Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n
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A23819
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The regal proto-martyr, or, The memorial of the martyrdom of Charles the First in a sermon preached upon the first fast of publick appointment for it : an appendix to The grand conspiracy / by John Allington ...
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Allington, John, d. 1682.
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1672
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Wing A1214; ESTC R14382
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21,772
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40
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their Rebellion having nothing to answer for their Murther of Gods Annointed having nothing to keep off that deadly stab which the charge of their killing the just one gave unto their very souls Acts 7. 57. They stop their ears but with wide open mouths they ran upon him and to stop that mouth whose truth cut their hearts for want of arguments so silenced him with stones that he died at their feet of whose death the Holy Ghost is pleased to take notice and to record not onely the Actors but a bare Consenter also in these words And Saul was consenting to his death But what talk I of the Murther of a Deacon upon a day solemnly set a part to be humbled for the Murther of a King my answer is I find so nigh a conjunction between Sacred Majesty and Holy Order between Prince and Priest between Gods annointed to be Kings and Gods annointed to be Prophets that we can scarse find the man who will wrong the one but if occasion serve he would do as much for the other and therefore we find them both equally shielded in one verse Touch not mine Annointed and do my Prophets no harm Psalm 105. They who will harm the Prophets they will not stick to arm against the Annointed They who killed the Just one they made nothing of murthering his Messengers and indeed in order to this horrid Murther in order to the betraying of our Just one and the Lords Annointed what was more previous than the stoning of his Prophets the sequestring silencing and depriving from all comforts of this life who ever durst as did Stephen magnifie the Lords Annointed or did dare to say They were his Betrrayers or his Murtherers Indeed between Deacon and King there is a great disproportion Deacon the lowest degree of Ministry and King the superexcellent for Majesty and yet the same Kings who are sometime called Gods they are also stiled Rom. 13. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gods Deacons too that is Gods selected and peculiar Servants and thus considered St. Stephen and our Soveraign may very well admit a Parallel For Was S. Stephen Acts 6. 5. a man full of Faiih and the Holy Ghost such was our Soveraign Full of Faith for it was in faith of a better that he gave up his earthly Crown Full of the Holy Ghost for the most envious cannot deny his Meditations and Solitudes to be the undoubted Breathings of that Spirit Was St. Stephen endowed with such high parts and gifts that v. 10. They were not able to resist the Wisdom and the Spirit by which he spoke Even so was it with our Blessed Soveraign or else we had never heard of An Ordinance for no Addresses nor as himself speaks had he been assailed with Armies instead of Arguments yea when his cursed Conspirators when those who sought his life and those who in order to it had declared him A Fool one unfit to govern when they had divested him of all counsel and sequestred him from all Advice when many and the choicest of the pack were sent to him as the Herodians to our Saviour to entrap and entangle him in his words they found him so qualify'd as the Book of God testifieth of S. Stephen That they were not able to resist the Wisdom and the Spirit by which he spake and therefore as St. Stephen was confuted with stones because they were not able to do it with Arguments Even so therefore was our Blessed Soveraign not permitted to speak against the High Court of Justice Therefore brought to his Scaffold and therefore cut off because they were not able to resist his Wisdom because they found he was no less good than great as they served St. Stephen Acts 7. 58. even so they ran upon him and cast him out of the City Yea the very circumstance of place whence those came who did this deed that relateth to St. Stephen too for the High Court of Justice that pack of Miscreants which were sent to do this Villany they came forth of St. Stephens Chappel Now being in Stephens Martyrdom the Spirit of God is so severe as to take notice not onely of those who as I may say sealed and signed his death not onely of those who ran upon him and were the actors in this Murther but of a very Accessory of a stander by of one who gave no vote flung no stone did no hurt being the Spirit of God takes notice of one who did onely look to the cloathing of those that stoned him vers 58. One that did onely look on and like the thing certainly we shall find Consenters as well as Actors are mightily to be humbled for the sin of this day Not onely they who plotted and preached and prepar'd the Murther but those also who liked it when it was done Those who by any complacency or after act or subscription avowed the thing All such are guilty of the Horrid Murther of this Day or else vainly did the Holy Pen observe what is our present Text And Saul was consenting to his death In and about these Words we shall consider of these three Propositions First a man may be guilty of that sin in which he was no actor by being onely as Saul here stands recorded A Consenter Secondly a guilt may be postnate unto a fact for after the stoning of St. Stephen it is observ'd and not before that Saul was consenting to his death Lastly Consent may contract so deep a guilt that without confession and contrition it may hale the vengeance of an Actor upon the Consenters head First A man may be guilty of that sin c. Consent it is the conception and the first quickning of every sin consent it is that which gives the first being to every iniquity insomuch that he who consenteth though he never act further is an actual sinner before his God Nam scelus intra se tantum qui cogitat ultum And therefore said our Blessed Master Matt. 5. 28. Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery already with her in his heart He who hath a wanton a lascivious and an adulterat reflection upon a beauty he who looks and lusts though he never exchange a word never touch handle or come nigh the woman even this very consent this very complacencie it is Adultery in the eye of the most pure For saith our Saviour the son of a Virgin he hath committed adultery with her already in his heart And as consent in the Concupiscible even so consent in the Irascible it contracts a like guilt For as he is an adulterer who looketh and lusteth though he never violate the chastity of the woman even so a man may be guilty of Murther and yet never draw bloud a man may be a Manslayer and yet never harm or hurt a person For the express determination and words of St. John are Whosoever hateth his brother is a Murtherer 1 Jo. 3. 15. Now if it be so that consent is the
be delivered from that extensive Guilt which few escaped This Sermon cannot possibly make any guilty who are not but possibly it may shew some to be so who have not thought they were And therefore whereas upon that solemn Day we are taught to pray Lay not the Guilt of this Innocent Blood the shedding whereof nothing but the Blood of thy Son can expiate lay it not to the Charge of thy People of this Land nor let it ever be required of us or our Posterity This Discourse God so working may occasion that this Prayer may be preferred with more sense heart and feeling than before it hath been which to his Glory may the good God effect it will glad and rejoyce the heart of Thy Friend in the Lord J. A. From my Study Nov. 13. 1671. THE REGAL Proto-Martyr Acts 8. part of the 1. Ver. And SAUL was consenting to his death IN these words are two eminent persons to be look'd upon Saul and Stephen a Martyr and a Persecutor and indeed for as much a Veritas Odium naked Truth begets Armed Malice no wonder to see the Persecutor at the heels of the Martyr and to read of his Death who durst be so bold as to give witness to a Dangerous and Loyal Truth Now concerning this Martyr some things are obviously to be observed before we can come exactly to the Text. 1. His Ordination he was a person separate from the people 2. The Danger bound up in that profession 3. The particular Truth for the which he was put to death In the sixth Chapter you shall find a Motion made by the Apostles vers 3. That seven men of honest report should be looked up and be brought to them to be put into Holy Orders upon which Stephen being found a Man full of faith and the Holy Ghost was one Where by the way we may observe that albeit S. Stephen was a person of excellent endowments a person abundantly gifted a person full of faith and the Holy Ghost yet he did not assume or take an Holy Office on him nay the Congregation who looked him up and made choice on him they had no power to confer Orders or to make him what they desired for v. 6. They set him before the Apostles and when they had prayed they layed hands on him So that though the people lookt him up v. 3. it was the Apostles who appointed him to his Business though the people found him out it was the Apostles who sent him out Manus ei imposuerunt it was they that laid hands upon him So that the first thing observable concerning the Death of the glorious Martyr is he was an Ordained person he was one who by Imposition of Apostolical Hands and Prayer was set apart and designed for holy use The First Christian Martyr was in Apostolical Holy Orders Secondly The Danger involved and bound up in this profession for whereas before he liv'd secure and private as a Christian or a Disciple now called to a publick employment and set apart for a peculiar and Holy use he was not long in his Office for for ought we read his first Sermon cost him his life 'T is true indeed he was chosen to minister unto Widows Acts 6. 1. yet by his employment it appears he was not chosen to that Ministration onely for Stephen full of Faith and Power did great Wonders and Miracles among the people vers 8. yea though there was an whole Assembly an whole Assembly of Libertines against him he held not his peace ver 9. but so he disputed and so spake that as the Text implies They dispacht him for it An Argument to me That Holy Orders are not onely Honos but Onus not onely an advance to Honor but an expose to Hazard insomuch that by how much God is pleased to take a man nigher to himself by so much the more is he than another expos'd to the Hate of the World and bound to abide Death or Danger for him For our Blessed Lord and Master he whose Manhood of all others was nighest in conjunction with the Deity he was as I may say therefore put into Holy Orders therefore made a Priest that through the Eternal Spirit he might offer himself to God Heb. 9. 14. therefore was he made a Priest that he might be a Sacrifice And indeed whereas Christians in general are by St. Peter called An Holy Priesthood 1 Pet. 2. 5. I know nothing that this can more safely and seasonably admonish than to remember if we are Priests we must then sacrifice and sacrifice no less than our very selves to Gods glory For so did our pattern so did our high Priest who is set before us So did St. Stephen who though a Deacon and one in the lowest step of Holy Office when he was put to it he declined not but to his Masters and to his Kings glory he so spake that he died for it For Saul was consenting to his death Lastly To come up to the Text let us see and observe what that particular Truth was and what that very Speech for which he was thus us'd for the which the Jews cried out Run upon him and stoned him to death and you shall find it was onely for accusing them and sharply setting before them the Murther of their King For Acts 7. 52. you shall find these words Which of the Prophets have not your Fathers persecuted and they have slain them who shewed before of the coming of the just one of whom yet have been now the Betrayers and the Murtherers When St. Stephen though full of the Holy Ghost was so bold as to tell the Rebellious Jews of their killing the Prophets and of their putting to death the Just one it presently followeth v. 53. When they heard these things they were cut to the heart and they gnashed on him with their teeth When St. Stephen was so bold as to tell them how they had 〈◊〉 trayed their King and murthered the Lords Annointed When he was so bold as to set their so horrid and so bloody Rebellion before their eyes no wonder if they resolve to cut off him who had thus cut them to break his head who had broke their hearts It is oft said Many a man loves the Treason who hates the Traitor But here we have a Treason which the Traitors themselves endure not to hear on For Acts 5. 40. The Counsel of State for the time being even those whose hands were imbrued in the blood of their King they call and command the Apostles that they should not speak in the Name of Jesus Jesus the King of the Jews his Murtherers commanded that no mention be made of him command even his own Servants even the nighest to him not to do any thing no not to speak in the Kings Name Yea so did the memory of their Rebellion crucifie their souls that witness St. Stephen they were ready to slay and to stone the Speaker For having nothing to answer in Defense of