And yet even these men these Audians Epiphanius who first took knowledge of them calls but schismaticks not hereticks so loth is charitie to say the worst of any Yet we must remember them of the Romane perswasion that they come too neare giving God a bodie in their pictures of God the Father and they bring the bodie of God that bodie which God the Sonne hath assumed the bodie of Christ too neare in their Transsubstantiation not too neare our faith for so it cannot be brought too neare to our sense so it is as really there as we are there not too neare in the ubi for so it is there there that is in that place to which the Sacrament extends it self for the Sacrament extends as well to heaven from whence it fetches grace as to the table from whence it delivers bread and wine but too neare in modo for it comes not thither that way We must necessarily complain that they make religion too bodily a thing Our Saviour Christ corrected Marie Magdalenes zeal where she flew to him in a personall devotion and said John 20.17 Touch me not for I am not yet ascended to my Father Fix your meditations upon Christ Jesus so as he is now at the right hand of his Father in heaven and entangle not your selves so with controversies about his bodie as to lose reall charitie for imaginarie zeal nor enlarge your selves so farre in the pictures and images of his bodie as to worship them more then him As Damascen sayes of God that he is Superprincipale principium A beginning before any beginning we can conceive and praeterea aeternitas an eternitie infinitely elder then any eternity we can imagine so he is superspiritualis Spiritus such a Superspirit as that the soul of man and the substance of angels is but a bodie compared to this Spirit God hath no bodie though Tertullian disputed it though the Audians preached it though the Papists paint it and therefore this image of God is not in the body of man that way Nor that way neither which some others have assigned That God who hath no bodie as God yet in the creation did assume that form which man hath now and so made man in his image that is in that form which he had then assumed Some of the ancients thought so and some other men of great estimation in the Romane Church have thought so too In particular Oleaster a great officer in the Inquisition of Spain But great inquirers into other men are easie neglecters of themselves The image of God is not in mans bodie this way Nor that third way which others have imagined that is that when God said Let us make man after our likenesse God had respect to that form which in the fulnesse of time his Sonne was to take upon him upon earth Let us make him now sayes God at first like that which I intend hereafter my Sonne shall be for though this were spoken before the fall of man and so before any occasion of decreeing the sending of Christ yet in the School a great part of great men adhere to that opinion That God from all eternitie had a purpose that his Sonne should become man in this world though Adam had not fallen Non ut medicus sed ut Dominus ad nobilitandum genus humanum say they Though Christ had not come as a Redeemer if man had not needed him by sinne but had kept his first state yet as a Prince that desired to heap honour upon him whom he loves to do man an honour by his assuming that nature Christ say they should have come and to that image that form which he was to take then was man made in this text say these imaginers But alas how much better were wit and learning bestowed to prove to the Gentiles that a Christ must come that they beleeve not to prove to the Jews that the Christ is come that they beleeve not to prove to our own consciences that the same Christ may come again this minute to judgement we live as though we beleeved not that then to have filled the world and torn the Church with frivolous disputations Whether Christ should have come if Adam had not fallen Wo unto fomentours of frivolous disputations None of these wayes not because God hath a bodie not because God assumed a bodie not because it was intended that Christ should be born before it was intended that man should be made is this image of God in the bodie of man nor hath it in any other relation respect to the bodie but as we say in the School arguitivè and significativé that because God hath given man a bodie of a noblerform then any other creature we inferre and argue and conclude from thence that God is otherwise represented in man then in any other creature and so farre is this image of God in the bodie above that in the creatures that as you see some pictures to which the very tables are jewels some watches to which the very cases are jewels and therefore they have outward cases too and so the picture and the watch are in that outward case of what meaner stuff soever that be so is this image in this bodie as in an outward case so as that you may not injure nor enfeeble this bodie neither by sinfull intemperance and licentiousnesse nor by inordinate fastings or other disciplines of imaginarie merits while the bodie is alive for the image of God is in it nor defraud the body of decent buriall and due solemnities after death for the image of God is to return to it But yet the bodie is but the outward case and God looks not for the gilding or enamelling or painting of that but requires the labour and cost therein to be bestowed upon the table it self in which this image is immediately that is the soul and that is truely the ubi the place where this image is And there remains onely now the operation thereof how this image of God in the soul of man works The sphere then of this Intelligence the gallerie for this picture the arch for this statue the table and frame and shrine for this image of God is inwardly and immediately the soul of man not immediately so as that the soul of man is a part of the essence of God for so essentially Christ onely is the image of God S. Augustine at first thought so Putabam te Deus corpus lucidum me frustum de illo corpore I took thee O God sayes that Father to be a globe of fire and my soul to be a spark of that fire thee to be a bodie of light and my soul to be a beam of that light But S. Augustine doth not onely retract that in himself but dispute against it in the Manichees But this image is in our soul as the soul is the wax and this image the seal The comparison is S. Cyrils and he addes well that no seal but
in the next word Hominem That though we were made by the whole Trinitie yet the whole Trinitie made us but men and men in this name of our text Adam and Adam is but earth and that is our West our declination our Sun-set We passed over the foure names by which man is ordinarily expressed in the scriptures and we found necessary miserie in three of them and possible nay likely miserie in the fourth in the best name We insisted upon the name of our text Adam earth and had some use of these notes first That if I were but earth God was pleased to be the potter If I but a sheep he a shepherd If I but a cottage he a builder So he work upon me let me be what he will We noted that God made us earth not aire not fire that man hath bodily and worldly duties to perform and is not all spirit in this life Devotion is his soul but he hath a bodie of discretion usefulnesse to invest in some calling We noted too that in being earth we are equall we tried that equalitie first in the root in Adam there if any man will be nobler earth then I he must have more originall sinne then I for that was all Adams patrimonie all that he could give And we tried this equalitie in another furnace in the grave where there is no means to distinguish royall from plebeian nor catholick from hereticall dust And lastly we noted that this our earth was red considered in what respect it was red even in Gods hands but found that in the bloud-rednesse of sinne God had no hand but sinne and destructions for sinne were wholly from our selves which consideration we ended with this that there was Macula alba a white spot of leprosie as well as a red and we found the overvaluation of our own puritie and the uncharitable condemnation of all that differ from us to be that white spot And so farre we sailed with that Western winde are come to our third point in this our compasse our North. In this point III. Part. Aquilo the North we place our first comfort The North is not alwayes the comfortablest clime nor is the North alwayes a type of happinesse in the scriptures Many times God threatens storms from the North but even in those Northern storms we consider their action that they scatter they dissipate those clouds which were gathered and so induce a serenitie Job 37.22 And so fair weather comes from the North. The consideration of our West our low estate that we are but earth but red earth died red by our selves and that imaginary white which appeares so to us is but a white of leprosie this West inwraps us in heavie clouds of murmuring in this life that we cannot live so freely as beasts do and in clouds of desperation for the next life that we cannot die so absolutely as beasts do We die all our lives and yet we live after our deaths These are our clouds then the North shakes these clouds Prov. 25.13 The North-winde driveth away the rain sayes Solomon There is a North in our text that drives all these tears from our eyes Cant. 4.16 Christ calls upon the North as well as the South to blow upon his garden and to diffuse the perfumes thereof Adversitie as well as prosperitie opens the bountie of God unto us and oftentimes better But that is not the benefit of the North in our present consideration but this is it that first our Sunne sets in the West The Eastern dignitie which we received in our first creation as we were the work of the whole Trinitie falls under a Western cloud that that Trinitie made us but earth And then blows our North and scatters this cloud that this earth hath a nobler form then any other part or limbe of the world for we are made by a fairer pattern by a nobler image by a higher likenesse Faciamus Though we make but a man Let us make him in our image after our likenesse The varietie which the holy Ghost uses here in the pen of Moses hath given occasion to divers to raise divers observations upon these words which seem divers Image and Likenesse as also in the varietie of the phrase for it is thus conceived and layed In our image and then After our likenesse I know it is a good rule that Damascen gives Parva non sunt parva ex quibus magna proveniunt Nothing is to be neglected as little from which great things may arise If the consequence may be great the thing must not be thought little No Jod in the scripture shall perish therefore no Jod is superfluous if it were superfluous it might perish Words and lesse particles then words have busied the whole Church In the Councel of Ephesus where Bishops in a great number excommunicated Bishops in a greater Bishop against Bishop and Patriarch against Patriarch in which case when both parties had made strong parties in Court and the Emperour forbore to declare himself on either side for a time he was told that he refused to assent to that which 6000 Bishops had agreed in the strife was but for a word whether the blessed Virgin might be called Deipara The mother of God for Christipara The mother of Christ which Christ all agree to be God Nestorius and all his partie agreed with Cyril that she might be In the Councel of Calcedon the difference was not so great as for a word composed of syllables It was but for a syllable whether Ex or In. The heretiques condemned then confessed Christ to be Ex duabus naturis to be composed of two natures at first but not to be In duabus naturis not to consist of two natures after And for that In they were thrust out In the Councel of Nice it was not so much as a syllable made of letters for it was but for one letter whether Homoousion or Homöusion was the issue Where the question hath not been of divers words nor syllables nor letters but onely of the place of words what tempestuous differences have risen How much hath sola sides and sides sola changed the case Nay where there hath been no quarrell for precedencie for transposing of words or syllables or letters where there hath not been so much as a letter in question how much doth an accent varie a sense An interrogation or no interrogation will make it directly contrarie All Christian expositours reade those words of Cain My sinne is greater then can be pardoned Gen. 4.13 positively and so they are evident words of desperation The Jews reade them with an interrogation Are my sinnes greater then can be pardoned and so they are words of compunction and repentance The prophet Micheas sayes Mich. 5.3 that Bethlehem is a small place Matth. 2.6 The Evangelist S. Matthew sayes No small place An interrogation in Micheas mouth reconciles it Art thou a small place amounts to that
It was sua ratio suum verbum sua sapientia sayes that Father God spake to his own word and wisdome to his own purpose and goodnesse And the Sonne is the word and wisdome of God and the holy Ghost is the goodnesse and the purpose of God that is the administration the dispensation of his Church It is true that when God speaks this over again in the Church as he doth every day now this minute then God speaks to his Angels to the Angels of the Church to his Ministers he sayes Faciamus Let Vs Vs both together you and we make a man joyn mine ordinance your preaching with my Spirit sayes God to us and so make man Preach the oppressour and preach the wanton and preach the calumniatour into an other nature make that ravening wolf a man that licentious goat a man that insinuating serpent a man by thy preaching To day if you will heare his voice heare us for here he calls upon us to joyn with him for the making of man But for his first Faciamus which is in our text it is excellently said Dictum in senatu Rupertus soliloquio It was spoken in a senate and yet in solitarinesse spoken in private and yet publiquely spoken spoken where there were divers and yet but one one God and three persons If there were no more intended in this plurall expression Vs but as some have conceived that God spake here in the person of a Prince and Soveraigne Lord and therefore spake as Princes do in the plurall We command and we forbid yet S. Gregories caution would justly fall upon it Reverenter pensandum est It requires reverent consideration if it be but so for God speaks so like a King in the plurall but seldome but five times in my accompt in all the scriptures and in all five in cases of important consequence In this text first where God creates man whom he constitutes his vice-Roy in the world here he speaks in his Royall plurall And then in the next Chapter where he exempts mans term in this vice-regencie to the end of the world in propounding man means of succession Faciamus Let us make him a helper there he speaks in his Royall plurall And also in the third Chapter in declaring the hainousnesse of mans fault arraigning him and all us in him God sayes Sicut unus ex nobis Man is become as one of us not content to be our vice-Roy but our selves there is his Royall plurall too And again in that declaration of his justice in that confusion of the builders of Babylon Descendamus Confundamus Let us do it And then lastly in that great work of mingling mercy with justice which if we may so speak is Gods master-piece when he sayes Quis ex nobis Who will go for us and publish this In these places these onely and not all these neither if we take it exactly according to the originall for in the second the making of Eve though the vulgar have it in the plurall it is indeed but singular in the Hebrew God speaks as a King in his Royall plurall still And when it is but so Reverenter pensandum est sayes that Father It behoves us to hearken reverently to him for kings are images of God such images of God as have eares and can heare and hands and can strike But I would ask no more premeditation at your hands when you come to speak to God in this place then if you sued to speak with the King to speak with no more fear of God here then if you went to the King under the conscience of a guiltinesse towards him and a knowledge that he knew it And that is your case here sinners and even manifest sinners for even midnight is noon in the sight of God and when your candles are put out his sunne shines still Nec quid absconditum à calore ejus sayes David There is nothing hid from the heat thereof Psal 19.6 not onely no sin hid from the light thereof from the sight of God but not from the heat thereof not from the wrath and indignation of God If God speak plurally onely in the majestie of a soveraigne Prince still Reverenter pensandum that calls for reverence What reverence There are nationall differēces in outward reverence and worships some worship princes and parents and masters in one some in another fashion children kneel to ask blessing of parents in England but where else servants attend not with the same reverence upon masters in other nations as with us Accesses to their princes are not with the same difficultie nor the same solemnitie in France as in Turkie But this rule goes through all nations that in that disposition and posture and action of the bodie which in that place is esteemed most humble and reverent God is to be worshipped Do so then here God is your Father ask blessing upon your knees pray in that posture God is your King worship him with that worship which is highest in our use estimation We have no Grandes that stand covered to the King where there are such though they stand covered in the Kings presence they do not speak to him for matters of grace they do not sue to him so ancient Canons make difference of persons in the presence of God where and how this and this shall dispose of themselves in the Church of God dignitie and age and infirmitie will induce differences But for prayer there is no difference one humiliation is required of all As when the King comes in here howsoever they sat diversly before all return to one manner of expressing their acknowledgement of his presence so at the Oremus Let us pray Let us all fall down and worship and kneel before the Lord our maker So he speaks in our Text not onely as the Lord our King intimating his providence and administration but as the Lord our maker and then a maker so as that he made us in a Councell Faciamus Let us and that he speaks as in councel is an other argument for reverence For what trust or freedome soever I have by his favour with any Counsellour of state yet I should surely use another manner of consideration to this pluralitie in God to this meeting in Councel to this intimation of a Trinitie then to those other actions in which God is presented to us singly as one God for so he is presented to the naturall man as well as to us And here enters the necessitie of this knowledge Oportet denuo nasci without a second birth no salvation And so no second birth without Baptisme no Baptisme but in the name of the Father Sonne and holy Ghost It was the entertainment of God himself his delight his contemplation for those infinite millions of generations when he was without a world without creatures to joy in one another in the Trinitie as Gregorie Nazianzene and a Poet as well as a Father as most of
and marrie there is the action This is not a clandestine marriage not the private seal of Christ in the obsignation of his Spirit and yet such a clandestine marriage is a good marriage nor is it such a parish-marriage as when Christ married me to himself at my baptisme in a Church here and yet that marriage of a Christian soul to Christ in that sacrament is a blessed marriage But this is a marriage in that great and glorious congregation where all my sinnes shall be laid open to the eyes of all the world where all the blessed Virgins shall see all my uncleannesses and all the Martyrs see all my tergiversations and all the Confessours see all my double dealings in Gods cause where Abraham shall see my faithlesnesse in Gods promises and Job my impatience in Gods corrections and Lazarus my hardnesse of heart in distributing Gods blessings to the poore and those Virgins and Martyrs and Confessours and Abraham and Job and Lazarus and all that congregation shall look upon the Lambe and upon me and upon one another as though they would all forbid those banes and say to one another Will this Lambe have any thing to do with this soul And yet there and then this Lambe shall marrie me and marrie me In aeternum For ever which is our last circumstance It is not well done to call it a circumstance for the eternitie is a great part of the essence of that marriage Consider then how poore and needie a thing all the riches of this world how flat and tastlesse a thing all the pleasures of this world how pallid and faint and dilute a thing all the honours of this world are when the very treasure and joy and glorie of heaven it self were unperfect if it were not eternall and my marriage shall be so In aeternum For ever The Angels were not married so they incurred an irreparable divorce from God and are separated for ever and I shall be married to him In aeternum For ever The Angels fell in love when there was no object presented before any thing was created when there was nothing but God and themselves they fell in love with themselves and neglected God and so fell In aeternum For ever I shall see all the beautie and all the glorie of all the Saints of God and love them all and know that the Lambe loves them too without jealousie on his part or theirs or mine and so be married In aeternum For ever without interruption or diminution Reve. 6.12 13 14. or change of affections I shall see the sunne black as sackcloth of hair and the moon become as bloud and the starres fall as a fig-tree casts her untimely figs and the heavens rolled up together as a scrowl I shall see a divorce between princes and their prerogatives between nature and all her elements between the spheres and all their intelligences between matter it self and all her forms and my marriage shall be In aeternum For ever I shall see an end of faith nothing to be beleeved that I do not know and an end of hope nothing to be wished that I do not enjoy but no end of that love in which I am married to that Lambe for ever yea I shall see an end of some of the offices of the Lambe himself Christ himself shall be no longer a Mediatour an Intercessour an Advocate and yet shall continue a Husband to my soul for ever where I shall be rich enough without joynture for my Husband cannot die and wise enough without experience for no new thing can happen there and healthy enough without physick for no sicknesse can enter and which is by much the highest of all safe enough without grace for no temptation that needs particular grace can attempt me There where the Angels which cannot die could not live this very bodie which cannot choose but die shall live and live as long as that God of life that made it Lighten our darknesse we beseech thee O Lord that in thy light we may see light illustrate our understandings kindle our affections poure oyl to our zeal that we may come to the marriage of this Lambe and that this Lambe may come quickly to this marriage and in the mean time blesse these thy servants with making this secular marriage a type of the spirituall and the spirituall an earnest of that eternall which they and we by thy mercie shall have in that kingdome which thy Sonne our Saviour hath purchased with the inestimable price of his incorruptible bloud To whom c. FINIS