Christ carried up so high but for prospect If the Kingdoms of the earth and their glory were onely to be presented to his Imagination the Valley would have served if to the outward Sense no Hill could suffice Circular bodies though small cannot be seen at once This show was made to both divers Kingdoms lying round about Judaea were represented to the Eye the glory of them to the Imagination Satan meant the Eye could tempt the Fancy no less then the Fancy could tempt the Will How many thousand souls have died of the wound of the Eye If we do not let in sin at the window of the Eye or the door of the Ear it cannot enter into our Hearts If there be any pomp majesty pleasure bravery in the world where should it be but in the Courts of Princes whom God hath made his Images his Deputies on earth There is soft raiment sumptuous feasts rich jewels honourable attendence glorious triumphs royal state These Satan lays out to the fairest show But oh the craft of that old Serpent Many a Care attends Greatness No Crown is without Thorns High seats are never but uneasie All those infinite discontentments which are the shadow of earthly Sovereignty he hides out of the way nothing may be seen but what may both please and allure Satan is still and ever like himself If Temptations might be but turn'd about and shewn on both sides the Kingdom of darkness would not be so populous Now whensoever the Tempter sets upon any poor Soul all sting of conscience wrath judgment torment is concealed as if they were not Nothing may appear to the eye but pleasure profit and a seeming happiness in the enjoying our desires Those other wofull objects are reserved for the farewell of sin that our misery may be seen and felt at once When we are once sure Satan is a Tyrant till then he is a Parasite There can be no safety if we do not view as well the back as the face of Temptations But oh presumption and impudence that Hell it self may be ashamed of The Devil dares say to Christ All these will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me That beggarly Spirit that hath not an inch of Earth can offer the whole World to the Maker to the Owner of it The Slave of God would be adored of his Creatour How can we hope he should be sparing of false boasts and of unreasonable promises unto us when he dares offer Kingdoms to him by whom Kings reign Temptations on the right hand are most dangerous How many that have been hardned with Fear have melted with Honour There is no doubt of that Soul that will not bite at the golden hook False Liars and vain-glorious Boasters see the top of their pedigree if I may not rather say that Satan doth borrow the use of their tongues for a time Whereas faithfull is he that hath promised who will also doe it Fidelity and Truth is the issue of Heaven If Idolatry were not a dear sin to Satan he would not be so importunate to compass it It is miserable to see how he draws the world insensibly into this sin which they profess to detest Those that would rather hazzard the furnace then worship Gold in a Statue yet do adore it in the stamp and find no fault with themselves If our hearts be drawn to stoop unto an over-high respect of any creature we are Idolaters O God it is no marvel if thy jealousie be kindled at the admission of any of thine own works into a competition of honour with their Creatour Never did our Saviour say Avoid Satan till now It is a just indignation that is conceived at the motion of a rivality with God Neither yet did Christ exercise his Divine power in this command but by the necessary force of Scripture drives away that impure Tempter It is written Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him onely shalt thou serve The rest of our Saviour's answers were more full and direct then that they could admit of a reply but this was so flat and absolute that it utterly daunted the courage of Satan and put him to a shamefull flight and made him for the time weary of his trade The way to be rid of the troublesome solicitations of that Wicked one is continued resistence He that forcibly drove the Tempter from himself takes him off from us and will not abide his assaults perpetual It is our exercise and trial that he intends not our confusion X. Simon called AS the Sun in his first rising draws all eyes to it so did this Sun of righteousness when he first shone forth into the world His miraculous Cures drew Patients his Divine Doctrine drew Auditours both together drew the admiring multitude by troops after him And why do we not still follow thee O Saviour through desarts and mountains over land and seas that we may be both healed and taught It was thy word that when thou wert lift up thou wouldst draw all men unto thee Behold thou art lift up long since both to the Tree of shame and to the Throne of heavenly Glory Draw us and we shall run after thee Thy Word is still the same though proclaimed by men thy Virtue is still the same though exercised upon the spirits of men Oh give us to hunger after both that by both our souls may be satisfied I see the people not onely following Christ but pressing upon him Even very Unmannerliness finds here both excuse and acceptation They did not keep their distances in an awe to the Majesty of the Speaker whilst they were ravished with the power of the Speech yet did not our Saviour check their unreverent thronging but rather incourages their forwardness We cannot offend thee O God with the importunity of our desires It likes thee well that the Kingdom of heaven should suffer violence Our slackness doth ever displease thee never our vehemency The throng of Auditours forced Christ to leave the shore and to make Peter's Ship his Pulpit Never were there such nets cast out of that fisher-boat before Whilst he was upon the land he healed the sick bodies by his touch now that he was upon the Sea he cured the sick souls by his doctrine and is purposely severed from the multitude that he may unite them to him He that made both Sea and Land causeth both of them to conspire to the opportunities of doing good Simon was busie washing his nets Even those nets that caught nothing must be washed no less then if they had sped well The night's toil doth not excuse his day's work Little did Simon think of leaving those nets which he so carefully washed and now Christ interrupts him with the favour and blessing of his gracious presence Labour in our calling how homely soever makes us capable of Divine benediction The honest Fisher-man when he saw the people flock after Christ and heard him speak with such power could not
mourning thy chief pleasure is the comfort of the afflicted What a confusion there is in worldly sorrow The mother shreeks the servants cry out the people make lamentation the minstrells howl and strike dolefully so as the ear might question whether the Ditty or the Instrument were more heavy If ever expressions of sorrow sound well it is when Death leads the quire Soon doth our Saviour charm this noise and turns these unseasonable mourners whether formal or serious out of doors Not that he dislikes Musick whether to condole or comfort but that he had life in his eye and would have them know that he held these Funeral ceremonies to be too early and long before their time Give place for the maid is not dead but sleepeth Had she been dead she had but slept now she was not dead but asleep because he meant this nap of death should be so short and her awakening so speedy Death and Sleep are alike to him who can cast whom he will into the sleep of Death and awake when and whom he pleaseth out of that deadly sleep Before the people and domesticks of Jairus held Jesus for a Prophet now they took him for a Dreamer Not dead but asleep They that came to mourn cannot now forbear to laugh Have we piped at so many Funerals and seen and lamented so many Corpses and cannot we distinguish betwixt Sleep and Death The eyes are set the breath is gone the lims are stiff and cold Who ever died if she do but sleep How easily may our Reason or Sense befool us in Divine matters Those that are competent Judges in natural things are ready to laugh God to scorn when he speaks beyond their compass and are by him justly laughed to scorn for their unbelief Vain and faithless men as if that unlimited power of the Almighty could not make good his own word and turn either Sleep into Death or Death into Sleep at pleasure Ere many minutes they shall be ashamed of their errour and incredulity There were witnesses enough of her death there shall not be many of her restoring Three choice Disciples and the two Parents are onely admitted to the view and testimony of this miraculous work The eyes of those incredulous scoffers were not worthy of this honour Our infidelity makes us incapable of the secret favours and the highest counsels of the Almighty What did these scorners think and say when they saw him putting the minstrels and people out of doors Doubtless the maid is but asleep the man fears lest the noise shall awake her we must speak and tread softly that we disquiet her not What will he and his Disciples doe the while Is it not to be feared they will startle her out of her rest Those that are shut out from the participation of God's counsells think all his words and projects no better then foolishness But art thou O Saviour ever the more discouraged by the derision and censure of these scornfull unbelievers Because fools jear thee dost thou forbear thy work Surely I do not perceive that thou heedest them save for contempt or carest more for their words then their silence It is enough that thine act shall soon honour thee and convince them He took her by the hand and called saying Maid arise and her spirit came again and she arose straightway How could that touch that Call be other then effectual He who made that hand touched it and he who shall once say Arise ye dead said now Maid arise Death cannot but obey him who is the Lord of life The Soul is ever equally in his hand who is the God of Spirits it cannot but go and come at his command When he says Maid arise the now-dissolved spirit knows his office his place and instantly re-assumes that room which by his appointment it had left O Saviour if thou do but bid my Soul to arise from the death of Sin it cannot lie still if thou bid my Body to arise from the grave my Soul cannot but glance down from her Heaven and animate it In vain shall my sin or my grave offer to withhold me from thee The Maid revives not now to languish for a time upon her sick-bed and by some faint degrees to gather an insensible strength but at once she arises from her death and from her couch at once she puts off her fever with her dissolution she finds her life and her feet at once at once she finds her feet and her stomack He commanded to give her meat Omnipotency doth not use to go the pace of Nature All God's immediate works are like himself perfect He that raised her supernaturally could have so fed her It was never the purpose of his Power to put ordinary Means out of office XXVI The Motion of the two fiery Disciples repelled THE time drew now on wherein Jesus must be received up He must take death in his way Calvary is in his passage to mount Olivet He must be lift up to the Cross thence to climb into his Heaven Yet this comes not into mention as if all the thought of Death were swallowed up in this Victory over Death Neither O Saviour is it otherwise with us the weak members of thy mystical body We must die we shall be glorified What if Death stand before us we look beyond him at that transcendent Glory How should we be dismay'd with that pain which is attended with a blessed Immortality The strongest receit against Death is the happy estate that follows it next to that is the fore-expectation of it and resolution against it He stedfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem Jerusalem the nest of his enemies the Amphitheater of his conflicts the fatall place of his death Well did he know the plots and ambushes that were there laid for him and the bloudy issue of those designs yet he will go and goes resolved for the worst It is a sure and wise way to send our thoughts before us to grapple with those evils which we know must be incountred The enemy is half overcome that is well prepared for The strongest mischief may be outfaced with a seasonable fore-resolution There can be no greater disadvantage then the suddenness of a surprisall O God what I have not the power to avoid let me have the wisedom to expect The way from Galilee to Judaea lay through the Region of Samaria if not through the City Christ now towards the end of his Preaching could not but be attended with a multitude of followers It was necessary there should be purveyours and harbingers to procure lodgings and provision for so large a troup Some of his own retinue are addressed to this service they seek not for palaces and delicates but for house-room and victuals It was He whose the earth was and the fulness thereof whos 's the Heavens are and the mansions therein yet He who could have commanded Angels sues to Samaritans He that filled and comprehended Heaven sendeth for shelter in a
Blessed Mother that a sword should pierce through her Soul but alas how many swords at once pierce thine Every one of these words is both sharp and edged My Soul is exceeding sorrowfull even unto death What humane Soul is capable of the conceit of the least of those sorrows that oppressed thine It was not thy Body that suffered now the pain of body is but as the body of pain the anguish of the Soul is as the soul of anguish That and in that thou sufferedst Where are they that dare so far disparage thy Sorrow as to say thy Soul suffered onely in sympathy with thy Body not immediately but by participation not in its self but in its partner Thou best knewest what thou feltest and thou that feltest thine own pain canst cry out of thy Soul Neither didst thou say My Soul is troubled so it often was even to tears but My Soul is sorrowfull as if it had been before assaulted now possessed with grief Nor yet this in any tolerable moderation changes of Passion are incident to every humane Soul but Exceeding sorrowfull Yet there are degrees in the very extremities of evils those that are most vehement may yet be capable of a remedy at least a relaxations thine was past these hopes Exceeding sorrowfull unto death What was it what could it be O Saviour that lay thus heavy upon thy Divine Soul Was it the fear of Death was it the fore-felt pain shame torment of thine ensuing Crucifixion Oh poor and base thoughts of the narrow hearts of cowardly and impotent mortality How many thousands of thy blessed Martyrs have welcomed no less tortures with smiles and gratulations and have made a sport of those exquisite cruelties which their very Tyrants thought unsufferable Whence had they this strength but from thee If their weakness were thus undaunted and prevalent what was thy power No no It was the sad weight of the Sin of mankind it was the heavy burthen of thy Father's wrath for our sin that thus pressed thy Soul and wrung from thee these bitter expressions What can it avail thee O Saviour to tell thy grief to men who can ease thee but he of whom thou saidst My Father is greater then I Lo to him thou turnest O Father if it be possible let this cup pass from me Was not this that prayer O dear Christ which in the days of thy flesh thou offeredst up with strong crying and tears to him that was able to save thee from death Surely this was it Never was cry so strong never was God thus solicited How could Heaven chuse but shake at such a Prayer from the Power that made it How can my heart but tremble to hear this suit from the Captain of our Salvation O thou that saidst I and my Father are one dost thou suffer ought from thy Father but what thou wouldst what thou determinedst was this Cup of thine either casuall or forced wouldst thou wish for what thou knewest thou wouldst not have possible Far far be these mis-raised thoughts of our ignorance and frailty Thou camest to suffer and thou wouldst doe what thou camest for yet since thou wouldst be a man thou wouldst take all of man save sin it is but humane and not sinfull to be loth to suffer what we may avoid In this velleity of thine thou wouldst shew what that Nature of ours which thou hadst assumed could incline to wish but in thy resolution thou wouldst shew us what thy victorious thoughts raised and assisted by thy Divine power had determinately pitched upon Nevertheless not as I will but as thou wilt As man thou hadst a Will of thine own no humane Soul can be perfect without that main faculty That will which naturally could be content to incline towards an exemption from miseries gladly vails to that Divine will whereby thou art designed to the chastisements of our peace Those pains which in themselves were grievous thou embracest as decreed so as thy fear hath given place to thy love and obedience How should we have known these evils so formidable if thou hadst not in half a thought inclined to deprecate them How could we have avoided so formidable and deadly evils if thou hadst not willingly undergone them We acknowledge thine holy fear we adore thy Divine fortitude Whilst thy Mind was in this fearfull agitation it is no marvell if thy Feet were not fixed Thy place is more changed then thy thoughts One while thou walkest to thy drouzy Attendents and stirrest up their needfull vigilancy then thou returnest to thy passionate Devotions thou fallest again upon thy face If thy Body be humbled down to the earth thy Soul is yet lower thy prayers are so much more vehement as thy pangs are And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly and his sweat was as it were great drops of bloud falling down to the ground O my Saviour what an agony am I in whilst I think of thine What pain what fear what strife what horrour was in thy Sacred breast How didst thou struggle under the weight of our sins that thou thus sweatest that thou thus bleedest All was peace with thee thou wert one with thy coeternal and coessential Father all the Angels worshipp'd thee all the powers of Heaven and earth awfully acknowledged thine Infiniteness It was our person that feoffed thee in this misery and torment in that thou sustainedst thy Father's wrath and our curse If eternal death be unsufferable if every sin deserve eternal death what O what was it for thy Soul in this short time of thy bitter Passion to answer those millions of eternal deaths which all the sins of all mankind had deserved from the just hand of thy Godhead I marvell not if thou bleedest a sweat if thou sweatest bloud If the moisture of that Sweat be from the Body the tincture of it is from the Soul As there never was such another Sweat so neither can there be ever such a Suffering It is no wonder if the Sweat were more then natural when the Suffering was more then humane O Saviour so willing was that precious bloud of thine to be let forth for us that it was ready to prevent thy Persecutours and issued forth in those pores before thy wounds were opened by thy Tormentours Oh that my heart could bleed unto thee with true inward compunction for those sins of mine which are guilty of this thine Agony and have drawn bloud of thee both in the Garden and on the Cross Woe is me I had been in Hell if thou hadst not been in thine Agony I had scorched if thou hadst not sweat Oh let me abhor my own wickedness and admire and bless thy Mercy But O ye blessed Spirits which came to comfort my conflicted Saviour how did ye look upon this Son of God when ye saw him labouring for life under these violent temptations with what astonishment did ye behold him bleeding whom ye adored In the Wilderness after his Duell with Satan ye
hurt me it may refresh me to carry this cool Snake in my bosome O then my dear Saviour I bless thee for thy Death but I bless thee more for thy Resurrection That was a work of wonderfull Humility of infinite Mercy this was a work of infinite Power In that was humane Weakness in this Divine Omnipotence In that thou didst die for our sins in this thou didst rise again for our Justification And now how am I conformable to thee if when thou art risen I lie still in the grave of my Corruptions How am I a lim of thy body if whilst thou hast that perfect dominion over death death hath dominion over me if whilst thou art alive and glorious I lie rotting in the dust of death I know the locomotive faculty is in the Head by the power of the Resurrection of thee our Head all we thy Members cannot but be raised As the earth cannot hold my Body from thee in the day of the Second Resurrection so cannot sin withhold my Soul from thee in the First How am I thine if I be not risen and if I be risen with thee why do I not seek the things above where thou sittest at the right hand of God The Vault or Cave which Joseph had hewn out of the rock was large capable of no less then ten persons upon the mouth of it Eastward was that great stone rolled within it at the right hand in the North part of the Cave was hewn out a receptacle for the body three handfulls high from the pavement and a stone was accordingly fitted for the cover of that Grave Into this Cave the good Women finding the stone rolled away descended to seek the body of Christ and in it saw the Angels This was the Goal to which Peter and John ran finding the spoils of death the grave-cloaths wrapped up and the napkin that was about the head folded up together and laid in a place by it self and as they came in haste so they return'd with wonder I marvell not at your speed O ye blessed Disciples if upon the report of the Women ye ran yea flew upon the wings of zeal to see what was become of your Master Ye had wont to walk familiarly together in the attendence of your Lord now society is forgotten and as for a wager each tries the speed of his legs and with neglect of other vies who shall be first at the Tomb. Who would not but have tried masteries with you in this case and have made light touches of the earth to have held paces with you Your desire was equall but John is the younger his lims are more nimble his breath more free he first looks into the Sepulcher but Peter goes down first O happy competition who shall be more zealous in the enquiry after Christ Ye saw enough to amaze you not enough to settle your Faith How well might you have thought Our Master is not subduced but risen Had he been taken away by others hands this fine linen had not been left behind Had he not himself risen from this bed of earth he had not thus wrapped up his night-cloaths and laid them sorted by themselves What can we doubt when he foretold us he would rise O Blessed Jesu how wilt thou pardon our errours how should we pardon and pity the errours of each other in lesser occasions when as yet thy prime and dearest Disciples after so much Divine instruction knew not the Scriptures that thou must rise again from the dead They went away more astonished then confident more full of wonder as yet then of belief There is more strength of zeal where it takes in the weaker Sex Those holy Women as they came first so they staid last especially devout Mary Magdalene stands still at the mouth of the Cave weeping Well might those tears have been spared if her Knowledge had been answerable to her Affection her Faith to her Fervour Withall as our eye will be where we love she stoops and looks down into that dear Sepulcher Holy desires never but speed well There she sees two glorious Angels the one sitting at the head the other at the feet where the body of Jesus had lain Their shining brightness shew'd them to be no mortall creatures besides that Peter and John had but newly come out of the Sepulcher and both found and left it empty in her sight which was now suddenly filled with those celestiall guests That white linen wherewith Joseph had shrouded the Sacred Body of Jesus was now shamed with a brighter whiteness Yet do I not find the good Woman ought appalled with that inexpected glory So was her heart taken up with the thought for her Saviour that she seemed not sensible of whatsoever other Objects Those tears which she did let drop into the Sepulcher send up back to her the voice of those Angels Woman why weepest thou God and his Angels take notice of every tear of our Devotion The sudden wonder hath not dried her eyes nor charmed her tongue She freely confesseth the cause of her grief to be the missing of her Saviour They have taken away my Lord and I know not where they have laid him Alas good Mary how dost thou lose thy tears of whom dost thou complain but of thy best friend who hath removed thy Lord but himself who but his own Deity hath taken away that humane body out of that region of death Neither is he now laid any more he stands by thee whose removall thou complainest of Thus many a tender and humbled Soul afflicts it self with the want of that Saviour whom it hath and feeleth not Sense may be no judge of the bewailed absence of Christ Do but turn back thine eye O thou Religious Soul and see Jesus standing by thee though thou knewest not that it was Jesus His habit was not his own Sometimes it pleases our Saviour to appear unto his not like himself his holy disguises are our trialls Sometimes he will seem a Stranger sometimes an Enemy sometimes he offers himself to us in the shape of a poor man sometimes of a distressed captive Happy is he that can discern his Saviour in all forms Mary took him for a Gardener Devout Magdalene thou art not much mistaken As it was the trade of the First Adam to dress the Garden of Eden so was it the trade of the Second to tend the Garden of his Church He digs up the soil by seasonable afflictions he sows in it the seeds of Grace he plants it with gracious motions he waters it with his Word yea with his own Bloud he weeds it by wholsome censures O Blessed Saviour what is it that thou neglectest to doe for this selected inclosure of thy Church As in some respect thou art the true Vine and thy Father the Husbandman so also in some other we are the Vine and thou art the Husbandman Oh be thou such to me as thou appearedst unto Magdalene break up the fallows of my Nature
not weeping his Hand seconds his Tongue He arrests the Coffin and frees the Prisoner Young man I say unto thee Arise the Lord of life and death speaks with command No finite power could have said so without presumption or with success That is the voice that shall one day call up our vanished bodies from those elements into which they are resolved and raise them out of their dust Neither sea nor death nor hell can offer to detain their dead when he charges them to be delivered Incredulous nature what dost thou shrink at the possibility of a Resurrection when the God of nature undertakes it It is no more hard for that Almighty Word which gave being unto all things to say Let them be repaired then Let them be made I do not see our Saviour stretching himself upon the dead corps as Elias and Elisha upon the Sons of the Sunamite and Sareptan nor kneeling down and praying by the Bier as Peter did to Dorcas but I hear him so speaking to the dead as if he were alive and so speaking to the dead that by the word he makes him alive I say unto thee Arise Death hath no power to bid that man lie still whom the Son of God bids Arise Immediatly he that was dead sate up So at the sound of the last Trumpet by the power of the same voice we shall arise out of the dust and stand up glorious this mortal shall put on immortality this corruptible incorruption This body shall not be buried but sown and at our day shall therefore spring up with a plentifull increase of glory How comfortless how desperate should be our lying down if it were not for this assurance of rising And now behold lest our weak faith should stagger at the assent to so great a difficulty he hath already by what he hath done given us tasts of what he will doe The power that can raise one man can raise a thousand a million a world No power can raise one man but that which is infinite and that which is infinite admits of no limitation Under the Old Testament God raised one by Elias another by Elisha living a third by Elisha dead By the hand of the Mediatour of the New Testament he raised here the son of the Widow the daughter of Jairus Lazarus and in attendence of his own Resurrection he made a Gaol-delivery of holy Prisoners at Jerusalem He raises the daughter of Jairus from her Bed this Widow's son from his Coffin Lazarus from his Grave the dead Saints of Jerusalem from their Rottenness that it might appear no degree of death can hinder the efficacy of his over-ruling command He that keeps the keys of death cannot onely make way for himself through the common Hall and outer rooms but through the inwardest and most reserved closets of darkness Methinks I see this young man who was thus miraculously awaked from his deadly sleep wiping and rubbing those eyes that had been shut up in death and descending from the Bier wrapping his winding-sheet about his loins cast himself down in a passionate thankfulness at the feet of his Almighty Restorer adoring that Divine power which had commanded his soul back again to her forsaken lodging and though I hear not what he said yet I dare say they were words of praise and wonder which his returned soul first uttered It was the Mother whom our Saviour pitied in this act not the Son who now forced from his quiet rest must twice pass through the gates of death As for her sake therefore he was raised so to her hands was he delivered that she might acknowledge that soul given to her not to the possessour Who cannot feel the amazement and ecstasie of joy that was in this revived mother when her son now salutes her from out of another world and both receives and gives gratulations of his new life How suddenly were all the tears of that mournfull train dried up with a joyfull astonishment How soon is that Funeral-banquet turned into a new Birth-day-feast What striving was here to salute the late carkass of their returned neighbour What awfull and admiring looks were cast upon that Lord of life who seeming homely was approved Omnipotent How gladly did every tongue celebrate both the work and the authour A great Prophet is raised up amongst us and God hath visited his people A Prophet was the highest name they could find for him whom they saw like themselves in shape above themselves in power They were not yet acquainted with God manifested in the flesh This Miracle might well have assured them of more then a Prophet but he that raised the dead man from the Bier would not suddenly raise these dead hearts from the grave of Infidelity They shall see reason enough to know that the Prophet who was raised up to them was the God that now visited them and at last should doe as much for them as he had done for the young man raise them from death to life from dust to glory XIV The Ruler's Son cured THE Bounty of God so exceedeth man's that there is a contrariety in the exercise of it We shut our hands because we opened them God therefore opens his because he hath opened them God's mercies are as comfortable in their issue as in themselves Seldome ever do blessings go alone Where our Saviour supplied the Bride-groom's Wine there he heals the Ruler's Son He had not in all these coasts of Galilee done any Miracle but here To him that hath shall be given We do not find Christ oft attended with Nobility here he is It was some great Peer or some noted Courtier that was now a suitour to him for his dying Son Earthly Greatness is no defence against Afflictions We men forbear the mighty Disease and Death know no faces of Lords or Monarchs Could these be bribed they would be too rich Why should we grudge not to be privileged when we see there is no spare of the Greatest This noble Ruler listens after Christ's return into Galilee The most eminent amongst men will be glad to hearken after Christ in their necessity Happy was it for him that his Son was sick he had not else been acquainted with his Saviour his Soul had continued sick of ignorance and unbelief Why else doth our good God send us pain losses opposition but that he may be sought to Are we afflicted whither should we go but to Cana to seek Christ whither but to the Cana of Heaven where our water of sorrow is turned to the wine of gladness to that Omnipotent Physician who healeth all our infirmities that we may once say It is good for me that I was afflicted It was about a day's journey from Capernaum to Cana Thence hither did this Courtier come for the cure of his Son's Fever What pains even the greatest can be content to take for bodily health No way is long no labour tedious to the desirous Our Souls are sick of a spiritual fever
acknowledges a virtue inherent in her It was his virtue that cured her yet he graciously casts this work upon her Faith Not that her Faith did it by way of merit by way of efficiency but by way of impetration So much did our Saviour regard that Faith which he had wrought in her that he will honour it with the success of her Cure Such and the same is still the remedy of our spiritual diseases our sins By faith we are justified by faith we are saved Thou onely O Saviour canst heal us thou wilt not heal us but by our Faith not as it issues from us but as it appropriates thee The sickness is ours the remedy is ours the sickness is our own by nature the remedy ours by thy grace both working and accepting it Our Faith is no less from thee then thy Cure is from our Faith O happy dismission Go in peace How unquiet had this poor Soul formerly been She had no outward peace with her Neighbours they shunned and abhorred her presence in this condition yea they must doe so She had no peace in Body that was pained and vexed with so long and foul a disease Much less had she peace in her Mind which was grievously disquieted with sorrow for her sickness with anger and discontentment at her torturing Physicians with fear of the continuance of so bad a guest Her Soul for the present had no peace from the sense of her guiltiness in the carriage of this business from the conceived displeasure of him to whom she came for comfort and redress At once now doth our Saviour calm all these storms and in one word and act restores to her peace with her Neighbours peace in her Self peace in Body in Mind in Soul Goe in peace Even so Lord it was for thee onely who art the Prince of Peace to bestow thy peace where thou pleasest Our body mind Soul estate is thine whether to afflict or ease It is a wonder if all of us do not ail somewhat In vain shall we speak peace to our selves in vain shall the world speak peace to us except thou say to us as thou didst to this distressed soul Goe in peace XXV Jairus and his Daughter HOW troublesome did the people's importunity seem to Jairus That great man came to sue unto Jesus for his dying Daughter the throng of the multitude intercepted him Every man is most sensible of his own necessity It is no straining courtesy in the challenge of our interest in Christ there is no unmannerliness in our strife for the greatest share in his presence and benediction That onely Child of this Ruler lay a dying when he came to solicit Christ's aid and was dead whilst he solicited it There was hope in her sickness in her extremity there was fear in her death despair and impossibility as they thought of help Thy daughter is dead trouble not the Master When we have to doe with a mere finite power this word were but just He was a Prophet no less then a King that said Whilst the child was yet alive I fasted and wept for I said Who can tell whether God will be gracious to me that the child may live But now he is dead wherefore should I fast Can I bring him back again I shall goe to him but he shall not return to me But since thou hast to doe with an omnipotent agent know now O thou faithless messenger that death can be no bar to his power How well would it have become thee to have said Thy daughter is dead but who can tell whether thy God and Saviour will not be gracious to thee that the child may revive Cannot he in whose hands are the issues of death bring her back again Here were more Manners then Faith Trouble not the Master Infidelity is all for ease and thinks every good work tedious That which Nature accounts troublesome is pleasing and delightfull to Grace Is it any pain for an hungry man to eat O Saviour it was thy meat and drink to doe thy Father's will and his will was that thou shouldst bear our griefs and take away our sorrows It cannot be thy trouble which is our happiness that we may still sue to thee The messenger could not so whisper his ill news but Jesus heard it Jairus hears that he feared and was now heartless with so sad tidings He that resolved not to trouble the Master meant to take so much more trouble to himself and would now yield to a hopeless sorrow He whose work it is to comfort the afflicted rouzeth up the dejected heart of that pensive father Fear not believe onely and she shall be made whole The word was not more chearfull then difficult Fear not Who can be insensible of so great an evil Where death hath once seized who can but doubt he will keep his hold No less hard was it not to grieve for the loss of an onely Child then not to fear the continuance of the cause of that grief In a perfect Faith there is no Fear by how much more we fear by so much less we believe Well are these two then coupled Fear not believe onely O Saviour if thou didst not command us somewhat beyond Nature it were no thank to us to obey thee While the Child was alive to believe that it might recover it was no hard task but now that she was fully dead to believe she should live again was a work not easy for Jairus to apprehend though easy for thee to effect yet must that be believed else there is no capacity of so great a Mercy As Love so Faith is stronger then death making those bonds no other then as Sampson did his withes like threds of tow How much natural impossibility is there in the return of these Bodies from the dust of their Earth into which through many degrees of corruption they are at the last mouldred Fear not O my Soul believe onely it must it shall be done The sum of Jairus his first suit was for the Health not for the Resuscitation of his Daughter now that she was dead he would if he durst have been glad to have asked her Life And now behold our Saviour bids him expect both her Life and her Health Thy daughter shall be made whole alive from her death whole from her disease Thou didst not O Jairus thou daredst not ask so much as thou receivest How glad wouldst thou have been since this last news to have had thy Daughter alive though weak and sickly Now thou shalt receive her not living onely but sound and vigorous Thou dost not O Saviour measure thy gifts by our petitions but by our wants and thine own mercies This work might have been as easily done by an absent command the Power of Christ was there whilst himself was away but he will go personally to the place that he might be confessed the Authour of so great a Miracle O Saviour thou lovest to go to the house of
absence as doubting it might savour of some neglect Christ was glad of it for the advantage of his Disciples Faith I cannot blame them that they were thus sorry I cannot but bless him that he was thus glad The gain of their Faith in so Divine a Miracle was more then could be countervailed by their momentany sorrow God and we are not alike affected with the same events He laughs where we mourn he is angry where we are pleased The difference of the affections arises from the difference of the Objects which Christ and they apprehend in the same occurrence Why are the Sisters sorrowfull because upon Christ's absence Lazarus died Why was Jesus glad he was not there for the benefit which he saw would accrue to their Faith There is much variety of prospect in every act according to the severall intentions and issues thereof yea even in the very same eyes The father sees his son combating in a Duell for his Country he sees blows and wounds on the one side he sees renown and victory on the other he grieves at the wounds he rejoyces in the Honour Thus doeth God in all our Afflictions he sees our tears and hears our groans and pities us but withall he looks upon our Patience our Faith our Crown and is glad that we are afflicted O God why should not we conform our diet unto thine When we lie in pain and extremity we cannot but droop under it but do we find our selves increased in true Mortification in Patience in Hope in a constant reliance on thy Mercies Why are we not more joyed in this then dejected with the other since the least grain of the increase of Grace is more worth then can be equalled with whole pounds of bodily vexation O strange consequence Lazarus is dead nevertheless Let us goe unto him Must they not needs think What should we doe with a dead man What should separate if death cannot Even those whom we loved dearliest we avoid once dead now we lay them aside under the board and thence send them out of our houses to their grave Neither hath Death more horrour in it then noisomeness and if we could intreat our eyes to endure the horrid aspect of Death in the face we loved yet can we perswade our sent to like that smell that arises up from its corruption O love stronger then Death Behold here a friend whom the very Grave cannot sever Even those that write the longest and most passionate dates of their amity subscribe but Your friend till death and if the ordinary strain of humane friendship will stretch yet a little farther it is but to the brim of the grave thither a friend may follow us and see us bestowed in this house of our Age but there he leaves us to our worms and dust But for thee O Saviour the grave-stone the earth the coffin are no bounders of thy dear respects even after death and buriall and corruption thou art graciously affected to those thou lovest Besides the Soul whereof thou saiest not Let us goe to it but Let it come to us there is still a gracious regard to that dust which was and shall be a part of an undoubted member of that mysticall body whereof thou art the Head Heaven and earth yield no such friend but thy self O make me ever ambitious of this Love of thine and ever unquiet till I feel my self possessed of thee In the mouth of a mere man this word had been incongruous Lazarus is dead yet let us goe to him in thine O Almighty Saviour it was not more loving then seasonable since I may justly say of thee thou hast more to doe with the dead then with the living for both they are infinitely more and have more inward communion with thee and thou with them Death cannot hinder either our passage to thee or thy return to us I joy to think the time is coming when thou shalt come to every of our graves and call us up out of our dust and we shall hear thy voice and live XLI Lazarus Raised GReat was the opinion that these devout Sisters had of the Power of Christ as if Death durst not shew her face to him they suppose his presence had prevented their Brother's dissolution And now the news of his approach begins to quicken some late hopes in them Martha was ever the more active She that was before so busily stirring in her house to entertain Jesus was now as nimble to goe forth of her house to meet him She in whose face joy had wont to smile upon so Blessed a Guest now salutes him with the sighs and tears and blubbers and wrings of a disconsolate mourner I know not whether the speeches of her greeting had in them more sorrow or Religion She had been well catechized before even she also had sate at Jesus his feet and can now give good account of her Faith in the Power and Godhead of Christ in the certainty of a future Resurrection This Conference hath yet taught her more and raised her heart to an expectation of some wonderfull effect And now she stands not still but hasts back into the Village to her Sister carried thither by the two wings of her own hopes and her Saviour's commands The time was when she would have called off her Sister from the feet of that Divine Master to attend the houshold occasions now she runs to fetch her out of the house to the feet of Christ Doubtless Martha was much affected with the presence of Christ and as she was over-joyed with it her self so she knew how equally welcome it would be to her Sister yet she doth not ring it out aloud in the open Hall but secretly whispers this pleasing tidings in her Sister's ear The Master is come and calleth for thee Whether out of modesty or discretion It is not fit for a woman to be loud and clamorous nothing beseems that Sex better then silence and bashfulness as not to be too much seen so not to be heard too far Neither did Modesty more charm her tongue then Discretion whether in respect to the guests or to Christ himself Had those guests heard of Christ's being there they had either out of fear or prejudice withdrawn themselves from him neither durst they have been witnesses of that wonderfull Miracle as being over-awed with that Jewish edict which was out against him or perhaps they had withheld the Sisters from going to him against whom they knew how highly their Governours were incensed Neither was she ignorant of the danger of his own person so lately before assaulted violently by his enemies at Jerusalem She knew they were within the smoak of that bloudy City the nest of his enemies she holds it not therefore fit to make open proclamation of Christ's presence but rounds her Sister secretly in the ear Christianity doth not bid us abate any thing of our wariness and honest policies yea it requires us to have no less of the
I said this for their sakes that they might believe Mercifull Saviour how can we enough admire thy goodness who makest our belief the scope and drift of thy doctrine and actions Alas what wert thou the better if they believed thee sent from God what wert thou the worse if they believed it not Thy perfection and glory stands not upon the slippery terms of our approbation or dislike but is reall in thy self and that infinite without possibility of our increase or diminution We we onely are they that have either the gain or loss in thy receit or rejection yet so dost thou affect our belief as if it were more thine advantage then ours O Saviour whilst thou spak'st to thy Father thou liftedst up thine eyes now thou wert to speak unto dead Lazarus thou liftedst up thy voice and criedst aloud Lazarus come forth Was it that the strength of the voice might answer to the strength of the affection since we faintly require what we care not to obtain and vehemently utter what we earnestly desire Was it that the greatness of the voice might answer to the greatness of the work Was it that the hearers might be witnesses of what words were used in so miraculous an act no magicall incantations but authoritative and Divine commands Was it to signifie that Lazarus his Soul was called from far the speech must be loud that shall be heard in another world Was it in relation to the estate of the body of Lazarus whom thou hadst reported to sleep since those that are in a deep and dead sleep cannot be awaked without a loud call Or was it in a representation of that loud voice of the last Trumpet which shall sound into all graves and raise all flesh from their dust Even so still Lord when thou wouldst raise a Soul from the death of sin and grave of corruption no easie voice will serve Thy strongest commands thy loudest denunciations of Judgments the shrillest and sweetest promulgations of thy Mercies are but enough How familiar a word is this Lazarus come forth no other then he was wont to use whilst they lived together Neither doth he say Lazarus revive but as if he supposed him already living Lazarus come forth To let them know that those who are dead to us are to and with him alive yea in a more entire and feeling society then whilst they carried their clay about them Why do I fear that separation which shall more unite me to my Saviour Neither was the word more familiar then commanding Lazarus come forth Here is no suit to his Father no adjuration to the deceased but a flat and absolute injunction Come forth O Saviour that is the voice that I shall once hear sounding into the bottom of my grave and raising me up out of my dust that is the voice that shall pierce the rocks and divide the mountains and fetch up the dead out of the lowest deeps Thy word made all thy word shall repair all Hence all ye diffident fears he whom I trust is Omnipotent It was the Jewish fashion to enwrap the corps in linen to tie the hands and feet and to cover the face of the dead The Fall of man besides weakness brought shame upon him ever since even whilst he lives the whole Body is covered but the Face because some sparks of that extinct Majesty remain there is wont to be left open In death all those poor remainders being gone and leaving deformity and gastliness in the room of them the Face is covered also There lies Lazarus bound in double fetters One Almighty word hath loosed both and now he that was bound came forth He whose power could not be hindred by the chains of death cannot be hindred by linen bonds He that gave life gave motion gave direction He that guided the Soul of Lazarus into the body guided the body of Lazarus without his eyes moved the feet without the full liberty of his regular paces No doubt the same power slackned those swathing-bands of death that the feet might have some little scope to move though not with that freedome that followed after Thou didst not onely O Saviour raise the body of Lazarus but the Faith of the beholders They cannot deny him dead whom they saw rising they see the signs of death with the proofs of life Those very swathes convinced him to be the man that was raised Thy less Miracle confirms the greater both confirm the Faith of the beholders O clear and irrefragable example of our resuscitation Say now ye shameless Sadducees with what face can ye deny the Resurrection of the body when ye see Lazarus after four-days death rising up out of his grave And if Lazarus did thus start up at the bleating of this Lamb of God that was now every day preparing for the slaughter-house how shall the dead be rouzed up out of their graves by the roaring of that glorious and immortall Lion whose voice shall shake the powers of Heaven and move the very foundations of the earth With what strange amazedness do we think that Martha and Mary the Jews and the Disciples look'd to see Lazarus come forth in his winding-sheet shackled with his linen fetters and walk towards them Doubtless fear and horrour strove in them whether should be for the time more predominant We love our friends dearly but to see them again after their known death and that in the very robes of the grave must needs set up the hair in a kind of uncouth rigour And now though it had been most easy for him that brake the adamantine fetters of death to have broke in pieces those linen ligaments wherewith his raised Lazarus was encumbred yet he will not doe it but by their hands He that said Remove the stone said Loose Lazarus He will not have us expect his immediate help in that we can doe for our selves It is both a laziness and a presumptuous tempting of God to look for an extraordinary and supernaturall help from God where he hath enabled us with common aid What strange salutations do we think there were betwixt Lazarus and Christ that had raised him betwixt Lazarus and his Sisters and neighbours and friends what amazed looks what unusuall complements For Lazarus was himself at once here was no leisure of degrees to reduce him to his wonted perfection neither did he stay to rub his eyes and stretch his benummed lims nor take time to put off that dead sleep wherewith he had been seized but instantly he is both alive and fresh and vigorous if they do but let him goe he walks so as if he had ailed nothing and receives and gives mutuall gratulations I leave them entertaining each other with glad embraces with discourses of reciprocall admiration with praises and adorations of that God and Saviour that had fetched him into life XLII CHRIST's Procession to the Temple NEver did our Saviour take so much state upon him as now that he was going towards his
and drowned in bloud to see your selves no Nation Was there ever people under Heaven that was made so famous a spectacle of misery and desolation Have ye yet enough of that bloud which ye called for upon your selves and your children Your former Cruelties Uncleannesses Idolatries cost you but some short Captivities God cannot but be just this Sin under which you now lie groaning and forlorn must needs be so much greater then these as your vastation is more and what can that be other then the murther of the Lord of Life Ye have what ye wisht be miserable till ye be penitent XLIX The Crucifixion THE sentence of Death is past and now who can with dry eyes behold the sad pomp of my Saviour's bloudy execution All the streets are full of gazing spectatours waiting for this ruefull sight At last O Saviour there thou comest out of Pilate's gate bearing that which shall soon bear thee To expect thy Cross was not torment enough thou must carry it All this while thou shalt not onely see but feel thy death before it come and must help to be an agent in thine own Passion It was not out of favour that those scornfull robes being stripped off thou art led to death in thine own cloaths So was thy face besmeared with bloud so swoln and discoloured with buffettings that thou couldst not have been known but by thy wonted habit Now thine insulting enemies are so much more imperiously cruell as they are more sure of their success Their merciless tormentings have made thee half dead already yet now as if they had done nothing they begin afresh and will force thy weakned and fainting nature to new tasks of pain The transverse of thy Cross at least is upon thy shoulder when thou canst scarce goe thou must carry One kicks thee with his foot another strikes thee with his staff another drags thee hastily by thy cord and more then one spur on thine unpitied weariness with angry commands of haste Oh true form and state of a servant All thy former actions O Saviour were though painfull yet free this as it is in it self servile so it is tyrannously inforced Inforced yet more upon thee by thy own Love to mankind then by their power and despight It was thy Father that laid upon thee the iniquity of us all It was thine own Mercy that caused thee to bear our sins upon the Cross and to bear the Cross with the curse annexed to it for our sins How much more voluntary must that needs be in thee which thou requirest to be voluntarily undertaken by us It was thy charge If any man will come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me Thou didst not say Let him bear his cross as forceably imposed by another but Let him take up his cross as his free burthen free in respect of his heart not in respect of his hand so free that he shall willingly undergoe it when it is laid upon him not so free as that he shall lay it upon himself unrequired O Saviour thou didst not snatch the Cross out of the Souldiers hands and cast it upon thy shoulder but when they laid it on thy neck thou underwentest it The constraint was theirs the will was thine It was not so heavy to them or to Simon as it was to thee they felt nothing but the wood thou feltest it clogged with the load of the sins of the whole world No marvell if thou faintedst under that sad burthen thou that bearest up the whole earth by thy word didst sweat and pant and groan under this unsupportable carriage O Blessed Jesu how could I be confounded in my self to see thee after so much loss of bloud and over-toiledness of pain languishing under that fatal Tree And yet why should it more trouble me to see thee sinking under thy Cross now then to see thee anon hanging upon thy Cross In both thou wouldst render thy self weak and miserable that thou mightest so much the more glorify thy infinite mercy in suffering It is not out of any compassion of thy misery or care of thine ease that Simon of Cyrene is forced to be the porter of thy Cross it was out of their own eagerness of thy dispatch thy feeble paces were too slow for their purpose their thirst after thy bloud made them impatient of delay If thou have wearily struggled with the burthen of thy shame all along the streets of Jerusalem when thou comest once past the gates an helper shall be deputed to thee the expedition of thy death was more sweet to them then the pain of a lingring passage What thou saidst to Judas they say to the Executioner What thou doest doe quickly Whilst thou yet livest they cannot be quiet they cannot be safe to hasten thine end they lighten thy carriage Hadst thou done this out of choice which thou didst out of constraint how I should have envied thee O Simon of Cyrene as too happy in the honour to be the first man that bore that Cross of thy Saviour wherein millions of blessed Martyrs have since that time been ambitious to succeed thee Thus to bear thy Cross for thee O Saviour was more then to bear a Crown from thee Could I be worthy to be thus graced by thee I should pity all other glories Whilst thou thus passest O dear Jesu the streets and ways resound not all with one note If the malicious Jews and cruell Souldiers insulted upon thee and either haled or railed thee on with a bitter violence thy faithfull Followers were no less loud in their moans and ejulations neither would they endure that the noise of their cries and lamentations should be drowned with the clamour of those reproaches but especially thy Blessed Mother and those other zealous associates of her own sex were most passionate in their wailings And why should I think that all that devout multitude which so lately cried Hosanna in the streets did not also bear their part in these publick condolings Though it had not concerned thy self O Saviour thine ears had been still more open to the voice of grief then of malice and so thy lips also are open to the one shut to the other Daughters of Jerusalem weep not for me but weep for your selves and for your children Who would not have thought O Saviour that thou shouldst have been wholly taken up with thine own sorrows The expectation of so bitter a Death had been enough to have overwhelmed any Soul but thine yet even now can thy gracious eye find time to look beyond thine own miseries at theirs and to pity them who insensible of their own insuing condition mourned for thine now present They see thine extremity thou foreseest theirs they pour out their sorrow upon thee thou divertest it upon themselves We silly creatures walk blindfolded in this vale of tears and little know what evil is towards us onely what we feel we know and whilst we feel nothing can
Body that was conceived by the Holy Ghost of the pure substance of an immaculate Virgin Woe is me that which was unspotted with sin is all blemished with humane cruelty and so wofully disfigured that the Blessed Mother that bore thee could not now have known thee so bloudy were thy Temples so swoln and discoloured was thy Face so was the Skin of thy whole body streaked with red and blew stripes so did thy thorny diadem shade thine Heavenly Countenance so did the streams of thy bloud cover and deform all thy Parts The eye of Sense could not distinguish thee O dear Saviour in the nearest proximity to thy Cross the eye of Faith sees thee in all this distance and by how much more ignominy deformity pain it finds in thee so much more it admires the glory of thy mercy Alas is this the Head that is decked by thine eternall Father with a Crown of pure gold of immortall and incomprehensible Majesty which is now bushed with thorns Is this the Eye that saw the Heavens opened and the Holy Ghost descending upon that Head that saw such resplendence of Heavenly brightness on mount Tabor which now begins to be overclouded with death Are these the Ears that heard the voice of thy Father owning thee out of Heaven which now tingle with buffettings and glow with reproaches and bleed with thorns Are these the Lips that spake as never man spake full of grace and power that called out dead Lazarus that ejected the stubbornest Devils that commanded the cure of all diseases which now are swoln with blows and discoloured with blewness and bloud Is this the Face that should be fairer then the sons of men which the Angels of Heaven so desired to see and can never be satisfied with seeing that is thus foul with the nasty mixtures of sweat and bloud and spittings on Are these the Hands that stretched out the Heavens as a curtain that by their touch healed the lame the deaf the blind which are now bleeding with the nails Are these the Feet which walked lately upon the liquid pavement of the sea before whose footstool all the Nations of the earth are bidden to worship that are now so painfully fixed to the Cross O cruell and unthankfull mankind that offered such measure to the Lord of Life O infinitely-mercifull Saviour that wouldst suffer all this for unthankfull mankind That fiends should doe these things to guilty souls it is though terrible yet just but that men should doe thus to the Blessed Son of God it is beyond the capacity of our horrour Even the most hostile dispositions have been onely content to kill Death hath sated the most eager malice thine enemies O Saviour held not themselves satisfied unless they might enjoy thy torment Two Thieves are appointed to be thy companions in death thou art designed to the midst as the chief malefactour on whether hand soever thou lookest thine eye meets with an hatefull partner But O Blessed Jesu how shall I enough admire and celebrate thy infinite Mercy who madest so happy an use of this Jewish despight as to improve it to the occasion of the Salvation of one and the comfort of millions Is not this as the last so the greatest specialty of thy wonderfull compassion to convert that dying Thief with those nailed hands to snatch a Soul out of the mouth of Hell Lord how I bless thee for this work how do I stand amazed at this above all other the demonstrations of thy Goodness and Power The Offender came to die nothing was in his thoughts but his guilt and torment whilst he was yet in his bloud thou saidst This Soul shall live Ere yet the intoxicating Potion could have time to work upon his brain thy Spirit infuses Faith into his heart He that before had nothing in his eye but present death and torture is now lifted up above his Cross in a blessed ambition Lord remember me when thou comest into thy Kingdom Is this the voice of a Thief or of a Disciple Give me leave O Saviour to borrow thine own words Verily I have not found so great faith no not in all Israel He saw thee hanging miserably by him and yet styles thee Lord he saw thee dying yet talks of thy Kingdom he felt himself dying yet talks of a future remembrance O Faith stronger then death that can look beyond the Cross at a Crown beyond dissolution at a remembrance of Life and Glory Which of thine eleven were heard to speak so gracious a word to thee in these thy last pangs After thy Resurrection and knowledge of thine impassible condition it was not strange for them to talk of thy Kingdom but in the midst of thy shamefull death for a dying malefactour to speak of thy reigning and to implore thy remembrance of himself in thy Kingdom it is such an improvement of Faith as ravisheth my Soul with admiration O blessed Thief that hast thus happily stoln Heaven How worthy hath thy Saviour made thee to be a partner of his sufferings a pattern of undauntable belief a spectacle of unspeakable mercy This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise Before I wondred at thy Faith now I envy at thy Felicity Thou cravedst a remembrance thy Saviour speaks of a present possession This day thou suedst for remembrance as a favour to the absent thy Saviour speaks of thy presence with him thou spakest of a Kingdom thy Saviour of Paradise As no Disciple could be more faithfull so no Saint could be happier O Saviour what a precedent is this of thy free and powerfull grace Where thou wilt give what unworthiness can bar us from Mercy when thou wilt give what time can prejudice our vocation who can despair of thy goodness when he that in the morning was posting towards Hell is in the evening with thee in Paradise Lord he could not have spoken this to thee but by thee and from thee What possibility was there for a Thief to think of thy Kingdom without thy Spirit That good Spirit of thine breathed upon this man breathed not upon his fellow their trade was alike their sin was alike their state alike their cross alike onely thy Mercy makes them unlike One is taken the other is refused Blessed be thy Mercy in taking one blessed be thy Justice in leaving the other Who can despair of that Mercy who cannot but tremble at that Justice Now O ye cruell Priests and Elders of the Jews ye have full leisure to feed your eyes with the sight ye so much longed for there is the bloud ye purchased and is not your malice yet glutted Is not all this enough without your taunts and scoffs and sports at so exquisite a misery The people the passengers are taught to insult where they should pity Every man hath a scorn ready to cast at a dying innocent A generous nature is more wounded with the tongue then with the hand O Saviour thine ear was more painfully pierced then thy brows
and sovereign wound by which our Souls are healed Into this cleft of the rock let my Dove fly and enter and there safely hide her self from the talons of all the Birds of prey It could not be but that the death of Christ contrived and acted at Jerusalem in so solemn a Festivall must needs draw a world of beholders The Romans the Centurion and his band were there as actours as supervisours of the Execution Those strangers were no otherwise engaged then as they that would hold fair correspondence with the Citizens where they were engarisoned their freedome from prejudice rendred them more capable of an ingenuous construction of all events Now when the Centurion and they that were with him that watched Jesus saw the Earthquake and the things that were done they feared greatly and glorified God and said Truly this was the Son of God What a marvellous concurrence is here of strong and irrefragable convictions Meekness in suffering Prayer for his murtherers a faithfull resignation of his Soul into the hands of his Heavenly Father the Sun eclipsed the Heavens darkned the earth trembling the graves open the rocks rent the veil of the Temple torn who could goe less then this Truly this was the Son of God He suffers patiently this is through the power of Grace many good men have done so through his enabling The frame of Nature suffers with him this is proper to the God of Nature the Son of God I wonder not that these men confessed thus I wonder that any Spectatour confessed it not these proofs were enough to fetch all the world upon their knees and to have made all mankind a Convert But all hearts are not alike no means can work upon the wilfully-obdured Even after this the Souldier pierced that Blessed Side and whilst Pagans relented Jews continued impenitent Yet even of that Nation those beholders whom envy and partiality had not interessed in this slaughter were stricken with just astonishment and smote their breasts and shook their heads and by passionate gesture spake what their tongues durst not How many must there needs be in this universall concourse of them whom he had healed of diseases or freed from Devils or miraculously fed or some way obliged in their persons or friends These as they were deeply affected with the mortall indignities which were offered to their acknowledged Messiah so they could not but be ravished with wonder at those powerfull demonstrations of the Deity of him in whom they believed and strangely distracted in their thoughts whilst they compared those Sufferings with that Omnipotence As yet their Faith and Knowledge was but in the bud or in the blade How could they chuse but think Were he not the Son of God how could these things be and if he were the Son of God how could he die His Resurrection his Ascension should soon after perfect their belief but in the mean time their hearts could not but be conflicted with thoughts hard to be reconciled Howsoever they glorify God and stand amazed at the expectation of the issue But above all other O thou Blessed Virgin the Holy Mother of our Lord how many swords pierced thy Soul whilst standing close by his Cross thou sawest thy dear Son and Saviour thus indignly used thus stripped thus stretched thus nailed thus bleeding thus dying thus pierced How did thy troubled heart now recount what the Angel Gabriel had reported to thee from God in the message of thy blessed Conception of that Son of God How didst thou think of the miraculous formation of that thy Divine burthen by the power of the Holy Ghost How didst thou recall those prophecies of Anna and Simeon concerning him and all those supernaturall works of his the irrefragable proofs of his Godhead and laying all these together with the miserable infirmities of his Passion how wert thou crucified with him The care that he took for thee in the extremity of his torments could not chuse but melt thy heart into sorrow But oh when in the height of his pain and misery thou heardst him cry out My God my God why hast thou forsaken me what a cold horrour possessed thy Soul I cannot now wonder at thy qualms and swounings I could rather wonder that thou survivedst so sad an hour But when recollecting thy self thou sawest the Heavens to bear a part with thee in thy mourning and feltest the Earth to tremble no less then thy self and foundest that the dreadfull concussion of the whole frame of Nature proclaimed the Deity of him that would thus suffer and die and remembredst his frequent predictions of drinking this bitter cup and of being baptized thus in Bloud thou beganst to take heart and to comfort thy self with the assured expectation of the glorious issue More then once had he foretold thee his victorious Resurrection He who had openly professed Jonas for his type and had fore-promised in three days to raise up the ruined Temple of his Body had doubtless given more full intimation unto thee who hadst so great a share in that sacred Body of his The just shall live by Faith Lo that Faith of thine in his ensuing Resurrection and in his triumph over death gives thee life and chears up thy drouping Soul and bids it in an holy confidence to triumph over all thy fears and sorrows and him whom thou now seest dead and despised represents unto thee living immortall glorious L. The Resurrection GRace doth not ever make show where it is There is much secret riches both in the earth and sea which never eye saw I never heard any news till now of Joseph of Arimathaea yet was he eminently both rich and wise and good a worthy though close Disciple of our Saviour True Faith may be wisely reserved but will not be cowardly Now he puts forth himself and dares beg the Body of Jesus Dearth is wont to end all quarrells Pilate's heart tells him he hath done too much already in sentencing an innocent to death no doubt that Centurion had related unto him the miraculous symptoms of that Passion He that so unwillingly condemned Innocence could rather have wished that just man alive then have denied him dead The Body is yielded and taken down and now that which hung naked upon the Cross is wrapped in fine linen that which was soiled with sweat and bloud is curiously washed and embalmed Now even Nicodemus comes in for a part and fears not the envy of a good profession Death hath let that man loose whom the Law formerly over-awed with restraint He hates to be a night-bird any longer but boldly flies forth and looks upon the face of the Sun and will be now as liberall in his Odours as he was before niggardly in his Confession O Saviour the earth was thine and the fulness of it yet as thou hadst not an house of thine own whilst thou livedst so thou hadst not a grave when thou wert dead Joseph that rich Councillour lent thee his lent it
thing here had horrour The Place both solitary and a Sepulcher Nature abhors as the visage so the region of Death and Corruption The Time Night onely the Moon gave them some faint glimmering for this being the seventeenth day of her age afforded some light to the latter part of the night The Business the visitation of a dead Corps Their zealous Love hath easily overcome all these They had followed him in his Sufferings when the Disciples left him they attended him to his Cross weeping they followed him to his Grave and saw how Joseph laid him even there they leave him not but ere it be day-light return to pay him the last tribute of their duty How much stronger is Love then death O Blessed Jesu why should not we imitate thy love to us Those whom thou lovest thou lovest to the end yea in it yea after it even when we are dead not our Souls onely but our very dust is dearly respected of thee What condition of thine should remove our affections from thy person in Heaven from thy lims on earth Well did these worthy Women know what Joseph of Arimathaea and Nicodemus had done to thee they saw how curiously they had wrapped thee how preciously they had embalmed thee yet as not thinking others beneficence could be any just excuse of theirs they bring their own Odours to thy Sepulture to be perfumed by the touch of thy Sacred Body What thank is it to us that others are obsequious to thee whilst we are slack or niggardly We may rejoyce in others forwardness but if we rest in it how small joy shall it be to us to see them go to Heaven without us When on the Friday-evening they attended Joseph to the intombing of Jesus they mark'd the place they mark'd the passage they mark'd that inner grave-stone which the owner had fitted to the mouth of that tomb which all there care is now to remove Who shall roll away the stone That other more weighty load wherewith the vault was barred the seal the guard set upon both came not perhaps into their knowledge this was the private plot of Pilate and the Priests beyond the reach of their thoughts I do not hear them say How shall we recover the charges of our Odours or How shall we avoid the envy and censure of our angry Elders for honouring him whom the Governours of our Nation have thought worthy of condemnation The onely thought they now take is Who shall roll away the stone Neither do they stay at home and move this doubt but when they are well forward on their way resolving to try the issue Good hearts cannot be so solicitous for any thing under Heaven as for removing those impediments which lie between them and their Saviour O Blessed Jesu thou who art clearly revealed in Heaven art yet still both hid and sealed up from too many here on earth Neither is it some thin veil that is spred between thee and them but an huge stone even a true stone of offence lies rolled upon the mouth of their hearts Yea if a second weight were superadded to thy Grave here no less then three spirituall bars are interposed betwixt them and thee above Idleness Ignorance Unbelief Who shall roll away these stones but the same power that removed thine O Lord remove that our Ignorance that we may know thee our Idleness that we may seek thee our Unbelief that we may find and enjoy thee How well it succeeds when we go faithfully and conscionably about our work and leave the issue to God Lo now God hath removed the cares of these holy Women together with the grave-stone To the wicked that falls out which they feared to the Godly that which they wished and cared for yea more Holy cares ever prove well the worldly dry the bones and disappoint the hopes Could these good Visitants have known of a greater stone sealed of a strong watch set their doubts had been doubled now God goes beyond their thoughts and at once removes that which both they did and might have feared The stone is removed the seal broken the watch fled What a scorn doth the Almighty God make of the impotent designs of men They thought the stone shall make the grave sure the seal shall make the stone sure the guard shall make both sure Now when they think all safe God sends an Angel from Heaven above the earth quakes beneath the stone rolls away the Souldiers stand like carkasses and when they have got heart enough to run away think themselves valiant the Tomb is opened Christ is risen they confounded Oh the vain projects of silly men as if with one shovel-full of mire they would dam up the Sea or with a clout hang'd forth they would keep the Sun from shining Oh these Spiders-webs or houses of cards which fond children have as they think skilfully framed which the least breath breaks and ruines Who are we sorry worms that we should look in any business to prevail against our Creatour What creature is so base that he cannot arm against us to our confusion The Lice and Frogs shall be too strong for Pharaoh the Worms for Herod There is no wisedom nor counsell against the Lord. Oh the marvellous pomp and magnificence of our Saviour's Resurrection The Earth quakes the Angel appears that it may be plainly seen that this Divine person now rising had the command both of Earth and Heaven At the dissolution of thine Humane nature O Saviour was an Earthquake at the re-uniting of it is an Earthquake to tell the world that the God of Nature then suffered and had now conquered Whilst thou laiest still in the earth the earth was still when thou camest to fetch thine own The earth trembled at the presence of the Lord at the presence of the God of Jacob. When thou our true Sampson awakedst and foundest thy self tied with these Philistian cords and rousedst up and brakest those hard and strong twists with a sudden power no marvell if the room shook under thee Good cause had the earth to quake when the God that made it powerfully calls for his own flesh from the usurpation of her bowells Good cause had she to open her graves and yield up her dead in attendence to the Lord of Life whom she had presumed to detain in that cell of darkness What a seeming impotence was here that thou who art the true Rock of thy Church shouldst lie obscurely shrouded in Joseph's rock thou that art the true corner-stone of thy Church shouldst be shut up with a double stone the one of thy grave the other of thy vault thou by whom we are sealed to the day of our Redemption shouldst be sealed up in a blind cavern of earth But now what a demonstration of power doth both the world and I see in thy glorious Resurrection The rocks tear the graves open the stones roll away the dead rise and appear the Souldiers flee and tremble Saints and Angels
attend thy rising O Saviour thou laiest down in weakness thou risest in power and glory thou laiest down like a man thou risest like a God What a lively image hast thou herein given me of the dreadfull majesty of the generall Resurrection and thy second appearance Then not the earth onely but the powers of Heaven shall be shaken not some few graves shall be open and some Saints appear but all the bars of death shall be broken and all that sleep in their graves shall awake and stand up from the dead before thee not some one Angel shall descend but thou the great Angel of the Covenant attended with thousand thousands of those mighty Spirits And if these stout Souldiers were so filled with terrour at the feeling of an Earthquake and the sight of an Angel that they had scarce breath left in them for the time to witness them alive where shall thine enemies appear O Lord in the day of thy terrible appearance when the earth shall reel and vanish and the elements shall be on a flame about their ears and the Heavens shall wrap up as a scroll O God thou mightest have removed this stone by the force of thine Earthquake as well as rive other rocks yet thou wouldst rather use the ministery of an Angel or thou that gavest thy self life and gavest being both to the stone and to the earth couldst more easily have removed the stone then moved the earth but it was thy pleasure to make use of an Angel's hand And now he that would ask why thou wouldst doe it rather by an Angel then by thy self may as well ask why thou didst not rather give thy Law by thine own immediate hand then by the ministration of Angels why by an Angel thou struckest the Israelites with plagues the Assyrians with the sword why an Angel appeared to comfort thee after thy Temptation and Agony when thou wert able to comfort thy self why thou usest the influences of Heaven to fruiten the earth why thou imployest Second causes in all events when thou couldst doe all things alone It is good reason thou shouldst serve thy self of thine own neither is there any ground to be required whether of their motion or rest besides thy will Thou didst raise thy self the Angels removed the stone They that could have no hand in thy Resurrection yet shall have an hand in removing outward impediments not because thou neededst but because thou wouldest like as thou alone didst raise Lazarus thou badest others let him loose Works of Omnipotency thou reservest to thine own immediate performance ordinary actions thou doest by subordinate means Although this act of the Angels was not merely with respect to thee but partly to those devout Women to ease them of their care to manifest unto them thy Resurrection So officious are those glorious Spirits not onely to thee their Maker but even to the meanest of thy servants especially in the furtherance of all their spirituall designs Let us bring our Odours they will be sure to roll away the stone Why do not we imitate them in our forwardness to promote each others Salvation We pray to doe thy will here as they doe in Heaven if we do not act our wishes we do but mock thee in our Devotions How glorious did this Angel of thine appear The terrified Souldiers saw his face like lightning both they and the Women saw his garments shining bright and white as snow such a presence became his errand It was fit that as in thy Passion the Sun was darkened and all creatures were clad with heaviness so in thy Resurrection the best of thy creatures should testifie their joy and exultation in the brightness of their habit that as we on Festivall-days put on our best cloaths so thine Angels should celebrate this blessed Festivity with a meet representation of Glory They could not but injoy our joy to see the work of man's Redemption thus fully finished and if there be mirth in Heaven at the conversion of one sinner how much more when a world of sinners is perfectly ransomed from death and restored to Salvation Certainly if but one or two appeared all rejoyced all triumphed Neither could they but be herein sensible of their own happy advantage who by thy mediation are confirmed in their glorious estate since thou by the bloud of thy Cross and power of thy Resurrection hast reconciled things not in earth onely but in Heaven But above all other the Love of thee their God and Saviour must needs heighten their joy and make thy Glory theirs It is their perpetuall work to praise thee how much more now when such an occasion was offered as never had been since the world began never could be after when thou the God of Spirits hadst vanquished all the spirituall powers of darkness when thou the Lord of Life hadst conquered death for thee and all thine so as they may now boldly insult over their last enemy O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory Certainly if Heaven can be capable of an increase of joy and felicity never had those Blessed Spirits so great a cause of triumph and gratulation as in this day of thy glorious Resurrection How much more O dear Jesu should we men whose flesh thou didst assume unite revive for whose sake and in whose stead thou didst vouchsafe to suffer and die whose arrerages thou payedst in death and acquittedst in thy Resurrection whose Souls are discharged whose Bodies shall be raised by the power of thy rising how much more should we think we have cause to be overjoyed with the happy memory of this great work of thy Divine Power and unconceivable Mercy Lo now how weak soever I am in my self yet in the confidence of this victorious Resurrection of my Saviour I dare boldly challenge and defie you O all ye adverse Powers Doe the worst ye can to my Soul in despite of you it shall be safe Is it Sin that threats me Behold this Resurrection of my Redeemer publishes my discharge My Surety was arrested and cast into the prison of his Grave had not the utmost farthing of mine arrerages been paid he could not have come forth He is come forth the Sum is fully satisfied What danger can there be of a discharged Debt Is it the Wrath of God Wherefore is that but for sin If my sin be defrayed that quarrell is at an end and if my Saviour suffered it for me how can I fear to suffer it in my self That infinite Justice hates to be twice paid He is risen therefore he hath satisfied Who is he that condemneth It is Christ that died yea rather that is risen Is it Death it self Lo my Saviour that overcame death by dying hath triumph'd over him in his Resurrection How can I now fear a conquered enemy What harm is there in the Serpent but for his sting The sting of death is sin that is pulled out by my powerfull Redeemer it cannot now