From motions regular about his Poles Shall even deadly sins in disaray Keep off our minds from his Diurnal sway Under the Law made he his resting place And chose the cutse to leave us under Grace But still to morals tied our hearts and hands Scorn not his easie yoak nor break his bands Without those Grates all fire of vertue cools None lawless thus but Devils Popes and Fools An Hymn on Trinity Sunday 1625. Tuned according to S. Bernards Cur mundus militat c. SIDesideria cordium satias Aeternas volumus agere gratias O pater Luminum pater illius Qui pater noster est tibi filius Per quem Coelestia singula feceris Quicum fundamina terrae conjeceris Quorum mens agitat molem mirabilis Atque operarius est ineffabilis OTRINE rejici quanquam sim meritus Me tamen refici dignare spiritus Re visas obsecro sol semper oriens In Lutum recidens Cor meum moriens Vt quae refulserit exinde Puritas Sit illi salus sancta securitas Heu sines animam hac in putredine Mundani pulveris omni dulcedine Supernae Gratiae privatam degere Quam nutu facili possis protegere Si Desideria cordium satias Aeternas volumus reddere gratias Ad Iesum Redemptorem Tu qui Serpentis caput contuderis Qui Preces Lachrymas sanguinem fuderis Orcum post tumulum qui penetraveris Et mortis Dominum morte prostraveris Et super nubium tractus ascenderis Ac modis milites mille defenderis Labimur labimur Heu dicto citiùs Jesu suavissime ni sis propitius Menteis irradians faveris lumine Ac labes diluens cruoris flumine Et sancti spiritus accendens flamine Nos incredibili leves solamine Si Desideria cordium satias Aeternas volumus habere gratias On the Holy SACRAMENT LOrd to thy flesh and blood when I repair Where dreadfull joyes and pleasing tremblings are Then most I relish most it doth me good When my soul faints and pines and dies for food Did my sins murder thee To make that plain Thy pierc'd-dead-living body bleeds again Flow sad sweet drops what diffring things you do Reveal my sins and seal my pardon too A Psalm for Christmass day morning 1 FAirest of morning Lights appear Thou blest and gaudy day On whom was born our Saviour dear Make haste and csme away 2 See See our pensive breasts do pant Like gasping Land we lie Thy holy Dews our souls do want We faint we pine we die 3 Let from the skies a joyfull Rain Like Mel or Manna fall Whose searching drops our sins may drain And quench our sorrows all 4 This day prevents his day of Doom His mercy now is nigh The mighty God of love is come The day-spring from on high 5. Behold the great Creator makes Himself an house of clay A Robe of Virgin flesh he takes Which he will wear for ay 6 Heark heark the wise Eternal Word Like a weak Infant cries In form of servant is the Lord And God in Cradle lies 7 This wonder struck the world amaz'd It shook the stary frame Squadrons of spirits stood and gaz'd Then down in Troops they came 8 Glad Shepherds ran to view this sight A quire of Angels sings And Eastern Sages with delight Adore this King of Kings 9 Bis. Joyn then all hearts that are not stone And all our voices prove To celebrate this holy One The God of Peace and Love PRAYER and PRAISE TO work strong lines and wreath a Crown of Baies For Jesus Brows Take servent Prayer and Praise 1. That runs and flows and bears a deeper sense Then winding Verse or ratling Eloquence It rises first and breaks through hearts of stone But not till Aarons rod be struck thereon Cleft with Remorse then climbs through weeping eyes With silver feet transcending far the skies To wash his feet whose purple drops divine Will turn this water into Angels wine 2. This made of words which are but vapor pent In forge of flesh by panting bellows sent To mix with mother Air yet this to me Shall both a blessing and an honor be Saith God who cals those things as if they were Which are not so or do not so appear To us And look how sweet it strikes the sense When vernal winds inspire their Influence On flowery Meads so thanks like Incense rise And Heavan takes praise as perfum'd sacrifice A Psalm for Sunday Nights 1 COme Ravisht souls with high Delight In sweet immortal Verse To crown the day and welcome night Jehovahs praise Reherse 2 O sing the Glories of our Lord His Grace and Truth resound And his stupendious acts Record Whose mercies have no bound 3 He made the All informing Light And hosts of Angles fair 'T is he with shadows cloaths the night He clouds or clears the Air. 4 Those restless skies with stars enchaste He on firm hindges set The wave embraced earth he plac'd His hanging Cabinet 5 Wherein for us all things comply Which he hath so decreed That each in order faithfully Shall evermore proceed 6 We in his Sommer sun-shine stand And by his favour grow We gather what his bounteous hand Is pleased to bestow 7 When he contracts his brow we mourn And all our strength is vain To former dust in death we turn Till he inspire again 8. Then to this mighty Lord give praise And all our voices prove The Glory of his name to raise The God of Peace and Love The Christians Reply to Christs Venite POssum good Lord by thee inclinal Volo sometimes with ease I find Nolo yet runs so in mind Male still makes me lag behind PRIDE will fall but Grace to the Humble 1. THis fall Fell Lucifer first tries Who endlong fell never to rise Woman the next then man and all Proud flesh from them have caught the fall 2. From this foul falling sickness shall The fall of one recover all Mankind that medcin'd by his Spirit His best of Graces shall inherit Whereby he still in it doth fall Upon his humble servants all His conjugal Prayer Domestick GOD infinitely Great and Good Purge all our sins by Jesus blood From serpentine three deadly foes The Gardens of our souls enclose That Spirit which Grace and Truth affords Rule all our actions thoughts and words Our hearts into his Temples raise Our tongues loud Organs of his praise Lord make our selves and Race throughout Pure humble sober chast devout Loyal and gratefull wise and just On thee and industrie to trust Blest with a low but glad estate In food and Rayment moderate Nor rich of poor to be en ied Nor poor to be by rich supplied Give freedom Order Health and Peace Then in thy favour to decease When Nature here by Grace prepar'd May look for Glory afterward Vpon a Bible presented to a young Lady the Lady Kath. C. 1624. THE world is Gods large Book wherein we learn Him in his glass of wonders to discern But
he remain in that mind still unappall'd insensible and therefore careless to prevent the wrath to come that he hath devested man or lost at least all excellency above beast though he be yet a seeming man and a seemly and an handsome man a proper valiant brave gentleman or a curious dainty man never so great so noble a man and take in all that can be in a man For wretched man his Ancestor is here cited in that nature and deprehended in that notion of a man Adam you see here though fouly bruised inwardy is still a man after his sin though now made of good evil and miserable of happy Sin destroyes not humane nature in the act or habit but in the harmony The Order and Beauty and Excellency of our nature like a Clock that 's broken is lost defac'd and ruin'd What a silliness is it then to argue sin as meerly nothing and make a mock of all reproof because it introduces no decay no sensible alteration in the body And yet some acts of some kind of wickedness are forcible even to thy corporal destruction and thou mayest come to mourn at the end when thou hast consumed thy flesh and thy body that very body of thine which thou lovest better then any body better then thy own immortal soul There is such a Text as applies it self to thee perhaps in a literal sense and if not to thee there be too many able to comment upon 't and he is blest that is not conscious now or whose body will not call upon him ere long and repeat this part of the Sermon in his own wosull experience But be it granted as it must that sin is an insensible aversion from God rather then a sensible apprehension of loss or pain or change in nature yet we know it is held a dangerous Symptom in a sick mans state if he be senseless and when he lies for dead perceives not his infirmity so it is to be heart-sick of sin a captive taken and no feeling of his sickness nor descerning of his own thraldom What is then to be done but to take up our book of conscience and read and find there our distemper especially by applying it and comparing it with the book of Gods declared Will find our Errata and labor to an amendment of life for to such is that sharp but sweet voice of the Spirit directed O consider you that forget God and your selves and again Arise thou that sleepest stand up from the dead And since sin and our humane nature are from the beginning so not only concorporaâ—e but friendly and familiar and so agreeable each with other learn not to rest content in our pure that is our impure Naturals for they are stil'd the Presse mony to Impiety by St. Ambrose even these which we stile commonly admirable natural parts if unsanctified lest that name of a Natural or what is worse of a meer carnal man stick so close unto us that great or rich or high shall only serve to skrew it faster or spread it further to our Reproach Labor to devest this old and earthly Adam the former Leven of corruption learn to purge away to cast from us in an holy scorn those rags for if our Righteousness be a stained Cloath what is our unrighteousness And learn and labor to give all diligence to enrobe our selves in the rayment of our elder brother the Second Adam whose odor may make us acceptable to our heavenly Father This is that Pia morositas that Sacra fames in the proper sense that holy hunger and honing and whyning that pure perversness of the soul when like earthly minds in point of food or garments or building they can never leave but take up dayly new desires We are displeased from time to time with our present weak condition and desirous to encrease in Grace and grow up from one measure of perfection to another cleansing our selves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit and perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord. 4. But this will never be done by any voyce of Reason any moral swasion or any perusing the History of the Bible say some what they please together with the best and ablest Expositor no nor by the Ordinance of God in the Ministry of man if we rely only upon that be the man never so wise never so eloquent learned mighty and which is the best mighty mighty in the Scriptores ' Paul was learned and laborious above them all and a wise-master-builder and Apollos had the striking and powerful way of Preaching textual Divinity yet we know it is not ascribable to the planting of the one or watering of the other No Magister intus docet is St Austins assertion and here it is the Lord God that speaks unto the heart So it is said The Lord opened the heart of Lydia to attend to those things which Paul preacht Isaiah may lift up a loud and shril voice like a Trumpet and John the Baptist may monrn and crie in the wilderness nay our Saviour himself in his Ministry and he spake so as never man spake was unbelieved by some and mockt by other It is only the inward voice of the holy Ghost which like a mighty rushing wind fals and fils and shakes the place and person where it comes and that voice can break the Cedars of Lebanus subdue all hearts and bring all high exalted thoughts down to the obedience of Christ Jesus our Lord. Against the power of Nature infecting God uses the secret instilment and inspiration of his Grace and against the calls of Satan and this present evil world man hath no sure help of himself or others but to hearken to and obey the call of God and thither we are come that 's our third part The Citation or the manner of Gods proceeding here with man by calling The Lord God called unto the man 5. Wherein our first care and disquisition must be to know what is meant For some have thought this was only some diffusion some scattering of the raies of Gods glory appearing in the Garden and others interpret this of the secret conviction of Adams conscience both which may be true but not warrantable nor to be fixed upon for expositions because these leave us unsatisfied For God appears where â—e calls not and for that of the Delinquents soul being troubled and affrighted it was doubtless so yet the holy Ghost would never we should think have delivered over to Posterity the first mans Plea in words had it only been a passage of his thoughts most probable therefore is their opinion of an humane shape certain assurance of an humane voice wherein the Lord God called unto Adam 6. This also we rather embrace for that in ver 8. where was a sound of his Voyce before but not so distinct Confusior primus sonus ut lex sed nunc instat Deus ad premendam conscientiam is Calvins Note The first sound was nor so distinct
in essence and properties And as lending thus his light to others averts no beam from us by reason of his full administration so nor the opacity nor incapacity of our Spirit can uneffectuate his power but that as our knowledge from a meer vacuity and brutish ignorance he brings up and raises to angel-like perfection so he can encrease and multiply that grain of precious faith to such a tree as shall lift up its Crown and reach the stars and apprehend and receive him there who is both the Author and Finisher of our Faith and Salvation Lastly Fix on what the school calls Convenientius for a surplusage to make this Cup oâ— Consolation brim-full and run over God was tied to no necessity absolute of sending his Son He could have saved us some other way yet this was so convenient that they dare think that if a man had not faln yet Christ had been incarnate for the demonstration of two things Gods infinite Power and Bounty His Power was not manisest so fully in Creation because no infinite Act and his bounteous and boundless love in it self apt for Communion had not yet come near enough to his beloved Creature in that our first Off-spring and universal Derive of being his generation Then a Christ Convenientius for man too more steadily to â—asten and anchor on Christ by faith and hope more to enlarge his knowledge in the proclaim of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here the Dignity to which sinfull flesh is exalted and thereby more enflame his love saltem redamare to relove him that so loved us in Christ Now observe in this second Edition of Grace and Mercy in this great work of the holy Ghost all these are reprinted and sealed in good assurance by the evidence and earnest and testimony which it gives to the bargain of thy salvation And to conclude this point As Christ was not sent till the fulness of time not presently after the fall a sense and discovery of sins power must precede ere we find our need of his powerful blood and man first sent to reason and to the Law under School-masters to bring us to Christ so the Spirit of Grace falls down in infinite Power and in strictest Union and yet performs the work in measure and by degrees which it could do by one Ransack and Destruction of all sin and infirmitie at once But for convenience and fit appliance to the Receiver it proceeds leisurely to fill our narrow vessels and stays that very season till the water be troubled mans heart made ready by remorse when he perceives himself sinking and is at it with Save Lord we perish and all this that the excellency of the power might be and might be felt and acknowledged to be of God and not of us By this time if you be content to taste this Cup so brewed I yet have no Power so to minister it not alone It must be mingled with both the former and if so it please you I shall be bold upon your Patience to urge and press the health of all three together AND first For conveniency in relation to our common Lord whose Cup it is The world hath her Cup of pleasure and she of Babylon hers of Fornication and what swilling in of these Even Kings of the earth drunk And shall we startle or scruple at this Cup of Christ What! Sit at my right hand in Glory and shame to taste a little shame and bitterness of a Cross and Cup which I have born and drunk off before you Remember 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is in the bottom what if it should make you sweat and pant in getting off this health Do but think how oft you have enforced your selves to take down those healths falsly so called and suffer then the word of exhortation which presses you down upon your knees to beg this pledge at the hand of your Soveraign Lord and Maker as his servant did Pota me Domine torrente voluptatis saith Austin for so you shall find it in the end though you should be compelled for Christs sake and the Gospels to drink it blood warm and in a fiery tryal So much the sweeter by his Grace and Power seasoning it who by his own example hath so begun it to us Secondly A Convenience in reference to our selves This Cup must down or else another that is worse and there is but another and that is in the hand of the Lord too wherein the wine is red and it is full mixt and the wicked of the earth must drink and wring out the dregs of Gods wrath If we would scape that drench and bane of soul and body which but begins the torment of those damned Spirits who must for ever drink it burning hot in a lake of fire and brimstone Resolve and speedily to taste and consider how gracious and sweet his offered Mercies are in Christ and if we would shun that Cup of his vengeance which runs out for the seirceness take then to day while it is called to day and while we are called to day this Cup of his Mercy which runs over for the sulness 2. As thus for Conveniency so is this Recipe to be prest on all for necessity absolute Wo to me if I do not preach or preach it dully or lazily and wo unto you if you receive it not as the unum necessarium For shall we need any more Receipts What would be given for a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Elixar a Cathâ—â—con to cure all diseases of the body and beside renue and preserve health youth beauty and restore them still fairer and fresher then before Such a Merchant might have all the Lords and Ladies and all the Kings of the earth his Clients and Patients Alas Is our soul and inward beauty less precious Why Here it is that will cure all sinfull distempers Restore thy soul her native Candor and sweetness and ingenuity making thee young and lustie as an Eagle Make all their eyes that be of a right aerie able by a lively faith to look up and contemplate that sun where the body of that light is there will the Eagles be gathered together and that body is here 'T is the very Vitis and Vitals and the Corps of my Text. Let me not lose you then Be gathered still in the continuance of your gracious and patient Attentions For now the last way I am to urge this health for necessity respective on those first that deny the Lord that bought them either directly as the Arrian and Socinian do or indirectly yet desperately would undermine our faith and sap out of the corner stone on which all relies by ruining some other parts of the building These boast themselves the rational discoursers of the age such as Saint Paul means in that question Where is the Disputer of this world For these dare dispute openly against the Creation related by Moses and justified by Christ and quarrel the souls immortality and the bodies resurrection which
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
who by his beams currents it out and delivers it over to all others 'T is in him universally and totally not now Light and now Darkness and exemplarily For all Light uniformly and causally prae-exists in him as in the simple and supernatural cause of all Lastly In him is Light in all the Powers of Light Expansion Renovation Nutrition Conciliation and in this power he vouchsafes it us though thus to make it ours it cost him more then making Light at first then he spake the Word only but here he suffered Multa tulit Sudavit alsit But blessed be the Lord God of Israel he hath raised a mighty Salvation for us in him Two ways as we are in Domino by Justification and then as Dominus in nobis by Sanctifications See already for our comfort Darkness of the first Adam taken off by a double Light in the Second Plus addidit medicina Christi ad salutem quam infirmitas detraxit sanitati saith St. Ambrose on the 12. cap. of the second of the Coriuthians And St. Paul agrees the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Gift of free Grace far to exceed the loss Rom. 5. and calls this dealing of our Saviour The exceeding Riches of his Grace Eph. 2.5 Call it the Miracle and the grand Mysterie no words will reach it Call it the Height it s above all the Depth there is no founding it nor Length nor Breadth imaginable by our weak spirits can span it Call it the Incomprehensibleness Numen the Deity of his Mercy to restore Light and Ability that we might have Life and have it more abundantly 1. A Sun and a Moon for day and night it is so Justification a Sun a prime a Spring original purity absolute in him and we in it and under the imputed Raies thereof our whole persons made bright and gâ—â—tious and acceptable Adam was brave in his native Integrity but this above humane perfection the Righteousness of God preserved too by him that it may never be lost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 now that is nor man nor Devils able to take them out of his hands those that are thus made Lux in Domino that is justified by faith working by love This is that white Robe which as it hath no spot so it will admit no mixture in the Act and Energie of justifying Our merits wrought up with his are like Musk and Ambergreece in a Perfume faith Gomesius a Papist and thinks he makes a fine composition but is it not rather an odious comparison Yea we are to renounce all those devices of Congruity Configuration Conformity c. if supposed to contain any vertue in themselves toward the Act of Justification only that true Hercules sailing in the frail vessel of his flesh comes to unrivet us from the Caucasus of despair to which mankind was fastened by a knot inexplicable and inextricable God is just and man unrighteous a sinner and must die and for sin is in darkness and shall not see Light Christ Jesus stoops to untie this knot denies the Minor makes the sinner righteous justifies the ungodly makes Darkness Light in Domino and then there is no Condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus 2. The second Light is Sanctification and that 's the striking the raies not upon us only but into us The first is in him only and ours by imputation God in Christ reconciling the world unto himself pleases himself in that but this second is inherent Righteousness in our hearts called Holiness without which we shall never see nor please God You will say these are high and glorious sounds and these Graces with their distinct or united natures and times have exercised the wits of men but since they are Donatives in the hand of our heavenly Father How are these things made over to us Clear that passage make this part of your discourse this Point of Divinity lightsom to our Capacities Tell us how shall these things be So said the blessed Virgin to the Angel when she was to conceive Christ in her body and for this Conception this Perception of the Lord in thy soul the same Answer must serve The holy Ghost shall come upon thee The Power of the most high can do this by his Spirit and how oft is that repeated Habitat he dwells in us by his Spirit and if any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his that 's the surest mark and a man cannot say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Spirit which is therefore called the finger and hand of God the vertue and Power of Christ who tells us in Joh. 14. I will not leave you Orphans I will come to you there 's his visitation and abide with you there 's his Residence and erecting of a Court and adds I will be your Teacher Comforter Remembrancer and all these in his Spirit who is all these to us these are his Offices and operations And must not he needs have Heaven at hand that hath the God of Heaven in his heart John lean'd upon his bosom but Christ rests in thy bosom by his Spirit opening thy dim eyes and opening them twice saith St. Austin giving a double Light in the Lord First to see thy sin and guiltiness and blenching at the horror thereof opens them again to see thy Saviour in his blood and the Spirit of his Grace But all this I have said you will say still is meer speculation But tell us what heavenly Magick or Mastick can combine or which way shall these two spirits meet How Gods Spirit and mans comes thus to match and marry in Domino Quae ferramenta qui vectes said the curious Enquirers into the Creation And have not we some as curions in this Reparation States have their Arcana Imperii their Ragioni di stato which is Jus Dominationis and every Trade is called a Mysterie But God must shew us all the jointures and Inlay of his Work and Will Take heed of pressing into Light lest we be opprest with the Glory Poor man What discernest thou in the workings of those Spirits that are but Creatures and vassals to the Creator yet have their methods Eph. 6. Inventions Circumventions and are exalted above thy reach in high places have the vantage ground of Pigmee mankind Nay What seest thou of thy own spirit Who saw it come in or go forth In the Air we all breath in the wind that fans that air which are but a little kin to spirits what do we understand yet God is so indulgent to our nature and weakness as to take in for us auxiliary Light of comparison for the clearing of that which in the downright act is indeprehensible Here 's a stir indeed saith the poor blind-born man in Joh. 9. With what and how which way Well! I cannot tell you all but one thing I am sure of I was blind born blind and now I see And our Saviour John 3. Thou bearest the sound of wind and
yet am I drawn and rapt to follow her and she lifts me up beyond and above my nature so that I am no more mine own but with a secret violence and new fire I am consum'd and compell'd to acknowledge the voyce of God that speaks therein Thus far that Papist But I speak I hope to men enlightened such as prove and find in their own souls the power and Energy of the Divine Word both when t is read when it is sincerely preacht for I have in my Discourse mingled both those wayes of Gods delivering it And I would know of you beloved in our Blessed Jesus did you never in the preaching and hearing the Scriptures read feel the Gale the sweet and gentle assistance of Gods Spirit pass into your souls Did the Preacher never come with darkness and disconsolation with Isaiahs anxious and perplexing thoughts All the day long have I stretcht out my hands c. And didst thou never meet him in the vanity of thy mind to mock or else to catch and betray And yet you both discern'd before you parted a blessing of a good God upon you both Both that he was sent of God and that the power of God was there to heal thee Luke 5.17 And if thou hast sound it so Take heed of quenching the Spirit nec in te nec in alio saith Aquinas in thy self by despising in the Preacher by discouraging or disparaging which is all injuries in one to an ingenuous spirit Rbet 2. For the Philosopher reduces them all to parvi-pension I mean not a small pension or salazy for our recompence but dis-esteeming under valuing those that are the Ambassadours of Christ and Secretaries in the great affairs of his Spirit Bethink your selves could any Angel in Heaven have said to man as our Lord to Peter Feed my Lambs my sheep Go preach baptize whose sins you retain they are retained c. Are these sayes one terrestrial sounds or are they uttered from the clouds above But look not so high descend into your own bosoms were not you once darkness are you now made light in the Lord Which way came that Influence was it not by the work of the Ministery That 's our part and that 's the end of our second part which brings us to the third part of our Catechism Gratitudo or mans duty in these last words of the Text Walk as children of light SERMON 2. PAssing the former part of the Text I past you through the cloud through Darkness the Lapse the fall of man the first part of the Catechism And I brought you thence to the second The Pillar of Fire which gives Light in the night of Ignorance Lux in Domino the workmanship of God in Christ Jesus The Restauration Now remains only Gratitudo Our duty Mans obedience due to Dominus here for our Redemption from the bondage of corruption and restoring us to the glorious liberty of the sons of God brought from darkness to be light in the Lord. Which Duty is here called A Walking Walk as children of Light which is the third and last part of our Catechism And it would afford a walk of many hours I shall strive to reduce it into one The Stations the Pauses I shall keep are these First there is a Bivium figured in the Pythagorean Y two wayes and but two There have been can be shall be but two wayes from the beginning to the end and after the end of the world for all shall walk in light or darkness and both are in the verse You were darkness but are light there is the Bivium But our way is the way of Light and even this is of comfort by the way that the way of Gods servants is a lightsome and a delight some way a clear and open passage Secondly this way may be gone For the words are the only wise Gods own Exhortation and then it must be gone for the words are his own commandment and our duty Thirdly Here are Pullies Evidences Inducements three 1. Quia Filii because Children 2. Etiamsi though but Children 3. Ω's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Children of Light taking the Light for our example direction and that will be double first the Light of Heaven the Sun and then he that is our Heaven of Light the true Light the Way the Truth and the Life Christ Jesus Thus far the explication then a word of application will finish this walk set us onward and encourage us in the way and cause us to walk as Children of Light First then there is a Bivium and both here but the Darkness is past the worst is over then For this is a way foul and deep and dangerous The way the vilest way that ever man went Will you hear them both briefly described in language the best that ever man heard What! mine God forbid I should mean so No not my rusty iron No nor any glittering tin-soild enticing words of humane wisdom but the clear fiery tryed and seven times purified silver of the Word of God dictated by the holy Ghost In that language we find this way and walk called Tenebrae abstract and plural Darkness and termed elsewhere the way of the Gentiles their own way after their own imaginations in the vanity of their mind inordinately walking as men i. e as meer men according to the course of this world in crastiness in the hidden thing of dishonesty after the flesh in lasciviousness lusts uncleanness excess riot revellings c. according to the prince of the power of the Air the spirit that works in the Children of disobedience till the paths of their ways saith Job come to nothing and perish till they arrive at the issues of death saith Solomon and all their Foundations Plots Projects Hopes Aims be out of course saith David going on so long and departing from God till he be forced to say Depart for ever Go ye cursed and so ends that walk O no! well were it for them if it might end but it never ends for this dark and slippery way slips them into Hell and that Gulf enlarges her self that horrible pit opens her mouth wide upon them from whence there is no Redemption but they shut out from the Father of Lights reserved in endless chains of Darkness to abide eternal eternal Damnation Methinks I hear you now upon that Respond in the Litany From thy wrath and from everlasting damnation good Lord deliver us The good Lord hath and doth and will deliver us if we will be delivered If we will but walk the other the better way the way of Light which elsewhere is called the good old way Jer. 8. The way of old Enoch Noah Abraham a walking with and before and after God in his Laws Statutes Ordinances cleaving to the Lord with all the soul A walking in liberty and safety over Lions Dragons through Darkness through the valley of the shadow of death A people walking humbly with their God and
and umbragious being chas'd away by the fiery indignation of a powerfull God especially with this co-consideration that his treason had been committed against a Lord so gracious But whether this Gracious and great Lord God was the second Person the Lord of Glory our blessed Redeemer Christ Jesus as some will have it conceivd both of this and other apparitions in the old Testament I stay not to determine nor to enquire But thus far only this Note will easily fall upon and into our consciences if we resist not if we despight not the Spirit of this Grace Namely that we should bear an infinite derestation to sin which procured at first and hath that malignant properte intrinsick and everlasting in all successive sin and sinners to provoke still the anger and offence of a most gracious Lord and if so then to think further of that infinite Grace and Love and goodness which even after sin committed could procure that Lord to compassion and could draw so deep a descent of Mercy as to submit himself to his most bitter Passion whereby he gives every wounded soul a clear assurance in an open pardon sealed in his own blood and also in this very Name leaves an Intimation that all our disobedience all our foul and many and weighty sins fall yet within the measure and compass and cannot sink us past or beneath the mercies of a gracious Lord God And therefore we to raise our souls upon this double Name as on a pair of powerfull wings oversoaring despair and flying up into his bosom who is our hope and life our dread and Love our Judge indeed but yet our Advocate that calls to us Come to me and whose blood cryes for us and we therefore to cry to him with that Disciple newly awakened to that frightfull and that delightfull double sight at once both of his sin and his salvation in Christ which made him so resolutely and so cheerfully take and wreath these Names together with Mâ—us in the appliance Dominus Deus meus my Lord and my God 12. This instruction I know and so you will apprehend it fits far better with the â—exts of the new and yet is no stranger in the old Testament For even Isay and Malaâ—hy in their clear and frequent forementions of our Lord retain as well the Relishes of Evangelists as Prophets and David openly sings and playes him on his Harp as Evidently as Elegantly Nay not so vail'd in Moses but that this very place of Genesis so early in the worlds infancy reveals some think the very person sure we are the Office of our Lord and Saviour whose after-manifestation and coming to destroy the works the Devil had made is promised within six verses and call'd a bruising of the Serpents head 13. But let us pursue this same consideration another way that a gracious and so a glorious Lord and God is offended and by sin drawn to an opposition to an enmity with his beloved creature man The vileness of sin is many wayes discovered in the language of the Holy Ghost It is to a main height of expression when God descends to so low a comparison as that in Amos I am prest under your sins as a Care is prest under many sheafs My Rebellion my stubbornness is a dangerous sin done against my Prince or Pastor or Parents And my violences my cruelties are heavy sins because in them I oppress my brother as a good man it may be better in his eye that made us both then my self But did I ever understand till now that I may oppress him that is optimus maximus my God also Is it not enough to weary men sayes the Prophet but shall I dare to vex and weary my God also and afflict and grieve my gracious Lord and his Holy Spirit No wonder we find David complaining My sins are a sore burden too heavy for me to bear when Davids Lord tunes his voice to the same key Your sins are a sore burden too heavy for me to hear Dost thou not see O vain man by this the vileness the odiousness of thy sin which makes him impotent that is Omnipotent As also in that term of Abomination How frequent is the use thereof in holy Scripture to cause us to write this lesson into all our souls from thence Nothing makes us so ugly spectacles to that Lord our God as sin which causes him to turn his face away in displeasure not able to abide us in his sight nay forced to deny his own workmanship Depart I know you not thus making him ignorant that is Omniscient And yet above and beyond and beneath all these we may collect the height and breadth and depth of a sinners dangerous and fearfull condition by those speeches of anger and provocation The wrath of a King is as Messengers of death the Wise man tells us and he that provokes him to anger sins against his own soul What is it when we provoke the holy one of Israel to anger O Lord rebuke me not in thy anger if in that mood I be called into Judgement O Lord who is able to abide it And this is doubtless one of the depths of Satan one of his main aims in provoking us to sin that thereby God being provoked to anger may declare himself our enemy What shall we then say Men and Brethren What will we then do May we not then say justly that other Lords have unjustly reigned over us Infoelix Lolium steriles dominantur our base and barren lusts and pleasures have indeed justly by Gods permission and by way of punishment had dominion over us by our willing submission of our souls to their sway and tyranny And will we still do so continue in sin still make a mock of gross and grievous sins never startle or admit the least umbrage of remorse at open blasphemies and often Adulteries drunkennesses Are not such mens Souls and Bodies States and Children in a fearfull manner engaged to the wrath of God which they hourly provoke by these abominations Alas poor wretched man or woman however titled Preacher or Hearer Lawyer or Courtier Lord or Lady every wickedness every known sin I dwell and delight in and resolve on is not only a touching pitch whence inevitable defilement nor a carrying fire in my bosom impossible to escape detriment but is an opposition a rebellious outstanding and sleighting of my God enmity for the wrath of God is manifoldly proclaimed from Heaven and Wisdom cries it in the streets Gods Declaration we are not ignorant of and dare we then despise If I be a Lord where 's my fear What earthly Monarch the anointed of the Lord unless super-anointed with the spirit of patience and meekness above mortals can endure his lawfull Commands to be vilified And can we look for less then suddain execution of that wrath which is drawn out and ready to fall on sinners and hath been the sinners case from the beginning Adam was our first Father
may undo thee nor can it redeem or preserve thee or thou it For Fool thy soul may be suddainly snatcht away And then whose shall those things be But if made a man indeed made for ever thou must be melted and refined and new made the Son of God in Christ Thirdly If long life be a blessing desireable Think all thy possessing here of all those dreams of the-shapes of pleasures shaddows can endure but for a vapory moment saith St Janes but he that believes in the Son of God hath everlasling Life saith St. John haves it in full and quiet possession by the power of his faith and having named everlasting life there need no addition of pleasure Food Rayment yet all these in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even in this life fulness of joy as full as humane nature can hold yea overflowing exceedingly abounding with all joy and peace in believing which Graces and replenishing of his Saints bosomes are therefore in the old resembled by saturity marrow fatness and in the new by manna hid and living fountains of water which mixt and cuited by the bleeding balm which drops from those holes of the Rock the peirced side of our Saviour becomes a cordial and soveraign Receipt against venom of sin and poison of the Serpent And lastly If felicity consist in knowledge or as he puts it Sapere fari with sapience like believing with the heart What Eloquence so puissant and clear like confessing with the mouth to salvation What learning to that Cross which makes Philosophy a fool suspends pales the sages and Disputers of this word Angels desire to prie into it and he that was full of Revelations desired to know nothing else 6. But take another view of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the two usual notions of the word Honour and Power Honour first It is so thin and aerie a thing as who can tell you what it is Something derivable from the prince the fountain of Honour yet he only alike to direct us where to lay and place the Title and the Ornaments He can bow no mans heart to any performance for it is a thing wholly in honorante in him that will do us honour if he lift and when he lift And what are the materials and the dress Reckond they are Esd 13. Thirdly Clothed in Purple and fine linnen eat in gold sleep on gold a Chariot with bridles of Gold Now usurpt by vulgars and then to sit next the King and to be called his Cousin Glories well worth the wearing when purchased by a long descent of noble blood and vertue mingled or by that vertue singular Yet how uncertain is the Possession In times of Peace how oft hath Glory vanisht all honour been laid in the dust and still attended on beside the shade of envy with those two certain Ravishers extream old age and death and in times of war or danger how subject to the pillage and affront of every Ruffin But here 's an honorable addition with a perpetuity enough if our hearts were filled with ambitious fires to give satisfaction and acquiescence Sons of the most high which stile though some on earth may wear yet God their Father wears it with a difference Some most high among men in their morning and meridian Glory may be full low before the evening But thy Kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom Thou O Lord art most high for evermore With cordial water it is that the Church sprinckles all our hearts when she teaches us to pray O Lord whose Kingdom is everlasting and Power infinite To be Son then to him is a Title which anoints us in Grace as Christ in nature above all our fellows of mankind and in a sort above Angels For to which of the Angels said God at any time Thou art my Son A Title wherein all Titles imperial are appaled impoverisht lost or far exceeded For I can ask as great or I can think beyond all honour ever worn by mortal But this Gods tells me is above Demand and Cogitation above all that we are able to ask or think Secondly In the notion of Power as it is here rendred What a formidable army doth the people present and oppose to the militant Christian Eph. 6.14 Principalities and Powers and then the vantage ground in high places enough to daunt the courage of the stoutest flesh and blood to encounter Legions of such spirits yet mark his oration to the soldiour verse 11. My Brethren Be strong in the Lord and in the Power of his might There is a compleat armour beaten out in Heaven and we fight under him who hath blood and spirit ready to run into and fill our veins to make us stand and standing fight and fighting conquer more then Conquerors for we are made to triumph in Christ who triumpht over all those powers for us And if there be more Troopers in the way of our Salvation as there is a world of enemies yet this is your victory whereby you overcome the world even your faith and against all the treasons and rebellions of the flesh the servant of God hath no other rescue granted him upon his instant petition but my Grace shall be sufficient for thee and my power shall be made â—erfect in Weakness PARTICVLAR 3. 7. I Have done with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and am come to Torcular the Wine-press of Application By which I promised first to draw a cup of consolation which is soon done by contemplating the Grace and Mercy of God in Christ Jesus His abundant manifold Grace and the multitude of his Mercies his sweet and tender mercies differenced from mens first in being sure then in their eternity The Lord is gracious and his mercy is everlasting And lastly mercy mingled of pardoning and rewarding both together which no man uses to a riotous Son or refractory servant yet our case was more desperate and behold God sets forth his love to us being enemies and in defiance Then he sent again his only Son that whosoever believes might not perish Is not that enough No But might have everlasting life The solemnity of this fulness of delight in the enjoying of Gods mercy thus in Christ makes it up a wedding Hos 2. and in the Gospel And the Saints said to rejoice in their beds The spouse in Thalamo And all that Psalm of David Ps 45. and all Solomons Song are nothing but Epithalamions at these nuptials wherein the Bride though bare and poor and naked and miserable before is now by the rich Dowry and Joynture of her Grace in Christ stated and possest and enobled and arayed and adorned above her wish and to her everlasting consolation but for we are too apt too easily to let such Comforts issue from such Texts as this therefore I told you this cup must awhile be set by till we have tasted first a Cup of sober consideration for a cooler Be sober and suspitious was the Heathens and Christians rule alike is Be
Monarchies so after he had joined and made up a Church of Jews and Gentiles he blest and preserved it through the ten Persecutions and to this very day For now we are refining this Gold and extending this propriety of God in his Saints and servants under the new Testament as we have cause to do we that live since that fulness of time which delivered him to the world in whom it pleased the Father that all fulness should dwell Then cartainly this consideration of our being Gods Peculiar in Christ the Sen of his love will rise to a full consolation For in him we know the Covenant was renewed and sealed in his sacred blood whereby those great Rivers of Creation and Providence flow over and fall into the large sea of Redemption and by that sea we may sail fairly on to the fair havens of Sanctification and compassing the point of good hope of a true and lively hope arrive in the end at endless Glory All this will be done if once we be his own in him that is his only Beloved if once he admits us into the league make us Confiederates and Princes of the Union Kings unto God by his blood Rev. 1.7 The Emphasis is upon His for that blood of his that Unction that Inauguration will effect it He and They God and Man at distance at enmity before by him who is both God and man and so a fit Modus and Medium and a fit Mediator are reconciled God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself No wonder though this be not only called a grand Mysterie as it is considerable in the person of Christ alone God manifested in the flesh that God should be made our very flesh but also as it reflects as it returns to us and brings us back for our flesh his Spirit That 's a Mysterie even Marriage wherein of two is made una Caro one flesh but this is more when we are joined to Christ per eundem by one and the same Spirit The Fathers are bold and industrious in the mintage of new words to express the nearness of God and man in Christs Incarnation by Corporation Illumination Adunation Contemperation But what man or Angel knows a word large and entire enough and high enough to title that Union by wherein the Apostle saith Man joined to the Lord is one Spirit and changed into the same Image from Glory to Glory This is that nuptial mentioned in Hos 2.18 and rementioned in the Gospels and all Solomons song and Davids Psalm 45. are Epithalamions wholly spent in Celebration of this Solemnity It was an happy Contract the Union of great Brittain when in the worlds Temple two Kingdoms were the wedded pair a gracious King was Priest and the Sea like a marriage-ring encircling both That was the way had it held for the education of both Realms to a Grandeur and Convalescence And even in story of time past it is a pleasant a delightsom Consideration to behold an Infant-state rise to maturity as in Rome or Venice But will you put out the eyes of all History or Poetry and dis-illustre all the Senate and becloud all the Clarissimo's of all mankind Look then upon God in his Son Christ Jesus founding a most noble Incorporation whereof all bodies Politick are but weak representations Excellent things are spoken of thee thou City of God And we know how large that holy Father Augustine is in delivery of those excellent things in his Civitate Dei whereof Christ is the supream Head The parts of this society Kings and Priests venerable and sacred persons in all antiquity and where other bodies want a soul the Ligament and soul of this body is the holy Ghost For by one Spirit are we baptized into one body and all made to drink into one Spirit Eph. 4.4 So that in this Center all meet Gods possession the Saints priviledge and in that these are become words all of one signification His Chosen His Holy His own His Royall His Peculiar People Nor can this chuse but prove a pure refined golden Consolation indeed when we find the proof in Gods own Testament that Jesus is not only the Mine wherein all the Treasures of Wisdom are hid but Jesus is the pure and grand golden Ingot of all the Comforts contained in holy Scriptures out of which Ingot are coined so many Medals some with Serpents and Anchors and some with Lions and Lilies and Doves and Crowns and Roses and Carduus Benedictus too good for Tremor cordis and all with the Effigies of that Cross whereon our joyes depend and wherein is found that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Apostle the exceeding riches proclaimed and offered to sail by the Possessor himself saying Buy of me fine Gold for fine Gold is he to the worlds brasse-farthings or as the Sun let in on stars or seas on pools which over-run chase away engulph and strike out their petite drops and sparkles Shall we hope to reach it in a big comparison and so comprehend that which is incomprehensible and cannot enter into the heart of man to conceive What Speaker can search out words fit for the unsearchable riches of Christ As Sopor Domini is the language of the Holy Ghost for the deepest sleep and Tuba Domini a superlative for the loudest found and Gandium Domini to express the very joy of Heaven so the Apostles Gaudete in Domino even here in the Kingdom of Grace implies the best and purest consolation 'T is with an Emphasis that if there be any consolation in Christ there is an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the joy as well as in the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord my Lord and my God with an Abfit too God for did I should prophane or mix this joy with any thing else I shall not need for this is enough to make St. Paul overflow exceedingly to abound with all joy and St. Peter to rejoyce with joy unspeakable and glorious This is comfort enough for every Christian to diminish and bedwarf and dis-illustre all those glimmerings and Glow-worms all those gleanings in risled fields and all that we are fain to feign to find in forelorn Ariadnes that is other mens leavings of Wealth and Beauty and Wit and Honor which are but empty Rinds and Husks and widowed shels and shoos thrown away in contempt and weariness And yet this Crown of Consolation here set on our souls in Grace is topt and phan'd and crown'd again This Consummation hath another Consummation yet above it The Emperor that keeps his hungry Eagle still poor man when the Romish Harpyes have devoured his dainties is glad after two duller Crowns to take a third of Gold which his holiness forsooth puts on and off at pleasure But the Christian faith which makes us Kings in Jesus blood and embalms us with his oyl of gladness assures us of a tripled Comfort when on those Crowns of hope and joy below the holy of Holies who will
fountain and such a physical and real Influence it hath on all mans habits and actions And if the estate of the best and purest be no better what shall we boast our selves who as they say of Northern Jewels that they are of a vicious softness and will not endure the file so certainly in respect of the primitive Christians when the Church was a true heaven upon earth we are as far from the brightness and miracles of their works as from their firm and miraculous faith It remains that we encourage our selves and stir up the Grace of God that is in us and though we cannot approve our selves in a perfection to a perfect God in whose eyes the moon shines not saith Job and the stars are impure yet if we be but vigilant to dress the paradise of our souls and keep out the Tempter preserving our breast at a garden enclosed and a fountain sealed up if we but earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the Saints and labor to shake off the sin that cleaves so fast unto our nature if we run and press to the mark and strive to purifie our selves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit and to grow up into full holiness such is then the manifold Grace and Goodness and tender mercy of our gracious God that he not only assists but accepts of our weak endeavors and approaches so far as to impute the very Act of cleansing and obtaining pardon too to such a frail condition and contention We do not we dare not say with Bellarmine de purg lib. 2. cap. 10. it pleases Christ to joyn our satisfactions with his own but by our complying under the hand of God and intention and love to work according to the influx of divine Grace we do by his indulgence impetrate for those sins for which we can never make compensation And as the Scripture enforms us of a cleansing by Redemption and Remission through the blood of our blessed Saviour and a second by application of that blood and a third by infused Regeneration so there is a fourth of mortifying and repressing of Concupiscence subjecting to the Regiment of Grace and also in renouncing and expelling sin by the contrary Acts of vertue and obedience of faith and works of Light expelling Darkness wherefore the Apostle saith All that have this hope in them have purged themselves even as he is pure And again You have purified your souls by obedience to the Truth through the Spirit 1 Pet. 2.22 Here then for a close fals in fitly that exhortation of Zophar in Jab 11.14 If iniquity be in thy hand put it far away and let not wickedness dwell in thy Tabernacles for then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot yea thou shalt be stedfast and not fear thine age shall be clearer then the noon-day thou shalt shine forth and be as the morning But all this is still upon that condition in verse 13. which is If thou prepare thy heart and stretch forth thy hands towards him which puts us in mind of Invocation and the use of Prayer for Gods assistance For as it is with Pearls according to the dew which it receives from Heaven in quantity and quality so doth the shel-fish breed her Pearl and after the Measure and Showr and Proportion and Instilment of divine Grace which our souls drink in we increase and grow in Purity and Sanctification and therefore we should put this into our hourly Letany as the woman in the Gospel John 4. Lord evermore give us of this water We know Lord in our selves there is no more goodness then in the mass of mankind in the rest of our fellow dust and pebbles but that thou by thy powerfull Grace and holy Spirit are pleased to drop and pierce and work upon us and purge away our dross and make us thy blessed work-manship created in Christ Jesus unto good works we have nothing can have nothing from our mixture or specifique forms or power of those materials whereof we consist and therefore to that end we may work Do thou first work thy Will on us instruct inform inlighten us cause thy face to shine upon us and so quicken our dull and earth-affecting souls that they may conceive an heavenly fire and ardent affection and intention by working together with thy Grace and so causing us in the end to work out our own salvation through Jesus Christ to whom c. S. D. G. THE THIRD SERMON At Oatlands MALAC. 3.17 And they shall be mine sayes the Lord of Hosts in that day when I make up my Jewels THis Text at first and second opening afforded us a double priviledge of Gods people in reference to their owner stiled here by his high and stately Title of Dominus Exercituum First They are his own his peculiar and then they are his Jewels In handling the first Priviledge I endeavoured to discover a Mine of Consolation even in this and drew certain Materials from this Mine namely the radiant mingle of Light and joy discernable in a Christians Profession Disposition Conversation Secondly the Connexion and Combination of Graces and Mercies from God observable in this Text pitcht like a Tabernacle with Curtains and Coverings with Loops and taches of comfort coupled one to another in Conjunctions And thirdly the Expansion and Dilatation thereof over all Adversity then the conserve Complication of all our comfort in our great Protector who is Dominus Exercituum And lastly I set on the Crown and consummation of all Consolation in Christ Jesus In our Discourse upon the second priviledge of Gods servants in being his Jewels was shewn in what respects especially this Metaphor is maintained and in what qualities the resemblance chiefly is most clear and useful to us All which being done that which is left us now to do is a Retrospect and a Prospect to look back first to the very Ground-work and Foundation whereon God layes this whole pile of Comfort which will be found to be nothing but his holy fear and then we are the more chearfully to look and go forward with the end of our Text and the end of our Faith and Hope and Pravers that in the work of God upon our bodies and souls in those several dayes wherein he promises and will perform this making up of his Iewels which dayes are four First the Day of punishing the ungodly Secondly the Day of powerful preaching the Word then the Day of Death and last the Day of the last Judgement Our first business and it is indeed the main business is to look to our Foundation Other foundation can no man lay but what is laid saith St. Paul that is Christ Jesus That 's most sure but so is this also that every one which calls on the Name of the Lord must depart from iniquity and this again as sure as the reft that without instruction and divine wisdom no man is able to do that and then the only way to that
perfect lacking nothing Alas if the unprofitable servant be cast out what shall become of the Malignant the Covetous the Proud the Luxurious How are we then to think of that triple charge of Pasce of Jacobs enduring frost and heat of the shepheards keeping watch by night and then of Leo Rugiens to devour both Pastor and Flock And how are they able to resist if we assist not unless we exhort rebuke exhort and minister a word of consolation to every soul that is weary and then the people to be swift to hear How precious is the treasure we bring though in earthen vessels Is it not the Word of God we bring and offer you To mens words we owe temporary belief if they speak wisely and a Resignation of our Judgements till we hear them out But to the Word of God which is diffused into a Sermon or else woe to him that makes it we owe an absolute Resignation and perpetual captivity Take heed then of contempt or wanton ranging after an heap of such Teachers as are after our own lusts lest we cause God to withold this bread from Heaven and endanger the famishing of our souls Let England remember the error of the Jewish Church once the Jewel and peculiar of the Lord of Hosts the defection of the Romish the Degeneration and then the demolition and abolition of Antioch Ephesus Corinth and many others O think in time for we draw very near it of this peoples sin here at the twelfth and thirteenth verses They held the Table of the Lord contemptible and snuffed at it perchance respecting the gorgeous Idols of the Gentiles In the same corrupt affection as many carnal Gospellers not ashamed to let men hear their wishes for the stately and triumphant shews again of Masse Dirges Processions Pilgrimages God hath blest the Land and Church even to the stupor and envy of our Neighbours with abundance of the Gospel of peace and the blessing of God in his Ordinance and with many curious and exact work-men Jewelers of souls and will we not bless the Lord praise him and magnifie him for ever Will we not prize this unsearchable Riches of Christ Shall we rather strive to quench and do despite to the Spirit of his Grace by despising Prophecying and like Swine and Dogs trample upon and turning again rend and tear such as pour these precious Pearls before us stoning them that are sent unto us with hard and bitter censures If the ministration of the Law was glorious what is that of the Gospel Examine it Is it not the Power and Wisdom of God and in the Administration of the Sacrament is not the bread we break the communion of the body and the cup we reach out into you from God the communion of the blood of Jesus Are not the offices of the Church such as distinguish us from Dogs and Infidels Let me then first creep a little into mount Ebal and bitterly curse all those thas have evil will at Sion and then flie into Gerizim and cheerfully bless with blessings of the right band Praise and Honor and Salvation upon the heads of all those Christian Kings Princes and people of all conditions who in their several places seek the advancement of the Truth of God and the encouragement of his faithfull servants while their own hearts strike them with the conscience and guilt of maliciousness and propenseness to Idolatry or schismatick Innovations that dare not say Amen 3. We come briefly to the third day to which we must all come the day of death when Gods own having past the fervor of youth and clean escaped the flesh and worlds contagions and the fiery darts of Satan having in short done what they came for they descend into the grave with their bodies like a rick of corn into the Barn in due season and their spirits return to God that gave them when even death is to them precious as well for rest and security as for that new Newness of life which then begins in death clearing to them that whereof Euripides doubted whether to die were indeed to live and contrary for so St. Paul determines it Christ is to me life and death is to me advantage and therefore desired he this day of his dissolution wherein he might be more perfectly united to his Jesus For these his holy Jewels are never so well set as when inset in the joy and Glory of their Lord and Master which makes that in such souls even the approaching towards death fils and purifies with high and heavenly apprehensions as it is in natural motions nearer still to the center or as in Diggers in a Myne who work most earnestly when near the Treasure But if it happen that any of these Jewels be so far dignified as his Lord accepts his life in sacrifice by Martyrdome consummate in sealing the Truth of Jesus with his blood how doth this add fresh ornament and addition of honor to these Servants of God as came to pass with that Protomartyr St. Stephen first made up a Jewel after his Master those stones the Persecutors threw surrounding his head as a precious Crown of Glory However they are all that die in the Lord enfranchised from those chains of corruption which abide the best alive for we dare not boast our Saints as Bellarmine doth Gouraga or his Fellow doth Phil. Nerius who was fain to pray God to depart from him and draw back his mind from heavenly things No we have learnt another way of humble acknowledgement from St. Paul I know that in me that is in my flesh dwels no good thing and St. James In many things we sin all and the day of absolute absolution from sin is not till this day of dissolution wherein these Jewels by death come to take possession of everlasting life 4. The last is the last of dayes Novissimus and the day of Renovation which none but the ancient of days can know and of which also there is a mixt mention in the beginning of this fourth chapter The day of the Lord comes as a furnace and Rev. 6. The great day of his wrath called the day of the Lord Jesus and the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ Rom. 16. The first day we spake on the day of affliction and the last we spake on the day of death do roule up sometime all together It befals alike saith the Preacher to the clean and unclean to him that swears and to him that fears an oath and for the second the day of powerfull preaching the word Hypocrites elude it The devil can transform himself into an Angil of Light and his zanies may make a fair shew in the flesh saith the Scripture But at this great day shall be a real Partition of Sheep and Goats of Wheat and Tares which yet flock and grow together then he will gather his elect from the four winds and declare his mighty Power in glorifying both their souls and
all those gracious Promises those Letters of Love indited by the Holy Ghost in Prose and Verse which cry unto us to turn and look upon and accept the salvation profered that salvation which our blessed Saviour wrought for us by strong cryes and by the effusion of that blood which yet cryes and intercedes freshly for us not all these availab letill the third visitation of his Spirit which is therefore called the Comforter Coming as Jobs friends in visitation both to mourn and comfort him Nay what Visitant what Physitian what Confessor what Wise of thy bosom what Friend who is as thine own soul would so attend for he abides for ever So minister for he helps Vna sublevat for the Greek better expresses it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 assists in lifting against our Infirmities so pray and groan for us with sighs and groans that cannot be exprest against all our faintings and despairs our sick fits of fear and distrust giving us Evidence Earnest broad Seal of Heaven untill the day of our full Redemption And this is that comfortable Visitation of the sacred Spirit respectively to the means of Grace when he will not trust me with the Bible alone the story of his Birth and Death not the Sermon alone the Exposition and Application of that Story but comes after both and sees how they work nay makes them work in me and enables me in some good measure to work by them Mans office in regard of this mercifull visitation it to debate and answer Debate first Think what we were before he visited Lost Captives Enemies Dead in sins and trespasses He then to drop his Blood and Grace his manifold Grace preventing exciting guiding confirming softly pierceing even into stony hearts which is described by many a sweet and amorous Metaphor These are his Flaggons and Apples and our state a Marriage above that too there 's una Caro one flesh But this Union so high and holy no words reach it Per â—undem Spiritum by one and the same Spirit But what shall we do First Believe else we make God a lyar and there 's the quarrel when we trample upon despise and count the blood of this Covenant as an unholy thing and if we tremble to contemn him shall we dare to think it nothing Shall we take a solemn Pride in despising his servants Et eo nomine even therefore hold a man despicable because a Minister Remember it is observed as the height and Precipice of all iniquity as far as people could do or God could suffer when God rising early by them was mockt in them the Text saith then there was no remedy 2 Chron. ult cap. But again Debate What shall we do and the Apostle meets this Consultation Make your Calling and Election sure and this to be done in Gods Method Enquire after our Calling first and not begin at the wrong end Hearken to that cry of the Spirit within thy soul the Kingdom of Heaven is within you and not too fondly spend the time in searching those rouls of Gods predestination and take heed of sinking thy soul toward a despair in his Mercy or to a self-condemnation For the Spirit of God speaking peace darest thou still proclaim a War Or if God have no bill against thee shall thy timerous Conscience be framing vain and carnal Answers Doth not God ask by way of Indignation Where is the bill of thy mothers divorce or to which of my Creditors have I sold thee Isaiah 50.1 If so Then what shall I answer answer God in obedience all the Creatures preach this Answer there is in all a Correspondency The Corn and Wine and Oyl hear us and the Earth hears them and the Heavens hear it but all hear him even the most unruly Creatures are our Rule the stormy wind and Tempest obeying his voice So we his Voyce without in his Word and his Voyce too within by his Spirit speaking to our hearts not then drown those motions or bury them in company and wine and worldly cares or pleasures lest so we quench grieve or do despight to the Spirit of grace and obey him actually not in professory Religion only but walk in light and bring forth fruits worthy amendment of life Lastly quid retribuam what answer but a grateful admiration as he that spake after a full apprehension O Lord what is man that thou dost so visit him This sacrifice as he counts it an Honour so t is all we can offer all we can offer him on earth and when all things here have end endless thanks shall have their beginning in Heaven As that Church in triumph there all those Angels and all those Virgins Prophets Apostles Martyrs with their loud clarious and Trumpets and Harps of Gold and Ivory strike nothing sing nothing but Hallelujah So we that are parts of the Church Militant should exalt our voyces and joyn in full Chorus We praise thee GOD we acknowledge c. Heaven and Earth shall thus be full of his glory 2. Gods second Visitation is in Judgement and for sin general When we find him coming forth of his Treasury his store-house of plagues War Famine wild beasts Pestilence and particular of crosses sickness loss But t is the great visitation here chiefly meant in the day of Judgement For Job was under temporal calamity now already at the pronouncing of this Text yet as we are viatores in our way to take notice of this especially as it reaches his servants his choisest though with limitation with that distinction ever ad correctionem non aâ—ruinam and yet they fall thick in the morning saith Job in the night saith David nay visiteth him every morning and trieth him every moment Job 7.18 For is there not a swarm an hydra and wheel of troubles in our whole life per caput circa saliunt latus saith he when rose the Sun so fair but ere his fall some clouds have seiz'd on them if not on him some grief some nay many many perturbations enough I 'le warrant thee for I have Gods own testimony enough for the day is the evil thereof Upon this Visitation when it drops when it falls when it pours on us what shall we do Why first debate stand and consider as Job if all should go Naked came I out of my mothers womb and naked must I return Is it the height the depth of any grievous affliction What is it more then that of my Saviour O but he was more then man is it more then theirs in Heb. 11. rackt sawn asunder c. Hast thou yet resisted to blood or is it come to the fiery tryal And then in affliction at least after it ask thy soul is it not good for thee Heb. 11.2 as the Apostle speaks of strangers may not a man this way receive Angels unawares as Gen. 28.16 Jacob on his journey at Bethel when he wak'd and said surely God is in this place so God is in this Visitation and I was