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
a week tythe all I possess This was well he ought to do so But Christ that saw his root was vain glory brings him on the stage for our learning to play his part of Miles gloriosus with a Panegyrick of his own praises in his prayer With Lord I thank thee that I am not like other men But all such flaring Hypocrites are met with by St. James Thou hast faith so hath the Devil saith he Is that faith which is all words and no works Can that Faith save thee Or is it vera fides Very faith indeed No it is the other Fià es rather that is a very Fiddlestring Saith not St. Paul as much Sever it from works of Charity and it is a meer sound and an ungracious sound too A sounding brass or a tinkling Cymbal Again they are met with by this Apostle where expounding this Text he tells them and us that walking in Light is all one with walking honestly Now is there any honor whence honesty is derided Is it not a shame Is this to deal fairly Is it fit men should so mis-use God and Godliness What make a shew of Godliness and have nothing to shew for it when it comes to the proof If nothing but profess saith Christ I shall be even with you one day Now it s your day to appear goodly and glorious before deluded men and to be thought Saints But when I come to be made manifest in my true and real Saints and to glorifie them indeed then I 'le profess too I 'le profess to you I know you not I know you well enough from the heart root but to be the men you call your selves My Saints my Elect and choice servants for such I know you not Depart from me you have been Retainers and Pretenders to and talkers of piety but workers of Iniquity 2. So far of active now for passive obedience A Christian ought to be such a one as old Philosophy and Poetry did Ideate only and imagine Sibi imperiosus totus teres atque rotundus A kind of Aeneas or Vlysses and Achilles mingled not only to do but suffer nobly For which end the Stoicks made men believe they had no infirmities but had turned out all their Passions and affections which is impossible Nor is that the thing which God requires 'T is not a disparking a disforesting but a Cicuration a Subjugation a Captivity a Crucifixion a Mortification and then farther respecting Christian profession Walking here implies a bold and constant course both in our faith and in our obedience the life and soul of faith a course undaunted an Eagles flight bold and forth on Comes humane injury in the way The heathen could rowse his friend with a Te moneo ut omnem gloriam quâ inflammatus fuisti omni cura industria consequare magnitudinemque animi ne unquam inflectas cujusquam injuria A Christian vertue then should be à crassiore tela then for every file to break 'T is for a weak or guilty mind to be troubled with injurious words like our Duellists preventing the day of Judgement and calling their brother to account next morning for every idle word over night by sending him the length of their sword And since I have mentioned Duellists let me have leave to throw three or four cool words this morning on that fire which is but Ignis fatuus and a Meteor that hath a place only in a middle rank and region of mankind The whole skie of women are clear against it Nobles for Council sit or government will learn to look down with storn upon it Beggars and the poorer Tribes ca◠live and die with a few brawls and broken heads The three professions are better taught and men of Trade and Occupation in Cities and Corporations understand not the word Business in the quarrelling Dialect So that fighting is confined it descends not usually beneath a serving man nor ascends above a Knight and being thus comprest the hope is it will shortly vanish into nothing For it rises from that which is next to nothing that is Vanity and Lyes and Vapors And you shall observe them still most tender of that dreadfull word the Lye on whom it falls in the nature of a true jest and such most enraged about Reputation forsooth whom wise and honest men know to have very little or no Reputation to lose Briefly What think these Gallants of the old Roman bravery and height of spirit Can they shew me from all that story a pair of worthy courages unless they will alledge those mercenary Fencers embrandled and fighting a duell for the Lye or the son of a whore or any such poor froath as flies from men in wrath or vext with distemper in drink or play But I am preaching to sober Christians a Religion that never occasions much less necessitates any Disciple to a fact which must inevitably draw on or endanger their hanging or damning or both And have we so learned Christ Did not that Lord and King of Glory empty himself first of all his Glory and make himself of no Reputation and then endured such contradiction of sinners such cruel mockings and revilings How many false accusations bore He before he bore his Cross So what a Tullying and declaiming of Tertullus What Rattles and Drums and Gun-shot And what a Catalogue of sufferings past St. Paul before he could finish his course and attain the Crown of Righteousness and even in the shock of painfull afflictions a man of God endued with a true Christian fortitude and Patience will learn to take up his Cross and learn by it as a a sound Distinction and take it as Gods usefull Fan to unmingle him from the chaffie and feathery things of the world and will look through it and find Gods primary intention of Mercy in sending it So David the man after Gods own heart did experiment his afflictions to be good for him and reductive of him into a right way And such a passive walk was his clean through In his beginning the Bear the Lion the uncircumcised Philistine then Troops of enemies with arrows and arrows prepared shot and shot privily Cost and Care and Wit employed to ruine him yet he sings The Lord is my Light and my Salvation whom then shall I fear Nay so far from fearing that if we belong to God it belongs to us to look for crosses What son is it whom the Father chastens not It is the lot of all his genuine Children it is the walk of all his pasture-sheep In the sheep-walk comes the storm the Shearer the Butcher Why For thy sake are we killed all the day long and counted as sheep to the slaughter If it come to death for Christ or his Cause it is the highest dignification to our nature next his own assuming it that parting with life is the consummate the best part of thy walk that severing is Union and that dissolution make the knot indissoluble 1. We come now
failed his Trust which amounts to a lye On the other side when I give another the lye and know in my own conscience he hath not lyed I give the Lye to my self And what cause have I if I say the Sun shines when it doth shine and another tels me it is a Lye for it is midnight to persesecute such a one to death for making himself a foollish Ruffin and Lyar in his own knowledge So that to give it in any case except of Loyalty and Life is frivolous and irrational Object They object These Discourses savour of Cowardize I answer 'T is true if they call it Cowardize to fear God or hell whereas the truly wise or valiant knows there is nothing else to be feared For against an enemies sword we find 10000 seven-penny men wag'd at that price in the wars that fear it as little perchance less then any prosest sword-man in the world Diligentissima in tutela sui fortitudo and it is saith Aristotle a mediocrity between doubting and daring Sicut non martyrem poena so not fighting but a good cause declares the valiant man In which whosoever shall resolvedly end his life resolvedly I mean in respect of the cause to wit in defence of his Prince Religion or Country as he may justly be numbred among the Martyrs of God so may those that die with malicious hearts in private Combats or Duels be called the Martyrs of the Devil Neither indeed do we take our own Revenge or punish the Injuries offered us by the death of the injurious For the true conquest of revenge is to give him of whom he would be revenged cause to repent him and we lay the Repentance of another mans blood upon our own conscience and drown our souls in the wounds of our enemies A second Objection or Demand will be Do I condemn generous defence of Honor prest with Injury I answer No if the Injury be violent for the Law of nature which is a branch of the eternal Law and the Laws of all Christian Kings and States do favour him that is assail'd in the slaughter of the assailant but no Gentleman on a Chartel or Chalenge being defied is bound to answer in point of Honor in a private combate because omitting the greatest which is the point of Religion the point of Law is directly contrary which hath dominion over the point of Honor which can judge it which can destroy it except you will stile those Arts honourable where the hang-man gives the Garland For the Laws of the Land having appointed the Hangman to second the Conqueror and the Laws of God appointed the Devil to second the Conquered dying in malice I say he is base and also a fool that accepts of any Chartel so accompanied A third Objection How shall a noble or gentle man be repaired in Honor for Infamy unsufferable Answer By the Court martial For do we not in cases of debts goods lands and all things else submit without disgrace to law because it may be felony to take by violence that which is our own And if Honor be dearer then goods or life it self yet know what is true Honor It is the History or Fame following Acts of Vertue or Acts of difficulty and danger for publique good He that in these fails by Cowardize or base affection is dishonoured but acting a private Combate for a private respect and most commonly a frivolous one is no act of vertue because contrary to Gods Law and the Kings nor difficult on even terms nor for publique good but contrary For a man may be Felo de se robbing so his King and Country as for contumelious words if I cause my enemy to confess be sorry or make amends all these or any are sufficient and the dis-reputation is not mine but his and for matter of Fact or Blows c. famous is that decision of the French Marshals in the case of Monsieur de Plessis struck by a Baron which was awarded to kneel before Mr. Pl. in open Court sitting in his Chair and to tender him a sword and a cudgil and Plessis to chuse with which he would strike but he for gave him and which of these two had the disgrace If you say the Barons Repentance was enforced and so no dishonor to him you may as much alledge for a thief confessing at the Gallows that his Repentance is enforced too so all enforced repentance is inflicted upon us for something done unworthy of a Gentleman or an honest man and therefore the Court of Chivalry most charitable for the blood of men violently spilt doth not bring forth hony bees as that of Buls doth which sting but the fingers or the face but it produces that monstrous beast Revenge which hath devoured so many noble personages of several nations as there is nothing more lamentable nor more threatning the wrath of God upon supream Governors then the permission therefore K. James extinguisht those deadly Feuds in Scotland and our Laws are strong against Duellists in England My Additions follow in a Sermon to K. Charls The Heathen could rouse his friend with a Te moneo ut omnem glotiam ad quam à pueritia inflāmatus fuisti omni curâ industriâ consequare magnitudinemque animi tui qu am ego semper sum admiratus semperque amavi ne unquam inflectas cu jusquam injuria A Christian vertue then should be è crassiore telâ then for every flie to break 'T is for weak and guilty minds to be troubled with injurious words like our Duellists preventing the day of Judgement and calling their brother to account for every idle word over night by sending him the length of his sword But I desire to throw three or four cool words upon this ignis fatuus a meteor that hath place only in a middle rank or region of mankind For first The whole skie of women are cleer against it among the males all nobler spirits fitted for Counsel or Government will learn to look down with scorn upon it Beggars and the poorer Tribes can live and die with a few brawls or broken-heads at most The three professions are better taught finding no Aphorism or Law of God or man to defend it and men of Trade and Corporations understand not the word Pusiness in the quarrelling Dialect so that fighting is confin'd it descends not usually beneath a serving-man nor ascends above a knight And being thus comprest the hope is it will shortly vanish into nothing for it rises from that which is next to Nothing Vanity and Lyes and Vapors in Tap-houses and Taverns And you shall observe such guests still more tender of that dreadful word the Lye on whom it falls in the nature of a true jeast and such most enrag'd about Reputation whom wise men know to have little or no Reputation to lose Briefly What think these Gallants of the Roman bravery and height of spirit Can they shew me from all that story a pair of worthy Courages out take the mercenary Fencers embrandled and enkindled to go forth and fight a Duel for the Lye or the son of a whore or any such poor froth as flies from men in wrath or vext with distemper in drink or play But are we not Christians a religion of meekness that never occasions much less necessitatets any Disciple to a deed that must inevitably draw on or endanger his hanging or damning or both The Captain of which profession the Author and Finisher of our faith and salvation was consecrate through sufferings made himself of no reputation and endured such contradiction of sinners FINIS
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
since the print was dark and we sin-blind His Word became the mirror of his mind And as the Eternal Father on the Son His form engrav'd before all worlds begun So what he is what God in him to us The spirit of both doth in this Book discuss Clear spring of wisdom Truths eternal mine The whole a Temple and each leaf a shrine And as on clouds on mountains and on streams The Sun lets beauties fall in golden beams But with his own pure Light the stars inspires And through their bodies thrusts his living fires So other holy books can but reflect Those Raies which here are native and direct Which apt to dazle and confound the wise Are yet a gentle light to Childrens eyes And you bright Maid whose name if I reherse I shall a Rubrique make and not a Verse And were such gold found in Italian Mines They would have twenty new St. Katharines As little ones in Gardens take delight Here gather fruits for tast and flowrs for sight The flower of Jesse that fresh and lasting Rose The fruit of knowledge and of life here grows On babes as tender Virgins love to look Behold that blessed babe within this book Pure fair adorn'd with perfect white and red A Crown of Radiant stars about his head If you be sick if head or heart do ake On Jesus name call and the pain will slake Read it when first you rise and goe to bed Under your Pillow let it bear your head All books in one all Learning lies in this This your first A B C and best Primer is Whence having throughly learnt the Christ-cross Row You may with comfort to our Father go Who will you to that highest lesson bring Which Seraphims instruct his Saints to sing A SERMON Preached to the KING AT OATLANDS 1638. JOHN 1.12 But as many as received him to them gave he Power to become the Sons of God even to them that believe on his Name WE Country Ministers preaching at Court are first confined to matter finishable in one hour being like the Virgins in the Court of Ahasuerus She that came once must come no more except she pleas'd the King and were call'd for by name For which I shall chuse to insist on few particulars And then we are fearfull to displease Such are the winds of Information One breaths that good wise Caveat of King James of ever blessed memory Not to soar aloft or muster up our own readings Another whispers Touch not State nor Discipline nor Controversies At length I threw down all fear of displeasing by choice of this Text which plainly preaches Christ Jesus but Christ in Excellency excellent things are here spoken of him and of his powerfull Grace and excellent things said to be done to us by him and his gracious Power And if wondrous things will take it is a Text replete with wonders and yet no wonder containing him who wears that title among and above all those in Isaiah of a Prince peaceable and wonderfull No wonder if an earthly King be and by his own neglected when the King of Kings that came down from Heaven in triple light and evidence of his own stupendious Miracles his Fathers acknowledgment and the fiends own confessing to see how hardly the beams of Truth are let in on envy-poisond souls came thus furnisht among his own and yet his own received him not No longer wonder that a gracious King retains a sweet and mercifull disposition even to disaffected Subjects taught by this King here the Messiah who as anointed with Grace above all so sheds Grace and Mercy over all offers it to all even to those that would none These Builders here that threw him by he would have built them upon himself as on a stone elect and precious and so have raised them up into a new Jerusalem Miracle of Mercy To urge and press the gift of his Grace yea of his blood on those that despis'd it counted it an unholy thing and to remember them for his Cross in his prayer and for his death in that Commission after Go preach the Gospel to them Let them have glad tidings of Peace and Salvation Go take in them that would not take in me Receive them to Mercy that received me not And go first to them first to the lost sheep of the house of Israel and beginning at Jerusalem Nor cease these wonders here for now not the Jewish Church alone not she his only beloved though even in this sense nor Rome nor Antioch but Jerusalem is the mother Church the mother of us all But 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Apostle The diminution of the Jew is become the riches of the Gentiles and in the place where it was said They are no people of mine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there they shall be called the Sons of God And that there is Here The Church of England a Church of Gentiles and this place the Represent and Lantskep of that If we will receive Christ What then I cannot tell you what Some mighty thing it is certain 'T is bundled up in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here which is a Right and Interest or Priviledge and Prerogative and a Dignity and Power no less then to become the Sons of God As many as received him c. Three parts I shall make of the Text First Vitis The Vine therein discoveting the root on which this fruit grows that is so copious clearing to us the Prime and other branching causes of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Secondly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 id est Racemus The bunch of Grapes that hangs upon this vine which who so puls and presses by a lively faith shall extract an Honor and Preheminence and Power quodcuunque velis A large trail of blessing unexpressable Our last part is Torcular The Wine-press whereby I shall first attempt to draw from Vitis and Raecemus a cup of Consolation as Calpar and Inferius but being so the too lushious issues of the Grape must a while be set by till we have tasted of a second cup of consideration for a cooler and then a third of Conformity and Concordance with Christ And then is that first to be resum'd and brew'd with some ingredients that may make it relish upon the Palate of the meekest Christians That done it will remain to urge the health of all three so mingled both for conveniency and necessity absolute and respective Last of all to make tryal by your patience of our receiving Christ in receiving his Receivers Those that are deputed to receive our homage and take our regard in his stead I shall name but three and reckon them upwards The Poor the Priest the Prince of his People Of these plainly and honestly And first of Vitis that is Christ Jesus to him we would but none can find that way till drawn and no way to be drawn up but our laying hold on the chain of Grace let down◠and nothing will do that but Prayer
Let us then lift up our hearts together with our hands to Go◠in the Heavens 1. OUR first part is Vitis and that is Christ we way take his own word John 15. 1. I am the true Vine Poor hedge and harth wine you may wring from natural knowledge and from moral Books and dull muddy stuff the world affords mingled with Mandragoras whose effect is betwixt sleep and poison But would you that above the spirit of Cecub or Falernian wine The Vine which breeds a liquor potent and mighty in operation Quod cum spe divite manet in Venas A cup of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that fills with holy Raptures and Extasies and lifts your Spirit up to become Partaker of the divine Nature Then come to me saith he He all alone at this He and none but He can give this Grace Search the Vineyards the Scriptures They testifie of him Those Cherubins the Old and New Testament clap all their wings together for the enclosing him who is A. and Ω. the same Rock and Mannae Jesus Christ yesterday and to day and the same for ever The Book of God is Paradise everywhere Trees of knowledge bowing their eminent tops But Christ Jesus the Tree of Life in the midst of the Garden The Fruit and Kernel of which Fruit is here in Vitis Objection 1. 2. But in 1 Pet. 1.3 we find this made the Act of God the Father Blessed be God even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath begotten us again c. and ascribable to him as an Act of Power and Wonder first above that of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And secondly As an Act of Love of which he is the Fountain While not as a Father alone but as a Mother too he conceives in the womb of Predestion brings forth in Vocation tenders and bears in arms and on his wings of Providence and hath Viscera misericordiarum in the plural And again this is made the work of the holy Ghost Tit. 3.8 By the washing of the new birth and renewing of the Holy Ghost c. And so much seems implied in that Commission Receive you the holy Ghost and then Whose sins you remit c. For answer hereto briefly we learn from the school that though in the sacred Trinity be order yet no Degree and in their Acts ad extra they all blessedly conspire as in this particular the Apostle informs us 1 Cor. 6. By the Grace of God the Father through the blood of his Son are we raised as so many Temples of the holy Ghost And as the Son is in at Creation by him were all things made he being the power and wisdom of the Father so the Spirit is called his Gift too whom I will send you from the Father and in the Galatians it is stild the Spirit of Christ All build then this holy frame But he lies down as the Foundation as that precious corner-stone on whom his Saints relie by vertue of their precious Faith and partake all these precious Promises in him Yea and Amen He that Olive of whose fatness and Vine from whose root live all the Branches which he performs in special too by a double distillation of his Grace and blood while the blood of that Vine is made ours and we through it and him made Sons of God and most properly in this Filiation here mentioned his Act who is in nature Filius He by generation to make us so by Regeneration Thus have we endeavoured to dig and discover this to the root indeed that root ineffable of three in one God the Father as Author and Fountain the Son as means and merit the Spirit forming cherishing and preserving the new Creature A Grace flowing from the Father by the Son in the Power and Operation of the holy Ghost Objection 2. 3. But where 's the Text then How do we receive it by Faith Our Saviour Answers it in the fifteenth of St. John This is done by insition as we by it receive him that is abide in him and that cannot be without assenting and obeying both By both which we begin to live and draw sap and conrinuating strength of spiritual Life The life I now live I live by the power of the Son of God 'T is his Act and Gift in the first Light and Influence and first Attraction and bowing our will to receive him and in obediential performaces too asubsequent and concurrent Grace yet a Nostrality too so far as a non fugere saith St. Austin nay as a Sequi too and an Agere a co-working with the work of him that works all in all and all our works in us And the manifest of this Insition by believing and so receiving him is a plain and easie Decision of that drie and tedious Jangle which infects the mysterie of Godliness For nor Faith nor works alone Nor they without their root Nor it without his fruits Poscit opem conjurat amice Faith working by Love Objection 3. 4. But which way How can these things be Which way is the Light parted saith Job c. Where comes our divine Light of Reason to clasp and Grace it self under that noble and ampler Lamp of Faith The Answer is prepard by St. Peter who tells us where it grows the immortal seed of his his Word called therefore the Word of Life and the Word of his Grace and this very Grace the Word of Faith to which is ever annext the use and blessing of those Sacraments of the one whereof our Saviour tells us Except a man be born again and of the other Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood no life is in you no kingdom of Heaven for you PARTICVLAR 2. 5. THus far of Vitis Our second Particular is Racemus The bunch of Grapes 'T is rendred here by Power but is understood in an Excellency Power cum Priviledgio This indeed intended as Caput Votorum For as he saith Quid voveat dulci alumno So what is it that thy soul desires Is it Beauty Belive there are no such Roses and Lilies in their Midsummer as Gods Sons in their early Spring That being true of every member which is spoken of the body in general Thou art all fair No deformity not that of sickness nor that of age nor spot nor wrinckle Free from all defilement of sin a brave and high victorious and insolent Beauty that pure fair white and red in his innocence and in the blood of the Lamb. Is it riches How faint and cold and poor a word to this that makes a man rich in God! And rich in faith is equivalent to that For by that is a poor wretch under all made Heir to God who is rich over all and enjoyes not these shadows of the world but those unsearchable riches of Christ not filthy lucre defiling in the acquist but fine Gold So that thy adoring Mammon is but a mockery to thy soul It cannot make thee it may marr it
in due season to such souls as are weary And first to clear up that misty Objection of ignorance Know for a certain that salvation's no matter of wit but as St. Austin in that known speech of his The faithful soul is safe in the sim plicity of his believing and not in the vivacity of understanding and as Nazâ—anzene hath it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Nothing could be more unequal then that our faith and so the way to salvation should be a thing only incident to learned bra ns Remember thy belief is like thy love he that commanâ—'s both gives both and having given a first spark blows it to a flame and if smal and weak yet if right and hearty good enough The best schollar of them all hath no better a Receipt then thou and God will firm thy Reed to support thee all the way to Heaven and as for dejection and aptness to despair I will take again that Cup of consolation in hand and strive to brew it so as it may relish on the palate of the weakest Christian and afford him a complacency at least an allay to all thought of impossibity or difficulty wont to prevail with such as taste themselves and consider not the puâ—ssance of Vitis and Racemus the power of God For our errour proceeds both wayes not knowing the Scriptures or not observing the power of God My Ingredients shall be but two and taken from two Comparisons 1. First compare this act of Regeneration with the worlds Creation there for the consolation of the darker and weaker spirit we find it vain to enquire what was before the frame so it is not clear what shall be after the dissolution so in Recreation what goes before of the destinating is a Depth and what the state of glory shall be is not clear it appears not yet what we shal be 1 Joh. 3. But this appears the Grace of God appears and his free act is evident in both The creature can contribute nothing at first and then though a double cover on the earth of darkness and the deep yet that released by his power infinite and then having removed the waters also by virtue of his Producat he made the land appear and suddenly disappear invested in a robe of numerous plants and flowers Just so in this work of thy new birth Darkness is first all over thee and t is Gods method first darkness and then light Our imaginations dark and our foolish heart full of darkness and all that men can do in that state of nature deeds and works of darkness But then comes oriens ex alto with his marvellous Light till the day dawn and Day-star rise in our hearts Those hearts that were all dark before all was a Chaos till light pin'd to the Sun stream'd to remotest angles And so it was with that Apostle St. Thomas deepsy cover'd in infidelity till the powerful light let in through his sense upon his soul Then see how soon he sees and startles up and fervently rises in that cry of Domine Deus my Lord and my God! and the spirit speaks the same comfort evidently to all Arise thou that sleepest and stand up from the dead and Christ shall give thee Light for he hath it and he is it He is the true Light in both those main properties of Light First Light makes things discernable in night great stones and blocks So to blind nature gross sins lie undiscovered till Light of Grace infuse a tenderness and scrupulosity and a discretion and ability both to observe the surprizes of and ask pardon for the least offences Then secondly The other Property of Light Irradiation it not shews alone but beautifies and gnilds and enamels where it lights so doth that Grace of Gratum faciens His embracing Grace upon thy soul rendring it gracious and precious in the eyes of thy heavenly Father Lastly I forget not that second Cover of the deep That inland Gulf of Corruption inborn and bred up with us respecting which we all must crie with David de profundis Out of the deeps But then remember one deep calls upon another There is a deep of Mercy answers the depth of all our misery and to top this Consolation if the waves of ungodliness make us afraid and roar horribly or after a sense of Mercy and Forgiveness we fear the reflux and revalescency of our prevailing sins upon us Remember his bow is in the clouds his gracious promise in his holy Word to make his Power perfect in weakness and he hath given to the Sea a Law and said to wickedness Hitherto shalt thou come and no further and here stay thy proud waves 2. Our secondingredient is from Resemblance of our Saviours incarnation First In Virgo his birth of a pure Virgin Mary so is thine of a pure heavenly Grace distilled from God without mans contribution or assistance When the Angel came to salute her when Christ came to Nicodemus one with tidings of her conceiving the Son of God the other with strange news of a man being born again and so become the Son of God both wondred alike both ask in effect the self same question How can these things be How can a man be born again and take notice the answer is the same to both for there is no other The holy Ghost shall come upon thee the Power of the most High shall do this in an act of as great freed om as the blowing of the wind so is every one that is born of the Spirit A second considerable comfort is that of infinite distance God the simplest essence to stoop and marry with mans body of all other the most compounded substance This hindred not the day-spring from on high to visit us why then dismaid to look down upon our own spirit wherein is summamalitia when we know in his sacred spirit there is summa bonitas and for all the distance and for all the deadness of our souls womb to conceive a thought that is holy of our selves yet he descends that Spirit which is the Comforter and applies unto us in an union so high and heavenly as all words forsake us in the expression Thirdly Another Consolation yet in plenè administravit when God descended to us but staid at her Full of Grace not abhorring to be there enclosed who yet fills and even then filled Heaven and earth wherein then and before and since he fully hath the administrations so it must be no dismay to thy own soul that God descends and shines into many others having abundance of spirit and of such a diffusive Power as the Sun which though received whole in the light and graces here yet shines elsewhere and think if a word spoken by us can pass to a whole audience and if our discursive Spirit can so suddainly shoot and subtilly pass to things distant and manifold What Energie is in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Power in his Spirit differenced from ours both
are all heads upon the same string fastened with our faith in Vitis here for our principal Jewel which if any of these fall loose is lost for ever and then all our preaching and ministring and your hearing and receiving vain and we be stript of our whole Creed even from God the Father Almighty maker of Heaven and earth along to Christ crucified and on to life everlasting But we have not so weakly learned Christ to be shaken from our botome with such wind and waves of wicked Disputants Let us take heed of infection from a second sort such as in deeds deny him having a shew but no power of godliness such as may be tract like the snail by their unclean and slimy passages and yet dare resolve it in the Imparative Let us leave some Tokens of our wantoness so of our prophaness blasphemie drunkenness in every place This is a large field and a common place but for I am upon an health suffer me to single him out and say a coolword or two this morning next his heart unto the drunkard such especially as in a more then barbarous custom for in Est 1. no man might compell by forcing healths make it yet a more sickly and disorderly drunkenness First I commend to their consideration St. Pauls Epiphany where the Grace of God comes it appears saith he and how teaching us to denie ungodliness c. and to live soberly So then where sobrieey is not learnt the Grace of Christ hath appeared in vain Then that Caveat of our Saviour which he gave even to his own Apostles Take heed lest your hearts be overcome with surfeiting and drunkenness Why What 's the danger and so that day come upon you unwares My next is that Redoubt and Barricado rather of St. Peter wherewith he makes out the enemie the Lion At one end he plants the great Ordinance of Faith Whom resist stedfast in the faith At the other he makes it sure and sets good guard Be sober and watch as if all our faith without sobriety would not keep out the devil that roaring Adversary who can out-roar these roars and devour these Devourers of drink My close shall be that terrible sentence of the great Judge of heaven and earth gone out against them That they shall never inherit the Kingdom of heaven It now remains I should press for faith in the foundation and furnishing a Believer with reasons of his faith against the Aâ—heist Jew and Mahumetan and then for the super structure of Good works But these are fitter for large Treatises in books then short notes in a Sermon Let us come then to the last trial how we receive Christ by receiving his Receivers Persons deputed to take our homage and receive our reward in his stead 1. AND first The Poor With him I shall deal as usually men do dispatch him briefly Yet such are near and dear unto the Vine and sent as Leiger-Embassadours and à Latere too cut like another Eve out of his own bleeding side Members of that mistical Body whereof he is supream Head and whoever wrongs oppresses grinds or pares them to the blood He cries in Heaven Non cruor hic de stipite manat I am Jesus of Nazareth whom thou persecutest It will come all to one in the end In as much as you have done it to them you have done it to me On the other side Do them good relieve them and he will reward it and make them able to requite it in proportion Receive them to harbour and those friends shall stand at heaven-gate to receive you into everlasting habitations 2. The Priest would be received too For Is not he in Vitis He that receives you receives me And is not our Ministry Vitis laetificans chearing God and man Did not the first Preachers receive largely for themselves and you when they received the holy Ghost and received power from on high at Christs ascension and gifts for men and were not the Apostles an odour of a sweet smelling savour to God and to men that received it even the savour of life unto life And is there not a Botrus of Blessing still received in receiving our Ministry If it be saith which is receiving Christ it is the word of God which we preach Nay May we not in a sober sense ask What have you that you have not received if it concern your spiritual state Christendom matriculation ablution from sin at one Receipt in baptism The body and blood and spirit of your Saviour by frequent receivings of the Eucharist which by the way now let me tell you in a word in verbo Sacerdotis if you should change for the mass it would lessen your receipts for whereas no lay-person hath a drop of the chalice allowed yet they have a Missale case that if any of the Consecrate-wine fall on the floore or pavement in that case a lay body may be permitted to lick it up left the dog should A fair reward it will be for such as decline to that Religion that Religion which hides away and denies the use of the word it self which is the power and wisedom of God to mans salvation But to fall back to our reckoning and Receipts is there nothing else Remember at night when you go to bed what is she if any be that sleeps in your bosome if you have not received her at the hand of some ordered and lawful Minister And when you shall go to your latest bed the Grave what difference from brute animals if we assist not to make it an honest and honourable Sepulture strange that mankind cannot well come in nor well stay nor well go out of this world without us and yet the world hates us Doth not this deserve a Torcular And I need not here press the cup of Comfort all apt enough to receive that benefits of Light and Salt and few so sensless but perceive it would be a very dark and a flash unsavoury dwelling here without the Gospel even stony ground will take in the Seed and gladly But where 's the Consideration of what is due to us And here I spare you I will not press that in the old Testament of Honouring God with your substance and first fruits and tithe of all that you possess I know the evasion you would turn over a new leaf and turn me to the new Priesthood in the New Testament yet take heed what you do for what is the news there How soon in that primitive Church do you meet with fellers of Possessions and laying all at the Apostles feet that 's a Torcular indeed and puts me in mind of a pretty passage in Tannerns a Jesuit who wishes withall his heart that all the Kings in Christendom would come and bring in all that ever they have and put it in their Churches treasury and henceforth be ruled by her but his Conclusion I like best Hoc in aeternum nunquaâ—fiet this will never be while the world stands saith
meat and drink to do service And here again Corpus aptasti I am sure we sure were â—â—â—er so fitted for a body and for an house For were it not for this house in woful state were all the great houses of the Land all the Princely houses of all Christian lands the famous houses of York and Laneaster Valois Burbon Medices and Austria The right descent and purest royal blood is from this house of flesh but for this house and his wearing it and bearing all ours sins on the top of it For into the house they came not What Title but from this Ancestour to Paradise the Palace the Nonsuch above not a Tarquin Priscus or Superbus but beholden to this Servius nay the best and purest votaties in this house of God the place of his service not David or Solomon or good King Ezekiah not Constantine or Theodosius or Jacobus or Carilaus no gratious King of famous Memory or present Merit no body though never so embellisht or embraved shall ever joyn in that Quire of his Saints and holy Angels above without the mediation of the body of Jesus our Lord and the service done in that body 5. But what service in that Inn at Bethlem where was no room for him it was yet made serviceable for us for there we Inn to this day all at that Star we Gentiles claim by those that were Primitiae first Guests to that house of Gold and Incense we find there he had and we Partakers of his fine Gold and good service hath his Incense done us I am sure We pray Lord increase our faith and he that could help our unbelief Lord might do us good service if so surely a hundred Sermons in this house not more available then the dumb Cradle of our Lord in that cratch The Scripture speaks evidently saith the Apostle the Scripture lies mute thâ— Cradle house yet therein is an herald to proclaim the fulfilling of two great Prophecies one was Et tu Bethlem there Christ to be born The other that of his poverty A Worm shame of men out-cast of the people Upon the very Pillars of this house which are but the staves of the Cratch may we safely relie and build our Faith this blinded and madded the Jew but thus it must be thus must Christ be born if ever he do us good this obscureness to manifest him this emptiness to be his fulness of a Messiah to fulfill the Scripture that so our joy might be full full of joy and Peace in believing This the service he doth our Faith and no less service in making us humble I believe Lord and may not every one say I am humble Lord too but Lord help our unhumility Help us off with the double lets of outward Pomp and inward Pride Behold this Royal Insant reaches out his hand to serve us from his Cratch in our Bed-chambers and by his powerfull his high and mighty and stupendious Humility thrusts it to our hearts and strips off all from the souls and bodies of his faithfull servants all that may offend the eye of his heavenly Father and in that voice comes from him in this Cradle though yet inarticulate we hear him in the evidence of his holy Word and Spirit say Learn of me Put on the Lord Jesus Christ who thus in this House serves us and helps his servants both in their Faith and their Humility 6. and 7. In the sixth and seventh the private houses and banqueting houses of his servants the Lord serves as a Builder and a Watch-man and a â—â—aplain to say Grace and bless and loves to do â—â—vice there in the freedom of his conversation said in his dish by the proud Pharisee and in dayly working that Miracle of warry juice turned into Wine concoct into fresh and cheerfull blood 8. Next he serves us in those water-houses Wilt not thou O Lord go forth with our Armies saith the Psalmist so we may say The Lord hath gone forth with our Navies as in 88. so Quadragesimus octavus too Mirabilis Annus And then it is the Lord and the Power of his Might that hath saved the Metaphorical ships of Church and State kept those Bottoms from forreign invasive storms and dangerous Schisms and Leaks at home Skilfull Mariners may do well but he the Pilote at the Helm Christo Duce auspice regno is a Right Prophetick and true Inscription by Land and Water His bloody Cross a braver Flag and nobler Badge then Lucida sidera Castor Pollux This Pollens Lux ipsa the true Light to guide the whole feet He did us worthy service who first came by ship to conveigh the Light of the Gospel hither some years before a spark of fire at Rome What doth Lux by whose blessing on our ships we may by the same way derive the Light to other Nation yet in darkness as importing so thus exporting too the unsearchable Riches of Christ to which all Treasures of East and West are pale and drowsie and muddy things as a little Gravel in comparison Thus venture I still on with my frail bark and well enough if still Cesarem veho bear his well tryed Patience and attention along while Dominum Caesarem vebo That Lord who now could find no further house-room on earth or water but ceas'd not yet to do us further service in his very Sepulchre 9. For till he came thither thither we were come dead and buried bound hand foot in the grave-cloaths of our sins sealed up and claspt down with a stony weight of the wrath of God which would have prest us to the nethermost Hell But behold in that short time of his abode in this house what Rare Redoubts and Mines this mighty Engineer casts and contrives works a descent through the Iron jaws of death down to Hell and like a Conqueror ascends leading in Triumph Captivity Captive opening so and seasoning and sweetning so this house before so dreadfull filled with ultimum terribilium that his Disciples all that love and seek him in Life and Death shall never find discomfort in a Grave Nothing but a Requiem and Dormitory with Angels sitting at the head and feet till he awake them in Tuba novissima and raise them to a meeting in the clouds where all his servants shall enter into the joy of that their Lord. 10. As for the Catholick Church to demand his service there is to ask What good the Vine the Head the Bridegroom the Corner-stone do to the Branches Members Spouse and Building in those strict Unions nay closer then all those per euâ—dem spiritum Behold so am with you never to offer to part from you never to suffer you to part from me to the end of the world in the end and world without end which will be soon discovered by the Service done to each particular Member in every â—fâ—nr Souls and Bodies in that house For is not our body his house wonderfully and fearfully built that little world of beauty shaken
out of dust and bals of living fire fiâ—xt in our eye-brow what work makes this heavenly Potter even with that clay in white red blew after all his polishing forced to take it down and like China earth hiding some for many 1000 years will shew his Power in their raising far fairer then before and yet able to dispatch the same effect on others in a moment in the twinckling of an eye changed and not die by a suddain dissolution and a suddain re-union But far rarer Workmanship is the Recreation of our souls washt brighter in his blood and heightned by his Spirit We need but two things for our souls Grace Truth and both came by Jesus Christ from his fulness we receive both by whose service and Ministry we are made New Creatures invested in a Robe and admitted to an Order past the Fleece and Garter the Right Order of the holy Ghost Brag not vain man O run not up into some beastly figure if guilding like a snail or tracing the way of thy preferment by thy blood or match thou be mounted to a local state of Wealth and Honor for these can add no new substantial forms But this access of Spirit from this Lord is right enobling and superinduces a new soul which like fire devours and takes up all within thee and winding in one Coelestial flame and embracing Understanding Will Affections wings and lifts up all to Heaven 12. Lastly In this very house where we assemble for the Worship and Service of the Lord it is the Lord himself that does the Service to the whole Assembly So that a non nobis Domine is fixable upon the porch of this and every house of God For first he invites us hither Come I Call upon me Seek you my face The skie of Scripture hung round with provocations calling us to service and being entered who executes the parts of our Divine Service in this house of Prayer And is it not he that prays for us in us with us before us and teaches us to pray and say after him Our Father and as once by himself in Prayers and strong cries so here assists our dulness and deadness of Spirit by his own quickning Spirit inditing our Prayers and raising our Devotion with sighs and groans that cannot be exprest It is secondly a house of preaching and we indeed preach Jesus and our selves your servants for Jesus sake nay him a Servant for your sakes But if we speak him right it is he that speaks the word of the Lord heavenly Treasure from our earthen vessels that the excellency might be of God and not of us 'T is he that first did write the word which is his Power and Wisdom to our salvation and 't is he that spels the Gospel and reads and speaks to us in his Word and he that laies out and distributes sentences to several bosoms as every man hath need and he alone that follows the Sermon home and saies it all over again to our hearts Finally his House is a House of Communion for the Saints and Churches of God for the due receiving of his holy Sacraments And as in the Baptistery it is he that receives the Infants in his arms and washes their Souls in his blood and makes the water there a Laver of Regeneration So in the Supper of the Lord it is the same Lord who first shed those primordial purple drops at his Circumcision the first fruits of his all powerfull blood to begin the work of our Salvation and ever since at every holy Communion gives both body and blood the food of faithfull and repentant Spirits and makes those sad sweet drops fall again to the anguish first and then the healing of our souls For such a different office hath this blessed Sacrament that it serves both to discover our sins and to seal our Pardons Wherein while faithfully we receive him he really receives us into him and we him into us So all of us become one body and one Spirit and all by the service of one and the same for ever Jesus Christ to whom c. S. D. G. A SERMON Preached at YORK 1640. AT The Council of King and Lords EPHE 5.8 For you were once darkness but are now Light in the Lord. Walk as Children of Light IN the Skie of Scripture shines the Sun of Divinity And all Divinity all that Sun is shed in these thee Radii The Lapse the Restoring the Duty These are a perfect Catechism And a sum of these is the Epistle to the Romans injust Methode and this Text a methodical Brâ—â—iat of that Epistle indeed an Epitome of all the Book of God for here we have the Creation the World struck out of Chaos or what is more mysterious It could not chuse but please the Angels then to see the LIGHT rise out of darkness by a powerfull FIAT and the earth anon to emulate heaven by vertue of a Producat But this This Rare Work the Angels desire to prie into 1 Pet. 1.12 And if we pace along we shall find here Enoch walking with God Abraham called out of VR to another VR a purer Light The deliverance from Egypt the Red Sea the Rock the Mannae the Ark the Mercy-seat And here are all the Sacrifices the Life and Substance of them all with the Fulness and Light of all the Promises and Prophesies and here is the new Testament The Star appears Behold we bring you glad tidings Run Shepherds and see the great Shepherd of all our Souls whiles yet an Infant Loe He is wrapt here in the Swadling bands of this Text. He is the Word and this his Comment his Paraphrase and Explication You were once c. These words are a Tree laden with fruit most precious the very shell the rind is precious But if we open this Onyx this Pearl Cabinet it contains rare Food and Medicine and Wine and Balsam a Quintessence an Extraction beyond the Spirits of Oyl and Wine and Spices For what Chymist can draw Light Is not that that thing my sterious in Job 38. which way saith he is the Light parted yet here is more the Sun the Spring of Light here is that Sun of Righteousness and the Father of Light and the Spirit of Illuminations All All the holy blessed and glorious TRINITY unfolded here we may with Moses in a pious sense see him that is invisible Behold that rare workman tasking himself in his main project busie in dispatch of all his Miracles at once The Leper is cleansed the Lame walk the Blind receive their sight the dead are raised Nay Majus opus moveo The earth raised up to Heaven Flesh wrought up to Spirit Nature changed to Grace and dust advanced to he Partaker of Divine Nature For you were once Darkness c. A Comprehensive Text it is will take in all persons Speak I to a King or Lords Will they not all be glad at heart to be enlightned by this Dominus in the
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
know further of this Divine Method which is the Aquaeduct the Ventiduct the Luciduct which way still doth Christ in his Spirit conveigh this Holy water this gentle Air this blessed Light to our Spirits I confess this is one of the most necessary important and most usefull Queries we can make and which being clearly resolved will shame both Papists that hide away as much as they can and other Hereticks that blaspheme the Scriptures and pretend to a Spirit enthusiastick which is nothing but the Devil of delusion and spirit of Giddiness And therefore for our best Resolve upon this question Let us do as our Saviour in the point of marriage enquire how it was in the Beginning Look back then to the Creation consider how came Light at first At first the Spirit moves and broods over that which is in it self a confusion a depth and a darkness and then his mighty Word Fiat Lux. He spake and it was Light then Then when all was dark he made material Light and Christ Jesus is the WORD 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For as Speech is the Image of the mind so he the brightness of his Fathers Glory and the express Image of his person Heb. 1.3 The immaterial Light that was never made and the Spirit of the true God in declaring the true Way of his Worship and mans true way thereby to obtain eternal life as the very heathen trusted to the false gods fained Oracles which of necessity must be revealed before man could find or follow it goes that way still that is by the WORD His Word wherein is his Will revealed from Heaven both makes and is our Light This world is Gods Book wherein as in a Glass of wonders we discern him but that print being Dim to us that are sin-blind it pleased him by lively Oracles to make a Mirror far more clearly revealing his mind And as God engraved his form on his Son before all worlds so what that Son is and what the Father is to us in him the Spirit proceeding from both delivers in the Scriptures of both Testaments And as the Sun guilds and enamels clouds and streams and hill Tops with his raies but thrusts his own pure Light his own living sire through the bodies of the stars so other Authors can but yield a faint reflexion of that beam which is direct and native in his book where the very Law he stiles a flaming Light The Prophecies a more sure Word then any Eye-evidences of the Apostles to which we do well to look saith St. Peter himself as to a Light shining in a dark place till the day dawn the day-star rise in our hearts But then the Gospel written and spread by his Evangelists and held out by his spouse the Catholick Church is his marvellous Light He brought life and immortality to Light by the Gospel 2 Tim 1.10 and in Acts 26. 16. I have appeared to thee saith our Saviour to that choice vessel of his Grace and name to make thee a Minister and a witness c. And now behold I will send thee to the Gentiles to what end A glorious end to open their eyes and to turn them from Darkness to Light from the power of Satan unto God and accordingly we find it 2 Cor. 4.3 4. If our Gospel be hid it is hid in them that perish in whom the god of this world hath blinded their unfaithfull minds that the Light of the Gospel of the Glory of Christ who is the Image of God should not shine unto them And in the sixth verse he shews the Walk and Circuit of this Light God who commanded Light to shine out of Darkness hath shined in our hearts there first and then the casting of the beam to give light of the knowledge of the Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ O then you have the means of Light and Grace among you Ministers you are the Light and Salt of the earth and who shall question that truth which the Truth himself hath testified And would it not be a very dark and desolate and a very flash and unsavory world without a publique Ministry of the Word and Sacraments The Clergie however despised are all out Spiritual Fathers Propter quos hanc suavissimam Lucem aspeximus But yet you and they both must know how they have it and the Apostle tells us that too in the next words We have this Treasure in our earthen vessels that the excellency of the Power might be of God and not of us You are not sent to a Means and Medicine of our preparing or any humane but to Gods Divine Ordinance that which is his Power and Wisdom to Salvation to every one that believes And therefore this may be enough to give all humble Christians satisfaction and acquiescence Speak then thy Word O Lord and thy servant shall be healed shall be undarkened and though like Bartimeus though sin-blind have my eyes opened with a word Mar. 10.12 St. Peter spake but words unto Cornelius but words whereby he and his house should be saved words so richly blest that the Text saith while Peter spake these words the holy Ghost fell on all them that heard the word Did not our hearts burn within us said those Disciples Luke 24. to whom our Saviour opened the Scriptures And the Apostles hearers prickt at their Hearts cried Men and Brethren What shall we do to be saved And what a large field of the Fathers testimonies do I here forsake to break by your patience into an Inclosure or two of the very Papists our enemies and the enemies of the Scripture Yet see the excellency of Gods word even those enemies being Judges Cardinal Bellarmine himself is in his superlatives Certissima tutissima regula credendi lib. 1. de verb. Dei ca. 20. and need we any more after so full a witness I 'le name but another but one Instar omnium 'T is he that in a traiterous itch of wit took on him purposely the abuse of Scripture that by mis appliance and prophane wresting he might so abuse our Princes and our Church Mark yet what he is forc'd to say and sure 't is worth our observation if I diminish him not in my English There is in Scripture sayes he an invisible Majesty an hidden splendour a Glory unperishable a wisdom in-exhaustible The solace of humane and the beginning of a Divine life made by the holy Spirit making our spirits holy compat'd with which the Egyptian sages will look pale and poor the Chaldee impure the Grecians blockish Plato no body and Philosophy it self a fool 'T is the print of Heaven on earth and if any where the Joy of Paradise or at least a brave Resemblance of Divine Light be shewed 't is in Scripture containing all that is severed from the actual Vision of God himself Again The paper burns me not yet am I all inflamed in reading it 'T is no composure no artificial tread the Scripture uses
for secresie You shall swear never to reveal what I payed and I will be drawn in pieces ere I tell how many score how many huudred pieces But my Patron when gone aside he boasteth and cannot chuse but tell his Lady perchance what fine things these presentations are sell my land and it never comes again that cruel word Ses heires But the Dunce or drunkard that bought may be forced to sell again or else resign or chop or be put out or dye and then there 's more money Thy money perish with thee Thou what shall I call thee Be what thou wilt and quarter what coats thou canst thy great Ancestors name was Simon Magus Well is that the worst No Remember what St. Peser said to Ananias why hath Sa'an filled thy heart and who it was that entered into the heart of Judas when he went to betray and sell his Mafter thou sellest thy Master and thy Masters Patrimony Patrimonium crucifixi The Patrimony of Christ crucified so it is called Tush caveat emptor You of the Clergy are the Magus's t is true and where 's the Purchaser too going to swear a dreadful swearing And hast thou done it What Neque per te nec per alium And canst thou again look God in the face in his beauty of holiness and take his word into thy mouth Hast thou any Lot any true clergy any Portion in our Ministry But quis talis fando quis tam ferreus hec dici potuisse non potuisse refelli Secondly Oppression is a work of Darkness though practised openly in extorting Ossicers and such men as greedy of Gain intrench and enclose themselves from others and hurl out the poor members of Christ turn them a walking to enlarge their sheep-walks Do these men walk honestly and as children of light And is there not a Brood and flutter of Prodigals that tend to oppression too Countrey Gull-Gallants that like NERO at first lap up horses houses and Lands into Balls and throw them away in Dole and Lottery till they come to a Dysentery So long mis-demeaning themselves in lavishing and flying out till it come to a cruel missing of their Demesnes in the end and then are forced to skrew and rack and grind the saces and bowels of the poor with Neroes resolution too Hoc agamus ne quis quicquam habeat Thirdly Drunkenness had wont to be a work of Darkness But now it defies the harbour of duil night and dares look day in the face But the Apofile meets them terribly both the Extortioner and the Drunkard Neither of them shall inberite the Kingdom of Heaven Fourthly and laftly That desperate and indesensible sin of swearing when the soul is let go for nothing No profit no pleasure unless hell and everlasting darkness dwell in mens desires But I forgee the time and I hope for better things of you and snch as accompany salvation And I trust I shall fitly and sully apply the Text to all that are here and in the Repetition of these words take in all the Congregation postremo meipsum Beloved we wers once darkness are now light in the Lord. Let us then walk as children of light Which that we may do let us pray to the Father of Lights Almighty God give us grace to cast away the works of darkness and put on the Armour of Light c S.D.G. A SERMON AT COVRT July 1640. MALAC. 3.17 And they shall be mine said the Lord of Hosts in that day when I make up my Jewels WHich words afford a double Priviledge of Gods servants be the times what they will in Reference to their owner described by his high and stately stile of Dominus Exercituum First his own they are his peculiar Secondly esteem'd of him at a high rate for they are his Jewels The first priviledge is laid out in this plain conclusion They that in a Deluge of corruption such as covered all in time of this Prophesie are yet emergent and bear up against the stream They that in desperate and desolate times dare yet make proof that they fear this Lord of Hofts and think upon his Name they are Gods own his peculiar For so the Rabbins interpret this word Segullah by peculium peculiare proprium speciale praecipuum singulare God hath a propriety a specialty in them I conceive your thoughts and expectations have by this time call'd me off from this seeming dry tree for what fruit shall you or I gather hence in being Gods own and of his peculiar people But I am even for this Imaginations sake desirous to insist and so far to intreat your patience too that I may yet be resident that I may spend the hour wholly incumbent on this little thing as it may seem of mine which yet in opening will appear I doubt not a rich and an inexhaustible Mine of Treasure and such as will prove useful and appliable to every Hearer You may then mistake you may prejudice me you cannot tell what work God may be pleased to enable me to make of this Text before and when I come to resresh the honour and comfort of my lise in preaching again in this Audience Now I mean not to part with this my first part in the Royalty the Priesthood and peculiarity of Gods people capable of that former Description which is compriz'd in this claim and promise and assurance for it is all those And they shall be mine sayes the Lord c. To every Text belongs but explication and application I intend both In the explication first that is now the opening that is the working of this Mine I shall present you with the riches of the Ore and then the refined Gold or draw first some materials from the Mine wherewith to build our comfort and then super-induce a roof and crown of pure Gold in precious things in Christ under the New Testament which was under the old too but not so clear so compleat Where God in Christ reconciling the world to himself weares the crown of Mercy manifold and enwraps us in a Robe of Totius total consolation by uniting us with the bonds of his Love by a plenteous Redemption made not with corruptible things as silver and gold but with the blood of Jesus the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world The first material from this Mine may be the very strowing of some grains of Golden comfort in our enterance on the consideration of Gods Word and work with man T is a special hightning of the spirit a mighty complacency and satisfaction to a servant of God to believe that God is and that he is a rewarder of those that diligently seek him Heb 11. for even Moses is said to have had this in his aym he had an eye to the recompence of Reward David begins his first Psalm where he describes Gods service with Beatus Blessedness is a blessed pully to Devotion and therefore both the Day-star and the Sun take this
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
invest us with a Light yet inaccessible will also place another Crown of Glory inaccessible And so in the allusion the contemplation of those joyes that go before the entrance into our Masters Joy and those that follow after in fruition will easily stir and fire our souls to cry or sing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to this son of David Blessed be he that comes thus in the name of the Lord and is the Lord that comes thus from the Father and God Totius of all consolation anointed to his great Office and Design of binding up the broken hearted by the Holy Ghost the Comforter Luke 1. and is himself by way of Excellency stil'd the consolation of Israel And thus this first glad priviledge of Gods fearful and faithful servant is refin'd and wrought up to perfection from this Mine in Malachy the last of the Prophets to that Mine of St. John the last and liveliest of the Evangelists or rather that Mine of our Lords own discovery in Iohn 17.10 Thine they are and all mine are thine and thine are mine Mine But who is he All our comfort even now was complicated and conserv'd in Dominus Exercituum And is he so That stile indeed wears out in the New Testament but is abundantly recompenc'd in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The only Potentate the Lord of Life and Glory Most of all in that name above all names which all tongues must confess and at which all knees should bow that sweet and powerful that gracious and glorious Name of Jesus a Saviour and able to save to the utmost in whom all fulness dwels and in whose hand is all power in heaven and earth And had not their eyes been held down and the Jews hearts vaild over they would have perceived and received him for the true Messiah in this very notion and nature of a Lord of Hosts For in him were all their Moses's Joshuales all their Captains and Saviours their Baraks and Gideons and Sampsons and Davids and Macchabees all reviv'd and restor'd to the world But they knew not the manner of their King and to mistake a King may be a world of misery nor of his Kingdom nor the force of his Artillery in the dreadful Canon and Ordinance of his Word Spirit Nor that the Scepter of his new Law should prove the Iron Rod to break and subdue both men and Devils They considered not his stupendious Miracles proving him the Lord of Hosts in commanding over the whole frame of Heaven and Earth and Seas and all the host of them and bowing whole created nature to his obedience To rebuke tempestuous winds roaring waves as a Nurse her child with Peace and be still nay suspend and silence and deprive Devils of their possessions with a word To lay his command on Death it self and force him to let go his hold after four dayes seisure in the grave Will Iews or Jewish hearts attend my voice that would not hear the thunder of those Miracles But for support of the true Catholick faith and for the consummation of all our consolation King and people Christ Jesus is become our Dominus Exercituum Christo auspice regno regnabo too and his bloody Cross a braver badge then that of Castor and Pollux This is polleus lux ipsa For is it not he alone destroyes our raging lusts and nails them to his cross and he alone that ' gainst a world of opposition and all the opposition of this evil world cryes to his host be of good comfort I have overcome the world He alone that came to dissolve destroy the works the strong holds of Satan and to vanquish powers and Principalities in high places that had the vantage ground over us He that breaks in on death and sin and hell and like a Conquerer in the triumphal Chariot of his Cross made a shew of them openly and as Triumphers us'd to do when he ascended up on high and led captivity captive he gave gifts unto men But yet more to prove him the Lord of Hosts by being more then that name can imply for this Name is observed to be too yong for the ancient of Dayes that is a Name taken up since and from the Creation A Name indeed that draws and scatters on us all we can look for from our Maker and Preserver But all his powers and mercies are resolved and melted into this Name of Christ Jesus Without Christ without God sayes the Apostle in the world we are but meer pieces of the masse nay far worse is our condition born children of wrath and in state of enimies and so the Lord of Hosts is against us and all the hosts of Heaven and spirits of Hell and all the creatures and our selves against our selves And when there was no Name under heaven to save and deliver us from present and wrath to come then came this Prince of peace and became our Peace pledg'd himself for us gave his life a Ransome so making peace So prevailing over the Lord of Hosts binding his Almighty hands and God content to accept terms of peace may we not say so Came not that Voyce from Heaven This is my beloved Son in quo acquiesco in whom I am at peace with all the world If all this prove him not a Lord of Hosts he will one day to the further consolation of all that love his appearing appear to the consternation of all his Despisers in flaming fire to render vengeance And as in the dayes of his flesh then unglorified and compast about with all mans infirmities he could have been encompast with more then twelve Legions of Angels so then he will meet those two Hosts those droves and flocks of sheep and goats with another Army of his Saints and Angels from Heaven with whom we shall be caught up to meet that Lord in the ayr and so shall be ever with the Lord. If we desire yet higher to raise this Crown of consummate consolation in Christ I will come to Visions and Revelations I will open that of St. Steven Acts 7.56 I see heaven opened and the son of man set on the right hand of God which place being further opened by St. John makes us see him on a Throne of Glory covered with light as with a garment under his feet Deaths pale head and a red Dragon and all his enemies about him stand the Armies of his Angels and of mankind a greater number then any man can number of all Nations Languages On his thigh that Name written Rex Regum Dominus Dominorum The Elders casting down their Crowns adore him that has many Crowns upon his head And we may safely add this Title to those Crowns of Dominus Exercituum and rejoyce to think how those Crowns are encinctur'd and enchas'd with precious stones for the twelve Tribes of Israel and with manifold unions of God and man of grace and glory for the consolation of the Gentiles also thereby fully made perfect
Judge is joyn'd in Commission with the Holy Ghost to lead us into all Truth and to bring all such that is all needful truth to our remembrance The Spirit of God bears witness but it is with our spirit and so enables us to pronounce sentence of self-clearing or self-condemnation When therefore I dare knock at that privy Chamber door at that closet and dare ask that question Am I a Divine Royalist a true Deilift a godly Christian One of Gods peculiar where then is my fear my thinking on his Name Do I serve the Lord with fear and rejoyce before him with reverence Do I indeed as one of his Royal Priesthood present my body and soul and all their children all their off-spring the actions of my hands and the Imaginations of my heart and projects of my brain as a lively sacrifice unto my God Does my justice and honesty my chastity and sobriety for even these may rise from corrupt springs flow from this only consideration Is the bottom of my conceited happiness any better then a sick mans dream or mad mans boiling fancy Do I indeed feel my confidence grounded on a modest a tender and reverential fear Doe the Larum the remembrance of this strike louder and faster in my brest then all Satans temptations with meminto Philippe Henrics Garole not that thou art but a man but that thou art no mans man nor no womans man nor no devils man taken captive to do his Will This I must thus enquire and this when I thus know then I must resolve with Joshua Let others do what they will I and my house at the least I and my heart and all that is within me will serve the Lord. Shall such a man as I that profess Christ and his Gospel shall I flie saith one Can I do this wickedness and sin against God Shall I take the members of Christ and make them the members of an harlot saith another of Gods fearfull and faithfull servants God forbid Do I profess to serve that Lord of Hosts who keeps a book of Remembrance whose eye is ever zenith and so pure that no iniquity can tarry in his sight and shall I not pass the time of my dwelling here in fear of his most blessed name And do we can we think then nay do they or can they say what they will can they indeed think in good earnest can they believe themselves to be Gods peculiar people and such a Priest-hood and chosen People as Christ shed his precious blood to purchase who though they dare not but fear men and tremble at the sound of some great name on earth yet have no true fear of God before their eyes such as dare curse swear pollute and blaspheme that very name in which both we and they profess to look for both Protection and Salvation Thirdly Our third and last particular in this observation about the Ground-work of all our comforts bottom'd on our fear of God is the joy and blessing the Grace and Mercy tender indulgence of God unto us in this Appropriation that God vouchsafes to tie this cordial joy fast to each single-hearted Christian so admits him under this signet to be of his cabinet Council in the inward Testimony of his Spirit assuring him his spirit that he is the â—ords own that so the Joy of his faithfull servants may as himself hath spoken it be full and that not by rejoycing in another but by finding and feeling the Ground and Principles of true Joy and Confidence in themselves For I am not therefore honest or valiant because some credulous brethren or some brethren of the Sword repute me so and would so give it under their hands No I pass not for yours or any mans Judgement saith St. Paul a silly fame is that into which a man is voted or for which he hath a Testimonial or Certificat I know saith he in whom I have believed and so every just and justified man lives by his own faith as well as he lives by that very bread which himself eats It is no trusting to Salvation implicite if I pin my soul to that great name of the Catholique Church and know no meaning of it but only him that calls himself the Head of it when he can be scarce or but at most a corrupt member or if I make a Pope of that poor private Priest that creeps in at my window If I freely resign my soul to him and say I must confide in you for so millions profess and boast themselves to do Can I tell whether this Romist will cary it to Heaven or Hell or neither in haste but make it stay in purgatory as some souls they tell me must do till the day of Judgement I cannot relish that dependance on any mans infallibility for if I could be certain of their high Priests election that all things therein had been rightly and canonically performed which is very difficult if not impossible yet for his low Priest whom he sends to me and who for his own food and maintenance brings me the Sacraments of Penance and the wafer-god to be assured of his intention on which they teach the very essence of all Popish devotion depends they must acquaint me how I shall be a Searcher of hearts which God hath reserved only to himself and therefore assuredly as some Papists have openly jeared the pretended infallibilâ—y of their Father so no doubt but his white sons the Jesuits like the Latine Augurs do laugh when they meet in secret at the open gullage of the world willing to mistake their infamous mother for the very Catholique Church in the Apostles Creed and yet our own Ladies in stead of Preserves from St. Austins boxes of Prascriptum Legis Pradicta Prophetarum which are soundly mingled with this holy sear in the Text are content to swallow their conserves of implicite faith and blind obedience and comfort their hearts with the cold consideration of an Indulgence when yet the blessed and the blasting the cordial and yet confounding Truth of God in this ponit hath wrung after a thousand wranglings that plain consession from a learned but a bitter and violent Papist that the Church by her Ministerie and Magisterie received of God doth cause us to believe yet for all that the very Reason wherefore we believe is not the Church but God speaking in us This is Stapleton in his third book of the Authority of the Scripture cap. 12. And indeed when all is said and done nothing but the Testimony of Gods own Holy Spirit is ever able to minister true consolation in believing The God of peace it is that fils us with all peace and joy in believing if we belive St. Paul ' to the Romans cap. 15. verse 13. But this is not meant of any private whisper or Enthusiasus which is deceitfull but of the spirits Testimony joyned to his Holy Word in the clear evidence thereof assuring our spirit that God is become our
Salvation and I come to feel and know this of a certainty by Gods Power made perfect in my weakness which I discern in finding his Holy fear rooted in my heart and so fixt that no stout words of prophane nor incursions nor invasious nor seas of overwhelming Corruptions in the examples of godless men about me can prevail over me to abandon my Religion which is bottomed on my holy fear and reverend thinking on his blessed Name For as I have said the mercy of our indulgent Father appears not only in tying this amulet to our own bosom that every man is sav'd by his own faith and not another mans bnt also in the manner of this ancorage 'T is his special Grace that my being Gods own is made descernable in the Light imparted to my own soul from his Word and Spirit whereby I perceive the Covenant sealed betwixt God and me in Christ Jesus But this is more wonderfull mercy still that my assurance and modest infallibility of salvation is fastened by his Almighty Power and so surely fastened to so slender a cordage so weak and tender and bruised reeds as my Faith and fear are for these two are to our purpose terms convertible This fear in my Text hath Gold and Treasure in it and contains the precious nature of faith too and discovers the same Efficacy and Properties of lively faith so that he who possesses or is bereft of it is so of God himself See for this Jer. 2.19 This is an evil and bitter thing that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God and that my fear is not in thee saith the Lord God of Hosts So he puts Fear for our whole Religion So rare a Builder is that Lord of Heaven that as he made the Heavens themselves and the earth of nothing and hung saith Job the earth in the midst of the air upon just nothing So in this mighty work of Grace when I am afraid of not being fast enough his goodness makes that very fear the means of fastning and confirmation and anchors my assurance to my fear Behold the unsearchable and unspeakable riches of his mercy in this that he forsakes not man therefore because he finds not in flesh and blood the Pority of Angels but as it s said to Levi Mal. 2.5 My Covenant was with him of life and Peace and Life and Peace include all Blessings and I gave them to him For what Observe it well The free Grace of God in this exchange I gave them to him for the fear wherewith he feared me and was afraid before my name and just such is the Appliance here of all this consolation for God hears and hearkens at verse 16. and a book of Remembrance is written before him for whom now all this and sor what For them that feared the Lord and thought upon his name and they shall be mine for that I will love them for that inward testimony and qualification and that inward Testimony and Qualification shall assure them of my love Is not this enough to make every one of us say at parting hence Well! I shall think the better of the fear of God as long as I live for this Sermon Do so in the name of God and take this further resolution with us Never to listen to the harsh and cruel doctrine of the Romish which a man would think were enough to throw down all the rest of their building in unstable soules if those souls would but seriously stay to think upon it if they would not like unclean beasts still swallow and never chew the cud and yet since it is fallen from them they must their Priests must by the oath ex officio all desperately maintain it as if they were told openly by one of their own Doctors at the Council of Trent and that is this That God will never be so assured never so contracted and espoused to believers hearts in everlasting love but even after all their Merits and Satisfactions and Penances and Pilgrimages and Supererogations too Is it not strange considering how wide they open their Ark at first and assure all clean and unclean beasts that will come in of never perishing Nay after all Pardons under the swelling seal and all plenary Indulgences Is it not a miserable case The wretched fluctuating Penitent after ablution extream Unction Absolution and all must be content to die in discontent and fall with horror and perplexity of Conscience and all his comfort in a little faint hope that it is not wholly impossible for him to get through long and dreadfull purging flames at length to the joyes of heaven But let us in Gods name still continue to repose our souls on Christ and resting on this ground of comfort in this appropriation we shall find no reason to conceive hardly of him who is the Father of Mercies and God of all consolation or impute a rigidness and tetrical sowerness or rather a tyrannous enwrapping us in inevitable damnation To admit no such jealousies and fears and suspitions of our Lord here but wisely learn to compound and keep close in conjunction that which God hath mixt and and put together That is a rejoycing in the Lord with trembling a worship joined with godly fear and joy in the holy Ghost and so we may return from his service as the women returned from his Sepulchre with fear and great joy PART 2. WE are come to our second part the Prospect the day of our deliverance and making up amongst Gods Jewels which day is fore-fold 1. The day of punishing the ungodly such a day as some think is described here at cap. 4.1 In such burning days the trial shall be made and then God will resolve this scruple here at verse 17. twixt them that serve him and such as serve him not and his Jewels in that day he will save spare as a man spares his own son as men incline to favour their peculiar and their Jewels and Treasure above all their stuff of less value as men in danger of shipwrack reserve a Jewel though forced to unlade the ship of all her other burden or as they catch away in times of war or fire or thieves some precious thing above all other goods And this renews the former consolation that to these Saints which excel in vertue these precious Jewels whose saith is precious sastned on the most precious blood of Christ belong all those precious Promises of compassing hiding embracing covering relieving defending comforting setting his eye heart soul upon them of opening his ears and hearkning to their cries of drawing near helping respecting assisting establishing blessing delivering by Protection Exaltation Coronation and this no empty but a real comfort including all time He hath and doth and will deliver us saith St. Paul He hath done it to his servants in the evil day in all their evil days of sorrow Sickness War Plague Famine Prison Deluge of waters or of ungodliness So Noah was boxed up in his ark
riding on his horse of wood over all the surges that devoured the world of the ungodly So in the time of Ahab and in the time of Queen Mary in our own land when the waves of persecution rouled high and raged horribly God reserved many Prophets in a cave by means of Obadiah and many thousands that bowed not the knee to Baal or were won to crouch to the Romish superstition or shrink from the Reformed Religion This is the mercy of God that when sometimes the wicked are swept away as the house of a Spider when the arrow flies by day and terror by night then comes out the Indulgence and Dispensation Touch not mine Anointed a thousand shall fall before thee and ten thousand at thy right hand Psalm 91.7 Or if God do not ever in publique calamity give his own a temporal deliverance for Cadit Ripheus yet he promises to redeem their soul from deceit and violence and precious shall their death be in his sight Psalm 72.14 Secondly The day of making up these Jewels is understood by some of the time of powerfull preaching of the Gospel principally when Christ himself and his fore-runner the Baptist entered on the office of converting the world so much also is intended here of that Sun of Rightcousness rising with healing in his wings his day-star coming in the Spirit of Eliah cap. 4.2 And we find indeed the time of our Saviour called the time of Reformation surely by that powerable Instrument of his Word it is that his Jewels are made up John prepared the Way and cleansed the people by baptism to repentance Christ wrought up many by himself more by his Apostles after St. Peter at one Sermon three thousand at another five thousand souls And in that time of our Saviour those Jewels were made bright and manifest even to their Despisers See Anna Elizabath Zachary Simeon whom the curious Pharisees reckoned among the base vulgar that knew not the Law but they then were known for Jewels and the other for a generation of Vipers Thus when the World in the Wisdom thereof knew not God it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe and to make what the world accounts weakness his Power to salvation For to this is ascribed first the birth and breeding of these Jewels For to which of the Angels said God at any time This day I have begotten thee But as that speech hath a natural Interpretation of Christ our elder Brother so applyed to us in a supernatural Of his own Will begat he us by the Word of Truth Jam. 1.18 which is therefore stil'd the uncorruptible seed 1 Pet. 2.12 God makes thee as he made this All a work of power but in recreating in producing Light of Christianity uses his Word and Wisdom to give thee form so in the New Testament his Word precedes his Miracles and the Donative to the Apostles first was Fieri Vehicula scientiae such as enliven the Receivers For man lives not by bread only and for this cause the Saints are called living stones built on the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles Jesus Christ himself the chief Corner-stone Again The word as it breeds and gives life so Light Grace and Lustre We cannot with the waxen wings of sense or reason flie up to the Deity not as revealed in Christ and ripeness and perfection and rectifying of meer Reason gains us nothing It loses rather and builds downward disclosing the earthly Globe and shutting up Heaven Only God is able by the power of his word to take hold of our souls and like so many keyes apply the graces of Faith and Hope and Love to the wards of prepared rational Nature For the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ is that which by original Purity and perfect obedience and satisfaction in his death he hath acquired to and for all his members But the noble Instrument to work that Grace a way into our souls is the declaration of his Gospel in use and Ministry of his Word Yea the Scripture informs us of Illumination by this same means in the very Angels Eph. 3. But the purest Saints are all in darkness till this flaming light be held from heaven no previous disposition in the soul no Platonick Recordation would ever bring us to the least glympse of salvation were it not for this dew of Grace which from the Word we drink into our understanding and thereby direct our Wills and even in their imaginations find it powerfull against all those starts and exorbitancies reducing and bringing into Carptivity every thought to the obedience of Christ Jesus For as health is the absence of sickness and serenity nothing but the avoidance of clouds and shadows so the Word where it comes hath an innate and genuine property to dispel sin like Davids harp driving out Sauls devil You are clean saith our Saviour propter Sermonem by reason of the Word therefore resembled to rain medicines fonntains Such an eager and piercing operation and opposition as it penetrates the closest sin and is a Discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart so Magdalens whoredom and nest of Devils dislodged Zacheus swoln to a Camels grosseness abated to the smalness of a thred fit to be drawn through the eye of a Needle fit to enter into the kingdom of Heaven with this was Lydia's heart opened all other appliances but charms or holy water This mighty word of stones able to raise up children unto Abraham this the double edged sword of the spirit this the fire and the hammer and file to frame and work out Gods Jewels from the rough till piece by piece God thereby hath removed those ruines which through Adams fall opprest all humane nature and hid away the primitive beauty and perfection of our souls Lastly 'T is this that transforms from Prophaness Rebellion Hypocrisie and purges the most dissolute Were with shall a young man reform of all other the most difficult by taking heed according to thy Word and then this Word it is which adorns and teaches how to hang about the neck and ears of Gods holy ones all those shinning graces of precious Faith and Hope and Charity and Meekndss and heavenly-Mindedness c. And therefore in our passage are we not to take notice of this I say we both Preachers and people we first as Jewellers to sever the precious from the vile if speak to speak as the words of God and yet to furnish themselves with all helps of learning the better to insinuate by Similes and riches of discourse and so to raise the imagination and fill the understandings of their hearers but above all it points directly at the curiosity of our pains and carefull industry to be work-men needing not to be ashamed They must be work-men indeed that dcal with Jewels specially with cuting them to the life and perfect beauty and fashioning them in all their points that the man of God may be
Romans and God himself confined his own people and pinned them down with Laws and still controules the rising of their cruelty by remembrance of their own condition in Egypt and for that very end the Holy Ghost proceeds here with a double Argument against such Insolency which Tremelius cals Elegantissimam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The first Argument drawn saith he a Judicio Dei 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Judgement of our common Lord and Master respectless of any mans person and therefore the despising either of his person or of his cause yea of such a cause as wherein he dares contend with me that am his Master even this God will not bear I must answer for this nay I shall not be able to answer it if I be guilty but of this And the second argument is taken a jure naturali in the fifteenth verse Is my mold or mettle better then my mans Is a Lords flesh and blood of a purer composition then his Grooms or his Foot-mans Did not he that made me in the womb make him And did not one fashion us in the womb or fashion us in one womb that is the common womb of our mother earth What is then the lesson hence but meekness for all to practise but specially those in upper place since none is more superior then a Master over his slave And for this purpose the Scripture presents us with two strange examples Moses so chosen to advancement by God himself So known of God as his friend Dignified by his miraculous Power in the eyes of his enemies and by the conduct of his people that never man more prompted to take state upon him and yet it is said this Moses was the meekest man alive The other is David when he danced before the Ark and Michal reprooving him he told her he would be more vile since so she called his humility and confesses the bottom of his heart Psal 131. I have behaved my self and quieted my soul even as a weaned child We find this was at least they said so in the intent of those Philosophers both Sceptique and Epicurean to arrive at Mansuetudo Tranquillus animus to clear the soul like a fair and unclouded Heaven and this was brought us by the Doctor of Heaven Christ Jesus both in precept Learn of me to be humble and meek and in patience possess your souls and in practice stooping himself not to a survey of our miseries but clad enclosed compassed with all mans infirmities sin only accepted and as unashamed as glorying in his humility he cries out tell the daughter of Sion not her Servant but her Soveraign her King the King of Kings comes nnto her meek And is it not then a miserable consideration a wretched spectacle to see a proud man and a humble God an angry impatient and a merciless man and yet a God of Love and long-suffering I look to Heaven and thence I find descending the Saviour of the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is his Description in Hebrews 1.3 the brightness of his Fathers Glory and the express image of his person in shape not only of a man but of a servant He that commands Legions of Angels and whose attendants they were in the wilderness and proud of the office to serve him as his Cooks and Butlers And shall not this example work on me that am but dust and worms and keep me from insulting over Inferiors who though my servants and my meaneft Hines and Drudges are yet respecting him our Lord and Father both my fellow servants and my fellow brethren Observe the provocations to this Vertue He scorns the Scorner resists the proud but gives Grace to the humble The Meek he will guide in Judgement in his Judgement he will teach them his way Psalm 25. When he shares the world he tels us The Meek shall inberit the earth and delight themselves in abundance of peace Psalm 39 7. which he ratifieth in his blessing Mat. 5.5 â—ut this is earthly blessing is it not so in heavenly things too Hear him in his Prophet Isa 61.1 The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings and we know what that means To whom to the Meek His first coming was for the Meek in the same Prophet Isa 11.4 And to meet again with the Text When God shall visit when this Son of God shall stand up to judge and to cast all proud and barbarous and cruel dispositions into Hell so he will then lift up the Meek and never leave these polisht Jewels till he hath inset them in heavenly Glory For the Lord takes pleasure in his people and will beautifie the Meek with salvation Psalm 149.4 Aud therefore who is a wise man saith St. James Jam. 3.13 let him shew out of a good conversation his works in meekness of wisdom for such is heavenly wisdom at verse 17. first pure then peaceable gentle easie to be entreated full of mercy c. If we preach it must be in love and the spirit of Meekness 1 Cor. 4. ult If you hear Receive with meekness the Word Jam. 1.21 If we will both Preacher and Hearers walk worthy our Vocation it must be with all lowliness and meekness c. Ephe. 4.2 For as if in this one grace all the rest were lock'd and infolded so doth the Apostle speak there and reckoning up the several gifts of the Spirit in Gal. 5. they seem all to be but Meekness diversified to several names To end I beseech you brethren by the meekness and gentleness of Christ Be ye cloathed with humility and upon that reason which is here in my Text God visits for rigor he resists the proud but gives Grace to the humble 1 Pet. 5.5 Furthermore If cruelty exclude from Paradise and disable from standing in the day of visitation Use this for terror against all the terrible Ones upon earth all exalted and crnel Oppressors They must hear of the wrath of this Supervisor in Heaven who sees them from thence and from thence they shall in that day see him come to visite for this sin Though they can over-soar and escape all power on earth yet see what a day the Lord threatens to make in Amos 8. and joyn to that the Prophesie of Isaiah 10.1 2 3. c. and Jeremy 6.6 c. Lastly Extend this for Consolation Regum timendorum in proprios greges saith he the highest power on earth can stretch but to their Vassals but over Princes themselves is his Perogative and Dominion that here stands up in my Text and of whom Solomon saith hc is higher then they In the cause and quarrel of Christ Jesus then we must put on the resolution of those three valiant Children The God whom we serve is able to deliver us Dan. 3. but if not we will not disobey his Command for any countercommand on earth And in this all those poor Saints of God that groan under the Turkish
saies he nor so loud but like as the Trumpet of the Law began low at first but now he presses the offenders conscience where first for Gods cause that is for Gods Glory let me crave again this advertency in your discerning what it is that calls us from sin The same Spirit that began in the Creation Revisits his own work and excels himself in thy Recreation It was God which call'd Abraham out of VR which signifies a fire or light and then brought him to a sweeter clearer fire and better and purer Light even that Light which was both revealed to the Gentiles after and remain'd the glory of his people Israel All the Israel of God united both Jews and Grecians bond or free on whom nor circumcision nor uncircumcision was regardable For those are nothing saies the Apostle what then is something Nay what is it then that is all things This only To become a new creature wherewith shall a yong man that is the sot the Prodigal in the Parable that hath wasted all his stock and is mad out of his right mind how shall this man that is troubled with the Scotomy and Vertigo a youthful wildness and unstayedness in his brains how shall he recover come to himself again and from his blinded and distempered flight find the way of Returning to hir heavenly Father This is hard but may be effected by taking heed according to thy Word There is a power in Nature but the wisdom of God shining in his Word by the joynt operation of his Spirit for these two ever work together is a power indeed mighty in operation to cast down the strong holds of Satan Not as it is the Ministry of men though the Dispensation be ours no not all those Clarious of his holy Prophets that spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost to which we do well to attend saies St. Peter as a more safe Word and as to a Light shining in a dark place till the day dawn till God send the marvailous light of his Gospel And then it is not in the Instruments Not in John greater then a Prophet and a stout and plain deliverer of the Truth and not a Reed shaken with the wind and bending his Doctrines to humour his variously inclin'd Audiences Nor in Paul thas was Os orbi sufficiens as that Golden-mouth'd father calls that blessed Apostle And all his Successors in any part of the world must know that their Voyces are but still and soft Musick and a sound qui aures percutit reaching only to the ear But the inward Minister of whom we heard before instructs the heart T is Gods Ephata that can do that That alone can call from the sleep and death of sin and from the grave of corruption Qui dixit sine me non potestis cogitare bene multo magis dixit sine me non potestis credere To believe is a greater work and of greater Grace and Power then to conceive a good thought Yet both those rich streams run from one and the same Fountain 7. But this Impotency will not be believ'd to press and lie on all mankind How gladly would some men find out some way in themselves whereby they might be less beholden to the Grace of God I Ungracious to God for his Grace and would gladly forget or fain to forget that God so incessantly remembers men with his preventing exciting with his inchoative and concomitant and subsequent and persevering Graces Graces of all sorts and all seasons Bold and presumptuous men that purposely neglect to magnifie the operations of Gods Graces on them because they would derive the Magnificat and Benidictus on themselves and so sacrifice to their own nets not looking up to the prime and constant mover of all not regarding the strong God of their Salvation There is indeed a Rate and a Sect of men who will perchance be content that God shall be kind and gracious to some feeble ones that stand in need of his assistance Sick and weak people may need the Physick of that Heavenly Doctor But not such able men such Saints and perfectists as they men that are wholly taken up with the admiration of themselves and their own purity Who yet must know that if they have been kept from falling into gross sins and are therefore apt to deride mine or any other mans weaknesses who have been and do confess as much frequently overtaken and overcome yet it is still the same gracious hand that hath done the several cures on both That God whose Grace was all the while a preservative to them was to me and him that slipt a Restorative Where is boasting then it is or it ought to be excluded and exploded out of all Christian books and out of all sober and religious brains and hearts Be not high-minded but fear is a Canon that uo wise man will cry down lest he fall with it For simply in the state of nature both he and I were even that is even able to do nothing as of our selves So far from being sure of Gods Election that we were not yet under this Grace of Vocation nor Law nor Gospel-calling and so without Christ so without God in the world Therefore here the exhortation is to be renew'd of calling upon God for this call and crying ardently unto the Throne of Grace that so we may obtain Grace to help us in time of need and that is at all times while we bear about flesh and blood wherein dwells corruption 8. Secondly Take notice of the mercy enlarg'd in this double call of God and this extension of the Voyce as in that to his Spouse Return O Shullamire Return Return and that convincing Interrogatory Why will you die As I live saies the Lord I would not the death of him that dies And this course we find God ever took sending his Prophets rising up early with many sweet invitements O come and taste how gracious the Lord is Come and drink of the waters of his Mercy freely And when those Prophets had spent their strength stretched out their hands in vain and had their cries returned in Reproiches and their reward was nothing but stones and persecutions then rose the Baptist with a new crie who was more then a Prophee then any son of man before him respecting the excellency of his Office in the present assignation of the Messiab and exhibiting the long longed for Lamb of God to take away the sins of the world He redoubled his crie in the wilderness of Repent and reason for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand so at hand that he could indigitate him that was and is the King of Heaven with his Ecce Agnus ' Dei Behold him that is come to call sinners to Repentance and Remission that hath brought abundance of Grace and Truth no more in Promise or Prophesie but in Act and personal performance and yet this John the Baptist you know how rewarded they extingnished this burning