done in every body The Judge is of pure and fiery eyes sees down through darkness to our hearts and reins no casting of mists no deluding of this Judge and then no need of long proceedings frequent siftings and tedions Cribrations of the cause for all things are naked and bare in his sight all evident and clear before this Lord for this Lord is God The Lord God is his name 7. Now the names of God are referred to two heads 1. Simple and absolute or 2. In Relation to us Of the first sort Some respect his Essence or Nature as that name which we know not certainly how but we are taught to pronounce Jehovah Some respect that which we call but yet in tender sense dare scarce call it so his Personality as the names of Father Son and Spirit And some his Attributes Essential as Just Holy c. The second kind of relative names are such as King Governor Preserver and this of Dominus here the Lord 8. First for the Name and so the Nature of God it is an Ocean too immense and boundless for our discovery An Abyss for the sounding of our light and frail reason to propound And concerning this Title Lord I will not enter though my Text lie near the Creation into that curious dispute which yet amused Tertullian and St. Austin afterwards whether this stile then only and properly began in the worlds beginning and could not be attributed to God before Such speculation is but drie and useless stuff I will rather tell you what the School tells us of all Gods Names in relation that is such Names are not really in God but in the Creature So as God is called Summum Bonum not because God cannot admit a composition of those two or any pieces but because his Bonitas as comprehensive of all other and diffusive to all so supereminently above all And because all that retains the name of Good as derivative from him so in it self defective and to us deficient in compare with him saith Aquinas and yet even in affecting and accepting such names God delivers himself to us in a gracious way of endearment For where men aspire to Honor and ascend to titular additions therefore that the swelling vapor of a Longa Pagina as he calls it may lift them like a Pageant high in the air and hal'd from the community of baser earth God in a wonderfull descending still vouchsafes rather to honor his servants and Clients by sometimes assuming names of particular and individual reference as the God of Abrabam the fear of Isaac sometimes of general appliance to all the Israel of God as is the large extended and branching Tree the spreading Sun in an Expansion Dilatation Emanation Communication Consolation to all his servants in this full and chearfull name of Dominus the Lord. 9. Which name in the strict and proper acceptation they say can belong of right to none but God by reason it includes these two conditions First He that is exactly Dominus may at his pleasure use the thing whereof he is Lord enlarge diminish change annihilate that is as far as the nature of the thing will bear And who is so supream on earth Secondly The absolute Lord stands in need of nothing but is endued with a proper innate and self-sufficiency Aad who can boast himself to be so absolute Vnxi te in Regem in caput are notes of humane eminence in the Old and as plain is that of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the New One from Samuels testimony a Seer and a chief Prophet of God and the other from St. Peter a prime Apostle both instructed in the Will of the Lord here And yet no Saul nor Roman Emperor nor any supream Head and Governor on earth since those times can ever say and say truly so much as to the foot of his body Politick I have no need of you much less then can the feet or legs the sides or arms or bulk of the body though never so big say to the head mistaking it for a Perruke say We have no need of thee 10. It was as is imaginable for this Energie in the restrained sense of the word that the Septuagint everywhere render Jehovah by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Lord and some such reverence to the name made Augustus sure so respective and nice as not to endure it and Suetonius reproves Domitian of incredible arrogance for not disclaiming that usual acclamation in the Amphitheatre of Dominofoeliciter Well might his Poet then recant and repent his Inscription of Dominus Deusque noster And yet we know what he that sits in that Emperors Throne the triple miter'd man of sin or if not so yet surely sinfull man doth dully and damnably retain and blushes not to this day to wear and hear from his Poets and Parasites in Print of Dominus Deus noster our Lord God the Pope And yet for the term of Dominus alone as in our language t is cheap enough The words Lord and Sir being very near allied in sense so in the Latine now and all those crums and drops of Spanish French Italian Eloquence into which the Latine is broken and dissolved it signifies no more it confers no more in usual phrase And in the very Greek of the New Testament so near Augustus dayes it is evident enough that their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was but equivalent to our Sir for it is observed that Mary Magdaleus gives it there to our blessed Saviour and at the same time envies it not but affords her 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sir to the very Gardiner 11. But a more usefull Note from both these Names together we may make out of St. Bernards rule Omne nomen Dei in Scripturis c. Every Name of God in Scripture sounds of Mercy or of Justice and both these are in this judicatorie to shew that Adam had now provoked not only a glorious God holy and just but his Lord Gracious and full of kindness to him This raises the wind into a foul storm swels a brook of disobedience to a Sea when man the master-piece the favorite turns against his God that had made him a kind of under-god given him dominion too For the Habendum enters with a Dominamini It was my Lord Adam from the beginning a Lord Lieutenant under the Lord of Hosts in three great Counties of the earth and air and Seas and of all things therein with power of life and death Ingratefull man to make offence against his maked the creature rise against his Creaâ—our that rais'd him from the dust sustain'd planted pleasur'd him with infinite varieties of sure and â—al favours This on the Remorse was it that cut David to the heart Against thee O Lord against thee have I â—inned and done this evill in thy sight No wonder if traiterous man on this recognition of the Judge offended hid himself and sought for shelter among the trees and even there remained startling
Let us then lift up our hearts together with our hands to Go◠in the Heavens 1. OUR first part is Vitis and that is Christ we way take his own word John 15. 1. I am the true Vine Poor hedge and harth wine you may wring from natural knowledge and from moral Books and dull muddy stuff the world affords mingled with Mandragoras whose effect is betwixt sleep and poison But would you that above the spirit of Cecub or Falernian wine The Vine which breeds a liquor potent and mighty in operation Quod cum spe divite manet in Venas A cup of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that fills with holy Raptures and Extasies and lifts your Spirit up to become Partaker of the divine Nature Then come to me saith he He all alone at this He and none but He can give this Grace Search the Vineyards the Scriptures They testifie of him Those Cherubins the Old and New Testament clap all their wings together for the enclosing him who is A. and Ω. the same Rock and Mannae Jesus Christ yesterday and to day and the same for ever The Book of God is Paradise everywhere Trees of knowledge bowing their eminent tops But Christ Jesus the Tree of Life in the midst of the Garden The Fruit and Kernel of which Fruit is here in Vitis Objection 1. 2. But in 1 Pet. 1.3 we find this made the Act of God the Father Blessed be God even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath begotten us again c. and ascribable to him as an Act of Power and Wonder first above that of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And secondly As an Act of Love of which he is the Fountain While not as a Father alone but as a Mother too he conceives in the womb of Predestion brings forth in Vocation tenders and bears in arms and on his wings of Providence and hath Viscera misericordiarum in the plural And again this is made the work of the holy Ghost Tit. 3.8 By the washing of the new birth and renewing of the Holy Ghost c. And so much seems implied in that Commission Receive you the holy Ghost and then Whose sins you remit c. For answer hereto briefly we learn from the school that though in the sacred Trinity be order yet no Degree and in their Acts ad extra they all blessedly conspire as in this particular the Apostle informs us 1 Cor. 6. By the Grace of God the Father through the blood of his Son are we raised as so many Temples of the holy Ghost And as the Son is in at Creation by him were all things made he being the power and wisdom of the Father so the Spirit is called his Gift too whom I will send you from the Father and in the Galatians it is stild the Spirit of Christ All build then this holy frame But he lies down as the Foundation as that precious corner-stone on whom his Saints relie by vertue of their precious Faith and partake all these precious Promises in him Yea and Amen He that Olive of whose fatness and Vine from whose root live all the Branches which he performs in special too by a double distillation of his Grace and blood while the blood of that Vine is made ours and we through it and him made Sons of God and most properly in this Filiation here mentioned his Act who is in nature Filius He by generation to make us so by Regeneration Thus have we endeavoured to dig and discover this to the root indeed that root ineffable of three in one God the Father as Author and Fountain the Son as means and merit the Spirit forming cherishing and preserving the new Creature A Grace flowing from the Father by the Son in the Power and Operation of the holy Ghost Objection 2. 3. But where 's the Text then How do we receive it by Faith Our Saviour Answers it in the fifteenth of St. John This is done by insition as we by it receive him that is abide in him and that cannot be without assenting and obeying both By both which we begin to live and draw sap and conrinuating strength of spiritual Life The life I now live I live by the power of the Son of God 'T is his Act and Gift in the first Light and Influence and first Attraction and bowing our will to receive him and in obediential performaces too asubsequent and concurrent Grace yet a Nostrality too so far as a non fugere saith St. Austin nay as a Sequi too and an Agere a co-working with the work of him that works all in all and all our works in us And the manifest of this Insition by believing and so receiving him is a plain and easie Decision of that drie and tedious Jangle which infects the mysterie of Godliness For nor Faith nor works alone Nor they without their root Nor it without his fruits Poscit opem conjurat amice Faith working by Love Objection 3. 4. But which way How can these things be Which way is the Light parted saith Job c. Where comes our divine Light of Reason to clasp and Grace it self under that noble and ampler Lamp of Faith The Answer is prepard by St. Peter who tells us where it grows the immortal seed of his his Word called therefore the Word of Life and the Word of his Grace and this very Grace the Word of Faith to which is ever annext the use and blessing of those Sacraments of the one whereof our Saviour tells us Except a man be born again and of the other Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood no life is in you no kingdom of Heaven for you PARTICVLAR 2. 5. THus far of Vitis Our second Particular is Racemus The bunch of Grapes 'T is rendred here by Power but is understood in an Excellency Power cum Priviledgio This indeed intended as Caput Votorum For as he saith Quid voveat dulci alumno So what is it that thy soul desires Is it Beauty Belive there are no such Roses and Lilies in their Midsummer as Gods Sons in their early Spring That being true of every member which is spoken of the body in general Thou art all fair No deformity not that of sickness nor that of age nor spot nor wrinckle Free from all defilement of sin a brave and high victorious and insolent Beauty that pure fair white and red in his innocence and in the blood of the Lamb. Is it riches How faint and cold and poor a word to this that makes a man rich in God! And rich in faith is equivalent to that For by that is a poor wretch under all made Heir to God who is rich over all and enjoyes not these shadows of the world but those unsearchable riches of Christ not filthy lucre defiling in the acquist but fine Gold So that thy adoring Mammon is but a mockery to thy soul It cannot make thee it may marr it
Lastly As it is implyed that our Saviours victory on the Cross was his purchase of the Gentiles Rev. 2.26 27. and Phil. 2. His stooping even to the Cross precedes his exaltation and then a Genuflexion and universal Acclamation All tongues to confess him c. So the mission of his Apostles to the Gentiles was after his passion and a little before it we find in John 12.24 some Greeks desired to see him and he answers in a Riddle If the grain of wheat die it will bring forth much fruit which was meant of himself saith St. Austin He was to die by the unbelief of the Jews and then to be multiplyed in the faith of all Nations as we see it come to pass But that faith saith St. Paul Rom. 10. it grows not in nature comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God And this hath brought us a little on our way in the understanding of our second part which we now pursue Lux in Domino Light That 's the matter here and the manner is in Domino or the other way for the matter indeed is in Domino and the manner by way of Illumination For what is meant surely that great work of God Mans restoring is meant included in a second great work Illumination of our minds and that in a third great work The light of the Sun in our eyes How rare and choice a fruit must that be which hath such curious Coverings The very Metaphor or rather Box and Nest of Metaphors is observable Is God a Metaphorical God saith one D. D. And he answers himself In a pious and humble meaning respecting the Scriptures heights and Excellencies in Allegories not only sinews in the Milk of Gods Word and things in his Words but spreadings and strange Rhetorical passages and curtains of figures flowing into figures Where are those Sophisters and Grand Seniors and grave Rabbies with their old dissembled Ensigns of Ignorance the Beard the Habit and the Title that will allow men no use of humane Learning in disclosing Divine Mysteries Is the Grape therefore harsh because such Strainers cannot reach it Theology shall remain the crowned Queen of Sciences but will admit her Hand-maids to carry keys to her Cabinets But ere we look in here be pleased to arrest your consideration on the covering of this Ark that is the Light of Heaven And as before in Darkness so here again we are blind with dazling How many are the opinions of those rowling Torches of Heaven the Sun and Moon St. Austin and in his old age too for it is in his Euchir ad Lauren. knew not whether he might account them to the Angels And for the Light Who shall tell us what it is When it comes to our doors and beats upon our eves we know not whether it have a real Being in the Air or an Intentional The first the second both and neither of both are defended Look into the Microcosm and Fiat Lux else all invisible no form no distinction and all inglorious nor use nor beauty 'T is Plenitudo the filling of all the Creatures and gives them Cognition Life Motion View the Microcosm the Light of the Body is the eye and not the Organ so much as the visive Power the light within that sits behind those Glass-windows with a balance and a file and weighs and works upon the shapes of things that enter But both these Lights are Darkness if the Medium be not illuminated if the Air be dark and searching the Scripture though we find not what it is yet we find a world of wonders in it Five things imparted yet remain entire Knowledge Vertue Happiness Joy and Light and this the Embleme of them all No good thing but Light takes it in by comparison all good things but never any ill Wisdom Health Beauty Food Joy and Reputation All the Graces of God Knowledge Faith Love Hope Joy Consolation yea the very Glory to come all our Joy and endless Bliss in that vision of Light And if God should ask us What house we would make him or to what compare him Should we offend in saying LIGHT though nothing resemble God exactly yet something better shews how far he is beyond all resmblance and by that Light his Creatures afford our admiration of his Incomprehensibleness may be raised higher and higher and with it so raised our longing after him enlarged And sure as in the works of Grace none liker God then LOVE So in the works of Nature Light as it is the eldest so the amiablest and the likest to the Father and what the Fathers affection is to it we may see by his first giving Light to the Chaos It could yield him no delight who was the double Parent so long as it lay in Night and Darkness and so deep in too that nothing yet was day What stood thus blindly could not be pleasing in his eye who is all eye But when it saw the Text saith God saw that all was good Doth he not dwell in Light and cover himself with Light as with a Garment May we not say his House and Robe and Eternal Essence are all one boundless christal Globe of Light Doth not he say so God is Light the Father the Father of Lights and the Son is God of God and Light of Light and the Holy Spirit as in this wide Engine of the world it is an inward eye which moves and rowls Spiritus in us alit So in our Souls it is the Spirit of Illuminations directing us to that place where in his Light we shall see Light even see God face to face and know him even as we are known I had not staid so long on this this cover here but that I conceived it might be in our way to discover what remains remembring my Promise to pass this part in explanation so demonstrating in an Orb where every part gives Light unto one another Here by the way might be inferred the usefulness of our sight and how we are bound to bless God that enjoy that Comfort And secondly How to compassionate the blind that sit in darkness considering there is no perfect joy on earth without it no nor in Heaven it being one of the torments in hell Darkness and contrary to the Inheritance of the Saints in Light And thirdly Applying to such times as these Rejoyce in this favour of Heaven that earthly men cannot restrain or excise the comforts of the Air and Light c. But we pass to our fruit it self the meaning of this Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ in our restoring veil'd here under this God-like Creature of Light That illumination which we receive from him by his Spirit relieving us from our state of corruption and bondage of darkness and translating us into his marvelous Light and glorious liberty of the Sons of God For you were c. In Domino In Domino For he is Light in the abstract others by participation He the true Light the cause efficient
SERMONS AND DEVOTIONS OLD and NEW Revived and publisht as an Oblation of gratitude to all such of the Nobility Gentry and Clergy as retain the noble conscience of having ministred to the weak Condition of the Author now aged 73. The SERMONS at Court were before the War brake forth betwixt King and Parliament Also a Discourse of DUELS being a Collection and Transtation of other mens Opinions with some Addition of his own And this in special dedicated for their Use To the Right Honourable THOMAS LORD VISCOVNT BEAVMONT of Coleorton and Mr. ROBERT SVTTON Heir to Mr. Rich. Sutton of Tongue in Leicestershire By THOMAS PESTEL the meanest amongst his late Majesties Chaplains in ordinary Nonumque premantur in annum Hor. LONDON Printed for Nathaniel Ekins at the Gun in Pauls Charch-yard 1659. DEVOTIONS ON Certain Anniversary FEASTS and other Occasions First on Ascension Day 1625. TO day white Saints and holy Angels sing To that pure Lamb some new triumphant thing Whereat the whole frame of the world ascends Each Bird on wings across his Journeys bends Upright and from the most exalted twist His voioe proclaims his Joyes above consist Earth swels to rise and heaves her Issue fair In swift perfumes to latch the mounting Air. Rise then my soul and every power awake Can wals of Dust so strong Resistance make Lo Thy Redeemer that brave Eagle flies With Cage and all breaking the marble skies His way to climb was fitst to be deprest Lay then his bloody Cross upon thy brest Which will be such a load as birds wings are To bear thee where his pleading wounds prepare A Crown of Glory made by conquest thine Was his by Nature where he will refine Thee and thy case of clay bright as his own When join'd in Glory both ascend one Throne The Relief on EASTER EVE LIke an Hart the live-long day That in thorns and thickets lay Rouse thee soul thy flesh forsake Got to relief from thy brake Shuddring I would have thee part And at every motion start Look behind thee still to see If thy frailties follow thee Deep in silence of the night Take a sweet and stoln delight Graze on Clover by this calm Precious spring of bleeding Balm Thou remembrest how it ran From his side that 's God and man Taste the pleasures of this stream Thou wilt think thy fâ—â—sh a dream Nightly this Repast go take Got to Relief from thy brake On WHITSUNDAY or God is Light GOD is all Light All eye who first gave sight To the dark Caos yielding no delight To him the double Parent whiles it lay So deep in night that nothing yet was day Wherein nought pleas'd his eye that blindly stood But when it saw He saw that all was good He whose eternal Essence House and Robe Are all one Light one boundless Christal Globe Fathers of Lights whose Son is from on high The day-spring and whose spirit an inward eye Which through this worlds wide Engine moves and rouls But dwels in us illumining our souls To search and find that whole and only Bliss Which of all three in one the Vision is Expostulation on the loss of a noble Gentlemans eye Mr. H. Ha. 1634. THou dreadfull Potter may thy humble clay Ask if Deformities or Darkness may Be pleasing in thy sight or why we find So many born so many striken blind Troops of diseases Change of chance to marr Thy work and leave a cloud where was a star If sin still made thy wrath thus heavy fall Alas thou mightst rain Darkness on us all If sins excess their pride that have their eyes Would all exceed for they would all despise But what on sins slaves as a plague is thrown Like manna fals and mercy to thine own The Sodomites were blind so Tobie was It fell on Paul as well as Elymas And to thy book thy glass when we repair Where as all scruples all solutions are That blind-born man so pos'd and quarrel'd there His parents too by thine own doom are clear And opening his thou giv'st us eyes to see That Natures Blemish may thy Glory be So canst thou blend these things and make us wealth Of Poverty and of a sickness health Want teaches Plenties use were night away We should grow wanton-weary of the day Blows Bruises Blindness ere thy work be done May into Medcine Balm and Eye-salve run God that through Darkness se'st down through my Rains And knowst how close this grief my heart constrains How this blow striks my eyes still that to weep I find them apter then to look or sleep Thou know'st the Muse was no phantastick fit Brought forth this verse I am not sick of wit But these disordered lines like Amraes deep Fetcht srom my soul in lowly murmur creep Up to thy Throne of Grace The rest is lost On New-years Day a New-years Gift Out of Gal. 4.4 God sent his Son made of a woman made under the Law First God sent his Sone GOD sent his Son to make mans joy begun From first to last in endless circle run Without Beginning God who never ends From boundless Being mans Beginning sends Mans double guard of Sun and stars we see Angels unseen all of his sending be A foodfull Garden after food came rest Then woman came of Visibles the best Her seed in Promise then in Gods intent Before all worlds into the world was sent But till all other sendings fail and fade The Blood that seal'd this mission was unmade Man first was sent to Reasons goodly Lamp Which dul'd he found and dim'd in sinful damp Then Sacrifice and Prayer which heard he saw New Light down sent him in a flaming Law Wild sinners scourge But School and Guide to those That tir'd by sin by Faith on him repose To make whose joyes in endless circle run From first to last Behold God sent his Son Made of a Woman MAde of a woman Heark you Race Of men no more this Sex disgrace The Lord of Glory leaves his place To Bour with Mary full of Grace God above all that 's great or good Is made of womans flesh and blood How rare a Vivary was this Our Lord within our Lady is O look Amazed Angels look But cannot read this my stick Book Till that Babes blood unclose the seal And so himself himself reveal The woman first that wrought our wo Remember first from man did grow Here all by Virgins blood was done Gods only Partner in his Son Made of a woman Heark you Race Of men no more this Sex disgrace Made under the Law UNder the Law He that the Ground-work laid Of Earth and gave the seas a Law was made Who gives the charge to this Eternal Word Supream-and-sole-law-giving mighty Lord. Proud slime and worms God bows our yoak to bear Put on in love to put us out of fear To service homage vassalage descends * Jan. 1. To day and first fruit of his blood he spends What Feind Eccentrick then shall force our souls
since the print was dark and we sin-blind His Word became the mirror of his mind And as the Eternal Father on the Son His form engrav'd before all worlds begun So what he is what God in him to us The spirit of both doth in this Book discuss Clear spring of wisdom Truths eternal mine The whole a Temple and each leaf a shrine And as on clouds on mountains and on streams The Sun lets beauties fall in golden beams But with his own pure Light the stars inspires And through their bodies thrusts his living fires So other holy books can but reflect Those Raies which here are native and direct Which apt to dazle and confound the wise Are yet a gentle light to Childrens eyes And you bright Maid whose name if I reherse I shall a Rubrique make and not a Verse And were such gold found in Italian Mines They would have twenty new St. Katharines As little ones in Gardens take delight Here gather fruits for tast and flowrs for sight The flower of Jesse that fresh and lasting Rose The fruit of knowledge and of life here grows On babes as tender Virgins love to look Behold that blessed babe within this book Pure fair adorn'd with perfect white and red A Crown of Radiant stars about his head If you be sick if head or heart do ake On Jesus name call and the pain will slake Read it when first you rise and goe to bed Under your Pillow let it bear your head All books in one all Learning lies in this This your first A B C and best Primer is Whence having throughly learnt the Christ-cross Row You may with comfort to our Father go Who will you to that highest lesson bring Which Seraphims instruct his Saints to sing A SERMON Preached to the KING AT OATLANDS 1638. JOHN 1.12 But as many as received him to them gave he Power to become the Sons of God even to them that believe on his Name WE Country Ministers preaching at Court are first confined to matter finishable in one hour being like the Virgins in the Court of Ahasuerus She that came once must come no more except she pleas'd the King and were call'd for by name For which I shall chuse to insist on few particulars And then we are fearfull to displease Such are the winds of Information One breaths that good wise Caveat of King James of ever blessed memory Not to soar aloft or muster up our own readings Another whispers Touch not State nor Discipline nor Controversies At length I threw down all fear of displeasing by choice of this Text which plainly preaches Christ Jesus but Christ in Excellency excellent things are here spoken of him and of his powerfull Grace and excellent things said to be done to us by him and his gracious Power And if wondrous things will take it is a Text replete with wonders and yet no wonder containing him who wears that title among and above all those in Isaiah of a Prince peaceable and wonderfull No wonder if an earthly King be and by his own neglected when the King of Kings that came down from Heaven in triple light and evidence of his own stupendious Miracles his Fathers acknowledgment and the fiends own confessing to see how hardly the beams of Truth are let in on envy-poisond souls came thus furnisht among his own and yet his own received him not No longer wonder that a gracious King retains a sweet and mercifull disposition even to disaffected Subjects taught by this King here the Messiah who as anointed with Grace above all so sheds Grace and Mercy over all offers it to all even to those that would none These Builders here that threw him by he would have built them upon himself as on a stone elect and precious and so have raised them up into a new Jerusalem Miracle of Mercy To urge and press the gift of his Grace yea of his blood on those that despis'd it counted it an unholy thing and to remember them for his Cross in his prayer and for his death in that Commission after Go preach the Gospel to them Let them have glad tidings of Peace and Salvation Go take in them that would not take in me Receive them to Mercy that received me not And go first to them first to the lost sheep of the house of Israel and beginning at Jerusalem Nor cease these wonders here for now not the Jewish Church alone not she his only beloved though even in this sense nor Rome nor Antioch but Jerusalem is the mother Church the mother of us all But 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Apostle The diminution of the Jew is become the riches of the Gentiles and in the place where it was said They are no people of mine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there they shall be called the Sons of God And that there is Here The Church of England a Church of Gentiles and this place the Represent and Lantskep of that If we will receive Christ What then I cannot tell you what Some mighty thing it is certain 'T is bundled up in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here which is a Right and Interest or Priviledge and Prerogative and a Dignity and Power no less then to become the Sons of God As many as received him c. Three parts I shall make of the Text First Vitis The Vine therein discoveting the root on which this fruit grows that is so copious clearing to us the Prime and other branching causes of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Secondly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 id est Racemus The bunch of Grapes that hangs upon this vine which who so puls and presses by a lively faith shall extract an Honor and Preheminence and Power quodcuunque velis A large trail of blessing unexpressable Our last part is Torcular The Wine-press whereby I shall first attempt to draw from Vitis and Raecemus a cup of Consolation as Calpar and Inferius but being so the too lushious issues of the Grape must a while be set by till we have tasted of a second cup of consideration for a cooler and then a third of Conformity and Concordance with Christ And then is that first to be resum'd and brew'd with some ingredients that may make it relish upon the Palate of the meekest Christians That done it will remain to urge the health of all three so mingled both for conveniency and necessity absolute and respective Last of all to make tryal by your patience of our receiving Christ in receiving his Receivers Those that are deputed to receive our homage and take our regard in his stead I shall name but three and reckon them upwards The Poor the Priest the Prince of his People Of these plainly and honestly And first of Vitis that is Christ Jesus to him we would but none can find that way till drawn and no way to be drawn up but our laying hold on the chain of Grace let down◠and nothing will do that but Prayer
good a man a man â—â—er Gods own heart so gracious a King that 〈◊〉 his people with a faithful and true heart and rul'd them prudently with all his power anointed by God with his holy oil and appointed by him to be Head over all the Tribes assured from God â—hat his holy hand arm and all should hold him faâ—â— and strengthen him against the violence of his enemies and yet to see this Head over the people 〈◊〉 surrounded with evil members such a roar about him of populorum multorum maximorum for so Tremellius reads it and so we translate iâ— Of all the mighty and the word will bear botâ— multitude and magnitude from all these in steâ—â— of Magnificat and Benedictus which were due ouâ— flie Reproaches blasphemies slanders thick a hail at every step he takes Vestigia it is hereâ— That may be all the prints and tracts of his wordâ— and actions defac'd and blur'd They found Erraâ—â— in them all in all he said or did they dayly mistaâ—â—â— my words is gone before Ps 56.5 And here theâ—â— slander my actions the footsteps of thy Anointed Is this all No the Kings enemies here are Goâ—â— enemies too Slandering David the Lords servant blaspheming Jehova Davids Lord. No wondeâ— then at Recordare Domine in the top here more woâ—der at Benedictus in the bottom Notwithstandingâ— this Rebuke and slander and blasphemy nay 〈◊〉 all this for all these Praised be the Lord for eveâ— more Amen 3. Less then two Parts we cannot make David Supplication and his Consolation or let the fâ—â—â— Part be his Malady and the second his Remeâ—â— First the Malady we shall see will draw to it all 〈◊〉 matter of the Supplication and take in all the pâ—â—sons as well those affected to it as those infeâ—â—â— by it and then the Remedy will heal up and make a fair hand of all when we have discovered it throughout the Text from Recordare down to Benedictus 4. This Malady then for the name we may call it here Opprobrium Reproachful or disgraceful language It hath other names here of Rebuke Slander Blasphemy three Channels all drain'd into one sink of Opprobrium That is the Monster the Bawling Cerberus foaming with Aconitum a strong poison working and drenching through all and if it light upon a King you see it obstructs his Pectoral parts sits near his very heart gestare in sinu doth not signifie nothing 5. But what causeth this Maladie whence comes fit not desuper not from the Father of Light from him none but good and perfect Gifts nor from his Son whose wisdom is first pure then peaceable gentle easie to be intreated who when he was reviled reviled not again nor comes it from that Spirit which proceeds from them both which came down in shape of a Dove it comes the other way then de subter from the fowl unclean spirit from the Prince of Darkness A dire and dreadful vapour it is from Hell that blasts the day and all the children of light But yet so welcome is this spirit to the spirit of a meer natural man while it lusteth after envy and lies soakt in flesh and blood that the carnal man loves it as his own flesh and blood nourishes and cherishes it till wonted once and grown familiar it goes from man to man and from house to house crescit eundo grows a foggy ugly unweldly and monstruous thing and that it fall among a crew of Populorum and gathers still upon multorum maximorum then it soon poisons and putrifies it condenses and putrifies the very air hurls rotten and killing slanders round about the earth and shoots up blasphemies as high as heaven 6. We may go another way to work and seek these blatant beasts Infamy and Blasphemy Slander and Reproach and find them all concentred in St. James his world of wickedness and a fitter Centre can never be for as in this great world we have infinite atomes feathers and dust flying aloft but massie and drossie things sink downward to the centre of the earth So in this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we have store of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 light and vain and foolish words upon the wing but still the most filthy the mineral and visceral and intestine the basest and heaviest dregs and lees and tartar the drossiest and lowest stuff even as low as the bottomless pit that which showes man likest and draws him nearest to the Devil is this Devilish part and price of opprobrium 7. Thus having fixt upon this Centre see if the Text will furnish out a Circumference and here are choice materials for of whom speaks the Prophet this of himself or of some other of himself and very many other We are told this Psalm and the former were made by two Brothers Ethan and Heman and by them cast as two Molds of Prayer both in private difficulties for which the former and in publike affliction or subversion of the Republike in which this Psalm is the pattern both prepared to warn and arm Gods people of and against dangers and both applicatory to Christ and his Church in all ages I told you Opprobrium would draw to it all the matter and take in all the persons in the Text and more it seems then I conceived to be therein contained at first for now we may include all the Lords servants at large and then all his Chiefs David and every anointed of the Lord and then the Lord Christ Jesus himself and God in his unspeakable name of Jehovah too this Circumference will embelish our skeme and yet as high and holy and heavenly as these persons are they may be vext and endangered by this malady all infested or offended from this Center 8. Not possible Is this in the power of Populorum What Sling What Engine What Ordinance have they to shoot as high as Heaven The Sun can dart a raie down through the bowels of the earth The Dog-star fling pernitious defluxions But these Caniculars that grin like a Dog and run through the City can they from a throat like an open Sepulcher vent such a steam such a ravenous and destructive vapour as will kill at that distance Should Earth swell out into 10000 Tenariffs they could not bore the moon Earths shadows run into nothing before they reach the Sun What earth born people then so malignant to produce a plague so powerfull You have heard of a people sowen in the dust and which grew up from a Dragons teeth 't is thus far true The race of Populorum maximorum and all came from the Dust which is the Serpents food and we are all the worse to this day for the Serpents tooth in the forbidden fruit and worst of all for the Serpents tongue in the first tentation for there and thence this spreading poison was instilled As he was a Murderer so a Lier and Slanderer from the beginning even Inimicus tuus Domine Satan The Arch-enimy that blasted and disordered
Division and Confusion These are the winds Euroclydon and Boreas and his brethren that lift up the waves of popular Tumults and none but Jehovah can still this Tempest 14. Especially if Maximi mingle in the mass of Populorum and run with them to the same excess of riot in Opprobrium which God forbid True Nobles and great ones worthy the name of the Worthies of Israel will consider the base alloy to be ingloriously harded with vulgar spirits and wise men will not easily be blown up or hurried away with every wind of Doctrine but be and do like those nobler Bereans that is search if those things men preach be so or no. They will read and believe the Scripture which tels them that the Lords anointed who raised them to be Majores Maximi made them suscipere magìs maximè The fountain of all honour is ordained of God to be Caput Head over all the Tribes in the Old and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 supream in the new Testament â—ud so set on the Throne and in the place of God that the Kings enemie is Gods enemie Every Opprobrium cast at him reviles Jehovah here renâ—ers the Rebuker of David a Blasphemer of the Lord. And therefore for the Lords sake since â—o parting him and Caesar every Maximus will â—arn what every Minimus every Christian that hath a soul as Saint Paul saith most learn that 〈◊〉 to be as Jehovah made them subject and that or conscience sake to God conscience of sinning against God blaspheming God and the King go together and the sin is done against Heaven and that Father there which is committed against Paâ—â—rem patriae here To cut a lap from the Kings to be made honest Davids heart smite him and those hearts are but dull and heavy stuff that can endure Detraction to disrobe or expose to disgrace the spiritual Fathers of the Church and especially that Father whom in Oaths and Prayers we stile next and immediately under God over all persons 15. Thus are we something onward to a remedy if either Populus would be reclaimed or Maximi disclaim their associaton but if neither our next Remedy is here explicite Gest are in sinu that is Patience Gods own remedy he is patient and he is provoked every day and Christus Domini bids us Learn of him and Christus Domini David did so in the case of Shimei Let him alone it may be the Lord will look on my affliction and that the Lord will requite good for his cursing this day and so servi Domini enform us St Paul and St. James You have need of Patience and let patience have her perfect work Take the Prophets for examples of suffering affliction and of Patience so this Medicine is Catholicon and hath Gods Probatum affixt The patient abiding of the week shall not perish for ever 16. The last Remedy is in Recordare benedictum which make a whole prayer and first 1. Prayer in general it is the invention of Gods people from the beginning Tents and Iron-works from Cain and His but Invocation from Enos and his royal Progeny and God would have it so Ever since he kept house on earth it must be called an House of Prayer for all Nations all that would be of the houshold of faith and fellowship of the Saints If that honour then this work which pleases God above incense and doth him more honour then all burnt Sacrifice But what good to his servants all the good our hearts can desire for would we do Wonders drie up Seas cleave Rocks stop the Sun or the Lions rage quench the violence of fire subdue Armies Kingdoms or over-power created and increated Nature bind down the hands of God himself Prayer hath done this and more with that Prayer of Bow the heavens and come down the Church of God brought down that Jesus at whose name we bow who bows the Spirit of God to us into us and fills us full of Grace and Truth of Faith and Hope and Love and Joy and all those Graces which serve to bring us in Grace and to reconcile us though sinners and enemies to the Father through the Son as he proclaims the Peace himself In quo acquiesco 2. Secondly Here is Christus Domini at prayer Iexhort that first of all Prayers and Supplications be made for Kings that 's well but I shew you amore excellent way Kings to make Prayers Supplications for themselves an appeal lies to and here from for Caesar too at this Throne of Grace before this Mercy seat of God who is the only Ruler of Princes And in this Davids zeal exemplary I was glad saith he when they said unto me Let us go up to the house of God Our feet shall stand in thy Gates O Jerusalem And in trouble and trouble of enemies let others seek what remedy take what course they please but I take my self nay I give my self unto Prayer 3. Thirdly Prayer in distress the proper Remedy because God erected the Court of Requests in Heaven for the grievances of his Houshold This the pool with several Porches and Parishes where if we wait in right season we may be cured be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 never so noisom what disease soever it be Should the enemies of Christus Domini conspire and continue to drie up that oyl of heavenly Power which pours it self from the head for the preservation of the members or the state it self grow sick of a Tympany or false conception or shake and totter with the palsie or we have just cause to complain in the Church and pray God to deliver u from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is I think such as regard no Topicks fetch their Arguments from no common place of old Reason or Religion evil and absurd men 2 Thess 3.2 O yet here 's our refuge The weapons of our Militia are our our Prayers to him that cals upon us to call upon him in time of trouble and he will deliver us 4. Fourthly Speciaily Prayer is prevalent in this particular textual disease and malady of Opprobrium Our Litany with Libora nos Domine is the best Ditany to throw off this arrow to return and repay and requite it into their bosom that annoy us is but Lutum luto purgare No though it be a case which nearly concerns us and an offence of an high nature yet our best way is to remove it to the highest court of audience in Heaven before the Judge of all the world where we have advocatum Regium and the darling and favorite of that court to plead our cause which is his own and who took this course himself reviled not again but commited it to him that judges righteously The Apostle indeed Eph. 6. arms and prepares the Souldier of Christ with an Helmet and a shield a sword too of the Spirit and fits him with an whole Armoury beaten our in Heaven for him But how concludes he praying always with all
meat and drink to do service And here again Corpus aptasti I am sure we sure were â—â—â—er so fitted for a body and for an house For were it not for this house in woful state were all the great houses of the Land all the Princely houses of all Christian lands the famous houses of York and Laneaster Valois Burbon Medices and Austria The right descent and purest royal blood is from this house of flesh but for this house and his wearing it and bearing all ours sins on the top of it For into the house they came not What Title but from this Ancestour to Paradise the Palace the Nonsuch above not a Tarquin Priscus or Superbus but beholden to this Servius nay the best and purest votaties in this house of God the place of his service not David or Solomon or good King Ezekiah not Constantine or Theodosius or Jacobus or Carilaus no gratious King of famous Memory or present Merit no body though never so embellisht or embraved shall ever joyn in that Quire of his Saints and holy Angels above without the mediation of the body of Jesus our Lord and the service done in that body 5. But what service in that Inn at Bethlem where was no room for him it was yet made serviceable for us for there we Inn to this day all at that Star we Gentiles claim by those that were Primitiae first Guests to that house of Gold and Incense we find there he had and we Partakers of his fine Gold and good service hath his Incense done us I am sure We pray Lord increase our faith and he that could help our unbelief Lord might do us good service if so surely a hundred Sermons in this house not more available then the dumb Cradle of our Lord in that cratch The Scripture speaks evidently saith the Apostle the Scripture lies mute thâ— Cradle house yet therein is an herald to proclaim the fulfilling of two great Prophecies one was Et tu Bethlem there Christ to be born The other that of his poverty A Worm shame of men out-cast of the people Upon the very Pillars of this house which are but the staves of the Cratch may we safely relie and build our Faith this blinded and madded the Jew but thus it must be thus must Christ be born if ever he do us good this obscureness to manifest him this emptiness to be his fulness of a Messiah to fulfill the Scripture that so our joy might be full full of joy and Peace in believing This the service he doth our Faith and no less service in making us humble I believe Lord and may not every one say I am humble Lord too but Lord help our unhumility Help us off with the double lets of outward Pomp and inward Pride Behold this Royal Insant reaches out his hand to serve us from his Cratch in our Bed-chambers and by his powerfull his high and mighty and stupendious Humility thrusts it to our hearts and strips off all from the souls and bodies of his faithfull servants all that may offend the eye of his heavenly Father and in that voice comes from him in this Cradle though yet inarticulate we hear him in the evidence of his holy Word and Spirit say Learn of me Put on the Lord Jesus Christ who thus in this House serves us and helps his servants both in their Faith and their Humility 6. and 7. In the sixth and seventh the private houses and banqueting houses of his servants the Lord serves as a Builder and a Watch-man and a â—â—aplain to say Grace and bless and loves to do â—â—vice there in the freedom of his conversation said in his dish by the proud Pharisee and in dayly working that Miracle of warry juice turned into Wine concoct into fresh and cheerfull blood 8. Next he serves us in those water-houses Wilt not thou O Lord go forth with our Armies saith the Psalmist so we may say The Lord hath gone forth with our Navies as in 88. so Quadragesimus octavus too Mirabilis Annus And then it is the Lord and the Power of his Might that hath saved the Metaphorical ships of Church and State kept those Bottoms from forreign invasive storms and dangerous Schisms and Leaks at home Skilfull Mariners may do well but he the Pilote at the Helm Christo Duce auspice regno is a Right Prophetick and true Inscription by Land and Water His bloody Cross a braver Flag and nobler Badge then Lucida sidera Castor Pollux This Pollens Lux ipsa the true Light to guide the whole feet He did us worthy service who first came by ship to conveigh the Light of the Gospel hither some years before a spark of fire at Rome What doth Lux by whose blessing on our ships we may by the same way derive the Light to other Nation yet in darkness as importing so thus exporting too the unsearchable Riches of Christ to which all Treasures of East and West are pale and drowsie and muddy things as a little Gravel in comparison Thus venture I still on with my frail bark and well enough if still Cesarem veho bear his well tryed Patience and attention along while Dominum Caesarem vebo That Lord who now could find no further house-room on earth or water but ceas'd not yet to do us further service in his very Sepulchre 9. For till he came thither thither we were come dead and buried bound hand foot in the grave-cloaths of our sins sealed up and claspt down with a stony weight of the wrath of God which would have prest us to the nethermost Hell But behold in that short time of his abode in this house what Rare Redoubts and Mines this mighty Engineer casts and contrives works a descent through the Iron jaws of death down to Hell and like a Conqueror ascends leading in Triumph Captivity Captive opening so and seasoning and sweetning so this house before so dreadfull filled with ultimum terribilium that his Disciples all that love and seek him in Life and Death shall never find discomfort in a Grave Nothing but a Requiem and Dormitory with Angels sitting at the head and feet till he awake them in Tuba novissima and raise them to a meeting in the clouds where all his servants shall enter into the joy of that their Lord. 10. As for the Catholick Church to demand his service there is to ask What good the Vine the Head the Bridegroom the Corner-stone do to the Branches Members Spouse and Building in those strict Unions nay closer then all those per euâ—dem spiritum Behold so am with you never to offer to part from you never to suffer you to part from me to the end of the world in the end and world without end which will be soon discovered by the Service done to each particular Member in every â—fâ—nr Souls and Bodies in that house For is not our body his house wonderfully and fearfully built that little world of beauty shaken
out of dust and bals of living fire fiâ—xt in our eye-brow what work makes this heavenly Potter even with that clay in white red blew after all his polishing forced to take it down and like China earth hiding some for many 1000 years will shew his Power in their raising far fairer then before and yet able to dispatch the same effect on others in a moment in the twinckling of an eye changed and not die by a suddain dissolution and a suddain re-union But far rarer Workmanship is the Recreation of our souls washt brighter in his blood and heightned by his Spirit We need but two things for our souls Grace Truth and both came by Jesus Christ from his fulness we receive both by whose service and Ministry we are made New Creatures invested in a Robe and admitted to an Order past the Fleece and Garter the Right Order of the holy Ghost Brag not vain man O run not up into some beastly figure if guilding like a snail or tracing the way of thy preferment by thy blood or match thou be mounted to a local state of Wealth and Honor for these can add no new substantial forms But this access of Spirit from this Lord is right enobling and superinduces a new soul which like fire devours and takes up all within thee and winding in one Coelestial flame and embracing Understanding Will Affections wings and lifts up all to Heaven 12. Lastly In this very house where we assemble for the Worship and Service of the Lord it is the Lord himself that does the Service to the whole Assembly So that a non nobis Domine is fixable upon the porch of this and every house of God For first he invites us hither Come I Call upon me Seek you my face The skie of Scripture hung round with provocations calling us to service and being entered who executes the parts of our Divine Service in this house of Prayer And is it not he that prays for us in us with us before us and teaches us to pray and say after him Our Father and as once by himself in Prayers and strong cries so here assists our dulness and deadness of Spirit by his own quickning Spirit inditing our Prayers and raising our Devotion with sighs and groans that cannot be exprest It is secondly a house of preaching and we indeed preach Jesus and our selves your servants for Jesus sake nay him a Servant for your sakes But if we speak him right it is he that speaks the word of the Lord heavenly Treasure from our earthen vessels that the excellency might be of God and not of us 'T is he that first did write the word which is his Power and Wisdom to our salvation and 't is he that spels the Gospel and reads and speaks to us in his Word and he that laies out and distributes sentences to several bosoms as every man hath need and he alone that follows the Sermon home and saies it all over again to our hearts Finally his House is a House of Communion for the Saints and Churches of God for the due receiving of his holy Sacraments And as in the Baptistery it is he that receives the Infants in his arms and washes their Souls in his blood and makes the water there a Laver of Regeneration So in the Supper of the Lord it is the same Lord who first shed those primordial purple drops at his Circumcision the first fruits of his all powerfull blood to begin the work of our Salvation and ever since at every holy Communion gives both body and blood the food of faithfull and repentant Spirits and makes those sad sweet drops fall again to the anguish first and then the healing of our souls For such a different office hath this blessed Sacrament that it serves both to discover our sins and to seal our Pardons Wherein while faithfully we receive him he really receives us into him and we him into us So all of us become one body and one Spirit and all by the service of one and the same for ever Jesus Christ to whom c. S. D. G. A SERMON Preached at YORK 1640. AT The Council of King and Lords EPHE 5.8 For you were once darkness but are now Light in the Lord. Walk as Children of Light IN the Skie of Scripture shines the Sun of Divinity And all Divinity all that Sun is shed in these thee Radii The Lapse the Restoring the Duty These are a perfect Catechism And a sum of these is the Epistle to the Romans injust Methode and this Text a methodical Brâ—â—iat of that Epistle indeed an Epitome of all the Book of God for here we have the Creation the World struck out of Chaos or what is more mysterious It could not chuse but please the Angels then to see the LIGHT rise out of darkness by a powerfull FIAT and the earth anon to emulate heaven by vertue of a Producat But this This Rare Work the Angels desire to prie into 1 Pet. 1.12 And if we pace along we shall find here Enoch walking with God Abraham called out of VR to another VR a purer Light The deliverance from Egypt the Red Sea the Rock the Mannae the Ark the Mercy-seat And here are all the Sacrifices the Life and Substance of them all with the Fulness and Light of all the Promises and Prophesies and here is the new Testament The Star appears Behold we bring you glad tidings Run Shepherds and see the great Shepherd of all our Souls whiles yet an Infant Loe He is wrapt here in the Swadling bands of this Text. He is the Word and this his Comment his Paraphrase and Explication You were once c. These words are a Tree laden with fruit most precious the very shell the rind is precious But if we open this Onyx this Pearl Cabinet it contains rare Food and Medicine and Wine and Balsam a Quintessence an Extraction beyond the Spirits of Oyl and Wine and Spices For what Chymist can draw Light Is not that that thing my sterious in Job 38. which way saith he is the Light parted yet here is more the Sun the Spring of Light here is that Sun of Righteousness and the Father of Light and the Spirit of Illuminations All All the holy blessed and glorious TRINITY unfolded here we may with Moses in a pious sense see him that is invisible Behold that rare workman tasking himself in his main project busie in dispatch of all his Miracles at once The Leper is cleansed the Lame walk the Blind receive their sight the dead are raised Nay Majus opus moveo The earth raised up to Heaven Flesh wrought up to Spirit Nature changed to Grace and dust advanced to he Partaker of Divine Nature For you were once Darkness c. A Comprehensive Text it is will take in all persons Speak I to a King or Lords Will they not all be glad at heart to be enlightned by this Dominus in the
knowest it is wind by that but knowest not whence nor whither So is every one that is born of the Spirit The cause and course is secret but the effect discernable As in Creation our soul and body meet by breathing so here the mystick work is Inspiration and infusion of manifold graces but those graces have activities and such whereby you shall easily perceive that you were once darkness but are now Light in the Lord. These Graces then will give us further Light whose excellencies are laid out in those expressions of Water Floods Fountains and Fire and Milk and Manna and Oyntment and their Efficacies in those names of Seal and Evidence and Earnest and Witness and Joy and Consolation And are there not fruits of the Spirit Gal. 5. Fruits that grow not up from the bitter Root of corrupted nature but from another Principle and which in their bloom and freshness render a man not like those Ethnick Graces only facile and sweet in conversation though they do that too but gracious in Gods aspect and glorious too shining as a Light in the midst of a crooked and perverse Generation If we shall taft a fruit or two in specialty I will only trie to do it in this notion here and under this Capacity of Light 1. Knowledge even that of nature is a Light and mans soul still is the Lamp of God saith Solomon and a Wisdom residing therein that Recedes as far from folly as Light ftom Darkness and this was all those great Philosophers Animalia Gloriae had which puft them up so For this hath some tincture of the Serpent and soon inflates yet alas Mans salvation is that Grove and Mysterie Nulli penetrabilis astro not pervious nor peirceable by the star-light of Reason There must come a supernatural Light from Heaven which as in the Giver it is called a Sun of Righteousness rising with healing in his wings the day-spring from on high and the True Light so in the Receiver it is called a great and marvellous Light of which Will you hear St. Paul I count all loss 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the supereminence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord this indeed is all for in this is all This is Eternal life to know Thee and him whom thou hast sent Jesus Christ to know him for my Jesus to apprehend him for my Justifier by a second Grace by a true and lively Faith 2. Faith then is another Light of the sanctifying Spirit superinduced on the Light of Reason to raise and perfect it for it is not in stones or beasts God can from stones raise up Children unto Abraham but if so the work must first be done by Infusion of a rational soul and the golden Key of this Grace then fitted to the prepared wards of reasonable Nature It is not amiss to compare it to Sybillaes golden bough which grew to and upon the Trce and as he adds Auri per Ramos aura refulsit So this superstructure out-shines the utmost endeavours and perfections of Nature and Reason and resembled it is by some as the Seal to Wax It is not naked and meer reason as Air is Fire but Faith is rather printed reason and there joined Light if we wilfully exstinguish not their flames will yield the bearer fair Direction and Confidence and Consolation There may be there will be a coarctation a compression of this flame in the act of Faith a damp upon the alacrity thereof yet if there be not in us an evil heart desirous nay wilfully set to depart from the living God If you abide in me saith our Saviour then certainly as his Father and he with the sacred Spirit joyntly made Light at first and pin'd it to that Sun which was never wholly darkned since and as he the true Light breaking from the clouds of the blessed Virgins body and joyned to mans nature retains that nature still now glorified so the Spirit of this Grace possessing thy spirit loves never to part again but grieves when we offer to quench his coelestial fires O then learn not to despair of Mercy and Assistance Clouds and Eclipses obscure and wandring and wicked thoughts self-accusings and self-condemnings and Satans suggestions may trouble and affright us But if we abide in him and be strong in the Lord and in the Power of his Might and resist the Devill he will flie from us and our hope in Christ and the Power of his Resurrection like a rising Morn will scatter all the delusions and rebellions of the Night and remember his gracious Promise Hell-gates shall not prevail against a Faith of Adherence All the Powers of Darkness let loose upon St. Paul yet he was safe I know in whom I have believed I live saith he no not I but Ckrist lives in me and it is his Spirit only that can give assurance that whereas I was darkness my Faith in him makes me light in the Lord. 3. As for Love another Grace the Grace of Graces the bond of perfection and especially of that coelestial Armor and Ardor of the soul to God What might we say Whatdo they feel into whose breasts is shot this right coelestial flame and there shed abroad by the holy Ghost which is given them Away then with all wanton fires of earthly Love or ambition set them but by this and they will appear poor and wan discolour'd pale and drousie things and like meretritious females shewn with modest and noble Matrons dasht all out of countenance 4. Lastly for I am not too long to insist on these Graces so perceptible to the Possessors if we would have true and lasting joy Where shall we seek it Is it to be found among those Pangs and Convulsions and Palpitations of an earthly sensuall mind Mala mentis gaudia as the heathen Poet calls them and plac'd by him far within the Porch of hell Meteors of imperfect mixture Scansory and seeming to mine and aim at lightsomness and height of Spirit But having crackt awhile and blaz'd down they slide again and resolve into their first earth and drossiness But he that hath tasted of the heavenly gift the joy in the Holy Ghost wherein the Kingdom of Heaven on earth doth principally consist can tell you of a joy that is full a joy unspeakable and glorious consisting in a dispersion of all that is dark and desolate and a true Light that is Lux in Domine Light in the Lord. Thus have we trac'd this Oriens ex alto and thus far described that Method that Lucidus Ordo of Gods procedure in descent of his Spirit and defluence of his Graces Thus far we are come to meet with this great Bishop of all our souls this blessed Visitor and have observed his way of baptizing with the Holy Ghost and with enthean fire and confirming his People with the manifold Graces of his Spirit But yet since he is in Heaven and that Spirit is to descend on us we are not satisfied till we
know further of this Divine Method which is the Aquaeduct the Ventiduct the Luciduct which way still doth Christ in his Spirit conveigh this Holy water this gentle Air this blessed Light to our Spirits I confess this is one of the most necessary important and most usefull Queries we can make and which being clearly resolved will shame both Papists that hide away as much as they can and other Hereticks that blaspheme the Scriptures and pretend to a Spirit enthusiastick which is nothing but the Devil of delusion and spirit of Giddiness And therefore for our best Resolve upon this question Let us do as our Saviour in the point of marriage enquire how it was in the Beginning Look back then to the Creation consider how came Light at first At first the Spirit moves and broods over that which is in it self a confusion a depth and a darkness and then his mighty Word Fiat Lux. He spake and it was Light then Then when all was dark he made material Light and Christ Jesus is the WORD 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For as Speech is the Image of the mind so he the brightness of his Fathers Glory and the express Image of his person Heb. 1.3 The immaterial Light that was never made and the Spirit of the true God in declaring the true Way of his Worship and mans true way thereby to obtain eternal life as the very heathen trusted to the false gods fained Oracles which of necessity must be revealed before man could find or follow it goes that way still that is by the WORD His Word wherein is his Will revealed from Heaven both makes and is our Light This world is Gods Book wherein as in a Glass of wonders we discern him but that print being Dim to us that are sin-blind it pleased him by lively Oracles to make a Mirror far more clearly revealing his mind And as God engraved his form on his Son before all worlds so what that Son is and what the Father is to us in him the Spirit proceeding from both delivers in the Scriptures of both Testaments And as the Sun guilds and enamels clouds and streams and hill Tops with his raies but thrusts his own pure Light his own living sire through the bodies of the stars so other Authors can but yield a faint reflexion of that beam which is direct and native in his book where the very Law he stiles a flaming Light The Prophecies a more sure Word then any Eye-evidences of the Apostles to which we do well to look saith St. Peter himself as to a Light shining in a dark place till the day dawn the day-star rise in our hearts But then the Gospel written and spread by his Evangelists and held out by his spouse the Catholick Church is his marvellous Light He brought life and immortality to Light by the Gospel 2 Tim 1.10 and in Acts 26. 16. I have appeared to thee saith our Saviour to that choice vessel of his Grace and name to make thee a Minister and a witness c. And now behold I will send thee to the Gentiles to what end A glorious end to open their eyes and to turn them from Darkness to Light from the power of Satan unto God and accordingly we find it 2 Cor. 4.3 4. If our Gospel be hid it is hid in them that perish in whom the god of this world hath blinded their unfaithfull minds that the Light of the Gospel of the Glory of Christ who is the Image of God should not shine unto them And in the sixth verse he shews the Walk and Circuit of this Light God who commanded Light to shine out of Darkness hath shined in our hearts there first and then the casting of the beam to give light of the knowledge of the Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ O then you have the means of Light and Grace among you Ministers you are the Light and Salt of the earth and who shall question that truth which the Truth himself hath testified And would it not be a very dark and desolate and a very flash and unsavory world without a publique Ministry of the Word and Sacraments The Clergie however despised are all out Spiritual Fathers Propter quos hanc suavissimam Lucem aspeximus But yet you and they both must know how they have it and the Apostle tells us that too in the next words We have this Treasure in our earthen vessels that the excellency of the Power might be of God and not of us You are not sent to a Means and Medicine of our preparing or any humane but to Gods Divine Ordinance that which is his Power and Wisdom to Salvation to every one that believes And therefore this may be enough to give all humble Christians satisfaction and acquiescence Speak then thy Word O Lord and thy servant shall be healed shall be undarkened and though like Bartimeus though sin-blind have my eyes opened with a word Mar. 10.12 St. Peter spake but words unto Cornelius but words whereby he and his house should be saved words so richly blest that the Text saith while Peter spake these words the holy Ghost fell on all them that heard the word Did not our hearts burn within us said those Disciples Luke 24. to whom our Saviour opened the Scriptures And the Apostles hearers prickt at their Hearts cried Men and Brethren What shall we do to be saved And what a large field of the Fathers testimonies do I here forsake to break by your patience into an Inclosure or two of the very Papists our enemies and the enemies of the Scripture Yet see the excellency of Gods word even those enemies being Judges Cardinal Bellarmine himself is in his superlatives Certissima tutissima regula credendi lib. 1. de verb. Dei ca. 20. and need we any more after so full a witness I 'le name but another but one Instar omnium 'T is he that in a traiterous itch of wit took on him purposely the abuse of Scripture that by mis appliance and prophane wresting he might so abuse our Princes and our Church Mark yet what he is forc'd to say and sure 't is worth our observation if I diminish him not in my English There is in Scripture sayes he an invisible Majesty an hidden splendour a Glory unperishable a wisdom in-exhaustible The solace of humane and the beginning of a Divine life made by the holy Spirit making our spirits holy compat'd with which the Egyptian sages will look pale and poor the Chaldee impure the Grecians blockish Plato no body and Philosophy it self a fool 'T is the print of Heaven on earth and if any where the Joy of Paradise or at least a brave Resemblance of Divine Light be shewed 't is in Scripture containing all that is severed from the actual Vision of God himself Again The paper burns me not yet am I all inflamed in reading it 'T is no composure no artificial tread the Scripture uses
God going along with his people in the Light of his countenance and blessing in the midst of their Camp Tents Tabernacles And in the New Testament it is called a following of God of him who is the Light a walking worthy of the Lord worthy their vocation circumspectly wisely honestly orderly in Truth in Love in Knowledge in good works in newness of life in the fear of the Lord and in comfort of the holy Ghost And in this Church Christ walks amidst the seven golden Candelsticks and this Church shall walk with him in Albis in white stoles when all believing Nations shall walk in the light of the new Jerusalem Behold I have set before you light and darkness the good and the evil way but chuse the good eschew the evil and walk as Children of Light For first We may do so for the words are an exhortation and the Wisdom of God exhorts to nothing impossible No imposing upon his creature without a previous disposing He enforms us of no Duty but he gives means of performance We shall have a portion the danger is our running away from our heavenly Father and wasting our whole stock We shall not want Grace to help us in time of need if we receive it not in vain if we abuse it not if we turn not his Grace into wantonness He invites us to a race who assists us also in the running and cals to us to cast off all that may hinder us And if he lay any thing upon us first he promises it shall be no more then he enables us to bear and then bids us cast our care upon him for he cares for us and he carries for us hath carried the most insupportable burden bore all our sins in his body on the tree that we might be at perfect liberty both in body and soul And if the Son so make us free then are we free indeed and being thus at this liberty by Christ we may well go on our way prescribed having our hearts enlarged as David saith I may go nay I can walk thy ways O Lord yea then I will run the wayes of thy Commandments And surely till then till the ripe season God doth not call upon men for mark the exhortation here and you shall see it leans back and listens to the words before and is like a pair of Compasses of which though one foot stand stifly here on 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the verb of Command and of present activity yet the other is as far removed as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the adverb of time Draw them up together and we shall inclose the whole Will of God Put the adverb to the verb and it is together 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now walk as the palsie-bed rid man now and not till now not till healed in case to walk When you were darkness you could not see to walk as Children of Light then you saw not you regarded not God and that time of your ignorance God oversaw too He regarded it not but now under the Gospel Dispensations he will have all men to come to Repentance and knowledge of the Truth In corrupt nature mankind lay as in fetters and manicles on hands and feet like St. Peter bound with two chains but if an Angel of Grace come down with a Light into the prison then Peter will up and follow the direction of that Light then he will when his Irons are knockt off and then shall nothing hinder him then the Iron gate flies openof its own accord strong prevalent lusts to which he hath been lockt and wedlockt and that Iron sinew in his soul that rock of Adamant shall dissolve and break into a bitter-sweet flood of Repentant tears Such advantage may we make of this little Particle Now now we have got it into the heart of the exhortation It is Gods Will ever now walk now or never to day while it is called to day lest hereafter you have no more dayes And now while it is this instant Now lest we never have another Now Now while we are called upon labor and pluck up our feeble knees and give all diligence to make our calling begin there and so our Election sure 2 Pet. 1. and so is St. Paul here and elsewhere to be understood While you have time and light and free Grace offered in the Word of Grace Now when called to labor in the Vineyard O delay not have a care of your precious souls and work out your salvation with sear and trembling Phil. 2.12 2. As we may let us do this work nay we must for the words are Imperative mood as well as present tense and none exempted they are in the plural number too And though the verb be of the active voice yet it implies our whole duty what we justiy own to Christ our Saviour which is both an active and passive obedience Active first And in that is first to be considered action immanent within the heart devotion there upon that Altar that 's most acceptable to God who is the Father of spirits John 4. seeks such to worship him I will marry her and speak unto her heart saith Christ by the Prophet to his Church his Spouse and betwixt spoused Pairs the offices are mutual God sanctifies your hearts by his Spirit and his holy Spirit calls upon you in his Word Sanctifie you the Lord God in your hearts 1 Pet. 3.15 We are renewed and purified and drest by him habitually But in use of his Graces in acts of Faith and Repentance and Obedience we must be dayly renewing and purifying like the spunging of a Statue or trimming of an Armor it is the Armor of Light Rom. 13. though done yesterday yet must be done to day again and in this sense we must be carefull for to morrow too Secondly In Actions transient for we are his workmanship Eph. 2.10 What then we to do nothing for our selves Yes that follows in due place and time His work-manship created in Christ Jesus To what unto good works which he hath ordained that we we should walk in them For whether that of Cajetan be exactly true or no that infused habits are of the same nature with acquisite Thus far it is true that both are preserved and maintained by works and action Hast thou Faith shew it Let your Light so shine and God is glorified when his Children of Light are seen walking in Love All vain pretences then Et utinam hoc esset bene latuit fallentis semita vita and so the monkish solitude with their Mors pretiosae are here all together shaken out of this walk and likewise the proud and painted Pharisee the swelling seeming Justiciary which sect repuliulates and comes up thick in every successive Generation Solomon saw a brood of them pure in their own eyes yet most impure of a strange alloy and medley religious and wicked And those of St. Paul's order he confesses to be Zealots very strict in appearance fast twice
a week tythe all I possess This was well he ought to do so But Christ that saw his root was vain glory brings him on the stage for our learning to play his part of Miles gloriosus with a Panegyrick of his own praises in his prayer With Lord I thank thee that I am not like other men But all such flaring Hypocrites are met with by St. James Thou hast faith so hath the Devil saith he Is that faith which is all words and no works Can that Faith save thee Or is it vera fides Very faith indeed No it is the other Fià es rather that is a very Fiddlestring Saith not St. Paul as much Sever it from works of Charity and it is a meer sound and an ungracious sound too A sounding brass or a tinkling Cymbal Again they are met with by this Apostle where expounding this Text he tells them and us that walking in Light is all one with walking honestly Now is there any honor whence honesty is derided Is it not a shame Is this to deal fairly Is it fit men should so mis-use God and Godliness What make a shew of Godliness and have nothing to shew for it when it comes to the proof If nothing but profess saith Christ I shall be even with you one day Now it s your day to appear goodly and glorious before deluded men and to be thought Saints But when I come to be made manifest in my true and real Saints and to glorifie them indeed then I 'le profess too I 'le profess to you I know you not I know you well enough from the heart root but to be the men you call your selves My Saints my Elect and choice servants for such I know you not Depart from me you have been Retainers and Pretenders to and talkers of piety but workers of Iniquity 2. So far of active now for passive obedience A Christian ought to be such a one as old Philosophy and Poetry did Ideate only and imagine Sibi imperiosus totus teres atque rotundus A kind of Aeneas or Vlysses and Achilles mingled not only to do but suffer nobly For which end the Stoicks made men believe they had no infirmities but had turned out all their Passions and affections which is impossible Nor is that the thing which God requires 'T is not a disparking a disforesting but a Cicuration a Subjugation a Captivity a Crucifixion a Mortification and then farther respecting Christian profession Walking here implies a bold and constant course both in our faith and in our obedience the life and soul of faith a course undaunted an Eagles flight bold and forth on Comes humane injury in the way The heathen could rowse his friend with a Te moneo ut omnem gloriam quâ inflammatus fuisti omni cura industria consequare magnitudinemque animi ne unquam inflectas cujusquam injuria A Christian vertue then should be à crassiore tela then for every file to break 'T is for a weak or guilty mind to be troubled with injurious words like our Duellists preventing the day of Judgement and calling their brother to account next morning for every idle word over night by sending him the length of their sword And since I have mentioned Duellists let me have leave to throw three or four cool words this morning on that fire which is but Ignis fatuus and a Meteor that hath a place only in a middle rank and region of mankind The whole skie of women are clear against it Nobles for Council sit or government will learn to look down with storn upon it Beggars and the poorer Tribes ca◠live and die with a few brawls and broken heads The three professions are better taught and men of Trade and Occupation in Cities and Corporations understand not the word Business in the quarrelling Dialect So that fighting is confined it descends not usually beneath a serving man nor ascends above a Knight and being thus comprest the hope is it will shortly vanish into nothing For it rises from that which is next to nothing that is Vanity and Lyes and Vapors And you shall observe them still most tender of that dreadfull word the Lye on whom it falls in the nature of a true jest and such most enraged about Reputation forsooth whom wise and honest men know to have very little or no Reputation to lose Briefly What think these Gallants of the old Roman bravery and height of spirit Can they shew me from all that story a pair of worthy courages unless they will alledge those mercenary Fencers embrandled and fighting a duell for the Lye or the son of a whore or any such poor froath as flies from men in wrath or vext with distemper in drink or play But I am preaching to sober Christians a Religion that never occasions much less necessitates any Disciple to a fact which must inevitably draw on or endanger their hanging or damning or both And have we so learned Christ Did not that Lord and King of Glory empty himself first of all his Glory and make himself of no Reputation and then endured such contradiction of sinners such cruel mockings and revilings How many false accusations bore He before he bore his Cross So what a Tullying and declaiming of Tertullus What Rattles and Drums and Gun-shot And what a Catalogue of sufferings past St. Paul before he could finish his course and attain the Crown of Righteousness and even in the shock of painfull afflictions a man of God endued with a true Christian fortitude and Patience will learn to take up his Cross and learn by it as a a sound Distinction and take it as Gods usefull Fan to unmingle him from the chaffie and feathery things of the world and will look through it and find Gods primary intention of Mercy in sending it So David the man after Gods own heart did experiment his afflictions to be good for him and reductive of him into a right way And such a passive walk was his clean through In his beginning the Bear the Lion the uncircumcised Philistine then Troops of enemies with arrows and arrows prepared shot and shot privily Cost and Care and Wit employed to ruine him yet he sings The Lord is my Light and my Salvation whom then shall I fear Nay so far from fearing that if we belong to God it belongs to us to look for crosses What son is it whom the Father chastens not It is the lot of all his genuine Children it is the walk of all his pasture-sheep In the sheep-walk comes the storm the Shearer the Butcher Why For thy sake are we killed all the day long and counted as sheep to the slaughter If it come to death for Christ or his Cause it is the highest dignification to our nature next his own assuming it that parting with life is the consummate the best part of thy walk that severing is Union and that dissolution make the knot indissoluble 1. We come now
to the three Inducements first Quia Filii because you are Children to Dominus here So it is not improper if we take the Light here for Christ the second person for he being the Wisdom of God is his Son from all Eternity and yet a joint-Parent as Eve is Adams daughter and yet trne mother of all that call him Father Walking then is our filial obedience in Faith in Fear in Love as dutifull Children else the Heathen will shame the Christian with his Morals and our Religion in the Practicks is but moral vertue explicated There is by it no third part added to our soul and body The Dr. of Heaven tels us he came adimplere to fill up the Law by supply where it was too narrow in the precepts And therefore the explication and enlargement being his it should excite and enlarge our obedience specially considering whom we call Father the same is our Lord here And shall the Creatutes shame us The Sun will stand still or back his fierie steeds as in the time of Joshuab and Ezekiah the stormy Winds and Tempests fulfilling his Word And is it enough for us to take that name into our mouths to crie only Lord Lord. Cuiresnomini subject a negatur nomine illuditur saith Tertullian And take heed saith the Apostle God is not that is God will not be mocked If Children then be ye followers of God as dear Children And this puts us in mind of our Fathers presence and of our due observance in this place a subject to a proclamation though it be but to fill his head will use a reverent gesture A Son will address and prepare for his Fathers presence especially if then and there to ask his blessing more if he be to hear his Fathers Will read and opened in what 〈◊〉 concerns his Portion most of all will be hearâ—en attentively if the Father he then to pass the Inâ—eritance No so graceless child as will be then and there disorderly or that at parting thence will preâ—ently fall fowle and revile his Father All this might â—e particularly applied but I dare not ask some â—earers how they prepared themselves for this place â—â—st night or this morning in Word and Deed. 〈◊〉 would we had no cause to fear what they will reâ—urn to say and do as soon as gone from hence from â—he presence of him in his Ordinance whom there â—hey called Father and pretended they came to â—â—ave his blessing as we all ought to do quia Filii 2 A second pully or Incentive to our duty is Etiâ—msi Though but children Let not the name dismay Best of all if we feel our selves to be but children For there are the same steps of Seducement in humane and Divine Learnings Men cannot abide to be children we all affect a Magisterium A Christian course is like a line drawn through but drawn with a trembling hand 'T is a salvation wrought but but wrought with fear and trembling And a â—hild will crie and yet follow if led by a stronger hand and we are in the Lords hand here In domino Remember then who leads who bids us follow He leads the way that is the way that makes the way for us and opens an access not by his Fathers acceptation only but his own intrinsique Vertue Power Office We are weak but that weakness inâ—ites his Might and Mercy thy weakness is from â—â—ture which hath her stint and measure but thy strength in Domino who as he possesses so distributes infinitely As in Creation when he had made he left not things to themselves There is a maâ—â— tenency else all would crumble back into their Atoms So in this Recreation Dominus suppoâ—â— manum rude and poor Lumps of our selves no seet no wings but born on his Eagles wings as on a seatherbed we are soft and secure and kept aloft faâ— and free from danger 'T is hard for weakness and child-hood to bear a yoak But his bearing with us and his Spirit assisting us makes the yoak easie and the burden light 'T is the saying of the sons of Beltal His wayes are alwayes grievous Hearken to our Apostle Our conversation is in Heaven Maria ibi non erat ubi erat Children of Light are where they would be It is but three steps with Gods help saith he and he saith it to these Ephesians cap. 2. ver 5. He hath quickned us with Christ raised us with him and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus So sure of possession if we be his Children so sure to hear that voice meet us from the clouds Come ye Children of my Father c. 3. Lastly As Children of Light using the Light for direction and example and this exemplary Light is double First The Suns course is imitable And Secondly The Sun of Righteonsness is our highest and chiefeit Pattern For the first Look how David dresses the Sun Psal 19. In a Tabernacle and presents him as a Bride-groom coming out of his Chamber and as a Gyant rejoycing to run his course So may we find St. Paul in this and the like places sets forth a Son of God a child of Light embraved like another Mordecay O far beyond all Fayorites of the highest Kings or Potentates in a Robe of Righteousness In Domino and in the inner man not outward splend or with Introsum turpis made bright and pure from sin by Sanctification of the Spirit proceeding to a darling and confounding beauty of Holiness shining in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation and the more for their perverseness by an Antiperistasis Learning of the Sun which is not retrograde for winds or clouds nor weary of his luminous operations after so many thousand years of Circuit sets him not down but moves still in a circular in a coelestial and communicable motion which motion if any dare traduce and call it a Pad-way ot dispute it into terms of false inconstant or serpentine as they use the Sun let the Persian or the Indian adore or curse so let the unclean worldings or churlish hel-hounds bark the child of Light will like the Sun cut a clear passage through all and smiling rise from out the liquid snares and jaws of gyant clouds unhurt uncaught and like a Sun-beam saith Seneca though forced to shine on dung hils converse with base and wicked company yet comes off untainted Et hoeret origini suae still cleaves inseparably to the first spring of Light There is yet a second observation in the race of the Sun he is tropickt and kept to his Zodiack and Ecliptick line and so are we confined Gods Will and Word are circle-wise put about us as Popilius served Antiochus and God hath set out the boundures of our walk which we must not pass When the Sun perceives the Tropick he will advance no further so what ever full evidence of Gods revealed Will restrains where his prohibition lies there 's the Barrier Then better walking in a fiery furnace
and partakers of the divine Nature and all these Unions contracted in the blood red shining Summit of his cross by the power whereof that Throne and Robe and all those Crowns are become ours and we become one with him in an union most high and holy even as he and his Father are one and higher we need not we cannot go nor well so high for that it should be thus we scarce dare ask but how it should be thus is above all that we are able to ask or think Thus far the first priviledge of Gods servants in being his Peculiar The second now should follow of being his Jewels with the usefull application of them both together with the Assignation of those several Dayes wherein these Jewels are to be made up all which I believe will make up a second and a third Exercise For this time I proceed no further but to beg the Blessing of God upon what we now have heard P.R. S.D.G. THE SECOND SERMON September 1643. MALAC. 3.17 And they shall be mine said the Lord of Hosts in that day when I make up my Jewels THE Word of God saith St Paul is not bound nor we that preach it bound to Formalities and courtly Decencies or much to care whether our Hearers be in good humor or no t is true nor are we to be Time-servers as we have been charged nor Men-pleasers in any ill sense yet since we are at liberty throughout the Garden of the Scripture to cull a Posie such as seemes best to us affording us a pleasure why may we not be thought therein also to preserve our just Devotion to God together with an intention for the complacency of good men too For which cause I blush not to acknowledge my respective choice or rather my recollection of this Text whereon I have preacht in royal audience before because though it look back upon vicious times and most ungodly men yet it will allow us for the present a Prospect as I verily belive upon some choice spirits and Gods gracious servants yet by his Reserve and special Mercy left alive while they are yet alive and I alive to apply this Scripture to them in special which in general suits with the condition of this time As men the sons of Time so Times themselves have their Parallels As the days of Noah were saith our Saviour Mat. 24. so shall also the coming of the son of man be eating drinking marrying till the day that Noah entered into the Ark and knew not till the flood came and tooke them all away so it shall be in the last times and so it is And we have no livelier proof that these are the last times then such our usages and in them such our security The Scripture foretels a soul and dangerous Sea of corruption that should prove rough and swell run high and the waves thereof rage horribly toward the end of the world when men should be more then imbrutished void of natural affection 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 implacable traiterous heady high minded lovers of pleasures more then lovers of God pretending the Spirit but being sensual and bringing in damnable Heresies having a show of godliness but denying the power thereof pretending to Piety and Law and Order but reviling Dignities which God hath ordained with Balaam greedily loving the wages of unrighteousness and perishing in the contradiction of Core But alas We have undone both Prophesie and Description put down both History and Poetry Examples and Imagination too even those Gyants before the flood are now not monstrous for we have defiled and made the earth more corrupt filled it with a bloodier cruelty and violence provoking the holy one of heaven to hurle down hils of miseries on our heads and hearts and to let in Torrents of his fierce wrath mingled wiih Christian blood in every street and a surrounding universal Scourge and Deluge to overwhelm three whole flourishing Kingdoms at once from end to end and burie them in endless desolation while senseless sinners we seem to contemn the Power of Gods wrath by letting loose the reins to all licenciousness when he is pouring down the vials of his anger and tumbling delightfully in our own tear up the wounds of our Saviour betrampling the sacred Blood that redeemed us and counting the blood of his Covenant a Covenant of Mercy and Peace an unholy thing crucifying again to our selves the Lord of Life and Glory and making a mock of him by grieving quenching and doing despight to the Spirit of his Grace So that our condition is worse then of this people here in this Prophet though in very many things resembling us for in the first chapter we read of their Unkindness Irreligiousness Profaness snuffing at the Table of the Lord and holding it contemptible In the second we find their Idolatry Adultery Infidelity In this third Sorcery false Swearing Oppression Sacriledge and at last it breaks into open rebellion and defiance of God voting down all divine service and decreeing it vain and no profit to walk longer in his Ordinances and then this was a brave time it must needs be so for proud and wicked people which were lift up like a skum over the face of clear and wholsom waters only such saith our Prophet were built to Wealth and Honor. And yet for all this sorrow there is a comfort comes up close at the sixteenth verse of use and advantage now for us Gods people still remained though secret not altogether silent they spake one to another admonished exhorted comforted one another mutually and these their Colloquies and Consultations were frequent and succesfull God came into their Assembly sate President in this Council and a book of Remembrance was written before him for all them that â—eared before him and thought upon his name and after all comes out his gracious Proclamation of Peace and Love The Patent under seal Teste meiâ—so and they shall be mine saith the Lord of Hosts in that day when I make up my Jewels Which words afford a double priviledge of Gods servants be the times what they will in reference to their Owner described by his high and stately stile of Dominus Exercituum First His own they are his peculiar Secondly Esteemed of him at a high rate for they are his Jewels There is a third part The day or time set for the making up of these Jewels admitting a four-fold Interpretation 1. Either the day of punishing the ungodly or 2. The day of powerfull preaching the Word 3. The day of death and 4. The last day the day of final Judgement In all these days God will manifest his Mercy and his Power both enwrapt in Dominus exercituum here and then the Specification the Verification the real and actual spreading of both in this that God in his holiness hath spoken it It shall certainly be so for so saith the Lord of Hosts The first priviledge is laid down in this plain conclusion They that in a
the Sun in his strength so when his time was fully come the day that this Jewel must be made up First his Body is glorified on earth and then assum'd into Heaven and a place for this precious Gem at his own right Hand above Principalities and Powers and a Name given him above all names And now that blessed Face wherein the Jews saw no beauty yet was fairer then the sons of men which they defiled and spit upon is ador'd by Seraphims and both Heaven and earth are full of the Majesty of his Glory Now God observes the self-same method in all the rest finds them out among the refuse of the world amongst flocks and herds of Nations from the first rude quarrie of the Chaos from utter vacuity and nothing assembles their attoms and smallest dust breaths in a lively spirit exalts purifies it grafts on it Knowledge Faith Love Holiness and having begun a good work of Grace never leaves it till he bring it to perfection filing away their dross and grinding out their grains and Ices and clouds of corruption till he hath refin'd them to a brightness as in St. Paul a rough stony-hearted persecutor wrought by certain scales and barks pull'd away to become a chosen vessel to bear his name among the Gentiles Act 9. A bright star on earth and now a glorious Saint in Heaven 3. Jewels then thirdly they are for that care and love which God affords them men prize their Jewels Reserve them curiously take a glory and perplacency in possessing and wearing them So God having bought them at a price inestimable purchased not with corruptible things as silver and gold but with the blood of Jesus Christ as of a Lamb undefiled and without spot then he sets his heart upon them all his delight is in the Saints that excel Those he tenders as the Apple of his eye sets them as Josiah for a seal and a Signet on his right hand hides them under the shadow of his wings and so also God glories in them and holds them out to the amazement and confusion of the world of gross and earthly souls which are as foils to their perfections and commands them to do him grace and to be an Ornament to him Let your light shine c. Again The Comparison would hold for the task is easie to pursue an Allegory for Rarity Rari quippe boni apparent rari in gurgite Vasto in a sea of froth and foam and for the place and manner of breeding and growth But I forsake the rest and chuse to insist only on Properties respecting which Righteous men are justly term'd Jewels and chiefly two of clearness and lustre first and then of firmness and solidity which are the Vrim and Thummim of a Christian 1. In the first precious stones excel being compact of the finest Atoms and this holds well for as while we admire the pure Orient Pearls the radiant and sparkling Carbuncle the serene bright Saphir the green Emerald and the like we may raise our contemplation to the beauty and clearness of the stars and Sun and so ascend to him that struck light out of darkness at the first that dwels in perfect Beauty and in light inaccessible and covers himself with Light as with a garment so in a spiritual manner that Light of Grace in his servants attracts others also to behold in them Him who is Pater Luminum the Father of all Illuminations and so that fair and pure soul which gives Light in the darkness of the Body and night of Ignorance returns with advantage to him that gave it with the gain of other souls wonne by beholding their chast and illustrious conversation They tell of Diamonds belonging to some of the house of Luxembourge and Theophrastus has it of other stones propagating their Species by turning first the circumstant ayr into water and then contracting that water into a more earthy substance like themselves But it is true of these precious and living stones who born of Gods immortal seed by a new Light shot from Heaven do likewise in Reflection and by aggregation assimilation and an ardent sympathetical combination and communion work others to the same conformity of the godly Nature inspire illumine and propagate others with a kind of Divine Generation And as that Godlike creature the child of Heaven and Gods first born Light when delivered from the womb and jaws of Darkness is able to deliver over it self without ceasing without Annibilation Fraction o◠Diminution and as Love in moral minds and true Charity in Coelestial souls not leaving its own habitation will walk the round to those spirits which are capable of its Society And as God the Son is of the Father God of God and Light of Light and Love of Love For God is Love as he is Light so are his Regenerate and Adopted children also all from him and one enlightened from another Secondly Solidity firmness constancy the Christians is a standing Credo it was wont to be so Lord I believe without distrust whether my understanding comprehend it or no without curiosity to be further confirm'd by Miracles Lastly Credo Audacter without dissembling or fear to acknowledge it This is stere 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Col. 2.2 that firm and full assurance of Faith I mean in Resolution not to alter or shrink as was in couragious Joshuah I will serve the Lord and hearty David that endured much and long yet he recedes not from his Vow no I have sworn and am stedfastly purposed And Job though he dyed for 't yet it should prove no this way dissolution And for this cause God allows the Name calls it the most precious faith of his Elect and chides those Recreants that Recoil so easily O ye of little faith Those are no right Jewels of his they are but Glow-worms and Hypocrites or as glass and Sophisticate shels and vitious stones which have an inconstant and languishing shine or whose splendor is only in a morning or under a clear sky and lasts not in gusts and storms of persecution or which in age decrease in Grace and Vertues and come to lose their abilities No t is said of Gods Palms and Cedars that they flourish on and bring forth more fruit in their age And for this firmness even moral men have made strange approaches and profest the conquest of it resolv'd to retain their vertue and honour untainted maugre all the rage of bloody tyrants and either allurements or encombrances of a base and vitious world How much more Christians to endure the torture the Rack the fire that which is the Crasis of all these The Inquisition to despise that tryal of cruel mockings and resist even to blood and ready to lay down our lives rather then betray or prevaricate and shuffle in the cause and quarrel of Christ Jesus and his holy Church As no sin shall tear me from that Root of Gods Love so I am perswaded sayes the Apostle no affliction Rom. 8.
saies he nor so loud but like as the Trumpet of the Law began low at first but now he presses the offenders conscience where first for Gods cause that is for Gods Glory let me crave again this advertency in your discerning what it is that calls us from sin The same Spirit that began in the Creation Revisits his own work and excels himself in thy Recreation It was God which call'd Abraham out of VR which signifies a fire or light and then brought him to a sweeter clearer fire and better and purer Light even that Light which was both revealed to the Gentiles after and remain'd the glory of his people Israel All the Israel of God united both Jews and Grecians bond or free on whom nor circumcision nor uncircumcision was regardable For those are nothing saies the Apostle what then is something Nay what is it then that is all things This only To become a new creature wherewith shall a yong man that is the sot the Prodigal in the Parable that hath wasted all his stock and is mad out of his right mind how shall this man that is troubled with the Scotomy and Vertigo a youthful wildness and unstayedness in his brains how shall he recover come to himself again and from his blinded and distempered flight find the way of Returning to hir heavenly Father This is hard but may be effected by taking heed according to thy Word There is a power in Nature but the wisdom of God shining in his Word by the joynt operation of his Spirit for these two ever work together is a power indeed mighty in operation to cast down the strong holds of Satan Not as it is the Ministry of men though the Dispensation be ours no not all those Clarious of his holy Prophets that spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost to which we do well to attend saies St. Peter as a more safe Word and as to a Light shining in a dark place till the day dawn till God send the marvailous light of his Gospel And then it is not in the Instruments Not in John greater then a Prophet and a stout and plain deliverer of the Truth and not a Reed shaken with the wind and bending his Doctrines to humour his variously inclin'd Audiences Nor in Paul thas was Os orbi sufficiens as that Golden-mouth'd father calls that blessed Apostle And all his Successors in any part of the world must know that their Voyces are but still and soft Musick and a sound qui aures percutit reaching only to the ear But the inward Minister of whom we heard before instructs the heart T is Gods Ephata that can do that That alone can call from the sleep and death of sin and from the grave of corruption Qui dixit sine me non potestis cogitare bene multo magis dixit sine me non potestis credere To believe is a greater work and of greater Grace and Power then to conceive a good thought Yet both those rich streams run from one and the same Fountain 7. But this Impotency will not be believ'd to press and lie on all mankind How gladly would some men find out some way in themselves whereby they might be less beholden to the Grace of God I Ungracious to God for his Grace and would gladly forget or fain to forget that God so incessantly remembers men with his preventing exciting with his inchoative and concomitant and subsequent and persevering Graces Graces of all sorts and all seasons Bold and presumptuous men that purposely neglect to magnifie the operations of Gods Graces on them because they would derive the Magnificat and Benidictus on themselves and so sacrifice to their own nets not looking up to the prime and constant mover of all not regarding the strong God of their Salvation There is indeed a Rate and a Sect of men who will perchance be content that God shall be kind and gracious to some feeble ones that stand in need of his assistance Sick and weak people may need the Physick of that Heavenly Doctor But not such able men such Saints and perfectists as they men that are wholly taken up with the admiration of themselves and their own purity Who yet must know that if they have been kept from falling into gross sins and are therefore apt to deride mine or any other mans weaknesses who have been and do confess as much frequently overtaken and overcome yet it is still the same gracious hand that hath done the several cures on both That God whose Grace was all the while a preservative to them was to me and him that slipt a Restorative Where is boasting then it is or it ought to be excluded and exploded out of all Christian books and out of all sober and religious brains and hearts Be not high-minded but fear is a Canon that uo wise man will cry down lest he fall with it For simply in the state of nature both he and I were even that is even able to do nothing as of our selves So far from being sure of Gods Election that we were not yet under this Grace of Vocation nor Law nor Gospel-calling and so without Christ so without God in the world Therefore here the exhortation is to be renew'd of calling upon God for this call and crying ardently unto the Throne of Grace that so we may obtain Grace to help us in time of need and that is at all times while we bear about flesh and blood wherein dwells corruption 8. Secondly Take notice of the mercy enlarg'd in this double call of God and this extension of the Voyce as in that to his Spouse Return O Shullamire Return Return and that convincing Interrogatory Why will you die As I live saies the Lord I would not the death of him that dies And this course we find God ever took sending his Prophets rising up early with many sweet invitements O come and taste how gracious the Lord is Come and drink of the waters of his Mercy freely And when those Prophets had spent their strength stretched out their hands in vain and had their cries returned in Reproiches and their reward was nothing but stones and persecutions then rose the Baptist with a new crie who was more then a Prophee then any son of man before him respecting the excellency of his Office in the present assignation of the Messiab and exhibiting the long longed for Lamb of God to take away the sins of the world He redoubled his crie in the wilderness of Repent and reason for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand so at hand that he could indigitate him that was and is the King of Heaven with his Ecce Agnus ' Dei Behold him that is come to call sinners to Repentance and Remission that hath brought abundance of Grace and Truth no more in Promise or Prophesie but in Act and personal performance and yet this John the Baptist you know how rewarded they extingnished this burning
meekness which he shews thee in himself and in his anointed who if ever any mortal man is exhibted by God himself to all his people as a Pattern of Patience and Humility thou shalt find a manifold sense in that sentence already pronounced against thee God resists the proud that is justles him in and out of his own way of Pride Renders him in the very acts and Elevations in the hoisting and spreading of all his sails and wings base and contemptible and ridiculous God permitting many proud men by way of punishment to debauch themselves with other vices which yet do spring from thence Resisting them in those very things wherein they please themselves and hope to purchase Reverence while by a most unseemly superciliousness by their haughty eye-lids stiff necks loud speeches oaths Cloaths Buildings they occasion the storks bill behind their backs and expose themselves oft-times to open affronts and derisions and so are a kind of masculine brood of new Muses to the smal Poets and Wits of the time and are many times justly made the songs of drunkards And lastly by approof of that in the Psalmists Aphorism Doubtless every man living in his best state is altogether vanity making their most stately and best Establisht their most hopeful and high-erected fortunes like Turnus his persidus ensis or like blown glass Cum splendet frangitur in the stretch and wresting broken in their very acme and exaltation ruinous and as smoak when most supream then to nearest vanishing with a Sic transit which is no new experiment every age affording such Coments and Meteors exhaled and past their bounds when they have crackt a while and blaz'd fall or shoot or are hurled down to their first original drossiness so becoming like the Historians Sword-chariots to the World at first a terror and afterwards a Scorn Men we see literally fulfilling that conclusive prediction Man cannot abide in honor which fatal frequent Event is enough to make us imagine a Favorite to be an unlawfull Calling but that we find exceptions to the contrary in Gods own book where we have example of his own rich friend Abraham and of Moses whom he honoured as his familiar and John the Favorite of our gracious Saviour And in the Chronicles of former and for the Chronicles of succeeding times we find and look upon some e meliore luto whose ardent and ethereal vertue preserves them in the love and preservation and protection of the Almighty as so many streight and noble Palms under a royal Cedar still fresh and unblasted as far from self-wickedness as others envie which is a rare complexion in felicity There is a fourth use or extraction to be had out of this by teaching us all to turn upon our common adversary I mean sin that thus first threw the ball of wild-fire to the ruine of our Fathers house and state and race this is truly the noble science of defence and the only bravery of resistance Here then learn to shew mettle courage and spirit and resolution Alas What a wretched feable and squib valor is it for a man to contend in blood with him that gives him then the lie when he most deserves it or speaks disgraceingly of her to him who in his own conscience knows he first and most hath made her liable to that reproach and dishonour and yet this same man so rank a coward as he dare not enter the lifts nor stand the Combat and conflict with this Adversary No no my brother of the sword is fouly mistaken in judging of true courage and must know that he is the poor unworthy the only base and bafled fellow that scorns not to be a fellow that weakly yields to be a servant and a Prisoner and a voluntary slave to sin his mortal enemy and content to be taken captive of the devil to do his will So in the point of Wisdom and true prudential policy which we all affect doth it shew vilely of May it not stand with the temper of a right English constitution to submit to Covenants and Articles with that pernitious foe who by invasion seeks to enthral and trample on and bereave us both of state and liberty What is it then to strike an everlasting league with sin and so with death and hell for sin is their Agent their leiger Embassadour and not rather conspire to draw up all our Auxiliary forces of rectified Reason and moral Precepts but specially confiding in coelestial aids of Angels and Influences of divine Grace and Assistance to root out the body of sin and death root and branch or as it is in Rom. 6. with a Saltem That at least sin may no longer raign and have Dominion Here every Christian Souldier marching under the Ensign of the Cross of Jesus is to bid Defiance and to run ad Arma those especially of Preces Lachrymae The weapons of this War-fare are spiritual but yet able through God to beat down the strongest holds of Satan And for this cause we should be watchfull over sins advantages of which I will make my conclusion and present a few and such as I find here in this story and in this example 1. First The serpentine nature of sin is discovered And all sins may say Documenta damus qua simus origine from the devil in the Serpent they draw their property of Insinuation And yet to see as the same Devil prevailed even at Rome to be worshipt in form of a Serpent you know the story of Aesculapius and the notice of that too in the Apocrypha The Dragon worshipt at Babylon So Epiphanius reckons up among his Hereticks those that worshipt that very Serpent in Paradise as the Author for sooth of Science But as we must all be cautelous of any such serpentine perswasions in the case of any sin and as all great ones are to eschew the danger of Flatterers the worst of all tame beasts so a Caveat here will not be unseasonable against the Romish Synagogue of a serpentine brood Stillant in aure venenum creep into houses and seduce silly women Against such Serpents bless God for Ibides Birds that can destroy that crawling generation by confounding Arguments from the Truth of God And learn even for that very cause to think well of such at least as either in the former Age of Reformation or in this present time from Cathedral Prelacy or other rule have stood up next under God and a gracious Soveraign the Pen-champions and Defenders of the Faith as well against that brood as the other dangerous extream of Sectaries 2 A second observation is the advantage gained by the Tempter in that way as we should think of disadvantage in the harsh unplesant hissing of the Serpent We wonder at the She-wolves affecting the most ill favoured Male and bless our selves to think as well we may that Witches should indent in blood and endure those horrid approaches which thrill our souls to imagine And yet we take no
failed his Trust which amounts to a lye On the other side when I give another the lye and know in my own conscience he hath not lyed I give the Lye to my self And what cause have I if I say the Sun shines when it doth shine and another tels me it is a Lye for it is midnight to persesecute such a one to death for making himself a foollish Ruffin and Lyar in his own knowledge So that to give it in any case except of Loyalty and Life is frivolous and irrational Object They object These Discourses savour of Cowardize I answer 'T is true if they call it Cowardize to fear God or hell whereas the truly wise or valiant knows there is nothing else to be feared For against an enemies sword we find 10000 seven-penny men wag'd at that price in the wars that fear it as little perchance less then any prosest sword-man in the world Diligentissima in tutela sui fortitudo and it is saith Aristotle a mediocrity between doubting and daring Sicut non martyrem poena so not fighting but a good cause declares the valiant man In which whosoever shall resolvedly end his life resolvedly I mean in respect of the cause to wit in defence of his Prince Religion or Country as he may justly be numbred among the Martyrs of God so may those that die with malicious hearts in private Combats or Duels be called the Martyrs of the Devil Neither indeed do we take our own Revenge or punish the Injuries offered us by the death of the injurious For the true conquest of revenge is to give him of whom he would be revenged cause to repent him and we lay the Repentance of another mans blood upon our own conscience and drown our souls in the wounds of our enemies A second Objection or Demand will be Do I condemn generous defence of Honor prest with Injury I answer No if the Injury be violent for the Law of nature which is a branch of the eternal Law and the Laws of all Christian Kings and States do favour him that is assail'd in the slaughter of the assailant but no Gentleman on a Chartel or Chalenge being defied is bound to answer in point of Honor in a private combate because omitting the greatest which is the point of Religion the point of Law is directly contrary which hath dominion over the point of Honor which can judge it which can destroy it except you will stile those Arts honourable where the hang-man gives the Garland For the Laws of the Land having appointed the Hangman to second the Conqueror and the Laws of God appointed the Devil to second the Conquered dying in malice I say he is base and also a fool that accepts of any Chartel so accompanied A third Objection How shall a noble or gentle man be repaired in Honor for Infamy unsufferable Answer By the Court martial For do we not in cases of debts goods lands and all things else submit without disgrace to law because it may be felony to take by violence that which is our own And if Honor be dearer then goods or life it self yet know what is true Honor It is the History or Fame following Acts of Vertue or Acts of difficulty and danger for publique good He that in these fails by Cowardize or base affection is dishonoured but acting a private Combate for a private respect and most commonly a frivolous one is no act of vertue because contrary to Gods Law and the Kings nor difficult on even terms nor for publique good but contrary For a man may be Felo de se robbing so his King and Country as for contumelious words if I cause my enemy to confess be sorry or make amends all these or any are sufficient and the dis-reputation is not mine but his and for matter of Fact or Blows c. famous is that decision of the French Marshals in the case of Monsieur de Plessis struck by a Baron which was awarded to kneel before Mr. Pl. in open Court sitting in his Chair and to tender him a sword and a cudgil and Plessis to chuse with which he would strike but he for gave him and which of these two had the disgrace If you say the Barons Repentance was enforced and so no dishonor to him you may as much alledge for a thief confessing at the Gallows that his Repentance is enforced too so all enforced repentance is inflicted upon us for something done unworthy of a Gentleman or an honest man and therefore the Court of Chivalry most charitable for the blood of men violently spilt doth not bring forth hony bees as that of Buls doth which sting but the fingers or the face but it produces that monstrous beast Revenge which hath devoured so many noble personages of several nations as there is nothing more lamentable nor more threatning the wrath of God upon supream Governors then the permission therefore K. James extinguisht those deadly Feuds in Scotland and our Laws are strong against Duellists in England My Additions follow in a Sermon to K. Charls The Heathen could rouse his friend with a Te moneo ut omnem glotiam ad quam à pueritia inflāmatus fuisti omni curâ industriâ consequare magnitudinemque animi tui qu am ego semper sum admiratus semperque amavi ne unquam inflectas cu jusquam injuria A Christian vertue then should be è crassiore telâ then for every flie to break 'T is for weak and guilty minds to be troubled with injurious words like our Duellists preventing the day of Judgement and calling their brother to account for every idle word over night by sending him the length of his sword But I desire to throw three or four cool words upon this ignis fatuus a meteor that hath place only in a middle rank or region of mankind For first The whole skie of women are cleer against it among the males all nobler spirits fitted for Counsel or Government will learn to look down with scorn upon it Beggars and the poorer Tribes can live and die with a few brawls or broken-heads at most The three professions are better taught finding no Aphorism or Law of God or man to defend it and men of Trade and Corporations understand not the word Pusiness in the quarrelling Dialect so that fighting is confin'd it descends not usually beneath a serving-man nor ascends above a knight And being thus comprest the hope is it will shortly vanish into nothing for it rises from that which is next to Nothing Vanity and Lyes and Vapors in Tap-houses and Taverns And you shall observe such guests still more tender of that dreadful word the Lye on whom it falls in the nature of a true jeast and such most enrag'd about Reputation whom wise men know to have little or no Reputation to lose Briefly What think these Gallants of the Roman bravery and height of spirit Can they shew me from all that story a pair of worthy Courages out take the mercenary Fencers embrandled and enkindled to go forth and fight a Duel for the Lye or the son of a whore or any such poor froth as flies from men in wrath or vext with distemper in drink or play But are we not Christians a religion of meekness that never occasions much less necessitatets any Disciple to a deed that must inevitably draw on or endanger his hanging or damning or both The Captain of which profession the Author and Finisher of our faith and salvation was consecrate through sufferings made himself of no reputation and endured such contradiction of sinners FINIS