the Spirit of Christ. For the First Eph. 6. 12. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities against powers against the rulers of the darkness of this world against spiritual wickedness in high places Beloved The great work of Salvation is not then accomplished when we have through the power of God and the strength of Jesus Christ overcome the Lusts of the Body as Drunkenness Gluttony Whoredom and the like But we shall find a new task the taming of our proud Spirit For after our first conquest I mean the overcoming the Lusts of the Body then pride and haughtiness and contempt of our Neighbour the thinking of our selves some-body rigour and unmercifulness to our sinful Brother the magnifying of our selves in some conceited Opinions searching out and confidently concluding concerning the secrets of God censuring and contemning all men that are not of the same conceit in Divine Speculations with our selves These and many such like evil delusions the Devil will sow in our Hearts The Devil himself is neither Whoremaster nor Drunkard nor Glutton But he is Proud but he is Contemptuous but he is Hypocritical but he is a Blood-sucker a Murderer from the beginning full of self-love full of self-admiration full of cruelty under pretence of Religion full of deceit and injustice under pretence of Truth and maintenance of Godliness full of ambition and desire of rule even over the Souls and Consciences of men full of self-applause and arrogancy and strutting in his own supposed knowledge and power But true denyal of our selves and unfeigned deep humility a sensible apprehension of our nothingness as I may so say or real detestable vileness will cause such dreadful agonies in our Souls that no tongue can express nor heart conceive that hath not had experience of those bitter Sufferings With so great pain and torment are we torn and riven from our spiritual wickedness disjointed and dislimb'd as it were from our head that Prince of Pride and Father of Disobedience the Devil But I will now shew you the other kind of suffering which is the suffering in Spirit by reason of other mens wickedness When we are united to God and Christ in the union of Spirit then do those things that are contrary to the Spirit of God as all manner of sin trouble our Spirit Envious or cruel acts drunkenness deceit pride rigour fierceness folly and whatsoever else is sinful or vain our Spirit being enlivened by the Spirit of God is grieved and vext at these wickednesses or vanities Then we plainly see how Christ is cut and lash'd and hew'd and stab'd with our wicked deeds how he is crucified afresh as the Apostle speaketh Here may the true Church of God the Holy Ierusalem take up fitly that Lamentation in Ieremy Is it nothing to you all ye that pass by Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow See how the Prophet David was affected with the wickedness of men Psal. 119. Mine eyes gush out with water because men keep not thy law I beheld the transgressours and was grieved because men keep not thy word So Lot was tormented at the wickedness of Sodom 2 Pet. 2. 7. And delivered just Lot vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked For that righteous man dwelling among them in seeing and hearing vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their unlawful deeds So God complains in the Spirit of his Prophet Amos. Behold I am pressed under you as a cart is pressed that is full of sheaves Amos 2. 13. And surely there is good Reason it should be so a sure Necessity For Fire is not more contrary to Water nor Light to Darkness nor any enmity in Nature or among men so strong as that betwixt the Spirit of God and the Spirit of the Devil that is in evil wicked men according to which they live and act So then when that detestable ugliness flowes out in their words or actions it must needs offend the Children of God God being of pure eyes and not abiding to behold wickedness Hence are they driven into consuming zeal or deep inexpressible grief And this is the second kind of suffering in Spirit But Beloved take this in by the way That he that can be angry at other mens faults and not much more angry at his own is a dissembler an Hypocrite Herein let every man examine himself But he that is so stupid that he is not moved at all with the wickedness of others or of himself is perfectly dead in Sin and is in the full power of Satan and is covered with Eternal Death and Darkness THIS Second Doctrine is now sufficiently plain That they that would be Heirs of the Kingdom of Christ must suffer with Christ. I will again here stir you up to an examination and tryal of your Spiritual state whether you have any interest in the Heavenly Inheritance The Sign and infallible Seal is our suffering with Christ. But not any suffering For the fuffering in Estate if we escape it yet may we be inheritors of Heaven But to be evil spoken of for Christ is harder to efcape yet admit we escape that too we may for all that be secure of our Eternal Inheritance Nor have all that are now with God been whip'd and tortur'd and put to death or martyrdom But yet we ought to be so minded that we had rather endure all these things than depart from Christ. But all the other sufferings as abstinence from voluptuousness from the delights of the flesh from priding our selves in any thing that God hath bestowed upon us a suppressing our anger abstaining from the sweetness of revenge denying of the ever-craving appetite of covetousness keeping our tongues from the delight of defamation and evil reports our ears from hearing evil of our Neighbour These be necessary All which endeavours will surely afflict and vex the corrupt Natural Spirit of a man But he that will not undergo this suffering believe it Beloved he is none of Christs he hath neither part nor portion in the Kingdom of Christ and of God But he that doth though with great agony of Soul and affliction of Mind fight against all this corruption of Flesh and Spirit He may bless God for his good condition and with good reason lay hold of the hope of Heaven They that are troubled in Spirit for the wickedness of men the prophanation of Gods name and any manner of sin and iniquity these men may conclude that they have the Spirit of God and consequently that they are the Sons of God And if sons then heirs heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ If so be that we suffer with him Which our own Spirit together with Gods Spirit doth testifie to us that we do and that we shall be certainly glorified with him Let every man herein examine himself that he may find a true ground of his hope of Eternal Salvation For none shall be saved but they that are
signifie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What a dismal darkness will there be then For the blind then leading the blind both will fall into the Infernal Pit THE meaning of the Text I conceive is now abundantly plain and that the scope and end of our Saviours uttering this Parable to his Disciples was to stir them up to a constant and earnest endeavour of utterly disentangling themselves from all the attractions of the relish of the Flesh or Spirit of the World and of joyning themselves entirely and cordially with and of dwelling wholly in the relish sense and life of the Spirit of God or of that Divine Spirit whose suggestions are no dictates of self-love or partial interest but the substantial concerns of the Kingdom of God and the good of the whole World For which he who has this Divine relish will not stick to lay down his Life if need require according to that endearing Example of our ever-blessed and adored Saviour Let it be therefore my task at this time to exhort you earnestly to endeavour after this great and indispensable attainment of this Single Eye this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Wisdom of the Spirit which this Parable of our Saviour points to and is indeed the proper Spirit of Christ concerning which S. Paul expresly declares He that hath not the Spirit of Christ is none of his Which ought to be a rousing Argument to awaken us into a due sense of so great a want For unless we regain this Single Eye we shall never see the right way to Heaven There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Iesus namely to such as walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Iesus hath freed me from the law of sin and of death For the relish of the flesh or carnal-mindedness is death But the relish of the spirit or spiritual-mindedness is life and peace But the carnal mind is enmity against God because it cannot submit it self to the law of God but is in perpetual opposition against it ever suggesting what is contrary to it Wherefore we must wholly withdraw our selves out of that Principle as we hope to attain to the glorious liberty of the Sons of God And assuredly whosoever has that Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Iesus it will free him and rid him from the power of all the urgings suggestions or subtil insinuations of that Law of the sinful flesh of self-love and self-interest Though he may feel these self-savouring suggestions and the more clearly discern them to be such by the perspicuity of the Single Eye the Spirit of Christ yet he is so freed from their power that he will never act according to them but constantly act according to the relish and suggestion of that pure Principle of the Spirit which has not the least tincture of self-love or carnal interest And there is a neceffity of perfectly clearing up at last into this Single-mindedness by reason of the war and enmity betwixt the Carnal Principle and this of the Spirit for without this there is no peace nor joy nor enjoyment in this Life nor in that which is to come The Law of the sinful life of the Flesh therefore is utterly to be abrogated nulled and annihilated and we are to judge and act in all things according to the discernments of that Single Eye or pure Principle of the Spirit of Christ. But I will rather confine the Arguments of my Exhortation to the Text and content my self with what it will afford namely the four Analogies I have produced and explained and so conclude 1. The light of the Body is the Eye What therefore the Eye is to the Body that is some vital and sensible leading Principle in the Soul to the Soul Is it not therefore of infinite consequence what this leading Principle is when it is of as much consequence to the Soul as the Eye is to the Body and the Soul of incomparably more worth than the Body What man would have the Eye of a Batt of an Owl or of a Mole for the guidance of his Body unless he were to have his abode under the Earth with the Mole or to venture abroad only in the Night with the Batt and Owl Every Animal is to have an Eye congenerous to its own Nature And therefore that Divine Animal which we call Man I mean the inward man the Soul is to have an Eye congenerous to hers she is to have this Single Spiritual Eye unless she will converse only with Brutes or Devils in their Kingdom of Darkness 2. Again The Single Eye makes the whole Body full of light that is it is a fit and faithful guide to it which way soever it goes And that is the law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Iesus to the Soul Which assuredly is the Law of Divine love which is not the love of a mans self or any particular or partial Interest but the hearty love of God and a mans Neighbour that is of all mankind when with a single heart he wishes them and is ready to do them all the good they are capable of and himself in a capacity to administer to them This is that pure and lovely Eye of the Soul indeed which fills her full of Celestial light and enrolls her in the Book of Life and of the Children of Light This is that Vnction from the Holy one even from the Father of Lights whereby we know all things appertaining to Life and Godliness and that Iesus that stupendious Pattern of this Divine Love is the Lord and Christ And that that man of sin that exalts himself above all that is called God and supports his Power Pride and Pomp with gross Imposture and barbarous Bloodshed is that notorious Antichrist he that has this Single Eye easily discerns this and can hardly forbear to suspect that they that do not see it are blind through the Spirit of the World or else drunk with the steames of that Cup of abominations and see double This Simple and Unself-interested Spirit of Love is that Anointing of which S. Iohn saith that if it abide in us we need not that any man teach us but the same Anointing will teach us of all things and is truth and is no lie It is very Truth substantial and essential without any shadow of vanity or imposture in it and such as will seal our hearts with an eternal adhesion to our ever-blessed Saviour as being the communication of his own Spirit to us and be evermore a safe guide to us in our passage thorough this present life He that loveth his brother abideth in the light and there is no occasion of stumbling in him Wherefore as we tender our safe conduct through the wilderness of this World through all the dangers and perils of so difficult a journey we must earnestly endeavour the recovering of this Single-mindedness this amiable Eye of the pure love
not with thy left hand that is thy natural false Spirit that will counsel for it self But let thy right hand act by it self that strong Arm of God the Spirit of Christ that the action may be wholly to God the evil principle of that wicked life of falseness nothing at all intermingling it self with it And thus this communication of good will be an Holocaust totally consecrated and consummated in the service of God alone But for the other two kinds Though the Christian Sacrifice hath not finem Sacrificantis the end of the Iewish Sacrificant yet hath it finem Sacrificii For so thanks is rendered to God for his goodness and further goodness obtained and future evils prevented as is manifest out of Scripture 2. The end of the Peace-offering was to procure the Blessing and Favour of God See now what the Wisdom of God teacheth us Prov. 11. The liberal person shall have plenty and he that watereth shall also have rain And in the Psalms He hath dispersed abroad and hath given to the poor His righteousness shall remain for ever his horn shall be exalted with honour Cornelius his Prayers and Alms how well were they rewarded with the service of Men and Angels and the descent of the Holy Ghost For as he was Fasting and Praying in his House one in the shape of a man in white clothing stood before him and said Cornelius Thy prayer is heard and thine alms had in remembrance in the sight of God So he directs him to send for S. Peter who came and in requital of his Alms fed him with the Bread of Life at whose Preaching the Spirit of Life the Holy Ghost fell upon all his Auditors amongst whom was Cornelius Thus we see how meet a Sacrifice this is pro beneficio accipiendo for the procuring a benefit from God And as fit it is pro accepto to manifest our thankfulness for favours received Freely you have received freely give saith our Saviour This is all the requital I desire all the thanks I expect 3. The last Sacrifice is a Sin-offering The reward of sin is death But mercifulness and doing good delivers from this Prov. 20. 2. The treasures of wickedness profit nothing but righteousness delivers from death That is The covetous hoarding of the wicked man or Riches wickedly and unlawfully heaped and scraped up together shall not profit in the conclusion But Righteousness that is bountifulness acts of Mercy For so the original will signifie the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is sometime turned 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an act of Mercy As also appears out of the Inscription of the Poor mans Box in the Iewes Temple which was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The chest of Iustice as we would Translate it following the first signification of the word but according to the signification of the word in that place the chest of Alms. This Righteousness Goodness of Mercifulness will deliver from Death That of our Saviour Christ is more plain and without exception Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy So whether we compare this Duty of communicating good with the general notion of a Sacrifice or with the kinds thereof we see correspondency enough it falls short in nothing of a Sacrifice under the Old Law but in not being a shadow which you might bear withal Though to say the truth it hath that in it too the outward act which I have intimated before But the inward principle it self whence those good acts flow nothing is greater than it nothing more divine nothing more sublime the Everlasting Life of Charity the Glory and Image of God the Beauty of Man the Lamp of Knowledge the Sun of Paradise the Seal of Eternity the Pledge and Crown of Everlasting Happiness NOW that I may not seem to have lost my time in inculcating this Truth so long let us see what useful Inferences will flow from the same First then If doing good be a Sacrifice let us remember that which R. Moses the AEgyptian conceives their Wise and Holy Law-giver to have bound them to Vt quisquis utilitatem aliquam ceperit ex re sanctificatâ pro praevaricatore habeatur c. Whosoever doth take to himself any profit out of Consecrated things as Oblations or Sacrifices or whatsoever is Consecrated to God he is a Transgressour and hath need of an Atonement to be made for him although he commits the act out of error Our doing good therefore to other men if we do it not simply in obedience to God and love of our Neighbour but in hope of requital by his friends or himself or out of desire of applause or vain glory or any other sinister respects it is a making use of a thing Consecrated a sharing with God in the Holocaust and makes our action sinful and unsavoury before God Wherefore vve are to endeavour to the utmost that vve be not guilty of this Sacrilege Secondly In omni Oblatione tuâ offeres sal Lev. 2. 13. All thy meat-offerings shalt thou season with salt neither shalt thou suffer the salt of the covenant of thy God to be lacking from thy meat-offering Vpon all thy oblations thou shalt offer salt See hovv this Precept is inculcated for offering of Salt with every Oblation and Sacrifice That Salt is an enblem of Wisdom and Discretion is so well known that I need not speak of it I will only name our Saviours words You are the salt of the earth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If the salt become foolish c. So that by Salt is understood Wisdom or Knowledge as it presently follows You are the light of the world So the seasoning our Christian Sacrifice of Bounty will prove nothing else but distributing our good things with discretion whether pertaining to Body or Mind Rebuke not a scorner for he will hate thee but rebuke a wise man and he will love thee saith Solomon And our blessed Saviour instill'd his words of Wisdom into his Disciples ears according as they were capable Iohn 16. 12. I have yet many things to say unto you but you cannot bear them now Howbeit when he is come which is the spirit of truth he will lead you into all truth As the Apostle 1 Cor. 2. The natural man receiveth not the things of the spirit of God And Chap. 3. 1. I could not speak unto you brethren as to spiritual men but as unto carnal I fed you with milk and not with meat for you were not able to bear it This is the discretion in imparting Spiritual Alms. Nor is every man a fit object of our Bounty as concerning things belonging to the Body If Strength and Health be joyned to their Poverty the best Charity is to set them to work Thirdly Leaven was not to be offered in Sacrifice So these Christian Oblations are to be offered in sincerity of heart without pride without hypocrisie Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees which is Hypocrisie And 1 Cor. 5. the Apostle makes
DISCOURSES ON Several Texts OF SCRIPTURE BY The late Pious and Learned HENRY MORE D. D. LONDON Printed by I. R. and are to be Sold by Brabazon Aylmer at the Three Pigeons against the Royal Exchange in Cornhil 1692. THE PREFACE I Shall not bespeak the acceptance of these Papers by any large Encomium either of them or of the Author This would detain the Reader too long from the Benefit of them and indeed to little or no purpose For the Discourses will sufficiently speak for themselves without the artifice of any Commendatory Preface And as for the Author His Name is so well known and deservedly admired in the World upon the account of the many Elaborate Treatises which he Published in his Life-time that these his Posthumous Pieces may find a welcome Entertainment without any other Invitation The business therefore of this Preface is only to acquaint the Reader with some things which concern this Edition and this I shall do very briefly in the following Particulars 1. The First and chief thing which the Reader is to be acquainted with is the Authenticness of these Writings they being all of them Printed by the Authors own Copies except Discourse XII th and XIII th which were with some of the other transcribed from the Originals in the Authors Life-time by one whose Faithfulness and Exactness is evident in the rest and is not in the least to be doubted of in these 2. The next thing which I should tell the Reader is by whom these Papers were committed to my care and management in order to make them Publick But I am forbidden to name him and therefore I shall be silent as to this particular 3. But here it may not be unfit to tell the Reader in general That I have bestowed upon them all the care and pains which the shortness of time determined for the preparing of them for the Press would admit of And this is sufficient to satisfie any ingenuous Person Whereas to speak of all the toil and difficulties which I met with therein would be too tedious an exercise of the Readers Patience and piece of Vanity as burdensome to my self as to others 4. And Lastly As for any Defects therein or for the Errors which have escaped the Press they are such as neither the Authors Name will suffer by reason of them nor the Papers be less acceptable to a Candid and well-disposed Reader Thus much I thought fit to advertise the Reader of here concerning this Edition As for the Discourses themselves I shall leave it wholly to Him to observe the Stile and Matter of them Only this I would suggest That they are such as were prepared for no mean Auditory some of them being University-Sermons and the rest College-Exercises I will conclude this Preface with a short Prayer Which I wish the Reader may as seriously and devoutly put up as the Pious Author did before one of the following Discourses O Lord our God the Fountain of Light and the Well-spring of all holy Wisdom and Knowledge without whose aid our search after thee and thy ways is but tedious error and dangerous wandering from thee Assist us mercifully in our endeavours after thee Open our eyes that we may see the wonders of thy Law Sanctifie our hearts unto obedience that we may unfeignedly love thee and worthily magnifie the holy Name through Iesus Christ our Lord. Amen London Nov. 1. 1692. John Worthington THE TEXTS OF THE Following Discourses DISCOURSE I. 1 PET. II. 11. Dearly beloved I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul. p. 1. DISCOURSE II. PSAL. LXXXIV 7. They go from strength to strength every one of them appeareth before God in Sion p. 31 DISCOURSE III. MAT. VI. 22 23. The light of the Body is the Eye if therefore thine Eye be single thy whole Body shall be full of light But if thine Eye be evil thy whole Body shall be full of darkness If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness how great is that darkness p. 60. DISCOURSE IV. PROV I. 7. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom p. 85. DISCOURSE V. JOHN IV. 31 32 33 34. In the mean time his disciples prayed him saying Master eat But he said unto them I have meat to eat that you know not of Therefore said the disciples one to another Hath any man brought him ought to eat Iesus saith unto them My meat is to do the will of him that sent me and to finish his work p. 119. DISCOURSE VI. JAM I. 22. Be ye Doers of the Word and not Hearers only deceiving your own selves p. 151. DISCOURSE VII PROV XV. 15. All the dayes of the afflicted are evil but a good conscience is a continual feast p. 191. DISCOURSE VIII PSAL. XVII 15. As for me I will behold thy face in righteousness I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness p. 221. DISCOURSE IX ROM VIII 17. And if children then heirs heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ if so be that we suffer with him that we may be also glorified with him p. 251. DISCOURSE X. JAM I. 27. Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep himself unspotted from the world p. 282. DISCOURSE XI HEB. XIII 16. To do good and communicate forget not for with such sacrifices God is well pleased p. 314. DISCOURSE XII GAL. VI. 14 15 16. But God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Iesus Christ by whom the world is crucified unto me and I unto the world For in Christ Iesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but a new creature And as many as walk according to this rule peace be on them and mercy and upon the Israel of God p. 369. DISCOURSE XIII 1 PET. I. 22 23. Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently Being born again not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible by the word of God which liveth and abideth for ever p. 394. DISCOURSE XIV PSAL. CVI. 28. They joined themselves also unto Baal-Peor and ate the sacrifices of the dead p. 419. DISCOURSE XV. COL III. 1. If ye then be risen with Christ seek those things which are above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God p. 435. Appendix to Discourse XIII p. 458. IMPRIMATUR Lambhith Nov. 2. 1692. Ra. Barker R mo in Christo Patri ac D no D no Johanni Archiepiscopo Cant. a Sacris Dom. DISCOURSES ON Several Texts OF SCRIPTURE DISCOURSE I. 1 PET. II. 11. Dearly beloved I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul. THE Text is an Exhortation to abstinence from the Lusts of the Flesh Which Duty the Apostle endeavours to fix upon the Spirits of
Shield of Faith in the power of God whereby we are enabled to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked And we must take the Helmet of Hope and sure expectation of Everlasting Life which will keep us from being easily knock'd down to the Earth by the fiercest Assaults of our Adversaries And lastly we must take to us the Sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God whereby we may divide betwixt Good and Evil and admit the one and reject the other And being thus appointed we must pray alwaies with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit watching thereunto with all perseverance And especially to watch in such a sense as this as to be extremely shy and careful how we admit any thing under the colour or upon the rellish of Animal pleasure but rather eo nomine to decline it Which is an impregnable Bulwark against the assaults of the Flesh and such as will ever defeat them If we do these things we shall never fall let the assaults of the Fleshly Lusts be as violent as they will 3. But if we be overcome let us now see what a lamentable spoil they will make of us and how cruelly and tyrannically they will use us For First They will rob us of whatever is precious that we have They will take down and carry away with them that chearful and delightful furniture of the Soul Peace and Tranquillity of mind For the mind of man is not of so base an Original as to enjoy it self in things so much below it self as are the Fleshly Lusts Whence it must needs be that she will be ever and anon disturbed with loathings and regrets of Conscience amidst her so base condition and practices and instead of that steady peace and chearfulness of Spirit which are enjoyed in our adherence to Holiness and Vertue be exposed to many horrours and distractions and confusions of thoughts and an ungrateful sense of inward shame and reproach which accompanies such unworthy actions Secondly They will disarm the Soul of that honest activity and diligence which we ought to have in our Affairs and make us more uncareful and more unable to pursue and manage our Business with that discretion and faithfulness we ought to do to the scandal of the World as well as to our own detriment This Lucretius notes of that notorious kind of Fleshly Lusts the being addicted to Women Languent officia atque aegrotat fama vacillans But takes place also in Gluttony in Drunkenness and whatever other pleasure has once overcome the Soul and subdued her to it self Thirdly These Fleshly Lusts rob a man of the safe use of his Reason They will make it wonderfully prevaricate in the behalf of themselves and commit such Paralogisms as the Soul cannot but be ashamed of so soon as she has got out of the reach of their power And they will in the conclusion so weaken the Faculties of the Mind that they shall very fondly dote in their Verdicts even touching such things as the Fleshly Lusts themselves are unconcerned in For these Lusts bereaving the Mind of her purity must needs dim and obscure her Faculties more or less in all uses of them where there is ordinarily any difference of Sentiments amongst men Fourthly and lastly These Lusts deprive us of the Life and Influence of the Divine Spirit and most dismally damp and dead the Power of Faith and Sense of Religion in the Soul which is of more consequence than even Reason it self which proves very weak in the assurance of these things when the sagacity of a better Life is extinguished or smothered by the soul impurities of the Lusts of the Flesh. But the Soul being once purged from these ipso facto unites with the Spirit of God and by an Holy and Divine Instinct is in a proneness and readiness to believe such things as God is truly said to have done or to intend to do concerning the sons of men by vertue of her union with the Divine Spirit or that Eternal Mind that immutably contains the whole Counsel of God touching things past present and to come This miserable spoil do the Fleshly Lusts make of the poor Soul when they overcome her and not only so but they use her cruelly to boot That they put out her Eyes I have already intimated in that I noted that they bereave her both of Faith and Reason And that they pluck all her Feathers out of her Wings it is as manifest since our being captivated with Fleshly Lusts keeps down the Soul and hinders all Holy and Heavenly Aspires and extinguishes the pure Flames of Devotion Nor are they content with this but they also crucifie and nail the captive Soul to this Earthly Body as Plato complains 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All Pleasure and Grief nails saith he the Soul to the Body Nor is it impertinent to name enormous Grief amongst the Lusts of the Flesh since no Grief is enormous but out of the enormity of Self-love or inordinate love of this Corporeal Personality of ours which if we could be sufficiently unconcerned for and love and esteem nothing but the Almighty Lord of Heaven and Earth and those Divine Laws and Holy Sentiments he has implanted in our Souls Enormity of Grief would not be able to seize upon us Nor do they only thus crucifie and kill that higher and Diviner Life of the Soul but by the exorbitant excitations of the contrary Life into several enormous modes and forms metamorphose men into so many abhorred Monsters whom they keep in the chains of this base servility and captivity and then let them loose upon the most villainous outrages or the basest and most contemptible actions imaginable Wrath and Revenge like a Bear robb'd of her Whelps makes them tear apieces and destroy all they meet with in their way Ambition and Avarice like an Evening-Wolf makes them fall upon the Sheepfolds and suck the blood of innocent Lambs to satisfie their thirst Superstition and false Zeal turnes them into such Furies or Devils that they destroy whole Cities and Countries with Fire and Sword out of pride and impatience that others do not submit to their Wisdom and give themselves up to their Guidance who yet have no Light but those Infernal Torches of an ignorant and bitter Zeal devoid of all Christian Charity which they could light no where but from the Flames of Hell nor conduct a Soul by this Light any whither but to the place of those Infernal Flames The sting of Lust transforms them into such Satyrs and Baboons that they fly upon all promiscuously not sparing their own Mothers Sisters nor Daughters Gluttony and Drunkenness as Circe did Vlysses his Companions changes their shapes into foul dirty Swine To say nothing of those ugly indecorums of Effeminacy that brings some into as base a Servility as Omphale did Hercules who made him put off his Lyons-Skin and sit amongst her Maids at the Distaff and Spindle Not to add what one would
affirming that some things are so vile and wicked that a man ought rather 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to undergoe death it self with the most grievons circumstances thereof than submit to the doing of them And is there any thing more base and vile than for a man knowingly and wittingly for the fear or favour of men to sin against his Maker and gracious Redeemer Which if he can do in any case how can he be secure but that he will do it in all cases where his Carnal Interest is highly concerned and that he may not at last be brought off even to worship the Devil himself For they whose guidance is by this Evil Eye this mixt Principle that worship God conditionally if it be safe if it be profitable if it be plausible when these conditions fail they are naturally left in the lurch and may easily apostatize to the grossest practises imaginable He that lives in this Principle it is impossible but that he must walk in dark and slippery places and can have no fast hold at all on Truth and Righteousness And therefore a man is never to rest till his Soul clear up into such a Simple principle of life that he is conscious to himself that neither security of his Person nor Fortunes nor the good opinion or applause of men nor any sinister respects or conditions whatsoever move him to do what he does but the plain and hearty love of the Truth and the sense of his indispensable duty to his gracious Maker and Redeemer according to which he will act and for which he will suffer though he have no witness of either but God and his own Conscience This is to be a true Single-eyed Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile But whatever is on this side of it is besmeared and smutted with rottenness and Hypocrisie 4. Fourthly and Lastly If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 how great is that darkness Indeed it will puzzle a man to say how great it is It is even infinite for space and so it will be for time if we be not timely cured of this blindness A man whose Eye is pure and entire in a dark Dungeon indeed he sees nothing and in a Winter-night cannot so much as discern his own hand but bring a Candle into the Dungeon or let but Day-light return he discerns all Objects very well for the light in him is not darkness that is he is not blind But travel with a blind man from Sun to Sun nay from one Vortex to another so that every Star may be as a Sun to him yet in this infinite and endless Journey he is still in the dark and discerns nothing Even so it is with him that has the Evil Eye in the Mystical Sense he that is Spiritually blind that instead of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is under the guidance of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Carnal mind he is every where in the dark there is nothing sincere in all his actions he can do no Duty as he ought neither to God nor Man but not sensible of any more enlarged Principle or Prospect hugs himself every where and seeks nothing ultimately but the satisfaction of his own Carnal Will and Pleasure Carry him from one Object to another from one Duty to another he is so blind that he will not fail of doing all things sordidly and basely in every place He may indeed endeavour to flatter God Almighty and crouch to him but he cannot sincerely worship him He may fear his Prince but not affectionately honour him and heartily wish him well as the Vicegerent of God He may be tickled with popularity and yet set as little by the common good and welfare of the people as he does by his meanest Cattle that he will not stick to kill and flea or sell away for his own advantage And lastly he may caress his Friend and Neighbour but it will be ever with an eye to Himself that he may lay the seeds of some Worldly advantage But if the service of these stand in any considerable competition with his own Interest he cannot fail having no better Principle but to betray both his God his Religion his Prince his Country and his Friend to serve himself These are his acts of darkness his abode in which will make him so blind that in the conclusion he will betray himself also to that everlasting darkness wherein is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth for evermore For to be carnally-minded is death but to be spiritually-minded is life and peace These short Intimations from our Saviours Parable methinks should be sufficient to well-disposed minds to quicken their speed towards this great and necessary attainment of that Single Eye of the Spirit that we may live according to that one simple Principle of the Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Iesus casting out the spirit of the World that there may be no cross vibrations or Paralytical motions in our Soul but that our whole man may be throughly actuated by the Spirit of God we being born to this Divine State even to be members of God and Christ to whom till we be united we are in an unnatural diluxation from our Body and being devoid of this Spirit though we cannot but depend of him yet we hang off from him as dead or Paralytical members of which the Spirit of Life has left its due hold which must be to every discerning Eye a sad and calamitous Spectacle God of his infinite Mercy amend it in us all DISCOURSE IV. PROV i. 7. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Philosopher in his Metaphysicks And indeed most men are so eager and vehement in the pursuit of Knowledge that they either afford not themselves time enough to consider and deliberate concerning the most efficacious means for obtaining it or have not the patience to use the means though they be well perswaded of it But in the heat of their pursuit make a God of their own industry and take it for the shortest cut to be their own carvers Not Line upon Line but Tractate upon Tractate Volume upon Volume Ossa upon Olympus Plainly according to the attempts of that sottish and boisterous generation of Giants thinking to hale away captive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 her that assists God on his Glorious Throne in Heaven by Spider-web fetters spun and twisted out of the corrupt apprehensions of Earthly-minded men Those did not the Lord choose neither gave he the way of Knowledge unto them But they were destroy'd because they had no Wisdom and perished through their own foolishness Who hath gone up to Heaven and taken her and brought her down from the clouds Who hath gone over the Sea and found her and will bring her for pure Gold No man knoweth her way nor thinketh on her path What then Is it impossible to attain unto her No. Her
the wilderness to tremble the Lord maketh the wilderness of Kadesh to tremble The voice of the Lord maketh the hinds to bring forth young and unbareth the thick bushes Every plant that my Heavenly Father hath not planted saith our Saviour shall be rooted out And indeed this was the end of his coming utterly to eradicate what so is evil And till he have his work in mans heart there be not a few ill Plants rather a Wilderness a Wood thick set with Trees not penetrable by any Star nothing capable of the light of Heaven But by the awful Voice of God the Hinds those fearful and timorous Creatures they bring forth the thick and shadowing Bushes are unbared And what follows In his Temple doth every man speak of his glory Now what is that Glory of God but the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the glorious eradiation of the Father of Lights the Wisdom of God and the Power of God And the Hinds that is those that fear and tremble who they are and what they bring forth and how presently the thick Bushes are unbared so that they that were in darkness see a marvellous light I leave to any man to judge that is not as fraid of a Spiritual sense as of a Night-spirit But if they will in this Psalm so full of life and vigour have all Body and no Soul How shall we expound the next Verse The Lord sitteth upon the water-floods and shall sit King for ever What will you turn the God of Heaven and Earth to some Triton or Water-Nymph Or the great Pastour of Israel who feeds the Souls of his people like a Flock will you have him Proteus-like to feed Sea-monsters It is true that all things according to their several degrees have their dependance and expectancy from God Yet so narrow and straitend sense as the bare letter sutes not here I think with the Majesty and Divinity of the Spirit of David or rather the Spirit of God in David The Summe is this Fear and Honour goes before and the Light of God follows after 4. I will only add this Fourth Proof or Illustration more and so go on 1 Kings 19. And the Lord said unto Elias Go forth and stand upon the mount before the Lord. And behold the Lord passed by and a great and strong wind rent the mountains and brake in pieces the rocks before the Lord but the Lord was not in the wind and after the wind came an earthquake but the Lord was not in the earthquake and after the earthquake fire but the Lord was not in the fire and after the fire a still small voice the voice of him that spake as never man spake But I would not have any mistaken as if the Fear of God which is said to be the Beginning of Wisdom were but an hours amazement or at most but a wonder of nine dayes Tam de repente Which Errour will easily be wiped out of their phansie if they observe but the description of the Fear of God in Holy Scripture The Fear of the Lord is to hate evil as pride and arrogancy and the evil way Now that which a man truly hates he will do the utmost of his endeavour to destroy or else to sever himself from it and decline it So the Prophet David in Psal. 34. where he professeth the teaching of the Fear of the Lord Eschew evil and do good saith he So that a lazy inert sluggish hatred is not sufficient See how that Victorious King uses his enemies in Psal. 18. I have pursued mine enemies and taken them and have not returned again till I had consumed them I have wounded them that they are not able to rise they are fallen under my feet I did beat them small as the dust before the wind I did tread them flat as the clay in the streets Now a mans enemies are they of his own Houshold Corruption residing in a mans own breast which he will never leave fighting against till he have the victory if he truly hate them which he will truly hate if he unfeignedly fear God So that the Fear of God is the victory over Corruption Which victory over Corruption maketh us capable of the Divine Nature as S. Peter speaks which Divine Nature is nothing else but Christ the Wisdom of God Wherefore whosoever would attain unto Wisdom the way is laid open the Old way known to those Antients of Renown Trismegist long since could point it out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Be Godly my Son for he that is Godly philosophizeth in the highest degree or most efficacious manner Which Sentence of Trismegist puts me in mind of the Septuagints Paraphrastical variation of the Text For beside 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they add 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In which variation that which is most remarkable is the substitution of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sense for Wisdom No man I believe is so devoid of Reason as to think the Prerogative of the Godly to be to have a more exquisite sense than others Though too too many gape after as a reward of obedience that which proves too oft the fewel of Sensuality sensible things What 's then meant by Sense There is a swimmering superficial Knowledge a light phantastical impression or abortive imagination engendered of aery words which many times neither the hearer nor speaker rightly understand false phantasms elicited out of misunderstood writings notional conjectures vain and temerarious efformations of that which we have not yet attained to so unlike the thing we would have it that if we did not do as the old bungling Painters did in their uuskilfully scralled pieces write on it Knowledge it would be hard to find what to call it But this false-nam'd Knowledge the Fear of God doth not begin but consume As clear Light makes all those shadows and resemblances to vanish that by the Opticks skill had been convey'd into a dark close room But the Fear of God is the beginning of Sense Which is to be understood according to that in S. Iohns Epistle That which was from the beginning which we have heard which we have seen with our eyes which we have looked upon and our hands have handled of the word of life this declare we unto you This is true Science quieting and setling the moveable mind This is the right 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even according to Aristotles Etymon which begets 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a rest and steddy standing in the Soul and therefore is not to be found in Cains Progeny nor to be light upon in all the Land of Nod. AND thus much of the first part of my Discourse That the Fear of God is the Beginning of Wisdom I will now enter upon the Reasons Why this is the only way that God hath pointed out for the attaining to Wisdom 1. One Reason may be the Falseness of mans Spirit The Heart is deceitful above all things So that God will not trust it with
abstain from fleshly and bodily Desires from their accomplishment I mean has some hidden Contentment within undiscover'd to the World The Heart knoweth his own bitterness and a stranger doth not intermeddle with his joy Our Saviour Christ himself could not with such ease have slighted the cravings of Nature for He was a man like to us in all things Sin only excepted and disregarded his seasonable Sustenance had it not been so as he professes it was in his Answer to his Disciples I have meat to eat you know not of AND thus much of the Occasion and Proposal of the Parable I come now to the double Consequent thereof viz. First The Disciples misapprehension or false collection Hath any man brought him to eat Secondly Our Saviours true interpretation of the Parable My meat is to do the will of him that sent me c. Hath any man brought him to eat It was obvious to think so I confess but not at all necessary 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Has any man The Ravens fed Elijah the Tisbite by the Brook Cherith which is before Iordan They brought him bread and flesh in the morning and bread and flesh in the evening 1 Kings 17. 6. And not the Fowls of the Air only but the winged Host of Heaven might have been employed for this purpose They owe more than this to the Son of God But the mistake was not so much in the manner of the conveyance of this Meat as in the nature of the Meat it self 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Meats for the belly and the belly for meats but God will destroy both it and them He breaks and weakens that strong influence they have upon the minds of men that Circean Magick that metamorphozes the Souls of men into meer Beasts and changes their Understandings By the power of These the Disciples themselves seem stupid and are at a loss when their great Teacher utters himself in Heavenly Parables I have meat to eat you know not of For the unfolding of this dark Riddle They look no higher than a Sun-dyal or at farthest on the Sun and read there past Twelve and without any great subtilty can easily collect that it is Dinner-time which now compar'd with their lately bought Provision in the Cities of Samaria and the savoury suggestions of their own Stomachs their thoughts are circumscribed within the margins of a Platter they have animam in patinis as the Proverb goes and are not at leasure to think of any thing higher than Bodily Food Has any man brought him to eat I will observe two things from this passage and so leave it First The slowness of the Earthly Mind to apprehend Spiritual Mysteries There be two notable Instances of it One in those two Disciples that went to Emaus to whom Christ appeared and part of whose discourse was Luke 24. Concerning Iesus of Nazareth a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people And how the Chief Priests and their Rulers delivered him to be condemned to death and have crucified him But they trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel viz. from the Roman yoke according to that meer Terrene apprehension the Iewes it should seem then had and at this time have concerning the Messias making him a Temporal Prince and expecting a Temporal Happiness from him The other Instance is Iohn 6. 51 52. I am the living bread that came down from Heaven If any man eat of this bread he shall live for ever and the bread that I will give is my flesh which I will give for the life of the world The Iews therefore strove amongst themselves saying How can this man give us his flesh to eat But the words our Saviour Christ here speaks are as he himself professes they are spirit and they are life and therefore Spiritually to be discerned and not by Carnal Eyes The other point that I would observe is the Vneffectualness of our Saviours presence according to the Flesh. If his Spirit had been in them as his Body was with them I make no question but their Minds had been so Heavenly disposed that our Saviours Speeches would not have proved such AEnigma's unto them It is true the very touch of Christs Garments healed the Bodies of the Sick sometime but nothing under his Spirit is effectual for recuring the Soul It is the Spirit that quickeneth the flesh profiteth nothing Ioh. 6. 63. I have many things to say unto you but you cannot bear them now Howbeit when the Spirit of Truth is come he will guide you into all truth Iohn 16. 12 13. Our Saviours Bodily presence could not convey those Divine Truths unto his Disciples that an inward principle of life when they were partakers thereof would convey to them And therefore he prefers the mission of the Holy Ghost before his own Bodily conversing with them at the 7th Verse of that Chapter I tell you the truth it is expedient for you that I go away for if I go not away the Comforter will not come unto you But if I depart I will send him unto you And this was S. Pauls pious boast 2. Cor. 5. 16 17. Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh yea though we have known Christ after the flesh yet now henceforth know we him no more Therefore if any man be in Christ he is a new creature viz. if he be in Christ not after the Flesh but be regenerate of the Spirit I HAST on now to the last part of the Text our Saviours own Solution of this Parable proposed by him to his Disciples and by them misunderstood Therefore said the disciples one to another Hath any man brought him to eat There 's the Misinterpretation Iesus saith unto them My meat is to do the will of him that sent me and to finish his work There 's our Saviours explication of his own mind The great Truth and Mystery not inferiour to any Mystery contained in this interpretation is this That the will of God is the food of the Soul This I conceive to be plainly exhibited to us in this Text. For the Divinity of Christ it cannot be said to feed of any thing it is self-sufficient and immutable according to those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Mankind has of God Such Spiritual food as the will of God cannot belong to the Body for those Bodies grow fat that have no relish thereof It remains therefore the Soul of Christ was that which was fed with the will of God And his Soul and ours are ejusdem speciei Christ being utterly like us in all things Sin only excepted Wherefore I conclude this Doctrine The will of God is the food of mans Soul I mean of Regenerate man I know the Carnal appetite will pronounce it a very slight and slender Sallet But I will answer that Objection in short The natural man is uncapable of the things of the Spirit of God 1. Cor. 2. 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
conceive not that the Spirit of God writes in Lawyers lines a little in a great deal but a great deal in a little I could travel further in this seeming Digression upon the Apostles words and yet bring all home at the last but I will rather pull in the reins and put on strait to the place I left If then without Hearing at least in some sense or other no Faith without Faith no Calling upon God without Calling upon God no Salvation without Salvation from the Old Man and his deceitful Iust no Regeneration then surely it is very requisite that we give heed to the Word and hearken to it and dispose our selves aright for the receiving of it as the necessary Seed for our New Birth and Holy Regeneration According to this Analogy of calling the Word Seed the Auditors or Disciples of them that teach the Word are called Children as begotten of their Spiritual Parents by the effusion of this Seed of the Word So amongst the Hebrews 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Sons of the wise men are as much as the Disciples or those that hear and are instructed of the wise men and so filii Prophetarum And accordingly S. Paul Gal. 4. 19. My little children of whom I travel in birth again till Christ be formed in you Ep. to Philemon ver 10. I beseech thee for Onesimus whom I have begotten in my bonds But we commonly take this expression to be metaphorical and the truth of every thing we ground in Sense and make account there is no generation but of Natural Bodies which we may touch and see making thus the visible World the idea and paradigm of better Essences and like Epicureans or Saducees we make nothing of invisibles or at least not conceiving aright of them set them in the scale of Truth at least a staff lower But if we could conceive that the spirit or life of every thing is the thing and that we look upon to be but the tabernacle or husk of it or any wise the vehicle or receptacle of it and not the thing it self We might very easily conceive that this Regeneration is as true and real generation as is in visible Nature and there is as it were rather a succession of a new Lord in this outward fabrick of our Bodies than the old new-clad with superficial accidentary habits Can the fig-tree my brethren bring forth olives either a vine figs So can no fountain make salt water and sweet So new actions in transient evolution must have a new centre or bottom of Essence which is the heart of life which is the being of every living creature Now the evolved life of man consists in this in knowledge or apprehension of things and a lively sympathy and antipathy with them whereby he doth either desire or abhor from them And if all the knowledge of these things which he now is perswaded of together with desire and abhorrency sympathy and antipathy fear or hope of future matters the memory of things past the sense of things present were utterly taken from him where would he be Or how would he feel out himself or find out himself This would be but turning man to destruction 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They would thus become a sleep a sleep that they sleep that descend into the chambers of darkness and whom God hath covered in the grave And in some sence those words of Iob are excellent O that thou wouldst hide me in the grave and keep me secret till thy wrath were past and wouldst give me time and remember me Thou shalt call me I shall answer thee thou lovest the work of thine own hands When this death is perfected in which there is no life but only a sense that we are utterly dead to all things then God makes a new man contrary to that of the Devils framing and inspires a new Life and a new Breath and loves this work of his own hands Thou turnest man to destruction again thou sayest return ye sons of men So then if this be destruction and death then must a new sense and apprehension of things new sympathy and antipathy new embracing and abhorrency be a new life a new generation a new creature Therefore if any man be in Christ he is a new creature Old things are passed away behold all things are become new Here is plainly a new species to speak in the Language of Philosophy For to distinguish species by outward figure and colour befits Children rather and Painters than Men of Understanding and true Philosophers The true and real inward difference betwixt a Stone Plant Brute and Man is that the second exceeds the first by the spirit of Vegetation the third the second by Sensation and the fourth the third by Reason And that a Regenerate man differs intrinsecally from a Natural man is that his sympathy sense and knowledge is in the life of the Spirit of God and the others in the spirit of the world 1 Cor. 2. So then the life of evolution or transient action in our Souls being utterly other from the Natural mans surely the original or centre of life is now quite another And here is generation of life ab intimo as deep as understanding can conceive of or apprehension penetrate to If then this Seed of the Word be of such efficacy that it beget a man into a new species even into the beautiful Image of Christ and that hereby we be linked into such Noble Kindred as to have to our Fathers such as are the Sons of God by Regeneration being born of God first themselves and so begetting Children in Christ. Otherwise they fling but Seed as Gardeners and Husbandmen do and that that grows is nothing like him that casts it Moreover we our selves being able after full age in the strength of Christ to propagate the lovely Image of the Life of God surely it should be a sufficient incitement to receive the Word with as much eagerness as the dry womb of the Earth doth the refreshing Rain after a long drought 3. But as the Word is Seed to beget so it hinders not but that it may be nourishment for the conservation and increase of that which is brought forth 1 Pet. 2. 2. As new born babes desire the sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby 1 Cor. 3. I could not speak unto you brethren as unto spiritual but as unto carnal even as unto babes in Christ I gave you milk to drink and not meat for you were not yet able to bear it There 's Milk and Meat Iohn 6. And Iesus said unto them I am the bread of life he that cometh to me shall never hunger and he that believeth in me shall never thirst There 's Bread and Drink But this was such Bread as the Pharisees ill Stomachs could not digest neither as yet can they Is not this Iesus the son of Ioseph whose father and mother we know How then saith he I came down from Heaven
of mind and Disquietness And this very latter disposition is good too but not alwayes that is when it is accompanied with a Iudas-like despair otherwise it is good as wholsome Physick not as a pleasant Banquet But it is seldom or never known that the Heart was ever established without the fore-going of this disquietness of mind For mans Natural Inclinations lead him astray and Childhood and Youth betray him unto vanity So that man being lost thus in his Natural blindness when Christ begins to open his eyes by his Truth and he is convicted of his wicked errours what can come of it but sorrow Nay but being thus in some good measure enlightened afterward to have rebelled against this measure of light or at least through weakness or rather the love of sin and neglectful yielding to the Devils assaults to fall into the same filth he was warned of before surely this must needs breed great distraction and confusion of Spirit And so long will this be as that Holy Light keeps in and we live not conformable unto it For God is a God of pure eyes and cannot behold wickedness and so long as we see this eye upon our wayes this light over our actions which we see by light imparted from it in lumine tuo videbimus lumen as it is said in the Psalms In thy light we shall see light Every work of darkness will so ashame us and confound us that we shall never be at quiet till we vvalk uprightly before the avvful Majesty of Heaven that is ever present before us But vvhen through the Mercy and Might of Jesus Christ and his quickning Spirit vve vvalk in unfeigned Obedience in the sight of the Father of Lights our Conversation being in Heaven vvhere Christ sits at the Right Hand of the Povver of God having led captivity captive as the Psalmist speaks Then shall our mouth be filled with laughter and our tongue with joy as it is said in another Psalm about the turning again the captivity of Sion And Psal. 63. My soul shall be filled even as with marrow and fatness when my mouth praiseth thee with joyful lips But there is a more apt and ample description of this joy and feasting Esay 25. In this mountain shall the Lord of Hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things a feast of fined wines and fat things full of marrow of wines fined and purified This is Mount Sion whom the Lord hath chosen to be an habitation for himself which he hath longed for which shall be his rest for ever Here will he dwell for he hath a delight therein Ps. 132. Here he keeps open house all the Year long or rather all Eternity long Ho! every one that thirsteth come ye to the waters and ye that have no silver come buy and eat Come I say buy wine and milk without silver and without money Wherefore do you lay out silver and not for bread and your labour without being satisfied Hearken diligently unto me and eat that which is good and let your soul delight in fatness Esay 55. But what is this Mountain that God should promise such Joy upon it Or what is Sion that such Feasting and Mirth should be in it Mount Sion is called the Hill of the Holiness of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the hill of his holiness Psal. 3. Such a kind of Holiness such a kind of Purity as a man may stand before God in that a man sees God in that is approved of God and will abide the fire For our God is a consuming fire and burns and pains a mans Soul so long as filth resides there Who amongst us shall dwell with devouring fire Who amongst us shall dwell with everlasting burning He that walketh in justice and speaketh righteous things c. He shall dwell on high his defence shall be the munition of rocks bread shall be given him and his water shall be sure saith the Prophet Esay He shall dwell on Mount Sion that high and holy Hill where God hath prepared this great Feast This is the Hill of the thirsty for so may this word Sion signifie And blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be satisfied Or more properly it may signifie dry Earth And so we may fitly use that of the Psalmist My soul thirsteth after thee as a thirsty land And the same Happiness will return again as before they shall be satisfied so our English 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they shall be fed so the Greek They shall be sufficiently fed they shall be feasted continually feasted For he that eateth of this bread shall never hunger and he that drinketh of this drink shall never thirst saith our Saviour How excellent is thy mercy O God! therefore shall the children of men trust under the shadow of thy wings They shall be satisfied with the fatness of thy house and thou shalt give them drink out of the river of thy pleasures Psalm 36. This is the excellent inward state of the upright Soul and undefiled Conscience streaming and over-flowing with strong and full torrents of Heavenly Delight issuing from the Throne of God and of the Lamb. But to handle the matter some what more distinctly I will consider the nature of a Feast and of what parts it chiefly consists The curious Varro in Gellius makes a compleat Feast to consist of these four things Si belli homuncali collecti sunt si electus locus si-tempus lectum si apparatus non neglectus i. e. If good disposition'd People be gathered together if the Provision be not poor or sordid if the Place be convenient if the Time fit and seasonable 1. That those that are assembled to this Feast are belli homunculi in the best sense I shall easily prove Mat. 8. Many shall come from the East and West and shall sit down with Abraham and Isaac and Iacob in the Kingdom of Heaven There is very good Company you 'll all grant it But the Doubt will be what this Kingdom of Heaven is Let the Apostle resolve you Rom. 14. The kingdom of God is not meat and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost All which things may be obtained in some good measure at least here without spreading a Table-cloth in the Coelum Empyreum But to proceed You saw before out of the Prophet how that God prepares a Feast in Mount Sion The Apostle in his Epistle to the Hebrews makes known to us the Guests But you are come to the mount Sion and to the city of the living God the celestial Ierusalem and to the company of innumerable Angels and to the congregation of the first-born written in heaven and to the spirits of just and perfect men All these are the Guests of Gods Heavenly Table There these are assembled Wheresoever the carkass is there will the eagles resort saith our Saviour This is the great Communion of Saints who do all eat of the same spiritual
recreates the Eyes of ordinary Mortals seem'd to him not a bright azure but a funeral black nor Sun nor Moon real and true Lights but two painted Scutcheons Or and Argent hung upon the Melancholly Tapestry of this House of Mourning Wherefore to be buried in the Body with him is a real Death and this Terrestrial Region wherein we seem to live but one great Caemeterium or Dormitory No life no joy no pleasure is here no not amongst those that seem to enjoy most that have the greatest portion in this Life nay their only portion therein Wherefore what expectation of Happiness before that blessed Resurrection When we shall see the Face of God and be satisfied with his Likeness in whose presence there is fulness of joy and at whose right hand there are pleasures for evermore But for the present Interval that is the time of our Immersion into the Sense of this Body the Prophet David as well as Heraclitus does plainly deem it a state of Sleep or Death which are the same in Scripture every where as to any Mystical meanings or purposes As for me I shall behold thy face in righteousness I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness Munster piously and I believe truly paraphrases thus upon the Text. Egó verò omnes electi tui Domine non ita quaeremus has temporarias transitorias divitias ut in illis deliciemur sed justè piè vivemus in hoc seculo ut aliquando in futuro seculo videamus faciem tuam eâ satiemur cum scilicet è pulvere evigilaverimus reformati fuerimus ad similitudinem Christi tui And this may go for the Philosophical sense of the Text. But there is a Moral sense thereof which Castellio seems to reach at and is indeed the most easie to the words of the Text which run thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Of which the easie and accurate Sense is I will behold thy face in Righteousness at the awaking of thy image I shall be satisfied according as Castellio has also rendered it Tum satiandus cum tua experrecta fuerit imago And his Gloss is accordingly Per Christi resurrectionem qui Dei imago est plenam consecuturus justitiam foelicitatem For the Image of God is Christ who is called also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the brightness of the Glory of God answerably to the LXX Translation of my Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I shall be satisfied when I shall see thy Glory Which Glory like the beams of the Sun reach and touch the very eye-lids of him that is asleep but are not seen nor enjoy'd till he awake for then the image of the Sun is also awoke in him that is to say excited into actual being According to which Analogy is that Saying of the Apostle Awake thou that sleepest and Christ shall give thee light The Evigilation therefore or Resurrection of the Image of God in us is our Evigilation or Resurrection in a Mystical or Moral Sense into it which as soon as it does appear we also do appear in Glory with it but while Christ is thus hid or dead or asleep in us we are in a state of Death or Sleep and the true Life of our Soul is hid in him And this I would have the First Truth comprised in my Text viz. That the immersion of the Soul into the life of the Body and love of this present World which is the Image of the Earthly Adam is as it were the Sleep or Death of the Soul The Second That there is no true Satisfaction in this Worldly or Terrestrial Life which is but a torpid Sleep and the very shadow of Death The Third That the true Evigilation and real Life of the Soul is the recuperation of the Image of God the Resurrection of Christ in us according to the Spirit The Fourth That this Mystical Resurrection of Christ is the only solid Enjoyment and Satisfaction to the Souls of the Faithful even in this Life The Fifth and Last That the way to attain to this Satisfaction which arises from the Evigilation of that Divine Image in us which is also stiled the Face of God or if you will the Image thereof whereby we see his Face so far forth as he is visible to Man is Righteousness and Sincerity of Heart I shall behold thy face in righteousness These are the precious Truths comprized in the Text which I shall handle with all possible brevity 1. That the Image of the Earthly Adam is as it were the Sleep or Death of the Soul the very Text does apparently intimate especially that Translation in our Liturgy When I shall awake into thy Image which is the Image of the Heavenly Adam I shall be satisfied therewith which implies that till this awaking we are in a state of Sleep or Death For in that we can eat and drink and go up and down these are no Arguments that we are truly alive no more than the growing of the Hair and the Nails of them that have lain long buried in the ground is any Argument of Life in them I mean of the Sensitive Life Nor though the Flesh be full of Worms will the man be thought ever the more alive for that For neither is Sense the Life of a man nor meer Carnal and Worldly Reason the Life of the Child of God The Divine Image is the Soul of his Soul and the Life of his Life of which seeing every Soul is capable it is rightly deemed dead till it partake thereof till it be awaken'd into this Image of God But so long as the mind is addicted to the things of this World to the Law of the Body which is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so long is she dead or asleep call it which you will Hierocles calls it Death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For the Death of every Rational Essence sayes he is the loss or suppression of her Divine and Intellectual excellencies Plotinus Sleep 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So far forth as the Soul is immerged into the Body so far she is asleep And therefore those that are wholly taken up with the concerns thereof as relishing nothing but what is Worldly and Carnal may justly be look'd upon as fallen into a deep Sleep And what if they can walk and talk and go up and down and do such things as men that are awake also do do not the Noctambuli do the same Whose eyes being shut yet unwittingly do they several exploits some hazardous others ridiculous other some as it some seldomer times happens safe and congruous if the chain of Phantasms that leads them attract luckily and to convenient Objects But in the mean time they know not what they do but without any free consultation or deliberation are carried out hoodwink'd to action by the meer suggestion of Dreams and Phansies And is not this the very condition of those who have arriv'd no higher than to the Image of the Earthly
good But we may have a kind of communicated Omnipotency as to the affairs of our own Sphere in our own Microcosm or little World where we ought to rule with an absolute hand and never to be quiet till we can profess with S. Paul I can do all things through Christ that strengthens me Wherefore as God is Omnipotent in the great Universe and does curb and keep up the whole Corporeal Creation within the limits of certain Natural Laws which they cannot pass So also we are to set bounds and limits to our Bodily Passions and keep them in constant subjection to the Laws of right Reason or to the Rule of the Spirit of God And again in the second place Though we cannot be Omniscient yet we may become in a manner entirely Intellectual and throughly understand and as affectionately relish the true interest of our own Souls and perfectly discern all the concerns thereof and be accompanied with all those Divine Truths and Blissfull Speculations which are requisite for the perfecting of Humane Happiness which in our Sphere is an imitation of the Divine Omnisciency And lastly Though it is impossible that any Creature should be infinitely good yet it is capable of being filled with a Spirit of unexpressible Benignity and to be a faithful well-willer to the happiness and prosperity of every Creature of God and therefore to be in a perpetual promptness and readiness to help them that are in any distress and to rejoyce in the good and wellfare of every parcel of the Creation And this is briefly the amiable Face or Image of God as it is visible or communicable to us which we see by the beams of its own brightness as we see the Sun by its own Light though not in that real lustre nor bigness that it is And I hope now it will plainly appear That the recuperation of this Divine Image is the true expergefaction or resuscitation of the Soul from a state of Sleep or Death into the most full and ample functions of Life Of which the first degree was self-motion or self-activity For meer passivity or to be moved or acted by another either without a mans will or against it this is the condition of such as are either dead or asleep as to go of a mans self is a Symptom of one alive or awake Wherefore whatever is done in us by meer Passion or Ignorance seems rather to be acted upon us than acted by us and to be a defect of that degree of Life which we call self-motion or self-activity in such cases we seeming rather to be carried by surprize than to go of our own accords as men that are dead drunk may be haled or disposed of where others please And every one that is acted by Passion is drunk or if acted upon through Ignorance asleep and so are deprived of that degree of Life which is self-activity a doing things from an inward or thorough assent to them Which no man does in a wicked action because every one that commits wickedness does it to his own infinite disinterest and wrong which no man did ever yet nor even can assent to Whence it is plain that he is not in this regard self-active and that therefore he is in the state of Death out of which the Image of God awakes him namely the power of Christ in him which shews him his way clearly that he may make a choice never to be repented of and enables him to walk in that way and to bear strongly and victoriously against all the assaults of the Body or suggestions of this Worldly Life And so by the self-activity of that spiritual or immaterial Principle in him he rules this little World of his by irresistible Laws as God himself does the great one And this I think is one considerable degree of the evigilation of the Soul through the Divine Image And the Second is no less considerable and which we have touched upon already in the former For if Ignorance be Sleep the Intellectual state of the Soul must needs be an eminent evigilation of her And if to grow Corporeal be to become more inert more unactive and drousie then surely to become more Spiritual must be joyned with a greater measure of Life and Activity And what actions are more Spiritual than those which the Soul exerts her self into in rational disquisitions and divine speculations and in the search of the most noble and momentous Truths concerning God and Nature When she unravels all into certain immutable and indelible Ideas of things which she was taught by no touch from external matter but are the most inward hidden Life of the Soul that Adytum or Oracle that speaks truth from the deepest recess of her Essence into which she cannot enter but by a lusty rowzing up and rubbing her Eyes clean of all those mists and fumes that arise from Corporeal Phantasms or accustomary prejudices These operations certainly must be very intellectual and incorporeal and therefore very much raised above the Body that Sepulchre or Dormitory of the Soul and not to be performed but by the excitation of such kind of Spirits as are in some measure congenerous to that Heavenly Body that Luminous or AEthereal Vehicle in which the Soul shall ride as in her Triumphal Chariot at the general Appearance in the last day I say the closer and more noble intellectual Operations of the Soul are not to be performed but by the assistance of more tenuious and fiery Spirits whence the Oracles call the mind 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mentem igneam which are contrary to that phlegmatick sluggishness and drownedness that the Worldly and Carnally-minded are overflown with But besides that the Principle from whence these Intellectual actions flow argues a notorious excitation or expergefaction of the mind therein that which is Intellectual being plainly Divine or Godlike whom the Schools rightly define to be Actus purissimus pure Life and Essential Energy That the Soul in her Intellectual Operations is roused as it were out of a Sleep will farther appear if we compare the functions of the Terrestrial Life with those of the Intellectual The largest Operation of the former of which is that of our Eye which takes in but this Visible Hemisphere of the World and if it could take in the whole according to this contracted proportion it were a pitiful scant thing such as is infinitely lesser than what our Understanding conceives the Universe to be nay many thousand times less than the Earth which is but as a Mathematical point in comparison of the body of the World How contracted then is Touch and Taste and the other Senses For the love of which when the Soul is immersed into the Body and wholly given up to them it is plain that her functions of Life are infinitely contracted and that she lies asleep or dead to her largest Faculties and that therefore the excitation of them is her expergefaction into infinitely a more ample Sphere
manners of the Sufferings of Holy Martyrs which they underwent under the tyranny of bloody salvage Heathen Heading and Hanging and Crucifying were nothing for the satisfaction of their fury They were broyl'd on Grid-irons they were fryed in Frying-pans they were boyl'd in Cauldrons they were put in the Brazen Bull they were fired at the Stake cast into Ovens fired in Ships and so thrust from the shore into the deep fired in their own Houses cast upon burning Coals made to walk upon burning Coals burnt under the Arm-pits with hot Irons They had their Hearts riven out of their warm Body had their Skin flean off from their live Flesh had their Feet tyed to boughs of two near Trees which boughs being at first forcibly brought together suddenly let go rent their Body in twain They were trodden down by Horses cast bound and naked into Vaults to be eaten of Rats and Mice They had their Flesh pulled off with Pinsers torn off with Iron-rakes were squeezed to death in Wine-presses were tyed upon Wheels which turning rub'd their naked Body against sharp pegs of Iron They were hung by their Hands and Feet with their Face downward over choaking Smoak They were set out on high in the Sun having their naked Skin besmeared with Honey to be stung with Bees and Waspes The Devil spent all the skill and malice he had in finding wayes and engines of Torture for them God make us truly thankful unto him for his Mercy so long continued to us that we have without terrour or torment so many years enjoy'd the Christian Religion in such Purity And give us Grace to repent us of our unworthy walking and unbeseemingly of so great a Light But as concerning these Sufferings of the Body Beloved such is the love of God to Mankind and so reasonable is his Service that he hath made it no necessary condition of Eternal Life actually to suffer them But we ought to be so minded that rather than to relinquish the true Christian Faith or do any thing which we know offends God we would rather dye a thousand deaths And this was S. Pauls resolution Acts 21. I am ready not only to be bound but also to dye for the name of the Lord Iesus But yet there is a Suffering in the Body that we must needs suffer if we will approve our selves the Children of God and Heirs of that Glorious Kingdom And this Suffering we must inflict upon our own selves 1 Cor. 9. 27. But I keep under my body and bring it into subjection These Sufferings are most acceptable to God and requisite fore-runners of Eternal Life If you live after the flesh you shall dye but if you through the Spirit do mortifie the deeds of the body you shall live Verse 13. of this 8th Chapter to the Romans 1 Pet. 2. 11. Dearly beloved I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims abstain from fleshly lusts that war against the soul. And Galat. 4. 24. They that are Christs have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts You see plainly then That we are not Christs nor Gods nor Heirs of God with Christ unless we suffer with Christ in mortifying all Bodily Lusts in curbing our inordinate Desire of eating or drinking unless we study to keep under the Body and live chastly and continently If we will be Heirs of that Heavenly Inheritance we must bring under all evil and carnal concupiscence If we will partake of that Eternal Glory in Heaven we must be content to suffer reproach and evil speeches amongst men If any man ask what Necessity what Reason is there I will briefly shew him how it comes about First For suffering in Name for I will step so much back There is no man loves to be disquieted in mind or vext But it would disquiet us and gall us exceedingly to be found fools so that we have not the heart to find our selves so it would so discontent our natural proud Spirit Hence we blame other men rather than our selves and say they be in the false way So did the Pharisees to our Saviour and to his Apostles And thus were the Prophets used before them because their wayes were of another sort their speeches and actions of another fashion from the World You will better understand it in some Examples A Carnal or Natural man that hath no Sense of the Spirit of God and is unacquainted with its Operations derides such performances as Prayers Exhortations or what so else may proceed from thence as truly and extraordinarily proceeding from the Spirit of God and counts those men that acknowledge Gods power in them in the performance of such things weak men crack'd-brain'd Enthusiasts Fanatical Fools silly Lunaticks But all this proceeds out of Pride Envy and Self-love he himself being not able to perform such Duties or at least not in that manner So some that have got the trick of Praying ex tempore by Custom the Mother of Confidence and Dexterity Ignorance and want of a true Sense of the Majesty of Heaven upholding them in their rash performance these men will vilifie Justice and Uprightness Humility and Patience and the mortification of our Sensual Lusts because they find in themselves no such Vertues nor intend to trouble themselves so much as to practise them Then for the upholding of their own credit they must give them poor contemptible terms that they are but Heathenish Vertues such as Socrates or Plato had and make but a Moral man and that there is no such need for a Christian to have them But Beloved be not so deceived but observe this Truth Though Moral Vertue carries us no higher than an Heathen yet without the exercise of Moral Vertue and inward life and liking of it we are no true Christians The Summe is this That the good ways of God are spoken against and miscall'd that wicked men may keep their credit and yet walk indeed in the wayes of the Devil To the Second I answer That it is necessary that we suffer in the Flesh because that if we do not keep down the Flesh and its suggestions the Spirit will be choaked and stifled by that filth and corruption The carnal mind is enmity against God for it is not subject to the law of God neither indeed can be Ver. 7. The carnal mind that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the bent will intent liking or desire of the Flesh is enmity with God desires against the Will of God and will not be obedient to the Law of God nor indeed can be Wherefore we are to kill it to mortifie it to crucifie it that we may be dead to sin or the desire of the Flesh and alive to God by his enquickening Spirit through Jesus Christ our Lord. Here is the Patience of the Saints Here their great Suffering 4. But I go on to their last Affliction which is in Spirit And that is twofold 1. The wrestling or conflict with spiritual wickedness in Heavenly places 2. The suffering with
and claims title to all must be Catholick None must stand before it A true Vr of the Chaldees eating up and devouring all other Deities Whatsoever is not This is Idolatry Blasphemy and Impiety And therefore we can admit of none but our own Or if we should by chance or unawares we recoyl back with more than Caunian zeal and indignation We are no where so lavish of our affection as in point of Religion and the more because no where more safe For who can love God too much and Religion immediately referrs to God This I would say that in the many and manifold distractions and divisions which the sons of men exercise one another with on this blind and dark spot the Earth where there is a great deal more talk of God than true knowledge of him all Religions every where agree in this one that nothing ought to be more precious and dear unto us than our Religion And in this also which I must again note with greater admiration that ordinary Religionists are in nothing so superficially and perfunctorily satisfied in as in what they do so devoutly love whence it comes to pass that many thousands of men Ixion-like embrace not Iuno but a Cloud Wherefore we cannot sufficiently commend the sober care and prudence of the blessed Apostle who hath so amply and fully set out to us that which few men have the patience to peruse in a closer Character And therefore out of neglect and carelesness very subject to mistake and if mistaken mistake more dangerously than in any thing else possibly they can do spending their most serious and dearest affections upon falshood their very hearts and souls upon unprofitable lyes and not only forfeiting their own happiness but as much as in them lyes pulling in others also into the same whirl-pool or dangerous pit of destruction But Beloved that we be not led away with the same errour of the wicked nor serve the phansies of men let us again cast our eyes on the Text and learn the truth of Religion Pure Religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep a mans self unspotted of the world The Text as I intimated before is a definition of Pure and Vndefiled Religion I might resolve it into these two Logical terms of Definitum and Definitio Pure Religion and undefiled before God and the Father that 's the Definitum or thing defin'd The Definition this To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep a mans self unspotted from the world But I shall handle the Text more roughly and fetch out though not force out these four Particulars 1. That there is a pure and undefiled Religion 2. That God the Father is judge of this pure and undefiled Religion 3. That to visit the Fatherless and Widows in their affliction and to keep ones self unspotted of the World this is pure and undefiled Religion 4. That it is pure and undefiled Religion even in the judgment and sight of God I. That there is a pure and undefiled Religion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It will not be amiss to make some short stay upon the unfolding of the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies properly Cultus divinus Orpheus the Thracian and great Mystagogue of the Graecians gave occasion to this term For they being taught the manners and rites of serving the Gods by him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Nonnus tells us They called the worshiping of the Gods 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as being a Thracian invention Beza translates it very well and significantly Cultus Religiosus and our English not amiss Religion in the proper sense as it is taken for the Worship of God and not extended to both Tables as S. Austin and Lactantius would have it For beside the propriety of the Greek word the quality of those to whom the Apostle wrote is no small Argument that that Religion which consists in Gods immediate Worship is here meant or alluded to they being the dispersed Iews to whom he wrote as is manifest in the beginning of the Epistle whose Native Religion consisted in multitude of Rites and Ceremonies and was eminent for the outward Form of Worship and Service of God These were all but a cloud a veil and mist and was to be drawn aside and vanish at the approach of the Sun of Righteousness that was to rise with healing in his wings that is our Saviour God blessed for ever And according to this notion the two following terms viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 will not only admit of but call for this Exposition viz. pure and unpainted as the words are sufficiently capable thereof The true pure refin'd unsophisticated Religion is this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plato in his Sophista And Plotinus Lib. 2. Ennead 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So that according to the idiom of the tongue Pure Religion is that which is unbared of all heterogeneal admixture purg'd and separated from all ascititious additaments cleansed and refined from that palpable gross luggage of unweildy Ceremonies being pure Extraction mere Essence or Quintessence perfect Life and Spirit Again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 undyed unpainted with the pencil of Humane Art or Device a naked and bare Truth Which though it hath been diversly figur'd and shap'd by the outward dress of Ceremonies yet it has been from everlasting to everlasting Christ the same yesterday to day and for ever 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Gospel of Eternal Truth the Law of Life the perfect Law of Liberty 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is most true of this everlasting Law of Life whose Original is as deep as the Divine Abyss But I am afraid that I have by this Exposition though very true and genuine so spiritualiz'd Religion and unbared the Truth that Carnal eyes accustomed to Shadows and gross Ceremonies will doubt whether there be any thing of Religion left after so much sifting and cleansing But I hold it no hard task to answer these men If they mean by no Religion left no Ceremony left I grant it But if by no Religion no truth of Religion I say there is nothing but the truth of Religion left And that the truth of Religion should not deserve the name of Religion as well as the Shadow or Type I know no reason no more than Caesar himself should not be called Caesar as well as his Picture be it drawn with never so much art and cunning Mistake me not I speak not as if the kernel must of necessity be without a shell but led on by my Text I speak of the kernel without the shell and exalt it far above the dry shell Psal. 50. 13. Will I eat the flesh of bulls or drink the blood of goats Psal. 51. 17. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit a broken and a contrite
heart O God thou wilt not despise And Psal. 4. 5. Offer the sacrifice of righteousness and put your trust in the Lord. And Rom. 12. 1. I beseech you brethren by the mercies of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable to God which is your spiritual service So Beza They were not to offer any dead or unclean Beast under the Law wherefore are we here under the Gospel to offer our selves a living and holy Sacrifice impolluted of the World and alive to Righteousness and to God Give me leave here a little to enlarge my self Who can doubt but that the Heart of a Christian from whence sweet odours of Prayers and Praises ascend up is a better Altar of Incense than that in Moses's Temple that God is more truly fed by relieving his living Members true and sincere Christians than by feeding the unsatiable fire by thousands of Holocausts that the seven Spirits the Spirit of the Lord the Spirit of Wisdom and Understanding the Spirit of Counsel and Might the Spirit of Knowledge and the Fear of the Lord are a truer and clearer light than the Seven Golden Candlesticks of Moses that the Iewish Temple was but a strait prison in comparison of the enlarged Soul of man So many load of Sand or Gravel would have filled that up to the top but no less than God himself can fill the Heart of man which therefore is the meetest Temple or Mansion for him In brief what is this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but as Nonnus speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to honour and worship God and what doth that consist in but in appropriating or consecrating unto him times or places or things persons also and solemnity of actions Is not this therefore to worship God in spirit and in truth truly and unfeignedly to devote our selves and dedicate all we have to the God of Heaven seeking his Will in all our actions and denying our selves and our own desires What comparison is there betwixt the offering the Firstlings of our Flock or the Fruit of our Ground whereby we acknowledge we hold all these things of God the great Lord of Heaven and Earth what comparison is there I say betwixt this and the not arrogating any thing to our selves of either knowledge and power but very sensibly and affectionately ascribing all to God whatsoever we can do think or speak which is the right Christian Humility and Spiritual Decimation to the true Melchizedek Christ Jesus And let me be yet bolder if there be any boldness in it What is Baptism or the washing of Water in respect of the real cleansing by the Spirit the being Baptized with the Holy Ghost and with Fire What is Bread and Wine in comparison of that true Bread from Heaven the Flesh and Blood of Christ Tell me therefore now is nothing of Religion left when I only consider the inward essence or substance of it abstracting from shell or husk Is the very heart or kernel of it nothing The pure and unpainted Religion is truly Religion if not the only true Religion And pardon me if I seem too careful and curious in reserving the name of Religion to it because that word strikes more powerfully upon the ears of men and summons at the very first alarm all the power we have both of Soul and Body to assist countenance and maintain it Wherefore I would under the name as the notion it self doth most eminently deserve it commend unto my self and all men this truth of Godliness that we may as heartily and zealously both aspire unto our selves and endeavour the same in others as ever we did or can do the opinions and institutions of men or yet the opposing of them For this will not be found pure and undefiled Religion in his eyes who is the judge thereof viz. God the Father Which is the Second Particular and upon which I would now fall did not another sense step between which must awhile hold me back 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hitherto 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 have signified the pure and un-colour'd truth of Religion without Show or Ceremony The words are not incapable of another sense which our English Translation favours Pure impolluted or undefiled Religion is this Which implies that there are impure filthy and impious Religions in the World How it would make a noise to speak of the obscene Ceremonies of Baal-Peor the cruel Rites of Moloch and that most ridiculous Devil-service in India But we need not run back so much in time or travel to so remote places I do not see but the Invocation of Saints and Worshipping of Idols is impious enough and the relying on any one man or a multitude for infallible guides of his Faith and Religion mere Idolatry and Irreligiousness For what is this but to cut our selves off from the living God and free guidance of his gracious Spirit and to give up our selves to men blind guides to the sons of men that are found deceitful upon the weights lighter than vanity it self Is it not the Lord that hath made Heaven and Earth and filleth all things with his spirit and power Behold the nations are as a drop of a bucket and are counted as the small dust of the ballance All nations are before him even as nothing and they are counted of him less than nothing and vanity It is he alone that has established the mountains and has given laws to the measureless deep that has stretched out the Heavens as a curtain and spreadeth it out as a tent to dwell in that sitteth upon the circle of the earth and the inhabitants thereof are as grashoppers Which of these will you chuse for your God Or what number of them for the stay of your hearts Will you worship a Fly instead of your Maker Will you ask counsel of the God of Ekron Will you advise with Baal-Zebub concerning your Salvation Is not Christ the only Healer the only Saviour the only Recoverer of fallen man Is his Holiness at Rome infallible Or may not a many gray heads joyn'd together go astray together 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Elihu in Iob And I said days should speak and multitude of years should teach wisdom But there is a spirit in man and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding Great men are not alwayes wise neither do the aged understand judgment Iob 32. It is the Lord that is the only wise God that Auncient of dayes alone it is that can instruct us in Prudence 't is God the Father alone that can guide us safely in his Truth And thus am I again cast upon the Second Particular viz. II. That God the Father is judge of what is true pure and undefiled Religion And indeed there is very good reason for it For what is Religion but the worship and service of God He therefore knows best how he would be worshipped and served And here it will not be unseasonable to
speak of that worship which the Apostle has found out a very fit name for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Will-worship serving God according to our own will and liking according to the dictates of our own vain hearts A fault that a Natural man is not only subject to fall into but it is even impossible for him to avoid it For who knows the Will of God saving to whom the Word and Spirit of God is revealed from within For if the outward could do it without the inward why is the whole Christian World intangled in so much errour and confusion Why unless for that they have served God either according to their own Will or have been led captive under the Will of other men For that they have forsaken the Lord the fountain of living waters and have hewed them out cisterns broken cisterns that will hold no water Is Israel a servant Is he a home-born slave Why is he become a spoil Verily because he is become a servant and a slave because he has ceased now to be Israel a Prince and prevailer with God and hath put his trust in mortal men What is Paul Apollos or Cephas What is Bellarmine Calvin or Arminius Was Arminius Crucified for you or was you Baptized into the name of Calvin Wo to the rebellious children saith the Lord that take counsel but not of me and that cover with a covering but not of my spirit that they may add sin to sin That walk to go down to AEgypt and have not asked at my mouth to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh and to trust in the shadow of Egypt Isa. 30. Shall all the preparation of Egypt be your safety Shall your chosen Learned Scribes and Disputers with all their knowledge of Tongues and Humane Arts assuredly talk you into the truth Where is that infallible Judge There are enough that say Lo here is Christ and Lo there he is But it is a shrewd Argument that he is not here nor there Or else why did Christ say Believe thou not He himself alone it is that is the Truth and let all men be lyars before him Cease from man whose breath is in his nostrils for whereof is he to be accounted of If God then be that only infallible Iudge of pure Religion and well pleasing to himself who is to be sought unto but He But that no man deceive himself for truth can deceive no man my drift is not to dehort from idolizing men that every man may make an idol of himself and to cleave to sudden phansies rashly sprung up in his polluted Spirit But that we may truly sanctifie God in our hearts and serve him from a true though inward invisible Principle of Life that we may attain to that Righteousness of Faith which we are not born with nor the mouth of man can confer upon us but is the Breath of the Holy Ghost a Light and Life derived from God the Father the Fountain of Light and Life from whom proceedeth every good and perfect gift Of this it is written You have an unction from the holy one and you know all things Io. 2. But as for us that have not yet attained thereunto it will be our wisdom and safety to have this draught of pure Religion set out by the Apostle ever before our eyes and endeavour to frame our service to God accordingly To visit the Fatherless and the Widow in her affliction and to keep our selves unspotted from the World And this is the Third Particular viz. III. That pure and undefiled Religion is this to visit the Fatherless and Widows in their affliction and to keep our selves unsported from the world It is set out to us as once God shewed himself to Moses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Videbis posteriora mea Exod. 33. Religion is here describ'd à posteriori or ab effectis Which as it is most feasable to the Teacher so it is most profitable to the Learner For the very face and essence of pure Religion is unexpressible No pencil can draw it and exhibit the sight of it to other men Hence is there and ever has been a veil drawn over it but it ought not to be environed with utter darkness Let your light so shine before men that they seeing your good works may glorifie your father which is in heaven The Sacraments are a veil over the Christian Religion but the Christians unfruitful yea impious Conversation a Cimmerian mist a palpable AEgyptian darkness But to return though I have as yet scarce given one step out of the way The description of pure Religion is from a two-fold effect The first respects others To visit the Fatherless and Widows in their affliction The second respects our selves To keep himself unspotted from the World But before I fall upon these particulars it will not be amiss first to set out some general Considerations which the nature of this description affords us And First That the Apostle chuseth to describe Religion from the Effects of it rather than from the Form Efficient or End Secondly Why rather from these Effects than any other 1. For the First The Form of pure Religion as I intimated before is unexpressible no man can describe it It is that name written in the white stone that no man knows nor can know but he that has it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Plotinus in a case not unlike to this If thou beest it thou seest it speaking of that eternal form or beauty Then to have described it from the Efficient which should have been God the Apostle knew very well what juggling and uncertainty there were in that For all Religions call God their Author and pretend his Glory for their End So that this general delineation would have been subject to much mistake abuse and deceit Wherefore the safest mark to point out true Religion was the Effects of it 2. But why these Effects rather than any other Would not Prayer would not the Hearing of the Word often Reading of the Scripture as the very Etymon of Religion as some would have it à relegendo doth import would not these a great deal better have set out the nature of Religion No verily For I dare be bold to take the Apostles part and rely upon his judgment For as for the external act of Prayer a Pharisee may perform it both largely and often with many tedious tautologies and wearisome circumlocutions as our Saviour has marked them out in the Gospel And as for hearing Divine Truth to talk of it in a natural exercise of our Memory and Reason it is pleasant even to the unregenerate and impious man That very natural motion that is in words and sounds put in a tunable number and set off with action and affection pleaseth in some sort even all kind of Auditors And if smartness of Reason and weight of Argument be added to it the merest Philosopher that is can be content to lend his attention thereto and no acceptable
Eternal Spiritual Riches he will endue us with hereafter 3. The Third Motive is taken from the persons to whom we are to communicate The rich and the poor meet together and the Lord enlightens both their eyes Prov. 29. No difference between the greatest Prince and the poorest Beggar but the goods of Fortune or rather of Providence For they come not to us by chance but by the good will of God who hath made out of his Wisdom some Poor and some Rich that we may have occasion to exercise the acts of Mercy and tender Compassion to our Brethren who live by the same Air vvalk in the light of the same Sun vvere created by the same God are to be saved by the same Christ. There is one Body and one Spirit even as you are called in one hope of your calling One Lord one Faith one Baptism One God and Father of all which is above all and through all and in you all Eph. 4. What One Body and one Member despise and disregard another One Spirit and not sympathize one vvith another One Hope and not help one another One Lord and not one fellovv-servant acknovvledge another One Father and Brethren not relieve one another One God above all over-seeing us all in all our actions vvho though he be so high yet beholdeth things here belovv upon earth and vve poor earthly vvorms overlook one another One God in us all and no goodness in us all God vvho is Love it self pierce through us all and yet not those lovely shafts of holy Charity vvound any of our hearts God forbid If vve abide not in Love God abideth not in us If our hearts be contracted and darkened by frozen rigidness the light of God shineth not through us If our poor contemptible Neighbour be so far under us that vve disdain to stretch forth our armes to help him vve forget God above us If vve love not as Brethren God is not our Father If vve be asham'd of our Fellovv-servants the Lord is not our Master If vve be cold in mutual affection our Faith is dead and Hypocrisie is our Religion If vve have no sympathy or fellovv-feeling the Spirit vve boast of is but vanity or empty air If vve favour not one another as Members of the same Body vve are not Members of the same Body but disunited Dust vvhich the Wind blovves to and fro upon the face of the Earth and the Angel of God scatters it Community is but a name vvhere there is no communication of good Vnity but a deceivable phansie vvhere there is no real Mercy He that will endanger the Soul of his Brother by with-holding the sustenance of his Body which out of Brotherly affection he is to administer to him surely that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Brotherly Love which the Apostle calls for dwelleth not in him The very shame of Poverty will force a man to do or suffer any thing How much more will pinching hunger scorching thirst benumming cold Necessity hath no Law or at least necessitous persons are easily drawn to think so Give me not poverty saith the Wise Man Prov. 30. 8 9. lest I be poor and steal and take the name of my God in vain A good man is merciful to his beast and shall not we be so good as to have compassion upon men The miserable and penurious condition of the Poor man would afford me great store or plenty of Arguments to plead his cause but I will only name them Hunger thirst nakedness rags filth deformity pensiveness sickness torture contempt sighs tears groans fear despair disconsolateness assaults of the Devil hard-heartedness of the World dejectedness of his spirit weak and vain looks loss of limbs blindness and deafness I cannot name them all Poverty is attended with such a numerous regiment of defects and infirmities that they may win the most strong and stony heart to compassionate their miseries But because we are fallen into these ill latter times in which the Apostle hath foretold that the love of many or rather of most if not almost of all shall wax cold Mercy and Pity are not passions easily to be stirred up out of the representation of our Neighbours misery and ill plight These are poor contemptible vertues befitting the weak womanish sect A strong vigorous faith I would to God it were so or if you will a deep conceited phansie that we are Gods Children though we be not merciful as our Heavenly Father is merciful is altogether in request and fashion amongst us Christians So this conceit makes us abound with Love toward God as vve think But when all comes to all it will prove but false and adulterate Love It will not abide that touchstone If you love me keep my commandements Or that of S. Iohns Epistle Chap. 3. Whosoever hath this worlds good and seeth his brother have need and shutteth up his compassion from him how dwelleth the love of God in him 4. But if we do love God so much and our Neighbour so little yet we may not evade or escape this duty of doing good for all that For say that all our time is to be spent in the duties of the First Table all our Piety to be shewed in performances toward God If I shew that these acts of Mercy and Bounty be acts of the First Table too I hope we will not shew our selves so ungrateful and impious as to decline this manner of Worship which he requires at our hands Now that acts of Mercy are duties of the First Table I need go no farther for proof than my Text which tells us that doing good and communicating is a sacrifice And Sacrificing you know is a duty of the First Table even the immediate service of God How fitly the Apostle hath framed his Argument for convincing of mens corrupt Consciences and discovering that mysterious hidden wickedness that lurks in our hypocritical hearts a strong perswasion that we are Gods though there be little of the inward power of Godliness in us This holy kind of irreligiousness that is so immerse and lost as it were in a false counterfeit love of God that it quite forgets all respect and duty to our Neighbour That foolish impudent Spirit that would so confidently father it self upon God and perswade him that he is his Child when it s nothing but the deceitful breath of the Devil A handsome slight to travel to Heaven at least charges The service of God that is a strong perswasion that we are one of them that God hath sign'd to be his though there be no other sure argument or sign saving that we do strongly perswade our selves so The hearing of the Word the saying of Prayers and such outward performances or outward deceivable phansies is a Religion so cheap and easie that it asks a man neither cost nor labour But to be crucified with Christ to suffer with him to undergo the deadly dolorous pangs of mortification to sweat drops of Blood and endure
in thy Heart and sweetly shine in thee with her mild light Give not thine Anger vent it will be extinct like smothered fire Answer not thy Lust or Lasciviousness and it will cease to call unto thee but dye as a Weed kept under in the ground Dare to do good though thy base heart gainsay it God will look upon thee in pity and repay thee with a more noble Spirit and Covetousness being oft crost will even out of discontent quite leave thee But if thou be false to God and thine own Soul in these things which he hath put in thy power and he hath put the outward man plainly in thy power and neglectest the performance of them and yet doest complain of want of strength thou art in plain English an Hypocrite and the Devil and thy own false heart have deceived thee A man I confess cannot generate himself but he may kill himself So though we cannot regenerate our selves yet we may mortifie our own corruption if we be not wanting to our selves And this is the Cross that we with S. Paul are to bear and to dye upon that when we have suffered and been buried with Christ in this Baptism God may raise us up with him to Life and endue us with his Holy Spirit And this is the New Creature which is spoken of in the next Verse For in Christ Iesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but a new creature In Christ Iesus i. e. When we have taken upon us the Profession of Christ have been made Members of the Christian Church by Baptism Circumcision availeth nothing And verily there is no reason why it should for it is a badge of Judaism not of Christianism and cannot no not in Judaism do much without the inward Circumcision of the heart and observation of the Commandments of God Rom. 2. 25. to the end For circumcision verily profiteth if thou keep the law But if thou be a breaker of the law thy circumcision is made uncircumcision Therefore if the uncircumcision keep the righteousness of the law shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision And shall not uncircumcision which is by nature if it fulfil the law judge thee who by the letter and circumcision dost transgress the law For he is not a Iew which is one outwardly neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh But he is a Iew which is one inwardly and circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit and not in the letter whose praise is not of men but of God And this also was known and propounded to the Iews under the Law Deut. 10. 16. Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart and be not refractory And in Chap. 3. ver 6. And the Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart and the heart of thy seed to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul that thou mayst live And what else indeed doth God require of thee O man but that thou wouldst love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and all thy strength and thy neighbour as thy self This if thou perform in thy Circumcision thy Circumcision is effectual to thee If thou do not it is but Concision and cutting off a piece of Flesh which God and Nature was not so overseen in making but it might well be left uncut off And if Circumcision without Obedience and an Holy Life availeth them nothing that are under the Law how could it possibly be any thing to us that live under the Gospel But to what purpose is this to us that do not bear the outward Circumcision nor are likely to prove so giddy as to revolt to Judaism Wherefore let us here turn aside awhile from the Circumcision of the Iews to that which is its 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that answers to it among us Christians And that is Baptism Will that avail any thing without the New Creature What it may do to Children before they be actually sinful by their own misdeeds I leave to the censure of the Schools to dispute That concerns not us who are past Children were we got as far out of Foolishness as Childishness The Question is how much Baptism availeth us of grown Age without the New Creature Just as much as Circumcision without the keeping of the Law availeth a Iew. Can Water wash without the Spirits operation Doth the Spirit operate and effect nothing Are we suppressors and choakers of the Christian Life that should revive in us and yet stand justified before God Can we kill Christ within us and persist in that obstinate cruelty and yet be clean from the guilt or punishment of so hainous transgression by the sprinkling of that outward Water upon us in Baptism Ah nimiùm faciles qui tristia crimina caedis Flumineâ tolli posse putatis aquâ Foolish and too too credulous men they are indeed that think their being dipt in the Font shall vvash out the deep stain of this so horrible murder Yet there is a Baptism that vvill do it and vvithout it nothing is done It is Mortification If the Murderer dye that is that man of Sin the Old Adam or the blood-red Edom and Christ revive all is vvell Rom. 6 3 4. Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Iesus Christ were baptized into his death Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father even so we also should walk in newness of life Ver. 6 7. Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him that the body of sin might be destroyed that henceforth we should not serve sin For he that is dead is freed from sin Believe it though vve are called to Liberty vve are not invited to Libertinism But our true Liberty or Freedom is to become free from sin So you see that Outvvard Baptism vvithout the Invvard is as little available as Circumcision in the Flesh vvithout that in the Spirit If any here as it is not plainly immaterial ask of the efficacy of the Lords Supper So far it is from doing good vvithout an invvard qualification that it is Poyson to the unvvorthy Receiver or vvorse even Damnation it self as the Apostle vvitnesseth It is the New Creature then only or at least chiefly that a Christian must rest upon sith nothing is available without it The New Creature It is worth the enquiring into what this New Creature is that is of such efficacy and power and worth and price It is no more certainly than the New man Ephes. 4. 22 23 24. That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts And be renewed in the spirit of your mind And that ye put on the new man which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness that is not in external Ceremonial holiness or outward Sanctimonious show but in the
in and drown the Soul and choak all Life of Vertue and Goodness This is that great Deity of the Heaten This is the Idol of the Daughters of Moab whose stay and confidence is in this visible World whose joy and pleasure is in the Life of the Flesh. I will conclude with the Conclusion of the Psalmist Save us O Lord our God and gather us from among the Heathen to give thanks unto thy holy name and to triumph in thy praise Blessed be the Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting and let all the people say Amen Praise ye the Lord. DISCOURSE XV. COL iii. 1. If you then be risen with Christ seek those things which are above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God THIS Text contains in it that precious mystery of the internal or inward Resurrection of Christ in our Hearts or Souls which is the chief if not only saving Knowledge of that part of our Christian Religion For alas Beloved what will that outward Resurrection of our Saviour according to the flesh profit us though we have the History of it never so accurately nay though we had seen it with our own eyes We may lye in the grave of sin our selves for all that We may sink like a dead stone into the bottomless pit and have our portion with the damned Devils who have an Historical Faith of all the passages of Christs doings or sufferings here on Earth it may be better than our selves And those wicked Souldiers that watched his Sepulchre were perfectly convinced that he had escaped the jawes of Death But what was this to them who were yet dead in their trespasses and sins Surely nothing at all And as little is it to us Beloved if we be dead in sin and have not risen from the strong holding bands of iniquity and vanity Wherefore it is not enough to say Christ dyed for our sins and rose again for our justification and so to imagine his Resurrection to be our raising from wickedness and corruption But we our selves also really and in truth are to rise from the grave of sin by the power of the enlivening Spirit of Jesus Christ. And whether we be thus risen indeed or no this present Text of Scripture will teach us If you be risen with Christ seek those things or you do seek those things which are above For the Greek Text will bear both senses I will first briefly run through the Sense of the words and then raise such Doctrines and Uses as shall most naturally flow from the Text and shall be most profitable for the promotion of that main work of our Salvation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If then you be risen with Christ That is If you be risen in your Souls as Christ in Body rose from the grave If your Souls have scaped the bands of the Spiritual Death which is the nature and life of Sin for that maketh us truly dead unto Righteousness and unto God as Christs Body broke from the Prison of the Sepulchre Then you seek those things that are above It must needs be understood of the Resurrection of the Soul from Sin because the Apostle did not Preach to dead men departed this Life once and again clothed with this Fleshly Tabernacle but to men who were alwayes alive from their first being born into this visible World In vain then had he taught them a sign of that which he knew would never come to pass till the Colossians were past his Preaching to to wit at the last day the time of the Resurrection of our Bodies And according to this manner doth the Apostle speak also of the Crucifixion of Christ making the outward Passion and Death of Christ a sign or resemblance of something in our Souls viz. our dying to Sin as here he hath made his Resurrection an emblem of our rising to Righteousness Rom. 6. 2 c.. How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein Know you not that all we that have been baptised into Iesus Christ have been baptised into his death We are buried then with him by baptism into his death that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father so we also should walk in newness of life For if we be grafted with him into the similitude of his death even so shall we be into the similitude of his resurrection Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him that the body of sin might be destroyed that henceforth we should not serve sin The Apostle there plainly compares our dying to Sin to the Crucifixion of our Saviour and that as he dyed on the Cross Corporally so we ought to crucifie the body of Sin in us by the power of God in our Spirits Thus have we good warrant from the example of the Apostle to look upon the Mystery of Christianity with Spiritual eyes The Birth the Death the Resurrection and Ascension of our Saviour Bodily have their similitude Spiritually in our Souls The Birth of Christ a resemblance of Christs being born in us Gal. 4. 19. My little children of whom I travail in the birth again till Christ be formed in you His Death of our dying to Sin as I have already declared Or of Christs being dead in us For we are also said to crucifie Christ by our ungodliness and by extinguishing his Spirit of power and illumination in us Heb. 6. 4. For it is impossible that they which were once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost and have tasted of the good word of God and of the powers of the world to come If they fall away that they should be renewed by repentance seeing they have crucified again to themselves the Son of God and put him to an open shame Crucified again For verily Beloved from our very youth up we have laid dead the Son of God the suggestions of the Holy Life in our Consciences But yet it pleaseth God to raise his Son in us and recover him to Life by the Preaching of the powerful Messengers of God and the secret working of his Holy Spirit upon the Heart And here is Christ risen as it were from the grave But if we by loose and negligent courses destroy this Life of Christ in us and extinguish the Spirit of God in our Souls then do we crucifie the Son of God afresh and shame the profession of Regeneration and the Spirit of God and the true and living Christianism by our open revolting from the living God and taking part with the wicked of this World and their ungodly and sensual courses But now as Christ is thus in a Spiritual manner killed and crucified so when he is in us restor'd to Life it must needs be fittingly termed his Resurrection from Death And according to this sense may those words of my Text be understood also If you be risen with Christ That is If your Souls have become living
by that Spirit of Christ being alive in you then you seek those things that be above For it is as impossible that the Spirit of Christ should be alive in us and not we alive by it to him as it is that light should be let into a room and the air in the room not enlightened Wherefore if Christ be risen in us we are also risen with him But the Sign that we are thus risen with Christ is that we seek those things that be above But how above What Is the contemplation of the Stars or the knowledge of Meteors viz. of Comets of Rainbows of falling Stars of Thunder of Lightning of Hail of Snow or such like commended to us Nor Astronomy nor Astrology nor Meteorology seem considerable things in the eyes of God Those things that be above That is in Heaven But how in Heaven Or what is Heaven We are therefore to understand that this word Heaven has a threefold signification in Holy Writ First It signifies the Air. Psal. 79. 2. The dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat to the fowls of Heaven That is of the Air. Secondly It signifies that space where the Stars the Sun and the Moon and the rest of the Host of Heaven do move Isa. 13. 10. For the stars of heaven and the planets thereof shall not give their light the sun shall be darkened in his going forth and the moon shall not cause her light to shine Thirdly It signifies that aboad of the holy spirits of men where the eternal light and lustre of God is present where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God At the right hand of God That is the Power Majesty or Glory of God For God hath neither a Right hand nor a Left because he hath not a Body or any palpable distinct Members Wherefore when any sensible parts of a Body are ascribed to him they are to be understood by way of Analogy or resemblance So when his eyes are said to be upon the hearts of men and his eye-lids to try their wayes when his ear is said to be open to the prayers of the faithful these signifie nothing else but that God doth perfectly both know and discern and approve or disallow as certainly and as clearly nay infinitely more clearly than we see or hear any thing with our eyes or ears Now as by the organs of sense attributed to God the Knowledge of God is set forth so by the organs or instruments of action or operation is his Power decyphered And most eminently by this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the instrument of instruments or best of all instruments the Hand The hand of God is the Power of God ordinarily in Scripture So is he said to deliver the Israelites with a mighty hand and stretched-out arm that is by exceeding great Power Now the Right hand being more active than the Left the more usual instrument in outward works or manufactures it may intimate the exceeding abundance of the Power of God Or the Right-hand of his Power may intimate the Power of God to good the more large effusion or pouring out of Benignity the enlargement and exaltation of the Soul of Christ and his Fellow-members as many as have been conformable to him in the death or mortification of the Old Man For these also God will raise up with him to Eternal Riches and Glory and irresistible Power which the Devil Death and Sin shall never be able to overcome But the Power of his Left-hand is the Power of destruction the fury and wrath and strong tempest of God which doth sieze the Children of Disobedience which abideth in Hell for them for an endless woe and toil and torment for ever And this is the distinction of the Sheep and the Goats on the Right hand and the Left these shall be plagued with the vengeance and anger of God in the power and dominion of Hell but those shall be strengthened and comforted with those pleasures that flow at the Right-hand of God for evermore Thou wilt not leave my soul in the grave neither wilt thou suffer thine holy one to see corruption Thou wilt shew me the path of life In thy presence is the fulness of joy and at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore What therefore the Right-hand of God is we plainly see viz. the full and strong stream of his Goodness and Divine Benignity To sit here what can it be but to remain in this Happiness unshaken unmov'd steadily and securely But he that stands is next going or departing AND thus much by way of Explication of the words which will afford us these Doctrines 1. That there is a Spiritual Resurrection of the Soul belonging to every true Christian 2. That those that do partake of this Spiritual Resurrection seek those things that be above that is Divine and Heavenly things 3. That they seek them where Christ sitteth at the Right-hand of God First of the first viz. That there is a Spiritual Resurrection of the Soul in this Life I will not go far for my first Proof I will only step back into the Chapter foregoing my Text viz. the Second Chapter of this Epistle to the Colossians at the 11th and 12th Verses In whom i. e. in Christ also ye are circumcised with circumcision made without hands by putting off the sinful body of the flesh through the circumcision of Christ in that you are buried with him through baptism In whom ye are also raised up together through the faith of the operation of God which raised him from the dead And ye which were dead in sins and in the uncircumcision of the flesh hath he quickened together with him forgiving you all your trespasses And then follows my Text for all the residue of that Chapter may be very well Parenthetical If ye then be risen with Christ c. which he doth assert or affirm in the forenamed Verses when as he saith they are buried with him in Baptism There 's the Death we are to imitate in our Soul that is to have the body of Sin dead and buried In whom you are also raised up by the operation of God There 's the Spiritual Resurrection of the Soul And in the next Verse Ye which were dead in sins There 's the Death of the Soul hath he quickened together with him There 's the Resurrection of the Soul from its Death which is Sin For Sin is the Death of the Soul as Obedience Righteousness or the Holy Spirit of God is the Life thereof But for further and more manifest proof of this point it will not be amiss to rehearse again to you that place at the 6th of Romans for it suits exceeding well with the place I expounded to you just now Ver. 3 c. Know you not that all we that have been baptised into Iesus Christ have been baptized into his death We are buried then with him by baptism into his death that like as Christ was raised