his eternall generation in the bosome of his Father had now cast a cloud of a temporary and earthly generation in the wombe of his mother that man who as he entred into the wombe of his first mother the blessed Virgin by a supernaturall way by the overshadowing of the holy Ghost so he vouchsafed to enter into the wombe of her whom he had accepted for his second mother the earth by an unnaturall way not by a naturall but by a violent and bitter death that man so torne and mangled wounded with thornes oppressed with scornes and contumelies Pilite presents and exhibits so Ecce homo Behold the man But in all this depression of his in all his exinanition and evacuation yet he had a Crown on yet he had a purple garment on the emblems the Characters of majesty were always upon him And these two considerations the miseries that exhaust and evacuate and annihilate man in this life and yet those sparkes and seeds of morality that lie in the bosome that still he is a man the affilictions that depresse and smother that suffocate and strangle their spirits in thier bosomes and yet that unsmotherable that unquenchable Spirit of Adoption by which we cry Abba Father that still he is a Christian these Thornes and yet these Crownes these contumelies and yet this Purple are the two parts of this text I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his wrath For here is an Ecce behold Ieremy presents a map a manifestation of as great affliction as the rod of Gods wrath could infflict But yet it is Ecce homo Behold the man I am the man he is not demolished he is not incinerated so not so annihilated but that he is still a man God preserves his children from departing from the dignity of men and from the soveraigne dignity of Christian men in the deluge and inundation of all afflictions And these two things so considerable in that Ecce homo in the exhibiting of Christ that then when he was under those scornes and Crosses he had his Crownes his purples ensignes of majesty upon him may well be parts of this text for when we come to consider who is the person of whom Ieremy says I am the man we finde many of the ancient Expositors take these words prophetically of Christ himself and that Christ himselfe who says Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow says here also I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his wrath But because there are some other passages in the Chapter that are not conveniently appliable to Christ it is not likely that Christ would say of himself That his Father shut out his prayer even then when he cryed and shouted not likely that Christ would say of himselfe That his Father was to him as a Beare in the way and as a Lion in secret places not likely that Christ would say of himselfe That his Father had removed his soul far from peace therfore this chapter and this person cannot be so well understood of Christ. Others therefore have understood if of Ierusalem it selfe but then it would not be expressed in that Sex it would not be said of Ierusalem I am the man Others understand if of any particular man that had his part in that calamity in that captivity that the affliction was so universall upon all of that nation of what condition soever that every man might justly say Ego vir I am the man that have seen affliction But then all this chapter must be figurative and still where we can it becomes it behooves us to maintain a literall sense and interpretation of all Scriptures And that we shall best do in this place if we understand these words literally of Iermy himselfe that the Minister of God the Preacher of God the Prophet of God Ieremy himself was the man the Preacher is the text Ego vir I am the man As the Ministers of God are most exposed to private contumelies so should they be most affected with publique calamities soonest come to say with the Apostle Quis infirmatur who is weake and I am not weake too who is offended and I am not affected with it when the people of God are distressed with sicknesse with dearth with any publique calamity the Minister is the first man that should be compassionate that should be compassionate and sensible of it In these words then I am the man c. these are our two parts first the Burden and then the Ease first the waight and then the Alleviation first the Discomfort and then the Refreshing the sea of afflictions that overflow and surround us all and then our emergency and lifting up our head above that sea In the first we shall consider first the Generality of afflictions and that first in their own nature And then secondly in that name of man upon whom they fall here Gheber Ego vir I am the man which is that name of man by which the strongest the powerfullest of men are denoted in the Scriptures They the strongest the mightiest they that thought themselves safest and sorrow-proofe are afflicted And lastly in the person upon whom these afflictions are fastned here Ieremy the Prophet of whom literally we understand this place The dearliest beloved of God and those of whose service God may have use in his Church they are subject to be retarded in their service by these afflictions Nothing makes a man so great amongst men nothing makes a man so necessary to God as that he can escape afflictions And when we shall have thus considered the generality thereof these three wayes In the nature of affliction it selfe In the signification of that name of exaltation Gheber And in the person of Ieremy we shall passe to the consideration of the vehemency and intensnesse thereof in those circumstances that are laid down in our Text First that these afflictions are Ejus His The Lords And then they are in virga in his rod And again In virga irae in the rod of his wrath And in these two branches the extent and the weight of afflictions and in these few circumstances that illustrate both we shall determine our first part the burden the discomfort When we shall come at last to our last part of comfort we shall finde that also to grow out into 2 branches for first Vidit he saw his affliction I am the Man that hath seen affliction Affliction did not blinde him not stupefie him affliction did not make him unsensible of affliction which is a frequent but a desperate condition vidit he saw it that is first And then Ego vir I am the man that saw it he maintained the dignity of his station still he played the man still he survived to glorifie God and to be an example to other men of patience under Gods corrections and of thankfulnesse in Gods deliverance In which last part
word that is without understanding or considering the institution vertue of baptisime expressed in Gods word and so receive baptisme onely for temporall and naturall respects they are not led to the waters but they fall into them and so as a Man may be drowned in a wholsome bath so such a Man may perish eternally in baptisme if he take it for satisfaction of the State or any other by respect to which that Sacrament is not ordained in the word of God He shall lead Men of years by Instruction and he shall lead young children in good company and with a strong guard he shall lead them by the faith of his Church by the faith of their Parents by the faith of their sureties and undertakers He shall lead them and then when he hath taken them into his government for first it is Reget he shall govern them and then Deducet that is he shall lead them in his Church and therefore they that are led to baptisme any other way then by the Church they are misled nay they are miscarried misdriven Spiritu vertiginis with the spirit of giddinesse They that joyne any in commission with the Trinity though but as an asstsant for so they say in the Church of Rome baptisme may be administred in the name of the Father Sonne and holy Ghost and the virgin Mary they follow not as Christ led in his Church Non fuit sic ab initio it was not so from the beginning for quod extra hos tres est totum Conservum est though much dignity belong to the memory of the Saints of God yet whosoever is none of the three Persons Conservus est he is our fellow-servant though his service lie above staires and ours below his in the triumphant ours in the militant Church Conservus est yet he or she is in that respect but our fellow-servant and not Christs fellow-redeemer So also if we be led to Marah to the waters of bitternesse that we bring a bitter taste of those institutions of the Church for the decency and signification in Sacramentall things things belonging to Baptisme if we bring a misinterpretation of them an indisposition to them an aversnesse from them and so nourish a bitternes and uncharitablenesse towards one another for these Ceremonies if we had rather crosse one another and crosse the Church then crosse the child as God shewed Moses a tree which made those waters in the wildernesse sweet when it was cast in so remember that there is the tree of life the crosse of Christ Iesus and his Merits in this water of baptisme when we all agree in that that all the vertue proceeds from the crosse of Christ the God of unity and peace and concord let us admit any representation of Christs crosse rather then admit the true crosse of the devill which is a bitter and schismaticall crossing of Christ in his Church for it is there in his Church that he leads us to these waters Well then they to whom these waters belong have Christ in his Church to lead them and therefore they need not stay till they can come alone till they be of age and years of discretion as the Anabaptists say for it is Deducet and Deducet cos generally universally all that are of this government all that are appointed for the Seal all the one hundred and forty foure thousand all the Innumerable multitudes of all Nations Christ leads them all Be Baptized every one of you in the name of Iesus Christ for the remission of sinnes for the promise is made unto you and your children Now all promises of God are sealed in the holy Ghost To whom soever any promise of God belongs he hath the holy Ghost and therefore Nunquid aquam quis prohibere potest Can any Man forbid water that these should not be baptized which havereceived the holy Ghost as well as we says S. Peter And therfore the Children of the Covenant which have the promise have the holy Ghost all they are in this Regiment Deducet cos Christ shall lead them all But whither unto the lively says our first edition unto the living says our last edition fountaines of waters In the originall unto the fountaines of the water of life now in the Scriptures nothing is more ordianry then by the name of waters to designe and meane tribulations so amongst many other God says of the City of Tyre that he would make it a desolate City and bring the deep upon it and great waters should cover it But then there is some such addition as leads to that sense either they are called Aqua multae great waters or Profunda aquarum deep waters or Absorbebit aqua whirlepooles of waters or Tempestas aquae tempestuous waters or Aqua Fellis bitter water God bath mingled gall in our water but we shall never read fontes aquarum fountaines of waters but it hath a gratious sense and presents Gods benefits So they have forsaken me the fountaine of living waters So the water that I shall give shall be in him a well of water springing up unto everlasting life and so every where else when we are brought to the fountaines to this water in the fountaine in the institution howsover we puddle it with impertinent questions in disputation however we soule it with our finnes and all conversation the fountaine is pure Baptisme presents and offers grace and remission of sinnes to all Nay not onely this fountaine of water but the greatest water of all the flood it selfe Saint Basil understands and applies to Baptisme as the Apostle himselfe does Baptisme was a figure of the flood and the Arke for upon that place The Lord sitseth upon the flood and the Lord doth remaine King for ever he says Baptismi gratiam Diluvium nominat nam deles purgat David calls Baptisme the flood because it destroyes all that was sinfull in us and so also he referrs to Baptisme those words when David had confessed his sinnes I thought I would confesse against my selfe my wickednesse unto the Lord and when it is added Surely in the flood of great waters they shall not come near him peccato non appropinquabunt says he originall sinne shall not come neare him that is truly baptized nay all the actuall sinnes in his future life shall be drowned in this baptisme as often as he doth religiously and repentantly consider that in Baptisme when the merit of Christ was communicated to him he received an Antidote against all poyson against all sinne if he applied them together sinne and the merit of Christ for so also he says of that place God will subdue all our iniquities and cast our sinnes into the bottome of the Sea Hoc est in mare Baptismi says Basil into the Sea of Baptisme There was a Brasen Sea in the Temple and there is a golden Sea in the Church of
but every poore soule in the Church may heare all these three witnesses testifying to him Integrum Iesum suum that all which Christ Jesus hath done and suffered appertaines to him but yet to bring it nearer him in visible and sensible things There are tres de terra three upon earth too The first of these three upon earth is the Spirit which Saint Augustine understands of the spirit the soule of Christ for when Christ commended his spirit into the hands of his Father this was a testimony that he was Verus hemo that he had a soule and in that he laid downe his spirit his soule for no Man could take it from him and tooke it againe at his pleasure in his resurrection this was a testimony that he was Verus Deus true God And so says Saint Augustine Spiritus The spirit that is anima Christi the soule of Christ did testifie De integritate Iesu all that belonged to Jesus as he was God and as he was Man But this makes the witnesses in heaven and the witnesses in earth all one for the personall testimony of Christs preaching and living and dying the testimony which was given by these three Persons of the Trinity was all involv'd in the first rank of witnesses Those three which are in heaven Other later Men understand by the Spirit here the Spirit of every Regenerate Man and that in the other heavenly witnesses the spirit is Spiritus sanctus the spirit that is holy in it selfe the holy Ghost and here it is Spiritus sanctificatus that spirit of Man which is made holy by the holy Ghost according to that The same spirit beareth witnesse with our spirit that we are the children of God But in this sense it is too particular a witnesse too singular to be intended here for that speakes but to one Man at once The spirit therefore here is Spiritus oris the word of God the Gospell and the preaching and ministration thereof We are made Ministers of the New testament of the spirit that giveth life And if the ministration of death were glorious how shall not the ministration of the spirit be more glorious It is not therefore the Gospell meerly but the preaching of the Gospell that is this spirit Spiritus sacerdotis vehioulum Spiritus Dei The spirit of the Minister is not so pure as the spirit of God but it is the chariot the meanes by which God will enter into you The Gospell is the Gospell at home at your house and there you doe well to read it and reverence it as the Gospell but yet it is not Spiritus it is not this Spirit this first witnesse upon earth but onely there where God hath blessed it with his institution and ordinance that is in the preaching thereof The stewardship and the dispensation of the graces of God the directing of his threatnings against refractary and wilfull sinners the directing of his promises to simple and supple and conâ—rite penitents the breaking of the bread the applying of the Gospell according to their particular indigences in the preaching thereof this is the first witnesse The second witnesse here is The water and I know there are some Men which will not have this to be understood of the water of Baptisme but onely of the naturall effect of water that as the abtutions of the old law by water did purge us so we have an inward testimony that Christ doth likewise wash us cleane so the water here must not be so much as water but a metaphoricall and figurative water These men will not allow water in this place to have any relation to the sacrament and Saint Ambrose was so far from doubting that water in this place belonged to the sacrament that he applies all these three witnesses to the Sacrament of Baptisme Spiritus mentem renovat All this is done in Baptisme says he The Spirit renewes and disposes the mind Aqua perficit ad Lavacrum The water is applied to cleanse the body Sanguis Spectat ad preâ—lium and the bloud intimates the price and ransome which gives force and virtue to this sacrament And so also says he in another place In sanguine mors in the bloud there is a representation of death in the water of our buriall and in the spirit of our owne life Some will have none of these witnesses on earth to belong to baptisme not the water and Ambrose will have all spirit and water and bloud to belong to it Now both Saint Ambrose who applies all the three witnesses to Baptisme and those later men which deny any of the witnesses to belong to baptisme doe both depart from the generall acceptation of these words that water here and onely that signifies the Sacrament of baptisme For as in the first creation the first thing that the spirit of God is noted to have moved upon was the waters so the first creature that is sanctified by Christs institution to our Salvation is this element of water The first thing that produced any living sensible creature was the water Primus liquor qnod viveret edidit ne mirum sit quod in Baptismo aquae aâ—nimare noverunt water brought forth the first creatures says Tertullian That we should not wonder that water should bring forth Christians The first of Gods afficting miracles in Egypt was the changing of water into bloud and the first miracle of grace in the new Testament was the changing of water into wine at the mariage So that water hath still been a subject and instrument of Gods conversation with man So then Aqua janua ecclesiae we cannot come into the Church but by water by baptisme for though the Church have taken knowledge of other Baptismes Baptisma sanguinis which is Martyrdome and Baptisma Flaminis which is a religious desire to be baptized when no meanes can be got yet there is no other sacrament of Baptisme but Baptisma Fluminis the Baptisme of water for the rest Conveniunt in causando sed non in significando says the Schoole that is God doth afford a plentifull retribution to the other baptismes Flaminis and Sanguinis but God hath not ordained them to be outward seales and significations of his grace and to be witnesses of Iesus his comming upon earth as this water is And therefore they that provide not duly to bring their children to this water of life not to speake of the essentiall necessity thereof they take from them one of the witnesses that Iesus is come into them and as much as they can they shut the Church dore against them they leave them out of the Arke and for want of this water cast them into that generall water which overflowes all the rest of the world which are not brought within the Covenant by this water of baptisme For though in the first Translation of the new Testament into Syriaque that be said in the sixth verse that Jesus is come per manus
of his word or in scantler measure not to be always a Christian but then when thou hast use of being one or in a different fashion to be singular and Schisâ—aticall in thy opinion for this is one but an ill manner of putting on of Christ as a garment The second and the good way is to put on his righteousnesse and his innocency by imitation and conforming our selves to him Now when we goe about earnestly to make our selves Temples and Altars and to dedicate our selves to God we must change our clothes As when God bad Iacob to goe up to Bethel to make an Altar he commanded all his family to change their clothes In which work we have two things to doe first we must put off those clothes which we had and appeare naked before God without presenting any thing of our owne for when the Spirit of God came upon Saul and that he prophecyed his first act was to strip himselfe naked And then sâ—condly we come to our transfiguration and to have those garments of Christ communicated to us which were as white as the light and we shall be admitted into that little number of which it is said Thou hast a few Namees in Sardis which have not defiled their garments and they shall walke with â—e in white And from this which is Induere vestem from this putting on Christ as a garment we shall grow up to that perfection as that we shall Inâ—â—ere personam put on hiâ— his person That is we shall so appeare before the Father as that he shall take us for his owne Christ we shall beare his name and person and we shall every one be so accepted as if every one of us were all Mankind yea as if we were he himselfe He shall find in all our bodies his woundes in all our mindes his 〈◊〉 in all our hearts and actions his obedience And as he shall doe this by impâ—tation so really in all our Agonies he shall send his Angels to minister unto us as he did to Eliâ—s In all our tentations he shall furnish us with his Scriptures to confoâ—â—d the Tempter as be in person did in his tentation and in our heaviest tribulation which may exâ—â—â—â— from us the voice of diffidence My God My God why hast 〈◊〉 forsaken me He shall give us the assurance to say In manus tuas câ— Into thy â—ands O Lord have I coâ—â—â—â—nded my spirit and there I am safe He shall use us in all things as his sonne and we shall find restored in us the Image of the whole Trinity imprinted at our creation for by this Regeneration we are adopted by the Father in the bloud of the Sonne by the sanctification of the holy Ghost Now this putting on of Christ whereby we stand in his place at Gods Tribunall implies as I said both our Election and our sanctification both the eternall purpose of God upon us and his execution of that purpose in us And because by the first by our Election we are members of Christ in Gods purpose before baptisme and the second which is sanctification is expressed after baptisme in our lives and conversation therefore Baptisme intervenes and comes between both as a seale of the first of Election and as an instrument and conduit of the second Sanctification Now Abscendita Dominâ— Dea nostro quae manifesta suâ—s nobis let no Man be too curiously busie to search what God does in his hedchamber we have all enough to answer for that which we have done in our bedchamber For Gods eternall decree himselfe is master of those Rolls but out of those Rolls he doth exemplifie those decrees in the Sacrament of baptisme by which Copy and exemplification of his invisible and unsearchable decree we plead to the Church that we are Gods children we plead to our owne consciences that we have the Spirit of adoption and we plead to God himselfe the obligation of his own promise that we have a right to this garment Christ Iesus and to those graces which must sanctifie us for from thence comes the reason of this text for all yeâ— that are baptized into Christ have put on Christ. As we cannot see the Essence of God but must see him in his glasses in his Images in his Creatures so we cannot see the decrees of God but must see them in their duplicats in their exemplification in the sacraments As it would doe him no good that were condemned of treason that a Bedchamber man should come to the Judge and swear he saw the king signe the prisoners pardon except he had it to pleade so what assurance soever what priâ—y marke soever those men which pretend to be so well acquainted and so familiar with the decrees of God to give thee to know that thou art elect to eternall salvation yea if an Angel from heaven comedowne and tell thee that he saw thy name in the booke of life if thou have not this Exemplification of the decree this seale this Sacrament if thou beest not baptized never delude thy selfe with those imaginary assurances This Baptisme then is so necessary that first as Baptisme in a large acceptation signifies our dying and buriall with Christ and all the acts of our regeneration so in that large sense our whole life is a baptisme But the very sacrament of Baptismeâ— the actuall administration and receiving thereof was held so necessary that even for legall and Civill uses as in the law that child that dyed without circumcision had no interest in the family no participation of the honor nor name thereof So that we see in the reckning of the Genealogy and pedegree of David that first sonne of his which he had by Bathshebae which dyed without circumcision is never mentioned nor toucht upon So also since the time of Mâ—ses law in the Imperiall law by which law a posthume child borne after the fathers death is equall with the rest in division of the state yet if that child dye before he be baptized no person which should derive a right from him as the mother might if he dyed can have any title by him because he is not considered to have been at all if he dye unbaptized And if the State will not beleeve him to be a full Man shall the Church beleeve him to be a full Christian before baptisme Yea the apprehension of the necessity of this Sacrament was so common and so generall even in the beginning of the Christian Church that out of an excessive advancing of that trnth they came also to a falshoodâ— to an error That even they that dyed without baptisme might have the benefit of baptisme if another were baptized in their name after their deathâ— And so out of a mistaking of those words Else what shall they doe Qui baptizantur pro mortuis which is that are ready to dye when they are baptized the Marcionites induc'd a custome to lay one under the dead bodyes
deeds to him But the Lord was there and Iacob knew it not As he takes knowledge by the first light of Gods presence so he acknowledges that he had none of this light of himself Ego nesciebam Iacob a Patriarch and dearly beloved of God knew not that God was so near him How much lesse shall a sinfull man that multiples sinnes like clouds between God and him know that God is near him As Saint Augustine said when hee came out of curiousty to hear Saint Ambrose preach at Milaâ— without any desire of profiting thereby Appropinquavi vesciebam I came 〈◊〉 God but knew it not So the customary and habituall sinners may say Eloâ—gavi nisciebam I have â—loyn'd my selfe I have gone farther and farther from my God and was never sensible of it It is a desperate Ignorance not to bee sensible of Gods absence but to acknowledge with Iacob that we cannot see light but by that light that we cannot know Gods presence but by his revealing of himself is a religious and a Christian humility To know it by Reason by Philosophy is a dimme and a faint knowledge but onely by the testimony of his own spirit and his own revealing we come to that confidence Verè Domine Surely the Lord is in this place Est apud 〈◊〉 sed deâ—â—â—â—lans God is with the wicked but he dissembles his beeing there that is conceals it he will not be known of it Et 〈◊〉 malâ—rum dissiâ—â—â—latio quodammodo Veritas non est when God winks at mens sinnes when he dissembles or disguises his knowledge we may almost say says Saint Bernard Veritas non est Here is not direct dealing here is not intire truth his presence is scarce a true presence And therefore as the same Father proceeds Si dicere licet if we may be bold to expresse it so Apud impios est sed in dissimulatione he is with the wicked but yet he dissembles he disguises his presence he is there to no purpose to no profit of theirs but Est apud justos in veritate with the righteous he is in truth and in clearnesse Est apud Angelâ—s in foelicitate with the Angels and Saints in heaven he is in an established happinesse Est apud inferos in feritate he is in Hell in his â—ury in an irrevocable and undeterminable execution of his severity God was surely and truly with Iacob and with all them who are sensible of his approaches and of his gracious manifestation of himself Verè non erat apud eos quibus dixit quid vocatiâ—â— me Dominum non facitis qua dixi vobis God is not truly with them whom he rebukes for saying Why call ye 〈◊〉 Lord and do not my Commandements but ubi in ejus nomive Angeli simul homines congregantur When Angels and men Priest and people the Preacher and the congregation labour together upon this Ladder study the advancing of his Church as by the working of Gods gratious Spirit we doe at this time 〈◊〉 verè est ibi verè Dominus est surely he is in this place and surely he is Lord in this place he possesses he fills us all he governs us all and as though we say to him Our Father which art in heaven yet we beleeve that he is within these walls so though we say Adveniat regnum tuum thy kingdome come we beleeve that his kingdome is come and is amongst us in grace now as it shall be in glory hereafter When he was now throughly awake when he was come to an open profession when he acknowledged himselfe to stand in the sight of God when he confessed his owne ignorance of Gods presence and when after all he was come to a setled confidence Verè Dominus surely the Lord is here yet it is added Et timuit and he was afraid No man may thinke himselfe to bee come to that familiar acquaintance with God as that it should take away that reverentiall feare which belongs to so high and supreme a Majesty When the Angell appeared to the wife of Manoah foretelling Samsons birth she says to her husband the fashion of him was like the fashion of the Angell of God what 's that Exceeding fearfull When God appears to thy soule even in mercy in the forgivenes of thy sins yet there belongs a fear even to this apprehension of mercy Not a fearfull diffidence not a distrust but a fearfull consideration of that height and depth what a high Majesty thou hast offended what a desperate depth thou wast falling into what a fearfull thing it had been to have fallen into the hands of the living God and what an irrecoverable wretch thou hadst been if God had not manifested himselfe to have been in that place with thee And therefore though he have appeared unto thee in mercy yet be afraid lest he goe away againe As Manoab prayed and said I beseech thee my Lord let the Man of God whom thou sentest come againe unto us and teach us what we shall doe with the child when he is born so when God hath once appeared to thy soul in mercy pray him to come again and tell thee what thou shouldest doe with that mercy how thou shouldest husband those first degrees of grace and of comfort to the farther benefit of thy soule and the farther glory of his name and be afraid that thy dead flyes may putrefie his ointment those reliques of sinne though the body of sinne be crucified in thee which are left in thee may overcome his graces for upon those words Pavor tenuit me tremor emniâ—â—ssa mea perterrita sunt feare came upon me and trembling which made all my bones to shake Saint Gregory says well Quid per â—ssa nisi fortia act a designantur our good deeds our strongest works and those which were done in the best strength of grace are meant by our bones and yet ossa perterrita our strongest works tremble at the presence and examination of God And therefore to the like purpose upon those words of the Psalme the same Father says Omnia ossa mea dicent Domine quis similis tibi all my bones say Lord who is like unto thee Carnes meae verba non habent my fleshly parts my carnall affections Infirma mea funditus silent my sinnes or my infirmities dare not speak at all not appear at all Sed ossa mea quae fortia credidi sua consideratione tremiscunt my very bones shake there is no degree no state neither of innocence nor of repentance nor of faith nor of sanctification above that fear of God and he is least acquainted with God who things that he is so familiar that he need not stand in feare of him But this fear hath no ill effect It brings him to a second profession Et dixit and he spoke againe He waked and then he spoke as soon as he came out of ignorance
our sakes not onely sinfull but sin it self And as one cruell Emperour wished all mankinde in one man that hee might have beheaded mankinde at one blow so God gathered the whole nature of sinne into one Christ that by one action one passion sin all sin the whole nature of sinne might bee overcome It was sin that was upon Christ else God could not have been angry with him nor pleased with us It was sin and his own sin Mine iniquities says Christ in his Type and figure David and in his body the Church and we may be bold to adde in his very person Mine iniquities Many Heretiques denied his body to be his Body they said it was but an airy an imaginary an illusory Body and denied his Soul to be his Soul they said he had no humane soul but that his divine nature supplied that and wrought all the operations of the soul. But we that have learnt Christ better know that hee could not have redeemed man by that way that was contracted betweene him and his Father that is by way of satisfaction except he had taken the very body and the very soul of man And as verily as his humane nature his body and soul were his his sins were his too As my mortality and my hunger and thirst and wearinesse and all my naturall infirmities are his so my sins are his sins And now when my sins are by him thus made his sins no Hell-Devill not Satan no Earth-Devill no Calumniator can any more make those sins my sins then he can make his divinity mine As by the spirit of Adoption I am made the childe of God the seed of God the same Spirit with God but yet I am not made God so by Christs taking my sins I am made a servant of my God a Beads-man of my God a vassall a Tributary debtor to God but I am no sinner in the sight of God no sinner so as that man or the Devill can impute that sin unto me then when my Saviour hath made my sins his As a Soldier would not part with his scars Christ would not They were sins that lay upon him part with our sins And his sins and as it follows in his Type David sins in a plurality many sins I know nothing in the world so manifold so plurall so numerous as my sins And my Saviour had all those But if every other man have not so many sins as I he owes that to Gods grace and not to the Devils forbearance for the Devill saw no such parts nor no such power in me to advance or hinder his kingdome no such birth no such education no such place in the State or Church as that he should be gladder of me then of other men He ministers tentations to all and all are overcome by his tentations And all these sins in all men were upon Christ at once All twice over In the root and in the fruit too In the bullein and in the coin too In grosse and in retail In Originall and in Actuall sin And howsoever the sins of former ages the sins of all men for 4000 years before which were all upon him when he was upon the Crosse might possibly be numbred as things that are past may easilier fall within a possibility of such an imagination yet all those sinnes which were to come after he himself could not number for hee as the Sonne of man though hee know how long the world hath lasted knowes not how long this sinfull world shall last and when the day of Judgement shall be And all those future sins were his sins before they were committed They were his before they were theirs that doe them And lest this world should not afford him sins enow he took upon him the sins of heaven it self not their sins who were fallen from heaven and fallen into an absolute incapacity of reconciliation but their sins which remained in heaven Those sins which the Angels that stand would fall into if they had not received a confirmation given them in contemplation of the death and merits of Christ Christ took upon him for all things in Earth and Heaven too were reconciled to God by him for if there had been as many worlds as there are men in this which is a large multiplication or as many worlds as there are sins in this which is an infinite multiplication his merit had been sufficient to all They were sins his sins many sinnes the sinnes of the world and then as in his Type David Supergressae his sins these sins were got above him And not as Davids or ours by an insensible growth and swelling of a Tide in Course of time but this inundation of all the sins of all places and times and persons was upon him in an instant in a minute in such a point as admits and requires a subtile and a serious consideration for it is eternity which though it doe infinitely exceed all time yet is in this consideration lesse then any part of time that it is indivisible eternity is so and though it last for ever is all at once eternity is so And from this point this timelesse time time that is all time time that is no time from all eternity all the sins of the world were gone over him And in that consideration supergressae caput they were gone over his head Let his head bee his Divine nature yet they were gone over his head for though there bee nothing more voluntary then the love of God to man for he loves us not onely for his own sake or for his own glories sake but he loves us for his loves sake he loves us and loves his love of us and had rather want some of his glory then wee should not have nay then he should not have so much love towards us though this love of his be an act simply voluntary yet in that act of expressing this love in the sending a Saviour there was a kinde of necessity contracted on Christs part such a contract had passed between him and his Father that as himself says there was an oportuit pati a necessity that he should suffer all that he suffered and so enter into glory when he was come so there was an oportuit venire a necessity a necessity induced by that contract that he should come in that humiliation and smother and suppresse the glory of the divine nature under a cloud of humane of passible of inglorious flesh So be his divine nature this head his sins all our sins made his were gone above his head And over his head all those ways that we considered before in our selves Sicut tectum sicut fornix as a roof as an arch that had separated between God and him in that he prayed and was not heard when in that Transeat Calix Father if it be possible let this cup passe from me the Cup was not onely not taken out of his hands but filled up
Evangelists that that voice added Hear him for after that Declaration that he who was visibly and personally come amongst them was the Sonne of God there was no reason to doubt of mens willingnesse to hear him who went forth in person to preach unto them in this world As long as he was to stay with them it was not likely that they should need provocation to hear him therefore that was not added at his Baptisme and entrance into his personall ministery But when Christ came to his Transfiguration which was a manifestation of his glory in the next world and an intimation of the approaching of the time of his going away to the possession of that glory out of this world there that voyce from heaven sayes This is my beloved Sonne in whom I am well pleased heare him When he was gone out of this world men needed a more particular solicitation to heare him for how and where and in whom should they heare him when he was gone In the Church for the same testimony that God gave of Christ to authorize and justifie his preaching hath Christ given of the Church to justifie her power The holy Ghost fell upon Christ at his Baptism and the holy Ghost fell upon the Apostles who were the representative Church at Whitsontide The holy Ghost tarried upon Christ then and the holy Ghost shall tarry with the Church usque ad consummationem till the end of the world And therefore as we have that institution from Christ Dic Ecclesiae when men are refractary and perverse to complaine to the Church so have they who are complained of to the Church that institution from Christ also Audi Ecclesiam Hearken to the voyce of God in the Church and they have from him that commination If you disobey them you disobey God in what fetters soever they binde you you shall rise bound in those fetters and as he who is excommunicated in one Diocese should not be received in another so let no man presume of a better state in the Triumphant Church then he holds in the Militant or hope for communion there that despises excommunication here That which the Scripture says God sayes says St. Augustine for the Scripture is his word and that which the Church says the Scriptures say for she is their word they speak in her they authorize her and she explicates them The Spirit of God inanimates the Scriptures and makes them his Scriptures the Church actuates the Scriptures and makes them our Scriptures Nihil salubrius says the same Father There is not so wholsome a thing no soule can live in so good an aire and in so good a diet Quà m ut Rationem praecedat authoritas Then still to submit a mans owne particular reason to the authority of the Church expressed in the Scriptures For certainly it is very truly as it is very usefully said by Calvin Semper nimia morositas est ambitiosa A frowardnesse and an aptnesse to quarrell at the proceedings of the Church and to be delivered from the obligations and constitutions of the Church is ever accompanied with an ambitious pride that they might enjoy a licentious liberty It is not because the Church doth truly take too much power but because they would be under none it is an ambition to have all government in their own hands and to be absolute Emperors of themselves that makes them refractary But if they will pretend to believe in God they must believe in God so as God hath manifested himself to them they must believe in Christ so if they will pretend to heare Christ they must heare him there where he hath promised to speake they must heare him in the Church The first reason then in this Trinity the person that directs is the Church the Trumpet in which God sounds his Iudgements and the Organ in which he delivers his mercy And then the persons of the second place the persons to whom the Church speakes here are Filiae Sion The daughters of Sion her owne daughters We are not called Filii Ecclesiae sonnes of the Church The name of sonnes may imply more virility more manhood more sense of our owne strength then becomes them who professe an obedience to the Church Therefore as by a name importing more facility more supplenesse more application more tractablenesse she calls her children Daughters But then being a mother and having the dignity of a Parent upon her she does not proceed supplicatorily she does not pray them nor intreat them she does not say I would you would go forth and I would you would looke out but it is Egredimini videte imperatively authoritatively Do it you must do it So that she showes what in important and necessary cases the power of the Church is though her ordinary proceedings by us and our Ministery be To pray you in Christs stead to be reconciled to God In your baptisme your soules became daughters of the Church and they must continue so as long as they continue in you you cannot devest your allegiance to the Church though you would no more then you can to the State to whom you cannot say ◠will be no subject A father may dis-inherit his son upon reasons but even that dis-inherited childe cannot renounce his father That Church which conceived thee in the Covenant of God made to Christians and their seed and brought thee forth in baptisme and brought thee up in catechizing and preaching may yet for thy misdemeanor to God in her separate thee à Mensa Toro from bed and board from that sanctuary of the soule the Communion Table and from that Sanctuary of the body Christian buriall and even that Christian buriall gives a man a good rise a good helpe a good advantage even at the last resurrection to be laid down in expectation of the Resurrection in holy ground and in a place accustomed to Gods presence and to have been found worthy of that Communion of Saints in the very body is some earnest and some kinde of first-fruits of the joyfull resurrection which we attend God can call our dead bodies from the sea and from the fire and from the ayre for every element is his but consecrated ground is our element And therefore you daughters of Sion holy and religious souls for to them onely this indulgent mother speaks here hearken ever to her voice quarrell not your mothers honor nor her discretion Despise not her person nor her apparell Doe not say she is not the same woman she was heretofore nor that she is not so well dressed as she was then Dispute not her Doctrine Despise not her Discipline that as you sucked her breasts in your Baptism in the other Sacrament when you entred and whilst you stayd in this life so you may lie in her bosome when you goe out of it Hear her a good part of that which you are to hear from her is envolv'd inwrapped in that w ch we have propos'd
shall feare the Lord and his goodnesse in the later dayes And beyond this land there is no more Sea beyond this mercy no more Judgement for with this mercy the Chapter ends Consider our text then as a whole Globe as an intire Spheare and then our two Hemispheares of this Globe our two parts of this text will bee First that no perversnesse of ours no rebellion no disobedience puts God beyond his mercy nor extinguishes his love still hee calls Israel rebellious Israel his Children nay his owne anger his owne Judgements then when hee is in the exercise thereof in the execution thereof puts him not beyond his mercy extinguishes not his love hee hides not his face from them then hee leaves them not then in the darke hee accompanies their calamity with a light hee makes that time though cloudy though overcast yet a day unto them the Children of Israel shall abide many days in this case But then as no disobedience removes God from himself for he is love and mercy so no interest of ours in God doth so priviledge us but that hee will execute his Judgements upon his Children too even the Children of Israel shall fall into these Calamities And from this first part wee shall passe to the second from these generall considerations That no punishments should make us desperate that no favours should make us secure we shall passe to the particular commination and judgements upon the children of Israel in this text without King without Prince c. In our first part we stop first upon this declaration of his mercy in this fatherly appellation Children the children of Israel He does not call them children of Israel as though hee disavowed them and put them off to another Father but therefore because they are the Children of Israel they are his Children for hee had maried Israel and maried her to himselfe for ever Many of us are Fathers and from God here may learne tendernesse towards children All of us are children of some parents and therefore should hearken after the name of Father which is nomen pietatis potestatis a name that argues their power over us and our piety towards them and so concernes many of us in a double capacity as we are children and parents too but all of us in one capacity as we are children derived from other parents God is the Father of man otherwise then he is of other creatures He is the Father of all Creatures so Philo calls all Creatures sorâ—res suas his sisters but then all those sisters of man all those daughters of God are not alike maried God hath placed his Creatures in divers rankes and in divers conditions neither must any man thinke that he hath not done the duty of a Father if he have not placed all his Sonnes or not matched all his daughters in a condition equall to himselfe or not equall to one another God hath placed creatures in the heavens and creatures in the earth and creatures in the sea and yet all these creatures are his children and when he looked upon them all in their divers stations he saw omnia valde bora that all was very well And that Father that imploies one Sonne in learning another to husbandry another to Merchandise pursues Gods example in disposing his children his creatures diversly and all well Such creatures as the Raine though it may seem but an imperfect and ignoble creature fallen from the wombe of a cloud have God for their Father God is the Father of the Raine And such creatures as light have but God for their Father God is Pater lâ—minum the Father of lights Whether we take lights there to be the Angels created with the light some take it so or to be the severall lights set up in the heavens Sun and Moon and Stars some take it so or to be the light of Grace in infusion by the Spirit or the light of the Church in manifestation by the word for all these acceptations have convenient Authors and worthy to be followed God is the Father of lights of all lights but so he is of raine and clouds too And God is the Father of glory as Saint Paul styles him of all glory whether of those beames of glory which he sheds upon us here in the blessings and preferments of this life or that waight of glory which he reserves for us in the life to come From that inglorious drop of raine that falls into the dust and rises no more to those glorious Saints who shall rise from the dust and fall no more but as they arise at once to the fulnesse of Essentiall joy so arise daily in accidentiall joyes all are the children of God and all alike of kin to us And therefore let us not measure our avowing or our countenancing of our kindred by their measure of honour or place or riches in the world but let us looke how fast they grow in the root that is in the same worship of the same God who is ours and their Father too He is nearest of kin to me that is of the same religion with me as they are creatures they are of kin to me by the Father but as they are of the same Church and religion by Father and mother too Philo calls all creatures his sisters but all men are his brothers God is the Father of man in a stronger and more peculiar and more masculine sense then of other Creatures Filius particeps con-dominus cum patre as the law calls the Sonne the partner of the Father and fellow-Lord joint-Lord with the Father of all the possession that is to descend so God hath made man his partner and fellow-Lord of all his other creatures in Moses his Dominamini when he gives man a power to rule over them and in Davids Omnia subjecisti when he imprints there a naturall disposition in the creature to the obedience of man So high so very high a filiation hath God given man as that having another Sonne by another filiation a higher filiation then this by an eternall generation yet he was content that that Sonne should become this Sonne that the Sonne of God should become the Sonne of Man God is the Father of all of man otherwise then of all the rest but then of the children of Israel otherwise then of all other men For he bought them and is not be thy Father that hath bought thee says God by Moses Not to speake of that purchase which he made by the death of his Sonne for that belongs to all the world he bought the Jews in particular at such a price such silver and such gold such temporall and such spirituall benefits such a Land and such a Church such a Law and such a Religion as certainly he might have had all the world at that price If God would have manifested himselfe poured out himselfe to the Nations as hee did to
dead without children as Tertullian expresses it in his particular elegancy Illiberis that is content to be his brother in that sense in that capacity to claime no children no spirituall children of his own begetting not to attribute to himself that holy generation of the Saints of God as though his learning or his wit or his labour had saved them but to content himselfe to have been the foster father and to have nursed those children whom the Spirit of God by over-shadowing the Church hath begot upon her for though it be with the word of truth in our preaching yet of his own will begot he us though by the word says the Apostle Saint Paul might say to the Corinthians Though you have tenne thousand instructors in Christ yet have yee not many fathers for in Christ Iesus I have begotten you through the Gospel And hee might say of his spirituall sonne Onesimus That he begot him in his bonds Those to whom he first of any presented the Gospel That had not heard of a Christ nor a holy Ghost before They into whom he infused a new religion new to them might well enough bee called his children and hee their father But we have no new doctrine to present no new opinion to infuse or miracles to amaze as in the Romane Church they are full of all these wee have no children to beget of our own Paul was not crucified for you nor were you baptized in the name of Paul sayes Paul himself as he sayes again who is Paul but a Minister by whom ye beleeved and that also not by him but as the Lord gave to every man Not as Paul preached to every man for he preached alike to every man but as the Lord gave to every man I have planted says he it is true but he that planteth is nothing says he also Only they that proceed as they proceed in the Romane Church Ex opere operato to tye the grace of God to the action of the man will venter to call Gods children their children in that sense My prayer shal be against that commination That God will not give us a miscarrying womb nor dry breasts that you may always suck pure milk from us and then not cast it up but digest it to your spirituall growth And I shall call upon God with a holy passion as vehement as Rachels to Iacob Da mihi liberos give me children or I die That God would give me children but his children that he by his Spirit may give you an inward regeneration as I by his ordinance shall present to you the outward means that so being begot by himselfe the father of life and of light you may be nursed and brought up in his service by me That so not attributing the work to any man but to Gods Ordinances you doe not tye the power of God nor the breath of life to any one mans lips as though there were no regeneration no begetting but by him but acknowledging the other to be but an instrument and the weakest to be that you may remember also That though a man can cut deeper with an Axe then with a knife with a heavy then with a lighter instrument yet God can pierce as far into a conscience by a plain as by an exquisite speaker Now this widow being thus maried This Church thus undertaken He must perform the duty of a husbands brother First it is a personall office he must doe it himself When Christ shall say at the Judgement I was naked and ye cloathed me not sick and ye visited me not it shall be no excuse to say When saw we thee naked when saw we thee sick for wee might have seen it wee should have seen it When we shall come to our accompt and see them whose salvation was committed to us perish because they were uninstructed and ignorant dare we say then we never saw them show their ignorance wee never heard of it That is the greatest part of our fault the heaviest weight upon our condemnation that we saw so little heard so little conversed so little amongst them because we were made watchmen and bound to see and bound to hear and bound to be heard not by others but by our selves My sheep may be saved by others but I save them not that are save so nor shall I my self be saved by their labour where mine was necessarily required The office is personall I must doe it and it is perpetuall I must perform it sayes the text goe through with it Lots wife looked backe and God never gave her leave to look forward again That man who hath put his hand to the plow and looks back Christ disables him for the kingdome of God The Galatians who had begun in the spirit and then relapsed before whose eyes Christ Iesus had been evidently set forth as the Apostle speaks fall under that reproach of the Apostle to bee called and called againe fooles and men bewitched If I beginne to preach amongst you and proceed not I shall fall under that heavy increpation from my God you beganne that you might for your owne glory shew that you were in some measure able to serve the Church and when you had done enough for your own glory you gave over my glory and the salvation of their souls to whom I sent you God hath set our eyes in our foreheads to look forward not backward not to be proud of that which we have done but diligent in that which we are to doe In the Creation if God had given over his worke the third or fift day where had man been If I give over my prayers due to the Church of God as long as God enables me to doe it service I lose my thanks nay I lose the testimony of mine own conscience for all My office is personall and it is perpetuall and then it is a duty He must perform the duty of a husbands brother unto her It is not of curtesie that we preach but it is a duty it is not a bounty given but it is a debt paid for though I preach the Gospel I have nothing to glory of for a necessity is laid upon me sayes Saint Paul himself It is true that as there is Vae si non Wo be unto mee if I doe not preach the Gospel so there is an Euge bone serve Well done good and faithfull servant to them that doe But the Vae is of Iustice the Euge is of Mercy If doe it not I deserve condemnation from God but if I doe it I deserve not thanks from him Nay it is a debt not onely to God but to Gods people to you and indeed there is more due to you then you can claime or can take knowledge of For the people can claime but according to the laws of that State and the Canons of that Church in which God hath placed them such preaching as those Laws and
by nature they are Spirits but by office they are Angels and when they see so good effect of their service as that a Sinner is converted There is joy in the presence of the Angels of God Christ himselfe had a spirituall office and employment To give light to the blind and to inflict blindnesse upon those who thought they saw all And when that was done Exultavit in spiritu in that houre Christ rejoyced in the Spirit and said I thank thee ô Father Lord of Heaven and Earth c. To have something to doe to doe it and then to Rejoyce in having done it to embrace a calling to performe the Duties of that calling to joy and rest in the peacefull testimony of having done so this is Christianly done Christ did it Angelically done Angels doe it Godly done God does it As the Bridegroome rejoyceth in his Bride so doth thy God rejoyce in thee Example as well as the Rule repeats it to you Gaudete semper But how farre may we carry this joy To what outward declarations To laughing Saint Basil makes a round answer to a short question An in Universum ridere non licet May a Man laugh in no case Admodum perspicuum est It is very evident that a Man may not because Christ saies Vae vobis Wo be unto you that laugh And yet Saint Basil himselfe in another place sayes which we are rather to take in explanation than in contradiction of himselfe that that woe of Christ is cast in obstreperum Sonum non in sinceram hilaritatem upon a dissolute and undecent and immoderate laughting not upon true inward joy howsoever outwardly expressed At the promise of a Son Abraham fell on his face and laughed a religious Man and a grave Man 100 yeares old expressed this joy of his heart by this outward declaration Hierome's Translation reads it Risit in Corde he laughed within himselfe because Saint Hierome thought that was a weaknesse a declination towards unbeliefe to laugh at Gods promise as he thinks Abraham did But Saint Paul is a better Witnesse in his behalf Against hope he believed in hope he was not weake in faith he staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief Quòd risit non incredulitatis sed exultation is indicium fuit his laughing was no ebbe of faith but a flood of joy It is not as S. Hierome takes it Risit in Corde putans celare deum apertè ridere non ausus he kept-in his laughing and durst not laugh out But as St. Ambrose says well Risus non irrisio diffidentis sed exultatio gratulantis he laughed not in a doubtfull scorne of Gods promise but in an overflowing of his own joy It is well expressed and well concluded O virum aeterno risu vere dignum sempiternae jueunditati bene praeparatum This was good evidence that he was a man well disposed for the joyes of heaven that he could conceive joy in the temporall blessings of God and that he thought nothing mis-becomming him that was an outward declaration of this joy It is a dangerous weaknesse to forbeare outward declarations of our sense of Gods goodnesse for feare of mis-interpretations to smother our present thankfulnesse for fear that some should say it was a levity to thank God so soon till God had done the whole work For God does sometimes leave half his work undone because he was not thanked for it When David danced and leaped and shouted before the Arke if he laughed too it mis-became him not Not to feele joy is an argument against religious tendernesse not to show that joy is an argument against thankfulnesse of the heart that is a stupidity this is a contempt A merry heart maketh a cheerfull countenance If it be within it will be without too Except I heare thee say in thine actions Gaudeo I do rejoyce I cannot know that thou hast heard the Apostle say Gaudete Joy for Gods blessings to us joy for Gods glory to himself may come ad Risum and farther Not onely ad Ridendum but ad Irridendum not onely to laugh in our own prosperity but to laugh them to scorne that would have impeached it They are put both together in God himself Ridebo and Irridebo I will laugh at your calamities and I will mock when your feare cometh And this being in that place intended of God is spoken in the person of Wisdome It mis-becomes not wisdome and gravity to laugh in Gods deliverances not to laugh to scorne those that would have blown up Gods Servants when it is carried so high as to the Kings of the Earth and the Rulers that take counsell against the Lord and against his Anoynted we may come Ad Gaudium to joy in Gods goodnesse but because their place and persons are sacred we leave the Ridere and the Irridere to God who says ver 4. That he will laugh at them and hold them in derision But at lower instruments lower persons may laugh when they fill the world with the Doctrine of killing of Kings and meane that that should animate men against such Kings as they call Heretiques and then finde in experience that this hath wrought onely to the killing of Kings of their own Religion we lament justly the event but yet we forbeare our Ridere and our Irridere at the crossing and the frustrating of their plots and practises Pharaohs Army was drowned Et Cecinit Moses Moses sung Sisera was slaine Et Cecinit Deborah Deborah sung Thus in the disappointing of Gods enemies Gods servants come to outward manifest signes of joy Not by a libellous and scurrill prophanation of persons that are sacred but in fitting Psalmes and Sermons and Prayers and publique Writings to the occasion to proceed to a Ridere and Irridere and as Saint Augustine reades that place of the Proverbs Superridere to laugh Gods Enemies into a confusion to see their Plots so often so often so often frustrated For so farre extends Gaudete Rejoyce evermore Joy then and cheerefulnesse is Sub praecepto it hath the nature of a commandment and so he departs from a commandment that departs and abandons himself into an inordinate sadnesse And therefore David chides his soule Why art thou cast down O my soul why art thou disquiesed within me And though he come after to dispute against this sadnesse of the soul which he had let in Hope yet in God and yet the Lord will command his loving kindnesse and my prayer shall be unto the God of my life yet he could not put it off but he imagines that he heares his enemies say Where is thy God and when he hath wrestled himself weary he falls back again in the last verse to his first faintnesse Why art thou cast down O my soule why art thou disquieted within me For As he that taketh away a garment in cold weather so is he that singeth Songs to