whence they had their birth so we say that in the book of Scripture divers matters histories examples judgements threatnings laws instructions and exhortations which like little rivers rejoyce the City of our God and serve to divers uses in the Church But after all Jesus Christ is the mark whereat all aim the Centre whither all return and guide our faith in him to find and obtain rest So Moses and the Prophets give their testimony Luk. 24.27 and the end of the Law is Jesus Christ Rom. 10.4 and to this intent speaks St. Paul 1 Cor. 2.2 that he will know nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified because that is the summary and principal end of all the knowledge of the Scriptures which faith not onely beholds as a thing to be consented to but embraces it as the only subject where to find salvation and life Certainly faith believes the creation of the world the genealogy of the fathers the confusion of tongues in Babel the captivity of Israel in Egypt the exploits of the Judges and Kings given to the people of God for Liberators and from all these things there may be gathered divers instructions for this life but to find in this recital the means of our reconciliation with God of the remission of sins and the eternal glory it is not possible because it is not in any of these properly Where the Eternal offers and presents the gifts of his heavenly grace that is a Word of God which he pronounced to Adam with his own mouth after he had transgrest the commandment Thou shalt dye the death in the sweat of thy brow shalt thou eat thy bread Gen. 3.19 These things were conformable to the Law and Word of God all these fearful menaces which the friends of Job with so much preparative denounced to the hypocrites and wicked but these are so far from begetting or keeping up faith which as 't is requisite should be accompanied with peace and consolation that contrariwise they put the conscience into trouble they fill the sinful soul with fear and in stead of giving us access to God go chasing and banishing us behind his face as we read of the people of Israel who not able to abide the thundring voice of the Eternal giving his Law upon the mountain stood afar off and said to Moses Exod. 20.19 Speak thou with us and we will hear thee but let not God speak with us for fear we dye This very part of the word that commands obedience and prescribes a rule for works proposing blessing and life to those that accomplish it Do this and thou shalt live Luk. 10.28 Whosoever doth these things shall live by them Levit. 18.5 is not that where our faith rests because as it promises life to the observers so it denounces malediction against all those that do not abide in all the words of the Law to fulfil them And thus our conscience guilty of many transgressions cannot find nor affirm her assurance nor seek for remission of sins where there is nothing presented but wrath and judgment And therefore the Apostle in the Epistle to the Romans and in that which he writes to the Galatians retires our faith from the Law and tells us openly that the Law is not of faith Gal. 3.12 that all they that are of the works of the Law are under the curse Gal. 3.10 11. that the Law was not given to quicken but contrary that it is the minister of death and of condemnation none being able to be justified before God by the works of the Law declaring with David those to be blessed to whom God imputes justice without works Psal 32.1 2. Nevertheless it ceases not to serve faith because by it comes the knowledge of sin and that it serves as a School-master to lead us to Christ Rom. 3.23 in whom we are freely justified by the grace of him by the redemption which is in Jesus Christ whom God hath proposed a mediator by faith in his blood by whom the remission of sin is announced to the end that in whatsoever we could not be justified by the Law whosoever believes might be justified by him Act. 13.39 For to him all the Prophets give testimony that whosoever shall believe in him shall have remission of sins by his name Act. 10.43 Hither it is properly that our faith is invited Whosoever is thirsty let him come to me and drink Joh. 7.37 Come unto me all ye that are weary and heavy loden and I will refresh you Matth. 11.28 So that this Gospel of peace this word of reconciliation ministry of spirit and of life power of God unto salvation to all that believe Rom. 1.16 Which opens to us the Abysses of compassions of love grace and the good pleasure of God which deduces to us the coming the incarnation the suffrances the justice and the death of the Redeemer of the world and which represents to us the Holy Spirit applying and sealing by the preaching of the Gospel and the Sacraments these divine and heavenly benefits in our souls and rendring us assured of our reconciliation with God of the abolition of our offences of the imputation of the justice of Christ and of the gift of heavenly life The Gospel is the word of life saith St. Paul Rom. 10.8 It looks at the whole word of God but it embraces only his good will It approves all his truth but it runs only after his gratuity and then 't is best pleased and content when both are met in Christ in whom gratuity and verity are met justice and peace have kissed each other Psal 85.11 by whom the gratuity of God is multiplied upon us and his truth endures for ever Psal 117.2 We do not then reject any part of the word nor we do not tear the faith in pieces but in this general object we observe what is most proper and most particularly belongs to it by reason of the differing parts of it Be then the Word of God a Paradise to the faithful soul but so as among so many fruits of different tast and vertue she may find one tree of life that may fully satisfie the hunger of justice that she so seeks for let the Scripture be her Orchard but yet let there be one apple-tree whose shadow she desires sitting down under it and the fruit sweet to her palate let the truth of God be her garden of aromatique drugs but let there be one Rose of Sharon whose sweet smell may recover her fainting heart and which she may put in her bosome no otherwise then a bundle of myrrhe Cant. 1.13 He knows well enough that his Redeemer is living But if the Gospel be the particular object of faith from whence shall we say that Job learned this science and from whence he could draw the foundations of an assurance so firm since this was not but many ages after his death that the Gospel was publisht to the world or that the Saviour of the world was come to
Fortior est qui se quam qui fortissima vincit Moenia He is the greatest Conqueror that can subdue his own passions and keep his body in subjection as St. Paul did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he I chastise my body from whence Friars draw their authority of chastising themselves though without cause and so take the word to be such a chastisement as School-masters use to boys We ought all of us against the grain of our flesh to mould and fashion our selves to repentance that so we may obtain a Trinity of Graces to save us Faith Hope and Charity and this Trinity of Grace will deliver us from a Trinity of Evils Blindness Error and Unbelief and if we be delivered from these we shall be freed from the predominancy of the World the Flesh and the Devil and if we be preserv'd from these we shall undoubtedly be crowned by the blessed Trinity God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Ghost to whom be Glory Honour and Praise World without end Amen GOD AND MAN Mutually Embracing In the first Epistle of St. John the 4 Chap. and the 19 vers it is thus written We love him because he first loved us LOve is the punctum or centre SERM. III. about which the circumference of our thoughts doth move and the primus motor that induceth us to fix our spirits upon an object Love is to our souls as weight is to ponderous bodies for as the gravity of a body forceth it downward that it may enjoy a sweet repose in its centre so Love moves our souls to an object that promiseth repose and contentment therefore from hence it follows that as ponderous bodies move in a straight line toward their centre so if we will obtain a true rest our Love must be regular and proceed in a direct line by a divinely-composed motion This Text Beloved that I come from reading to you is the Epitome of Christian Religion or the great Folio of Christian duty reduced into a Decimo-sexto or pocket-volume In this Text there are two parts and these two parts are the two pillars of the Church and the whole Christian World 1. Our love toward God in these words We love him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2. Gods love toward us which is but the reason or rather efficient cause of our love toward him because he first loved us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Not to stand upon the nice and fine-spun distinctions that the School-men make of Love we shall only divide it into two sorts Divinum and Humanum amorem into Love Divine and Humane the divine is couched down by the holy Spirit of God in the latter part of the verse because he loved us and the humane in the former We love him We will begin with the latter humane love or the love of man to God Spiritual or true love gives repose and contentment to the soul when as carnal or false love is an irregular agitation and an inconsiderate motion without a Terminus ad quem it is ever repleat with inquietude and distraction and never ceaseth or resteth till it despairs or is quite tired out which is not properly a rest but an impotency and inability of motion and the desire is strong when the power is weak like a horse that tied to a manger gnaweth his bridle asunder such are most persons their desires are strong their power but weak they desire most what they can least perform The cause of this disturbance is this Our Love selecteth out Reasons why we love not God perfectly 1 Cause and fixeth upon false objects and such that cannot satiate the desire for if you survey all sublunary things that deserve the name of beautiful you shall find in them no true quiet or rest but a concatenation of cares interwoven with perpetual trouble The greatest delicacies are consited in bitterness The acquisition of honour and preferment is painful and many break their necks in riding upon the airy stilts of Fame The possession of riches is uncertain and the loss certain if they leave not us by some accident Death Natures Bayliff will arrest us and force us to leave them To aim at such things is but ventum prosequi To pursue the wind an action as ridiculous as can be Grant they be good yet they are incertain therefore we must seek after our repose somewhere else since the earth cannot afford it and turn the compass of our Love toward Heaven For as the lower region of the Air is the habitation of winds tempests and earth-quakes but that part that is near the Heaven is serene and quiet so our Love so long as it adheres to sublunary objects will be full of trouble but 't will find rest and quiet if it lift it self up to Heaven and lay hold of the promises of God and then the soul though in the midst of the confusions and afflictions of this world be they never so thorny will have the fruition of an assured tranquillity like the Needle of the Compass that remains firm upon one point notwithstanding the violence of the scolding surges of a Tempestuous Sea and all because it is guided by the motion of the Heavens God is the sole object or at least ought to be of our Love and hath only a power to render us amiable by loving us He that only can nay that will give them felicity and that unutterable too that love him As the Apostle St. Paul writeth in the first to the Corinth the 2 Chap. and the 9 vers Eye hath not seen nor ear heard neither hath entred into the heart of man to conceive the things that God hath prepared for them that love him He promiseth also in St. John chap. 14. vers 23. to come unto him that loveth him and make his abode with him O unparallelled Love that makes a Palace of our souls for the King of Glory and a Sanctuary of the Holy Ghost 2. 2 Cause Philosophy it self hath this down for a maxime that Natura Deus nihil fecerunt frustra that God and Nature made nothing in vain Now that infinite and insatiable desire or appetite that is in man were in vain if there were nothing to satisfie and content it Which since it is impossible to find out upon this Terraqueous Globe we must search after it in Heaven of God that is bonum infinitum an infinite good 3 Cause 3. Besides God created the world for the use of man and therefore without doubt he created man for something better then the world viz. God himself 4 Cause 4. God created man inter omnia animalia only secundum imaginem according to his own image with a straight body and an upright countenance according to mellifluous Naso Os homini sublime dedit coelumque tueri Jussit erectos ad sydera tollere vultus that so he might behold him whom he represented and that the But and White of all his actions and thoughts
be received into the Kingdom of Heaven born among beasts that we might be the associates of Angels He that was regens sydera became sugens ubera 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 became 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that is the bread of life was pinched with hunger that we might be satisfied He that is the fountain of life became thirsty that we might have ours quenched In fine he that is life it self did undergo death that he might make us heirs of eternal life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the blessed Apostle in a holy extasie cried out O the depth of the riches of the Love of Christ These are prosundities that swallow up our spirits and there is pleasure in being lost therein for these are the graces of God that surpasse our shallow capacities but recreate our hearts that afford matter of admiration and subject of consolation Now to what end is all this if not to induce us to love God and admire the treasures and riches of his grace Our spirits are extasied with the rapture and contemplation of thy bounty Our words are a degree beneath our thoughts yet our thoughts are far beneath the truth We do but lisp forth thy praise our commendation and elogiums of thee are but an undervaluing of thee for in so doing we do but lumen soli praeferre or endeavour to delineate him in his golden tresses by the dark draught of a charcoal Therefore we must intreat the Lord that is our Father to touch our hearts with a filial affection that it would please him that bestows and infuseth his love into us to create also in us strong affections and desires after such a divine vertue that we may pant after pursue it with so much eagerness as to encounter with all obstructions for the obtaining of it All these considerations do but incite us to the love of God not for our selves but for his own sake which is perspicuous in this that our Love cannot be regulate unless it be formed and fashioned on the model of his Love that he bears to us Now God Loves us for his own sake according to the Prophet Isa Chap. 43. 'T is I 't is I that blot away thy trangressions for mine own sake And it is the prayer of holy Daniel in the 9. of his prophecy Lord hear me Lord pardon me O Lord my God tarry not for thine own sake for thy name hath been called upon by this people God considers that we bear his Image on our souls he considers that we are unworthy of his benefits but that it is a divine thing to do good to those that are unworthy of receiving it and which is more to make them worthy in doing them good He looks upon his Church as a small fold that carrieth his name and are baptized the people of God Hosea the 2. nor will he suffer it to become the prey of Satan or the triumph of their adversaries Amen GOD AND MAN Mutually Embracing In the first Epistle of St. John the 4 Chap. and the 19 vers it is thus written We love God because he first loved us WE have in one Sermon already discoursed of our Love of God SERM. IV. and informed you of the several degrees of this Love which were five two whereof we have only as yet insisted on the other three we shall auspice Christo dispatch in our subsequent love-discourse Therefore not to detain you with the reiteration or repetition of what you have formerly heard we 'll proceed at present to the third degree of our Love to God which is this viz. To Love God so far above all sublunary beings as to affect nothing 3 Degree to be enamoured with nothing but only for his sake As for instance in the vast circumference of the terrestrial Globe there is variety both of persons and things that we cannot withdraw our affections from them we cannot but love them and in reality 't were impiety not to Love them A Father loveth his Children a Wife her Husband our Parents our Kindred our Neighbours our Friends have all share in this amity So a man loves his health and labours to preserve it if it be any way lost he endeavours by all possible means to recover it The brawny Peasant is in his element when whistling to his Teem and manuring of his acres The Scholar is so ravished with his study that his very countenance smels of the candle as the Poet ingeniously expresseth it Livida nocturnam sapiebant ora lucernam Their pale countenance did relish of the candle speaking of excessive students Nay to go to disrobe a man of this love would be a doctrine inhumane and a degree below brutality He is worse than an Infidel that hath not a care of his family saith the blessed Apostle Piety doth not extirpate a mans affections but cultivates them and makes them colleagues with the Love and fear of God No otherwise than Joshuah who having subdued the Gibeonites would not put them to death but compel them to service in the House of God For then doth a father love his sons with a real paternal affection when he resolves to educate them so in their youth that they may encrease in growth and become plants that one day may fructifie to the glory of God Then doth a man love his friends as he ought when their love to God is the efficient cause of his love to them and that he perceives the Image of God shine in them Then shall we love our health lawfully and aright when we desire it not because it is more pleasant and comfortable but because it endowes our bodies with a vigour and our souls with a liberty of serving God in our vocation The same may be said of Riches Honour Learning and the like these are things that one may affect but so that their love rob us not of our love to God but rather stimulate us on and provoke us to good works And as there is no river so small but disembogues it self into the Sea so there is none of Gods benefacta though of the lowest size of the most dwarfish stature but conducts and leads our thoughts to the profound abyss of his goodness and greatness Then shall our affections to our friends be regulated and sweetly composed when they shall be branches or arms of the Sea of Gods immense Love and have a reflection upon the Image or benefits of God Set not a price or estimation upon men for that that is about them but for what is in them Love not men as you do Purses i. e. for the money they have If you honour a person for his stately attire you might as well salute the Sattin when intire in a whole piece If you reverence a man for his honour or renown you pin his dignity upon his sleeve and fix his worth on an airy title and this is the mode now adaies this is the frame of most mens spirits in the world to
adore the Casket and contemn the Jewel that is cabinetted in it to esteem the bark and slight the body It was the ancient complaint of devout St. Bernard Color non calor aestimatur vestium non virtutum cultus insistitur 'T is the gawdiness not the warmth of apparel that is minded the trimming of garments not the adorning of vertues is stood upon 'T is the lining of his pockets not that of his brain that is regarded Nay Aristotle Natures elder son was of opinion that an Asse laden with Gold might have a pass through any gate 'T is true in a natural but not in a spiritual sense for he cannot passe through the straight gate of Heaven 'T is Gold hisce temporibus ferreis that is omnium Regina The Empress of the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fight with spears of Gold and you will meet little or no opposition And pardon me if I go too high or offend some dunghill-souls will betray their Royal Soveraign for reward for a mercenary golden recompence 'T is money that rules and overrules the whole world Men rise early sit up late and eat the bread of carefulness and all for adding to the mass of their treasure all is good that procures wealth be it what it will or how it will per fas nefas by hook or by crook right or wrong quo jure quaque injuria as the Comedian excellently and suitable to our present times whether it be by Hophnies flesh-hook or Habakkuks net all 's good fish that comes to the net The holy Apostle tells us that godliness is great gain but there are many now living that would tell him if he were among us that great gain is godliness at least their godliness 'T is apparel makes a man now adaies but if once you be disrobed of your bravery and ad paupertatum redactus Then Nullus ad amissas ibit amicus opes Then when you are in a thred-bare condition you shall find no friends few or no visitations and whereas before they did stick to your threshold and were unwilling to leave your society now they 'll be as niggardly of their visitations as before they were prodigal of them Like the Asse that carried the Image Isis in procession when adorned with the ornaments then did they bow the officious knee but when spoiled and deprived of them then they come no more about her but she must be ranked with the rest of her dull cold contemptible fellow-creatures But on the contrary when your affections are bestowed on a man because he fears God he is firm and stable in his faith advanced in the true knowledge of God true in his words just in his deeds and charitable to the afflicted inflamed or eaten up with the zeal of Gods house not like many of the Puritanical faction whose preposterous zeal hath put the whole Nation into a combustion your love toward him will continue as long as he himself Dispossess such a person of his Lands deprive him of his Titles disrobe him of his gorgeous attire his body and all his ornaments will remain and that excellency that consists in the Image of God and the graces of his Spirit I know that the secrets or intentions of mens hearts are profound and that oftentimes it evenes that those persons that we make choice of and pick out for friends and vertuous too become vitious or else demonstrate unto us they have ever been so In this case he that loves God ought to reprove his friend and redress him with all his power Adulation or flattery hath rob'd amity or true love of all its terms but onely a liberty of reproving He that reproves not his friend for fear of incurring his displeasure it is a respect full of cruelty just as if when he were upon the point of drowning you should be afraid of lifting him up by the hair of the head for fear of plucking off a lock If he mend not when you reprehend him the love of man must give place to the love of God you must in this case do as holy Moses did who made use of his Rod whilest it was a Rod but did flye away from it when 't was metamorphosed into a Serpent and 't is better far to separate your self from such a person gradatim by degrees and rather untwist your friendship with him than to tear it all to pieces The Love of God serves as a rule to the overcoming and subduing all the forementioned difficulties Pagans have amassed and pickt up several precepts out of the nature of amity or friendship but never discovered that secret that regulates and orders all their precepts viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 first to love God and to make our love spring from the love of God What the Brain is to the Nerves the Liver to the Veins or the Heart to the Arteries the same is the Love of God to humane love i. e. filaments or branches on which it depends Without this divine Love friendship is not friendship but a conspiracy an accord of discording with God friendship whose tottering basis or shaking foundation is placed on pleasure or profit expires when pleasures lose their gust or taste through age or when the profit is diminished begins to moulder and crumble away or when the distribution thereof is unequal But the love or friendship fixed or rooted in the Love of God is firm and stable because built upon a sure foundation which love ought to proceed so far that we must powre out our Love not only upon our friends but our intestine enemies for Gods sake 't is the will and pleasure of the Almighty Matth. the 5. because that even in the midst of this enmity the impression of the Image of God is apparent And these are Rods in Gods hand to jerk us for correction and amendment and have such a compulsive vertue as to induce us to fear him 4 Degree We are not yet come to the highest round in this Jacobs Ladder that reacheth to Heaven for we must arrive to so high a pitch as to hate our selves for the Love of God For although we concede that self-love is the strongest and most natural love of man and it is this amor-sin that is the greatest Antagonist and enemy to the Love of God and 't will opus magnae molis multi sudoris to overcome and surmount it What the shirt is among our cloaths the same is self-love among our affections viz. the last that is pulled off it is like the last onset or sally that Satan makes upon a soul that is hard to be repulsed or made to quit the field Yet no person can love God ut deceat as it behooveth him that detests not his own nature that is not irritated against his concupiscence and wages not a perpetual war with them with a firm and Christian resolution to subdue them Deo juvante and to admit of no truce nor quarter but to commit a total slaughter
men now adaies like the Pellaean Hero Alexander the Great do Aestuare angusto limite mundi Sweat for want of room in the world there is not space enough for the flight of their soaring thoughts that are wing'd with ambition but this is according to the Wiseman nothing but vanity vanitas vanitatum omnia vanitas They fish after impossibilities and grant they could subdue the whole world and reduce it into their own possession 't would not it could not satisfie their heart or give them any real solid content for the world is a Circle the heart of man a Triangle now we all know that a Circle cannot fill a Triangle Cease then all you that aim at the hilling up of fatal gold and employ your hours in a more noble traffick in procuring the riches and treasures of Jesus Christ that may serve you and be of use to you in the day of wrath to get your Sins pardoned all your crimes expunged with the Spunge of Oblivion that the Lord may nevermore lay them to your charge and this must be by an unfeigned repentance though none of the five forementioned ways Now that you may know how to gain the salvation of your souls how to be eternally blessed and sing Hallelujahs to God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Ghost world without end which felicity will undoubtedly be attained unto by all true penitent souls And that you may know affirmatively what it is to be true penitents take it in these following Considerations The five steps of ascention by Repentance To this felicity we must ascend by 5 degrees or steps of true and unfeigned repentance 1. The first step whereof that leads and conducts to heaven is for a man to have an internal regret for sin to be grieved and perplexed for it to be wounded in conscience for it for till a man see his Sins in the glass of repentance and weigh them and meditate upon the curse of God that hangs over his head in a judgment for them he will never repent This is the godly sorrow that leadeth unto repentance never to be repented of This compunction or pricking of the heart is a clear demonstration of repentance sincere and sound and is the first step to heaven and so per consequens to the salvation of the never dying soul And if it be so that this is the first step to heaven Use 1 how sad a thing is it to see men in such a miserable estate as many are in these distracted times how many are there that have not set one foot forward in the way to heaven and you know the old saying Non progredi est regredi Not to go forward is to go backward How many are there that never have been humbled never touched never wounded in conscience for their Sins Wilful impenitency or a careless neglect of Repentance very dangerous O what a miserable condition what a deplorable estate do they lye in Now apply this to your selves Beloved did the sacrificing Knife of Gods Word never wound your conscience nor extract one tear from your eyes for the deluge of your Sins that will overwhelm your soul eternally without Gods infinite mercy if you have not been thus and thus grieved for your trespasses and transgressions you are in a desperate condition and there is very little hope or probability of your salvation Vse 2 This serves then for a Use of Consolation to all the Children all the Sons and Daughters of God for if you feel your hearts wounded for your Sins and you bath your soul in true penitent tears for the many hainous crimes that you are conscious of it is a true indicium or sign of being in the state of grace and that Gods spirit hath met with us and his Word hath cut the throat of Sin which otherwise would have ruinated you nay aims at God himself for peccatum saith Parisiensis est Deicidium Sin is the Cut-throat of God with holy reverence be it spoken Sin strives to dethrone God therefore let us endeavour to cast Sin down the precipice of our hearts and nevermore afford it house-room since it offends so merciful so gracious and so kind a God as ours for Sin is an abomination unto the Lord and so are all Sinners and evil-doers 2. The second sign of or way to true penitency is this when a man fears to Sin not because of the punishment but because he offends so great a God in so doing like holy Joseph who when he was tempted by the sweet caresses of his Mistris cried out How can I do this great evil and sin against God! Therefore from him we may learn what is most to be desired here on earth viz. the love and favour of God so that if any one should put the question to you and demand what your desire most hunted after and what your affections were most fixed on You ought to answer The love and favour of God in Christ Jesus 'T is not your embroidered apparel your manners and mannors your parts and arts that are able to appease the trouble and perplexity of a distressed conscience nothing but the mercy of God in Christ Jesus will afford it This is the onely refuge for a troubled conscience in the greatest extreamity Men may in their extremities go to drink away sorrow as they term it in their profane gibbrish and betake themselves to their merry company but alas this is no comfort this no remedy for their disease an old sore gangren'd or putrified if it be not very skilfully handled will hardly admit of cure but if it be superficially healed at top and not throughly at the bottom as soon as 't is skin'd at the top it will break out at the bottom so when men seek to smother the accusation of their own consciences and strive to blunt the edge of it it will rebound again and give a deadly wound even to desperation Beg of God therefore power and ability through his strengthning grace that you may be buoy'd up thereby in the midst of an Ocean of troubles and that the burden of an afflicted wounded conscience may be minorated and lessened that so you may not fall into despair To prevent despair all godly persons ought like Heraclitus to weep away their daies and indeed they are a sea of tears a meer vapour melted into tears his voice is painted with tears which have such an airy power and faculty as that they are able to mount up to Heaven and there to insinuate themselves into the ear of the Almighty begging and craving pardon for sin and a preservation from despair by the mighty power of God Lachrymae preces are the only weapons in a Christian battel let us so fight with these weapons as to get the peace of conscience and joy of the Holy Ghost that passeth all understanding and that speedily too for our journey is long and our time short therefore we had need to husband
engaged into a business with so much vigor as when they were assured of success by the answers of Oracles We are called by the vocation of God to the possession of the heavenly Canaan He promises us for the getting it his conduct favour and assistance so that with Job we may very well say I shall see God And what then remains but that casting down every burden and the sin that so easily enlaces us we may pursue with constancy the course set before us and traversing all dangers and going under hope against hope we may have our eyes upon Jesus Christ the author and finisher of our faith that so we may more and more in his love revive the strength of ours and recollect in him every day new vigor until the time that from vertue to vertue we may appear before his Sacred face where receiving the Crown and heap of his blessings we may glorifie him for ever as to him appertains honour and glory from this time forth and from generation to generation Amen THE SAINTS COMFORT in the day of death In the book of Job the 19 Chapter and the 25 verse it is thus written As for me I know that my Redeemer liveth c. IT is impossible to please God without faith Heb. 11.6 SERM. VI. for 't is necessary that he that comes to God believe not only that he is but that he is a rewarder of those that seek him To God that dwells in the Heavens we go by faith not by view All the view that conducts us to eternal salvation is faith And therefore as in vain the Sun sends forth his light in vain does it enlighten so many torches in the Heavens and discovers upon Earth so rich an embroidery of leaves and flowers for those that are without eyes So as unprofitable are the marveiles which the wisdom of God hath display'd in all this universe and the divine mysteries which it hath discovered in the clearness of his holy word for those that are without faith God complaines Esai 65. that in vain he hath stretcht out his hands to a rebellious and contradicting people and St. Paul Heb. 4.2 gives a reason why the word of preaching hath not profited the people of the Jewes and it is because it was not mingled with faith in those that heard it Who hath believed our preaching and to whom hath the arm of the Eternal been revealed Isai 53.1 Light is the first and most excellent work of God in the elementary world the eye is the most admirable beauty of all the humane body it is the joy of our life the address of our actions and the cleerest window of the soul the eye and light of our soul is faith without which it remaines in darkness ignorant of the way of God confused in all her actions and plunged in mourning and despair and therefore it is also the chief gift of heavenly grace the first tract of the Image of God that is markt in our hearts the first action of our spiritual life and the foundation and origine of all other vertues By this light Job acknowledges and discovers the eternal benefits which recompense his temporal losses he finds spiritual sweetness which tempers the bitterness of his corporal dolours he sees and embraces the perdurable felicity of the second life which reinforces his soul against the apprehensions of death For this cause we have so long insisted to describe and represent to you the nature of this faith by winding it out of ignorance from the confusion and uncertainty wherein they seek to fold it up that withdraw souls from the true spring of life and divert it to the crackt cisterns of superstition to engrave the lively tracts of it as deep in your souls as Job desired to have them imprinted in the hard rock that so the deduction which we shall make you after him of the mysteries of your redemption may not be unfruitful to you but that being guided by this divine and heavenly torch you may there find that assurance firmity and consolation that Joy inenarrable and glorious which is necessary for you in the midst of so many evils and combats as the enemies of the truth of God do deliver and prepare for his Church Before we come to a more particular consideration of the Redeemer and of this life resurrection and glory which he hath purchased for us by the price of his redemption we must upon these words make some general remark which may be proper to confirm us as much in the verity of our faith as they will make us see that it is venerable for antiquity and alwaies veritable and constant in her unity We see the dolours of Job encrease against all other remedies drawn either from hope of temporal things or from any rules of the law and to acquiesce in one onely Jesus Christ seeking in the only benefit of his redemption his repose and hope where he teaches us clearly that the principal and special object of faith hath at all times been the promise of the grace and salvation which was to be purchased by this Mediator betwixt God and men which holding and embracing she finds and not till then her repose and tranquillity The whole Word of God is truly the proportioned object to th'extent of our faith and according to the intelligence and approbation of the understanding she embraces it wholly and can go no further and in every thing and every where she reputes God to be true whether he command or forbid whether he promise or threaten whether he instruct or correct she leads all her thoughts captive under obedience she receives all his commands with humility she keeps her self to his prohibitions with fear she embraces his promises with affection she fears his threatnings she hearkens to his instructions and profits by his corrections for if faith doubt and go reeling in uncertainty of any one point of whatsoever is manifested in the Word of God there will afterwards need no great violence to shake it in all other things and to throw it head-long into infidelity And therefore when we give for the principal object of faith the promise of salvation and grace we will not subtract it to other parts of the word as leaving it indifferent and every one to liberty of believing or mis-believing at his fancy but contrariwise knowing that all hath been brought to us not by the will of man but by the inspiration of the eternal spirit which hath guided the tongues and pens of those that have announced and left written this holy word we maintain that the verity of it must be wholly and in every part both heard and received with the like reverence But we say moreover that as the waters of the Sea are for divers ends spread abroad and go creeping through an infinity of chanels over and under the face of the earth yet in such sort that at last they return all into the bosom of the Ocean from
and Musick wherein God himself hath seemed to tread the measures for it 's well seen O God how thou goest how thou goest how thou my God and King goest in the Sanctuary the singers go before the minstrels follow after in the midst are the Damsels playing with their timbrels yet all this is hudled up in confusion That house of holy pleasure wherein King David had rather be a door-keeper then dwell in the glorious tents of ungodliness is sacked and spoiled and the many thousand vessels of gold and silver and the rich and hallowed vestments of the house of God are sacrilegiously carried away and prophaned with revelling When we think upon these things we pour out our souls within us for we were wont to go with the multitude into the house of joy and praise but now by these waters of Babylon we sit down c. But they were Babylonians that did this Heathens that had no knowledge of Gods Laws but when men do Gentes agere sub nomine Christi mask Gentilisme with the titles of Christianity acting works of darkness under vizards of children of light not carrying the children of Zion captive into Babylon but turning Zion it self into Babylon this is enough to make us by these waters of Babylon sit down and weep when we remember thee O Zion Ezekiel took up a lamentation for wicked Tyre Ezek. 27.2 Isaiah bewailed with the weeping of Jaazar the vine of Sibmah I will water thee with my tears O Heshbon Esai 16.9 and how shall not we take up a lamentation and a bitter mourning when we remember thee O Zion How doth the City sit almost solitary that was full of people she that was Princess among the Provinces how is she become tributary Lam. 1.1 How is the gold become dimme how is the fine gold changed the children that did feed delicately are almost desolate in the streets and they that were brought up in scarlet are ready to embrace dunghils Lam. 4.5 hinc illae lachrymae hence hence are these rivers of tears which gush out of our eyes whilest by the waters of Babylon we sit down and remember thee O Zion I have now done with the parts of my Text and you may expect I should apply them but I forbear only from what hath been spoken let us gather two things as a double Corollary one from them as they were patientes sufferers the other as they were compatientes fellow-feeling members of other sufferings 1. As they were Patientes sufferers A Church may be brought into extream calamity By the waters of Babylon we sate down 2. As Compatientes as they were fellow-feeling members of others sufferings We must be affected with the calamities of the Church we wept when we remembred thee O Zion 1. Of the first A Church may be brought into deep misery by the waters of Babylon we sate down This Church of the Jews for I desire not to lead your thoughts into a further pilgrimage though it had such a magazine of blessings as no Nation or Church under Heaven was owner of yet was it not exempt from this humane nay Christian lot of misery in its very infancy for in the Egyptian bondage it was but an embryo not yet formed but no sooner did it take but its name but it was christned with the cross in Samuels dayes God suffered himself be it spoken with holy reverence to be taken captive of the uncircumcised Philistines for the Ark in which was his immediate presence was surprised and taken from the Israelites when the Church no less then Phinehas son first got the name of Ichabod where is the glory 1 Sam. 4.19 In the dayes of Zedekiah when she was now in her perfect age and beauty Jerusalem was destroyed by fire and her children led captives into Babylon which sad story that sorrowful Prophet hath exprest in his pathetical Lamentations and our Psalmist David here prophesied of In her decrepit age after the coming of Christ Jerusalem was sackt by Vespasian and made quite desolate of which Daniel prophesied Dan. 9. vers last And our Saviour himself foretold there shall not one stone be left upon another Matth. 24.2 Nothing is left of it but a name and ruines that bear the impress of Gods vengeance and justice Where now are those lying words wherein you trusted the Temple of the Lord the Temple of the Lord this is the Temple of the Lord Jer. 7.4 The Ark may be taken the Temple may be destroyed and ye may be carried captives into Babylon where by the waters of Babylon ye may sit down c. And was God so severe to the natural branches Appl. which were disobedient will he spare the wilde olive-branch that is grafted in Behold I bring evil upon the City that is called by my name and shall you go unpunished Jer. 25.9 What is become of those renowned Churches of the East mentioned in the Revelations are they not quite destroyed What is done to our neighbouring Churches in Germany are they not miserably defaced Hath not God been working this strange work of justice also even upon us these many years here in these three Nations which though divided from the rest of the world by Seas of waters yet are conjoined in the same lot of calamity What will be the end who can divine but without speedy and serious repentance and amendment of life may we not fear the like destruction in which others have perished Therefore what was the Angels advise to the Church of Ephesus it will be happy for us if we can make use of it Remember from whence thou art fallen and repent and do thy first works or else I will come quickly and remove the candlestick out of its place except thou repent Rev. 2.5 And thus considering them as Patientes sufferers you see that a Church may be brought into deep calamity by the waters of Babylon we sate down Secondly As Compatientes fellow-feeling members of others sufferings we must be affected with the miseries of the Church we wept when we remembred thee O Zion Compassion is an act of humanity to any in distress Did I not weep for him that was in trouble was not my soul grieved for the poor saith Job 3.25 but to the Church in evil times compassion is a duty of piety If I forget thee O Jerusalem let my right hand forget her cunning if I remember thee not O Zion let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth It is a sin that prophaneth the affections of nature it self to hide thy face from them of thine own flesh how much that crosseth the divinity of grace to hide thy face from them of the same spirit Our Saviour wept over languishing Jerusalem Daniel set his face to seek God in the captivity by prayers and supplications and fasting and sack-cloath and ashes Nehemiah when he heard of the afflictions of the people sate down and wept and mourned and fasted and prayed before the God