of them together in Hierusalem was his first of all though afterwards they fled for fear into Galilee and had againe the honour to be present when Christ did there appeare to above five hundred at once as Saint Paul avoucheth 1 Cor. 15. v. 6. besides it is evident by the Text of this verse that this was Christ his first apparition to his Apostles because it was late that day namely on Easter day on Sunday the first of the Sabbath so called from the dignity it had to be made ever after the first day of the Christian week and so their Sabbath day as bringing them newes of the eternall rest which Christ his resurrection upon that day had purchased unto them and if we observe the story as Saint Iohn relates it there was reason why it should be late that day for first the Maries were to goe from the Tombe to the City then Mary Magdalene runing away before the rest seemes first to have met Peter and Iohn onely and comming back with or after them who run to the Tombe to see if it were true that Mary had told them and returning afterwards to get together their whole number of Apostles if they could though with seare of the Iewes to consult what was to be done by them and in the meane time Mary comming back to the Sepulchre and weeping there had the honour to have our Saviour appeare unto her and then to goe open mouth to the Apostles and to tell them she was not now to seek but had found her Lord and that he had told her he was to ascend to his heavenly Father so before all this was done the day must needs passe a pace away and therefore no marvell it was late when our Saviour appeared the doores being shut where the Disciples were gathered together probably in the same roome where Christ with them made his last Supper This place argues Christ may be in the Sacrament without extension of Parts as well as he could with his whole Body enter into the room where his Apostles were and had the doors close shut upon them for fear of the Jews whatsoever the Hereticks pretend to the contrary this being as strange a Penetration as the other is a Transubstantiation and a Celation or Covering the Order of his Corporeal Parts not amassed nor confounded one with another how ever not requiring such extension as is naturally requisite to their dimensions since it is as easie for God to keep his real Body under the Sacramental Species without commensuration to place as it was for him to pass with his whole Body thorough the walls without division made by his miraculous Penetration of their Parts being therefore they must grant this because his Apostle says it how can they with modesty deny the other which himselfe avouched when he said Take and eat this is my Body Mark cap. 14. v. 22. Luk. cap. 22. v. 19. and which his Apostles took and believed in the Sense that now the Roman Churches believes and defends it against all the opposers of that most sacred Truth But observe the first salute of our Saviour saying peace be to you which is to say all good betide you fear no more I have fought your battailes and bring you the tidings of a
would ever suffer unlesse he were so insolent as to condemn his Judge or another body guilty as himself We must not therefore take it in this sense but rather thus Judge not falsly of another and you shall not be condemned of such false judgement Condemn not your neighbour falsly and God will not condemn you for that particular guilt of false condemnation or make the best interpretation of other mens actions and God will make the best of yours also when he comes your Judge Yet we have an excellent example in the Adulteresse escaping even the just sentence of the old law by our Saviours bidding those that were without sin to cast the first stone at her whereby every man slunk away and none was left to execute that severe law upon her and sure it is to this example the Evangelist alludes when he forbids rash Judgement in us under the notion of our own being to come to Judgement also and of our hope to escape well at the dread Tribunal of Almighty God if we endeavour to clear our own seen consciences rather then passe a Judgement upon the unseen sins of others But the close of this verse puts a period to this difficulty Admit others do offend God or you yet judge them not condemn them not forgive rather on your parts and by this means you shall obtain from God forgivenesse of your offences to his Divine Majesty O who would not forgive a trivial fault in hope to gain thereby a pardon for his own haynous offences 38. Give you temporal almes and you shall have given to you spiritual treasures not onely according to the small proportion of your gift but according to the good measure of God whose hand is alwayes full and who never gives his gifts to halfes but doth presse down his graces upon us and shakes a world of his favours together even untill they run over and inables us to spare others part of his holy gifts to us whilest his Divine Majesty pleaseth to make sinful men instruments of sanctity in others And that for temporall Almes we receive spiritual treasures the following words of this verse declare saying those abundant proportions shall he given into your own bosomes which are the Vessels of spiritual gifts and graces as other mens hands are the receptacles of our temporal Almes and what followes tells us that according to the measure of our Almes we shall receive a measure of graces for little almes a little grace though in comparison of temporal gifts with those that are spiritual the least grace is a pressed shaken running over measure in respect of a little almes if therefore our almes be great by this account the graces proportionable thereunto will be infinite which is in part declared when we are told charity covers a multitude of sinnes So the sum of this verse is to exhort us to giving almes according as we will hope for our own sins to be forgiven and for the grace of God covering our sins to make us able to sanctifie others whilest we adde to our temporal almes an addition of spiritual instruction both by the exemplarity of our lives and by our teaching the ignorant if need be their duty towards Almighty God as this lesson we shall alwayes teach when we give Almes that 't is God who gives while our purses are open to the relieving of the poore since God hath placed the portion of the poore in the rich mans hands 39. This similitude was here aptly introduced because it is alluding to that which went before of rash Judgement one against an other since it is the part of a Judge to be himself clear of all the faults he condemns others of to be indeed the eye of the people or rather ever in the peoples eyes so they will never run in danger of the Law but follow the conduct of their leading Judge in the part of Innocence and Justice But if they will take upon them to be Judges of other mens actions then they put out as it were their own eyes and become blind guides of others and consequently both fall into the ditch of danger if not into the bottomlesse pit of hell fire 40. This simile followes fitly upon the former for as a guide is a kind of master in the way he guideth others so if the guide be blind the guided who follows not so much in vertue of his own eyes as in belief of his guides knowledge must needs perish in that trust reposed in his guide if the guide doe perish missing his way by his own blindnesse So a master in that art he undertakes to teach must needs be supposed better versed then any of his schollars are in the same Art for so long as he is able to teach he is a master and so long as others learn they are schollars and consequently in this sense no schollar as he is a schollar or a learner can know more then his master all which notwithstanding absolutely speaking the man that is at first but a schollar in an Art may arrive at last to a perfection in that Art much above his master but this must be by his own better industry or by some other greater helps then any his master was able to afford him and then he is no schollar as to that particular wherein he excells his master but rather his master may in that become his schollar So when it is said every one shall be perfect if he be as his master it is understood in that which the master can teach and wherein the schollar was to learn not in any other particular And truly this place is a good incitement towards humility in those who think themselves grand masters and knowing men for even such may stoop to learn some speciall truths or experiments of far lesse knowing or lesse experienced men then themselves and in these smaller acquisitions the greater men must be content not onely to learn but even to esteem they acquire a kind of perfection by what they have thus learned from those who in other matters are hugely their inferiours 41. Here the Apostle lookes back to the rash judgement he had before forbidden as who should say why dost thou censure judge or condemn little faults in thy neighbour being thy self guilty of farre greater Is this mercy is this perfection is this to love thine enemies no it is to tyrannize over thy friends who give thee better example then thou followest though they are not themselves free from fault For by the more and beam are here understood the faults on both sides the mote being the little fault in one mans eye rashly judged of by him that hath a beam a greater mote or fault in his own eye And this example was well made in the eye which never sees it self but is alwayes looking upon other objects and censuring them for deformed or beautifull according as they please the eye just so do those who judge rashly of others and never
be reall and not verball onely to be operative not idle or lazy for here the tongue is opposed to truth as dissimulation to sincerity and the word to the work as empty air to a purse full of money or as froth is to beer or wine To conclude hence we are taught further that we must not onely be effectually charitable but also we are bound to be affectionately so for it little avails to give alms unlesse we also love the poor whom we relieve and therefore love them because we relieve Christ in them and unlesse we give thus we sell our selves for popular applause by giving away our substance to purchase the empty air the shadows of vain commends and so lose a divine blessing as to the children of God to get a morall one as to be esteemed humane fathers of the world The Application 1. HItherto it hath appeared how exactly holy Church recommends unto us the practise of charity and truely this dayes Epistle confirms us in the same practise while it runnes wholly upon the subject of love so high that it seems to exceed even the last sundayes act of charity commanding then to love our enemies because now it exhorts us to do more then love them when v. 16. it invites to die for them also if need be which yet a true love of enemies involves as our Saviour did for us to shew his love unto us 2. And least we should pretend to love and not do it really see how the master of this Art S. John Evangelist in the last verse of this Epistle bids us take heed we do not feign the part we ought to act in earnest for he tells us 't is not enough to say we love unlesse we do it too no he obligeth us to love in deed to love in truth lest we seem to mock Almighty God by giving out we mean to act the best part of his sacred sonne his loving unto death those he pretended once to love according to that of the Evangelist Christ when he loved his people he loved them to his end that is he died for love of them 3. Hence we may safely say those are unworthy of the gift of love who have not in their hearts and eyes the holy fear of God as truely those can never have who dare to mock his sacred sonne by their dissembling love that is not reall No Christians no we are not yet in heaven where we cannot erre here we must carry fear before our eyes lest losing it we lose our labours too for without this holy fear we cannot work out our salvation nor can we hope to please his heavenly majesty unlesse we fear his power who is as well our Governour as our God and as we must love his Deity so we must fear his Government Whence it is holy Church most properly prayes to day as above The Gospel Luke 14. v. 16. c. 16. But he said to him A certain man made a great supper and called many 17. And he sent his servant at the houre of supper to say to the invited That they should come because now all things are ready 18. And they began all at once to make excuse The first said to him I have bought a farm and I must needâ— go forth and see it I pray thee hold me excused 19. And another said I have bought five yoke of Oxen and I go to prove them I pray thee hold me excused 20. And another said I have married a wife and therefore I cannot come 21. And the servant returning told these things unto his Lord. Then the master of the house being angry said to his servant Go forth quickly into the streets and lanes of the city and the poor and feeble and blind and lame bring in hither 22. And the servant said Lord it is done as thou didst command and yet there is place 23. And the Lord said to the servant Go forth into the wayes and hedges and compell them to enter that my house may be filled 24. But I say to you that none of those men that were called shall taste of my supper The Explication 16. THis parable is almost the same that was mentioned Mat. 22.2 only there in a different way time and place as under the name of a dinner and here it is brought in under the name of a supper And there are divers senses made upon this supper Some call it a parable of the Incarnation life and death of Christ and thus S. Matthew seems to take it calling it a dinner as to the Church militant and a supper to the Church triumphant Others apply this parable unto the Blessed Sacrament and those make God the Father master of this feast his sacred Sonne the feast it self made of his blessed body and bloud and in favour of this opinion the holy Church at this time reads this Gospel as alluding to the flowing feast of Corpus Christi But yet for all that the literall sense of this Gospel alludes to the last supper of heavenly glory for that is the true supper which ends the laborious day time and begins eternall rest that never shall have end so though many may be cast out of doors after the dinner of the Church militant yet none can be cast out after they once enter to this triumphant supper And for that cause the most genuine sense of this place alludes as S. Gregory saith hom 36. to the society of eternall sweetnesse and glory Where note that great signifies here all the degrees of greatnesse such a supper as none could be greater either for the rarity of the dainties and banquets thereof or for the splendour and duration of it whereof S. Paul 1. Cor. 2. v. 9. sayes Eye hath not seen nor hath ear heard neither hath it ascended into the heart of man what things God hath prepared for them that love him And to this supper he called many by many are here understood no lesse then even all the Jews who were the true Church and people of God and were called by the Patriarchs and Prophets by John the Baptist by Christ himself while he lived amongst them 17. But by his servants whom he sent are properly meant the Apostles left by him to convert these Jews as well as other nations And by the bower of supper here mentioned is understood the resurrection of our Saviour for then and not till then were all things ready for this great supper of glory because then he brought with him from his grave a multitude of blessed souls who therefore were in Paradise as he promised the thief to be that very day he died because they were in his impassible presence that is to say when he was pleased to allow his body the benefit of all the gifts due to glorious bodies so though they were not in the finall place of eternall rest untill they did ascend with him to heaven yet they were set at the table of glory with him and were carried
resignation as a meanes to our exaltation in the time of visitation which is to be understood when God shall think fit to look upon us with the eye of mercy 7. It were an injury to Gods goodnesse for us to cast about for that which God himself takes care for that is our soules good the care of that is his and our rule of that is by him laid unto us so in that affayre we have rather to do what is commanded already then to be solicitous about it as if it were not done And to be solicitous of Temporals is an unchristian care and therefore often forbidden in point of perfection however tolerated in regard of humane infirmity but moderate care is alwayes allowed Christians in order to Temporals when anxious solicitude is forbidden them by many texts of holy writ 8. Sobriety is the best companion of watchfulnesse and therefore both are recommended And because our watchfulnesse is to be perpetual therefore our sobriety must be so too but especially towards night when our hearts onely are to keep the watch whilest our senses are asleep and this because the devil is then most busie in temptations when men are least able to resist having as it were but their wish awake and their will asleep hence all spiritual men recommend temperance towards bed-time both in meat and drink hence the Completory begins alwayes with this very verse to put us in mind with what purity we ought to go to bed having our profest enemy alwayes awake and ready to devour us if he find us off our sober guard 9. Happy we that by the least resistance are sure of victory against this ravenous devil for maugre all his malice and all his power he cannot hurt us unlesse we yeeld our consents to his Temptations Here is added that we must stoutly resist him and believing too because so we get compleat victory for by resistance we overcome him by fortitude we bind him captive by Faith we take away all his armes and power that is by firm stout and constant Faith And again our resistance will have the more force because of what followes in this verse we never are left alone but have alwayes our fellow Souldiers to help us in this Fight against our enemy who never tempts us alone but all other good men at the same time and we have share in their greater resistance by adding what our weaknesse is able to do 10. This next verse comes yet more home to our comfort and assistance telling us besides the help of our fellow creatures we have the help of our omnipotent Creatour against this enemy of mankind the God of all grace who having called us to everlasting glory will not if we help our selves permit the devill to snatch us away into his kingdom of darknesse so that being designed for glory we cannot fear the want of grace for that is the seed and glory the fruit of Gods goodnesse in us O who seeing how much Christ suffered to purchase us patience would not gladly suffer this little we are told must be indured if we will hope for victory Let us therefore with the same zeal begin to suffer as we would desire the happy end of it which is assured victory and glory 11. This last verse minds us that the victory is Gods and the honour of it his though the reward by his mercy be our eternall glory too The Application WE have had hitherto the holy Ghost the sacred Trinity and the blessed Sacrament to help us on in our long journey between Pentecost and Advent which we are to march all upon the feet of Charity but now we must expect no more such speciall helps suffice it we have had last Sunday the corroborating repast whereof Elias his refreshment under the Tree in the desert was but a type or figure when yet he was told that little bread should inable him to his journeyes end although he had a great wâ—y to go after that before he came to the mount Horeb so beloved must our charity from this day forward march upon the late refreshment of the blessed Sacrament till we come in our annuall journey to the mount of Advent the mount of expectation the mount that leaves us on the top of the highest mystery of our redemption the Incarnation of our Lord God where his first stoop to earth was our first step to heaven 2. Now for as much as we shall in this march find charity sometimes handed on by other vertues as last Sunday most properly by holy fear sutable to her in so long a journey and through the many dangers which she was to meet withall in the desert of this world and because at other times she will be in a manner out of sight and carried on with the crowd of other vertues thronging about her to secure themselves by her and to be her guard as they are bound she being sovereign to them all we must not therefore think our design is ill laid and that our obligation ceaseth as to the practise of charity when in the holy Text other vertues are more visible then she for there want not good Divines who grounded on S. Paul his definition or description at least of this majestick vertue affirm there is indeed no other vertue but charity both because God himself is called charity and because in heaven all other vertues are refunded into her so that in these Divines opinions even Faith Hope Humility Patience Obedience and all other vertues whatsoever are but charity believing hoping submitting suffering obeying or the like as one and the self same man by the severall faculties of his soul by his severall senses and members of his body is doing those exercises that such faculties such senses and such members are necessary for Be these Divines right or wrong it boots not to our purpose more then thus to let us see all our actions are good or bad according as they partake or want of charity to give them life or to declare them dead 3. This premised see how humility resignation to Gods holy will sobriety vigilance and a strong faith bring charity along this first-dayes journey after the repast she had last Sunday as above And though the Text tell her she is to carry us through the ravenous Lions walk yet we see the close of this Epistle is that the God of all Grace the God of charity will secure us through these dangers for his own glory if we but love him and will cast our cares on him and will rely upon his multiplied mercies whereof we have dayly and hourely huge experience if we will make him our Ruler him our Guide and if we do not loose our charity to him our Creatour by wasting it away upon creatures unworthy of our love because we cannot grasp temporall felicities without hazard of loosing eternall happinesse Yes yes assuredly this ought to be our duty now Whilest to this very purpose holy Church prayes to day
are not bound to have some care of others as well as of themselves if it be but to edifie and lead them on by their exemplarity of life therefore every lay-man ought more or lesse to zeal his neighbours soul and to contribute towards the saving of it in some sort or other though with intermission of his own devotions if the neighbour require his charitable assistance at that time when he would else be at his prayers 3. To conclude least even in the conversion of others souls pride or vain glory run away with ours we are still to keep the lamp of charity light at home burning within our hearts for fear it be as S. Paul said a vain labour to us though we gain all the soules in the world to heaven if we loose our own for want of regulating all our actions by the rule of love and charity to God first whereby we are secured and to our neighbour next that we may help him too Whence it is holy Church concludes her prayer to day petitioning that even in the best of Temporall goods which is the searching after other mens fooles a work of Time though a fruit of Eternitie we may be protected by the God of Love and may be ruled and guided by his charity which will carry us securely through all the allurements of Temporalitie into a safe and blissefull Eternitie Say now the prayer above and see how home it is unto this Application On the fourth Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Luk. 5. v. 5. MAster we labouring all night have taken nothing but in thy word we will cast our net Vers Let my prayer O Lord c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer GRant us O Lord we beseech thee that by thy order our course in this world may be peaceably directed and that thy Church may injoy a quiet devotion The Illustration TWo things beloved we aske in this prayer a peaceable flowing of the course of this world and an unperturbed devotion in the Church O that we all had our desires in this or rather that we did all truely desire and pray for it doubtlesse we should then have it since holy Church we see unfeinedly petitions it while by this dayes service she exhorts us to do the like And truly one main reason why we apply not our selves to a still devotion in the Church is because we are neither at peace with one another in the world nor are content to let things flow in that channell which God hath ordered them to glide in but are ever striving to have all things go as we our selves desire For what Christian lives that hath not some grudge or other with his neighbour to say nothing of all the Christian Princes now at warres among themselves leaving the Turk and other Infidels to incroach upon them to perturb the quiet devotion of the Church and laugh us all to scorn besides But it remains to shew how this prayer exhausts the Epistle and Gospel of the Masse to day The Epistle tells us what order Almighty God hath set the world in and this prayer beggs the same course may flow peaceably according as God hath ordered it that is to say neither one man should jarre with another nor those other creatures which God hath subjected to man should repine at their subjection And I would to God man kept his course as peaceably as all other creatures under him do theirs I would to God he did as resignedly undergo those little sufferings he is here subjected unto as they deserve to be undergone in hope of the huge reward they are to have if patiently and peaceably endured see how to day we pray that we may do this What prayer then more suitable to this Epistle The Gospel tells us how sweetly Jesus Christ founded his Church to day upon the persons of the Apostles whom he calls to be the pillars thereof It tells us with what devotion S. Peter followed the first call of our Saviour it shews what miracles accompanied the Apostles being called to this ministery it declares with what peaceable piety they followed our Saviour and left all they had in the world to dedicate themselves to his devotion What else doth the prayer to day close withall then a petition that the same miraculous Institution of the Church may be continued by a like miraculous preservation of it in the self same quiet and peace of piety as it was instituted with for it is indeed a miracle to see it so preserved nor is the goodnesse of God lesse seen in this then in the other and thereby shews that this is not a prayer of one day but ought to continue and be the incessant prayer of holy Church unto the worlds end that so it may appear to be the same sweet Spouse of Christ in the end which it was in the beginning of the foundation thereof and for this purpose holy Church we see makes it her annuall prayer so must we make it our annuall practise to pray in this conformity to the preaching and prayer of our holy mother The Epistle Rom. 8. v. 18. c. 18 For I think that the passions of this time are not condigne to the glory to come that shall be revealed in us 19 For the expectation of the creature expecteth the revelation of the Sonnes of God 20 For the creature is made subject unto vanity not willing but for him that made it subject in hope 21 Because the creature also it self shal be delivered from the servitude of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God 22 For we know that every creature groaneth and travelleth even till now 23 And not onely it but we also having the first fruits of the Spirit groan within our selves expecting the adoption of the sons of God the redemption of our body The Explication 18. HEnce hereticks take their rise to deny merit of good works but in vain for the Apostle onely means that humane actions as humane are not proportionable to the glory to that reward we purchase by them and in that sense onely denies our sufferings to be able to merit heaven But this notwithstanding our humane actions as they are elevated by the grace of God in vertue whereof they became good and meritorious and are by that means dipt in the passion of our Saviour Jesus Christ so they are in some manner proportionable to the reward they purchase in as much as they are so the effects of grace and not of nature and consequently may merit to be rewarded with eternall blisse or glory because grace is as it were the seed of glory and so what grace produceth is capable of glory Thus finite actions become capable of infinite reward thus one hours martyrdome is capable of eternall glory the like of other good works 19. This verse shews the greatnesse of the longing that creatures have after heaven when it seems to make the creature expectation it self whilest
it saith the expectation of the creature expecteth rather then the creature expecteth Again by creature in this place is understood not onely all mankind but even all other creatures below man for in man as in the abstract of all their perfections they are as it were made happy when he is rewarded by having God revealed to him face to face and by his injoying him for all eternity as who should say All corruptible nature hath then the full of their expectation when corrupted man is invested with incorruptible glory And then they are truly the sons of God when they are in glory an honour which the glorious Angels have not because their nature was never assumed by the nature divine and so though they are creatures of glory in nature more perfect then we yet are they not children of God so properly as men are 20. This verse shews that angels are not understood by the word creature since as they are in fruition and not in expectation so they cannot be liable to the vanity which here men and all creatures under them are subject unto in them who are God knows too too vain By vanity therefore understand here mutability labour corruption of all those creatures that God hath made subject unto man and therefore the text adds not willingly of their own accord for the time of his being in this world but in hope to be freed from that subjection when man is made immutable and stands no more in need of this vanity or mutability in other creatures Or we may understand this vanity to be that which is in man himself whereunto he is made subject not willingly but by being guilty of the sinnes of his first Father punished with his own mortality or corruption in all his progeny who yet have hope in Christ to be made free from it and to become immortall 21. In this verse is understood that not onely man but in him all other creatures under him that is the creature it self shall not by the gift of nature or grace but by that of glory be freed from all mutability and subjection and rendered sharing in glory with the children of God that is with men who become his children by their eternall glory 22. This verse rather shews the pain that other creatures are in under man then that which he is in himself as who should say they did cry out in continuall labour till in mans glory they were delivered 23. By this verse S. Paul means that not onely himself and the other Apostles who are the first fruits of all Christians but even all Christians themselves groan within themselves expecting as well the perfected adoption of glory in them as that of imperfect adoption which they have already of Baptismall Grace because this notwithstanding they may nay often do perish but the other coming then they have the full of their expectations and not till then For the desire of man is never satisfied untill the glory of God appear in him The Application 1. IT may seem a strange piece of divinity in S. Paul or a mistake of his sense in me to dissuade men from sin by the Rhetorick or voice of inanimate creatures as if either they could speak at all or yet speak more pathetically then holy men and blessed Angels for we see how often those do speak in vain to sinners to amend their lives But who so shall have read the Expositours above upon this present Text will see they do incline to this divinity that our sinnes are so weighty as they make the whole world groan beneath the burden of them ready to split indeed and unable to keep the course of Nature being so often interrupted in that course by our unnaturall proceedings every sinne being more or lesse an act against the law of Nature it self as well as against the law of God because all Naturall operations of the creatures are glorious to the Creatour whereas every sinne is inglorious and thence offensive to the Divine Majesty 2. Hence it is S. Paul begins this Epistle first to those whose charity and love to God gives them a sense of sin and to those who are willing to amend their lives by taking patiently the present punishments of sin such as are indeed but the naturall effects thereof neither as sicknesse sorrow persecution death it self Not condigne to the glory that shall be revealed in those who bear with patience the present Passions of Time so S. Paul stiles those effects of finne and animates the just to bear them patiently in hope of Heaven a reward so great as will render all those heavy burdens light 3. But the Apostle speaks in other language here to sinners such as wanting charity have no sense of God or of future happinesse these he makes the dumbe world speak unto in the 20. verse especially of this epistle bewailing the unwilling subjection the whole creature is in to sinfull mans vanity and looking on her hope to be freed from this generall subjection by the particular salvation of some few saints of men though not untill their corrupted bodies be made as incorruptible by glory at the latter day as their souls are already by that glory blessed Yes beloved this is the genuine sense of holy Text to day it tells us all the Fabrick of the world is like to split it tells us how dumbe creatures cry out shame of man to force them so against their nature to concurre to sinne it shews the bestiality of sinne when beasts themselves that never do commit it are ashamed of beastly man are sick and weary of him are tyred in beeing forc'd to serve him in his sinfull wayes and beg their own salvation in the just at least in which sense holy David said Thou O Lord wilt save both men and beasts to confound the sinner who pursues his own damnation even to the Torment of the creatures that are not capable of sinne and yet detest it out of an innate desire of honouring Almighty God in all their operations and so detest it too as they are ready to rebell against the man of sinne in so much that holy Church in her charity makes her petition proper to the sense above as if she were afraid least mans unnaturall wayes of sinne should force nature out of that order God hath set it in of serving man and pluck a warre of all the other creatures in the world on all man kind to the disturbance of the Church in her devotion and piety which at least she begs may be quiet and unperturb'd Say but the prayer above and see how patt it is to this purpose The Gospel Luke 5. v. 1. c. 1 And it came to passe when the multitudes pressed upon him to hear the word of God and himself stood beside the lake of Genesareth 2 And he saw two ships standing by the lake and the fishers were gone down and washed their nets 3 And he going up into one ship that was
sanctity that any Christian can hope to arrive unto so sweetly doth holy Church adapt her Prayer unto the doctrine of her preachers that so the layity may in little carry away what the preachers deliver to them at large The Epistle 1 Pet. 3.8 8 Be ye all unanimous in Prayer having compassion lovers of the fraternity merciful modest humble 9 Not rendring evil for evil nor curse for curse but contrariwise blessing for unto this are you called that you may by inheritance possesse a Benediction 10 For he that will love life and see good dayes let him refrain his tongue from evil and his lips that they speak not guile 11 Let him decline from evil and do good let him enquire peace and follow it 12 Because the eyes of the Lord are upon the just and his eares are open unto their prayers but the countenance of the Lord upon them that do evill things 13 And who is he that can hurt you if you be emulatours of good 14 But and if you suffer for justice Blessed are ye And the fear of them fear ye not and be not troubled 15 But sanctifie our Lord Christ in your hearts The Explication 8. St. Peter here recapitulates some of the chief vertues which make a perfect Christian No marvel he begins with unanimity be it in prayer or otherwise in all common Actions because this vertue is radicated in the B. Trinity the ground of all Christianity for there the three distinct Persons are not onely all of one mind but of one essence too in imitation whereof Christians are taught to be all of one mind all ayming still in every action at the honour and glory of one onely God as the Angels do The Apostle puts compassion next to shew that each Christian should be as sensible of his neighbours sufferings as his own soul is sensible of the pain in any member of his own body This vertue flowes indeed from the former unanimity for where there is but one mind or soul as it were there must be one and the same sense or compassion And this vertue of compassion extends as well towards our being sensible of each good in our neighbour and zealous to imitate it as of any evil we see in him out of a zeal to remedy or cure the same So excellent is the unity of Christianity Hence also flowes the next vertue lovers of the fraternity to shew that the grace of our Religion teacheth us to imitate the perfection of nature so to love one another being Brothers in grace as we do that are Brothers in nature When we are bid Be merciful it is as if we were told our compassion must be even from the Bowels of our hearts Modesty and humility are well joyntly recommended together because they are indeed inseparable companions as it were and so in this exteriour vertue modesty rendring the whole person exteriourly gratefull and in her inseparable companion humility S. Peter closeth up his enumeration of vertues ending with humility because that is indeed both the basis and summity of all others for as it must be the first as captivating mans proud reason unto Faith so if it go not hand in hand up to the top of perfection with other vertues even with charity the Queen of them all that great Queen cannot stand fast in her throne but upon the feet of humility 9. S. Peter here forbids not the flowing of Justice or execution of just revenge when it is legal but onely private retaliation of evil for evil and exhorts that each private person blesse and not curse those which do him mischief because as the end of all our temporal evils is eternal Blisse so we must in hope of that for our selves Blesse those that do us evil O rare perfection of Christianity 10. By these three next verses taken out of Davids mouth S. Peter proveth that to repay evil for evil is our natures propension but bids us forbear as we will hope to have our own evil deeds towards God forgiven and the little good we do rewarded with eternal life called here seeing good dayes for those are chiefly good which shine with glory over our heads though the dayes of grace here are not deprived of that Epitheton too We are therefore bid refrain our tongues because when they be loose and unbridled that alone begets bad dayes unto us every one judging him to have a bad heart that hath a bad or an unbridled tongue and how can the lips of an ill tongue speak other then guilt when they betray the guiltinesse of their own heart 11. The declining evil and doing good is an abstract of all Christian duty and a perfect rule of Christian perfection 'T is reason to bid us seek peace and follow it as being the special gift of our Saviour which he brought with him from heaven at his birth and then the Angels bestowed it amongst us the holy Ghost did the like at his coming too and Christ at his going left it as his Farewel as hath been said before yet is not here unseasonably repeated 12. By the eye of our Lord understand the piercing knowledge of Almighty God whereby he sees into the secrets of all hearts and seeing them lovers of Justice heares all the prayers they make unto him and grants them all they ask By his Countenance understand here that displeasure he shews at the latter day unto the wicked when he pronounceth the sentence of damnation against them for how ever he doth not damne every man in his actual sin but differrs his justice till the latter day yet he looks on their iniquity that do sin with the same displeasing countenance as at the day of Judgement when it will be a greater torment to behold the displeasure of that countenance then to suffer hell fire O that we could in all Temptations to sin reflect on this Truth so should we avoid the fact that will merit this effect 13. A happy shield against evil to emulate vertue and goodnesse Emulation here imports a vehement zeal and fervour of soul towards vertue not a faint velleity or wish of it but a strong will and action too and so makes a strong shield not onely against all vice but even against all mischief for S. Austin sayes well no body is hurt but by himself by his own sin therefore if all men be emulatours of vertue they are sheltred from all evil or hurt from others And this one of the Churches prayers in Lent assures us of that no adversity shall hurt us if no iniquity dominear over us 14. Doubtlesse those are Blessed that suffer for justice since Jesus Christ who is verity it self hath numbered those among the Blessed nay among those who actually are possessed of heaven as if a patient suffering an unjust persecution here were a heaven to the sufferer even whilest he is in durance and as if God were not content to reward that kind of suffering with future Blisse but with
given us in the Blessed Sacrament whereof this Gospel was but a figure according to the exposition of the best Expositours of Holy Writ For look how to day four thousand persons were corporally fed with multiplied loaves so are millions of soules dayly fed with the body of Christ multiplied under millions of consecrated hoasts and as by this food is chiefly nourished in us all that is good so by the practice of Piety as the prayer petitions in the close is maintained in us what by the aforesaid blessed Sacrament is nourished as who should say in vain we take this spirituall nutriment if after it we do not maintain the grace it gives us by the continuall study and practice of Piety wherefore to make this Prayer accomplished we beg in the close thereof that God will maintain in us by our practice of Piety the good nutriment we receive by the blessed Sacrament Thus wee see how admirably the Prayer is adapted to the other parts of this dayes service and withall we are taught that the perfection of a Christian life consists in the continuall practice of Piety and devotion The Epistle Rom. 6. v. 3. c. 3 Are you ignorant that all we which are baptized in Christ Jesus in his death we are baptized 4 For we are buried together with him by Baptisme into death that as Christ is risen from the dead by the glory of the Father so we also may walk in newnesse of life 5 For if we become complanted to the similitude of his death we shall be also of his resurrection 6 Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him that the body of sinne may be destroyed to the end that we may serve sin no longer 7 For he that is dead is justified from sin 8 And if we be dead with Christ we believe that we shall also live together with Christ 9 Knowing that Christ rising again from the dead now dieth no more death shall no more have dominion over him 10 For that he died to sin he died once but that he liveth he liveth to God 11 So think you also that you are dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord. The Explication 3. TO be baptized in Christ is to be christned according as Christ hath commanded in the name of the Father Sonne and holy Ghost to be baptized in his death is as much as to say in representation of his death and that our Baptisme hath force and vertue from the merits of his death and passion and signifies that as Christ died on the Crosse to this naturall life so the baptized die to sinne and live to Christ which is a life opposite to that of a sinner 4. This verse adds more to the Analogie saying we are not onely dead to sinne in Baptisme but thereby also buried with him in proof of our death to sinne So that the Trine Immersion used in Baptisme alludes to the three dayes that Christ lay buried in his grave as our sinnes in Baptisme lie drowned under the water thereof And for this cause holy Church makes a solemn Baptisme yearly on Easter eve to shew that thereby those who died were buried with Christ do also rise with him by the glory of his heavenly Father that is to glorifie him to a new life in him in testimony whereof the baptized have a white garment cast over them called the Chrisome to shew the purity of their souls and are advised to carry the same inward purity with them to the tribunall of Christ as a proofe of their fidelity to their vow in holy Baptisme of renouncing the world the flesh and the devill so to conserve their puritie or newnesse of life to the which the Fathers exhort earnestly when they inculcate the frequent memory of our baptismall vow which they ground in these words so we also may walk importing so we may persevere in that purity 5. See how this verse insists further upon the consequence of our spirituall resurrection even in this life by our spirituall death and buriall as above shewing that our newnesse of life by Baptism is like the ingrafting us into the stock or tree of Christ whence we are to receive all our future sap or nutriment so that as his death to naturall life was the way to his resurrection in like manner our death to sinne is the way to our resurrection with him and as we see graftâ— following the changes of the tree they are ingrafted in seem in the winter to die with it in the spring to revive with it so do we by Baptisme in Christ seem to die with him in the winter of his passion but revive in the spring of his resurrection 6. Then we know indeed our old man to be crucified with Christ when the new man lives in him By the old Man understand custome of sinning renounced by Baptisme by the body of sinne understand here the whole masse of our sinnes by the destruction of it understand not the palliation of it onely by imputative Justice as heretikes do but the absolute death thereof by inherent justice infused by baptismall grace into our souls 7. And this sense is confirmed by the next verse saying he that is dead meaning to sinne is justified from sinne lives by the infused Justice which hath killed and not onely covered sinnes in the baptized 8. This verse imports our future life eternall which we firmly believe we shall injoy with Christ if here we die with him to sinne 9. The sense of the precedent verse is confirmed by this following that tells us death shall as little reign over us in the next life if we truely die to sinne in this as it did over Christ once risen from his grave and yet withall alludes to the constancie we ought to have in good works even in this life that having once had the happinesse to live spiritually here we should disdain to die again by relapse into sinne and so to let death dominear ever us whom once we had slain by grace Note here the strange goodnesse of our Saviour who being God was content to let death once dominear over him on the Crosse that we might for ever after triumph with him over death 10. Here Christ is not to be understood to die to sinne as we doe but to die for sinne not his own but ours and that once for all our sinnes Where he is said here to live to God understand with God a blessed and immortall life as also that by so living he may perpetually praise and glorifie Almightie God since as he died for sinnes abolition so he lives for Gods glorification 11. 'T is reason we should think our selves dead to sinne when by Baptisme we renounce it and living to God when by the same Baptisme we live in him But it is a high expression of the alteration which the Apostle exhorts unto in advising us to think we are dead to sinne for as dead men have no motion
honest ends not for lucre or unjust sordid gain the temptation whereof will cease if we make it the end of our labour to do works of charity to others such as is relieving them in their necessity And if to this end even Church-men labour they will not want the example of it given them by the Apostles who did practise the same as well as preach it The Application 1. St. Paul not knowing what better counsel to give his Ephesian Converts when he found some of them relapsing towards the old man then to bid them be renewed in the spirit of their minds and to put on the new man which according to God was created in Justice and Holinesse seemes in this to have left it as a rule of Christian perfection that the Ephesians should endeavour to be continually the Saints which first they were when God by holy baptisme snatcht them out of the bondage of the devil and made them free-born Citizens of the heavenly Hierusalem clad in the richest robes of Saintitie the purest Innocency 2. And surely holy Church can have no other aym by reading us this lesson to day then to mind our charity of walking in that saving path of Innocency by renewing her baptismal vow her holy covenant with Almighty God of loving him above all things and her neighbour as her self of renouncing the world the flesh and the devil with all their lying passion malice and injustice forbidden to all Christians in the holy Text above 3. Now because this is easier said by Preachers then done by the people and because it is impossible for men of themselves to do the least good at all the Royal Prophet saying there is not one that doth it therefore holy Church finding her children by S. Paul exhorted to no lesse perfection then the highest of Saintity and remembring that as when Adam was in Paradise God to ease his way to Saintity had shut out all Adversity both of mind and body from thence all disturbance and grief of soul all rebellion of sense against reason all disasters of the body in a word all mortality it self so the same God having pleased to bring us in to a Paradise of grace our prudent Mother hopes his divine goodnesse will also shut out all adversity from thence that we may not by disturbance either in mind or body be hindered from executing his commands better in this paradise of grace then Adam did in the paradise of Earth yet withall our holy Mother knowing the difficulty of this work to procure us this tranquillity useth all her best arts and for this end Prayes to God that it may be if not ours at least his own handy-work and if not feisible by his ordinary Power that yet it may be done by his Omnipotency or by that which yet to us is greater by his mercy and lest that mercy be mistaken she conjures him by the highâ—st of his mercies by his bitter death and passion by that mercy which doth not onely satisfie the rigour of his Justice but renders him Propitious also to us Say but the Prayer above and see if it be not home to all this purpose The Gospel Matt. 22. v. 1. 1 And Jesus answering spake again in parables to them saying 2 The Kingdome of heaven is likened to a man being a King which made a marriage to his son 3 And he sent his servants to call them that were invited to the marriage and they would not come 4 And again he sent other servants saying tell them that were invited behold I have prepared my dinner my beeves and fatlings are killed and all things are ready come you to the marriage 5 But they neglected and went their wayes one to his farme and another to his merchandize 6 And the rest laid hands upon his servants and spitefully entreating them murdred them 7 And when the King did hear of it he was wroth and sending his hosts destroyed those murtherers and burnt their City 8 Then he said to his servants the marriage indeed is ready but they that were invited were not worthy 9 Go ye therefore into the high wayes and whomsoever you shall find call to the marriage 10 And his servants going forth into the wayes gathered together all that they found bad and good and the marriage was filled with guests 11 And the King went in to see the guests and saw there a man not attired in a wedding garment 12 And he said to him Friend how camest thou in hither not having a wedding garment but he was dumb 13 Then the King said to the wayters binde his hands and feet and cast him into the utter darknesse there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth 14 For many are called but few elected The Explication 1. BY this way of parables Christ did often instruct and illuminate the Jewes who were very intentive to any parabolical sense and much pleased therewith 2. By the Kingdome of heaven is here understood the Church militant which is truly a Kingdome purchased by the blood of Christ and the time when this marriage was made was when Christ became man who being the second person of the blessed Trinity was espoused to his holy Church So the King here mentioned is God the Father sending down his Son to be married to his said Spouse the holy Church 3. The servants meant in this verse were the Patriarks and Prophets of the old Law who could not prevail with the Jews to come unto the wedding feast that God had by these his servants invited them unto 4. The servants in this verse were the Apostles their disciples and all missionary Priests of the new Law of Christ These were bid tell the people invited and with great reason the wedding feast was ready for so the word dinner here imports By the beeves and fatlings are understood the Sacrifices Sacraments Sermons Martyrdomes and all other spiritual food prepared for souls in holy Church 5. By these are understood men preferring the world before God and so refusing to be reconciled for fear of loosing their estates by the penal lawes of man made against the followers of the Law of Christ The farm and merchandize are here set down in lieu of all other worldly occupations withdrawing soules from the service of God 6. These are such as did not onely refuse themselves to become good but proceeded farther in their malice by opposing others in their way of vertue in a word by persecuting the people of God the true Church of Christ Such were those who put to death the Apostles such they who now execute the Priests that succeed the Apostles in the ministery of Gods holy Word 7. This verse tells us that God perceiving the wickednesse of those who persecuted his Saints as the Jewes had done his sacred Son sent in his wrath Titus and Vespasian to destroy the Jewes to sack Jerusalem and therein to pull down the Temple of Solomon the miracle in a manner of the world So
bounty we bring unto thee that these sacred mysteries by the operative power of thy grace may sanctifie us in the conversation of this present life and lead us to eternall joyes The post-Communion BE O Lord unto us this heavenly mystery a reparation both of soul and body that whose worship we perform his effect we may feel On the ninth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer LEt the ears of thy mercy O Lord be open to the prayers of thy suppliants and to the end thou mayst grant the things desired to those that ask make them ask such things as to thee are pleasing The Secret GRant unto us O Lord we beseech thee that we may worthily frequent these mysteries because as often as the commemoration of this Hoste is celebrated the work of our Redemption is exercised The post-Communion VVE pray O Lord that the communion of thy Sacrament may confer purity and give unto us unity On the tenth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer O God who doest manifest thy Omnipotence most of all by pardoning and taking pitty multiply upon us thy mercy that we running unto thy promises thou maist make us partakers of thy Heavenly Treasures The Secret BE the consecrated sacrifices rendered unto thee O Lord which thou hast granted us so to be offered in honour of thy name that withall thou hast allowed them to be remedies unto us The post-Communion VVE beseech thee our Lord God that whom thou dost not cease to repair with divine Sacraments thou wilt not deprive them of thy favours being as thou art benigne On the eleventh Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer ALmighty everlasting God who out of the abundance of thy pity doest exceed as well the merits of thy suppliants as their desires pour out thy mercy upon us that thou maist forgive what our conscience is afraid of and add even what our prayers dare not presume to ask The Secret LOok we beseech thee O Lord propitiously upon our service that what we offer may be to thee an acceptable gift and to our frailty a support The post-Communion MAy we find O Lord we beseech thee by the receiving thy Sacrament help of soul and body that beeing in both preserved we may glory in the plenitude of the heavenly remedy On the twelfth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer OMnipotent and most mercifull God from whose bounty it proceedeth that of thy faithful people thou art worthily and laudably served grant unto us we beseech thee that we may runne unto thy promises without offence The Secret LOok we beseech thee O Lord propitiously upon the hosts which on thy holy altars we offer unto thee that giving us pardon they may also give honour unto thy Name The post-Communion LEt the holy participation of this mystery quicken us O Lord we beseech thee and equally give unto us expiation and defence On the thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer ALlmighty and everlasting God give unto us the increase of Faith Hope and Charity and that we may deserve to obtain what thou doest promise make us love what thou doest command The Secret BE propitious O Lord we beseech thee unto thy people and to their offerings that appeased by this oblation thou both pardon us and grant us our requests The post-Communion HAving O Lord received the heavenly Sacraments we beseech thee let them avail us to the increase of our eternall Redemption On the fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer KEep we beseech thee O Lord thy Church with perpetuall propitiation and since without thee humane mortality faileth let it alwayes by thy help be withdrawn from such things as are hurtfull and directed to those that are saving The Secret GRant unto us we pray thee O Lord that this wholsome offering may be a purgation of our sinnes and a propitiation of thy power The post-Communion LEt thy Sacraments O God alwayes cleanse us and bring us to the effect of our eternall salvation On the fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer LEt thy continual mercy O Lord both cleanse and defend thy Church and because without thee it cannot stand securely be it alwayes governed by thy bounty The Secret LEt thy Sacraments O Lord keep us and alwayes defend us from the assaults of the devil The post-Communion VVE beseech thee O Lord let the operation of thy heavenly gift possesse our minds and bodies that not our sense in us but continually the effect of thy said gift may prevent us On the sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer LEt thy Grace we beseech thee O Lord alwayes go before and follow us and make us continually intent unto good works The Secret CLeanse us O Lord we beseech thee by the effect of this present sacrifice and mercifully work in us that we may be sharers of the same The post-Communion VVE pray thee O Lord to purifie benignely our souls and to renew them with thy heavenly Sacraments that consequently we may have both present and future helps for our bodies On the seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer GRant we beseech thee O Lord that thy people may flye Diabolical contagion and follow thee the onely God with pure intention The Secret O Lord we humbly beseech thy Majestie that these holy things which we bear about us may divest us of our present and future offences The post-Communion BY thy sanctifications Almighty God be our sins cured and may eternal remedies accrue unto us On the eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer LEt O Lord the operation of thy mercy direct our hearts because without thee we cannot please thee The Secret O God who by the venerable commerce of this sacrifice dost make us partakers of thy onely and highest Deity grant we beseech thee that as we acknowledge thy truth so we may by our behoofeful comportment attain the same The post-Communion WE give thee thanks O Lord for being nourished by thy sacred bounty beseeching thy mercy that thou wilt make us worthy to partake thereof On the nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer ALmighty and mercifull God vouchsafe propitiously to exclude all things which are adverse unto us that being set at liberty both in mind and body we may with free souls execute those things that appertain unto thee The Secret THese offerings which we make in the sight of thy Majestie grant O Lord we beseech thee that they may be saving unto us The post-Communion MAy thy medicinall operation O Lord clemently free us from our perversities and make us alwayes adhere to thy commands On the twentieth Sunday after Pentecost The first Prayer VVE beseech thee O Lord thou being pacified grant unto thy faithfull people pardon and peace that they may be both clean from all offences and serve thee with secured souls The Secret WE pray thee O Lord to let these mysteries afford us heavenly remedy and to purge away the sinnes of our heart The post-Communion THat we may be
Octave of the Epiphanie The Prayer VVEe beseech thee O Lord prosecute with heavenly Piety the desires of thy suppliant people that they may both see what is by them to be done and be able to perform what they see they are to doe The Secret GRant O Lord that this Sacrifice offered unto thee may quicken alwayes and defend us The Post-Communion VVEe humbly beseech thee Omnipotent God that whom thou hast with thy Sacraments refreshed thou wilt gratiously grant they may serve thee with an agreeable comportment On the second Sunday after the Epiphanie The Prayer ALmighty everlasting God who doest moderate at once both Heavenly and Earthly things hear clemently the Prayers of thy people and grant us thy peace in our times The Secret SAnctifie O Lord our offered gifts and purge us from the spots of our Sinnes The Post-Communion O Lord we beseech thee let the operation of thy vertue be increased in us that nourished by thy Divine Sacraments we may be prepared through thy bounty to receive thy promises On the third Sunday after the EPIPHANIE The Prayer OMnipotent eternall God look we beseech thee propitiously on our infirmity and extend to our protection the right hand of thy Majesty The Secret VVEe pray thee O Lord let this Host cleanse our sins and sanctifie the bodies and soules of thy subjects towards the celebrating of thy sacrifice The Post-Communion TO whom thou doest O Lord grant the use of so great mysteries vouchsafe we beseech thee that we may truly be adopted unto their effects On the fourth Sunday after the EPIPHANIE The Prayer O God who knowest us set in so great dangers that we cannot through humane frailtie subsist gran unto us health of mind and body that what we suffer for our sins thou helping we may overcome The Secret GRant we beseech thee almighty God that the offered gift of this sacrifice may ever purge our frailtie and defend it from all evill The Post-Communion LEt thy gifts O God free us from terrene delights and refresh us alwayes with heavenly food On the fifth Sunday after the Epiphanie The Prayer KEep we beseech thee O Lord thy family in continuall pietie that resting on the onely hope of heavenly grace it may ever by thy protection be defended The Secret WEe offer unto thee O Lord the Host of Pacification and that thou mayest mercifully absolve us from our sins direct our drowsie hearts The Post-Communion WEe beseech thee almightie God that we may have the effect of that safety the pledge whereof we have received by these Mysteries On the sixth Sunday after the Epiphanie The Prayer GRant we beseech thee Almighty God that alwaies meditating those things which are reasonable we may both in our words and deeds doe what is pleasing unto Thee The Secret LEt this oblation O God cleanse and renew govern and protect us we beseech thee The Post-Communion BEing fed O Lord with heavenly delights we beseech thee that we may alwaies covet those things by which we truly live On SEPTUAGESIMA SUNDAY The Prayer VVEe beseech thee O Lord clemently to hear the Prayers of thy People that we who for our sins are justly afflicted may for the glory of thy Name be mercifully delivered The Secret THou having received our gifts O Lord and our prayers cleanse us with thy heavenly mysteries and hear us clemently we beseech thee The Post-Communion BEe thy faithfull O God strengthened by thy gifts that they may without end knowing seek and seeking know the same On SEXAGESIMA SUNDAY The Prayer O God who seest we confide not in any of our own Actions grant us propitiously that against all adversities we may be armed by the protection of the Doctor of the Gentiles The Secret MAy this sacrifice offered unto thee O Lord alwaies revive and protect us The Post-Communion WEe humbly beseech thee Almighty God to grant that those whom thou doest refresh with thy Sacraments may graciously serve thee with their good behaviour On QUINQUAGESIMA Sunday The Prayer O Lord we beseech thee hear clemently our Prayers and being loosened from the fetters of our sins keep us from all adversity The Secret MAy this oblation O Lord we beseech thee purge away our sins and sanctifie the bodies and souls of thy subjects for the celebrating of this sacrifice The Post-Communion VVEe pray thee O God Omnipotent that we who have received Heavenly food may thereby be guarded from all adversity FINIS The END Of the FIRST PART THE SECOND PART Of the first TOME On the first Sunday in Lent The Antiphon 2 Cor. 6. v. 2 c. BEhold now the acceptable time behold now the dayes of health in these dayes therefore let us exhibite our selves as the Servants of God in much patience in fastings in watchings and in unfeigned charity Vers To his Angels God hath given charge of thee Resp That in all thy wayes they may keepe thee The Prayer O God who doest purifie thy Church with an annuall observation of Lent grant unto thy Family that what it endeavoureth to obtaine of thee by Fasting it may finish the same by good workes The Illustration IF in the holy time of Lent we find not so exact a report between the Epistle Gospell and Prayer of the day as at other times of the yeer it must be given to the more then ordinary regard had unto the Lenten Fast which we shall observe all these Prayers make speciall mention of as if holy Church intended nothing more then a recommends of that wholesome Fast unto us neverthelesse I shall not despaire to find the Epistle and Gospell even like full-sail'd Vessels falling down this channell of holy abstinence and directed by the helme of the Prayer come full fraughted with the same concording Spirits into the Ports of our ever open hearts to Ghostly comforts which the other seasons of the yeare afford unto us But before we venture upon a thing so hard let us facilitate the way by first cleering the full sense of the Prayer for when we know what we aske therein we shall see what relation the Petition hath to the Epistle and Gospell whence we must draw it out Observe then first in this Prayer an acknowledgement that Almighty God doth purifie his Church with an annuall observation of Lent so the end of this Fast is the Churches purification Next see how the Prayer begs that what we endeavour to obtaine by Fasting we may finish by good workes so though purification be the end of our Fast yet the Fast alone is but an endeavour towards that end and nothing brings us home unto it unlesse to the endeavouring fast we adde the finishing help of good works and this with great reason too for as we are never said to be perfectly purified untill we can in a chaste body represent a pure Soule to God so by Fasting alone we onely chastize our bodies but by good workes the grand affaire is finished our Soule is made pure and then the Churches
end is accomplisht then the whole creatures we are become as was intended purified but least I should be thought to state this sense to my own designe let us heare Saint Leo in his Homily upon this day which the Priest reads in his Office tell us his opinion wherein consists the perfection of our Lenten Fasts Not in the sole abstaining from meat consisteth the integrity of our Fast but in the joynt taking away our affections from sinne thus hee and how shall we give better Testimony of our not being sinners then in doing good works such as may make us Saints see here then the Scope of holy Fast is as it were to starve the body and to feed the Soul for in vaine this forbears to eat flesh if that doe not feast upon Spirituall Cates such as are good works of Prayer Almes-deeds and other sorts of vertues especially recommended in this holy time of Lent nor is it without mystery the Prayer to day begges we may finish by good workes what we indeavour only by Fasting our annuall purifications by this Lenten Abstinence since though we have the grace to keep the fast exactly in point of dyet yet in vaine our bodies fast towards purification of the whole creature which we are unlesse our Soules at the same time feast upon vertues by abandoning all vices in this the Prayer to day observes the method of the Epistle in vaine the Ministers of holy Church receive the grace of God unlesse they make use of the acceptable time the dayes of salvation that now are flowing and this by rendring themselves with good workes pleasing to all men offensive to none unlesse to their Fast they adde the good works expressed in the Antiphon above taken out of the same Epistle and many more which those few referre unto from one end of the Epistle to another nor can we say these are counsels proper for Church-men only since those the expositours understand by Helpers in the Ministery of God because the Apostle layes himselfe open to the Corinthians not only as a Minister of God requiring such perfections as this Epistle mentions but as a patterne to the people to imitate so that all the good workes he tells them Churchmen should be perfect in he exhorts lay-men to practise too as if he would have the sheep equal Saints with their shepheards and indeed this is no strained sense of mine for we see holy Church to day exhibits unto us not only Apostolicall perfection in the Epistle but even that of Jesus Christ himselfe the Master of the Apostles when his forty-dayes Fast is set before our eyes in the Gospell and not that Fast alone but withall the addition of his good workes his Watching and his praying his resisting the strongest temptations that the Devill could accost him with now who that seeth this can say there wants sufficient Harmony betweene the preaching and the Praying part of this dayes service and that ample as can be in an abstract of Prayer exhausting two such large Texts as are the Epistle and Gospell of the first Sunday in Lent The Epistle 2 ad Cor. 6. v. 1 c. 1 And we helping doe exhort that you receive not the grace of God in vaine 2 For he saith In time accepted have I heard thee and in the day of Salvation have I holpen thee Behold now is the time acceptable behold now the day of salvation 3 To no man giving offence that our Ministery bee not blamed 4 But in all things let us exhibite our selves as the Ministers of God in much patience in tribulation in neâ—cssities in distresses 5 In Stripes in Prisons in Seditions in Labours in Watchings in Fastings 6 In chastity in knowledge in longanimity in Sweetnesse in the holy Ghost in charity not fained 7 In the word of Truth in the vertue of God by the Armour of Iustice on the right hand and on the left 8 By honour and dishonour by infamy and good fame as Seducers and True as they that are unknown and knowne 9 As dying and behold we live as chastened and not killed 10 As sorrowfull but alwayes rejoycing as needy but inriching many as having nothing and possessing all things The Explication 1. THe Apostles stiling themselvs Helpers in this verse allude to what was said more plainly in the immediate Chapter before to the Corinthians v. 19. where they were told Christ was the true reconciler of the people to God and his Apostles had given unto them by Christ the Ministery of this reconciliation the Administration of the Sacraments whereby we receive the grace of God and so are reconcil'd to him principally by himselfe Secondarily or Ministerially by his Apostles And the like is done by their Successours the Priests of holy Church to which alludes that saying of the Apostle Coloss 1. v. 24. That his Ministery and sufferings for the Faith doth accomplish those things which are wanting of the Passion of Christ not but that Christ did suffer personally all he was to suffer as head of his Church but that hee was yet to suffer more in his Members and even their sufferings he esteemed his own in so much as he gives the Apostle leave to say his and the other sufferings of Christians are supplies even of what was wanting in Christ his passion to shew us how neer and deer our sufferings are to God while he esteemes them as those of his own sacred Sonne and as thus by suffering for Justice all Christians supply what was wanting of Christ his passion so particularly all Priests by their exhortations and administration of the Sacraments are helpers of Christ in the reconciliation of Christians to Almighty God his favour through the grace of the holy Sacraments dispensed to them by the hands of the Priests who onely have this prerogative of reconciliation between God and Man what by their Sacrifices what by their exhortations and Sacraments which are dispensed unto us While the Apostle exhorts us not to receive the grace of God in vain he destroyes the fond doctrine of heretikes who will have grace alone without cooperation on our behalfe to be sufficient whereas out of this very Text the Catholike Church first teacheth that that Gods grace offers no violence to our free will but that it comes so sweet unto us as it is in our powers to reject or receive it as we please and that further we are taught that by our own free act of cooperation and this gratuite grace joyned together we are made gratefull to God whereas if we have never so much grace given us unlesse we doe freely cooperate therewith it is in vaine received as the Apostle sayes here in plaine termes whatsoever Heretikes pretend to the contrary thereby to make a gap open to their lazy liberties perswading themselves Christ hath already saved them and that it boots not what they doe so they have his grace or rather Faith alone without his grace a doctrine diametrically opposite to