Blind zeal which wants knowledge 3. Turbulent zeal which wants love and moderation 1. The First of these Hypocritical zeal is a meer blaze and shew of fervency without any true and solid heat It is nothing but the Vizor of zeal looking a squint one way but tending another pretending God and his Glory but aiming at some private and sinister end Such was the zeal of Iehu who marched furiously and his word was The Lord of hosts Come said he to Ionadab and see my zeal for the Lord but his project was the Kingdom Iezabel proclaimed a Fast as out of an Extasie of zeal that God should be blasphemed but her aim was Naboth's vineyard So in Acts 19. Demetrius the Silver-Smith and his fellows cry Great is Diana of the Ephesians but meant the gain they got by making of her Silver Shrines vers 24. This Zeal is soon descried by the proper Character it hath namely an affectation of having their works seen of men which is said of the vain-glorious Pharisees in Matt. 6. be it by ostentation of their zealous deeds like Iehu or by the excess of affected gestures sighs and other like actions falling within the view of men Not but that a true zeal doth shew it self vehement even in external actions but it is the straining of them beyond measure which argues the Heart to be guilty of emptiness within 2. The Second kind of False zeal is Blind zeal Ignis fatuus or Fools fire leading a man out of the right way when men zealously affect evil things supposing them to be good or are eagerly bent against good things supposing them to be evil Such was the Zeal of the Iews of whom S. Paul witnesseth that they had a zeal of God that is in the matters of God but not according to knowledg And with this Zeal was he himself once carried when he persecuted the Christians with an opinion of doing God good service as the phrase is Iohn 16. 2. I verily thought saith he with my self that I ought to do many things contrary to the Name of Iesus of Nazareth And such is the zeal of simple and devout Sectaries who blindly run after some person they esteem without knowing themselves either why or whither This kind of zeal is like to metal in a Blind horse that will speed to fall into a pit or to break his neck The counsel I would give for avoiding this kind is to look before we leap and see our way clearly before we run 3. The Third kind of False zeal is Turbulent zeal which S. Iames calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bitter zeal a kind of Wildfire transporting a man beyond all compass of Moderation namely when in the excess of our heat we either outgo the bounds of our place and calling or use undue Means or wayes or overshoot the limits of Love and Charity whether to God or our Neighbour For howsoever Zeal be an excess of our affections in the things of God yet must this excess never break over the banks either of our vocation or in choice of Means out-bound the Rule of God's Law as theirs most certainly doth who endeavour to colour their Religion by the Massacres of Princes overturning of Kingdoms breach of Oaths and almost all bands of humane Society Such was the Zeal of Saul when he slew the Gibeonites forgetting the Oath which the Princes of the Congregation had made unto them Iosh. 9. 15 18 19. And such was the zeal of Iames and Iohn in the Gospel when to vindicate the honour of Christ they would have Fire to come down from heaven to consume a whole Village of Samaria Such also was Peter's zeal when he cut off Malchus his ear The former outwent the limits of Love and Charity the last the limits of his Vocation As Clocks whose Springs are broken overstrike the hour of the day So this mad and untempered Zeal the measure of Moderation Thus I have briefly described these False fires that by the Law of contraries we may know who is the true Zealot whom God approveth namely He whose Spirit is in Fervency and not in Shew for God and not for himself guided by the Word and not with humours and opinions tempered with Charity and free from head-strong violence This is that Zeal which our Saviour calls for in my Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Be zealous therefore This is that Zeal which whoso wants in him God hath no pleasure but will spue him out of his Mouth as it is said in vers 15. a little before my Text. But why will you say should this zeal be so needful or why may we not worship God without it Let us therefore now see the Reasons and Motives which do evince and prove it needful and should urge us to it 1. First therefore I will seek no further than my Text where the want of Zeal is reckoned for a Sin a Sin to be repented of Be zealous and Repent Is not that needful without which all our works are sinful But Vertue you will say consists in a Mean and not in Excess and why should not Piety also I answer The Mean wherein Vertue is placed is the Middle of different kinds and not the Middle or Mean of degrees in one and the same kind Vertue so it be Vertue is at the best in the highest degree and so is Religion in the highest pitch of Zeal 2. It is the Ground-rule of the whole Law of God and of all the Precepts concerning his Worship That we must love the Lord our God with all our heart with all our Soul with all our Mind and with all our Strength What is this else but to love him zealously to worship him with the highest pitch of our affections and the uttermost strain both of Body and Soul For he is the Soveraign and chiefest Good what Love then can suite to him but the very top and Soveraignty of Love All things in God are Supreme his Power his Knowledg his Mercy and therefore he cannot truly be worshipped unless we yield him whatsoever is Supreme in ourselves a supremacy of Fear a supremacy of Hope a supremacy of Thankfulness For whom then should we reserve the top and chief of our affections for our gold for our Herodias c How can we offer God a baser indignity will he endure that any thing in the world should be respected before him or equalled to him The Lord our God is a jealous God and will not suffer it Let therefore all the Springs and Brooks of our affections run into this Main and let no Rivulet be drawn another way If Zeal be good in any thing it is most required in the best things and if in any thing it be comely to work with all our might Eccles. 9. 10. certainly in the service of God it is most comely Be not slothful in business but fervent in spirit serving the Lord
Rom. 12. 11. 3. Zeal is that which carries our Devotions up to Heaven As Wings to a Fowl Wheels to a Chariot Sails to a Ship so is Zeal to the Soul of Man Without Zeal our Devotions can no more ascend than Vapours from a Still without fire put under it Prayer if it be fervent availeth much but a cold Sute will never get to Heaven In brief Zeal is the Chariot wherein our Alms our Offerings and all the good works we do are brought before the Throne of God in Heaven No Sacrifice in the Law could be offered without fire no more in the Gospel is any Service rightly performed without Zeal Be zealous therefore lest all thy works all thy endeavours be else unprofitable Rouze up thy dull and heavy Spirit serve God with earnestness and fervency and pray unto him that he would send us this fire from his Altar which is in Heaven whereby all our Sacrifices may become acceptable and pleasing unto him AND thus I come to the next thing in my Text Repentance Be zealous and repent Repentance is the changing of our course from the old way of Sin unto the new way of Righteousness or more briefly A changing of the course of sin for the course of Righteousness It is called also Conversion Turning and Returning unto God This matter would ask a long discourse but I will describe it briefly in five degrees which are as five steps in a Ladder by which we ascend up to Heaven 1. The first step is the Sight of Sin and the punishment due unto it for how can the Soul be possessed with fear and sorrow except he Understanding do first apprehend the danger for that which the Eye sees not the Heart rues not If Satan can keep sin from the Eye he will easily keep sorrow from the Heart It is impossible for a man to repent of his wickedness except the reflect and say What have I done The serious Penitent must be like the wary Factor he must retire himself look into his Books and turn over the leaves of his life he must consider the expence of his Time the employment of his Talent the debt of his Sin and the strictness of his Account 2. And so he shall ascend unto the next step which is Sorrow for sin For he that seriously considers how he hath grieved the Spirit of God and endangered his own Soul by his sins cannot but have his Spirit grieved with remorse The Sacrifices of God are a contrite Spirit Neither must we sorrow only but look unto the quality of our Sorrow that it be Godly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and to the quantity of it that it be Great We must fit the plaister to the wound and proportion our sorrow to our Sins He that with Peter hath sinned heinously or with Mary Magdalen frequently must with them weep bitterly and abundantly 3. The Third step of this Ladder is the Loathing of sin A Surfiet of Meats how dainty and delicate soever will afterwards make them loathsome He that hath taken his fill of sin and committed iniquity with greediness and is sensible of his supersinity or abundance of naughtiness and hath a great Sorrow for it he will the more loath his sins though they have been never so full of delight Yea it will make him loath himself and cry out in a mournful manner with S. Paul Rom. 7. 24. O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of death 4. The fourth step is the leaving off Sin For as Amnon hating Tamar shut her out of doors So he that loaths and hates his Sins the sight the thought the remembrance of them will be grievous unto him and he will labour by all good means to expel them For true Repentance must be the consuming of sin To what purpose doth the Physician evacuate ill humors if the Patient still distempers himself with ill diet What shall it avail a man to endure the launcing searching and tenting of a wound if he stay not for the cure So in vain also is the Sight of sin and the Sorrow for and Loathing of Sin if the works of darkness still remain and the Soul is impatient of a through-cure And therefore as Amnon not only put out his loathed Sister but bolted the door after her as it is said in the forequoted place So must we keep out our sins with the Bolts of Resolution and Circumspection Noah pitched the Ark within and without Gen. 6. 14. So to keep out the waters and a Christian must be watchful to secure all his Senses External and Internal to keep out sin 5. The Fifth and last step is the Cleaving unto God with full purpose of heart to walk before him in newness of life All the former Degrees of Repentance were for the putting off of the Old man this is for the putting on of the New For ubi Emendatio nulla Poenitentia necessariò vana saith Tertullian de Poenit. c. 2. Where there is no Reformation there the Repentance must needs be vain and fruitless for as he goes on caret fructu suo eui eam Deus sevit i. e. hominis saluti it hath not its fruit unto holiness nor the end everlasting life Rom. 6. 22. And thus have I let you see briefly What Repentance is Will you have me say any more to make you to affect it as earnestly as I hope by this time you understand it clearly Know then that this is that which opens Heaven and leads into Paradise This is that Ladder without which no man can climb thither and therefore as S. Austin saith Mutet vitam qui vult accipere vitam Let us change our life here if we look for the Life of Glory hereafter Let us leave the old way of sin for the new way of righteousness and to apply all to my Text Let us change our course of Lukewarmness for a course of fervency in God's service our dull and drowsie Devotions for a course of Zeal Be zealous and Repent AND thus I come to the Third thing I propounded namely the Connexion and dependance of these latter words Be zealous therefore and Repent upon the former As many as I love I rebuke and chasten Many things might be here observed but I will name but one which is this That Repentance is the means to avoid and prevent God's Iudgments For as Tertullian in his de Poenitentia observes * Qui poenam per judicium destinavit idem veniam per poenitentiam spospondit He that hath decreed to punish by Iustice hath promised to grant pardon by Repentance And so we read in Ieremy 18. 7. When I shall speak saith the Lord there concerning a Nation or Kingdom to pluck up to pull down and to destroy it If that Nation against whom I have pronounced turn from evil I will repent of the evil which I thought to do unto them And in Ezekiel 18. Repent and turn
Daemon-gods of the Nations for Christ's Monarchical Mediation excludes all other Mediators and Daemons not that the wooden Idol was ought of it self but that the Gentiles supposed there dwelt some Daemon therein who received their sacrifices and to whom they intended their services Thus may this place be expounded and so the use of the word Daemon in the worst sense or directly for a Devil will be almost confined to the Gospel where the subject spoken of being men vexed with Evil spirits could admit no other sense or use and yet S. Luke the best-languaged of the Evangelists knowing the word to be ambiguous and therefore as it were to distinguish it once for all doth the first time he useth it do it with an explication Chapter 4. verse 33. There was saith he a man in the Synagogue 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 having the spirit of an unclean Daemon Thus much of the word Daemonium 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Scripture whereby I hope it appears that this place of my Text is not the only place where the word is used according to the notion of the Gentiles and their Theologists But you will say Did any of the Fathers or Ancients expound it thus in this place If they had done so the Mystery of iniquity could never have taken such footing which because it was to come according to divine disposition what wonder then if this were hidden from their eyes Howsoever it may seem that God left not his spirit without a witness For as I take it Epiphanius one of the most zealous of the Fathers of his time against Saint-worship then peeping took 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in my Text for a Doctrine of worshipping dead men You may read him in the seventy eighth Heresie towards the conclusion where upon occasion of some who made a Goddess of the blessed Virgin and offered a cake unto her as the Queen of Heaven he quotes this place of my Text concerning them saying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which in English sounds thus That also of the Apostle is fulfilled of these Some shall apostatize from the sound Doctrine giving heed to Fables and Doctrines of Daemons for saith he they shall be worshippers of Dead men as they were worshipped in Israel Are not these last words for an Exposition of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But what will you say doth he mean by the Dead worshipped in Israel I suppose he means their Baalim who as is already shewed were nothing else but Daemons or Deified Ghosts of men deceased yet he brings in two examples besides one of the Sichemites in his time who had a Goddess or Daemoness under the name of Iephtah's daughter another of the AEgyptians who worshipped Thermutis that daughter of Pharaoh which brought up Moses Some as Beza would have these words of Epiphanius to be a part of the Text it self in some copy which he used But how is that likely when no other Father once mentions any such reading Nay it appears moreover that Epiphanius intended to explain the words as he quoteth them as he doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Faith by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the sound Doctrine and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 erroneous spirits by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fables and so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 giving heed to Doctrines of Daemons by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 worshipping Dead men Otherwise we must say he used either a very corrupt copy or quoted very carelesly But grant that Epiphanius read so Either this reading was true and so I have enough because then the Apostle with his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. should expound himself by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to mean the Deifying of the dead Or it was not the original reading but added by some or other for explication sake and so it will follow that those who did it made no question but that the words there contained some such thing as worshipping of the dead Therefore take it which way you will it will follow that some such matter as we speak of was in times past supposed to be in this Text and Prophecy CHAP. VII Why those words in the description of the Mystery of Godliness Received into Glory are set last That praying to Saints glorified as Mediators and Agents for us with God is Idolatry For the proof of this several Grounds are laid down To be prayed to in Heaven and to present our Devotions to God and to deal as an Agent and Mediator between us and him is a Prerogative appropriate to Christ a Flower of his Glory and Exaltation to sit at God's Right hand a Royalty incommunicable to any other That none but Christ our High Priest is to be an Agent for us with God in the Heavens was figured under the Law in that the High Priest alone had to do in the Most holy place and there was to be Agent for the people That though Christ in regard of his Person was capable of this God-like Glory and Royalty yet it was the Will of God that he should purchase it by suffering an unimitable Death This proved from several Testimonies of Scripture Saint-worship is a denial of Christ's Prerogative Bread-worship in the Eucharist to what kind of Idolatry it may be reduced How Saint-worship crept into the Church NOW I come to the Second point to maintain and prove That praying to Saints glorified as Mediators and Agents for us with God is justly charged with Idolatry For this is the hinge whereupon not the Application only of my Text but the Interpretation thereof chiefly turneth For this is that which I told you in the beginning that my Text depended upon the last words of the former chapter and verse Received into glory which were therefore out of their due order put in the last place because my Text was immediately to be inferred upon them The like misplacing and for the like reason see Heb. 12. 23. where in a catalogue or recension of the parts of the Church Christ the Head and the sprinkling of his bloud is mentioned in the last place and after the spirits of just men because the next verses are continued upon this sprinkling of Christ's bloud Ye are come to the general assembly and Church of the first-born which are written in heaven and to God the Iudge of all and to the Spirits of just men made perfect And to Iesus the Mediator of the New Covenant and to the bloud of sprinkling which speaketh better things than that of Abel whereas the right order should have been◠First God the Iudge of all secondly Christ the Mediator of the new Covenant and thirdly in the last place the Spirits of just men made perfect Agreeably therefore to this dependance of my Text I am to shew That the Invocation of Saints glorified implies an Apostasie from Christ and a denial of his Glory and Majesty whereunto he is installed by his Assumption into heaven to sit at the right hand of God Which before I do I