upon the dark souls of these poor Infidels and enlighten them with the saving knowledge of the great mysterie of Godlinesse Let the beams of thy Gospell break forth unto them and work them to a sound beleef in thee their God manifested in the flesh Fetch home into thy fold all those that belong to thy mercifull election bring in the fulnesse of the Gentiles gather together the out-casts of Israel and glorifie thy self in completing a world of beleevers And for us on whom the ends of the world are come as we have been graciously called to the comfortable notice of this mysterie of godlinesse and have professed and vowed a steadfast beleef in thy name so keep us by thy good spirit in an holy and constant avowance of all those main truths concerning thy sacred Person Natures and Offices unto our last end For thou seest O blessed Jesu that there is now such an hell of the spirits of errour broken loose into the world as if they meant to evacuate this part of the mysterie of godlinesse Christ beleeved on in the world O do thou by thy mighty power restraine and quell these pernicious heresies and send down these wicked spirits back to their chains so as our most holy faith may ever remain inviolable till the day of thy glorious return Neither let us sit down contented that we hold fast and beleeve the meer historie of thy life death and resurrection without which as we can be saved so with it alone we cannot but do thou by thy good spirit work and settle in our souls a sound lively operative justifying faith in thee whereby we may not only beleeve on thee as a common Saviour but beleeve in thee as ours bringing thee home to our hearts and confidently relying upon thee for the acquittance of all our sins and for our eternall salvation O that thou mightest be thus beleeved on in the world and if not by them in the notion of their universality yet by us who professe thy name to thy great glory and our everlasting comfort SECT. XV IN these occurrences on the earth Great is the mysterie of godlinesse but the highest pitch of this great mysterie O Saviour is that thou thus manifested in our flesh wert received up into glorie even that celestiall glorie which thou enjoyest in the highest heavens sitting on the right hand of majesty seen and adored by all that blessed company of the souls of just men made perfect and the innumerable troops of glorious Angels If some erroneous fancies have placed their heaven here below upon earth ours is above and so is thine O blessed Jesu who wert taken up in glorie thou couldst not be taken up to any earthly ascent since thou tookest thy farewell on the top of Mount Olivet but from this globe of earth thou ascendest through the skies to that Empyreall heaven where thou remainest in glorie infinite and incomprehensible The many and intentive beholders of thy last parting did not cast their eyes down into the valley neither did see cause with the fifty sons of the Prophets to seek for thee as they would needs do for Elijah in vallies and mountains they saw and worishpped thee leasurely ascending up through the region of this lower heaven till a cloud intercepted thee from their sight neither then could easily be taken off either by the interposition of that dark body or by the interpellation of Angels And now O blessed Saviour how is my soul ravished with the mediation of thy glorious reception into thine Heaven Surely if the inhabitants of those celestial mansions may be capable of any increase of joy they then both found and shewed it when they saw and welcomed thee entering in thy gorlifi'd humanity in to that thy eternal palace of blessedness and if there could be any higher or sweter ditty then Hallelujah it was then sung by the Chore of Angels and Saints And may thy poor servants warfairing and wandring here upon earth ever second them in those heavenly songs of praises and gratulations for wherein stands all our safety hope comfort happinesse but in this that thou our Jesus art received up into glorie and having conquered all adverse powers sittest on the right hand of God the Farher crowned with honour and majesty O Jesu thou art our head we are thy body how can the body but participate of the glory of the head as for thy self therefore so for us art thou possessed of that heavenly glorie as thou sufferedst for us so for us thou also raignest Let every knee therefore bow unto thee of things in heaven and things on earth and things under the earth O blessed be thy name for ever and ever Thine O Lord is the greatnesse and the power and the glorie and the victorie and the majestie for all that is in the heaven and in the earth is thine thine is the kingdom O Lord and thou art exalted as head over all And now O Saviour what a superabundant amends is made to thy glorified humanitie for all thy bitter sufferings upon earth Thine Agonie was extreme but thy glorie is infinite thy crosse was heavie but thy crown transcendently glorious thy pains were unconceivably grievous but short thy glory everlasting If thou wert scorned by men thou art now adored by Angels Thou that stoodst before the Judgment Seat of a Pilate shalt come in all heavenly magnificence to judge both the quick and the dead Shortly thou which wouldst stoop to be a servant upon Earth rulest and raignest for ever in Heaven as the King of eternall glorie O then my soul seeing thy Saviour is received up into this infinite glorie with what intention and fervour of spirit shouldst thou fix thine eyes upon that heaven where he lives and raigns How canst thou be but wholly taken up with the sight and thought of that place of blessednesse how canst thou abide to grovell any longer on this base Earth where is nothing but vanity and vexation and refrain to minde the things above where is all felicitie and glorie with what longings and holy ambiâ—ion shouldst thou desire to aspire to that place of eternall rest and beatitude into which thy Saviour is ascended and with him to partake of that glory and happinesse which he hath provided for all that love him O Saviour it is this clog of wretched infidelity and earthlinesse that hangs heavie upon my soul and keeps me from mounting up into thy presence and from a comfortable fruition of thee O do thou take off this sinfull weight from me and raise up my affections and conversation to thee enable me constantly to enjoy thee by a lively faith here till by thy mercie I shall be received into thy glorie FINIS Prov. 16. â—7 Jer. 2. Hos. 4. 2. Actâ— 10. 35. Jude 3. phes 4. 5 1 Cor. 3. 11. 1 Cor. 7. 20 1 Tim. 3. 16. Great is the Mysterie of Godlinesse 1 Pet. 1. 12. God manifested In the flesh Job 1. 14 Job 25 6. Psal. 22. 6. Esay 53. 5. Mat. 17. 2. Mark 29. Luke 9. 28. 2 Cor. 5. 16. Rom. 1. 20. Justified in the Spirit Luk. 2. 9 10 13 1 Rom. 4. 25. Rom. 8 33. Seen of Angels Dan. 8. 19 17. Mat. 18. 10. Luk. 2. 9. 15. Act 12. 7 8 10. Luk. 22. 41. Heb. 1. 9. Mat. 28. 2 3 4. Joh. 20. 12. Act. 1. 10 11. 1 Pet. 1. 12. Ephes. 3. 9. Ephes. 3 8. Psal. 76. 1. Ephes. 2. 12. Esay 25. 7. Luk 2. 32. Esay 66. 18. Esay 2. 2 3. Esay 49. 2â— Esay 55. 5. Psal. 96. 7 Ps. 66. 4. Ps. 22. 27 Cant. 8. 8. Hos. 2. 19. Râ—m 11. 2â— Rom. 22. Rom. 11. 1. Rom. 11. 20 Act. 10. 11. â—2 Beleeved on in the world Esay 53. 1. 2 Cor. 1. 23. Mat. 21. 9. 1 Joh. 5. 19. Rom. 11. Psal 147. 2. Received up into glory Heb. 12. 22. 23. 2 King 2. 16. Phil. 2. 11. 2 Chr. 2. 11.
at the foundation of faith let us labour by all gentle means and brotherly conviction in the spirit of meeknesse to reclaim him If after all powerfull indeavours he will needs remain obstinate in his evill way let us disclaim his fellowship and not think him worthy of a God-speed But if he shall not only wilfully undermine the ground-work of Christian faith by his own damnable opinions but diffuse his hereticall blasphemies to the infection of others let him be cut off by spirituall censures and so dealt with by publick authority that the mischief of his contagion may be seasonably prevented and himself be made sensible of his hainous crime In all which proceedings just distinction must be made betwixt the seduced soul and the pestilent seducer the one calls for compassion the other for severity So then my brethren let us pity and pray for all that have erred and are deceived let us instruct the ignorant convince the gainsaying avoid the obstinate restrain the infectious and punissh the self-convicted heresiarch In the fourth place let us I beseech you take heed of beeing swayed with self-interests in all our designs These have ever been the bane of the best undertakings as being not more plausibly insinnuative then pernicious For that partiall self-love that naturally lodges in every mans brest is ready to put us upon those projects which under fair pretences may be extreamly prejudiciall to the publique weal suggesting not how lawfull or expedient they may be for the common but how beneficiall to our selves drawing us by insensible degrees to sacrifice the publique welfare to our own advantage and to underwork and cross the better counsails of more faithfull patriots Whereupon many flourishing Churches Kingdomes States have been brought to miserable ruine Oh that we could remember that as all things are ours so we are not our own that we have the least interest in our selves being infinitely more considerable as parts of a community then as single persons that the main end of our beeing next to the glory of our maker is an universall serviceablenesse to others in the attaining whereof we shall far more eminently advance our own happiness then by the best of our private self-seeking indeavors But withall it will be meet for us to consider that as we are made to serve all so only in our own station There can be no hope of a continued wel being without order There can be no order without a due subordination of degrees and diversity of vocations and in vain shall divers vocationâ— be ordained if all professions shall enterfere with each other It is the prudent and holy charge of the Apostle Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he is called We are all members of the same body every one whereof hath his proper employment The head is to direct and govern the feet to walk the eyes to see the ears to hear How mad would we think that man that should affect to walk on his head to hear with his eye to see with his ear Neither surely is it lesse incongurous for men in divine and civill administrations to offer to undertake and manage each others function in their nature and quality no lesse disperate So then let us indeavour to advance the common good as that a pious Zeal may not draw in confusion and that we may not mistakeingly rear up the walls of Babel whiles we intend Jerusalem Not religion only but policie cals us to encouragement of all usefull professions and of the sacred so much more as the soul is more precious then all the world beside Heed therefore must be taken to avoid all means whereby the study of learning and knowledge may be any way disheartned as without which the world would soon be over-run with ignorance barbarism All arts therefore as being in their kind excellent may justly challenge their own rights and if they shall want those respects which are due to them will suddenly languish But above all as Divinity is the Queen of Sciences so should it be our just shame that whiles her handmaids are mounted on horsback she should wait on them on foot Fifthly As it is our greatest honour that the name of Christ is called upon us so let it I beseech you be our care that our profession be not formal empty and barren like the Jewish fig-tree abounding with leaves void of fruit but reall active fruitfull of all good workes and exemplary in an universal obedience to the wholwill of God For it is a scandall never to be enough lamented that any of those who are Saints by calling such we all are or should be should hug some dearling sin in their bosome which at last breaks forth to the shame of the Gospell and to the insultation of Gath and Ascalon Wo be to us if we shall thus cause the name of our God to be evill spoken of There are two many of those whom I am loath and sorry to style heathen-Christians Christians in name Heathens in conversation these as they come not within the compasse of my Dedication for alas how should they love the Lord Jesus when they know him not so I can heartily bewail their condition who like Gideons fleece continue altogether dry under so many sweet shewres of Grace wishing unto their souls even thus late a sense of the efficacy of that water which was once poured on their faces These if they run into all excesse of riot what can be other expected from them but for us that have learned to know the great Mysterie of Godlinesse and have given up our name to a strict covenant of obedience if we shall suffer our selves to be miscarried into any enormious wickedness we shall cause heaven to blush and hell to triumph Oh therefore let us be so much the more watchfull over our ways as our engagements to the name of our God are greater and the danger of our miscariages more deadly Lastly let me beseech and adjure you in the name of the Lord Jesu to be carefull in matter of Religion to keep within the due bounds of Gods revealed will A charge which I would to God were not too needfull in these last dayes wherein who sees not what Spirits of Errour are gone forth into the world for the seducing of simple and ungrounded souls Wo is me what throngs are carried to hell by these devillish impostures One pretends Visions and Revelations of new verities which the world was not hitherto worthy to know another boasts of new lights of uncouth interpretations hidden from all former eyes one despises the dead letter of the scriptures another distorts it to his own erroneous sense O the prodiges of damnable hereticall Atheous fancies which have hereupon infested the Christian Church for which what good soul doth not mourn in secret the danger whereof ye shall happily avoid if ye shall keep close to the written word of our God which is only able to make you wise
to salvation As our Saviour repelled the Devill so do ye the fanatick spirits of these brain-sick men with It is written Let those who would be wiser then God justly perish in their presumption My soul for yours if ye keep you to S. Pauls guard not to be wise above that which is written I could easily out of the exuberance of my Christian love overcharg you with multiplicity of holy counlses but I would not take a tedious farewell May the God of heaven bless these and all other wholesom admonitions to the furtherance of your souls in grace and may his good spirit ever lead guide us in all such wayes as may be pleasing to him till we happily meet in the participation of that incomprehensible glory which he hath prepared for ill his Saints till when Farewel from your fellow-pilgrim in this vale of tears Jos. Hall HIGHAM neer NORWICH Nov. 3. 1651 THE Great Mysterie OF GODLINESS Laid forth by way of Affectuous and Feeling MEDITATION By JOS. HALL D. D. B. N. London Printed by E. Cotes for John Place at Furnivals Inne-gate 1659. THE GREAT MYSTERIE OF GODLINESS SECT. I. LET no man goe about to entertain the thoughts of the Great Mystery of Godliness but with a ravished heart an heart filled with a gracious composition of love and joy and wonder Such a one O Saviour I desire through thy grace to bring with me to the meditation of that thine infinitely glorious work of our Redemption It was as possible for thy chosen Vessell who was by a divine extasie caught up into Paradise and there heard unutterable words to express what he saw and heard above as to set forth what was acted by thee here below as therefore unable either to comprehend or utter things so far above wonder he contents himself with a patheticall intimation of that which he saw could never be enough admired Great is the Mysterie of Godlinesse There are great Mysteries of Art which the wit and experience of skilfull men have discovered there are greater Mysteries of Nature some part whereof have been described by Art and Industrie but the greater part lyes hidden from mortall eyes but these are lesse then nothing to the great mystery of Godliness For what are these but the deep secrets of the Creature mean therefore and finite like it self but the other are the unfadomable depths of an infinite Deitie fitter for the admiration of the highest Angels of heaven then for the reach of humane conception Great were the mysteries of the Law neither could the face of Moses be seen without his veile But what other were these but the shadowes of this great Mystery of Godliness what did that golden Ark overspread with glorious Cherubims that gorgeous Temple those perfumers Altars those bleeding Sacrifices that sumptuous Priesthood but prefigure thee O blessed Saviour which in the fulnesse of time shouldst be revealed to the World and make up this great Mystery of Godliness There is nothing O dear Jesu that thou either didst or sufferedst for mankind which is other then mysterious and wonderfull but the great and astonishing mysterie of Godlinesse is thy self God manifested in the flesh Lo faith it self can never be capable to apprehend a mysterie like this Thou who art a Spirit and therefore immateriall invisible to expose thy self to the view of earthen eyes Thou who art an infinite Spirit to be enwrapped in flesh Thou an al-glorious eternal Spirit to put on the rags of humane mortality Thou the great Creatour of all things to become a Creature Thou the omnipotent God to subject thy self to miserable frailty and infirmity O mysterie transcending the full apprehension of even glorified souls If but one of thy celestial Spirits have upon thy gracious mission assumed a visible shape and therein appeared to any of thy servants of old it hath been held a spectacle of so dreadfull astonishment that it could not be consistent with life even so much honour was thought no less then deadly neither could the Patient make any other account then to be killed with the kindnesse of that glory What shall we say then that thou who art the God of those Spirits and therefore infinitely more glorious then all the Hierarchy of heaven vouchsafedst not in a vanishing apparition but in a setled state of many years continuance to shew thy self in our flesh and to converse with men in their own shape and condition O great mysterie of Godlinesse God manifested in the flesh so great that the holy ambition of the heavenly Angels could not reach higher then the desire to look down into it SECT. II. BUt O Saviour that which raised the amazement at the appearance of thine Angels was their resplendent glorie whereas that which heightens the wonder of thy manifestation to men is the depth of thine abasement Although thou wouldst not take the nature of Angels yet why wouldst thou not appear in the lustre and majesty of those thy best creatures Or since thou wouldst be a man why wouldst thou not come as the chief of men commanding Kings and Princes of the earth to attend thy train Thou whose the earth is and the fulnesse thereof why wouldst thou not raise to thy self a palace compiled of all those precious stones which lye hid in the close cofers of that thine inferiour Treasurie why did not thy Court glitter with pearle and gold in the rich furnitures and gay suits of thy stately followers why was not thy Table furnished with all the delicacies that the world could afford O Saviour it was the great glory of thy mercy that being upon earth thou wouldest abandon all earthly glory there could not be so great an exaltation of thy love to mankinde as that thou wouldst be thus low abased Manifested then thou wert but manifested in a despicable obscurity whether shall I more wonder that being God blessed for ever thou wouldst become man or that condescending to be man thou wouldst take upon thee the shape of a servant a servāt to those whose Lord whose God thou wert What proportion could there be O blessed Jesus betwixt a God and a Man betwixt finite and infinite the onely power of thy everlasting and unmeasurable love hath so reduced one of these to the other that both are united in that glorious person of thine to make up an absolute Saviour of mankind O the height and depth of this supercelestial mysterie that the infinite Deity and finite flesh should meet in one subject yet so as the humanity should not be absorpted of the Godhead nor the Godhead coarcted by the humanity but both inseparably united that the Godhead is not humanized the humanity is not deifred both are indivisibly conjoyned conjoined so as without confusion distinguished so as without division So wert thou O God manifested in the flesh that thou the word of thine eternall Father wert made flesh and dwelledst among us and we men beheld thy glory the glory as
SECT. V. HOw easily could I be drawn to envie the priviledge of those eyes which saw thee here walking upon Earth O God and Saviour in the dayes of thy manifesting thy self in flesh Oh what an happy spectacle was this to see the face of him in whom the Godhead dwelt bodily All the world is not worth such a sight whither could I not wish to go to see but a just portraiture of that shape wherein thou wert pleased to converse with men But thine holy Apostle checks this uselesse curiosity in me whiles he saies If we have knowne Christ after the flesh yet now henceforth know we him so no more It is not the outside of thine humane form the view whereof can make us more holy or more happy Judas saw thee as well as he that lay in thy bosome those saw thee that maligned and persecuted thee and shall once again see thee to their utmost horror see him whom they pierced They saw that flesh in which God was manifested they saw not God manfested in the flesh It is our great comfort and priviledge that it was flesh wherein God was manifested but it is not in the flesh but in the Deity to render us blessed O Saviour I dare not beg of thee so to manifest thy self to me as thou didst to thy chosen Vessell in his way to Damascus or to thy first Martyr in the storm of his Lapidation these miraculous manifestations are not for my meanness to sue for But let me never cease to crave of thee a double manifestatioÌ„ of thy self to me Be pleased to manifest thy self to me in the clear illuminations of thy Spirit let me by the eyes of my faith clearly see thee both sprawling in the Manger and walking upon earth and tempted in the Wildernesse and arraigned in the Judgment-hall and suffering upon Calvarie and rising out of thy Tomb and a soending from thy Olivet and reigning in Heaven and there interceding for me And after my approaching dissolution let my soul see thee in that glorified flesh wherein thou wert manifested to the World and in the Majesty of that all-glorious Deity which assumed it to that ever blessed society of glory SECT. VI IT was thy mercy O God that thou wouldst not keep up thy self close in thine eternall spirituall and incomprehensible essence unknown to thy creatures upon earth but that thou wouldest be manifested to the world It was yet thy further mercy that thou wert not only pleased to manifest thy self to man in the wonderfull works of thy Creation since those invifible things of thine are understood and clearly seen by the things that are made even thine eternall power and God-head but to manifest thy self yet more clearly to us in thy sacred Word the blessed Oracles of thine eternall truth but it was the highest pitch of thy mercy that thou wouldst manifest thy self yet more to us in the flesh Thou mightst have sent us thy gracious messages by the hands of thine Angels those glorious ministring spirits that do continually attend thy throne this would not content thee but such was thy love to us forlorn wretches that thou wouldst come thy self to finish the work of our Redemption Neither didst thou think it enough to come to us in a spirituall way imparting thy self to us by secret suggestions and inspirations by dreams and visions but wouldst vouchsafe openly to be manifested in our flesh how then O my God how wert thou manifested in the flesh was not the flesh thy vail and wherefore serves a vail but to hide and cover Did not thy Deity then lie hid and obscured whiles thou wert here on earth under the vail of of thy flesh How then wert thou manifested in that flesh wherein thou didst lye obscured Surely thou wert certainly manifested in respect of thy presence in that sacred flesh of thine though for the time thy power and Majesty lay hid under the vail Sometimes thou wert pleased that this sun of thy Deity should break forth in the glorious beams of divine operations to the dazeling of the eyes of men and Devils to the full eviction of thine omnipotent power against thy envious gainsayers at other times thou wert content it should be clouded over with the dim and dusky appearances of humane infirmity The more thou wert obscured the more didst thou manifest thy most admirable humility and unparallelable love to mankinde whose weaknesse thou disdainedst not to take up And the more thou didst exert thy power in thy miraculous works the more didst thou glorifie thy self and vindicate thine Almighty Deity thus manifested in the flesh Oh that thou wouldst enable me to give thee the due praiss both of thine infinite mercie in this thine humble obscurity and of thy divine omnipotence who as thou wert manifested in the flesh so wast also justified in the spirit SECT. VII HE that should have seen thee O Saviour working in Josephs shop or walking in the fields or streets of Nazareth or journying towards Ierusalem would have looked upon thee as a meer man neither did thy garb or countenance bewray any difference in thee from the ordinary sort of men so did â—hy God-head please to conceal it for a time in that flesh where in thou wouldst be manifested it was thine al-working and coessentiall spirit by whose evident testimonies and mighty operations thy Deity was irrefragably made good to the world If the doubtfull sons of men shall in their peevish Infidelity he apt to renew the question of Johns Disciples Art thou he that should come or shall we looke for another thine ever blessed and coeternal Spirit hath fully justified thee for that only true absolute perfect mediator by whom the great work of mans redemption is accomplished Whiles the gates of hell want neither power nor malice nor subtletie it is not possible that thy divine person should want store of enemies These in all successions of times have dared to open their blasphemous mouthe against thy blessed Deity But against all their hellish oppositions thou wert still and shalt be ever justified by thy co-omni potent spirit In those convictive wonders which thou wroughtst upon earth in those miraculous gifts and graces which thou powredst out upon men in that glorious resurrection and ascension of thine wherein thou didst victoriously triumph over all the powers of death and hell Lo then ye perverse Jews and scoffing Gentiles that are still ready to upbraid us with the impotency and sufferings of a despised Redeemer and to tell us of the ragges of his Manger of the homelinesse of his Education of his temptation and transportation by the Devill of his contemptible train of his hunger and thirst of his weariness and indigence of his whips and thorns of his agonie in the garden of Gethsemane of his opprobrious crucifixion in Calvarie of his parted garments and his borrowed grave Is not this he to whose homely cradle a glorious and supernaturall star guided the sages of