on your own time and suspendeth the judgments your sins have deserved for a space as here he did Ahab's upon his humiliation but be assured sooner or later vengeance will overtake you or yours for it You have Coveted an evil covetousness to your house and there hangeth a judgment over your house for it as rain in the clouds which perhaps in your sons perhaps in your grand-childs days sometime or other will come dashing down upon it and overwhelm it Think not the vision is for many descents to come De malè quaesitis vix gaudet tertius haeres seldom doth the third scarce ever the fourth generation pass before God visit the sins of the Fathers upon the Children if he do not in the very next generation In his sons days will I bring the evil upon his house Secondly if not only our own but our Fathers sins too may be shall be visited upon us how concerneth it us as to repent for our own so to lament also the sins of our forefathers and in our confessions and supplications to God sometimes to remember them that he may forget them and to set them before his face that he may cast them behind his back We have a good president for it in our publick Letany Remember not Lord our offences nor the offences of our forefathers A good and a profitable and a needful prayer it is and those men have not done well nor justly that have cavilled at it O that men would be wise according to sobriety and allow but just interpretations to things advisedly established rather than busie themselves nodum in scirpo to pick needless quarrels where they should not What unity would it bring to brethren what peace to the Church what joy to all good and wise men As to this particular God requireth of the Israelites in Lev. 26. that they should confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their Fathers David did so and Ieremy did so and Daniel did so in Psal. 106. in Ierem 3. in Dan. 9. And if David thought it a fit curse to pronounce against Iudas and such as he was in Psal. 109. Let the wickedness of his fathers be had in remembrance in the sight of the Lord and let not the sin of his mother be done away why may we not nay how ought we not to pray for the removal of this very curse from us as well as of any other curses The present age is rise of many enormous crying sins which call loud for a judgment upon the land and if God should bring upon us a right heavy one whereat all ears should tingle could we say other but that it were most just even for the sins of this present generation But if unto our own so many so great God should also add the sins of our forefathers the bloodshed and tyranny and grievous unnatural butcheries in the long times of the Civil wars and the universal Idolatries and superstitions covering the whole land in the longer and darker times of Popery and if as he sometimes threatned to bring upon the Iews of that one generation all the righteous blood that ever was shed upon the earth from the blood of the righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias the son of Barachias so he should bring the sins of our Ancestors for many generations past upon this generation of ours who could be able to abide it Now when the security of the times give us but too much cause to fear it and regions begin to look white towards the harvest is it not time for us with all humiliation of Soul and Body to cast down our selves and with all contention of voice and spirit to lift up our prayers and to say Remember not Lord our offences nor the offences of our forefathers neither take thou vengeance of our sins Spare us good Lord spare the people whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood and be not angry with us for ever Spare us good Lord Thirdly Since not only our fathers sins and our own but our Neighbours sins too aliquid malum propter vicinum malum but especially the sins of Princes and Governours delirant reges plectuntur Achivi may bring judgments upon us and enwrap us in their punishments it should teach every one of us to seek his own private in the common and publick good and to endeavour if but for our own security from punishment to awaken others from their security in sin How should we send up Supplications and prayers and intercessions for Kings and for all that are in authority that God would incline their hearts unto righteous courses and open their ears to wholesom counsels and strengthen their hands to just actions when but a sinful oversight in one of them may prove the overthrow of many thousands of us as David but by once numbring his people in the pride of his heart lessened their number at one clap threescore and ten thousand If Israel turn their backs upon their enemies up Ioshua and make search for the troubler of Israel firret out the thief and do execution upon him one Achan if but suffered is able to undo the whole host of Israel what mischief might he do if countenanced if allowed The hour I see hath overtaken me and I must end To wrap up all in a word then and conclude Thou that hast power over others suffer no sin in them by base connivence but punish it thou that hast charge of others suffer no sin in them by dull silence but rebuke it thou that hast any interest in or dealing with others suffer no sin upon them by easie allowance but distaste it thou that hast nothing else yet by thy charitable prayers for them and by constant example to them stop the course of sin in others further the growth of grace in others labour by all means as much as in thee lieth to draw others unto God lest their sins draw God's judgments upon themselves and thee This that thou mayest do and that I may do and that every one of us that feareth God and wisheth well to the Israel of God may do faithfully and discreetly in our several stations and callings let us all humbly beseech the Lord the God of all grace and wisdom for his Son Iesus sake by his holy Spirit to enable us To which blessed Trinity one only Wise Immortal Invisible Almighty most gracious and most glorious Lord and God be ascribed by every one of us the kingdom the power and the glory both now and for ever AD POPULUM The Fourth Sermon In St. Paul's Church London Nov. 4. 1621. 1 COR. VII 24. Brethren let every man wherein he is called therein abide with God IF flesh and blood be suffered to make the Gloss it is able to corrupt a right good Text. It easily turneth the doctrine of Gods grace into wantonness and as easily the doctrine of Christian liberty into
have certainer grounds for what we do than uncertain examples Secondly what if Phinehas had the Magistrates Authority to enable him to that attempt It is not altogether improbable to my apprehension from the fifth Verse of the Chapter where the story is laid down Numb 25. 5. especially parallell'd with another story of much like circumstances Exod. 32. 27. that as there the Levites so here Phinehas drew the Sword in execution of the express command of Moses the supreme Magistrate If neither thus nor so yet Thirdly which cutteth off all plea and is the most common answer ordinarily given by Divines to this and the like instances drawn from some singular actions of God's worthies Men of Heroical spirits and gifts such as were David Sampson Ehud Moses Elias and some others especially at such times as they were employed in some special service for the good of God's Church were exempt from the common rules of life and did many things as we are to presume not without the secret motion and direction of God's holy and powerful Spirit which were therefore good in them that secret direction being to them loco specialis mandati like that to Abraham for sacrificing his Son but not safe or lawful for us to imitate Opera liberi spiritus say Divines non sunt exigenda ad regulas communes nec trahenda in exemplum vitae The extraordinary Heroical Acts of God's Worthies are not to be measured by the common rules of life nor to become exemplary unto others Of which nature was David's single combat with Goliah and Sampson's pulling down the house upon himself and the Philistines And Moses slaying the Egyptian and Ehud's stabbing of King Eglon and Eliah's calling down for fire from Heaven upon the Captains and their fifties and divers others recorded in the Scripture Of which last fact we have our blessed Saviour's judgment in Luk. 9. that it was done by the extraordinary and peculiar instinct of God's spirit but it is not to be imitated by others without particular certain assurance of the like instinct Where when the Disciples would have called down for fire from Heaven upon the Samaritans and alledged Elias for their precedent Lord wilt thou that we command fire to come down from Heaven and consume them as Elias did His answer was with a kind of indignation as both his gesture and speeches shew Nescitis cujus spiritus estis You know not what manner of spirits you are of Elias was endued with an extraordinary spirit in the freedom whereof he did what he then did but it is not for you or others to propose his example unless you can demonstrate his spirit And if Phinehas's Act also was as most think it was such as these it can no more justifie the usurpation of Magistracy than David's act can bloody Duels or Sampson's self-murther or Moses's secret slaughter or Ehud's King-killing or Eliah's private revenge I have stood the longer upon the discovery of this sin that men might take right judgment of it and not think it either warrantable or excuseable by any pretension of zeal or of whatsoever other good and that both such as have gone too far this way in their practice already for the time past may acknowledge their own oversight and be sorry for it and others seeing their error may for the time to come forbear such outrages and keep themselves within the due bounds of Christian sobriety and their particular Callings And thus much of the former instance in a matter of Commission I am to give you another in a matter of Omission Every Omission of a necessary duty is simply evil as a sin But affirmative duties are but sometimes necessary because they do not obligare ad semper as being many it is impossible they should And many times duties otherwise necessary in case of Superior reason and duties cease to be necessary pro hic nunc and then to omit them is not to do evil Among other necessary duties this is one for a Minister furnished with gifts and abilities for it to acquaint God's people with all material needful truths as he can have convenient occasion thereunto And such conveniency supposed not to do this is simply evil Now then to make the Case and the Question The Case thus A Minister hath just opportunity to preach in a Congregation not his own where he seeth or generally heareth some error in judgment or outragious sin in practice to be continued in with too publick allowance He hath liberty to make choice of his Text and Theme and leisure to provide in some measure for it and his conscience telleth him he cannot pro hic nunc direct his speech with greater service to God's Church than against those errors or sins He seeth on the other side some withdrawments his discretion may perhaps be called in question for medling where he needed not he shall possibly lose the good opinion of some with whom he hath held fair correspondence hitherto he shall preserve his own peace the better if he turn his speech another way This is the Case The Question is Whether these latter considerations and the good that may come thereby be sufficient to warrant unto him the omission of that necessary duty The rule of my Text resolveth negatively they are not sufficient The duty being necessary pro hic nunc it is simply evil to omit it and therefore it may not be omitted for any other good I deny not but a Minister may with good discretion conceal many truths from his flock at least the opening and amplifying of them if they be not such as are needful for them to know either for the establishment of Faith or practice of Life as not only many nice School-points and Conclusions are but also many Genealogies and Levitical Rites and other things even in the Scriptures themselves Nay more a Minister not only in discretion may but is even in Conscience bound at least in the publick exercise of his Ministry to conceal some particular truths from his Auditory yea though they be such as are needful for the practice of life and for the setling of mens Consciences if they be such withal as are not fit to be publickly spoken of as are many Resolutions of Cases appertaining to the seventh Commandment Thou shalt not commit Adultery and some also appertaining to the eighth Thou shalt not steal Our men justly condemn the Popish Casuists for their too much liberty in this kind in their Writings whereby they reduce Vices into an Art under colour of reproving them and convey into the minds of corrupt men Notions of such prodigious filthiness and artificial Legier du-main as perhaps otherwise they would never have dreamed on or thirsted after The loose writings of the unchaste Poets are but dull Tutors of Lust compared with the authorized Tomes of our severe Romish Votaries
in reproving sin should not allow those that come amongst them that liberty and plainness against themselves and their own sins I dare appeal to your selves Have you never been taught that it is the Ministers duty as to oppose against all errors and sins in the general so to bend himself as near as he can especially against the apparent errors and sins of his present auditory And do you not believe it is so Why then might I not nay how ought I not bend my speech both then against a common error of sundry in these parts in point of Ceremony and now against the late petulancy or at least oversight of some misguided ones The noise of these things abroad and the scandal taken thereat by such as hear of them and the ill â—ruits of them at home in breeding jealousies and cherishing contentions among Neighbours cannot but stir us up if we be sensible as every good member should be of the damage and loss the Church acquireth by them to put you in mind and admonishâ— you as opportunities invite us both privately and publickly Is it not time trow ye to thrust in the sickle when the fields look white unto the harvest Is it not time our Pulpit should a little echo of these things when all the Country far and near ringeth of them For my own part however others censure me I am sure my own heart telleth me I could not have discharged my conscience if being called to this place I should have balked what either then or now I have delivered My Conscience prompting me all circumstances considered that these things were pro hic nunc necessary to be delivered rather than any other If for any outward inferiour respect I should have passed them over with silence I think I should have much swerved from the Rule of my Text and have done a great evil that some small good might come of it But many thousand times better were it for me that all the world should censure me for speaking what they think I should not than that my own heart should condemn me for not speaking what it telleth me I should And thus much of things simply evil I should proceed to apply this Rule We must not do evil that good may come unto evils not simply but accidentally such and that both in the general and also in some few specials of greatest use namely unto evils which become such through Conscience Scandal or Comparison In my choice of the Scripture I aimed at all this and had gathered much of my provision for it But the Cases being many and weighty I foresaw I could not go onward with my first project without much wronging one or both either the things themselves if I should contract my speech to the scanting of time or you if I should lengthen it to the weight of the matter And therefore I resolved here to make an end and to give place as fit it is to the business whereabout we meet The Total of what I have said and should say is in effect but this No pretension of a good end of a good meaning of a good event of any good whatsoever either can sufficiently warrant any sinful action to be done or justifie it being done or sufficiently excuse the Omission of any necessary duty when it is necessary Consider what I say and the Lord give you understanding in all things Now to God the Father Son and Holy Spirit c. AD CLERUM The Third Sermon At a Visitation at Boston Lincoln March 13 th 1620. 1 COR. XII 7. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal IN the First Verse of this Chapter S. Paul proposeth to himself an Argument which he prosecuteth the whole Chapter through and after a profitable digression into the praise of Charity in the next Chapter resumeth again at the fourteenth Chapter spending also that whole Chapter therein and it is concerning spiritual gifts Now concerning spiritual gifts brethren I would not have you ignorant c. These gracious gifts of the holy Spirit of God bestowed on them for the edification of the Church the Corinthians by making them the fuel either of their pride in despising those that were inferiour to themselves or of their envy in malicing those that excelled therein abused to the maintenance of Schism and Faction and Emulation in the Church For the remedying of which evils the Apostle entreth upon the Argument discoursing fully of the variety of these spiritual gifts and who is the Author of them and for what end they were given and in what manner they should be imployed omitting nothing that was needful to be spoken anent this subject In this part of the Chapter entreating both before and after this verse of the wondrous great yet sweet and useful variety of these spiritual gifts he sheweth That howsoever manifold they are either for kind or degree so as they may differ in the material and formal yet they do all agree both in the same efficient and the same final cause In the same efficient cause which is God the Lord by his Spirit ver 6. Now there are diversities of gifts but the same Spirit and there are differences of administrations but the same Lord and there are diversities of operations but it is the same God which worketh all in all And in the same final cause which is the advancement of Gods glory in the propagation of his Gospel and the edification of his Church in this verse But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal By occasion of which words we may inquire into the nature conveyance and use of these gifts First their nature in themselves and in their original what they are and whence they are the works of Gods Spirit in us the manifestation of the Spirit Secondly their conveyance unto us how we come to have them and to have propeâ—ty in them it is by gift it is given to every man Thirdly their use and end why they were given us and what we are to do with them they must be employed to the good of our Brethren and of the Church it is given to every man to profit withal Of these briefly and in their order and with special reference ever to us that are of the Clergy By manifestation of the Spirit here our Apostle understandeth none other thing than he doth by the adjective word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the first and by the substantive word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the last verse of the Chapter Both which put together do signifie those spiritual gifts and graces whereby God enableth men and specially Church-men to the duties of their particular Callings for the general good Such as are those particulars which are named in the next following verses the word of Wisdom the word Knowledge Faith the gifts of healing working of miracles prophecy discerning
of spirits divers kinds of tongues interpretation of tongues All which and all other of like nature and use because they are wrought by that one and self-same Spirit which divideth to every one severally as he will are therefore called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Spiritual gifts and here 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the manifestation of the Spirit The word Spirit though in Scripture it have many other significations yet in this place I conceive it to be understood directly of the Holy Ghost the third Person in the ever-blessed Trinity For First in ver 3. that which is called the Spirit of God in the former part is in the latter part called the Holy Ghost f I give you to understand that no man speaking by the spirit of God calleth Iesus accursed and that no man can say that Iesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost Again that variety of gifts which in ver 4. is said to proceed from the same Spirit is said likewise in ver 5. to proceed from the same Lord and in ver 6. to proceed from the same God and therefore such a Spirit is meant as is also Lord and God and that is only the Holy Ghost And again in those words in ver 11. All these worketh that one and the self-same Spirit dividing to every man severally as he will The Apostle ascribeth to this Spirit the collation and distribution of such gifts according to the free power of his own will and pleasure which free power belongeth to none but God alone Who hath set the members every one in the body as it hath pleased him Which yet ought not to be so understood of the Person of the Spirit as if the Father and the Son had no part or fellowship in this business For all the Actions and operations of the Divine Persons those only excepted which are of intrinsecal and mutual relation are the joynt and undivided works of the whole three Persons according to the common known Maxim constantly and uniformly received in the Catholick Church Opera Trinitatis ad extra sunt indivisa And as to this particular concerning gifts the Scriptures are clear Wherein as they are ascribed to God the Holy Ghost in this Chapter so they are elsewhere ascribed unto God the Father Every good gift and every perfect giving is from above from the Father of Lights Jam. 1. and elsewhere to God the Son Unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ Eph. 4. Yea and it may be that for this very reason in the three verses next before my Text these three words are used Spirit in ver 4. Lord in ver 5. and God in ver 6. to give us intimation that these spiritual gifts proceed equally and undividedly from the whole three persons from God the Father and from his Son Iesus Christ our Lord and from the eternal Spirit of them both the Holy Ghost as from one intire indivisible and coessential Agent But for that we are gross of understanding and unable to conceive the distinct Trinity of Persons in the Unity of the Godhead otherwise than by apprehending some distinction of their operations and offices to us ward it hath pleased the Wisdom of God in the holy Scriptures which being written for our sakes were to be fitted to our capacities so far to condescend to our weakness and dulness as to attribute some of those great and common works to one person and some to another after a more special manner than unto the rest although indeed and in truth none of the three persons had more or less to do than other in any of those great and common works This manner of speaking Divines use to call Appropriation By which appropriation as power is ascribed to the Father and Wisdom to the Son so is Goodness to the Holy Ghost And therefore as the work of Creation wherein is specially seen the mighty power of God is appropiated to the Father and the work of Redemption wherein is specially seen the wisdom of God to the Son and so the works of sanctification and the infusion of habitual graces whereby the good things of God are communicated unto us is appropriated unto the Holy Ghost And for this cause the gifts thus communicated unto us from God are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 spiritual gifts and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the manifestation of the Spirit We see now why spirit but then why manifestation The word as most other verbals of that form may be understood either in the active or passive signification And it is not material whether of the two ways we take it in this place both being true and neither improper For these spiritual gifts are the manifestation of the spirit actively because by these the Spirit manifesteth the will of God unto the Church these being the Instruments and means of conveying the knowledge of salvation unto the people of God And they are the manifestation of the spirit Passively too because where any of these gifts especially in any eminent sort appeared in any person it was a manifest evidence that the Spirit of God wrought in him As we read it Acts 10. that they of the Circumcision were astonished when they saw that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gifts of the Holy Ghost If it be demanded But how did that appear it followeth in the next verse For they heard them speak with tongues c. The spiritual Gift then is a manifestation of the Spirit as every other sensible effect is a manifestation of its proper cause We are now yet further to know that the Gifts and graces wrought in us by the holy Holy Spirit of God are of two sorts The Scriptures sometimes distinguish them by the different terms of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 although those words are sometimes again used indifferently and promiscuously either for other They are commonly known in the Schools and differenced by the names of Gratiae gratum facientes Gratiae gratis datae Which terms though they be not very proper for the one of them may be affirmed of the other whereas the members of every good distinction ought to be opposite yet because they have been long received and change of terms though haply for the better hath by experience been found for the most part unhappy in the event in multiplying unnecessary book-quarrels we may retain them profitably and without prejudice Those former which they call Gratum facientes are the Graces of Sanctification whereby the person that hath them is enabled to do acceptable service to God in the duties of his General Calling these latter which they call Gratis datas are the Graces of Edification whereby the person that hath them is enabled to do profitable service to the Church of God in the duties of his particular Calling Those are
office is a certain evidence and manifestation of a Spirit of life within and that maketh it a living Organical body So those active gifts and graces and abilities which are to be found in the members of the mystical body of Christ I know not whether of greater variety or use are a strong manifestation that there is a powerful Spirit of God within that knitteth the whole body together and worketh all in all and all in every part of the body Secondly though we have just cause to lay it to heart when men of eminent gifts and place in the Church are taken from us and to lament in theirs our own and the Churches loss yet we should possess our Souls in patience and sustain our selves with this comfort that it is the same God that still hath care over his Church and it is the same Head Iesus Christ that still hath influence into his members and it is the same blessed Spirit of God and of Christ that still actuateth and animateth this great mystical Body And therefore we may not doubt but this Spirit as he hath hitherto done from the beginning so will still manifest himself from time to time unto the end of the world in raising up instruments for the service of his Church and furnishing them with gifts in some good measure meet for the same more or less according as he shall see it expedient for her in her several different estates and conditions giving some Apostles and some Prophets and some Evangelists and some Pastors and Teachers for the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the Body of Christ till we all meet in the unity of the Faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. He hath promised long since who was never yet touched with breach of promise that he would be with his Apostles and their successors always unto the end of the World Thirdly where the Spirit of God hath manifested it self to any man by the distribution of gifts it is but reason that man should manifest the Spirit that is in him by exercising those gifts in some lawful Calling And so this manifestation of the Spirit in my Text imposeth upon every man the Necessity of a Calling Our Apostle in the seventh of this Epistle joineth these two together a Gift and a Calling as things that may not be severed As God hath dictributed to every man as the Lord hath called every one Where the end of a thing is the use there the difference cannot be great whether we abuse it or but conceal it The unprofitable Servant that wrapped up his Masters Talent in a napkin could not have received a much heavier doom had he mis-spent it O then up and be doing Why stand ye all the day Idle Do not say because you heard no voice that therefore no man hath called you those very gifts you have received are a Real Call pursuing you with continual restless importunity till you have disposed your selves in some honest course of life or other wherein you may be profitable to humane society by the exercising of some or other of those gifts All the members of the body have their proper and distinct offices according as they have their proper and distinct faculties and from those offices they have also their proper and distinct names As then in the body that is indeed no member which cannot call it self by any other name than by the common name of a member so in the Church he that cannot style himself by any other name than a Christian doth indeed but usurp that too If thou sayest thou art of the body I demand then What is thy office in the Body If thou hast no office in the Body then thou art at the best but Tumor praeter naturam as Physicians call them a Scab or Botch or Wenne or some other monstrous and unnatural excresâ—ency upon the body but certainly thou art no true part and member of the body And if thou art no part of the body how darest thou make challenge to the head by mis-calling thy self Christian If thou hast a Gift get a Calling Fourthly We of the Clergy though we may not ingross the Spirit unto our selves as if none were spiritual persons but our selves yet the voice of the World hath long given us the Name of Spiritualty after a peculiar sort as if we were spiritual persons in some different singular respect from other men And that not altogether without ground both for the name and thing The very name seemeth to be thus used by S. Paul in the 14. Chapter following where at ver 37. he maketh a Prophet and a Spiritual man all one and by Prophesying in that whole Chapter he most what meaneth Preaching If any man think himself to be a Prophet either spiritual let him acknowledge c. But howsoever it be for the Title the thing it self hath very sufficient ground from that form of speech which was used by our blessed Saviour when he conferred the ministerial power upon his Disciples and is still used in our Church at the collation of Holy Orders Accipite Spiritum Sanctum Receive the holy Ghost Since then at our admission into holy Orders we receive a spiritual power by the imposition of hands which others have not we may thenceforth be justly styled Spiritual persons The thing for which I note it is that we should therefore endeavour our selves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so to stir up those spiritual gifts that are in us as that by the eminency thereof above that which is in ordinary temporal men we may shew our selves to be in deed what we are in name Spiritual persons If we be of the Spiritualty there should be in us anothergates manifestation of the Spirit than is ordinarily to be found in the Temporalty God forbid I should censure all them for intruders into the Ministry that are not gifted for the Pulpit The severest censurers of Non-preaching Ministers if they had livd in the beginning of the Reformation must have been content as the times then stood to have admitted of some thousands of Non-preaching Ministers or else have denied many Parishes and Congregations in England the benefit of so much as bare reading And I take this to be a safe Rule Whatsoever thing the help of any circumstances can make lawful at any time that thing may not be condemned as universally and de toto genere unlawful I judge no mans conscience then or calling who is in the Ministry be his gifts never so slender I dare not deny him the benefit of his Clergy if he can but read if his own heart condemn him not neither do I. But yet this I say As the times now are wherein learning aboundeth even unto wantonness and wherein the world is full of questions and controversies
and obedience other fruits of grace in some good and comfortable measure it is a good sign of grace and sanctification in the heart But if thou hast these things only by fits and starts and sudden moods and art sometimes violently hot upon them and other sometimes again and oftner key cold presume not too much upon shews but suspect thy self still of hypocrisie and insincerity and never cease by repentance and prayer and the constant exercises of other good graces to physick and dyet thy soul till thou hast by Gods goodness put thy self into some reasonable assurance that thou art the true child of God a sincere believer and not an hypocrite as Ahab here notwithstanding all this his solemn humiliation was Here is Ahab an Hypocrite and yet humbled before the Lord. But yet now this humiliation such as it was what should work it in him That we find declared at vers 27. And it came to pass that when Ahab heard these words c. There came to him a message from God by the hand of Eliah and that was it that humbled him Alas what was Eliah to Ahab a silly plain Prophet to a mighty King that he durst thus presume to rush boldly and unsent-for into the presence of such a potent Monarch who had no less power and withal more colour to take away his life than Naboth's and that when he was in the top of his jollity solacing himself in the new-taken possession of his new-gotten Vine-yard and there to his face charge him plainly with and shake him up roundly for and denounce Gods judgments powerfully against his bloody abominable oppressions We would think a Monarch nusled up in Idolatry and accustomed to blood and hardened in Sin and Obstinacy should not have brooked that insolency from such a one as Eliah was but have made his life a ransom for his sawciness And yet behold the words of this underling in comparison how they fall like thunder upon the great guilty Offender and strike palsie into his knees and trembling into his joints and tumble him from the height of his jollity and roll him in sackcloth and ashes and cast him into a strong fit of legal humiliation Seest thou how Ahab is humbled before me And here now cometh in our second Observation even the power of Gods Word over the Consciences of obstinate sinners powerful to Cast down strong holds and every high thought that exalteth it self against God That which in Heb. 4. if I mistake not the true understanding of that place is spoken of the Essential word of God the second person in the ever blessed Trinity is also in an analogy true of the revealed Word of God the Scriptures of the Prophets and Apostles that it is Quick and powerful and more cutting than any two-edged sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of the soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow Is not my word like as a fire saith the Lord and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces Jer. 23. Like a soft fire to dissolve and melt the hearts of relenting sinners and true Converts but like a strong hammer to batter and break in pieces the rocky and flinty consciences of obstinate and hardened offenders Examples hereof if you require behold in the stories of the Kings Saul whining when Samuel reproveth him in the books of the Prophets Ninevites drooping when Ionas threatneth them in the Acts of the Apostles Felix trembling when Paul discourseth before him in the Martyrologies of the Church Tyrants and bloody Persecutors maskered at the bold consessions of the poor suffering Christians in this Chapter proud Ahab mourning when Eliah telleth him his sin and foretelleth him his punishment Effects which might justly seem strange to us if the Causes were not apparent One cause and the Principal is in the instrument the Word not from any such strength in it self for so it is but a dead letter but because of Gods Ordinance in it For in his hand are the hearts and the tongues and the ears both of Kings and Prophets and he can easily when he seeth it good put the spirit of Zeal and of Power into the heart of the poorest Prophet and as easily the spirit of fear and of terrour into the heart of the greatest King He chooseth weak Instruments as here Eliah and yet furnisheth them with power to effect great matters that so the glory might not rest upon the instrument but redound wholly to him as to the chief agent that imployeth it We have this treasure in earthen Veslels saith St. Paul that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us 2 Cor. 4. We say words are but wind and indeed the words of the best Minister are no better as they are breathed out and uttered by sinful mortal man whose breath is in his nostrils but yet this wind as it is breathed in and inspired by the powerful eternal Spirit of God is strong enough by his effectual working with it not only to shake the top branches but to rend up the very bottom-root of the tallest Cedar in Lebanon Vox Domini confringens Cedros Psal. 29. The voice of the Lord is mighty in operation the voice of the Lord is a glorious voice The voice of the Lord breaketh the Cedars yea the Lord breaketh the Cedars of Lebanon Another Cause is in the Object and that is the force of Natural Conscience which the most presumptuous sinner can never so stifle though he endeavour all he can to do it but that it will be sometimes snubbing and stinging and lashing and vexing him with ugly representations of his past sins and terrible suggestions of future vengeance And then of all other times is the force of it most lively when the voice of God in his Word awakeneth it after a long dead sleep Then it riseth and Sampson-like rouseth up it self and bestirreth it self lustily as a Giant refreshed with Wine and it putteth the disquieted patient to such unsufferable pain that he runneth up and down like a distracted man and doth he knoweth not what and seeketh for ease he knoweth not where Then he would give all Dives his wealth for A drop of Water to cool the heat he feeleth and with Esau part with his birth-right for any thing though it were never so little mean that would give him but the least present refreshing and preserve him from fainting Then sack-cloth and ashes and fasting and weeping and mourning and renting the garments and tearing the hair and knocking the breast and out-cries to heaven and all those other things which he could not abide to hear of in the time of his former security whilest his conscience lay fast asleep and at rest are now in all haste greedily entertained and all too little if by any means they can possibly give any ease or asswagement to the present torment
Isaac he kept with him and gave him all that he had Right so God giveth temporal gifts to Hypocrites and Cast-aways who are bastards and not sons and not sons of the freewoman not sons of promise not born after the spirit and that is their portion when they have gotten that they have gotten all they are like to have there is no more to be looked for at his hands But as for the Inheritance he reserveth that for his dear Children the godly who are Born after the Spirit and Heirs according to promise on these he bestoweth all that ever he hath all things are theirs for on them he bestoweth his Son the heir of all things in whom are hid all the treasures of all good things and together with whom all other things are conveyed and made over unto them as accessories and appurtenances of him and on them he bestoweth Himself which is All in all in whose presence is fulness of joy and at whose right hand there are pleasures for evermore To which joy unspeakable and glorious O thou the Father of mercies who hast promised it unto us bring us in the end for thy dear Son's sake Jesus Christ who hath purchased it for us and given into our hearts the earnest of his and thy holy Spirit to seal it unto us To which blessed Son and holy Spirit together with thee O Father three persons and one only wise gracious Almighty and eternal Lord God be ascribed by us and all thy faithful people throughout the world the whole kingdom power and glory for ever and ever Amen Amen AD POPULUM The Second Sermon At Grantham Linc. Feb. 27. 1620. 3 KINGS 21. 29. because he humbleth himself before me I will not bring the evil in his days I Will not so far either distrust your Memories or straiten my self of Time for the delivery of what I am now purposed to speak as to make any large Repetition of the Particulars which were observ'd the last time from the consideration of Ahab's Person and Condition who was but an Hypocrite taken joyntly with his present Carriage together with the Occasion and Success thereof He was humbled It was the Voice of God by his Prophet that humbled him Upon his humbling God adjourneth his Punishment From all which was noted first That there might be even in Hypocrites an Outward formal Humiliation secondly the Power and Efficacy of the Word of God able to humble an Oppressing Ahab thirdly the boundless Mercy of God in not suffering the Outward formal Humiliation of an ungodly Hypocrite to pass altogether unrewarded All this the last time by occasion of those first Clauses in the Verse Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me because he humbleth himself before me I will not We are now next to consider of the Great Favour which it pleased God to shew to Ahab upon his humiliation what it was and wherein it consisted It was the Removal at least for a time that is the suspension of an heavy judgment denounced against Ahab and his house most deservedly for his bloody and execrable oppression Because he humbleth himself before me I will not bring the evil in his days The Evil which God now promiseth he will not bring I will not bring the evil in his days is that which in vers 21. he had threatned he would bring upon Ahab and upon his house Behold I will bring evil upon thee and will take away thy posterity and will cut off from Ahab him that pisseth against the wall and him that is shut up and left in Israel and will make thy house like the house of Jeroboam the Son of Nebat and like the house of Baasha the Son of Abijah for the provocation wherewith thou hast provoked me to anger and made Israel to sin A great Judgment and an heavy But the greater the Judgment is when it is deserved and threatned the greater the mercy is if it be afterwards forborn as some of this was But whatsoever becometh of the Iudgment here we see is Mercy good store God who is rich in mercy and delighteth to be stiled the God of mercies and the Father of mercies abundantly manifesteth his mercy in dealing thus graciously with one that deserved it so little Here is mercy in but threatning the punishment when he might have inflicted it and more mercy in not inflicting the punishment when he had threatned it Here is mercy first in suspending the punishment I will not bring the evil and mercy again in suspending it for so long a time I will not bring the evil in his days Of these two points we shall entreat at this time and first and principally of the former I will not bring the evil It is no new thing to them that have read the sacred Stories with Observation to see God when men are humbled at his threatnings to revoke them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Chrysostom more than once this is ever Gods manner when men change their deeds to change his doom when they renounce their sins to recal his sentence when they repent of the evil they have done against him to Repent of the evil he had said he would do against them Search the Scriptures and say if things run not thus as in the most ordinary course God commandeth and Man disobeyeth Man disobeyeth and God threatneth God threatneth and man repenteth Man repenteth and God forbeareth Abimelech thou art but a dead man because of the woman which thou hast taken but Abimelech restoreth the Prophet his Wife untouched and God spareth him and he dieth not Hezekiah make thy Will and Put thine house in order for thou shalt die and not live but Hezekiah turneth to the Wall and prayeth and weepeth and God addeth to his days fifteen years Nineveh prepare for desolation for now but forty days and Nineveh shall be destroyed but Nineveh fasted and prayed and repented and Nineveh stood after more than forty years twice told Generally God never yet threatned any punishment upon person or place but if they repented he either withheld it or deferred it or abated it or sweetned it to them for the most part proportionably to the truth and measure of their repentance but howsoever always so far forth as in his infinite wisdom he hath thought good some way or other he ever remitted somewhat of that severity and rigour wherein he threatned it A course which God hath in some sort bound himself unto and which he often and openly professeth he will hold Two remarkable testimonies among sundry other shall suffice us to have proposed at this time for the clear and full evidencing hereof The one in Ier. 18. 7 8. At what instant I shall speak concerning a Nation and concerning a Kingdom to pluck up and pull down and to destroy If that Nation against whom I have pronounced turn from their evil I will
to God and the fairest requital we can make for them If we withdraw our obedience and fall into open rebellion against God if we abuse them in making them either the occasions or instruments of sin to the dishonour of God and damage of his Servants we repay him ill and unworthily for the good we have received and are guilty of Unthankfulness in this foulest and highest degree Now we have seen what we are let us say the worst we can by unthankful ones call them Wretches Caitiffs Churles any thing load them with infamies disgraces contumelies charge them with Injustice Prophaneness Atheism condemn them and with them the vice it self Unthankfulness to the pit of Hell do all this and more and spare not and as David did at Nathan's Parable when we hear any case or example of ingratitude in any of the former degrees whether really done or but in a Parable pronounce sentence upon the guilty The man that hath done this thing shall surely die But withal let us remember when we have so done that our hearts instantly prompt us what Nathan told David Thou art the man We we are the men we are these unthankful ones unthankful to God first in passing by so many of his blessings without taking any consideration of them unthankful secondly in ascribing his Blessings wholly or partly to our selves or any other but him unthankful thirdly in valuing his Blessings so lightly as to forget them unthankful fourthly in diminishing the worth of his Blessings and repining at our portion therein unthankful fifthly in not rendring to him and his according to the good he hath done for us but sixthly and most of all unthankful in requiting him evil for good and hatred for his good will Dealing thus with him let us not now marvel if he begin to deal something strangely and otherwise than he was wont with us If he deny us his Creatures when we want them if he take them from us when we have them if he withhold his blessing from them that it shall not attend them if we find small comfort in them when we use them if they be unanswering our expectations when we have been at some pains and cost with them if as the Prophet speaketh We sow much and bring in little we eat and have not enough we drink and are not filled we cloath us and we are not warm and the wages we earn we put into a bag with holes if any of these things befal us let us cease to wonder thereat our selves are the causers of all our woe It is our great unthankfulness that blasteth all our endeavours that leaveneth with sowerness whatsoever is sweet and turneth into poison whatsoever is wholesom in the good Creatures of God It is the Word of God and Prayer that sanctifieth them to our use and they are then good when they are received with thanksgiving So long as we continue unthankful we are vain if we look for any sanctification in them if we expect any good from them I have now done with my first Inference for Trial or rather Conviction I add a second of Exhortation The duty it self being so necessary as we have heard Necessary as an Act of Iustice for the receipt of the Creature and necessary as an Act of Religion for the sanctifying of the Creature how should our hearts be enflamed with an holy desire and all our powers quickned up to a faithful endeavour conscionably to perform this so necessary a duty One would think that very necessity together with the consciousness of our former unthankfulness should in all reason be enough to work in us that both desire and endeavour In all reason it should so but we are unreasonable and much ado there is to perswade us to any thing that is good even when we are perswaded Wherefore to enforce the exhortation more effectually I must have leave to press the performance of this duty upon our Consciences with some farther Inducements and important Considerations Consider first the excellency of the Duty There are but three heads whereto we refer all that is called good Iucundum Utile Honestum Pleasure Profit and Honesty There is nothing desirable and lovely but in one or other of these three respects Each of these singly we account good but that excellently good wherein they all concurr We love things that will give us delight sometimes when there is neither profit nor credit in them we love things that will bring us profit though possibly neither delightful greatly nor sâ—emly and we love things that we think will do us honesty oftentimes without regard either of Pleasure or Profit How should we then be affected to this duty of giving thanks and singing Praises unto our GOD wherein all those do jointly concurr and that also in an excellent measure David hath wrapped them all together in one verse in the beginning of Psal. 147. Praise ye the Lord for it is good yea it is a pleasant thing and praise is comely It is good it will bring you profit it is pleasant it will afford you delight and it is comely it will do you honesty and what can heart wish more Again many good virtues and graces of God in us shall expire together with us which though they be eternal in their fruit and reward yet are not so as to their proper Acts which after this life shall cease because there shall be neither need nor use of them then Whether there be Prophecies they shall fail or whether there be tongues they shall cease or whether there be knowledge it shall vanish away There shall be no use of taming the flesh by Fasting or of supplying the want either of others by Alms or of our selves by Prayer Nay even Faith and Hope themselves shall have an end for we shall not then need to believe when we shall see nor to expect when we shall enjoy But giving of Thanks and Praise and Honour and Glory unto God shall remain in the Kingdom of Heaven and of Glory It is now the continual blessed exercise of the glorious Angels and Saints in Heaven and it shall be ours when we shall be translated thither O that we would learn often to practise here what we hope shall be our eternal exercise there Oh that we would accustom our selves being filled in the Spirit to speak to our selves in Psalms and Hymns and spiritual Songs singing and making Melody in our hearts to the Lord giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the Name of our Lord Iesus Christ as speaketh our Apostle Ephes. 5. Consider secondly the multitude and variety and continuance of God's Blessings and let that provoke thy Thankfulness If thou hadst received but one or a few benefits yet thanks were due even for those few or for that one more than thou art able to return But what canst thou alledge or how excuse thy unthankfulness when
doctrine of Christian Liberty to them in such a manner as might frame them withal to yield such Reverence and Obedience to their Governours as became them to do And therefore St. Peter beateth much upon the point of Obedience But he no where presseth it more fully than in this Chapter Wherein after the general exhortations of subduing the lusts that are in their own bosoms vers 11. and of ordering their conversation so as might be for their credit and honesty in the sight of others ver 12. when he descendeth to more particular duties he beginneth first with and insisteth most upon this duty of subjection and obedience to Authority in the greatest remaining part of the Chapter The first Precept he giveth in this kind is set down with sundry Amplifications and Reasons thereunto belonging in the next verses before the Text submit your selves to every Ordinance of man for the Lords sake And then he doth by way of Prolepsis take away an Objection which he foresaw would readily be made against that and the following Exhortations from the pretext of Christian liberty in the words of the Text As free and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness but as the servants of God Conceive the words as spoken in answer to what those new converts might have objected We have been taught that the Son of God hath made us free and then we are free indeed and so not bound to subject our selves to any Masters and Governours upon Earth no not to Kings but much rather bound not to do it that so we may preserve that freedom which Christ hath purchased for us and reserve our selves the more entirely for Gods service by refusing to be the servants of men This Objection the Apostle clearly taketh off in the Text with much holy wisdom and truth He telleth them that being indeed set at liberty by Christ they are not therefore any more to enthral themselves to any living soul or other creature not to submit to any Ordinance of man as slaves that is as if the ordinance it self did by any proper direct and immediate virtue bind the conscience But yet all this notwithstanding they might and ought to submit thereunto as the Lords free-men and in a free manner that is by a voluntary and uninforced both subjection to their power and obedience to their lawful commands They must therefore take heed they use not their liberty for an occasion to the flesh nor under so fair a title palliate an evil licentiousness making that a cloak for their irreverent and undutiful Carriage towards their Superiours For albeit they be not the servants of men but of God and therefore owe no Obedience to men as upon immediate tie of conscience and for their own sake but to God only yet for his sake and out of the conscience of that Obedience which they owe to his command of honouring of father and mother and of being subject to the higher powers they ought to give unto them such honour and obedience as of right belongeth unto them according to the eminency of their high places As free and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness but as the servants of God From which words thus paraphrased I gather Three Observations all concerning our Christian Liberty in that branch of it especially which respecteth human◠Ordinances and the use of the creatures and of all indifferent things Either 1. in the Existence of it As free or 2. in the Exercise of it And not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness or 3. in the End of it but as the servants of God The first Observation this We must so submit our selves to superiour Authority as that we do not thereby impeach our Christian Liberty As free The second this We must so maintain our liberty as that we do not under that colour either commit any sin or omit any requisite office either of charity or duty and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness The third this In the whole exercise both of the liberty we have in Christ and of the respects we owe unto men we must evermore remember our selves to be and accordingly behave our selves as those that are Gods servants but as the servants of God The sum of the whole Three Points in brief this We must be careful without either infringing or abusing our liberty at all times and in all things to serve God Now then to the several points in that order as I have proposed them and as they lie in the Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As free Which words have manifest reference to the Exhortation delivered Three Verses before the Text as declaring the manner how the duty there exhorted unto ought to be performed yet so as that the force of them stretcheth to the Exhortations also contained in the Verses next after the Text. Submit your selves to publick Governours both supreme and subordinate be subject to your own particular Masters honour all men with those proper respects that belong to them in their several stations But look you do all this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not as slaves but as free do it without impeachment of the liberty you have in Christ. Of which liberty it would be a profitable labour but that I should then be forced to omit sundry other things which I deem needful to be spoken and more nearly pertinent to the points proposed to discover at large the Nature and Parts and Causes and Effects and Adjuncts that we might the better understand the amplitude of that power which Christ hath setled upon his Church and thence learn to be the more careful to preserve it But I may not have time so to do it shall therefore suffice us to know that as the other branches of our liberty whether of glory or grace whether from the guilt of sin in our justification or from the dominion of sin in our sanctification with the several appendices and appurtenances to any of them so this branch of it also which respects the use of indifferent things First is purchased for us by the blood of Christ and is therefore usually called by the name of Christian liberty Secondly is revealed unto us outwardly in the preaching of the Gospel of God and of Christ which is therefore called the Law of liberty And thirdly is conveyed unto us inwardly and effectually by the Operation of the Spirit of God and of Christ which is therefore called a free spirit O stablish thou me with thy free spirit because where the spirit of the Lord is there is liberty 2 Cor. 3. 17. Now this liberty so dearly purchased so clearly revealed so firmly conveyed it is our duty to maintain with our utmost strength in all the parts and branches of it and as the Apostle exhorteth to stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free and not to suffer
of Iupiter and the other Gods wings both at his hands and feet to intimate thereby what great speed and diligence was requisite to be used by those that should be imployed in the service of Princes for the managing of their weighty affairs of State Surely no less diligence is needful in the service of God but rather much more by how much both the Master is of greater Majesty and the service of greater importance Not slothful in business fervent in spirit serving the Lord saith St. Paul Let all those that trifle away their precious time in unconcerning things or put off the repentance of their sins and the reformation of their lives till another age or any other way slack their bounden service unto God either in the common-duties of their general or in the proper works of their particular calling tremble to think what shall become of them when all they shall be cursed that have done the Lords work in what kind soever negligently We see now what we are to do if we will approve our selves and our services unto the Lord our heavenly Master What remaineth but that we be willing to do it and for that end pray to the same our Master who alone can work in us both the will and the deed that he would be pleased of his great goodness to give to every one of us courage to maintain our Christian liberty inviolate as those that are free wisdom to use it right and not for a cloak of maliciousness and grace at all times and in all places to behave our selves as the servants of God with such holy reverence of his Majesty obedience to his will faithfulness in his employments as may both procure to us and our services in the mean time gracious acceptance in his sight and in the end a glorious reward in his presence even for Jesus Christ his sake his only Son and our alone Saviour FINIS A Table of the Places of Scripture to which some light more or less is given in the fore-going Fourteen Sermons Chap. Ver. Page Gen. III. 4-5 122 15 206.290 16 206 19 206 iv 2 206 vi 6 172 ix 25 190 xv 15 180 xviii 20 127 32 182 xix 8 33 9 182 16 181 xx vi 269 c. xxiv 12 c. 112 xxxi 23 c. 286 xxxii 6 287 xxxiii 4 c. 287 Exod. II. 14 8 x 26 303 xi 5-6 193 xiv 4 155 xx 5 193. 198. 201. xxiii s i ii-iii 117 c. Lev. 26. 21 324 23 324 26 c. 266. 208 Num. 22. 27 238 xxiii 19 172 xxv 5 139 Deut. 8. 3 251 14 255 17 255 18 263 xv 4 213 xvii 2 105 xxxii 15 258 Iosh. 24. 15 320 24 323 Iudg. 3. 9-10 139 v 7 139 xix 30 105 1 Sam. 2. 30 321 iv 18 138 xii 24 325 xv 15 308 1 Sam. 13. 28 324 xv 4 110 xxi 14 146 3 King 3. 9 99 x 20 107 xxi 13 308 s xxix 151 c. 4 King 2. 9 51 vi 25-26 196 viii 27 195 x 10 179 30 191 xxii 20 180 1 Chro. 26. 29-31 138 2 Chro. 19. 6 108 xxiv 22 258 Nehem. 5. 15 131 Iob 1. 3 98 5 8 20 193 ix 33 2 xiii 7 62 xxii 30 182 xxix 9 98 s 14-17 c. 95 c. Psalm 2. 11 323 iii 7 107 iv 6-7 252 xiv 4 106 xviii 44 323 xix 12 272. 278. 13 296. xxxv 11 284 xxxvi 3 279 6 186 xxxvii 1 167 xxxix 11 189 xlv 6-7 99 l 22 183 li 6 325 12 301 lii 2-4 122 lvii 4 106 lviii 4 279 6 107 lxxiii 2-3 188 17 188 lxxv 2-4 108. 149 lxxvi 10 288 12 288 lxxxi 12 297 lxxxii 6 102. 108. ciii 1-2 249 cv 14 290 cvi 6 201 sxxx 133 c. 31 139 cvii 8 290 cix 14 101 16 98 cxvi 12 250 16 320 cxix 6 159 94 322 141 3 cxliii 12 322 cxlv 8 177 16 208 cxlvii 1 260 cxlix 8 293 Prov. 1. 13 125 iii 3 103 xii 13 143 xiv 21 5 xv 8 164 17 252 xvi 12 149 xvii 16 221 xviii 7 125 9 208 13 105 17 126 xx 25 321 xxi 1 287 xxiv 26 99 xxv 2 105 xxvi 13 143 25 292 xxviii 13 278 xxix 7 127 12 130 xxx 1 5 33 121 xxxi 21 208 Eccles. 1. 4 191 18 280 viii 11 143 ix 1 156 x 4 229 10 54 xi 4 142 xii 9 56 Isaiah 1 24 171 iii 9 308 15 106 18-23 311 v 20 305 viii 20 140 xxvi 12 321 xxviii 21 311 xxxvii 35 191 xxxix 8 180 xliii 23-24 320 xliv 21 319 lii 11 176 lv 8-9 186 lvii 1 181 lx 12 320 lxv 13-14 322 Ierem. 3. 15 201 v 1 282 viii 6 288 xvii 9 223 xviii 7-8 172. 174. 18 122 xxiii 29 161 xlviii 10 326 Lam. 5. 7 198 Ezek. 22. 9 123 xxix 20 165 xxxiii 11-14 171. 174 Dan. 3. 16 71 18 306 vi 3-5 124 ix 5 201 Hos. 2. 8 258 iv 1 279 xi 8 171 xiii 9 236 Amos 3. 6 196. 236 vi 4-6 311 Ion. 3. 9 174 Micah 6. 8 299 Zach. 5. 4 195 Mal. 1. 6 323 Chap. Ver. Page Matth. 3. 7 195 iv 10 303 v 15 56 16 44. 156 17 310 29-30 244 37 32 vi 2 c. 165 24 321 vii 12 123 ix 13 29 xi 19 156 30 304. 321 xii 31-32 26 36 25 xiii 5 6 154. 159 20-21 154 xviii 7 246 10 36 xix 21-22 158 xxiii 4 312 8 301 10 301 13 309 14 308 23 99 35-36 201 xxiv 45 324 51 156 xxv 21 324 26 325 28 55 xxvi 11 213. 257 xxvii 25 190 xxviii 20 46 Mark 4. 16-17 154 x 18 237 Luke 3. 14 125 vi 25 311 viii 6 154 ix 50 70 x 28 179 xii 14 8 48 279 xv 17 168 xvi 2 127 9 209 19 311 25 167 xvii 13 262 xviii 11 4. 295 xix 8 121. 130 41 164 53 35 xxi 15 57 26 137 xxiii 2 24 11 4 Iohn 20 22 47 iii 36 66 ix 2-3 189 x 12 25. 107 xv 22 308 xvi 26 310 xix 12 24 xx 22 47. 229 Acts 4. 19 306 viii 22 309 x 28 215 45-46 43 xiv 12 66 15 306 17 252 xv 9 253 28-29 273 xvii 11 307 28 260 xxiii 1 282 xxiv 25 163 xxvi 9 68 Rom. 1. 16 156 19-20 223 ii 5-6 188 14 282. 283 15 63 22 34 iii viii 21 c. 31 310 iv 13 252 20 323 vi 14 310 16 323 21-22 322 23 187 vii 4 310 6 310 x 4 310 xi 35 262 xii 7 100 11 326 xiii 1 110 1. 6 318 4 102. 108. 118. 144 6 102 xiv 2 66 iii 1 c. 4 9 5 69 6 249 10 9 13 8 14 29. 70. 15 312 20-21 29 22 71 s xxiii 59 c. xv 1-2 312 14 125 xvi 18 306 1 Cor. 1. 13 307 26 291 iii 4-5 307 21 168 22-23 240. 252 iv 3 284 4 284 5 9. 142 7 49. 255. 295 v 8 309 vi 12 243.
strengthened the hands of those enemies against thee with whom thou mightest have been at peace 2. Thou hast exposed thy self for a prey to those temptations from which thou mightest have escaped 3. Thou hast blocked up the passage against thine own Prayers that they cannot have access before the Throne of grace 4. Thou hast utterly debarred thy self from ever entering into the Kingdom of glory All this thou hast lost not now to be regained save only by bewailing the time past that thou hast not sought to please him better heretofore and by redeeming the time to come in seeking to please him better hereafter 12. Which how and by what means it may best be done is our next Enquiry Wherein to give you a general and easie direction without descending into particulars these two things will do it Likeness and Obedience For the first Similis Simili is a common saying and common experience proveth it true Likeness ever breedeth liking As men we see are best pleased every one with such notions and expressions as sort best with their own fancies and with such companions as are of their own temper So good Souldiers are best pleased with those that are valiant like themselves and good Wits with those that are facetious like themselâ—â—s and good Scholars with those that are judicious like themselves and accordingly it is with all other sorts of men in their kinds Yea of so great moment is likeness unto complacency as that two men if they be of different dispositions as it may be the one of a quick stirring and active the other of a slow remiss and suffering spirit or it may be the one of an open free and pleasant conversation the other of a sad close and reserved temper although they may be honest and holy men both yet I say two such men will take little pleasure either in the company of the other as experience also sheweth Oderunt hilarem tristes c. 13. Now a wicked man is altogether unlike God both in his inward Affections and in his outward Conversation He loveth the ways of sin which God hateth and hateth to be reformed which God requireth He speaketh well of evil men as the covetous and others whom God abhorreth and casteth out their names as evil in whom God delighteth Is it possible that God who is light should take pleasure in him that is nothing but darkness And God who is a Spirit in him who is nothing but flesh And God who is Love in him who is nothing but rancour and malice and uncharitableness And God who is righteous in all his ways and holy in all his works a just a merciful a bountiful God in him who is altogether unclean or unjust or cruel or covetous It cannot be 14. But then as for the Godly no marvel if both their persons and ways be well pleasing unto God being that both their persons are inwardly renewed after his Image and their ways also outwardly framed after his Example They love what he loveth hate what he hateth in the Affections of their hearts and they are followers of God as dear children in the conversation of their lives They desire and endeavour to be holy as he is holy perfect as he is perfect and merciful as he their heavenly Father is merciful And as earthly Parents though they love all their Children well yet commonly love those best that are likest themselves so our heavenly Father is well pleased with all his Children because they are indeed all like him but best pleased with those that nearliest resemble him The more we grow in likeness to him the more shall we grow also in liking with him 15. The other thing wherewith to please God is our Obedience when he beholdeth in our ways a proof of our willing and chearful subjection to his most righteous Commands All Superiours are best pleased with those that owe them service when they find them most pliable to their Wills and most careful to observe what is given them in charge neither are ever so much or so justly displeased with them as when they see them to slack their own Obedience and slight their Commands Do you think the Centurion could have been pleased with those he had under him if when he said to one Come he should have gone the other way And to another Go he should have stood still And to another Do this he should have left that undone and done the quite contrary Obedience is a thing wherein God more delighteth than in Sacrifice and the keeping of the Commandment will please him better than a Bullock that hath horns and hoofs The Apostle giveth this very reason in Rom. 8. why they that are in the flesh carnal and worldly men cannot please God even because the carnal mind is not subject to the Law of God neither indeed can be so long as it continueth carnal Intimating that if it could be subject it could not chuse but please 16. Great therefore is the vanity of those men who think to gain and to hold the favour of God by the outward performances of Fasting Prayer Almsdeeds hearing Gods Word receiving the Holy Sacrament and the like just as the hypocritical Iews of old did by Sacrifices and Oblations when as all the while their hearts are rotten and their conversation base But let not any of us deceive our selves with vain confidences For as the Lord of old often cried down Sacrifices by his Prophets though they were in those times a necessary and principal part of that holy worship which himself had prescribed so no doubt he will now reject these outside services though otherwise and in themselves excellent dâ—ties in their kinds if there be no more in them but meer outside And they are no better where there is not withal a conscience made of Obedience The Lord who weigheth the spirits as it is a little before in this Chapter and searcheth the hearts and reins seeth the falseness of our spirits and observeth every prevaricating step both of our hearts and lives There is no dallying therefore with him either let us set our hearts and our faces aright and make straight steps to our feet or our ways will not please the Lord. Deus non volens iniquitatem he is a God that hath no pleasure in wickedness Psal. 5. 17. We have hitherto enquired into the Reasons why we should endeavour to please the Lord and into the means how it may best be done There remains yet a third Enquiry which concerneth the success or the Event and that is how it cometh about that such poor things as our best Endeavours are should so far find acceptance with the Lord as to please him Likeness indeed will please and Obedience will please But then it should be such a likeness as will hold at least some tolerable proportion with the Exemplar such Obedience as will punctually
answer the Command and such is not ours True it is if the Lord should look upon our very best Endeavours as they come from us and respect us but according to our merit he might find in every step we tread just matter of offence in none of acceptance If he should mark what is done amiss and be extreme in it no flesh living could be able to please him It must be therefore upon other and better grounds than any desert in us or in our ways that God is graciously pleased to accept either of us or them The Apostle hath discovered two of those grounds and joined them both together in a short passage in Heb. 13. Now the God of peace make you perfect in every good work to do his will working in you that which is pleasing in his sight through Iesus Christ. Implying that our good works are pleasing unto him upon these two grounds First Because he worketh them in us Secondly Because he looketh upon us and them in Christ. 18. First Because he worketh them in us As we see most men take pleasure in the Rooms of their own contriving in the Engines and Manufactures of their own devising in the Fruits of those Trees which themselves have planted Now the crooked ways of evil men that walk according to the course of the World are indeed the Works of the Devil he is the spirit that worketh in the children of disobedience Eph. 2. such works therefore may please the Devil whose they are But it is not possible they should please God who sent his Son into the World on purpose to destroy the Works of the Devil And as for those strayings also and outsteppings whereof Gods faithfullest servants are now and then guilty although they be not the Works of the Devil for he hath not now so much power over them as to work in them yet are they still the Works of the flesh as they are called Gal. 5. Such works therefore may be pleasing to the flesh whose they are but they are so far from being pleasing unto God that they rather grieve his holy Spirit The works then that must please God are such as himself hath wrought in us by that his holy Spirit which are therefore called the fruits of the Spirit in the same Gal. 5. As it is said by the Prophet O Lord thou wilt ordain peace for us for thou also hast wrought all our works in us And again in the Psalm The Lord ordereth a good mans ways and maketh them acceptable unto himself they are therefore acceptable unto him because they are ordered by him 19. That is one ground The other is because God looketh not upon us as we are in our selves neither dealeth with us according to the rigour of a legal Covenant but he beholdeth us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the face of his beloved One even Jesus Christ his only Son and as under a Covenant of Grace He is his beloved Son in whom alone he is well pleased for his own sake and in whom and for whose sake alone it is if at any time he be well pleased with any of us or with any of our Ways For being by him and through faith in his Name made the children of God by adoption and grace he is now pleased with us as a loving Father is with his beloved Child As a loving Father taketh in good part the willing Endeavours of his Child to do whatsoever he appointeth him though his performances be very small So the Lord is graciously pleased to accept of us and our weak services according to that willingness we have and not according to that exactness we want not weighing our merits but pardâ—ning our offences and passing by our imperfections as our loving Father in Iesus Christ. That is the other ground 20. And we doubt not but the acceptance we find with God upon these two grounds if seasonably applied will sustain the soul of every one that truly feareth God with strong comfort against two great and common discouragements whereunto he may be subject arising the one from the sense of mens displeasure the other from the conscience of his own imperfections Sometimes God and his own heart condemn him not and yet the World doth and that troubleth him Sometimes God and the World condemn him not and yet his own heart doth and that troubleth him more If at any time it be either thus or so with any of us let us remember but thus much and we shall find comfort in it that although we can neither please other men at all nor our selves sufficiently yet our Works may for all that be graciously accepted by our good God and so our ways may please the Lord. 21. But I forbear the amplification of these comforts that I may proceed from the Antecedent in those former words when a mans ways please the Lord of which I have spoken hitherto unto the Consequent in the remaining words he maketh even his Enemies to be at peace with him Wherein also as in the former part we have three things observable The Persons the Effect the Author The Persons a mans Enemies the Effect Peace the Author the Lord. He maketh a mans Enemies to be at peace with him The words being of an easie understanding will therefore need the less opening Only thus much briefly First for the Persons they that wish him ill or seek to do him Harm in his Person Estate or good Name they are a mans Enemies And Solomon here supposeth it possible that a man whose Ways please the Lord may yet have Enemies Nay it is scarce possible it should be otherwise Inimici Domestici rather than fail Satan will stir him up Enemies out of his own house 2. And these Enemies are then said to be at peace with him which is the Effect when either there is a change wrought in their Affections so as they now begin to bear him less ill-will than formerly they have done or when at least-wise their evil Affections towards him are so bridled or their power so restrained as not to break out into open hostility but whatsoever their thoughts are within to carry themselves fairly and peaceably towards him outwardly so as he is at a kind of peace with them or howsoever sustaineth no harm by them Either of which when it is done it is thirdly Mutatio dextrae excelsi it is merely the Lords doing and it may well be marvellous in our Eyes It is he that maketh a mans Enemies to be at peace with him 22. The scope of the whole words is to instruct us that the fairest and likeliest way for us to procure peace with men is to order our ways so as to please the Lord. You shall therefore find the favour of God and the favour of men often joined together in the Scriptures as if the one were and so usually it is a consequent of the other So
which he suffereth their enmity to continue But it is more certain thirdly that we please him but imperfectly and in part even as those Graces wherewith we please him are in us but imperfectly and in part And therefore no marvel if our peace also be but imperfect and in part Possibly he will procure our peace more when we please him better 28. But where none of these or the like Considerations will reach home it will sufficiently clear the whole difficulty to consider but thus much and it is a plain and true answer that generally all Scriptures that run upon temporal promises are to be understood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not as universally but as commonly true Or as some Divines express it cum exceptione crucis not absolutely and without all exception but evermore with this reservation unless the Lord in his infinite Wisdom see cause why it should be good for us to have it otherwise But this you shall ever observe withal and it infinitely magnifieth the goodness of our gracious Lord and God towards us that where he seeth it not good to give us that blessing in specie which the Letter of the Promise seemeth to import he yet giveth it us eminenter that is to say if not that yet some other thing fully as good as that and which he well knoweth though perhaps we cannot yet apprehend it so to be presently far better for us than that Say he do not give us Wealth or Advancement yet if he give us a contented mind without them is it not better Say he do not speedily remove a temptation from us whereunder we groan which was St. Paul's Case yet if he supply us with a sufficiency of grace to encounter with it is it not better So in the present Case if he do not presently make our Enemies to be at peace with us yet if he teach us to profit by their Enmity in exercising our faith and patience in quickning us unto prayer in furthering our humiliations or encreasing any other grace in us is it not every way and incomparably better Now will any wise man tax him with breach of Promise who having promised a Pound of Silver giveth a Talent of Gold Or who can truly say that that man is not so good as his Word that is apparently much better than his Word 29. From the Words thus cleared may be deduced many profitable Inferences for our further instruction but that the time will not suffer us to enlarge them As first We may hence know what a blessed and desirable thing Peace is not only that inward peace with God and in our own breasts which passeth all understanding but even this outward peace with men When the Holy Spirit of God here in the Text useth it as an especial strong inducement to quicken us up the rather to the performance of that with chearfulness which we are in Duty bound to perform howsoever in seeking to please the Lord. We may learn hence secondly if at any time we unfeignedly desire peace by what course we may be likeliest to procure it Preposterous is the course which yet most of men take when to make their Peace with mortal men they hazard the disfavour of the Eternal God The right and ready way is chalked out in the Text First to make our peace with God by ordering our Ways so as to please him and then to commit our Ways to his ordering by leaving the whole success to him and so doing it is not possible we should miscarry Those that are now our Enemies either he will turn their hearts towards us so as to become our Friends if he seeth that good for us or else he will so curb and restrain them that with all their Enmity they shall not be able to do us any harm if he see that better for us or if by his just sufferance they do us harm one way and yet he will not suffer that neither unless he see that absolutely best for us it shall be recompensed to us by his good providence in a far greater comfort another way We may learn hence Thirdly how hateful the practice is and how wretched the condition of Make-bates Tale-bearers Whisperers and all those that sow dissention among Brethren Light and Darkness are not more contrary than are Gods Ways and theirs He is the Author of Peace and lover of Concord they are the Authors of Strife and lovers of Discord It is his Work to make a mans enemies to be at peace with him It is their business to make a mans friends to be at odds with him We may learn hence Fourthly if at any time our Enemies grow to be at peace with us to whom we owe it Not to our selves it is a thing beyond our power or skill to win them Much less to them whose Malice is stiff and will not easily relent But it is principally the Lords own Work He is the God of Peace which maketh men to be of one mind in an house it is he that causeth wars to cease in all the Earth and that giveth unto his people the blessing of peace And therefore the glory of it and the thanks for it belong to him alone 30. But I willingly omit all further enlargement of these inferences that I may somewhat the longer insist upon one other inference only very needful to be considered of in these times which is this We may hence learn Fifthly if at any time we want peace probably to guess where the fault may partly be and that by arguing from the Text thus I read here that when a mans ways please the Lord he maketh his Enemies to be at peace with him I find in mine no relenting but an utter averseness from peace I am for peace but when I speak to them thereof they make them ready to battel I have cause therefore to fear that all is not right with me either my heart is not right or my ways are not right I will examine them both throughly and search if I can see any way of wickedness in me for which my God may be justly displeased with me and for which he thus stiffneth mine Enemies still against me 31. Thus to be jealous over our selves with a godly jealousie would not only work in us a due consideration of our ways that so we might amend them if there be cause but would be also of right use to prevent two notable pieces of Sophistry two egregious fallacies wherewith thousands of us deceive our selves The former fallacy is that we use many times especially when our Enemies do us manifest wrong to impute our sufferings wholly to their iniquity whereof we should do wiselier to take some of the blame upon our selves Not at all to excuse them whose proceedings are unjust and for which they shall bear their own burthens But to acquit the Lords proceedings who still is just even in those
confident that friend will not fail to assist him therein to his utmost power Now if a man be bold to do but what he may and should do and that withal he have some good ground for his confidence from the consideration of his friends ability the experience of his love some former promises on his friends or merit on his own part or other like so as every man would be ready to say he had reason to presume so far of his friend this is a good reasonable and warrantable presumption But if he fail in either respect as if he presume either to do unlawful unworthy or unbefitting things or to do even lawful things when there appeareth no great cause why any man should think his friend obliged by the laws of friendship to assist him therein then is such his presumption a faulty and an evil presumption And whatsoever may bear the name of a Presumptuous sin in any respect is some way or other tainted with such an evil irrational presumption 9. But we are further to note that presumption in the worser sence and as applied to sin may be taken either Materially or Formally If these terms seem obscure with a little opening I hope the difference between these two will be easily understood Taken materially the sin of presumption is a special kind of sin distinguished from other species of sins by its proper Object or Matter when the very matter wherein we sin and whereby we offend God is Presumption and so it is a branch of Pride When a man presuming either upon his own strength or upon Gods assisting him undertaketh to do something of himself not having in himself by the ordinary course of nature and the common aid which God affordeth to the actions of his creatures in the ordinary ways of his providence sufficient strength to go through therewithal or expecteth to receive some extraordinary assistance from the Mercy Power c. of God not having any sufficient ground either from the general Promises contained in the Scriptures or by particular immediate revelation that God will certainly so assist him therein 10. All those men that over-value themselves or out of an overweening conceit of their own abilities attempt things beyond their power That lean to their own understandings as Solomon That mind high things and are wise in their own conceits as St. Paul That exercise themselves in great matters and such as are too high for them as David expresseth it All those that perswade themselves they can persist in an holy course without a continual supply of Grace or that think they can continue in their sins so long as they think good and then repent of them and forsake them at their leisure whensoever they list or that doubt not but to be able by their own strength to stand out against any temptation All these I say and all other like by presuming too much upon themselves are guilty of the sin of Presumption ' 'To omit the Poets who have set forth the folly of this kind of Presumption in the Fables of Phaethon and Icarus A notable example we have of it in the Apostle Peter and therein a fair warning for others not to be high-minded but to fear who in the great confidence of his own strength could not believe his Master though he knew him to be the God of truth when he foretold him he would yield but still protested that if all the world should forsake him yet he would never do it 11. Nor only may a man offend in this kind by presuming upon himself too much but also by presuming even upon God himself without warrant He that repenteth truly of his sins presuming of Gods mercy in the forgiveness thereof or that walketh uprightly and conscionably in the ways of his Calling presuming of Gods Power for his protection therein sinneth not in so presuming Such a presumption is a fruit of Faith and a good presumption because it hath a sure ground a double sure ground for failing first in the Nature and then in the Promise of God As a man may with good reason presume upon his Friend that he will not be wanting to him in any good Office that by the just Laws of true friendship one friend ought to do for another But as he presumeth too much upon his friend that careth not into what desperate exigents and dangers he casteth himself in hope his friend will perpetually redeem him and relieve him at every turn So whosoever trusteth to the Mercy or to the Power of God without the warrant of a Promise presumeth farther than he hath cause And though he may flatter himself and call it by some better name as Faith or Hope or Affiance in God yet is it in truth no better than a groundless and a wicked Presumption Such was the Presumption of those Sons of Sceva who took upon them but to their shame and sorrow to call over them that had evil spirits the name of the Lord Iesus in a form of adjuration Acts 19. when they had no calling or warrant from God so to do And all those men that going on in a wretched course of life do yet hope they shall find mercy at the hour of death All those that cast themselves into unnecessary either dangers or temptations with expectance that God should manifest his extraordinary Power in their preservation All those that promise to themselves the End without applying themselves to the means that God hath appointed thereunto as to have Learning without Study Wealth without Industry Comfort from Children without careful Education c. forasmuch as they presume upon Gods help without sufficient Warrant are guilty of the sin of Presumption taken in the former notion and Materially 12. But I conceive the Presumptuous sins here in the Text to belong clearly to the other notion of the word Presumption taken formally and as it importeth not a distinct kind of sin in it self as that Groundless Presumption whereof we have hitherto spoken doth but a common accidental difference that may adhere to sins of any kind even as Ignorance and Infirmity whereunto it is opposed also may Theft and Murther which are sins of special kinds distinguished either from other by their special and proper Objects are yet both of them capable of these common differences inasmuch as either of them may be committed as sometimes through Ignorance and sometimes through Infirmity so also sometimes through Wilfulness or Presumption 13. The distribution of Sins into sins of Ignorance of Infirmity and of Presumption is very usual and very useful and compleat enough without the addition which some make of a fourth sort to wit Sins of Negligence or Inadvertency all such sins being easily reducible to some of the former three The ground of the distinction is laid in the Soul of man wherein there are three distinct prime faculties from which all our actions flow the Understanding the Will and the sensual
understanding can fathom Sic Deus dilexit So God loved the world But how much that so containeth no tongue or wit of man can reach Nothing expresseth it better to the life than the work it self doth That the Word should be made Flesh that the holy One of God should be made sin that God blessed for ever should be made a curse that the Lord of life and glory should suffer an inglorious death and pour out his own most precious blood to ransome such worthless thankless graceless Traitors as we were that had so desperately made our selves away and that into the hands of his deadliest enemy and that upon such poor and unworthy conditions O altitudo Love incomprehensible It swalloweth up the sense and understanding of Men and Angels fitter to be admired and adored with silence than blemished with any our weak Expressions 29. I leave it therefore and go on to the next his Right When de facto we sold our selves to Satan we had de jure no power or right at all so to do being we were not our own and so in truth the title is naught and the sale void Yet it is good against us however we may not plead the invalidity of it forsomuch as in reason no man ought to make advantage of his own act Our act then barreth us But yet it cannot bar the right owner from challenging his own wheresoever he find it And therefore we may be well assured God will not suffer the Devil who is but malae fidei possessor an intruder and a cheater quietly to enjoy what is Gods and not his but he will eject him we have that word Ioh. 12. 21. Ejicietur now is the Prince of this world cast out and recover out of his possession that which he hath no right at all to hold 30. Sundry inferences we might raise hence if we had time I may not insist yet I cannot but touch at three duties which we owe to God for this Redemption because they answer so fitly to these three last mentioned assurances We owe him Affiance in respect of his Power in requital of his Love Thankfulness and in regard of his Right Service First the consideration of his Power in our Redemption may put a great deal of comfort and confidence into us that having now redeemed us if we do but cleave fast to him and revolt not again he will protect us from Sin and Satan and all other enemies and pretenders whatsoever O Israel fear not for I have redeemed thee Isa. 43. If then the Devil shall seek by any of his wiles or suggestions at any time to get us over to him again as he is an unwearied sollicitor and will not lose his claim by discontinuance Let us then look to that Cornu salutis that horn of salvation that God hath raised up for us in Christ our Redeemer and flie thither for succour as to the horns of the Altar saying with David Psalm 119. I am thine oh save me and we shall be safe In all inward temptations in all outward distresses at the hour of death and in the day of judgement we may with great security commit the keeping our souls to him both as a faithful Creator and as a powerful Redeemer saying once more with David into thy hands I commend my spirit for thou hast redeemed me O Lord thou God of truth Psal. 31. 6. 31. Secondly The consideration of his love in our Redemption should quicken us to a thankful acknowledgment of his great and undeserved goodness towards us Let them give thanks whom the Lord hath redeemed and delivered from the hands of the enemy Psal. 107. Let all men let all creatures do it but let them especially If the blessings of corn and wine and oyl of health and peace and plenty of deliverance from sicknesses pestilences famines and other calamities can so affect us as to provoke at least some overly and superficial forms of thanksgiving from us how carnal are our minds and our thoughts earthly if the contemplation of the depth of the riches of God mercy poured our upon us in this great work of our Redemption do not even ravish our hearts with an ardent desire to pour them out unto him again in Hymns and Psalms and Songs of Thanksgiving with a Benedictus in our mouths Blessed be the Lord God of Israel for he hath visited and redeemed his people 32. Thirdly The consideration of his Right should bind us to do him service We were his before for he made us and we ought him service for that But now we are his more than before and by a new title for he hath bought us and paid for us and we owe him more service for that The Apostle therefore urgeth it as a matter of great equity you are not your own but his therefore you are not to satisfie your selves by doing your own lusts but to glorifie him by doing his will When Christ redeemed us by his blood his purpose was to redeem us unto God Rev. 5. 9. and not to our selves and to redeem us from our vain conversation 1 Pet. 1. 18. and not to it And he therefore delivered us out of the hands of our enemies that we might the more freely and securely and without fear serve him in holiness and righteousness all the daies of our lives Luke 1. which being both our bounden duty and the thing withal so very reasonable we have the more to answer for i◠we do not make a conscience of it to perform it accordingly He hath done his part and that which he was no way bound unto in redeeming us and he hath done it to purpose done it effectually Let it be our care to do our part for which their lye so many obligations upon us in serving him and let us also do it to purpose do it really and throughly and constantly 33. Thus is our Redemption done effectually it is also done freely which is the only point now remaining Not for price nor reward Isa. 45. 13. but freely and without money here in the Text. Nor need we here fear another contradiction For the meaning is not that there was no price paid at all but that there was none paid by us we laid out nothing towards this great Purchase there went none of our money to it But otherwise that there was a price paid the Scriptures are clear You are bought with a price saith St. Paul 1 Cor. 6. and he saith it over again Chap. 7. He that paid it calleth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a ransom that is as much as to say a price of Redemption and his Apostle somewhat more 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which implieth a just and satisfactory price full as much as the thing can be worth Yet not paid to Satan in whose possession we were for we have found already that he was but an Usurper and his title naught He had but bought of us
this mind and so be at least thus far like-minded as to resolve to forbear all scornful and insolent speeches and behaviour of and towards one another without jeering without censuring without provoking without causless vexing one another or disturbing the publick peace of the Church For the servant of God must not strive but be gentle unto all men and patient So gentle and patient that he must study to win them that oppose themselves not by reviling but instructing them and that not in a loud and lofty strain unless when there is left no other remedy but first and if that will serve the turn only in love and with meekness Our conversation where it cannot be all out so free and familiar should yet be fair and amiable Gods holy truth we must stand for I grant if it be opposed to the utmost of our strength neither may we betray any part thereof by our silence or softness for any mans pleasure or displeasure where we may help it and where the defence of it appeareth to be prudentially necessary Yet even in that case ought we so to maintain the truth of God as not to despise the persons of men We are to follow the truth in love which is then best done when holding us close to the truth we are ready yet in love to our brethren to do them all the rights and to perform unto them all those respects which without confirming them in their Errors may any way fall due unto them 27. It is a perfect and a blessed Unity when all the three meet together unity of true Doctrine unity of loving Affection and unity of peaceable conversation and this perfection ought to be both in our Aims and in our Endeavours But if through our own weakness or the waywardness of others we cannot attain to the full perfection of the whole having faithfully endeavoured it pulchrum est in secundis tertiisve it will be some commendation and comfort to us to have attained so much as we could 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Phil. 3. Nevertheless whereunto we have attained let us mind the same thing 28. To quicken us hereunto the duty being so needful and we withal so dull these few things following would be taken into consideration Consider first that by our Christian Calling we are all made up into one mystical body 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that by such a real though mysterious concorporation as that we become thereby 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as all of us members of Christ so every one of us one anothers members Now the sympathy and supply that is between the members of the natural body for their mutual comfort and the good of the whole the Apostle elegantly setteth forth and applieth it very fully to the mystical body of the Church in 1 Cor. 12. at large It were a thing prodigiously unnatural and to every mans apprehension the effect of a phrensie at the least to see one member of the body fall a beating or tearing another No! if any one member be it never so mean and despicable be in Anguish the rest are sensible of it No terms of betterness are then stood upon I am better than thou or I than thou no terms of defiance heard I have no need of thee or I of thee But they are all ready to contribute their several supplies according to their several abilities and measures to give ease and relief to the grieved part 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the reason is given at Ver. 25. there that so there might be no rent no schism no division or dis-union of parts in the body Consider secondly That by our Condition we are all fellow-brethren and fellow-servants in the same family of the houshold of faith all and these are obliging relations We ought therefore so to behave our selves in the house of God which is the Church of the living God as becometh fellow-brethren that are descended from the same Father and fellow-servants that live under the same Master We all wear one livery having all put on Christ by solemn profession at our holy Baptism We are fed at one Table eating the same spiritual meat and drinking the same spiritual drink in the holy Communion Every thing that belongeth to this House breatheth Union One body one spirit one calling one hope one Lord one Faith one Baptism one God and Father of all as the Apostle urgeth it Eph. 4. concluding thence that therefore we ought to be at one among our selves endeavouring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace Any of us would think it a very disorderly house and ill governed if coming in by chance we should find the Children and Servants all together by the Ears though but once How much more then if we should observe them to be ever and anon snarling and quarrelling one with another and beating and kicking one another Ioseph thought he need say no more to his brethren to prevent their falling out by the way in their return homeward than to remind them of this that they were all one mans children And Abraham to procure an everlasting Amnesty and utter cessation thenceforth of all debate between himself and his Nephew Lot and their servants made use of this one argument as the most prevalent of all other for that end that they were Brethren Ecce quam bonum I cannot but repeat it once more Behold how good and joyful a thing it is for brethren to dwell together in unity 30. Consider thirdly how peace and unity forwardeth the work of God for the building up of his Church which faction and division on the other side obstructeth so as nothing more When all the workmen intend the main business each in his place and office performing his appointed task with chearfulness and good agreement the work goeth on and the building gets up apace But where one man draweth one way and another another way one will have things done after this fashion and another after that when one maketh and another marreth now one setteth up by and by cometh another and plucketh all down again how is it possible whilst things go thus that ever the building should be brought to any perfection or handsomness The Apostle well understood what he said when in the foregoing Chapter he joyned Peace and Edification together 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let us follow after the things that make for peace and things wherewith we may edifie one another Where the Hearts and Tongues of the builders are divided the building will either come to nothing or prove but a Babel of Confusion For where envying and strife is there is confusion and every evil work Strife you see maketh ill work it buildeth up nothing unless it be the walls of Babel It is peace and concord that buildeth up the walls of Ierusalem which as it hath its name from Peace so hath it its beauty also and
but every man also on the things of others as St. Paul elsewhere exhorteth then should we also agree with one mind and heart to follow the work close till we had got it up That for dispatch 36. But haste maketh waste we say It doth so and in building as much as in any thing It were good wisdom therefore to bring on the work so as to make it strong withal lest if we make false work for quicker dispatch we repent our over-hasty building by leisure To rid us of that fear know secondly that unity and concord serveth for strength too as well as dispatch Ever more vis unita fortior but division weakeneth A house divided against it self cannot stand and the wall must needs be hollow and loose where the stones stand off one from another and couch not close Now brotherly love and unity is it that bindeth all fast so making of loose heaps one entire piece I beseech you brethren saith the Apostle that there be no divisions among you but that ye be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgment 1 Cor. 1. Like-mindedness you see is the thing that joineth all together and in the well-joining consisteth the strength of structure In Eph. 4. therefore he speaketh of the bond of peace and in Col. 3. he calleth love the bond of perfectness 37. In Phil. 1. he hath another expression which also notably confirmeth the same truth That I may hear saith he of your affairs that ye stand fast in one spirit with one mind They never stand so fast as when they are of one mind There is a Greek word sometimes used in the New Testament 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the word which is commonly translated confusion and sometimes tumult Not unfitly for the sence either but in the literal notation it improveth a kind of unstableness rather or unsettledness when a thing doth not stand fast but shaketh and tottereth and is in danger of falling And this St. Paul opposeth to peace 1 Cor. 14. God is not the author 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of confusion or unstableness but of peace By that very opposition intimating that it is mostly for want of peace that things do not stand fast but are ready to fall into disorder and confusion St. Iames speaketh out what St. Paul but intimateth and telleth us plainly that this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the effect of discord and that contention is the mother of confusion For where envying and strife is saith he there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 inconstancy unsettledness confusion and every evil work The builders make very ill work where the building is not like to stand but threatneth ruine and is ready to drop down again by that it be well up And yet such ill work doth envying and strife ever make it is concord only and unity that maketh good work and buildeth strong Let Ierusalem be built as a City at unity in it self and Ierusalem will be like to stand the faster and to stand up the longer 38. For a conclusion of all I cannot but once again admonish and earnestly entreat all those that in contending with much earnestness for matters of no great consequence have the glory of God ever and anon in their mouths that they would take heed of embarquing God and his glory so deep in every trifling business and such as wherein there is not dignus vindice nodus But since it clearly appeareth from this and sundry other Texts of holy Scripture that peace and love are of those things whereby our gracious Lord God taketh himself to be chiefly glorified that they would rather faithfully endeavour by their peaceable charitable and amiable carriage towards others especially in such things as they cannot but know to be in the judgment of sundry men both learned and godly accounted but of inferiour and indifferent nature to approve to God the World and their own Consciences that they do sincerely desire to glorifie God by pleasing their brethren for their good unto edification Which that we all unfeignedly may do I commend us and what we have heard to the grace and blessing of Almighty God dismissing you once again as I did heretofore with the Apostles Benediction in the Text for I know not where to fit my self better Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be like-minded one towards another according unto Christ That ye may with one mind and with one mouth glorifie God even the Father of our Lord Iesus Christ. To which God the Father and his Son Iesus Christ our Lord and the blessed Spirit of them both three Persons c. AD AULAM. Sermon XIV WOBURNE 1647. AUGUST Psal. 27. 10. When my Father and my Mother forsake me the Lord taketh me up 1. THings that have a natural weakness in them to bear up themselves do by a natural instinct lean towards and if they can find it clasp about something that may sufficiently support them but in default of such will catch and twine about whatsoever is next them that may be any little stay to them for any little time So a Hop for want of a strong Pole will wind it self about a Thistle or Nettle or any sorry weed The heart of man whilst it seeketh abroad for somewhat without it self to rest it self upon doth even thereby sufficiently bewray a secret consciousness in it self of its own insufficiency to stand without something to support it If it find not that which is the only true support indeed it will stay it self as long as it can upon a weak staff rather than none Chariots and Horses and Riches and Friends c. any thing will serve to trust in whilst no better appeareth 2. But that our hearts deceitful as they are delude us not with vain confidences we may learn from the Text where it is and where alone that we may repose our selves with full assurance of hope not to fail David affirmeth positively what he had found true by much experience that when all others from whom we expect help either will not or cannot God both can and will help us so far as he seeth it good for us if we put our trust in him When my Father and Mother forsake me the Lord will take me up The words import First a possibility of failing in all inferiour helps It is supposed Fathers and Mothers and proportionally all other friends and helps may forsake us and leave us succourless When my Father and my Mother forsake me Secondly a never-failing sufficiency of help and relief from God though all other helps should fail us Then the Lord will take me up The two points we are to speak to 3. Father and Mother First who are they Properly and chiefly our natural Parents of whom we were begotten and born to whom under God we owe our being and breeding Yet here not they only but by Synecdoche all other kinsfolks neighbours
our Faith But it is by the grace and power of God that our Faith it self standeth Take that grace away and our faith faileth and then our hearts fail and then there is neither courage nor patience nor obedience nor any thing else that good is in us At least not in that measure as to render our ways during that estate either acceptable to God or comfortable to our selves until it shall please him to renew us unto repentance to give us the comfort of his help again and to establish us afresh with his free spirit and grace 32. Of whose most holy and wise dispensations although we be neither able nor worthy to apprehend any other reason than his own will nor to comprehend that for his spirit breatheth where and when it listeth and we know not antecedently either why or how yet are we well assured in the general that the Lord is righteous in all his ways and holy in all his works Yea and we find by the blessed consequents many times that the very withdrawing of his grace is it self a special act of his grace 1. As when he hath thereby humbled us to a better sight and sense of our own frailty so was Hezekiah left to himself in the matter of the Embassadours that came from the King of Babel 2. Or checkt us for our overmuch self-confidence as Peters denial was a real rebuke for his over-bold protestation 3. Or brought us to acknowledge with thankfulness and humility by whose strength it is that we have hitherto stood My strength will I ascribe unto thee Psal. 59. 4. Or taught us to bear more compassion towards our brethren and their infirmities if they hap to be overtaken with a fault and to restore them with the spirit of meekness considering that even we our selves are not such as cannot be tempted Or wrought some other good effect upon us some other way 33. Sith then great and lasting afflictions are strong trials of mens patience and courage and their inability to bear them great through the frailty of nature is yet by their own personal default and supine negligence much greater and without the support of Gods grace which as he is no ways bound to give them so he may and doth when it pleaseth him take from them their spirits are not able to bear up under the least temptation you will grant the Apostle had great reason to fear lest these Hebrews notwithstanding the good proof they had given of their Christian constancy in some former trials should yet be weary and faint in their minds under greater sufferings And consequently how it concerneth every one of us whatsoever comforts we may have of our former sufferings and patience whereof unless God have the whole glory our comfort sure will be the less yet to be very jealous of our own treacherous hearts and to keep a constant watch over them that they deceive us not not to be too high-minded or jolly for any thing that is past nor too unmerciful censurers of our weaker brethren for their faintings and failings nor too confident of our own future standing 34. It ought to be our care rather at all times especially in such times as threaten persecution to all those that will not recede from such Principles of Religion Iustice and Loyalty as they have hitherto held themselves obliged to walk by to live in a continual expectancy of greater trials and temptations daily to assault us than we have yet wrestled withal And to give all diligence by our faithful prayers and utmost endeavours to arm and prepare our selves for the better bearing them with such calm patience and moderation on the one side and yet with such undaunted courage and resolution on the other side as may evidence at once our humble submission to whatsoever it shall please God to lay upon us and our high contempt of the utmost despight the world can do us 35. For since every affliction Ianus-like hath two faces and looketh two ways we should do well to make our use of both It looketh backward as it cometh from God who layeth it upon us as a correction for some past sin And it looketh forward as it cometh from Satan and the World who lay it before us as a temptation to some new sin Accordingly are we to entertain it As it is Gods Correction by no means to despise it My Son despise not thou the chastening of the Lord the next verse but one but to take it up with joy and to bear it with patience and to profit by it to repentance But as it is Satans temptation by all means to resist it with courage yea and with disdain too Resist it I say but in that sence wherein such resistance is to be understood in the very next verse after Text. That is to say so to resist the temptation by striving against that sin whatever it be which the Tempter seeketh to drive us into by the affliction that we should fight it out in blood resolving rather to lose it all were it to the last drop than consent to the committing of that Thus to lose our blood is to win the day And the failing so to do is that weariness and faininess of mind and soul of which our Apostle here speaketh and upon which we have hitherto thus long insisted 36. Yet dare I not for all that leave it thus without adding a necessary caution lest what hath been said be mis-understood as if when we are bidden not to faint under the Cross we were forbidden to use any means or endeavours to remove it No such matter True it is where no more is left to our choice but one of the two either Sin or Suffer a right Christian should not for shame so much as take it into deliberation Never demur upon it it is a plain case we must suffer But where there is a Medium or third thing as an out-let or expedient between both as many times there is nothing hindreth but we may and reason would we should make choice of that and so neither sin nor suffer Lay that first as a sure ground We must avoid sin though we suffer for it But that once laid if we can then avoid suffering too without sinning why may we not nay why ought we not to avoid both 37. No man doubteth but we may pray to be delivered from troubles David doth it an hundred times and if we do it not daily too even as often as we beg our daily bread our Saviour having contrived both Petitions into the same Prayer we are to blame And if we may pray for it then no doubt but we may endeavour it also Though they look something alike in someother respects yet in this one at least Wishes and Prayers are much unlike Many things we may lawfully wish for which we may not endeavour after but sure whatsoever we may lawfully pray for we not only lawfully may but are in
so many Mock-Graces and specious counter feits that carry a semblance of spiritual fruit but are not the things they seem to be And on the other side inordinate love of our selves partly and partly want of Charity towards our brethren have so disposed us to a capacity of being deceived that it is no wonder if in passing our judgments especially where our selves are concerned we be very much and very often mistaken It might rather be a wonder if we should not be sometimes mistaken 44. As most Errors claim to be a little akin to some Truths so most Vices challenge a kind of affinity to some Vertue Not so much from any proper intrinsecal true resemblance they have with such vertues as by reason of the common opposition they both have to one and the same contrary Vice As Prodigality hath some overly likeness with Liberality and so may hap to be mistaken for it for no other cause but this only that they are both contrary to Covetousness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Aristotle truly fallacy and deception for the most part arise from the appearance of some likeness oâ— similitude when things that are like but not the same are taken to be the same because they are like They that have given us marks of sincerity for the trial of our Graces have not been able to give us any certain Rules or infallible Characters whereby to try the sincerity of those Marks so as to remove all doubtings and possibility of erring 45. Whence I supose I may safely infer that the certainty of a Man's present standing in grace but much more then of his eternal future salvation although I doubt not but by the mercy of God it may be attainable in this life and that without extraordinary revelation in such a measure as may sustain the soul of an honest Christian with comfort is not yet either so absolutely necessary nor so void of fears and doubtings as some perhaps have imagined 46. Not so necessary but that a Man may be saved without it Many a good soul no doubt there is in the world that out of the experience of the falseness of his own heart and the fear of self-deceit and the sense of his own unworthiness could never yet attain to be so well persuaded of the sincerity of his own Repentance Faith and Obedience as to think that God would approve of it and accept it The censure were very hard and a great violation it would be of Charity I am sure and I think of Truth also to pronounce such a Man to be out of the State of Salvation or to call such his dis-persuasion by the name of Despair and under that name to condemn it There is a common but a great mistake in this matter Despair is far another manner of thing than many take it for When a Man thinketh himself so incapable of God's pardon that he groweth thereupon regardless of all duties and neither careth what he doth nor what shall become of him when he is once come to this resolution Over shoes over boots I know God will never forgive me and therefore I will never trouble my self to seek his favour in vain this is to run a deseperate course indeed this is properly the sin of Despair But when the fear that God hath not yet pardoned him prompteth him to better resolutions and exciteth him to a greater care of repentance and newness of life and maketh him more diligent in the performance of all holy duties that so he may be the more capable of pardon it is so far from being any way prejudical to his eternal salvation that it is the readiest way to secure it 47. But where the greatest certainty is that can be attained to in this life by ordinary means it is not ordinarily unless perhaps to some few persons at the very hour of death so perfect as to exclude all doubtings The fruits of the Spirit where they are true and sincere being but imperfect in this life and the truth and sincerity of them being not always so manifest but that a Man may sometimes be deceived in his judgment concerning the same it can hardly be what between the one and the other the imperfection of the thing and the difficulty of judging but that the Assurance which is wholly grounded thereupon and can therefore have no more strength than they can give it must be subject to Fears Iealonsies and Doubtings 48. I speak not this to shake any Man's comfort God forbid but to stir up every Man's care to abound and increase so much the more in all godliness and in the fruits of the Spirit by giving all diligence by walking in the Spirit and subduing the Lusts of the Flesh to make his Calling and Election sure Sure in it self that he fail not of Salvation in the end and sure to him also as far as he can that his comfort may be the greater and sounder in the mean time Now the God of all Grace and Glory send the Spirit of his Son plentifully into our Hearts that we may abound in the Fruits of godly living to the praise of his Grace our present comfort in this Life and the eternal salvation of our Souls in the Day of our Lord Iesus Christ. AD MAGISTRATUM The First Sermon At the Assizes at Lincoln in the Year 1690 at the Request of Sir DANIEL Dâ—IGNâ— Knight then High Sheriff of that Coâ—â—â—y Prov. 24. 10 12. 10. If thou faint in the day of adversity thy strength is small 11. If thou forbear to deliver them that are drawn unto death and those that are ready to be sâ—ain 12. If thou sayest Behold we know it not doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it and he that keepeth thy soul doth not he know it and shall not he render to every man according to his works 1. AS in most other things so in the performance of that duty which this Text aimeth at we are neither careful before-hand such is the uncharitableness of our incompassionate hearts to do well nor yet willing afterwards through the pride of our Spirits to acknowledg we have done ill The holy Spirit of God therefore hath directed Solomon in this Scripture wherein he would incite us to the performance of the duty to frame his words in such sort as to meet with us in both these corruptions and to let us see that as the duty is necessary and may not be neglected so the neglect is damnable and cannot be excused In the handling whereof I shall not need to bestow much labour either in searching into the contexture of the words or examining the differences of translations Because the sentence as in the rest of this Book for the most part hath a compleat sence within it self without any necessary either dependence upon any thing going before or reference to any thing coming after and the differences that are in the translations are neither many in number nor
day of their adversity protect the innocent from such as are too mighty or too crafty for him hew in pieces the snares and break the jaws of the cunning and cruel oppressor and deliver those that are drawn either to death or undoing 24. The course is preposterous and vain which some Men ambitious of honour and reputation take to get themselves put into the place of Magistracy and Authority having neither head nor heart for it I mean when they have neither knowledge and experience in any measure of competency to understand what belongeth to such places nor yet any care or purpose at all to do God their King and Country good service therein The wise Son of Sirac checketh such ambitious spirits for their unseasonable forwardness that way Sirac 7. Seek not of the Lord preeminence neither of the King the seat of honour Think not he hath any meaning to dissuade or dishearten Men of quality and parts for medling with such employments for then the service should be neglected No Men that are gifted for it although the service cannot be attended without some both trouble and charge yet should not for the avoiding either of charge or trouble indeed they cannot without sin seek either to keep themselves out of the Commission or to get themselves off again being on His meaning clearly is only to repress the ambition of those that look after the Title because they think it would be some glory to them but are not able for want either of skill or spirit or through sloth nor willing to perform the duties And so he declareth himself a little after there Seek not to be a Iudge being not able to take away iniquity lest at any time thou fear the person of the mighty and lay a stumbling-block in the way of thy uprightness 25. Did honour indeed consist which is the ambitious Man's error either only or chiefly in the empty Title we might well wish him good luck with his honour But since true Honour hath a dependence upon vertue being the wages as some or as others have rather chosen to call it the shadow of it it is a very vanity to expect the one without some care had of the other Would any Man not forsaken of his senses look for a shadow where there is no solid body to cast it Or not of his reason demand wages where he hath done no service Yet such is the perversness of our corrupt nature through sloth and self-love that what God would have go together the Honour and the Burden we would willingly put asunder Every Man almost would draw to himself as much of the honour as he can if it be a matter of credit or gain then Why should not I be respected in my place as well as another But yet withal would every Man almost put off from himself as much of the burden as he can If it be a matter of business and trouble then Why may not another Man do it as well as I Like lazy servants so are we that love to be before-hand with their wages and behind-hand with their work 26. The truth is there is an Outward and there is an Inward Honour The Outward honour belongeth immediately to the Place and the place casteth it up on the Person so that whatsoever person holdeth the place it is meet he should have the honour due to the place whether he deserve it or not But the Inward honour pitcheth immediately upon the Person and but reflecteth upon the Place and that Honour will never be had without desert What the Apostle said of the Ministry is in some sense also true of the Migistracy they that labour faithfully in either are worthy of double Honour Labour or labour not there is a single honour due to them and yet not so much to them as to their Places and Callings but yet to them too for the places sake and we are unjust if we with-hold it from them though they should be most unworthy of it But the double Honour that inward Honour of the heart to accompany the outward will not be had where there is not worth and industry in some tolerable measure to deserve it The knee-worship and the cap-worship and the lip-worship they may have that are in worshipful places and callings though they do little good in them but the Heart-worship they shall never have unless they be ready to do Iustice and to shew Mercy and be diligent and faithful in their Callings 27. Another fruit and effect of this duty where it is honestly performed are the hearty prayers and blessings of the poor as on the contrary their bitter curses and imprecations where it is slighted or neglected We need not look so far to find the truth hereof asserted in both the branches we have a Text for it in this very Chapter Prov. 24. He that saith unto the wicked Thou art righteous him shall the people curse nations shall abhor him But to them that rebuke him shall be delight and a good blessing shall come upon them Every Man shall kiss his lips that giveth a right answer As he that with-holdeth corn in the time of dearth having his Garners full pulleth upon himself deservedly the curses of the poor but they will pour out blessings abundantly upon the head of him that in compassion to them will let them have it for their mony Prov. 11. So he that by his place having power and means to succour those that are distressed and to free them from wrongs and oppressions will seasonably put forth himself and his power to do them right shall have many a blessing from their mouths and many a good wish from their hearts but many more bitter curses both from the mouth and heart by how much men are more sensible of discourtesies than of benefits and readier to curse than to bless if they find themselves neglected And the blessings and cursings of the poor are things not to be wholly disregarded Indeed the curse causless shall not come neither is the Magistrate to regard the curses of bad people so far as either to be deterred thereby from punishing them according to their desert or to think he shall fare ever the worse doing but his duty for such curses For such words are but wind and as Solomon saith elsewhere He that observeth the wind shall not sow so he that regardeth the speeches of vain persons shall never do his duty as he ought to do In such cases that of David must be their meditation and comfort Though they curse yet bless thou And as there is little terrour in the causless curses so there is as little comfort in the causless blessings of vain evil Men. But yet where there is cause given although he cannot be excused from sin that curseth for we ought to bless and to pray for not to curse even those that wrong us and persecute us yet vae homini withal woe to the