all Consciences and the peace and reconciliation of all Sects by opening the plain Promises of God in the New and last Testament of Christ Jesus 1. A Humour possesses many that hug themselves for their wisdom and moderation therein That either the Will of God concerning Man's Election to salvation is inexplicable or if not Will of God must be kept secret from the people or at least most tenderly toucht upon as being so harsh and grating that it would drive the hearers into despair Let any Rational man judge that is to be free to use his Judgment whether this be fair dealing or no. Whether it is likely that God's Will is still kept secret now Christ Jesus is come in the flesh or whether if revealed by God it should be kept secret by men or whether it be so hard to be understood as few or none know what to make of it or whether if understood or so much of it as is understood it be so rigid and sharp that no body cares to hear it Will any wise man make a Testament that no body shall be able to understand Will any good man make a Testament that few or none shall be the better for nay much the worse How then shall we dare to think that the most wise and just and gracious God hath done after this fashion or which is worse that he hath indeed made a fair and pleasing Will to all Mankind for salvation inviting them to Holiness in order thereunto but hath reserved a secret Will to himself quite contrary which no body must question but every body must follow his outward Will though by the inward Will they are bound up for the generality by an Eternal decree never to do that Righteousness nor enjoy that Happiness which they are exhorted and intreated to do and to enjoy I say again If this be fair dealing let the world judge They talk of handling the word of God deceitfully I pray what shall we call this way of handling it when they teach that men are decreed to a Number to be good and happy sinful and miserable inevitably i. e. against their wills 2. Another Humour possesseth those of the Church of Rome That whatsoever the Will of God was from all eternity some disputing it to be Absolute others Conditional few or none take care to preach it But all their Guides insist upon the Masse and other Sacraments and urge Austerities and Penances of Whippings Pilgrimages c. And direct them to pray to Saints departed Superstition by ceremonies and offerings to their Shrines Images and Reliques and grant them large Indulgences for mony and Dirges and Masse for releasing their Souls out of Purgatory And in these and all other their Heathenish shews and Pageantries amuse the simple sort with Certainty of salvation upon the implicite Faith of the Church and the Opus operatum injoyned to merit Heaven by And so they go away clearly to heaven to rights without any more ado A man would admire that Learned men should be such knaves to practice and teach such a blind Religion and that the Laity should be such slaves to use no Judgment of their own but to submit to such unreasonable Fopperies But let these and such like look to themselves I shall go another way to work The Fathers Ancient witnesses of the Truth Men of Renown have relished of the Eloquence Philosophy and Superstition of the Heathens amongst whom they were bred as Origen Fathers Tertullian Cyprian Ambrose c. Others retained much of Judaism as well as Paganism after their conversion to the Christian Religion Later men having good wits did ill employ them in making knots Schoolmen in railing and beggarly confutations of adverse parties tossing the Ball to and fro disparaging the labours of deserving men an odious way Others flie aloft and hover in the clouds and lose themselves in Rosicrucian Rosicrucians Metaphysical Idea's and speculations All this while such a dust is raised round about that the plain truth of Faith and honesty is obscured and groped after Whereas if the great kindness and love of God were fairly published to the World without tricks or legerdemain Promises preached God would be glorified Souls would embrace the Promises and be in covenant with their God and inherit everlasting life Then would the free people of God be subject to his laws and not remain in bondage to humane ordinances Touch not Taste not Handle not nor to will-Will-worship of Saints or Angels then would all unnecessary disputes cease all cases of Consciences be resolved Pacification all Sects and Heresies be united the spiritual worship and power of Godliness advanced all jealousies removed and the world would be at peace and quiet Because the fiery and unquiet spirits of men are tamed and settled by the spirit of the Gospel and the Lion will feed and couch with the Lamb and they shall learn no kind of war any more This were a rare Attempt however it should succeed for God's glory the Worlds good and the honour of the Undertakers though they bring all the proud Disputers of the Schools about their ears For this purpose I would blow the Trumpet fain so to rowse up the spirits of learned and meek men for peace as others have done for war I am sure in this doing I choose the better part which shall never be taken away from me And let God work his will however I and those of my genius will long for it and endeavour after it at least to satisfie and comfort our own Souls and convince the world or rather the wiser sort that such a way and means there is to be used if they would but look after it This way and Means Means to understand Scripture I take to be the right understanding of the last Will and Testament of God by Jesus Christ In order to this way of Pacification I humbly under God apply my self to be a Disciple to the best of men that labour to know and teach what things are to be had or done in Rule and Government in duty and action for Souls how to make them wise and just for Bodies how to make and keep them safe and sound for Estates how to get preserve increase and use them for society of cohabitation and commerce at home and abroad in peace and war for this life and for a better Which do all the businesses of Souls Bodies and Estates in Church and State the rest are but as Cyphers in comparison of them Such are our meer Grammarians Oratours Criticks Poets Musicians Sophisters Linguists c. that serve for Loves Complements Entertainments Recreations Revels Triumphs Births Marriages Instalments Funerals Pomps Dissentions Interests Parties and Factions by their Panegyricks Epithalamiums Elegies Disputes c. while those Sacred Mystae by their braver spirits are raised up to give their attendance at the holy Altars of Religion and Justice performing all the higher more
c. and when they were gone out of sight they erected their Statues and conceited that the power of their Numens was confined to those Stocks and Stones and raised Temples to their honour that they might keep them near to themselves and have recourse to them in all their necessities As the Children of Israel who though they heard Gods voice and saw fire upon the Mount and the Pillar of a Cloud and of fire in the Red Sea as visible tokens of his presence yet because the Thunder and Lightning was terrible they could not endure it and because Moses was gone up to the Mountain for forty daies they gave him for gone whom they wished to speak unto them and now they lacked some visible Gods such as they saw in Egypt and forced Aaron to make them a Golden Calf and cried saying Make us Gods to go before us for as for this Moses we know not what is become of him And when they had their Idols to their mind they said with joy These be thy Gods O Israel Thus the greatest part of Mankind though they had in them by the light of Nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sufficient knowledge of God yet they glorified him not as God neither were thankful Ro. 1.21 c. but became vain in their imaginations and their foolish heart was darkened professing themselves wise they became fools and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an Image made like unto corruptible Man and to Birds and four-footed Beasts and creeping things wherefore God gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts to dishonour their own Bodies between themselves who changed the Truth of God into a Lie and worshipped and served the Creature more than the Creatour who is blessed or evermore Amen And this carnal and gross humour cauled the opinion of carnal Gods and of a carnal worship by them of the true God Wherefore God knowing the dull temper of the Jews and their fond disposition of being like unto the rest of the World commanded them Altars and Sacrifices of Beasts and Birds to the true God which otherwise they would have erected and raised to false Gods Till the time of Reformation God winked at this Ignorance in them and the rest of the World and brought in by his Son the full revelation of the True God and his True worship in Spirit and in Truth The CONTENTS Natural Religion Supernatural Religion Revelation TITLE III. Of Religion ALL men being convinced that there is a God from what they are and from what is within their Souls and Bodies as also from the Magnificent Beautiful and Harmonious works of God in the World round about them and that he is most Powerful Wise Holy Just and Gracious c. It must necessarily follow that this God ought to be worshipped and served Natural Religion which is the Natural Religion due to God from all his Creatures who do also express it in one kind or other but more especially the Rational Creatures who are most able and most obliged to give unto God this their reasonable service and most especially Mankind who have most need and who stand in peculiar relation to God who made them but a little lower than the Angels and Lords of this Inferiour World and designed them for the Inheritance of Glory with Angels and Arch-Angels in heaven To which Estate they should have passed by Grace and Favour if they had kept his Law which he first gave them and then all their religious Applications to God should have been in the quality of Saints in Honour and Praise and Thanksgiving for evermore But since the First man did disobey and die all since do and suffer the same sin and death therefore all their religious Addresses to God must be made in the quality of Sinners and Sufferers Being therefore thus sinful and miserable in all their transactions from time to time with a Deity they have been complaining and bemoaning their condition and imploring relief and mercy to cleanse the stain of their Guilt and to remove their sorrow and plague and after pardon to return praise and thanks For this purpose they all along poured out their Supplications and offered their gifts and Sacrifices of their best things even of their Children sometimes by a blind zeal thinking to pacifie and attone if it might be the wrath of a provoked God This way of Service in their approaches to Heaven Nature prompted them unto even to do the best they could to purifie themselves and appease their Maker Yet even this they quickly forgot and performed the same Devotion to the Creatures that were below themselves and forsook their Creatour out of an idle fancy that they could not see him nor hear nor feel him because he was far above out of their sight and reach Therefore this Natural Information of Divine duty and worship did not do the work as is proved by the experience of Idolaters for some thousands of years Supernatural Religion Therefore it was necessary that there should be a supernatural Revelation from God to Man for his conduct and guidance in the way of Religion In order to which practice and the end of Salvation whereto it was to tend God that was in Christ reconciling the World unto himself revealed his Will what he would have done by Man and his Promises what was to be had of him for a Reward by degrees more and more till Christ came from the bosom of his Father who brought in all Perfection and taught us all things As namely 1. By common instinct unto all men 2. By special Impulse to the first Fathers 3. By Dreams and Visions to the Prophets 4. By Providences and Dispensations of all sorts 5. By Miracles and great Wonders 6. By Christ Jesus saying This is my welbeloved Son in whom I am well pleased hear ye him Heb. 1.1 So great is that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past to our Fathers by the Prophets hath in these last daies spoken unto us by his Son whom he hath made Heir of all things That is Before the Law immediately By the Law Angels and Moses mediating By the Gospel Christ and his Spirit mediating Revelation The Subject of Gods Revelation all along more or less is Gods Bounty Blessedness and Mans Duty Holiness The Manner all along move or less is Instinct oral Instruction Writing in Tables Writing in Heart the Law Will Testament and Word of God This Divine commerce and interposure of Revelation of Gods Will is the true means of serving God aright which was never wanting in some degree sufficient to all that endeavoured after it But through Carelesness and Sensuality the greatest part of Mankind have been imposed upon by fantastical Dreams and magical Divinations of Astrologers Sooth-sayers Poets Philosophers Enchanters Prophets Priests Running to Oracles and Entrails of sacrificed Beasts and Flying of
are as Isaac who was a True Son and had the State of the Person and the Right of a Son because he came from a Woman who had the state of a Woman and the Right of a Wife and was no Bond-woman nor Concubine So it is plain from this way of Argumentation used by the Apostle That the Sons of the Law that trust to the Law only shall be as little justified or have as little Right to the Inheritance of heaven as Ismael had to Abraham's Inheritance which was none at all because he was born of a Woman who had Works enough for she was a Bond-maid but those could create unto her no Right nor to her Son to inherit But the Sons of the Gospel that trust to the Gospel only shall be thereby as much justified and have as much right to the Inheritance of heaven as Isaac had to Abraham's Inheritance which mas a complete Right because he was born of a Woman who had Faith to conceive when past Child-bearing which did create to her a full Right to be a Mother and to her Son to be an Heir This was the first Difference between the two Mothers and the two Sons on the Mother's side The second Difference is between the two Sons only by the Father's side For though they had one and the same Father yet they were begotten from different principles and operations in Abraham enabling him to beget them Gen. 16.2 1. Ismael came from Abraham as from a natural Father born after the flesh by Abraham's natural power and strength of Generation as also from Agar's natural force of Conception For Abraham was not restrained by Nature from begetting being then but eighty five years old though Sarah was restrained from bearing though not by Nature as being the younger yet by God's will 2. Isaac came from Abraham as from a supernatural Father born after the Spirit by Abraham's supernatural power and strength of Generation from God as also from Sarah's supernatural virtue of Conception by God For Abraham was restrained by Nature from begetting Ro. 10.7 being then Ninety nine years old and Sarah had a double deadness for besides that she was barren she was Ninety years old yet conceived by virtue of God's Promise Ro. 9.8 9. or by the Spirit and power of God upon her Faith So they that will be under the Law which is a Bond-woman and engendring to Bondage though thereby they be the Children of God yet they are but his natural and carnal Children because born after a more natural and carnal way by Works under the Law Heb. 9.10 consisting in carnal and fleshly Ordinances But they that are under Grace or under the Gospel which is a Free-woman and engendring to Liberty they are the True Divine and Spiritual Sons of God because they are born after a more supernatural and Spiritual way by Faith under the Gospel consisting of Spiritual Precepts Thus that which is born of the Law or Flesh is flesh Joh. 3.3 according to the nature of the Law but that which is born of the Gospel or Spirit is Spirit according to the nature of the Gospel And the Sons of God by Faith are Sons by Adoption and Grace Heirs of God and Co-heirs with Christ Jesus Eph. 1.13 and are sealed with that Spirit of Promise which is the Earnest of their Inheritance SECTION III. Many more Covenants God made But two Eminent Covenants but these two of the Law and Gospel were the most eminent 1. Because they were National The Law was a Covenant with the Nation of the Jews and the Gospel was a Covenant with all Nations The rest of the Covenants of God were Personal God was one Party and the Counterparty to him was some single Person as Adam Noah Abraham David c. 2. Because these two were Mediatory Covenants made by the Intervention of two solemn Mediators Moses and Christ the rest were immediately proposed by God and had no Interlocutor or Mediator Yet though these two Covenants disagree from all the rest yet are they different and contrary the one to the other Hagar and Sarah and the Children of the Covenant as contrary the one to the other as Ismael and Isaac The Apostle addeth to the Nature of the two Covenants the adjuncts of Place and Effect 1. For the Law the Place it was from Mount Sinai in Arabia Gal. 4.25 the Country of Hagar's Posterity called Hagarens though they would be thought to be of Sarah and called Saracens Exod. 19. Gen. 2â— And Hagar her self was originally of Egypt the house of Bondage 2. The Effect of the Law was Bondage engendred thereby For according to the Nature of the Law so are the Spirits and Manners of men under it The Law of Moses burthensom for its Rites and contains only outward Precepts and Temporal Promises and Curses And therefore it self begets a Spirit or Genius correspondent to it of servile drudgery and slavish fear under a Curst Mistress II. For the Gospel 1. The Place it was from Mount Sion in Jerusalem the Country of Sarah and her Posterity which though free in comparison of Arabia yet is in bondage being compared with the heavenly Jerusalem which is absolutely and truly free Gal. 4.26 Heb. 11.10 Heb. 11.16 and is the Mother of us all A City which hath foundations whose builder and maker is God in a better Country than Canaan that is the Heavenly Canaan where God hath prepared this City For we are come to Mount Sion and to the City of the living God the heavenly Jerusalem Heb. 11.22 and to an innumerable company of Angels to the General Assembly and Church of the First-born which are written in Heaven and to God the Judge of all and to the Spirits of Just men made perfect This is the holy City Apoc. 21.2 3. the New Jerusalem that comes down from God out of heaven prepared as a Bride adorned for her Husband The Tabernacle of God with Men. So the Seat of the Gospel is above whence it was delivered to Christ and from whence Christ brought it to the World below 2. The Effect of the Gospel is Liberty engendred thereby For according to the Nature of the Gospel so are the Spirits and Manners of Men under it The Gospel of Christ is easie and light for its Rites which are but two Baptism and the Lord's Supper and for its Precepts and Promises and Threatnings pure spiritual and eternal And therefore it begets a Spirit or Genius correspondent to it self of Son-like Diligence and filial Love under a kind and tender Mother The Mothers differ so do the Children The Children resemble their several Mothers The Children of their several Mothers resemble one another and are all in a like state of the same Spirit The Children of the Law are chiefly for the Letter The Children of the Gospel are chiefly for the Spirit The Children of the Law are chiefly for Temporals The Children of the
with Penances and Reliques and Indulgences and Outward performances never regarding the Inward killing of Lusts nor expecting a Living Law written in the heart This is to forsake our Husband Christ and cleave to the bondage of the Law which is dead to us by Christ's Cross and might be dead in us by his Spirit if we would believe And the ground of all this Error is from a Novel Interpretation of that Paragraph of the latter part of the seventh of the Romans contrary to all Antiquity Sense or Reason SECTION IV. The Reasons for this Victory over the Law are these Because Grace is stronger than the Law Grace stronger than Law Mercy rejoyces and prevails over Justice The absolving power of the Gospel is stronger than the condemning power of the Law The Mercies of God are above all his Works Prerogative is above Law Custome overcomes Law Mercy much more The Sword of Justice is strong and sharp but Mercy keeps off the blow and holds the hand of Justice from striking If the Law calls aloud for Justice Christ's blood calls louder and pleads for pardon If any man sin we have an Advocate with the Father and the blood of Christ is the Propitiation for all sins God will have mercy because he will have mercy and what is that to the Law It is the will of God to pardon and pass by Iniquities Transgressions and Sins and to remember them no more When the strong man enters into the house he keeps it and all that is therein but when a stronger than he comes upon him he binds him hand and foot and casts him out So is the Gospel to the Law 2. Because the Spirit of Grace is stronger than the Spirit of the Law Spirit of Grace stronger than Spirit of Law The Spirit of Sin is strong in it self Lust hath a violent impulse and vehement motion The Spirit of Sin is stronger by the Law and rages and takes on much more for being opposed Like a Lion scorns to be kept in but breaks down all barrs and bounds to run abroad at randome But the Spirit of the Law is stronger for though it cannot curb sin from sinning yet it keeps it under the Curse that it cannot escape it But when the Spirit of Grace in Christ comes it preacheth deliverance to the Captives and recovery of sight to the blind and opens the prison doors to them that were fast bound in misery and iron and publishes the acceptable Year of the Lord. The Word of God is mighty in operation throegh the Spirit for the beating down of the strong holds of Sin and Satan As Light is stronger than Darkness to destroy sin so the Blessing of Grace is stronger than the Curse of the Law to take it quite away Though the Spirit of the Law be the Spirit of God's Justice yet the Spirit of the Gospel is the Spirit of God's Mercy which God will have to be more effectual than the other and Blesses whom the Law curses yea and they shall be Blessed 3. God delights more in Mercy than Vengeance Because God delights more in shewing Mercy than in executing Vengeance in sparing than in punishing As I live saith the Lord I delight not in the death of a sinner but rather that he should turn and live Judgment is his strange work Bowels of mercy tender pity and Compassion are his delightful properties 4. Because Man is made to be the object of God's Love not Wrath Man Object of God's Love his Blessing not a Curse Life not Death Heaven was prepared for Men and Angels till they sinned and then Hell was prepared for them and since that for all Hypocrites like unto them We cannot imagine in any reason that God made his poor Creatures for everlasting Destruction We may observe it in our selves though we be evil yet we are not so unnatural as to beget children to starve them or beat out their brains or leave them to the wide World or send them to the Hangman to be tormented to death And if we that are evil know well enough notwithstanding to give good things to our children not a Scorpion for a Fish nor a Stone for an Egg how much more then shall our Heavenly Father give his Holy Spirit to them that ask him and how infinitely more pitiful and compassionate is he than we can imagine or express Christs Pleading undeniable to God 5. Because the Pleading of Christ for Mercy purchased by his own Blood is undeniable to God above all the Pleading of the Law or the Devil that lays the Law against the Brethren whose malicious accuser he is God will not cannot deny his own Son and whatsoever we shall ask the Father in his Name he will deny us nothing SECTION V. Victory procured meritoriously by Christs death 1. This Victory is meritoriously procured for us by Christ's Death O Death I will be thy death O Grave I will be thy destruction And his Resurrection was the pledg to assure us thereof 2. This Victory is really effected and performed in us by the Spirit of Christ raising our Souls from the death of sin to the life of righteousness and our Bodies from the Grave to the life of glory If the Spirit that raised up Christ from the dead dwell in you Rom. 8.11 he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal Bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you As if he should have said If the Spirit of Christ dwell in you regenerating your Souls to a New Creature which is the first Resurrection from the first death then the very same Spirit shall also immortalize your Bodies which is the second resurrection from the second death that upon them the second death shall have no Power Thus abundantly hath God provided for us by Jesus Christ both in respect of our Souls and of our Bodies Our Souls raised from the death of sin and the curse of the Law Our Bodies raised from the Grave The Natural Body is raised a Spiritual Body the Corruptible puts on Incorruption Dishonour turn'd into Glory Weakness into Power a Change to be as the Angels in Heaven Rom. 8.23 2 Cor. 5.2 We Groan within our selves waiting for the Adoption to wit the Redemption of our Bodies In this we groan earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from Heaven Victory obtained by the Spirit of Faith 2. But no obtaining this Victory over death purchased for us till by the Spirit of Faith we obtain a Victory over Sin which is also procured for us by Christ who hath received the Promise of the Spirit for all that believe This is that Crown of Life that Christ the first born of God and first begotten from the dead shall set upon the heads of all those that have fought the good fight of faith and have been more than Conquerours For as death proceeds only from Sin for sin is mortal so life
be enlarged to all places in the World and that not after this nor that manner of outward and carnal worship but after the only manner of inward and spiritual Service John 4.24 for God was a Spirit and therefore the true worshippers of God should always worship him in Spirit and in Truth From hence therefore the world is given to understand the two great Doctrines First That the true worship of God is onely Spiritual Secondly That there is greater perfection in Christianity than in Judaism or Heathenism Worship Spiritual 1. That the True Worship of God is only Spiritual Religion is a Spiritual service that is Prayers Praisings Eucharists Acts of Love Acts of Faith Acts of Hope Acts of Humility Fasting Alms c. Excepting the two Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper whose effects are Spiritual Sense mysterious Rites easie and number smallest I dare in meekness and charity challenge all perswasions to shew me if they can in the whole Digest of the Christian Law any other external Rite or Ceremony enjoyned or that is necessary that it should be enjoyned Reason Because as the Christian Religion intends wholly an exclusion of all Mosaick Ceremonies made by God so it will not admit of a Body of new and superinduced Rites made by men for they are or may be as much against the Analogy of the spiritual Worship of Jesus Christ as the body of Rites made by Moses and more because they were made by the Will of God but these meerly by the Wills of men Ceremonies The Ceremonies of the Christian Services may be Practised but must be no part of Religion it self but either the Circumstances thereof or the imperate acts of some moral Virtue As thus The Christian must be in some place when he prays and that place may and it is fit it should be determined by Authority for the publick prayers and thither he must go and yet for his private prayers he may go any where else And so for preaching And because the Religious actions of a Christian are finite therefore they must be done as in a place so at a time and that time may and it is fit it should be determined by Authority and then he must do his Devotions in publick at that time only but for his private devotions he may do them at any time else The Religious Actions of a Christian must be in some posture of his Body and that posture may be appointed and it is fit it should be appointed by Authority for the publick worship as to kneel or stand or bow c. and then he must do it in that posture that he is commanded in that publick place and yet he may use what postures he pleases at any other time or place for his private devotions And when the Christian comes to the publick place at the time appointed for Publick Prayer his prayers though in the Spirit must be of some form or manner of expressions by words and that form and manner of expressions by words may and it is fit it should be ordained by Authority for the whole Congregation openly and yet he may be and is at liberty to use what other form he pleases in his private addresses to God And this is enough to satisfie all those that have the true spirit of Christ who though he had no need of the Circumcision of the Law nor yet of the Baptism of the Gospel because there was no superfluity of evil to him to be cut off nor any stain of sin to be washed away yet he suffered himself to be circumcised and baptized and did obey that Law which he came to abolish and was subject to those Powers that were then over him in the world and quarrelled at nothing but was willing to fulfill all Righteousness And if our Fanaticks had the true spirit of Christ they would do as he did and be obedient to his Laws and to the Laws of the Powers that God hath set over them The Differences betwixt the Mosaick Rites under the Law and the Christian Rites Difference of Mosaick and of Christian Rites besides what Christ himself hath ordained under the Gospel are these 1. The Mosaick Rites were only appointed by God but these Christian Rites are appointed by men 2. They were necessary parts of that Religion that then was so far as it was discerned but these are not 3. The Mosaick Ceremonies did oblige every where but the Christian only in publick 4. They were integral parts of the Jewish Religion but these are but circumstances and investitures of our Religious Actions 5. They were done all of them in the spirit of Bondage and great fear but ours are done in the Spirit of Liberty and great Love They were lasting as long as that Religion was to last but ours are alterable though our Religion be everlasting 7. They were many and burdensome and very costly for they were at greater charges to buy Cattel c. for the Sacrifices and the Priests and Levites were as Butchers and Porters and Cooks to knock down Oxen or cut the throats of Calves c. and slay them c. but ours are few and easie and cheap but neither theirs nor ours did or ever will please God The sum is the Ceremonies of Christians they may be the accidents of their worship they must be no more but a just investiture of Time Place Form Habit and Posture He that would have his body decently vested must not wear five and twenty Cloaks a Stole and a Tunick will suffice some thing for warmth and something for ornament does well But as the tender and delicate Woman that will scarcely vouchsafe to set her foot upon the ground for delicateness and tenderness and thinks no ornaments curious enough for her head and the rest of her body makes it the work of half a day to dress and deck her self is a slave to her fine trinkets and thinks neither her Soul nor Body but her habiliments to be the principal part of her care So they that are superstitious and over much righteous in Will-worship and count no formalities nor bodily exercises enough to set out their Devotions are servants to their Beads and trumperies and think not of the substance of Religion but make the out sides thereof the principal part of their care Church of Rome Thus the Church of Rome whose Ceremonies are described in a great Book in folio Quem mea vix totum Bibliotheca capit and my purse strings will not stretch to buy it And although by such means Religion is made pompous and apâ—â—o allure them that admire their gay nothing yet then it also spends their Religious passions and wonderments in that which effects nothing upon the Soul The Priest must be intent upon his Rubrick that he miss nothing of his Bowings Crosses Anointings Sprinklings Perfumes c. and the people are taken up with staring upon the dumbe Images the Larges and the Priests
days which are a shadow of things to come but the Body is of Christ Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world Why as though living in the world are ye subject to Ordinances touch not taste not handle not which all are to perish with the using after the commandments and doctrines of men Which things have indeed a shew of wisdom in Will-worship and humility and neglecting of the Body not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh ib. v. 13. Blotting out the hand-writing of Ordinances which was against us which was contrary to us and took it out of the way nailing it to his Cross There are many proofs more to this purpose too long to set down here Because all other Ritual worship superinduced by Men must needs be Reas II as much contrary to the Analogy of Christ's worship No other rites to be superinduced and more than that of the Law was Because no Rites in themselves ever did or will please God Witness Reas III God's declaration that of old he never imposed Sacrifices upon them No rites ever pleased God and when he did he preferred Mercy and Obedience before them and says he never delighted in them and the Prophets all along called for this kind of Sacrifice in comparison whereof all others were an abomination unto him and he was weary of them Because greater perfection is required in the Christian than was in the Reas IV Jewish Religion Greater Perfection in the Christian Religion But against this kind of doctrine flie forth a swarm of Objections from the Wasps of the world This spiritual worship and perfection you speak of Obj. is hard to understand and harder to practise A hard saying who can hear it And if so who then can be saved You may understand and practise both by the Spirit Answ if you will learn and obey with your Reason and your Will The Mind and Will of the Flesh is dull to know and stout to do such spiritual things and indeed she neither can nor will act any thing towards it till it yield to the Spirit For the Carnal man understandeth not the things of God neither indeed can he because they are spiritually discerned The Spirit only understandeth the things of the Spirit and the Flesh only understandeth the things of the Flesh The Gospel is a light to our Spirit to understand it by and the Spirit of God is a light to the Gospel and Christ is the person in whom is this Spirit of whose fullness we all receive who is the light that enlighteneth every man that cometh into the world John 1.9 This Light is come into the World but the Darkness comprehendeth it not because the world loveth darkness rather than light because her deeds are evil Ceremonies are a great help to Devotion Obj. But Devotion brought them forth the Daughter destroys the Mother Answ They be few easie and significant and used with liberty of spirit yet God hath no where in the Gospel commanded them but forbidden such as are Jewish and Heathenish the rest that make for decency and order being enjoyned by the Church are freely to be used trusting in all things to the aids of the Spirit which helpeth all our Infirmities Use therefore all honest helps but trust to the Spirit have recourse to that Fountain and covet after the best gifts Behold I shew unto you a more excellent way The world is not able to bear these high Dispensations Obj. Why then hath God introduced them If they were impossible Answ there could no obligation be upon us to bear them nor could God be Just in imposing them The World is in its Majority now God saw it to be the time of Love the Fullness of Time The World is Older and might be Wiser than it is O that Men were Wise to learn to know in this their day of Visitation the things that do belong to their Peace 1. We have or might have heard of all God's dispensations before and under the Law and of this last and best under the Gospel what revelations providences and administrations of justice mercy and power by miracles God hath wrought 2. We have the great example of Jesus and the Saints a cloud of Witnesses before us 3. We have the New Testament read and preached with the inward teaching of the Spirit If we will not learn by all these more than they could that had not these assistances Is it not our own faults And shall we not be without excuse Wo unto us if we now bring not forth more fruits worthy of Repentance than they did who came short of the Means we have The times of the former ignorance that was not willful God winked at and forgave them because they knew not what they did for had they known better things they would have done them as many as had honest hearts Mat. 13.14 Blessed are your eyes for they see and your ears for they hear For verily I say unto you that many Prophets and Righteous men have desired to see the things which ye see and have not seen them and to hear those things which ye hear John 8.56 and have not heard them Abraham rejoyced to see my day and he saw it and was glad All the old Worthies died in Faith not having received the Promises but having seen them afar off and were perswaded of them and embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth Heb. 11.23 39 40. All these having obtained a good report through faith received not the Promise God having provided some better thing for us that they without us should not be made perfect What went ye out for to see A Prophet yea I say unto you and more than a Prophet Verily I say unto you among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he Mat 11.9 c. And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffered violence and the violent take it by force for all the Prophets and the Law prophecied until John He that hath ears to hear let him hear When I was a Child I thought as a Child I spake as a Child I did as a Child but when I became a Man I put away childish things The childhood of the World is past Heb. 5.12 c. For our time we might have been teachers and not have need to be taught again which be the first principles of the Oracles of God we are dull of hearing Every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of Righteousness for he is a Babe But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil Heb. 6.1 Therefore leaving the Principles of the Doctrine of Christ
The Nature of the Two Testaments OR The Disposition of the WILL and ESTATE Of GOD to Mankind FOR HOLINESS and HAPPINESS BY Jesus Christ Concerning Things to be done by Men AND Concerning Things to be had of God Contained in his two great Testaments The LAW and the GOSPEL DEMONSTRATING The High SPIRIT and STATE of the Gospel above the Law In Two Volumes The First Volume of the WILL OF GOD. The Second Volume of the ESTATE OF GOD. The First Volume Of the WILL OF GOD Concerning Things to be done by Men. By ROBERT DIXON D. D. Prebendary of Rochester LONDON Printed by Tho. Roycroft for the Author MDCLXXVI Imprimatur Ex Aed Lambethanis THO. TOMKYNS TO THE READER THE principal Wisdom in all Learning is the knowledg of Rights made and granted by God or Man Rights and to whom they are made and granted and how why and when and for how long and how they are obtained and kept how lost and how recovered That men might be holy in themselves and righteous to others understanding what is their own and to do well to themselves and to all men that they and others might be happy He that can discern and judge rightly of these things is an Oracle amongst men and fit for all business in Church and State Other knowledge is very good Laws and greatly ornamental and useful in its kind but this Learning of Laws divine and humane excells all the rest as the Sun the Stars for the excellency of Piety Equity and Reason that is in it and for the infinite use and benefit that redounds by it to Soul and Body to Ecclesiastical and Civil Societies for this life and for a better I undervalue no Learning hereby but give every Art its due in its time and place and so I give this sublime Faculty of Laws its due also Hereby I do no more than perswade to choose the best things and to find out the most excellent waies Jural sense of Scriptures In order therefore to the understanding of the Scriptures which are Gods Laws I prefer the Jural sense as most genuine and kindly and make use of Jural Terms borrowed from Laws Ecclesiastical and Civil in their proper style as most homogeneal and sutable to the Divine Law in which God hath condescended to humane capacities by propounding his Will in the nature of Laws by his Servant Moses and by his Son Jesus Christ and this is the most stately eloquence for all business There are in the Scriptures which are the two Laws and Testaments of God published by the two Mediators Moses and Christ certain â—ccessories and Consequences as Histories and Prophecies to the explaining whereof Philosophy and Chronology may be very helpful But for the principal and essential Will Word Law Covenant Testament of God concerning mans salvation by Faith in Jesus Christ let any discerning person judge whether it be not expresly revealed by Christ and his Apostles especially St. Paul that great Divine and Lawyer as that other Testament by Moses and the Prophets in terms of Law Such as Predestination Election Justification Adoption Faith Grace Gift Covenant Will Testament Heir Inheritance Possession Liberty c. as shall be made more largely to appear hereafter So the Laws of God being described in terms of Law after the manner of Men are more aptly interpreted by the Science of Law than of Philosophy or any other Art whatsoever This I lay as a principle and foundation to my ensuing discourse Title of Scripture There is nothing more ordinary in our Discourses and Writings than the Laws and Testaments of God which are the Titles of the Scriptures and yet how few regard the Nature of these so considerable Titles For the Subject of every Book is best apprehended by the full Name and Title that is given to it expressing the Nature of the thing contained in it But because this is a New untrodden path and that I am almost alone in this Manner of speaking therefore unsearching and undistinguishing men that are lazy withal and hang upon others Judgments are shie of this Way and pass it by giving it no good report The terms of Philosophy and Oratory are pleasantly swallowed down by them because usual but the terms of both Laws stick and will not go down as harsh and crabbed Sure this doth mightily betray the Ignorance of these men I do not use any barbarous words as are in some Laws but the pure and elegant expressions of the best of humane Laws far more learned and significant than the froth of Rhetoricians or the Fustian stuff of Schoolmen or the Canting Rosicrucian Enthusiastick nonsense of Fanaticks This is our shame that so many Divines and Lawyers reject that most illustrious Faculty so highly useful to them and to the Nobles and Princes of the World in comparison whereof all other inferiour Arts are pedantick and base I take them to be the best Divines Distinction of Old and New Testament that distinguish best between the Old Testament and the New that preach the New Testament and not the Old the Spirit and not the Letter the power of Godliness and not the form A clear distinction between the two Testaments the Law and the Gospel I take to be the principal excellency of a Divine and a noble vein that should run through every Theological Treatise For which I note the most Illustrious Hugo Grotius Dr. Hammond Dr. Taylor Dr. Lushington Dr. Spencer Mr. Thorndike Mr. Farindon c. to be the most eminent in giving light to this great Point which deserves to be more enquired into For which cause I have offered my poor Endeavours hoping to find acceptance from all searching and free spirited men Such divine Lawyers as these I take to have the soundest Notions and the clearest and fullest Expressions no disparagement the World knows it Legists The Linguists and Disputants and Humanists make much ado with their Criticisms and subtilties and Fineries but 't is the wise Legist that must do the business in Church and State A wise Jurisconsult in my opinion knows more of Religion Equity and Government than the profoundest Platonist Aristotelian or Ciceronian of them all I admire the most Excellent Grotius for his rare knowledge in all things but especially for his wisdom in the Laws both divine and humane which makes him shine among all other Writers H. Grotius Tanquam Luna inter minora sidera And thence spring those incomparable Notions digested by a judicious and moderate spirit his Enemies being Judges Many Currs bawl about him that mighty Giant of whom the World was not worthy and spare not to abuse him now he is in his grave who were not worthy to carry his Books after him These and such as these are the Men that divide the Word of God aright like workmen that need not to be ashamed clearly unfolding the good will of God without taking any side or party wholly aiming at satisfaction to
serious and profitable services in Church and State as the Ambassadors of God the Counsel of Souls the Priests of Justice and Equity the Legates of Princes and States the Guides of Souls in all religious and civil Transactions by their Preaching Praying Praising Pleading Judging Treating and Executing of Laws Divine and Humane I have reason therefore I think to wave the laziness of such men of good Talents but not improving them to the best advantage but staying behind in the enjoyment of Vulgar notions content themselves with Vulgar errors Mercurial Spirits There are in this latter Age of the world men of Mercurial spirits that by their labours have advanced all kind of Learning to a higher pitch than ever No disparagement to our Ancestors at all who some of them fairly aimed at the same mark but were unhandsomly cried down and discouraged in their several Ages as Trismegistus Plato Socrates Hierocles Hippocrates c. of old and Paracelsus Helmont Harvy c. of late So for Divines Clement Ignatius Irenaeus Justin Hierome Chrysostome Basil Theophylact c. of old and Cassander Melancthon Arminius Grotius Hammond Lushington Taylor c. of late This may be granted perhaps in Philosophy Physick and Mathematicks and in Mechanick Arts as of Navigation c. but to assert any improvement in Divinity will be thought Heresie Schism or Innovation at the least which is counted dangerous Principles sure As for the Foundations and Principles of Faith there is no doubt but they alwaies have been and are and will be the same but for the superstructures and consequences they are now by Discerning men more clearly drawn out for Spiritual advantages than ever they were before by a more perfect understanding of the Scriptures without the mixture of Traditions or the Doctrines of Men. Christianity unmixt The Reason is because at the first Christianity was compleatly revealed by Christ to his Apostles who with him taught the purity and perfection of Divine worship far above the Jewish dispensation and the Wisdom of the world But this Treasure after their daies was a little hid yea in the Apostles daies this mischief began to work which was by them wisely observed especially by St. Paul who in all his Epistles especially to the Romans and Galatians clears up the absolute independent necessity of the Gospel without Moses and the help of vain Philosophy against the Jewish and Heathenizing Christians But in the daies of their Disciples and their Successors the streams that arose from pure fountains ran farther through the channels of Judaism and Heathenism and though they kept themselves in their own nature unmixt and do still yet Men of weak Judgments through Ignorance and of Corrupt minds through too much Worldly wisdom did and do taste too much of their own muddy waters and keep the savour of them as is apparent in their Expressions and Superstitions to this very day And why then should not some if they can Aspire to perfection be wiser and honester too than some Must we be always Children dwell always upon beggarly Elements be always biassed by Parties and Sides for favour and gain The older the World is it should grow the wiser and not stand at a stay It is no Solecism to say We are elder in our Generations than our Fathers and have more experience than our Teachers and our Children and Disciples will be wiser than we And that Antiquity which we so admire and trust unto is Junior and Neoterick properly to us The first Ages are the Youth of the World in their Minority but we are the Antients and Adult We are beholding to them and they would now if alive be beholding to us Neither are the Truths among them altered at all but the same far better understood and kept pure by themselves and enlarged to more profitable uses It is a dull thing to fit still like Children and venture no farther than we have been taught to go All men have not the same drowzy spirits all men will not be so contented Some men will put on lively and try to add something more upon the old stock and not suffer themselves to be led by the nose as for those that will be deceived there is no remedy let them be deceived And they are for the most part of these kinds Vain Sciences Such as for ostentation heap up variety of Learning from vain and unnecessary Logick Philosophy History Tongues Mathematicks Antiquities c. and little regard Morality for life and action to govern themselves and others Hence they become Imperious and Magisterial in their Determinations though for the most part unprofitable and too often hurtful to the Publick good 2. Such as call themselves and are called Poets and Orators fine tongued fellows that can seemingly set off what smattering knowledge they have the easier to gull themselves and others by false Reasons guilded over by fucous enticing expressions by whom a full clear grave and solid style conveying the digested conceptions of the mind to the ears and minds of men by significant terms and fit to do business is derided as rude and barbarous These profound Sages with other folks learning as the Bird with strange feathers or the Asse with the Lion's skin are mightily elevated with their great Parts of Memory and Utterance How they can recite Councils Fathers Philosophers Historians Pick Hebrew Greek and all kind of Roots Coin subtil Distinctions without difference and engross all knowledge to themselves Although all this cry makes but a little wool all is but borrowed nor can they manage the stock of others but spoil it mar it in the using This is meer Pedantry here 's nothing of Judgment and right Reason of their own nor a spirit to discern but to quit the Authorities and Sentences of the Ancients Right Reasoning But where is the true and solid way of Reasoning and Method which a Piercing man without all these Tawdries principally aims at He that follows his own sound Reason without favour and affection to any extream and does his work as is pleasing to his own mind with his own well chosen and disposed materials shall make a far better structure than he that busily collects several materials of several mens framing and fashioning which being all jumbled together must needs be botching A man 's own clear Notions maturely disposed fully expressed in genuine terms is his best Wisdom and most flourishing Rhetorick A structure strongly and usefully contrived and beautified with serviceable and agreeable stuff is better than a Medly or Hotchpotch gawdily painted without frame or fashion Still he that builds for his own conveniences and is neat in his own Nest prosecutes his own end and uses the means accordingly But several mens fancies and contrivances especially wanting Art do not fit the scope of one Man's work That therefore which we call Learning acquired Sound Judgment is an excellent thing in it self but unless a man have sound
promoted thereby and more than by any other course that hath been taken hitherto For what our several sorts of Postillary Cabbalistical Critical Casuistical Scholastical Systematical Sceptical or Rosicrucian Divinity could never yet attain unto for the setling of Unity and Peace This one Testamentary way may by God's blessing effect if rightly understood and fairly prosecuted without prejudice passion biassed Judgment pride or gain Moreover I make bold to tell you Quotations that I hope I am not vainglorious in this unusual way of not stuffing my Margin as Index-Rakers do with Quotations of Divines Philosophers Lawyers Historians c. I am alone and want Labourers to do that drudgery nor will I hire them nor have I will or leisure to do it my self Nor care I to shew my reading by plagiary of Matter and Method what I have read I have read I had rather utter a sound Reason than an Authority without reason I avoid all riming reasons and quaint distinctions and allusions and quirks and flourishes I count it Pedantical to interrupt a continued discourse with interlarded phrases or inlaid adagies and sentences of other men when the Author himself may speak the same sense in his own as good or better words for his purpose without pumping or racking his natural genius If therefore I have laid my foundation strong or made my building uniform with good lights and chambers and necessary offices therein and have seated it from the injury of weather I have satisfied my self and may satisfie all equal and ingenious Judges though I have wanted Carvers and Painters to set out the Fabrick with Antiques or other curious Imagery The true end of stately structures and vessels of Precious matter is to be useful plain and goodly for aspect artificial symmetry and true composure though not all over enamelled and powdered with sparks of Diamonds Gems or gaiety of Sculptures Surely a pure smooth flowing style True Eloquence solidly and clearly expressing sound matter in genuine words and a natural method is the best conveyance and insinuation of Doctrine into the Judgment of the Learners and the best motive to stir up their affections And this is the Eloquence used by learned and wise men who scorn the Pedantry of vulgar Orators as much below them Thus I have given an account as I ought of the purpose and scope which I aim at in this ensuing Discourse and of the style and phrase therein used For which if any brand me for an Opiniator Novelist Legist Neuter or any other Nick-name they can invent I retort nothing but hope in time they may come to their wits and be free to use their own Judgments as I have done and then they will tell me another story Farewel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 THE Standard of this whole Book OR A Grain of Salt to season every Proposition therein THE First light of Nature well observed and better improved creates a knowledg most kindly and similary to the common sense and genius of Mankind and is the most certain infallible fairest and freest way of reasoning and perswading without subtilties and sophistries of Logick or Rhetorick falsly so called By this First light and law of Nature we do well and truly understand our whole duty to God and to our Neighbour And are thereby capacitated to receive the Second light and law of Revelations into our minds and facilitated to embrace Divine impulses upon our wills and every way to be fitted for Christian perfections Without this plain Rule and Guide which some Learned men scorn and most men take little notice of all sorts of men fall upon incertainties and believe little but fluctuate much in empty and vast speculations and warp to every Fantastical Idea embracing the cloud of Error for real Truth without this we grope and wander in the dark If this solid foundation of prime natural easie Truths were well laid the Consequences agreeing together and resembling one another in their Principles would be known as Daughters by their faces and the features and tempers of their common Mother But Learned men are to blame to admire as they do Notions wild new and rare above the vulgar ken and consequential to no common foundation desiring to stoop so low as to dig out of those natural veins the precious minerals contained in them but flie to Chymical extractions of gold and silver out of lead and iron and neglect the true ore because every Bungling operator they think can do that But they would erect a Laboratory of Furnaces and Limbecks to extract more than the Sun can do out of the rich mass of the earthy and watry Globe In a word They reach at all things and catch nothing The great Scholar loses the day when the illiterate Rationalist carries the Truth in triumph upon his naked shoulders This First knowledge is as the Alphabet in all Books incorporated in all other knowledg A Light to the understanding of the Scriptures and all other Sciences This is the root spring and foundation of all Arts and without this we learn nothing This knowledge wanteth no other but all others want it This presupposeth no Grammar Logick Philosophy nor any of the Liberal Sciences but they presuppose this as the first and necessary Art that ordereth all others to the good ends of truth and happiness Because it teacheth man to know God and to know himself and to do as he would be done by to know why he is made and by whom and to whom he is obliged And except a man do know these things what will all other knowledge profit him This is easily learned without other helps and is not easily forgotten This makes a man cheerful humble liberal just obedient to hate all vice and love all vertue and it puffs not up at all This knowledge argues by infallible Arguments such as no body can deny because every man feels them true by his own experience within himself This knowledge seems at the first to be very vile and low and of no strength because it begins from the smallest matters as the Mathematicks do which every one is apt to slight but at last the high and noble fruits being discerned in the true knowledge of God and Man makes them of another mind Because by how much the more low the foundation is laid in easie and terrestrial things by so much the more lofty the structure is raised in hard and celestial matters Other knowledge is contrived in methods and terms Pedantick and unintelligible it puffeth up and the Professors and Scholars of several Faculties fall together by the ears and are never the wiser nor the more honest at all but impose upon themselves and the world of Fools that are willing to be cheated Which kind of slavery is abhorred and loathed by all liberal and noble Spirits So they most Majestically in their chains and purple Robes determine undeterminable things triumphing as the masters and conquerers of all Truth And can you blame
Nothing can be altered Eccles 1.15 That which is crooked cannot be made straight and that which is wanting cannot be numbred Consider the waies of God for who can make that straight which he hath made crooked Eccles 7.13 Let no man say Wherefore is this or wherefore is that For all things are fitted with their due shapes and qualities and though some things ugly in comparison of others yet all things make up the compleat beauty and loveliness of the Universe Reas A fortuitous convolation of blind Atoms could not do this Because all Beautiful composures require Labour and Art which is only in Spirit and Intellect not in Matter or Deadness Works of God harmonious III. Harmonious Works Agreement amongst disagreeing qualities and unlike quantities Reas 1. Because Chance links not one thing into another in contrived harmony 2. Because established Order amongst things void of understanding must be the work of an Infinite understanding that knows their natures and uses 3. Because not only Brutes but Inanimate Creatures sagaciously operate for ends which they understand not As the Regular course of a Ship argues a wise Pilot at the Helm so the Regular course of the World argues a wise Creatour Upon these Notions mankind acknowledged a Deity and because they could not see it chose to worship any thing for a God which they could see rather than to be without one which they could not see And when they found any benefit by any thing they made it a God as by Ceres Bacchus c. the good Corn and Wine that gladded their hearts Is not this a God And because they could not see the Deity being a Spirit they adored Idols and other Creatures which were material because they could see them Obj. Some have denied a Deity Sol. This is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to bely Nature In some Individuals Nature and Reason may be perverted by Education and Customes Institutions and Examples destroying natural Notions but this cannot invalidate Universal perswasions and the consent of all Nations The Will in some particulars doth often change as often as the Will changes which is very changable but the true Notion is fixt from the understanding natural which never changeth This must come either 1. From the Oracle of God or 2. From the Tradition of Parents If from God it must be true If from Parents it cannot be false Ob. Soul is invisible and all Spirits Ergo there are none Ergo no God Sol. Air invisible and Wind Ergo none Ob. We cannot comprehend God Ergo no God Sol. Inferiours cannot comprehend Superiours Beasts cannot comprehend Men nor their Actions Art or Government As Man is above Beasts so God is above Man There are higher than the highest and there are higher than they Arist Top. 6. That is universally known not which every one acknowledgeth but that which every one who doth not debauch his Faculties doth or may discern for it is enough evident that Gods Being lies eaven to all Understandings The Atheist eradicates 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 â—para To deny God is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Profaness of this Age has tinctured it with Atheisme Men sunk into Sensualities their Reason complies with their Carnal appetite contrary to its self and fain would they have none to see them or call them to an account Quod valdè volumus facilè credimus And so what they earnestly desire they do readily believe Therefore 1. Let the Soul know its own Imperfection and acknowledge all Perfection to be in God 2. Let the Soul know that Right and Wrong Good and Evil imply a Law which is Gods Ergo to be guided thereby 3. Let the Soul know she is a Judge of her own Actions but God is a Judge above her 4. Let the Soul know that her vast unsatiated desires may be satiated in God 5. Let the Soul know that she can frame no other Idea of God but that he is the first and best and therefore Independent and Munificent Being Therefore 1. Look on the Magnificent works of the VVorld Were they eternal in Atoms VVho made them 1. How could Dead matter move it self without Life and Spirit 2. How could Unreasonable matter produce Reason which it hath not Nihil dat quod non habet 3. How could blind Chance fall into such a World as it is and into no other and to no more what wit had it 4. How could various Atoms hang so handsomely together as they do and not flie unhappily asunder what Power had they 2. Look on the Beautiful works of the World How could ugly lumpish Matter make it self so fair as Nothing can be more 3. Look upon the Harmonious works of the World How can a curious Instrument be tuned without a skilful hand Why do not Contraries fall together by the ears sight and destroy all Who curbs them and keeps the Peace Who sets bounds to the proud Waves and keeps the Ocean with the bounds of the Sands 1. And now Who can look within himself into his own Soul and Body but he must see a God In his Understanding which because Imperfect must be derived from what is most Perfect which is God which in part sees good and evil Ergo God much more Which reflects upon and Judges good and evil Ergo God much more Which hath vast inexplicable desires Ergo God only can satisfie them 2. Who can look round about him upon the Creatures but he must see a God 1. In the Magnificence of his Works 2. In the Beauty of his Works 3. In the Harmony of his Works in which all agree And when we do see a God both from within us and from without us Who can choose but love obey trust and hope in him How then this Profaness this Cruelty this Hypocrisie c. Stay therefore and consider your own Souls your Bodies how wonderful they are how came you by them You made not your selves the Creatures made not themselves All must be judged Ergo there is a God Upon these Notions Mankind acknowledged a Deity And because they could not see Idolatry nor hear nor feel him being a Spirit and because they would not take so much pains as to elevate their Spirits to the contemplation of the Father of Spirits that they might worship him in Spirit they chose to acknowledge and worship any thing which they saw and felt any good from instead of the Most high God rather than be without one So when they found any extraordinary benefit from any thing they made it a God to them especially the Sun Moon and Stars whose kind influences they perceived to enrich the lower World with life and growth of all good things which did refresh their hearts with food and gladness And even those Men that had ruled them and saved them from their Enemies or taught them to sow Corn or plant Vineyards after their death they adored them for Petty-Gods as Mars and Ceres and Bacchus
Rebellion by providing for my Family I am deceived in Covetousness Extortion because I am a Gentleman I must not starve therefore I will take a Purse upon the High-way because I have a Wife and many Children and poor Kinred to maintain therefore I will gripe and grind the faces of the Poor and take all the unjust courses I can by a Community I am deceived in levelling and denying all Propriety and Superiority 5. By a pretended Law of God in a certain Law of Man Instances 5. By a pretended Law of God I am deceived in a certain Law of Man As by the Jewish Ceremonial and Judicial Laws now abolished which were once established by God I would have Adultery to be death and Theft punished only by Restitution a Tooth for a Tooth c. By Dominion pretended to be founded upon Grace I would deny all legal Propriety and none but the Babes of Grace should have right to any of the Creatures By imagination of Christ's reigning a Thousand years upon Earth I would destroy all the wicked in the World by Community of all things I deny the Propriety in any thing by God's seeing no sin in his Children I affirm they sin not at all or most of all and yet shall never be punished by the work of Grace irresistibly and absolute Assurances of salvation I presume to run on in wickedness till God call me and to be free from all doubts and fears 6. By a private Law in a publick Law Instances 6. By a private Law I am deceived in a publick Law I will be true to my Neighbour but false to the State I will sell cheaper than others on purpose to engross all the trade to my self and cheat so much the more those that I employ to work under me I will tithe Mint and Cummin and devour Kings Priests Widows and Orphans houses I will be quiet at home and factious and tumultuous in the Church and State an Angel in the Church and a Devil in my House I will use private Prayers by the Spirit and Fast and Preach in close Conventicles and despise publick Set-forms of Prayer and Fastings and Sermons in the open Church 7. By the Moral Law in the Ceremonial Law Instance 7. By the Moral Law I am deceived in the Ceremonial Law Because of Spiritual worship I will endure no Bodily worship because I may worship God in every place I will not worship him in a Set-place commanded because I must serve God every day I will observe no Holydaies 8. By the Ceremonial Law in the Moral Law Instance 8. By the Ceremonial Law I am deceived in the Moral Law Because I worship God in External forms I will not be careful of the sincere worship of my heart If I am baptized and receive the Sacrament and pray and fast and give Alms I will trust to the opus operatum the work done I will draw near to God with my lips when my heart is after my Covetousness SECTION V. 5. By one Law in all other Laws Instances V. By one Law in all other Laws By the Law of Zeal I would be quite lawless I would be as Elias Phinehas the Maccabees the Jewish Zealots the Stoicks the Roman Tribunes the Lacedemonian Ephori like Tully Demosthenes the factious Oratours and Poets the Oracles and Soothsayers kill steal lie flatter or do any thing as if by divine impulse break through all Laws for the glory of God and the good of the Commonwealth I would as Jehu drive furiously kill and slay and rob a Kingdom and say Come see my zeal for the Lord. I would like Brutus Cassius Cateline Sylla Marius Mauritius Phocas Ravilliac Massenello Cromwell Bradshaw c. banish proscribe murder massacre assassinate Kings Nobles Priests or People for God's Cause or my Countrie 's good I would preach Christ and persecute his Members I would propagate Religion by the Sword as the Turks do and say the Sword of the Lord and of Gideon and write upon my Sword Holiness to the Lord and cry cursed is he that witholdeth his hand from blood and doth the Work of the Lord negligently And curse ye Meroz curse ye bitterly those that come not to the help of the Lord against the Mighty This is the Zeal that sets the World on fire these are the daring men that have their Fates written in their Foreheads that are canonized for Saints and dye the Martyrs of Jesus or Mahomet and are called of God to be his Executioners to destroy all the wicked of the World to ride up to the Horse bridles in blood to carry all clear before them possess and rule all the Earth and after all mount up to rights into Celestial Mansions Cavete Principes Sacerdotes Nobiles c. My Zeal to Rome makes me cross the Law Temporal my Zeal to Geneva the Law Ecclesiastical and make them Ropes of Sand. This is the Hercules that clears the Augaean stable the St. George and Amadis de Gall that rids the World of Monsters and relieves all distressed Souls These sight the Lords Battels these are the Favourites and Darlings of Heaven and the Jewels of the Earth these are taught of God by the Impulse of the Spirit seeking God and finding Kingdoms these have signal Victoies and are as signally destroyed as ever that Egyptian Theudos the Gaulonite Moses Barchochebas David George John of Leyden Knipperdolling and Cromwell were By this Law I will outlaw the Law maintain and make the King a Subject My care of the Clergy and consistory would subordinate the Prince to the Priest and my love to the Lay-Presbytery would make Princes truckle under the People Iterum atque iterum cavetè Principes By this Law I walk alone in the pride and loftiness of my spirit By virtue of my zeal for the Lord of Hosts I am above all Laws I tread upon the necks of Kings and trample Lions under my feet Nay I sore aloft in the Clouds and disdain the poor Ants crawling upon this Mole-hill and fly swifter than the Wind upon the wings of the Spirit Alas poor vile Souls I have some pity in my holy anger I could tell them of higher and statelier conducts but they are not able to bear the ravishments and raptures of the Spirit Thus much inspired Learning makes me mad and Madmen will be subject to no Laws So with and without a Law I am deceived and will be deceived any way I care not God help me The CONTENTS Deliberation by halves Judgment by likelyhood Ampliations and limitations of Law Weighing my action by one Law Suspense between two Laws Sin hath the casting voice Reason of Law TITLE VII Of the Reasons of Deceit THE Reasons in general why one Law deceives me in another may be these Deliberation by halves I. To resolve upon my Action I deliberate to halves I grant the conclusion upon demi-Principles I lay an Action in the balance stript from those
were in Egypt the house of Bondage their service was hereditary arbitrary and unprofitable at pleasure of their Task-masters and no wages but a charge to find straw and be beaten for not performing their daily tasks The CONTENTS The Soul Spirit 's free TITLE IX Of the Seat of Slavery THE seat of Slavery is the Spirit The Soul A bondage on the Soul and her faculties The bondage of the Body is a grievous burthen but it is not the true slavery For a man's Body may be moved to and fro and set on work to dig or draw or tug at an Oar or any other beastly works according to the will and command of a Tyrant but the Will all this while is free to act according to the mind and reason of a Man So a vertuous ingenuous Man is spiritually and truly free inwardly in his mind to know and do better things though outwardly in his Body he be a slave at the will of another as if he had no will of his own because he cannot use it to the guidance of his Corporal actions but he hath a will free to the actions of his Soul Thus Joseph was a bodily Bondslave to his Mistress to do her lawful commands but was spiritually free and refused to be subdued to her Lust He was more free than she He only a slave Corporal to her bodily power she a slave spiritual to her own base and filthy desires Joseph endures not so base a bondage chuses rather to lye fast bound in the dungeon and let the Iron enter into his Soul Thus the Israelites were slaves in Egypt under the Iron yoke of Pharaoh but free in the service of God to wait for his Promises So in the Babylonish Captivity they were slaves in body yet free to serve the Lord and would not sing the songs of Sion in a strange Land Give me any slavery but the slavery of the Soul I had rather they should bind me in Chains and load me with bolts and fetters of Iron make me tug at an Oar dig in a Mine or draw in a Wagon than take away the free use of that little Understanding which God hath given me I value the liberty of my Body to go when and whither I please and to do what and how I have a mind to but I value the liberty of my Soul at a far higher rate to judge and resolve according to the best of my skill and understanding As Mammon is the false Riches of Unrighteousness not the true and right riches but Wisdom is the true riches of the Spirit so bondage or Corporeal slavery is the false slavery of Unrighteousness but the true slavery is of the Soul and Spirit If therefore the Spirit be enthralled as it should not be how great is that thraldom and if the Spirit be free as it should be how great is that freedom Reason Because all Spirits are naturally free for they properly do force but are not forced they lead and are not led they bind and are not bound Spirit 's free The Spirit of God is absolutely free The will of his Spirit is supremely free to himself for he doth whatsoever he will The presence of his Spirit who is the Father of Spirits brings freedom to others Spirits 2 Cor. 3.17 For where the Spirit of God is there is liberty The conduct of the Spirit of freedom is the great freedom of the spirit The Leader makes the Follower free As many as are led by the Spirit of God Ro. 8.14 they are the Sons of God Gods Free-men The Will is naturally free by its first creation but now it comes to be supernaturally free by its New creation So the Will draws nearer and nearer to God in Liberty till it comes to the measure of the fulness of the stature of Christ till it comes to will nothing but good and can do no otherwise Thus the Spirits of Just men are made perfectly free Necessary willing of Good without haesitancy from within or coaction from without is the greatest freedom Gods necessary doing of all good and impossibility of doing of any evil is his perfection Necessary willing of Evil without haesitancy from within or coaction from without is the greatest slavery Satans necessity of all evil and impossibility of doing any good is his imperfection Gods Spirit is perfect and absolute Freedom that makes the spirits of Just men and Angels perfectly and absolutely free Satans spirit is perfect and absolute bondage that makes the spirits of Unjust men and Angels perfectly and absolutely slavish For The Spirits of Angels and Men though naturally they be free yet accidentally they may be bound as in divers cases Satan himself and his Crue are all Spirit yet every Wizard pretends to bind them Jud. 6. But God doth indeed bind him and them reserving them in chains of Darkness unto the Judgment of the great day The Spirit of Man is free yet may it be religiously bound by a Vow or Oath Numb 30.2 and is shamefully bound by lust of Flesh the pride of World and the Temptations of the Devil and too often led captive by him according to his will Now the bondage of the Spirit is the true right and perfect slavery because the Spirit is naturally free and the more free a thing is naturally the more slavish is the bondage thereof for therein is the greater violence and the greater violence makes the greater slavery The CONTENTS Restraint from proper End Restraint from proper Guide Restraint from proper Act. Restraint from proper Rule Restraint from proper State Restraint from proper Right Constraint to base Actions TITLE X. Of the Cases of Slavery The Cases of true Slavery TRue Slavery is a thing so large and indefinite as that it cannot well be defined therefore it will be best by shewing the Cases thereof to design it As because Felony and Treason are Crimes indefinite therefore wise Lawyers do not define them but shew the Cases to design them Cases designing true Slavery I. A Restraint of Man from his proper End is slavery Restraint from proper end The proper End of Man is Happiness which consists in the knowledge and fruition of God For this is life eternal to know God c. other Ends are improper alien and forreign as Honour Wealth c. for these are neither his proper end nor yet the proper means to it they are neither happiness nor holiness For a man then to be restrained from true happiness that he cannot or may not be happy that he cannot or may not know or enjoy God this is true slavery For the disability to true happiness to be made uncapable of it is true misery and true misery is true slavery Hence Bastardy is a misery which bars the Child from all Inheritance and makes him uncapable of succession to his natural Father's Estate And Infamy is a misery which bars a man from all Offices and makes him uncapable of all Honour
by Law but Abel Noah Enoch c. the Sons of God before and after the Flood lived all by Faith Mystical Providences In all which Dispensations not only the Rites and Ceremonies of Worship the words of the Law and Prophets but the actions of God's Providence were Mystical to represent the things of Faith as Paradise and the Trees of Life and of Knowledge the marriage of Adam and Eve Eph. 5.32 the Calling of Abraham the Ark the Bondage of Egypt and deliverance through the Red Sea the Wilderness the Land of Canaan the Captivity of Babylon c. The interpreters that stick in Literal sense of the Old Testament cleave close only to the outside and bark but never come near the pith and marrow therein contained The History and Letter is not to be neglected but the truth of Faith covered and veiled in the Law and the Prophets and in the Transactions of God is to be searched diligently As the Fathers themselves and Prophets enquired after this Salvation and Grace which was to come unto them 1 Pet. 1.10 which things the Angels themselves desired to look into This is testified in the Scriptures 2 Cor. 3.6 c. God hath made us able Ministers of the New Testament not of the Letter but of the Spirit of the ministration of the Spirit and Life and of Righteousness much more glorious than that of the Flesh and of Death and Sin The Fathers were under the Cloud and all passed through the Sea 1 Cor. 10.1 c. and were all baptized unto Moses in the Cloud and in the Sea and did all eat the same spiritual meat and did all drink the same spiritual drink for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them and that Rock was Christ c. Now what is it to be baptized unto Moses in the Cloud and in the Sea but to pass through the Sea under the covering of a Cloud submitting themselves to the conduct of Moses as the Faithful do under the banner of Christ in Baptism And what are the Meat and Drink and the spiritual Rock but types of the spiritual Meat and Drink and Rock of Christ which the Apostle hints saying Now all these things happened to them for our examples and are written for our admonition verse 11. upon whom the ends of the World are come And Jesus Christ is the same yesterday to day and for ever Heb. 13.8 But most clearly speaks the Apostle in these words Now we have received not the spirit of the World but the Spirit which is of God 1 Cor. 2.12 c. that we might know the things that are freely given us of God which things also we speak not in the words which Man's wisdom teacheth but which the Holy Ghost teacheth comparing spiritual things with spiritual What are these Spiritual things but the Spiritual sense of Moses Law and of the Prophets compared with the more Spiritual things of the Gospel and of Christ In this sense the Law is Spiritual Ro. 7.14 Acts 7.38 and Moses is said to have received the living Oracles of God And the Jew and Circumcision openly in the Flesh and Letter is distinguished from the Circumcision of the heart and the Judaism of the Spirit This is the Righteousness of God Ro. 2.28 29. Ro. 1.17 revealed from Faith to Faith from the Law to the Gospel Grace for Grace the Grace of the Gospel revealed for that which was concealed in the Law For the Law was given by Moses but Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ Joh. 1.16 17. Luc. 24.45 And they erre that know not the Scriptures of the Old Testament in these senses for in them there is Salvation contained through Faith not the works of the Law as appears by the whole Catalogue of Saints in the eleventh of the Hebrews Indeed the kingdom of Heaven is not expressed in the Letter but in the Spirit of the Law which all did not perceive else how should the Sadduces part of the most Learned and many among the Priests and of the Sanhedrin not discern it Vide Act. 4.1 6. and 5.17 and 23.6 The Promises of the Law are plainly extant Exod. 16.27 28. and 19.5 6. and 23.25 Deut. 26.16 and 27.28 29 30. Lev. 25. per totum Heb. 7.19 and 8.6 and 9.15 and 7.16 and 9.9 14. 2 Tim. 1.9 10. Math. 22.36 Now these Carnal Rewards were not proportionable to a Spiritual Law therefore the Law was Carnal as the Promises were For the Moral Precepts that are of perpetual right are in their office Carnal if they be exerted no farther than the measures of a Carnal life As the Precept of loving our Neighbour respected only the duty of a Civil life among the Jews because the same offices of Civility were forbidden to be exercised by them towards the Ammonites Moabites Idumaeans and Egyptians Deut. 23.3 6 8. and 25.17 18 19. Upon this account Mordecai is supposed to deny to give honour to Haman Esth 2.3 These Precepts were given upon the account of hindering the infection of Idolatry by too much familiarity of Consanguinity Affinity or intimacy of Conversation And these very Enemies of God's People were figures of the Enemies of all Christians And this sense of the Law in this case Christ himself does declare in the Parable of him that fell among Thieves Luk. 19.29 By this way and method if due care were taken the Scriptures might be understood and the Word of Truth rightly divided and things new and old exactly distinguished and the difference between Judaism and Christianity exactly stated By this one distinction of a Mystical and Literal sense the Law of Works might be discerned from the Law of Grace the Righteousness of the Law from the Righteousness of the Gospel ☞ By this we should understand that all that was brought in by Moses is vanished and gone and nothing is of force or virtue to remain but that which was introduced by God of Christ from the beginning to be promulgated instaurated and fully reformed in the fullness of the Gospel times by Jesus Christ in the flesh Only we must take heed That although the reason of God's divine Counsel for the restauration of Man fallen in Adam is more clearly revealed by the Gospel than it was before or under the Law yet nevertheless it is not to be expected that out of the Scriptures we should define the same bounds of offices set by the preaching of the Gospel which were known and received to them that understood the Spiritual Law under Moses which was a Law that vailed a better Law For what should hinder but that while the same Reason of Salvation stands in force at all times there should be some offices proper only for some of those times according to the different manner of God's divine Revelation And therefore now all Carnal offices do cease which never were in their own nature acceptable unto God for they are
the World are blessed The CONTENTS What the Old Testament contains What the New Testament contains Gospel a Testament rather than a Covenant TITLE III. Of the Gospel a Testament FOR contemplation of this New Estate leaving the Wisdom of the Gentiles take but a short view of the Glories of the Old Testament so far out-shined by the lustre and brightness of the New The Old Testament held forth these things What the Old Testament contains 1. Legacies or Gifts devised thereby which were earthly and temporal as Canaan's Land with plenty peace honour and long life therein 2. Conditions Precepts or Laws such as were the Rites or Moralities therein 3. A Mediator or Executor who was Moses who dying before he had finished his office Joshuah succeeded him and gave the People possession of the Promised Land the People being first subdued by the Sword 4. Legataries Abraham and his Seed the Israelites 5. Publishing by Angels God's Representatives declaring his Will Act. 7.53 Gal. 3.19 6. Proof by Thunderings and Lightnings and the sound of a Trumpet with many Terrours upon the burning smoaking and trembling Mount Sinai to the heart-aking of all the Spectators and Hearers Exod. 19.16 Heb. 12.18 7. Writing of the Moralities of that Testament upon Tables of Stone by God Ex. 32.16 The Ceremonies and Penalties in a Book by Moses Ex. 24.4 8. Confirmation to be of force by the death of Calves and Goats Exod. 24.5 Heb. 9.19 For all Testaments are of force by the death of the Testator or some body for them if men should make such a Law as God did by the substitution of the blood of Beasts for that purpose The New Testament comprehends these things 1. Predestination or Purpose or good Pleasure of Will in God What the New Testament contains before the World to make a just Disposition of things to be or done in time and to be had and enjoyed to all Eternity 2. Declaration or Nuncupation to Jesus Christ the Son of God and Heir apparent of all things and sole Executor to his Father This Will I say was first Nuncupative or by Word of mouth declaring the full mind of the Testatour as a Will Parol made to Christ the Word and Wisdom of God that came from the bosom of the Father and revealed him Afterwards it was written by some of Christ's Apostles and other Divine Persons to whom he taught it on earth and from heaven as he had received it and they also preached what was revealed unto them to all the World 3. Legacy or Inheritance which is Blessedness and in order thereunto Forgiveness of sins the Gift of the Spirit and the Resurrection of the Body Which said Blessedness is a firm Estate in Heaven free from all Evil and full of all Good incorruptible reserved for us in the Heavens 4. Condition Resipiscence or Holiness possible and accepted though not perfect yet made perfect through Christ I say possible so made by God or else if the Condition had been impossible the Disposition had been void and unjust as all Impossible Conditions are and therefore such Testaments are null and void 5. Executor Jesus Christ who is a Mediatour between God and Man For every Executor mediates between the Testatour and the Legataries because the Legacies came from the Testatour first to the Heir or Executor as we now speak and by the means of the Executor they are conveyed to the Legataries who may not take them of their own accord with their own hands but must demand or sue for them from the hands of the Executor or otherwise they have no power no right to receive or enjoy them 6. Legataries instituted of God are All Believers In all Testaments for Pious causes the Legataries are instituted by appellative or common and not by their proper Names for then no Testament was able to contain them As when a Benefactour bequeaths such or such gifts to all the honest and laborious Poor in such a Town all that are honest and laborious Poor in that place may challenge their Legacies by virtue of that Devise neither can any of them so qualified be excluded or denied their dues It is therefore to be noted that this VVill of God is such a Will and that therein there is no Dereliction or Praeterition at all but that it is like an Universal Pardon proclaimed to all that will come in and accept thereof upon the Condition expressed Math. 12.18 Gal. 3.15 7. Proof by a Voice from heaven saying This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased Hear ye him Besides many and great Miracles 8. Confirmation by the Death of Christ substituted to take Flesh and die for God who could not die This is my Blood of the New Testament Math. 26.8 v. Heb. 9.15 All which Dispensations afford just matter of wonder adoration and praise of the manifold Wisdom and Grace of God Gospel a Testament rather than a Covenant The Gospel therefore appears to be a Testament to all intents and purposes much rather than a Covenant or any other Deed as may be demonstrated by these Testimonies and Reasons The very words used by Christ himself are a sufficient proof if there were no more which he uttered a little before his death Math. 26 28. This is my Blood of the New Testament which was shed for many for the Remission of sins And the repetition of the sense of them by St. Paul 1 Cor. 11.25 This Cup is the New Testament in my Blood David in the Spirit Then said I Loe I come In the volume of the Book it is written of me that I should fulfil thy will O God I am content to do it Sacrifice and Burnt offering thou wouldest not have but a Body hast thou prepared me Then said I Loe I come to do thy will O God Heb. 10.5 7 c. he taketh away the First Covenant that he may establish the second v. 29. That great Shepheard of the sheep through the Blood of the Everlasting Covenant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is used all along and the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 never in the Old or New Testament These are the two Covenants the one from the Mount Sinai which gendreth to bondage Gal. 44. c. This is the Covenant which I will make with the house of Israel I will put my Law c. In that he saith a New Covenant Heb. 8.10 c. he hath made the first Old now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away By so much was Jesus made Surety of a better Covenant Heb. 7.22 established upon better Promises Heb. 9.15 The Mediatour of the New Testament that by the means of Death for the redemption of the Transgressions that were under the first Testament they which are called might receive the Promise of Eternal Inheritance For where a Testament is there must also of necessity be the Death of the Testatour For a Testament
grievous in such cases The CONTENTS Writing Testimony Confirmation Execution Christ the Executor Executorship conditional Flesh and Blood Christ's Assention Spirit 's Mission TITLE VI. Of the Confirmation of the New Testament NOW the New Testament though it were not written as was the Old with the finger of God upon Tables of Stone but was Nuncupative yet this Nuncupation was by God himself not by any Angel and that unto Christ himself only to be published and accordingly was published by him in his own Person and by his Spirit in the persons of the Apostles and their Disciples through the whole World and afterwards committed to writing by the chief of the Apostles and not only so Writing but written again after a better manner by the spirit of God himself upon the Tables of Mens Hearts Testimony And as for the Testimony given thereunto to prove it to be the Will of God Christ himself did testifie thereof with such mighty miracles as never had been done before Besides the unquestionable Holiness of his life and the solemnity of his death Which things were not done in a corner but in the full view of a greater Congregation than was at Mount Sinai for he preached in their Temple and Synagogues and did wonders in all Judea and suffered death upon Mount Calvary Mat. 27.51 At which time the Vail of the Temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom the Earth did quake and the Rocks rent and the graves were opened and many bodies of the Saints which slept arose The Sun also was darkned after an extraordinary manner when the Moon was at the Full. And after all this was added as the last and greatest Proof of all the glory of his Resurrection and Ascention into Heaven He saith therefore of himself John 18.37 To this end was I born and for this cause I came into the world that I should bear witness unto the truth And the Apostle said of him 1 Tim. 6.13 Rev. 3.14 that before Pontius Pilate he witnessed a good Confession Hence he is called the Amen the faithful and true Witness the Martyr of the New Testament to testifie it with his Blood His death was not only a Testimony Confirmation but a Confirmation of the New Testament because his death doth wholly and for ever extinguish in him all will or power to revoke it and evidence that immediately from that Death God's Testament was ipso facto in force and began to take effect for the Justification of Mankind to all the Rights in that Testament contained by the Access of their Faith Thus the immortal God came as near to Death as he could by the Death of his Son in his Divine Nature immortal but made a mortal man to dye in his Father's stead and to demonstrate his own and his Father 's unconceivable Love to lay down his Life for Sinners Which thing deserves a perpetual Commemoration so commanded by Christ in the Holy Eucharist instituted by him for that purpose And as Wills are to be proved and confirmed Execution so they are to be executed and performed or else the Will it self is as dead as he that made it and so was made to no purpose The publick Wills of Legislators are to be put in Execution by sworn Magistrates or else the Law is in vain and a dead Letter And the private Wills of Testators are to be put in Execution by their Heirs or Executors covenanting and swearing so to do else the Will or Law of the Testator is frustrated Now of this New Testament Christ is the Executor or Mediator Christ Executor between God the Testator and the Legataries in the Will expressed to convey unto them from God as a Priest the Expiation of their Sins by his Sacerdotal offering up of himself to God in the Temple of Heaven and the Mission of his Spirit to cleanse their hearts and as a King sitting in the Throne of Heaven to rule his Church and protect them from their Enemies and to raise them up from Death and set them at his Right hand and at his left in heavenly places and as a Prophet to lead them into all Truth And Christ as an Executor and Mediator received to himself this benefit to be the universal Heir of God who was so by Nature and was so appointed by Grace to be Heir of all things Heb. 1.2 And for this purpose had all Power given unto him both in Heaven and Earth Mat. 28.18 and universal honour also wherefore God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name That at the name of Jesus Phil. 2.9 every knee should bow of Persons in Heaven and Earth and under the Earth For let all the Angels of God worship him Heb. 1.6 and he hath spoiled Principalities and Powers and triumphed over them openly 1 Cor. 15.27 and hath put all his Enemies under his feet The Reason is because Christ's Executorship was conditional Reason 1 Executorship Conditional that is charged upon the Condition of his own Death he must dye before he can enter upon it and therefore dye that he may perform it because every Testament is a Decree of things to be done after Death and this Testament of God hath this strange Prerogative above the Testaments of men that it is confirmed by the Death of a Man who was God and that the Executor not the Testator dyes and that the Disposition of things to be had or done is made after the Death of the Executor who for that purpose rose from the dead that he might justifie the faithful to the Inheritance of Heaven A Cause quite contrary to the Testaments of men wherin the Testator only dies to confirm his Testament and the Executor surviving performs it Therefore as Christ the principal Heir was fitted to receive his Inheritance ordained for him in that Testament whereof he was Executor So we that are Christ's Co-heirs must be fitted to receive the same Inheritance ordained for us in that Testament wherein we are Legataries Reas 2 Flesh and Blood 1 Cor. 15.5 Joh. â— 14 1 Cor. 15.45 Heb. 2.9 2. Because Flesh and Blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of heaven And CHRIST the Word was made Flesh but afterwards he was made Spirit For the last Adam was made a quickning Spirit And JESUS who was made a little lower than the Angels for or by they suffering of Death was crowned with glory and Honour And so Christ was made perfect For it became him for whom are all things and by whom are all things in bringing many Sons unto glory Heb. 2.10 to make the Captain of their salvation perfect through Sufferings And though he were a Son yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered and being made perfect he became the Author of Eternal Salvation unto all them that obey him And so Christians they are first Flesh For that which is
me free from the Law of Sin and Death Ro. 8.1 2. Ro. 8.5 6. And they that are in Christ walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit for to be carnally minded is death but to be spiritually minded is life and peace for they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit The Gospel times therefore were prophesied to be searching times Consequences Mal. 3.1 2 c. The Lord shall suddenly come into his Temple even the Messenger of the Covenant whom ye delight in Behold he shall come saith the Lord of Hosts But who may abide the day of his coming and who shall stand when he appeareth for he is like a Refiner's fire and like Fuller's sope And he shall sit as a Refiner and Purifier of Silver and he shall purifie the Sons of Levi and purge them as gold and silver that they may offer unto the Lord an Offering in Righteousness Then shall the Offerings of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the Lord as in the daies of old and as in former years Thus the thoughts of many hearts will be discovered and it shall be known who will follow the World and who will follow Christ who will live after the Flesh and who will live after the Spirit Who will enter into Covenant with God and who with the Devil Thus the Letter of the Law killeth 1. Because it only discovers sin 2. Because it only condemneth sin 3. Because it stirreth up sin the more 4. Because it punisheth sin without mercy Thus the Spirit giveth life 1. Because it offereth Life freely 2. Because it justifieth them that accept it 3. Because it saves them from Sin Death and Hell 4. Because it giveth them Eternal Life and Glory SECTION III. Digression Cautions Mistake not these words Take heed well what you hear and read He that hath ears to hear let him hear and he that hath a heart to understand let him understand 1. Some will not read the Scriptures nor hear them read or preached by any study or pains by any Art or Eloquence 2. Some will not pray by any forms at sett times or places nor submit to any Discipline nor preach by Meditation or helps of any Comments or Writing nor hearken to any Counsels Exhortations or Conferences nor be ruled by any Laws or Orders of men These trust they say to the Light that is in them and to the motions of the Spirit in their own Consciences which is rather their humor fancy and obstinacy These are above all Ordinances in the letter of the Law of God or Man and walk aloft by the revelations of the Spirit which if it were the true Spirit would never be contrary to the true sense and Spirit of the Gospel written and preached The Spirit teacheth us to pray preach and live Spiritually by the Means of the Word of God and wholesom Discipline of Men. Therefore what is written in the Book and preached by the Voice and commanded by lawful Power is the same with that which is the Mind of God first predestinated and secret then revealed and published to and by the Fathers at last to and by Christ and his Apostles and written in the heart by the Holy Ghost Therefore deceive not your selves 1. With vain Fancies and new Revelations for the Truth is old 2. With feigned Words and canting Expressions for the Truth is plain 3. With framing a Law to your selves as if infallible contrary to Nature's Law to the Laws of Nations and to Christ his Law This must needs be a Spiritual cheat tending to all mischief and confusion Take heed therefore 1. Of Law-Preachers of Curses Hell and Damnation 2. Of Spirit-Preachers of Evidences and Rapture walking without and against all Law and Rule These sort of men are Rigid Surly Morose Self-conceited Opiniators Malicious Proud Scoffers Straitners of God's love to Mankind therefore not of God and having not the Spirit SECTION IV. Leave of vain Disputes and learn 1. To hold all necessary and confessed Truths Instructionâ— and contend only for the Faith and a good Conscience 2. To submit to all Orders and Decencies and to fulfil all Righteousness which is the ornament of a meek and quiet Spirit which is in the sight of God of great price 3. To reverence and adore the Manifold Wisdom of God admiring and praising but not prying and searching into the Reasons of his Workings whose waies are alwaies Just but often hid from our eyes because his paths are in the great Waters and his foot-steps past our finding out 4. To embrace the Promises of Forgiveness of sins Adoption Heaven and Happiness This will engage the Soul to live by the Spirit of the Gospel and not merely by the Letter much less by the Law or by Sense This will sublimate the Soul to the spiritual acts of Faith Hope Love Prayer Self-denial against the Carnal acts of Sense Lust Drunkenness c. Forbear ignorant and proud boasting of the Spirit to be above Ordinances and contrary to what is Revealed it is most dangerous Let us not be Fools or Cross 1. In being too superstitiously Formal and trusting to Outward worship 2. In being too Profane and Licentious in neglecting all Conscience and Inward worship 3. In being too superstitiously precise in Inward worship only without any regard to Decency and Order calling it Jewish Heathenish and Popish 4. In being actually Rebellious thereupon by separation from publick Assemblies and rising up in Arms openly and destroying the Powers of the Church and State There is a right way if we could hit upon it as we may without prejudice against any man's Person to take in all the Truths held by them though we like not other things which they are mistaken in The way of Charity is excellent To suffer long and to be kind not to envy or vaunt not to be puffed up not to behave our selves unseemly 1 Cor. 13.4 c. nor to seek our own not to be easily provoked to think no evil not to rejoyce in iniquity but to rejoyce in the Truth to learn all things to believe all things hope all things endure all things There are that hold the Truth in Unrighteousness which ceaseth not to be the Truth because they hold it with other Errors There are that hold the Foundation of Gold Silver and Precious stones though they unhappily build Wood Hay and Stubble and such unworthy matter thereupon There are that sit in Moses's Chair and teach according to the Law and their Disciples are bound to believe and do according as they say though they say and do not There are that preach Christ out of Envy and for Gain and yet Christ is preached and thereat they may rejoyce and should rejoyce If I find a Jewel upon a Dung-hill I will stoop to take it up I will reverence Wisdom in the poor or blind or lame or otherwise
had shewed them his last Sign of Rising from the dead and had given power to his Apostles to work Wonders when they left the World he sent no more Angels nor Prophets nor did no more Signs or Wonders nor left no more Oracles but the Scriptures and minds of the Faithful enlightned by his Spirit to lead them into all Truth and to be with them to the end of the World Therefore we may not expect any Angel or Prophet nor any Thundrings or Lightnings Sword Famine or Pestilence Peace Plenty Health or Prosperity particular or general Judgments or signal Deliverances upon any such account as formerly to manifest thereby God's special favour or wrath to particular Persons or Nations in general as to their Spiritual or Eternal condition For God goes another way to work more free easie natural and rational to the Souls of men and made sweetly convincing and attracting to a more sublime and holy Worship suitable and pleasing to the Majesty of Heaven and therefore we are not to be frighted by Judgments nor allured by Prosperities into Religion as Children but informed convinced and perswaded like men by sound reason and understanding through any good or bad condition in this life unto the hopes of a glorious and blessed Immortality It becometh not Christians adult that know their Fathers Will to be in fear and bondage all their life long because of temporal Plagues nor to be ravished with temporal Joys but to live above them all by faith and not by sight as Pilgrims and Strangers here declaring by their Conversation that they have no abiding City below but that they seek one that is above whose builder and maker is God Eternal in the Heavens The Fifth BOOK OF A MEDIATOR The CONTENTS Transition Mediator Reconciliation Moses TITLE I. Of the Name and Thing THE Dispositions of the Will and Estate in God's Testament are to pass through the hands of the Mediators or Executors of them both Transition who are Moses and Christ The word MEDIATOR is rarely Mediator if at all found in any Heathen Author being proper to the Holy Scriptures only Philo the Jew uses it whose form of writing resembles the Old Testament so familiar to that Nation The said Philo calls the High Priest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Jews had a High-Priest as a Mediator between two that by some middle Person they might appease God God dispenses his Graces to Men using as it were the Ministery and Subserviency of some certain Person Reconciliation CHRIST first obtained of God that to Mankind fallen into heinous Sins God would neither shut up the door of Repentance nor refuse to grant pardon to the Penitent which is that first Conciliation that was procured for all Mankind Rom 5.10 When we were Enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son All things are of God who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ 2 Cor. 5.18 19. and hath given to us the Ministery of Reconciliation to wit that God was in Christ reconciling the World unto himself not imputing their trespasses unto them c. So Job was a Mediator to God for his two Friends My Servant Job shall pray for you for him will I accept Job 42.8 The great Benefits that accrue to the World by Christ are not only obtained by his Prayers but by his vast obedience unto death who gave himself a Ransom for all Eph. 1.10 11. to be testified in due time That in the Dispensation of the fulness of time he might gather together in one all things in Christ In whom also we have obtained an Inheritance being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will A Mediator therefore is an Arbiter Herald or Messenger that intervenes between two Persons to relate their mutual minds and meanings to each other and to propound Articles of peace and agreement between them that are at variance or to propose and declare Rules and Laws for both Parties to consent unto Moses Moses was the Mediator or Intercessor between God and the Israelites to make and finish up a Covenant between them and this Covenant was the Law Gal. 3.19 20. Ordained by Angels in the hand of this Mediator Now a Mediator is not a Mediator of one but God is one Note that though the Law was ordained by Angels yet it was not immediately delivered by them to the People but by the intervention or means of the Mediator Moses who passed between the Angels and the People God gave the inheritance of Canaan to Abraham immediately by Promise but the Law that was added because of Transgressions four hundred and thirty years after till the Seed should come to whom the Promise was made was delivered by the ordination of Angels and the Mediation of Moses 1. Because Law was a Terror but the Inheritance was a matter of Grace As is the manner of great Princes to bestow their Graces and Favours by themselves but to execute matter of Law and Justice by their Officers and Judges Moses was the Receiver of the Law from the Angels and the Repeater of it to the People three daies together for the Commandments thereof but the Judgments were published by Moses only upon the Peoples request because of the terror of the Angels voice who first wrote them in a Book and afterward read them openly to all the Congregation So for the Ceremonies Moses had a Pattern delivered unto him in the Mount Exod. 22. Exod. 25.9 Deut. 5 5. Act. 6.11 called therefore the Law of Moses and Moses We have heard blasphemous words against Moses ye have one that accuseth you even Moses in whom ye trust So the Archangel was the Minister of God to the People not the Mediator 2. Because the Archangel sustained the very Person and Majesty of God and therefore spake not as an Embassador or Messenger for every Embassadour distinguisheth his own Person from the Person of his Master that sent him and speaketh not in his own name but in the name of the Prince or State that imployed him whom he also represents But the Archangel spake as if God himself were present without other Angels to attend him Whereas it is said that the Commandments were delivered by the hand of Moses it is as much as to say by his Ministery because the Hand is the greatest Instrument of working Exod. 32.15 and 34.29 So the two Tables are said to be written by the Finger of God and were delivered into Moses's hand But the Judgments and Ceremonies which made up the greater bulk of the Law so passed through Moses's hand as that he wrote them in a Book The hand writing of Ordinances which was against us Exod. 24.4 Heb. 9.19 Deut. 31.9 10. Col. 2.14 and contrary unto us was nailed to the Cross of Christ So they were written by Moses the Mediator of the first Testament and cancelled by
and purity of an Evangelical spirit We dwell too much upon outward and carnal things which are lawful as of Water in Baptism Bread and Wine in the Communion Fasts and Feasts Rites and Ceremonies Penances Judgments Prosperities and stretch them too far or lay too hard a stress upon them The two Sacraments ordained by Christ and the other decent Orders of the Church for edification and the Dispensations of outward Punishments and Blessings are reverently to be observed and practised but not in the outside and Gaiety only to move humiliation and fear but in the intrinsecal and essential virtue to create spiritual Communion Love Joy and hope of Glory To use Rites is comely and for Edification but to multiply them to distraction is Jewish and Paganish and of it self a dead way without any spirit or life at all Covet therefore after the best of Gifts and behold I shew unto you a more excellent way to make it our meat and drink to do the will of God to fulfil all Righteousness outward but not to rest there but to taste the good Word of God and the Powers of the VVorld to come and to have our Spirits throughly exercised to discern the Truth in all Shadows I will not slight but reverence every Ordinance of Man for the Lord's sake and for Conscience sake I will read and hear and see the description of Christ in a Book or Sermon or Picture but I will come nearer to Christ and close in my Soul with his Spirit I will be ravished with his Love that died for me and rose again and admire and draw a Curtain and be silent when I cannot describe nor imagine the infiniteness of his Shames and Glories Call me to Joy and Gladness after I have tried all other waies and to a constant walking with God and full Assurance of Heaven 1. Because Christ hath entred into his Temple and opened the Kingdom of Heaven to all Believers 2. Because Christ hath offered and presented himself to God for all his Saints 3. Because Christ sits and rules in Heaven and by his Spirit in all Saints and over all his and their Enemies 4. Because Christ as a Prophet teacheth us and leads us into all Truth 5. Because Christ makes Intercession for us 6. Because Christ will come again in great glory to raise from the Dead to Judge and to call to the full possession of Glory And this practice is truly and solidly comfortable unmixt with Carnal VVorship or VVorldly Policy Nothing but honesty and love in all this no scandal of the Cross because of the ample recompence of Reward No true and proper Priest Prophet or King but Christ All Priests and Prophets and Kings in Christ who is all in all God blessed for evermore The Second Use therefore is to conform to his Exaltation and Glory The CONTENTS Victory over Sin Imputation of Righteousness Jural Righteousness Reasons of Victory over Sin Light conquers Darkness Sin no Native Propension in Nature to its proper state Genuine Nature of the Spirit Superior Faculties predominate Active Co-operation Christ's Victory over Law Outward Covenant of Works Inward state of Mind Alive to Sin Dead to Law Carnal Liberty to Sin Legal Perfection Our Victory over Law Grace stronger than Law Spirit of Grace stronger than Spirit of Law God delights more in Mercy than Vengeance Man object of God's Love Christ's Pleading undeniable to God Christ's Victory over Death Victory procured meritoriously by Christ's Death Victory obtained by the Spirit of Faith Our Victory over Death Sin conquered Law conquered Devil conquered Christ entred into the Holy of Holies TITLE VIII Of Christ's Exaltation CHRIST's Resurrection manifested his Death to be effectual against Sin 1 Cor. 15.57 Law and Death else our Faith had been in vain and we yet in our sins For he was delivered to death for our sins and rose again for our Justification Ro. 4. If Death had held him then neither Sin nor Law nor Death nor Satan that hath the power of Death had been conquered and then Sin and Law and Death and Hell must have held us for ever This therefore is the greatest of all Christ's Miracles for the World to believe him to be a perfect Saviour which without it could never have been believed This takes away all scandal of the Cross for we worship not one was as the Jews call him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or as Lucian 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Crucified or Staked-God But when the Lord was Risen then Faith revived The Disciples thought this had been he which should have restored the Kingdom to Israel but he was dead and buried and therefore all their hopes of that ever coming to pass were dead and buried with him But now he is Risen from the Dead both theirs and ours is risen up again with him who though he was crucified through weakness yet he liveth by the power of God Christ's Resurrection assures us of Life after death of which the World was never assured before 'T is he that hath abolished Death and brought Life and Immortality to light through the Gospel 2 Tim. 1.10 Who after he had overcome the sharpness of Death did open the Kingdom of heaven to all Believers The Reasons of Philosophy to prove the Soul's Immortality and the Bodie 's Resurrection though demonstrative enough yet are so thin and subtil that they glide and slip away quickly from Vulgar Apprehensions But Christ his Soul being in Paradise during the Body's abode in the Grave and his Resurrection Appearances and Conversations and Visible Ascension into heaven do put the matter out of question and more strongly affect Vulgar minds By and after Christ's Resurrection he was made Lord and Christ King and Saviour Christ's Oeconomical Kingdom is calculated from the Epocha of his Resurrection and Ascension and sitting at the Right hand of his Father in heaven Let all the house of Israel know assuredly Act 2.36 that God hath made that same Jesus whom ye have crucified both Lord and Christ Jesus whom ye slew and hanged on a Tree him hath God exalted on his Right hand Act. 5.31 to be a Prince and a Saviour He humbled himself to the Death Phil. 2.9 even to the death of the Cross wherefore God hath highly exalted him and given him a Name above every name that at the Name of JESUS every knee should bow c. All Power is given to me both in Heaven and Earth Matth. ult 1 Cor. 15.27 God hath put all things in subjection under Christ's feet the Vicegerent of God a Mediatorious King till he hath put down all Rule and all Authority and Power and hath delivered up the Kingdom to God the Father that God may be all and in all A great Comfort that one of our Flesh and tempted as we and therefore knows the better how to pity us and succour us when we are tempted A great Comfort that our Flesh is in Heaven already as
perfect temper again Propension in Nature to its proper state 3. Because there is a great propension in Nature to return to its proper estate by casting of what is heterogeneal thereunto So Medicaments are subservient to Nature by removing obstructions but Nature it self and the inward Archeus being released and set at liberty works the Cure The whole Creation groaneth and longeth to be delivered Ro. 8.21 Bodies bent out of their natural place and violently forced from their proper position of their parts have a spring of their own and an inward strong tendency to return to their posture again This is Motus Restitutionis as if the Air be driven into a narrow compass it hath a spring or Conatus to come back to its proper state So a stone thrown upwards hastens to fall to its Center Sin is a violent and preternatural Estate Returning to God and Righteousness is Motus Restitutionis Liberationis a motion of Restitution and Liberation The Elater and spring in the Soul being quickned and enlivened by God's Grace hath a natural Conatus to return to its proper Estate I delight in the Law of God after the inward man but I see another Law in my Members Ro. 7.21 warring against the Law of my Mind and bringing me into captivity to the Law of Sin which is in my Members This is called Spirit the Mind of the Spirit Inward Man Law of Mind an Innate propension of the Soul awakened to return to its genuine condition as it is intellectual and free to its ancient Nature When the Spirit of God promised to Believers acts from the Spirit or Soul of the Faithful there is 1. An Assent to yield unto God 2. An Acceptation to receive his Promises 3. A Concurrence to work with him Here is no external force or violence offered to the Soul to free it from a state which it would alwaies continue under but a sweet and gentle Call to return to its proper state which the Soul it self longs for Where the Spirit of the Lord is 2 Cor. 3.17 there is Liberty The Freedom of the Spirit is the Soul 's acting from an inward principle and spring of its own Intellectual Nature Longing to be restored and endeavouring with God's Grace to return So that there is not a mere outward Impulse of the Spirit of God but an inward Concurrence of the Spirit of Man The Soul is not like a Boat tugged or driven by Oars or Winds but it goes on Secundo flumine according to the genuine Current of its own intellectual Nature with the help of the gentle gale of the Divine Spirit Genuine nature of the Spirit 4. Because it is the genuine Nature of the Spirit to do that which is agreeable to the Spirit and pleasing to God of whose Nature the Spirit doth partake Vertue and Honesty are homogeneous Vice and Wickedness are heterogeneous There is in the Spirit Cognatio quaedam cum Deo A certain kindred with God 5. Because it is natural to the superior Faculties to be predominate Superior Faculties predominate They are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of a Lordly nature and made to rule and the inferior Faculties are of a Servile disposition and made to obey It is then but Jus Postliminii for Equity Light and Reason to be re-inthroned in my Soul there to command and suppress the Exorbitant affections that rise up against it This is the design of God in the Gospel to restore us to the rectitude and perfection of our own Beings Wherefore he calls us off from the perishing vanities of this World so infinitely below us not to debase or pollute our Spirits by them not to gratifie our lower Faculties the Brute that is in us but the sublimer Angel above The outward objects are but Baits to the outward relishes and sensations of the Body The outward World is like an enchanted Palace seemingly ravishing but a mere Spectrum or shadow that which pleases is the Vital energies of our own Spirits to Vertue and Goodness 6. Because we are not merely Passive Active Cooperation but an active Co-operation is required in us The Spirit of God in Nature that Spiritus intus alens produceth Vegetables and Minerals beyond Art and Industry yet it doth not work absolutely unconditionally omnipotently and irresistibly but requireth certain preparations and dispositions of Plowing Sowing c So the Spirit of God requireth some preparations and dispositions in our Spirits forasmuch as it may be stirred up or excited in us or resisted and quenched by us Unless the Husbandman stirrs up and plows the ground the Spirit of God in Nature will not give any increase So we are bidden to plow up the Fallow-ground of our hearts that is to do our earnest endeavours to work out our own salvation to fight the good fight of Faith to run the Race and to enter in at the strait-Gate Be not therefore merely Passive but move and co-operate with God Fac quod in te est do what is in thy power to do and God that gave thee that power if thou use it will give thee more 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do but breath a desire and long to come to God and God will meet thy desires and draw thee after him with the Cords of his Grace and Love It is a never-failing Rule He that hath shall have more full measure pressing down and running over shall God give into his bosom But he that hath not from him shall be taken away that which he seemeth to have For all Motions unto Sin and from God are unnatural retrograde excentrick unkindly forced cross unprofitable dishonourable SECTION III. Of Christ's Victory over Law Hitherto I have spoken of the Inward Victory over Sin by the Resurrection and Spirit of Christ Now in the second place of the Victory attainable by the same Power over the Law by Christ his Victory over the Law Where Sin is there is alwaies a Law and where there is no Law there is no Transgression The Law is considered two waies Outward Covenant of Works 1. As an outward Covenant of Works by which Death is to all that break it in Morals or Ceremonials And all men are naturally under the Law and are convinced thereby of Sin and Death and are therefore in bondage and fear of death all their life long without mercy This outward Letter or Covenant of Works is conquered by Christ's Death on the outward Cross Christ hath redeemed us from the Curse of the Law Gal. 3.13 being made a Curse for us as it is written Cursed is every one that hangeth on a Tree That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Christ that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through Faith That we might be free from the Obligation to the Commandements which were not good Exod. 20.25 Christ having broke down the middle-wall of Partition Eph. 2.14 15. that was between the Jew
5. Some mens Religion is nothing but a Faculty of Rhetoricating in Preaching and Praying by Inspiration as they call it of the Spirit whereas in truth it is a mere Natural Faculty often helped by Art and Learning in persons grosly hypocritical and debauched There is a mere Natural Enthusiasm of Poetry and Oratory Est Deus in nobis agitante calescimus ipso Sedibus Aetheriis Spiritus ille venit And when such Eloquent and fiery men are imployed in Religious Exercises they are fluent to admiration and become extremely popular to lead Multitudes like Pitchers by the Ears into Fanatick Distempers against Church and State in Peace or Warr especially if they be bred in the Schools of Learning or set in Publick Imployments It is farr from my meaning to undervalue or declare against the sincere and ardent affections of Devout Souls naturally and freely breathing out their earnest Ejaculations to God in private But to caution the Simple well-meaning People from mistaking the Natural and Enthusiastick fervour of mens Spirits and the ebulliency of their Fancies and Expressions for a supernatural Inspiration especially if they meddle with Religion or Polity for which they have no warrant from God or Man Let the World know what wise men judge That the Evidence and Demonstration of God's Spirit consisteth not in words and talk as if God were to be heard for their much speaking or glorified by their loud noises and long harangues For that is chiefly to be discerned in Life and Action though the words be few And therefore when some Corinthians were puffed up by reason of a rich Fancy they had expressed by the sweetness of Attick Eloquence in which they were bred so that the Unlearned had their Persons in great Veneration above St. Paul who had not that strain nor could use the entising words of man's wisdom in the business of the Gospel he tells these deceived Souls having the Word of God in respect of persons and their boasting Teachers the Gnosticks That he would come amongst them for he had the Spirit of Discerning and know not the speech of them that were puffed up but the power For the Kingdom of God saith he consisteth not in Word but in Power and Life Wherefore laying aside all these deceitful Fancies let us really set our selves to mortifie all our Lusts and Affections That being Born Crucified Dead Buried and Risen with Christ here we may live Eternally with him in Glory hereafter Amen SECTION I. From all these Premises we derive these Corollaries or Conclusions Of the Consequences of Christ's Death and Resurrection Material Cross 1. There is a Material Cross of Wood. There are Whips Nails a Crown of Thorns Agony and Death at Jerusalem outward visible matter of Fact a History 2. There is a Spirttual Cross The spirit virtue of Death Spiritual Cross Fellowship of Sufferings Death of Sin in the Heart inward invisible matter of Right a Mystery 3. Material Resurrection There is a Material Resurrection from Death and Grave at Jerusalem outward matter of Fact History 4. There is a Spiritual Resurrection virtue Spiritual Resurrection power of Resurrection from Death in Sin to the Life of Righteousness in the heart inward matter of Right Mystery The Historical Faith is only of matter of Fact for Knowledge only as the Devils and Turks c. believe The Justifying Faith is for matter of Right for Merit Virtue Power Comfort of Christ's Death and Resurrection by the Spirit of Christ So are all the Promises of God accepted by us and sealed confirmed to us So we promise and covenant to and with God So we partake of all the Benefits of his Death and Resurrection 5. Material Ascension There is a Material Ascension of Christ into the holy place of Heaven offering up his Blood to consecrate that place for us sitting at the Right Hand of God and making intercession There he rules over all things from thence he sends down his holy Spirit Matter of Fact History 6. There is a Spiritual Ascension Entring into the Hearts Spiritual Ascension Ruling in our Souls by his Spirit Crying Abba Father Matter of Right Mystery So in Christ's Birth Life Death Resurrection and Ascension there is a History and a Mystery a Letter and a Spirit 1. Christ is born in our Flesh Christ is born in our Spirit We are born in the Flesh we are born again in the Spirit Christ is formed in the Womb of his Mother We are formed in the Womb of Christ We are born in Christ and with Christ and Christ is born in us and with us 2. Christ died in the Flesh we are dead in the Flesh we are dead to the Flesh We are dead in the World we are dead to the World We are dead with Christ and buried with Christ 3. Christ rose in the Flesh Christ riseth in the Spirit We shall rise in the Flesh we shall rise in the Spirit Thus there is a Birth in Sin there is a Birth to and from Sin and there is a Birth for Sin Thus there is a Birth in Sin there is a Birth from Sin and there is a Birth to Sin Thus there is a Life in Sin there is a Life from Sin and there is a Life for Sin So Christ's Death conquers our Sins for us And Christ's Spirit conquers our Sins in us So Christ's Resurrection raiseth us from Sin unto Righteousness Christ's Resurrection justifies his Death to be true and Christ's Resurrection justifies the pardon of our Sins and his Spirit doth actually assure the pardon to our Souls So Christ is in us and with us and we are in Christ and with Christ So Christ lives in us and with us and we live in Christ and with Christ So Christ is crucified in us and with us so we are crucified in Christ and with Christ So Christ dies in us and with us and we die in Christ and with Christ So Christ rises in us and with us so we rise in Christ and with Christ So Christ is glorified in us and with us and we are glorified in Christ and with Christ This is to eat Christ's Flesh and drink his Blood spiritually This is to put off the Old Man and to put on the New Man This is our Regeneration and a New Creature This is our Communion with Christ and Christ's Communion with us This is to dwell in Christ and Christ in us This is to be one with Christ and Christ with us I am my Well-beloved's and my Well-beloved is mine This is to believe all and do all in the Spirit in the Lord and for the Lord. All is our Faith all is his Spirit The words that I speak unto you they are Spirit and Life If ye fast or weep for Christ's Death if ye feast or rejoyce for Christ's Resurrection do all in the Spirit Pray Praise Hear Read Sing Meditate Communicate Live in the Spirit Obj. The Language is hard and high Sol. It is
concernments is much pleased with them that after a little pain and patience there may be the greater indulgence unto carnal things for which they quickly hope for expiation by carnal sufferings A great cheat in carnal Religion Thus the outward man is much pleased 1. With the History of the Cross of Christ 2. With the pictures of the Cross of Christ and sheds many a melting tear at the actings of this Tragedy 3. With Whippings Fasting Sackcloth Pilgrimages c. Col. 2.18.23 A voluntary humility a shew of wisdom in Will-worship and humility in neglecting of the body and not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh 2. The Inward Cross is the power and virtue of Christ's death the spirit of Mortification and Self-denial the Spirit the Inward Man is much delighted with these exercises of the Spirit the Mystery of Christ's Cross the Memory and Love of Christ crucified the Joy and patience of suffering for Christ 2. The Effect of the Cross Crucifixion Effect of Cross Crucifixion Procured by Outward Cross which is 1. Procured and merited for us by the outward Cross and Passion Sacrifice and Oblation of Christ for us By these is Salvation from the victory of Sin Death and Hell all conquered by Christ Propitiation and Attonement made Security from the barr of Justice that Scopulus Reorum and Curse of Law Solus calcavit Torcular 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christ trod the Wine press of God's wrath alone no Angel nor Man to help him He left nothing undone that he might be the Author and Finisher of our Salvation and was made perfect through sufferings 2. Wrought and effected to us and in us by the Inward Cross and Passion of Christ sacrificed and offered in us This is the spirit and power of his death the virtue of his Resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings Philosophy 1. Philosophy did combate much with sin Vertue kills Vice Reason destroys Passion Brave Seneca cries out like a Christian O when shall I see the day when all my Passions shall be subdued and that I shall say Vici I have overcome them Christianity 2. Christianity much more more than Conquerors I thank God through Jesus Christ Thanks be to God which hath given us Victory through Jesus Christ our Lord. Only be valiant and of a good courage Flie from sin as from a serpent resist the Devil and he will flie from you stand still and see the salvation of God This power of the Cross will do our work for us and in us this death destroys death this is to conquer by suffering Depressu Resurgo the more kept down the more we rise A Divine virtue in Christ's sufferings a great conquest made by the Son of God in his own person for us in our persons for our selves under him and by him From hence we have power to conquer Sin Law Satan Death I can do all things through Christ that strengthneth me Hence we overcome the world are dead unto it using the world as if we used it not this is our victory even our Faith this is Self-denial Mortification Crucifixion with Christ Regeneration a New Creature Thus Christ hath redeemed us from all iniquity and purified to himself a people zealous of Good works perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord that they might obtain an inheritance among them that are sanctified by faith which is in Christ Jesus It is not therefore good to glory in Carnal things such as Eloquence Wit Beauty Health Honour Riches c. It is not good to glory in Carnal Religion such as are 1. Ceremonies Judaical or Heathenish 2. Ordinances Opus operatum Prayers Fastings Hearings c. It is good to glory in Spiritual things such as are Faith Love Hope Patience Joy Peace Rejoyce in the Lord evermore and again I say rejoyce But this is counted no Joy but Melancholy or Religious Madness in Sequestrations from worldly Policies and Glories and Conversation wit God and our own Souls The gaieties of this world affect the senses and they are counted little better than stark Fools that prefer undiscerned contentations of the spirit before them When Paulinus a Young Noble Man and Senatour of Rome renounced the World and became a Christian the whole City wondred at it and all the Wits jear'd at his retirement from the splendour of the Court What a Gallant so young ex illâ formâ ex illâ prosapiâ illâ indole so beautiful of such a family and of such ingenuity and leave all his companions and pleasures Such men are counted mad men and weary of their lives scorning the delights of Nature Paula and Melania two Noble Ladies left their honours and estates for the Cross This was presently Table-talk for all Rome St. Paul so noble so learned so honour'd as he was counted all but Loss and Dung to gain Christ was as a man crucified and dead unto the world the world had no favour for him nor he for the world so is a Christian not of this world dead to it looks to higher things As the Jews had no dealing with the Samaritans so Christians have not their conversation with the world As a man Proscribed is pursued from place to place hiding his head so is a Christian As a Woman divorced from the Bed and Board of her Husband lives still in the family walks up and down like a shadow hath food and clothing only upon courtesie but no countenance from her Husband nor respect from her children nor command over her servants So are those that take up the Cross of Christ and follow him Cast therefore your eye once more upon this great Mediator in all his Transactions Here 's a Conception Birth Life Cross Death Here 's a Resurrection Ascention Entrance and Oblation in the Holy Place Session and Intercession And what a coming to Judgment will that be at the Last Day How is all this apprehended Why was all this Action and Passion Shame and Glory Was not a Deity offended and thereby appeased How Affected what Joy what Sorrow what Hope what Faith what Obedience what Thankfulness what Love what Oblation of all that we are and have and all nothing to what is due from us but is all accepted of God More would a Soul inflamed with divine love do or suffer She cannot do what she would but she will do what she can and throw her self into the arms of her dear Lord praying him to accept her as she is and make her such as he would have her for to be for his own great Mercies sake I. Christ the true Sacrifi◠and Priest Christ therefore is the Absolute and true Sacrificer and Sacrifice in se per se in himself and by himself 1. Because he only perfectly pleased God This is my Well-beloved Son in whom I am well pleased He only was without sin he only fulfilled the Will of his Father 2. Because he only is the cause of all our
of sinful Love must be digged up by the roots before we can come to plant the habit of Divine Love Justice Mercy or Humility in our hearts There must be mortification of lusts self-love love of the World pride of life we must go out of our selves renounce the World before in the place of these evil Habits we can get a habit of pure love to God to our selves to our neighbours to our enemies And all this for God's sake for goodness sake if there were no other reward for the glory of God for the good of our selves for the good of the Church for the good of Mankind Contractio Causae 1. All Religion is Love Spiritual 1. Sorrow for Sin and hatred of it 2. Satisfaction to God offended 3. Reformation of life 4. Love of Justice Mercy Humility 5. Love of God 6. Love of Soul 7. Love of Heaven To be spiritually minded is life and peace If ye walk after the Spirit ye shall live The things that are not seen are Eternal We live by Faith We mind heavenly things We set our affections on Heaven 2. All Irreligion is Love Carnal 1. Delight in Sin and love of it 2. Dissatisfaction to and contempt of God offended 3. Continuance and increase in Evil. 4. Love of Injustice Cruelty and Pride 5. Hatred of God 6. Love of Body 7. Love of World To be carnally minded is Death If ye walk after the Flesh ye shall dye The things that are seen are but temporal We live by Sense We mind earthly things We set our affections on Earth Now after all this If to live spiritually be impossible why then doth God command it An impossible command is no command Why do we Preach it God should mock us to bid us do that which he hath not given us power to do We should be found lyars like Aegyptian Task-Masters to exact the number Bricks and not allow materials But if to live Spiritually be possible Why then do we not live so and how shall we answer it to God and Men and to our own consciences our consciences will condemn us and good men will condemn us and God who is greater than our consciences and all the World will condemn us much more The great objection against pure Religion is That the flesh is weak Object original sin is strong temptations are many and vehement The Devil is subtil the World hates and persecutes strongly We profess against all these Answ and if we would strive as much against them we might overcome all these If there were faith and hope of a Resurrection to Glory it would work a victory over Sin World and Devil and with God's help nothing should be impossible unto us This was typified by Pharaoh the Red Sea the Wilderness the Anakims Giants the Towns walled up to Heaven yet all these were overcome These things are written for our instruction that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope We can do all things through Christ that strengtheneth us We shall be more than conquerors and bruise Satan under our feet If God be with us who shall be against us Only be valiant and of a good courage and stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. But once more before I take off my Pen let me contemplate Christ our Mediator in all his Offices 1. A Priest sacrificing himself on the Altar of his Cross Christ a Priest So is a Christian crucified with Christ dying daily filling up that which is behind of the sufferings of Christ We bear in our bodies the dying of the Lord Jesus because we are his Members of his Flesh and of his Bones We have put on Christ and Christ is in us and we in him St. Chrysostome is not ashamed to call Christ's sufferings his sufferings Christ himself saith Saul Saul why persecutest thou me In as much as ye do it to any of these Little ones ye do it unto me We are baptized with the baptism of Christ and drink of his Cup. His Cross is ours and ours is Christ's we are to look upon all the sufferings of Christ's members as the sufferings of the head for the body is one and all parts suffer together our members are the members of Christ our bodies the Temples of the Holy Ghost we are in Christ and Christ in us he suffered in his Person we suffer in our persons we take up his Cross We men as Priests with him sacrifice our selves with him in him and by him who sacrificed himself for us as God and Man Christ quickened by his Eternal Spirit 2. Christ quickened his Body by his Eternal Spirit and so entred into the holy place to offer up himself by the same Spirit unto God once for all men so Christians have their Bodies quickned by the Spirit of Christ and so enter with him and by him into the holy place to offer up themselves unto God and are accepted by him for Christ his sake So we are in Christ crucifying and killing our selves that is our sins in the bodies of our sinful flesh so we are in Christ offering up our quickned bodies without sin in the Holy place where no unclean thing can ever enter following him who hath made way for us that where he is there we might also be for he being lifted up draws all men after him and where the carcass is there will the Eagles be gathered together Thus are we Priests to sacrifice and offer with Christ both in Heaven and Earth Christ a Prophet 3. Christ a Prophet leading us into all truth and opening unto us the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven that we might be Prophets to teach in his Name that men and Angels might know the wonderful dispensations of the Kingdom of Heaven This is the light that lighteth every one that cometh into the World so all the Lord's people are Prophets speaking the wonderful things of God Christ a King 4. Christ a King ruling in our hearts and subduing all our enemies and covering us with everlasting glory so do we rule by his Spirit over all our lusts which else would rule in our mortal bodies and so do we subdue our enemies and bruise Satan under every one of our feet and through him that strengtheneth us are more than conquerors triumphing over the World the Flesh and the Devil and reigning with Christ in his everlasting Kingdom All this is by virtue of our union with Christ espousing his sufferings and glories to us As Man and Wife are one flesh so Christ and his Church are one Spirit bone living dying rising ascending and sitting together in heavenly places as Priests Prophets and Kings for ever such honour have all his Saints Thus hath our Mediator bought us to himself and with himself unto God to be like unto him in his humiliation and exaltation which is the glorious estate of God's Children ordained to them in his last Will and Testament confirmed executed and performed
Correction Work Payment Church Elders Bishops Priests Deacons High Priest Altar Sacrifice Tithes Oblations First fruits Dedication Consecration Expiation Propitiation Excommunication Idol Faith Vow Covenant Contract Promise Oath Stipulation Sacrament Seal Intercession Hand-writing Mediator Obligation Assurance Evidence Conveyance Alliance Affinity Consanguinity Tribe Stock Familie Degrees Line Birthright Succession Dominion Lordship These and other learned Titles of the Law with the profound judgments of renowned Antecessors upon each of them serve more to the enrichment of the treasury of wisdom for the furnishing of apt Interpretations and Glosses upon the Laws divine than all the Arts or Learning of the World Besides the aptitude of resolving cases and doing business with prudence honesty and gallantry is created by them after the rellish of those equitable and brave Souls that made them The CONTENTS Of the Laitie's Calling AND as to the Laity I say consider your Calling we may not speak the mind of God in learned and unknown Tongues to the high ones only that Pearch on the Towers but in Vulgar language to the meanest that sit on the wall Quod omnes tangit ab omnibus tractari debet That which concerns all ought to be understood by all We will not hoodwink you to make your Ignorance the Mother of your as blind devotion we will not captivate your minds by Magisterial dictates of us men and hide from you the Royal Commandments of your God TITLE VI. Of the Laitie's Doctrine I. I Say then boldly Consider your Calling For Doctrine 1. From beyond the lowest Law of Nature 2. From beyond any Laws written upon Tables 1. To the Law of the Spirit and of Grace 2. To the Law written upon the Heart To the best of Precepts of Evangelical perfection taught by Christ in his famous Sermon upon the Mount and other occasional Discourses and by the Apostles and other holy Men of God that had the same treasure in earthen vessels To the best of Promises Viz. Forgiveness of sins Liberty Adoption Spirit Resurrection eternal life These are the Laws that are so high and yet so easie few favourable and pleasant for the wayes of Wisdom are wayes of pleasantness and all her paths are peace I exhort them therefore to a high belief and full assurance of Heaven by the seal and earnest of the Spirit to be partakers of the holy Unction of Wisdom and Perfection to be a Royal Priesthood and a peculiar people by vertue of the promises that belong to you and to your Children of high exemptions and priviledges of great honour and estate TITLE VII Of the Laitie's Persons II. FOR your Persons Look therefore to your selves that ye walk worthy of so great Salvation and having such an hope in you so full of a glorious and blessed Immortality see that ye purifie your selves even as God is pure and become a people altogether zealous of good Works perfecting Holiness in the fear of the Lord that at last you may obtain an inheritance among them that are sanctified by faith which is in Christ Jesus Fear not therefore little Flock for it is your Father's good Will and pleasure to give you a kingdom Your hope is laid up for you in heaven And neither eye hath seen nor ear hath heard neither can it enter into the heart of man to conceive what things God hath laid up for those that fear him When Christ the favourable Mediatour and Executor of God's Testament shall put the Faithful into actual possession of Eternal Glory saying Come ye Blessed Children of my Father receive the kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of the World Aim therefore at a gospel-Gospel-Spirit 1. Care not for unnecessary Disputes God's Testament is a plain Testament of Grace Mercy and Peace from God the Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ As Men's Testaments are to be seen and read by all that are concerned so is God's Will to be seen and read by all Col. 2.6 c. As ye have received Christ Jesus the Lord so walk ye in him rooted and built up in him and stablished in the faith as ye have been taught abounding therein with thanksgiving Beware lest any man spoil you through Philosophy and vain deceit after the traditions of men after the rudiments of the world and not after Christ 2 Tim. 2.23 But foolish and unlearned questions avoid knowing that they do gender strifes also Genealogies and contentions and strivings about the Law for they are unprofitable and vain 1 Tim. 1.4 Neither give heed to Fables and endless Genealogies which minister questions rather than godly edifying which is in Faith If any man teach otherwise 1 Tim 6.3 c. and consent not to wholsome words even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ and to the doctrine which is according to Godliness he is proud knowing nothing but doating about questions and strifes of words whereof cometh envy strife railings evil surmisings perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth supposing that gain is godliness Jude 27 c. from such turn away Remember ye the words which were spoken before of the Apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ how that they told you there should be mockers in the last time who should walk after their own ungodly Lusts these be they who separate themselves sensual having not the Spirit But ye Beloved building up your selves in your most holy Faith praying in the Holy Ghost keep your selves in the love of God looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal Life and of some have compassion making a difference and others save with fear pulling them out of the fire hating even the garments spotted by the flesh Let the Clergy exhort and teach these things and whatsoever else belongeth unto sound doctrine with all long suffering and patience as the stout Soldiers of Jesus Christ 1 Tim. 6.20 And let them be sure to keep that which is committed to their Trust avoiding profane and vain bablings and oppositions of Sciences falsly so called which some professing have erred concerning the Faith Tit. 1.14 Let them not give heed to Jewish fables and commandments of men that turn from the truth nor yet to endless genealogies which minister questions rather than godly edification 1 Cor. 2.4 Let not your speech nor your preaching be with the entising words of mans wisdom but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power Speak Wisdom among them that are perfect the wisdom of God in a mystery even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world unto our Glory For other Foundation can no man lay than that is laid 1 Cor. 3.11 c which is Jesus Christ Now if any man build upon this foundation Gold Silver Pretious stones Wood Hay Stubble every man's work shall be made manifest for the day shall declare it because it shall be revealed by fire and the fire shall trie every man's work whatsoever it is If any
of God have been thoughts of love and kindness in him all along from the beginning of the world but especially in the days of the Gospel And that God's love was always to mankind though not so clearly demonstrated as it is now by Christ How therefore this frowning face of terrors and amazements in his dealings here giving mortals no rest for the little space he hath afforded them to stay in this world and plunging them into eternal torments in the world to come can consist with the gentleness and justice of his nature I can in no wise be satisfied I am not able to conceive of a good Prince but that he will be always careful to preserve the lives and fortunes of his good Subjects and use all possible means to reduce the rebellions and still to be sparing of the blood of his People even where his Justice calls for it Nay every petty King of a Town or Family will do the same within the circuit of his power How much more then shall the Great and Gracious not only Potentate but Creator and Redeemer of the World hover over his poor creatures and servants for good and be infinitely and therefore inexpressibly tender of their Temporal and Eternal Wellfare But I am told that God reprobates the far greatest part of the world to shew the Glory of his Justice and absolute Soveraignty over his creatures And here I must cry out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O the Depth and if I be one of these Cast-aways must be as the rest contented and for ever silent 'T is true I must if so and there can be no help for it nor must Mortals complain for who art thou O Man that thou shouldest dispute against God But how these men more than others of equal judgments should come to this pitch of Knowledg to determine this thing thus I cannot imagine nor whence they had this revelation And how this agrees with God's declaration of himself to be willing that all men should be saved and come to the knowledg of the Truth and not to delight in the death of any Sinner will put them to a stand Well however it is I am sure that God is good and if God hath given men reason to understand what is Justice and Mercy how the wisdom of God though infinitely above should be as infinitely contrary to this our humane understanding will be very hard to conceive Still Justice is Justice and Mercy is Mercy in God or Man though in vast differences of degrees We shall never know how but we may always know that God is Just and can and will do us no wrong I take the safest side therefore I hope if I interpret humbly all his dispensations though seemingly never so harsh to be cum favore that if he do as certainly he does severely punish yet he will as graciously reward those that fear him for all their miseries in this life And if God inflicts as he doth the same Calamnities now under the Gospel as he did before under the Law yet it is in a different manner in the Church's Majority from what it was in her Minority And that though the former Dispensation was in wrath yet now it is in Grace and was always just Well let the Inhabitants of the earth work righteousness as well as they can and trust God for his Mercies and through the tender mercies of God they shall be sure never to miscarry I am certain Grace is Grace and above Wrath though I suffer never so much And that God does not dodgenor lie upon the catch with mankind to destroy them but rather waits for their conversion to save them I will trust in God therefore though I am never able to understand the reasons of his workings From henceforth I will never go about to measure the depths of God's Providences by the shallowness of my comprehensions I will be meditating and doing good and leave all to God But it is high time to leave this dreadful Subject of mis-representing God in his Counsels so fatal to mankind Gospel-Dispensations Let us see what other mis-understandings there are of God's Dispensations God was pleased suitably to the non-age of the Church to address himself very much to the lower faculties of the Soul and the outward senses that were nearest to them and did most affect them Therefore he ordained splendid Types solemn services and many miracles as the pillar of a Cloud and of Fire the walls of water in the Red Sea the burning Mount Sinai the tabernacle and rays of Glory visible therein the Temple c. But they which look for any such apparent Expressions of Divinity now mistake the Genius of a Gospel-Dispensation to a Church Adult and capable of higher Administrations All things since Christ's coming are managed in a sedate smooth and serene temper The mysteries of the Gospel came forth in plain and intelligible forms of Speech from Mount Sion without drawing the Soul into Raptures and Extasies of amazements God doth not fright men into heaven by visible Terrours God expects now a reasonable Service a Judicious Religion acted by the Spirit of Love and of a sound mind under the Graces Truths and Glories of a Gospel-state for ever to endure This Spirit of the Gospel arriving to our Spirits in this aimable and winning manner creates a generous Spirit above the Evils or Goods in this world resolved to go through them and overcome them and settle upon absolute Eternal Goodness When men's hopes and fortunes are most embarqued in the Ship of this World without Faith They are in continual fears of Shipwrack because then all is lost that is before their sense But when men's hopes and fortunes are all embarqued in one bottom of Divine Faith they are in continual Hopes and Assurances of arrival in the Haven of Glory because then all is found that was before their Spirit in the Eye of Faith This Hope so full of glorious and blessed Immortality hath supported the spirits of such as live by their Faith better than all the Fatality of the Stoicks or the Jollity of the Epicureans These can look Sin and Death in the face by the Spirit and not be daunted by the Flesh The high Religion of the Gospel teacheth higher things than ever that of Moses or the Law of Nature or Nations or Philosophy could do Reformation This great Reformation of Religion in the World Christ declared plainly to the woman of Samaria requiring of him as a Prophet to tell her the place of worship whether it was not to be upon Mount Gerizim in Samaria where the Fathers had worshiped and not in Jerusalem as the Jews believed Upon this occasion he told her that neither she nor the Samaritans her Country-men nor the Jews nor yet the Gentiles of the World should from that time ever trouble themselves about the place or manner of Divine worship For it should be neither confined to Samaria nor Judea but should
Adopted Sons of God by Grace 2. We are sealed with the holy Spirit of Promise 3. We are renewed by Regeneration 4. We are Justified by his Grace through Faith 5. We are invited by his glorious Promises greater than we can understand Now he that considereth this state of things and hopes for the state of blessings will proceed in duty and love towards the perfection of God never giving out till he partake of the purities of God and his utmost Glories perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord till he obtain an inheritance among them that are sanctified by faith in Christ Jesus In the practice of these spiritual duties there is no difficulty but what is made by the careless lives and actions of outward Christians and by their lazy and unholy Principles So that after the rate such Christians live now it is hard to know how and in what instances and in what degrees our duty ought to excell that of Moses's disciples though a Greater than Moses is here But they that love will do the thing that is good and so understand the Rule of perfection Obedite intelligetis Obey and ye shall know all that is necessary to be known for God shall lead you into all truth and love is the fulfilling of the whole Law We cannot be too careful for ignorant and weak and carnal persons especially for hypocrites because both pretend the one sort really as knowing no better but the other falsely and basely to the shame of Christianity that 1. This so high and spiritual worship inclines the minds of men to scruples and dislikes of all orders and rules in the Church and so because Christians must have but few Rites therefore they will endure none at all or such only as are of their own making We protest utterly against this spirit of men that it is an abuse of Christian Liberty and a cloak of maliciousness in hypocrites and a grievous cheat to all weak and well-meaning Christians 2. That this leads into rebellion against the religious Powers that according to their bounden duties do establish order and decency in all things belonging to the Service of God It is the principal care of the Magistrate to see that God be honourably served in Publick with decency at set times and places with set forms and postures to avoid confusion Now these pretenders to spirituality only do strongly set themselves against the face of Authority under the shew of Conscience This is a very wicked thing most contrary to the meaning of the Spirit and Power of Godliness For God hath ordained Princes to rule and Subjects to obey But these unruly Spirits under a feigned zeal for God's Cause set up their own Cause and set the whole world on fire by their ungodly Rebellions Take heed therefore of this one thing The True gospel-Gospel-Spirit minds most of all a True Spiritual Service But if Lawful and Religious Power commands a few innocent Forms to be observed in publick only to avoid Distraction they submit peaceably and still continue to worship God in the Spirit in publick In the Time Appointed by Law In the Place Appointed by Law In the Posture Appointed by Law In the Form Appointed by Law And in private too at any time place and in any form or posture as they themselves shall please What can be done more If men were not unreasonable they would be contented and come in to the Publick Worship and not proudly separate themselves as they do This did not the Jews though they had different opinions otherwise and this do not the Papists though they have several Orders and Perswasions amongst them For all Jews came to the same Temple and all Papists to the same Mass But our Sects are more unfortunately cross and more unhandsomely disobedient to Ecclesiastical and Temporal Authority than all the world besides the more is our misery Learn to be wiser and make it a matter of Conscience to fulfil all Righteousness to take your liberty in God's name in private no body desires to hinder you in the least Have ye not houses to pray in Mat. 3.13 Why despise ye the House of Prayer Shall I praise you for this I praise you not Do not forbear the assembling of your selves together as the custome of too many is to do It is spiritual Pride it is not only rebellious but uncivil and very rude to flock together to unlawful meetings or to stay at home or walk in the fields or streets or be at Ale-houses or Taverns as people unconcerned when better men than you are gathered together in the fear of God and Obedience to the Laws to Pray and Praise God and to hear his Word and to give Alms to the Poor O how decent a thing it is for Brethren to meet together in Unity And how prudent is that Devotion that places all the substance of Religion in the heart and yet uses the circumstances of order to avoid the confusion of wild Extravagancies Certain it is that if every one were left to serve God in his own way there would be no Face of a Church One would be Working or Playing while another was Preaching or Praying ignorant men and women would take upon them to teach and the blind would lead the blind till they both fall into the ditch We have greater cause therefore to bless God for establishing Powers over us without which we should be as herds of Wild Beasts rather than sober men and fall foul of one anothers persons and estates But God is the God of Order not of Confusion and we have no such unmannerly Custome nor ever had the true Churches of God Abhor therefore if you be wise all Fanatick Expressions That all Time all Places are alike so they are but not for publick Offices and that any Postures Gestures or Habits may be used so they may but not in Publick Service God and Man have given us our Liberty in Private only for the Publick we are restrained This is enough to give content to all Parties if Reason would do it for this is decent and comely in the sight of God and Man And thus it becometh us to dispute no more about such matters but to fulfil all Righteousness Spiritual Perfection From what hath been delivered at large I collect these Reasons for Spiritual Worship and Gospel-Perfection Reas I Because the Ritual Worship induced by God is abolished Believe me Ritual Worship abolished John 4.23 the hour cometh when ye shall neither in this Mountain nor yet at Jerusalem worship the Father But the hour cometh and now is when the true Worshippers shall worship the Father in Spirit and in Truth for the Father seeketh such to worship him God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in spirit Col. 2.16 c. and in truth Let no man deceive you in meat or in drink or in respect of an holy day or of the new Moon or of the Sabbath
let us go on to perfection not laying again the foundation of Repentance from dead works and of Faith towards God of the Doctrine of Baptisms and of laying on of Hands and of resurrection of the dead and of eternal judgment and this we will do if God permit Gal. 3.23 Before Faith came we were kept under the Law shut up unto the Faith which should afterwards be revealed Wherefore the Law was our Schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ that we might be justified by Faith But after that Faith is come we are no longer under a School-master For ye are all the children of God by Faith in Christ Jesus Gal. 4.1 c. Now I say that the Heir as long as he is a Child differeth nothing from a Servant though he be Lord of all but is under Tutours and Governours until the time appointed of the Father Even so we when we were Children were in bondage under the Elements of the world But when the Fulness of the Time was come God sent forth his Son made of a Woman made under the Law to redeem them that were under the Law that we might receive the adoption of Sons And because ye are Sons God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts crying Abba Father Wherefore thou art no more a Servant but a Son and if a Son then an Heir of God through Christ Howbeit then when ye knew not God ye did service unto them which by Nature are no Gods But now after that ye have known God or rather are known of God How turn ye again to the weak and beggarly Elements whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage Ye observe days and months and times and years I am afraid of you lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain Gal. 3.3 Are ye so foolish having begun in the Spirit are ye now made perfect by the Flesh Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free and be not entangled again with the yoke of Bondage As free 1 Pet. 2 1â— and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness but as the servants of God Honour all men Love the brethren Fear God Honour the King Be subject to every Ordinance of man for the Lord's sake and for Conscience sake For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear but ye have received the spirit of Adoption whereby ye crie Abba Father All things are lawful 1 Cor. 2.6 12. but I will not be brought under the power of any Time was when there was no greater light of Knowledg to be given than was given nor hearts of apprehension greater than to receive such knowledg But now there are greater lights and greater capacity of Minds and greater helps of the Spirit to comprehend greater wisdom and if they do not comprehend them it must needs be their own fault The Prophets had a glimmering of this Light but especially he that was called the Prophet of the Highest Luk. 1.78 c. that went before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways to give knowledg of salvation unto his people by the remission of their sins Through the tender mercy of our God whereby the Day-spring from on high hath visited us To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death to guide our feet into the way of Peace This Great man stood and peeped in at the door of the Gospel and saw more of this light than any that went before him but less than any that came after him For since that God hath poured out of his spirit upon all Flesh and their Sons and Daughters have prophecied their old men have dreamed dreams and the young men have seen visions and the people are all taught of God the Kingdom of Heaven is taken by violence and all men rush into it The Standard of the Gospel is set up upon the top of Mount Sion displayed and seen of all and all Nations are invited to flow into it 4. Besides all this teaching we have the learning of our own Experience what the world is and how we have found it to our selves which in our greatest Necessities hath ever left us in the lurch and is allways flux and wavering and we may presume it ever will be so and therefore if we will still leave the wisdom of God and cleave to the wisdom of the world trusting to that which was never to be trusted it is our own fault and we must take that that comes of it Obj. Who can be perfectly spiritual Ans We may aspire to perfection and be spiritual though not perfectly spiritual Eph. 4.11 c. Wherefore God hath given some Apostles and some Prophets and some Evangelists and some Pastours and Teachers for the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministery for the edifying of the Body of Christ till we all come to the unity of the Faith and of the knowledg of the Son of God unto a perfect Man unto the Measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ We may be spiritual at the first though not perfectly spiritual till the last Phil. 3.12 c. Not as though I had already attained either were already perfect but I follow after that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus Brethren I count not my self to have apprehended but this one thing I do forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth unto those things which are before I press toward the mark for the price of the High Calling of God in Christ Jesus Let us therefore as many as be perfect be thus minded And if in any thing ye be otherwise minded God shall reveal even this unto you Nevertheless whereto we have already attained let us walk by the same rule 1 Cor. 4.4 let us mind the same things For I know nothing by my self yet am I not thereby justified Be ye therefore perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect Obj. Outward Service at this rate will be slighted 1 Cor. 6.19 20. Ans No we are taught that our Body is the Temple of the Holy Ghost which is in us which we have of God and we are not our own for we are bought with a price therefore we must glorifie God in our Body and in our Spirit which are the Lord 's I beseech you therefore Brethren by the Mercies of God that you present your Bodies a living Sacrifice holy acceptable unto God Rom. 12.1 2. which is your reasonable Service And be ye not conformed to this World but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind that ye may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God And therefore we are taught to yield freely to a few harmless easie significant Bodily Rites for order and decency and for uniformity and peace sake and for Conscience sake of our duty which we owe to
'T is very hard But Noble Spirits cannot brook it their Tongues and Pens and their whole Bodies may be captivated against their Wills but in their Souls they will be free Is there any greater Idleness Idleness than to stay and rest on that which men have formerly done said or written to attribute all to the Ancients without leaving any thing to be mended by those that come after them Surely all the Mysteries of God and Nature are not yet discovered the greatest things are difficult and long in coming and Truth is the Daughter of Time Many things which were hidden are come to light and more will come to light and our Successors will wonder that we were ignorant of them We do not build now adaies after the fashion of Vitruvius Improvements nor Till the ground or plant according to Varro or Columella we use not food or physick after the rules of Galen or Hypocrates we judg not exactly after the Civil Law of the Romans or the Feudal Customs of the Lombards neither plead we as Demosthenes and Cicero nor govern as Solon or Lycurgus did we war not fail not sing not c. as did the Ancients but much better And therefore the World is beholding to those brave Souls that have adventured by long Study care charges and bodily Labours to excel their Predecessors in finding out such rare secrets as serve more for the benefit of Mankind The Antipodes the Sailing by the Compass the Circulation of the Blood the Chymistry of Plants and Minerals Guns Printing c. were strange things to be believed before the truth of them was seen by Experience The Wisest men may not scorn better helps though offered by far meaner hands It must be pride that rejects teaching though from an Ant or Sow And let them be choaked that refuse to be drawn out of a Dungeon by Ropes and rotten Clouts Let the infection of Leprosie stick close to their Skin that scorn to wash it off in a narrow or shallow Stream Knowledg does very ill to puff up so as to scorn Ignorance much more to despise greater knowledg A Sickness a Disease of the Mind in men of high parts is hard to be cured but if their Bodies be in danger they will not disdain Album Graecum or the Receipt of a poor Beggar While they ail little or nothing they will resolve to die by the Book but if all the Great Doctors give not ease to the Gout or Stone Strangury or Flaming Feaver an Emperick a Quack an Old Woman any body that can be gotten for God's sake at any rate and thank you too a thousand times Obj. It is not safe to leave the old Road. Sol. What if it be rugged What if it be about c. What is he that will read in no bodies book but his own or that shuts his good book is wise enough and will read no further that begins to build and leaves off in the first story that goes half his journey and then comes back If Columbus had not discovered another World and Americus Vespucius conquered the same it had been no world still to us We must have wanted our Plantations of Virginia New-England c. and the King of Spain his Gold and Silver Mines Is there no progress to be made Must we stand at a stay Look into all Mechanick Trades Mysteries and Professions they grow more ingenious every day to their great Commendation Observe Lawyers Philosophers and Physicians Oratours Poets c. improving daily God's Blessing on their hearts for so doing Obj. But Divines must not stir a foot others may Sol. No Why so Stay let us consider more of this matter It is for certain that no other Foundation can be laid than what is already laid of Gold and Silver and pretious Stones But we may build upon this foundation suitable matter which will endure the Fire Christ Jesus delivered the full perfection of all truth the most pure precepts and highest promises in the Gospel The Apostles but it was a long time first understood it and preached it to the world The chiefest things which Christ did suffered and spake are written in the Gospels as also the Sermons Miracles and Acts of the Apostles in the Epistles also are occasionally taught the pure Doctrine of Christ unmixed with Moses and Vain Philosophy The Apostles by Inspiration understood the whole Will of God and preached infallibly and from their Light we all receive Light But Inspiration and Infallibility dying with them the Disciples of the Apostles and their Disciples were good men and kept the Faith which was delivered to them and so it hath been kept and would have been kept by constant tradition of Preaching if so much had not been written as is written In a word the Will of God was plainly revealed Corruption and as plainly understood but some after the Apostles days grievous Wolves entred into the Flock of Christ even Jewish and Gentile Christians who wrested the Scriptures both Old and New to their own destruction and too much trusting to art and subtilty corrupted the simplicity of the Gospel Then as mens Pride with their wealth and worldly polities encreased came in the Doctrines of Infallibility Supremacy Transubstantiation Purgatory Masses worshipping of Saints and Angels innumerable Superstitions of Will-worship and carnal services And though in all these ages good men saw the clearness of Gospel truths through these mists of vulgar errors yet could not swim against the Stream and the common sort relying upon men of mighty names grew careless to search any further believing all that was told them by their Leaders The rest contented themselves and sate still under those Tyrannies wishing for Reformation but they were poor and weak and the violence of the Powers and Multitudes was too strong against them Such was the humour of those dark and ignorant ages when the modest Disciple would not presume to know more than his admired Master though he were fit to be a Master himself to others And so the world lay in a trance for a long time and fetcht a sound sleep and was almost dead especially in and about the Eleventh Century that unhappy age overspread with Ignorance and Barbarity Reformation Till by degrees some more Heroick Spirits appeared and boldly told the world those glorious truths which they had discovered as Luther Melancthon Cassander Calvin c. who weeded out many Tares that the Enemy had sown while good men were fast asleep And since that greater men than these have more and more illustrated the Spiritual Dispensation of the Gospel to all mankind far different from that which was before the Law and under the Law And still we go on to perfection not for a new Faith or Religion but for the understanding of the old way of God more perfectly The Reformation grows higher and higher every day and the Faithful grow more and more spiritual and fitted for glory walking more sublimely and
but that Man should be left to the liberty of his own will for good or evil And if any thing be given from above to help the Gifts of Nature whatsoever is so given is given according to the capacity of the receiver Nor is any thing given till it be received nor can it be received till it be accepted nor can it be accepted without a will nor can it be a will without God who hath given this will Who then can sin and be damned against his will and who can repent and be saved against his will Damnation it self cannot damn them that will not be damned and Salvation it self cannot save them that will not be saved The Devil wills us to sin and we will it too God wills us to repent and we will it too So comes Sin and Damnation so comes Grace and Salvation We cannot sin nor be damned without our selves we cannot have Grace nor be saved without our selves There is shuffling and cutting in saying God worketh the will sweetly over to consent how then irresistibly and how comes the will to dissent but irresistibly O Irresistibility Irresistibility thou takest away all Sin and all Goodness because thou takest away all will to either and there can be neither good nor bad without a will O Irresistibility Irresistibility thou takest away all damnation and salvation because thou takest away all will to either and there can be neither damnation nor salvation without a will And so no punishment nor reward can be due to any And so all Rules and Laws are fooleries and signifie nothing So God shall be the author of Grace without or against the will and give a Gift and no Gift And the Devil by act but God by purpose shall be the author of sin without and against the will and force a sin and no sin I may suffer against my will but I cannot sin against my will I cannot do good against my will nor can I be rewarded against my will These are such necessary consequential demonstrations as no body can deny But some would if they could put out the eyes of all Men and being blind in themselves would have no body see because they want tails would perswade others to cut off theirs If God had not given Man a will he had had no sin but now his sin remaineth If God had not given Man a Will he had had no good but now his good remaineth If God had not given a Man will it had been very unreasonable to bid him use what he never had But now God hath given him a will it is very reasonable to bid him use what he hath So God's wayes are very equal Just and true are thy wayes O King of Saints and the Judg of all the World must needs do right He therefore that hath eyes to see let him see and he shall see more clearly He that hath ears to hear let him hear and he shall hear more distinctly He that hath a Heart to understand let him understand and he shall understand more profoundly And he that hath a Will let him will and he shall will more freely SECT X. But still the point is not clear'd Object till I have answer'd to those two stabbing Texts that smite the adversary under the fifth rib and 't is thought impossible for any living Soul to escape the dint of that deadly two-edged sword Et nunc ventum est ad Triarios Now we are come to our last Prayers we must therefore strive to come off now or never The first Text is that of David Behold I was shapen in iniquity Ps 51.6 explained Answ and in sin did my mother conceive me What shall we say to this no more than this It is an Hyperbolical expression shewing the long continuance of his Soul in sin not only now but ever since his childhood that he came to have the use of Reason Such another speech he useth Ps 22.9.10 Thou art he that took me out of the womb thou didst make me hope when I was upon my mother's breasts I was cast upon thee from the womb thou art my God from my mother's belly In like manner Job speaking of the poor and Widow From my youth he was brought up with me Job 31.18 as with a Father and I have guided her i. e. the Widow from my mother's womb Ab utero matris meae deduxi eam i. e. comitem habui That is From my first age I had a pity and a care of her And again the Psalmist speaketh thus The wicked are estranged from the womb Ps 58.3 Ps 71.5 6. they go astray as soon as they be born speaking lyes And again For thou art my hope O Lord God thou art my trust from my youth By thee have I been holden up from the womb thou art he that took me out of my mother's bowels my praise shall be continually of thee In like manner God rebuketh the Jews for their obstinacy Thou heardest not yea thou knewest not Is 48.8 yea from that time that thine ear was not opened For I knew that thou wouldest deal very treacherously and wast called a transgressor from the womb The same answer serves for John 5.34 Thou wast altogether born in sin and doest thou teach us That is they counted him a pittiful ignorant fellow but they were not born in sin but bravely born and bred to all knowledg And now what is all this great cry Does it appear from these Texts or any other of the Old Testament that ever David Job or any of the Patriarchs Priests or Prophets understood any thing of sinning in the womb or from the womb or any such thing as from Adam's loyns let any Man judg Are not Prophets and Poets ecstatical and can their high Rapsodies be taken Literally I but what shall we say to St. Paul in the New Testament Object Eph. 2.3 explained Amongst whom also we had our conversation in times past in the lust of our flesh fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind and were by nature the children of wrath even as others To this I answer The precedent words sufficiently declare Answ that nothing is here meant of Original Sin but of Actual Sin contrary to Original Nature because many of the Heathens feared God and were free from such vices as are above described viz. Walking after the course of this world Eph. 2.2 according to the Prince of the power of the Air the Spirit that now worketh in the Children of disobedience And further though the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may signify 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is really and truly Gal. 4.8 as When ye knew not God ye did service to them which by nature are no gods as the Syriach Plenè omninò Yet we need not strain the word Nature at all for they that so walked in the lust of the flesh c. being contrary to Natures rational principles are even by Nature
Dower nor power from Abraham in his House as a Wife but was still a Bondmaid to her Mistress and when she had served both and done her work as a slave she was fairly turned out of doors 2. Isaak the younger by a Free-Woman his Legitimate Son by a lawful Wife Sarah free born and free living a Matron that had right of Bed and Board Dower and Dignity Power and Rule under her Husband over the Family As the two Mothers conditions were quite contrary the one to the other so were the two Sons for Partus sequitur ventrem one therefore a Bondman the other a Freeman one had no right to the Inheritance because a Bastard the other had right because a lawful Son So those under the Law unjustified are in the condition of Ishmael who though a Son had neither the state of a Person nor the right of a Son but was a Bondchild and Bastard because he came from a Woman who had not the state of a Woman nor the right of a Wife but was a Bond-maid and a Concubine So the Sons of the Law that trust to their Mother Bondwoman shall be as little justified or have as little right to the inheritance of Heaven as the Law can afford them which is none at all for Righteousness comes not by the Law and by the Law no flesh can be justified even as little right as Ishmael could have to Abraham's inheritance who was born of a Woman who had works enough for she was a Bondmaid yet no right by them for she had no right in her Person But they that are under the Gospel are justified are in the same condition of Isaak who had the state of a Person and the right of a Son because he was born of a Free-Woman who had the state of a Woman and the right of a Wife So the Sons of the Gospel that trust to their Mother Free-Woman shall be as much justified or have as much right to the Kingdom of Heaven as the Gospel can afford which is All right Even as much right as Isaak had to Abraham's inheritance who was born of the Free-Woman who had Faith enough for she was free and therefore All right by her Faith for she had all right in her Person This was the first difference between these two Sons on the Mother side because born of several venters The second difference is on the Father's side For though they had one and the same Father yet they were begot from different principles operating in Abraham and enabling him to beget them Gen. 16.2 1. For Ishmael came from Abraham as a Natural Father born after the Flesh by Abraham's natural power and strength for though Sarah was restrained from bearing yet Abraham was not restrained from begetting at eighty five years old 2. For Isaak came from Abraham as a Supernatural Father born after the Spirit by a Supernatural power of God when he was ninety and nine years old and Sarah ninety years old and was ever barren which was a double deadness of age and custom This Generation and Conception was by God's promise Rom. 9.8 9. or by the Spirit and power of God So they that will be under the Law which is a Bondwoman and therefore engendreth bondage though thereby they be the Children of God yet they are but his Natural and Carnal Children because born after a meer natural and carnal way Heb. 9.10 and live under a Law consisting of carnal and fleshly ordinances But they that are of the Gospel which is a Free-Woman that engendreth Liberty and Freedom one of the Divine and Spiritual Sons of God because by means of their Faith they are born of the Spirit For that which is born of the Flesh is Flesh but that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit Joh. 3.3 Ephes 1.13 And because after that Faith they are sealed with that Spirit which is the Spirit of Promise SECT XXIX Many more Covenants God made but these two of the Law and the Gospel were the most eminent Because 1. National and OEcumenical Covenants 1. The Law was National to the Jews only 2. The Gospel was OEcumenical to all the World The other Covenants that were made were but personal or famular to one single Person or Family as to Adam Noah Abraham David c. 2. Mediatory and Testamentary Covenants by the intervention and execution of two solemn Mediators and Executors Moses and Christ The rest were immediately proposed and executed by God and had no Interlocutor nor Performer beside Though these two Covenants and Testaments do disagree from all other Covenants and Testaments yet they are as different and contrary one to the other as was Hagar and Sarah SECT XXX 1. The Law was a Covenant of Bondage 1. From the adjunct of place from Mount Sinai Law a Covenant of Bondage Exod. 19. Gen. 25.18 the place in which the Law was given and the Country of Hagar Gal. 4.25 2. From the adjunct of Bondage engendred according to the nature of Law so are the Spirits the Genius and manners of Men. The Law of Moses is carnal and burdensom for its rights and contains only Temporal promises and curses accordingly therefore it begets servile labour and servile fear a hard Mother a curst Mistress SECT XXXI 2. The Gospel is a Covenant of Liberty 1. From the adjunct of place from Mount Sion Gospel a Covenant of Liberty the place in which the Gospel was given and the Country of Sarah Jerusalem which yet is in a kind of bondage too compared with Jerusalem which is above which is free and the mother of us all Hebr. 12.20 Hebr. 11.10 Rev. 21.2 3. 1. The Seat is above 2. The State is free 3. The Issue general Because the mother of us all the true Spouse of God by whom he begets Children by his Promise and Spirit John 3.8 Gal. 4.29 He that is born of the Flesh persecuted him that was born of the Spirit Law published on Earth by an Angel Gospel published in Heaven to Christ and from Heaven to the World Heb. 12.25 See that ye refuse not him that speaketh for if they escaped not who refused him that spake on Earth much more shall not we escape if we turn away from him that speaketh from Heaven Sarah Mother but of one Nation Jerusalem the Mother of all Nations Is 54.1 Glorious then but after the Captivity more glorious So will the Gospel be after many Ages of barrenness Isaak's Posterity double to Ishmael's New Covenant more large and more lasting than the Old The Jew persecuted the Christians as Ishmael persecuted Isaak by mocking him The carnal Christian who persecutes his Brother learnt it of the infidel and carnal Jew But the Son of the Bond-Woman shall be cast out for he shall not be heir with the Son of the Free-Woman 2. From the Adjunct of Liberty As is the Gospel so are the Spirits of Men. The Gospel Spiritual and easie a
on me believeth not in me but on him that sent me Joh. 12.44 i. e. not on the ultimatly but beyond me to my Father SECT V. 2. Because Christ is the author beginner and finisher of our Faith Christ the Author of Faith 1. By being the publisher of our Faith who hath made Faith thereof to the World 1. Of his Person that he is the Son of God and the Son of Man 2. Of his Message that it is the Last Will and Testament of God and consequently doth on his part sufficiently work in us Faith to accept of the Legacies contained therein This Faith was originally taught by Christ secondarily propagated by the Apostles and their Successors which were witnesses to attest the truth which was first testified by Christ who made Faith of it 1. By declaring it to be God's Last Will and Testament Declaring God's Will decreed from the beginning of the World but during many Ages it was a Mystery or Will sealed up Therefore it is called God's Secret will the purpose and Counsel of his Will the Mystery hidden from Ages and from Generations but now is manifested unto his Saints Known it was in general that there was such a Will the being of it was witnessed by the Law and the Prophets yet the particular contents thereof were not known But in the last Age of the World God nuncupated his Will unto Christ and the particular counsels thereof And Christ by special Commission was sent from his Father into the World to publish this his Will and to work in us our faith of it Therefore First he made it known to the Apostles saying Joh. 15.15 All things that I have heard of my Father have I made known unto you I have given unto them the Words which thou gavest me and they have received them Joh. 17.8 and have known surely that I came out from thee and they have believed that thou didst send me He commanded the Apostles to make this Will known unto all Nations for the obedience of Faith Ro. 16.25 26. Now to him that is of power to stablish you according to my Gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ according to the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret since the World began but now is made manifest and by the Scriptures of the Prophets according to the Commandment of the everlasting God made known to all Nations for the obedience of Faith To God only wise be glory through Jesus Christ for ever Amen Eph. 1.9 God hath made known to us the mystery of his Will according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself 2. By proving the Will of his Father Publication was for the matter and contents thereof Proving God's Will Probation is for the verity of it that it is the true Last Will and Testament of God Never any Will of God or Man had such a probation For Christ hath made Faith thereof five waies 1. By Witnesses as John the Baptist sent from God who came to bear witness of the Light that all Men through him might believe That was the true Light Joh. 1.6 7. that enlightneth every one that cometh into the World He pointed him out saying Joh. 1.19 Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the World An Eye witness who saw the Spirit of God descending from Heaven like a Dove Joh. 1.32 and lighting upon him And he saw and bare record that this is the Son of God Mat. 3.17 2. God the Father from Heaven at his Baptism said This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased hear ye him And at his Transfiguration But I have greater witness than that of John Mat. 17.5 for the works which my Father hath given me to finish the same works that I do bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me Joh. 5.36 Therefore if Man's witness be valid for the proof of humane Testaments much more is the witness of God valid for the proof of his Divine Testament And if at the mouth of two or three witnesses every truth shall be established much more when one of the witnesses or the sole witness is God 1 Joh. 5.10 He that believeth not God hath made him a lyar because he believed not the record that God gave of his Son 2. By his Miracles which are full proofs to make Faith He rebuked the Winds and the Seas and they obey'd him he cast out Devils and cured all manner of diseases Joh. 5.36 and raised the dead Go tell John what ye have seen and heard the blind see the lame and sick are healed and to the poor the Gospel is preached if ye will not believe me yet believe me for the works sake for they testifie of me If two or three Miracles of Moses made Faith of his Ambassage to the Children of Israel when he did them in the sight of the People and they believed much more shall the many and great Miracles of Christ make full faith of his Message to the World when he did them in the sight of the World and they believed For without controversie great is the mystery of Godliness 1 Tim. 3.16 God was manifested in the Flesh justified in the Spirit seen of Angels preached unto the Gentiles believed on in the World received up into Glory These works suffice to produce Faith to the Worlds end Mat. 9.35 1. Because they are incomparable The like had never been seen in Israel Never Man did as he did nor spake as he spake Mat. 11.21 2. Because they were most powerful to beget Faith If the mighty works which have been done in thee had been done in Tyre and Sidon they had repented long since in sack-cloth and ashes Joh. 5.36 The works which the Father hath given me to finish these bear witness of me that he hath sent me If I do not the work of my Father believe me not but if I do though ye believe not me believe the works that ye may know and believe that the Father is in me and I in him Miracles and signs are the strongest means to give credit to the Authority or Doctrine of God or Man Mar. 1.24 3. By his Holiness He is called the Holy one the Holy one of God Vid. Acts 2.17 Acts 3.14 John 2.20 Holy every way Luc. 7.35 1. His Birth holy The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee and therefore that Holy Thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God 2 Cor. 5.21 Heb. 4.15 1 Pet. 2.22 2. His Life holy He knew no sin in all points tempted like as we are tempted yet without sin He did no sin neither was guile found in his mouth Which of you convinceth me of sin Like unto Man in all things sin only excepted 3. His Death holy He was led as a Sheep
hath not believed in the name of the only Son of God Joh. 3.36 He that believeth not the Son shall not see Life Joh. 8.24 but the wrath of God abideth in him If ye believe not that I am he Ro. 8.13 Gal. 5.19 Ephes 5.5 ye shall die in your sins if ye live after the Flesh ye shall die The works of the Flesh are manifest c. They which do such things shall not inherit the Kingdom of God For this we know that no whoremonger nor unclean Person nor covetous Man who is an idolater hath any inheritance in the Kingdom of God or of Christ When therefore any Man can truly be called a Believer in Christ then the Gifts of God are sure unto him as if he had been nominated in God's Book by his special and single Name So Men are reprobated or disinherited not by their proper Names or Surnames but by the Appellative or common names of Unbelievers Unfaithful Rejecters of Christ Carnal Worldly c. And therefore in God's Last Will there is no preterition of any Man or Men personally by name or number but all Men are either Believers or Unbelievers And seeing all Believers are by that common name instituted and all Unbelievers are by that common name disinherited therefore none are instituted or pretermitted by any proper name The Reasons are SECT VI. 1. Because God's Will is a Testament ad pias causas of meer Grace Testament ad pias causas Love and Pity to miserable Persons And in such Wills the Legacies are so numerous that they cannot be personally nominated for if so no Will would hold them and they are not yet all in being to be capable of them by common names as thus I give and bequeath so much to the Poor of such a Parish Town or City to the Prisoners of such a Goal or to the Diseased in such an Hospital So every Poor in such a Parish Town City every Prisoner in such a Goal and every Diseased in such an Hospital are qualified for such a Legacy and may justly claim by Right and Title of their Poverty Imprisonment Disease or any other condition expressed in the Will and the Executor is bound to perform it And so every Christian hath a Right to Eternal Life by the Title of his Faith 2. Men are thus nominated in common because Christ is the Hypotype by whose right all have right For Christ hath the original right of alliance to be the Son of God The only begotten Son of God full of Grace and Truth Joh. 1.114 Whom God hath appointed Heir of all things Not an heir of expectance Hebr. 1.1 but actually seized on his Inheritance Eph. 1.20 For God hath set him at his own right hand in Heavenly places from him we have the same right Joh 1.12 To them gave he power to be called the Sons of God even to as many as believed on his Name Behold what manner of love is this 1 Joh. 3.1 that we should be called the Sons of God so then thou art no more a Servant but a Son and if a Son then an Heir of God through Christ That being justified by his Grace Gal. 4.7 we should be made Heirs according to the Hope of Eternal Life If Children Tit. 3.7 Ro. 8.17 then Heirs Heirs of God and Joint heirs with Christ Now Joint-heirs have the same right alike As the Seed of Abraham had all right alike to the Kingdom of Canaan So Believers in Christ Christ and the Children which God hath given him have all right alike to the Kingdom of Heaven The Seed of Abraham by Abraham the Seed of Christ by Christ because the Kingdom of Heaven was originally given to Christ as the Kingdom of Canaan was given to Abraham The Israelite claimed by his Birth the Believer claims by his Faith Gal. 3.26 For ye are all Children of God by faith in Christ Jesus And if ye be Christ 's then are you Abraham 's Seed and Heirs according to the Promise SECT VII Of Physical Operation This great Instrument of Man's Salvation called Faith is an easie Of Physical Operation gentle and noble thing in it self but hath been represented difficult and obscure and great quarrels have been made about it and little hopes of reconciliation concerning it unless second and third thoughts be framed by unbiassed and considering Men so to undeceive themselves and others For hitherto the World hath been imposed upon and amused to conceive that Faith and other Graces of God are habits infused by God into Mens Souls quickning their dead Faculties which neither know nor feel any thing that is done unto them till they see themselves in a new condition and frame of Spirit which they call the Work of Grace irresistible as is the fashioning of a lump of clay into a new mold or the raising of a Man that is dead and rotten or the turning of a wheel by meer strength and keeping it in motion by the spring and weights that are put upon it Hereupon the poor People lye still and endeavour nothing but believe that if they be elected after the Covenant of Grace to the end they are elected in time to the means whether they will or no and that they have no will at all to any Good not so much as to accept it when offered but rather an aversion from it and a proneness to all evil to draw it to them and hatefully to turn all goodness from them This Physical operation which they dream to be upon their Spirits is the same with earthly bodies which are moved by natural or artificial causes of force or virtue the greater strength violently prevailing over the less as we move logs and stones by the power of horses or Men or curiously turning of vast bodies by Engines and Wheels of Art Operation Moral Whereas in deed and in truth the operations upon the Soul are moral rather than physical with no other violence or force than that which is not properly so but intellectual and rational or persuasive and inviting unless you will call that a physical way of the working of Spirits upon Spirits but still it is free and fair without force or battery but rational by information of the judgment and persuasion of the Will For quicquid operatur operatur ad modum operantis quicquid patitur patitur ad modum patientis Whatsoever acts acts according to the quality of the Agent and whatsoever suffer suffers according to the condition of the patient Here is therefore nothing of a real touch of the Agent upon the Patient to create necessarily a real change and alteration of the Patient thereby from what it was before but a virtual motion of instruction and insinuation upon an understanding and free subject to convince and invite the same faculties and call them off to new objects freely from their former mistakes So the vulgar are made to believe of
Gods turning hardning softning opening or shutting of Mens hearts as Men do of the motion of natural bodies by strength or wit not considering that these things are spoken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 after the manner of Men Metaphorically for our apprehension And if wise Men are able by solid reasons to convince Mens judgments and Eloquent Men are able to incline their wills and affections how much more is the Alwise God by his Spirit able to clear our understandings to a full satisfaction and to draw our desires to those divine truths which he hath revealed by Jesus Christ What more there is in the work of God's conversion of Men by his calling Justification and Sanctification of them let any Man satisfie me fairly Saving Faith Et erit mihi magnus Apollo If Saving Faith properly so called be an entring into Covenant with God in assenting to the promises of his Last will and Testament and making reciprocal promises to him again for Justification And if Holiness be a keeping of our Covenant or faithfulness to our promises for Sanctification And if expectation of Glory be a hope of that Blessedness to which we are justified and sanctified Then where is the infusion of any habit or physical change insensibly made in the Soul But rather as in all Covenants is there not 1. A free offer or promise from God 2. A free consent of acceptance from Man 3. A free observation of obedience to God 4. A free expectation of reward from God All things are free in rational Agents and Patients A rational free Agent thus works upon a rational free Patient 1. By propounding his will in Doctrine 2. By intreaties and exhortations in promises This is Divine and Humane working and drawing with the cords of Love So Wisdom enters into the Soule Not as water out of one vessel into another while one vessel knows not what another doth but by illumination of Wisdom precept upon precept line upon line here a little and there a little This is our forcing and fashioning anew our partaking of the Divine Nature and of the precious promises of God our regeneration our new Creation our Translation from the power of Darkness into the Kingdom of the dear Son of God This is to be in the state of Grace to be Elect to have our Names written in the Book of Life to be in Covenant and Alliance with God to be his Children Heirs and Co-heirs with Christ If Faith comes ordinarily by hearing or otherwise Means of Faith where there is no preaching even by Conversation Contemplation observation of Divine Providences or by other unknown instincts and revelations All these waies and means are informative and persuasive and the more because they come from a Divine Spirit and offer a Divine reward and carry a Divine assistance along with them This is a more God like and Man like way from a free Creator to a free Creature than an insensible irresistible plastick power upon a dead stock or stone It would be mockery to a Soul in that senseless and slavish condition to bid it hear that is deaf or see that is blind or run that is lame Then to what purpose is Reason Will or Memory or are they lost by our fall and where are they if we can answer without blushing God can do all this and more Object God can do nothing but wisely and justly Answ It is not wise to save a Man without or against his Will or to make him willing whether he will or no. Therefore God cannot do it It is not noble to give any thing to one that refuseth or to continue it to him that after acceptation and reception will not use it or improve it As for the notion of a New Heart and a New Spirit A New Heart It is as when a Man is advanced to any Dignity or Rule He is a New Man and hath another Spirit yet the same individual Soul and Body remains How much more when a Man by being in League and Covenant with his God is advanced to the Dignity of a Son and Heir of Heaven hath a Man a New Heart and Spirit yet the same individual Soul and Body remains so doth he live above himself and all the World to what he did before yet he is the same Person though altered in his conditions And God gives this Spirit to this Faith which is the Gift of God 1. To hear his Word outward inward 2. To understand it 3. To love and embrace it 4. To persevere in it 5. To hope for Eternal Life by it So God is all in all not essentially by his Substance in our Hearts working as in a Shop but virtually rationally liberally operating and cooperating by his Spirit with our Spirits teaching moving helping in all our internal and external actions Amen The Fourth BOOK OF SANCTIFICATION The CONTENTS Transition Spirit the first Agent Hidden Man Outward Man Natural Man Supernatural Inspiration Penal and grievous Beneficial and gracious Holy Spirit Spiritual Man TITLE I. Of the Spirit THE Act of the Understanding apprehending the truth of Divine promises and the Act of the Will assenting to them The Transition and covenanting with the Promiser is the act of Faith justifying the Soul to all the Rights of God's Estate and engaging the Soul to all the Commands of God's Will The Act of the Understanding apprehending the Truth of Divine precepts and the act of the Will consenting to them and performing the Covenant is the act of Love sanctifying the Soul till it come to perfect holiness in the fear of God for the obtaining of the Inheritance amongst them that are sanctified by Faith which is in Christ Jesus Thus the Entrance into Covenant with God is the Exercise of Faith to Justification and the continuance in that Covenant is the practise of Faithfulness or Holiness to Sanctification and Glorification by the Spirit SECT I. There is scarce any word in the whole Scripture that hath more various significations than the word Spirit I shall pass by most of them and shall only lead the understanding to the sense which this word beareth particularly to the point in hand Spirit the first Agent That secret Engine which is the first mover in a Watch which moveth all the wheels but is moved of no wheel and without which no wheel doth or can move as to the going of the Watch is called the Spring of the Watch. And that secret fine substance which is the first Agent in Man which doth act all his Members but is acted of no Member and without which no Member doth or can act as to any humane action is called the Spirit of Man Whereof the knowing faculty which affirmeth or denyeth matter of truth or falshood is called the Mind or Understanding and the moving faculty whereby the Spirit chooseth or refuseth matter of good or evil is called the Will or Affection And the judging faculty which accuseth or excuseth acquitteth
be loath to lose his Senses and have his eyes put out if he could help it Alwaies remembring the frequent and earnest exhortations of the Holy Ghost to put off the Old Man and put on the New c. Whereas if no act of Man were hereunto required why should or how could the Holy Ghost fairly or honestly or wisely press Men thereunto For though it be a thing ordinary for Men to press Men to absurdities and impossibilities yet it is incredible that the most High and Wise and just God should so do 1. The opposers themselves of this Truth confound the Metaphorical and primitive sense of words 2. Neither do they apprehend that these two actions of God and Man have no Identity to be the same though they have some similitude to be alike 3. Neither do they remember That every Metaphor is but a contracted simily and that every simily is but a lame reason for though it may somewhat illustrate yet it can conclude nothing SECT XII This Doctrine of Sanctification as it is Spiritual so it is obvious to the weakest Understanding of the Spirit to apprehend Faith Repentance Honesty and a New Life And the largest Understanding can comprehend in substance no more for the summe of all Religion is but to fear God and keep his Commandments to love God and our Neighbour And what doth the Lord require of thee but to do Justice and love mercy and to walk humbly with thy God he that believeth shall be saved and he that believeth not shall be damned To renounce the Devil and all his Works the Pompes and vanities of this wicked World and all the sinful lusts of the Flesh to account all the World but vanity of vanities and vexation of Spirit to fight under Christ's Banner and to continue Christ's faithful Souldier and Servant unto our lives end The Gospel is plain and contained in a little compass The People asked John Baptist saying Luc. 3.10 c. What shall we do and he answering said He that hath two coats let him impart to him that hath none and he that hath meat let him do likewise The Publicans said unto him Master what shall we do And he said Ask no more than that which is appointed you And the Souldiers demanded of him saying And what shall we do And said unto them Do violence to no Man neither accuse any falsly and be content with your wages Let him that stole steal no more but let every one labour truly to get his own living that he may have wherewith to give unto others Be not deceived God is not mocked That Soul that sinneth that Soul shall die As ye mete to others so shall it be meted to you again As a Man soweth so shall he reap c. 1. Let every one therefore use his own Reason and Understanding to learn what he can 2. Let every one use his own Conscience to reflect what he hath learned and done 3. Let every one use his own Will to chuse as well as he is able according to the best of his skill to curb his Senses and restrain his Passions to the best of his power 4. Let every one suffer his Understanding to be taught 5. Let every one suffer his Conscience to be convinced 6. Let every one suffer his Will to be persuaded 7. Let every one understand with God 8. Let every one examine his Conscience with God 9. Let every one exercise his Will with God 10. Let every one increase his Wisedom 11. Let every one keep his Conscience good 12. Let every one increase his Love to perfect Holiness in the fear of the Lord to covet after the best Gifts and still to find out the most excellent waies In a word consider reflect strive Fac quod in te est do what you are able Work with God work with your selves Enter into Covenant with God keep it enter into Covenant with your selves keep it Aspire to perfection what if infirmities are many 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Do but desire and breath after God God will help and further your desire The assistance of God the Spirit with our holy endeavours doth not take away the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the weakness attendant on our Christian practises but the honesty of the heart and the purity of our Love for the worthiness of Christ will hide all our imperfection◠God acts upon us ad modum nostrum according to our capacities and Quicquid recipitur recipitur ad modum recipientis And God accepteth a Man according to what he hath and can do and not according to what he hath not and cannot do Though the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the frailties of natural actions are not removed yet they are excused and pardoned and the bruised Reed he will not break and the smoking flax he will not quench all things are well done that are well meant and God will pardon the infirmities of us all The CONTENTS Transition Sensual and Spiritual Life Mind and Will of Flesh and Spirit Life in Man threefold Spiritual Senses and Passions Life of Faith Corollaries Conclusion TITLE VII Of the Flesh and Spirit Transition THe nature of Sanctification or a Spiritual Life will more clearly appear by the contrary i. e. the nature of contamination or a carnal Life Sensual and Spiritual Life 1. The Subject of a carnal Life is the Flesh living after the Flesh for that which proceedeth from the Flesh is Flesh 2. The subject of a Spiritual Life is the Spirit living after the Spirit for that which proceedeth from the Spirit is Spirit 3. The organ or instrument of a carnal Life is the sense that is the mind and will of the Flesh or the sensitive understanding and appetite called I know not why the lower part of the Soul 4. The organ or instrument of a Spiritual Life is the Understanding that is the mind and will of the Spirit or the Rational understanding and appetite called the higher part of the Soul 5. The object of a carnal Life is the World and all that is seen heard smelt felt or tasted therein 6. The object of a Spiritual Life is the World to come or all that is seen heard willed or understood therein 7. The Precepts of a carnal Life are to love our selves to love our Friends to hate our enemies to curse and be revenged of them to love the World to choose pleasures riches and honours to please our selves to flatter and please the World to get what we can how we can and such like 8. The Precepts of a Spiritual Life are To deny our selves to love our enemies to pray for them and do them any good to hate the World to suffer affliction with the People of God rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season to please God and good Men to be content with our own and to invade no Man's rights and such like 9. The rewards of a carnal Life are adequate and homogeneal
through weakness but lived by the power of God And after he had died for our sins rose again for our justification 3. That Christ as a Law-giver propounded the purest Rules of Holiness and the highest Rewards of happiness introduced the most Spiritual worship that ever was manifested unto Mankind that he put an everlasting period to Moses's Rites and confounded the Wisdom of the World by the foolishness and weakness of God which is wiser and stronger than the Wisdom and strength of the World That he brake the Devil's power and malice silenced the lying Oracles and lay'd flat the strong holds of Sin and Satan to the ground And set up his Kingdom against all Principalities and powers and Spiritual wickednesses in high places and the gates of Hell shall never be able to to prevail against it 4. That Christ's Apostles saw and heard all that he did spake and suffered and the Glory of his Resurrection and Ascension and testified to the World all these things which they had seen and heard without all hope of Reward in this Life against all discouragements of persecutions and deaths And that the Spirit of God was so powerful in these illiterate and obscure Men as to indue them with Wisedom and Understanding from on High and with courage and resolution to preach the Mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven and the enduring of the Cross by mortification and self-denyal and renunciation of the World in order thereunto Things hard to be believed done or suffered by Flesh and Blood but mightily assured of performed and endured by themselves and their Disciples out-witting the Learning of Athens and Rome out-pleading the Orators and over-coming the powerful oppositions of both and of all others translated by their Gospel from the power of Darkness of Satan into the glorious Kingdom of the dear Son of God Thus the Ground of our Assurance sufficeth as to credence for matter of Fact SECT II. 2. The second Ground of all the Assurance Matter of Right that is possible and convenient to be had in this Life concerning our Salvation is in matter of Right to the Promises of that Salvation so procured for us is 1. Our consenting to the Promises delivered unto us 2. Our accepting and free embracing them as to our selves drawing the right of those Promises unto us 3. Our obedience or observation of them accordingly preserving those Rights unto us All which is our Faith whereby we are justified to all the Rights procured purchased and published by our Saviour Jesus Christ Thus living and dying and rising again and sending of his Spirit and ascending into Heaven and offering himself to God as a Priest and Sacrifice and sitting at the Right Hand of his Father to rule over all for us Men and for our Salvation That where he is thither he might bring us who is thus gone before us to prepare a place for us This is great Assurance and there can be no evidence nor conveyance or settlement greater or more secure than this The Word of God standing sure and our reliance thereupon We know we are the Sons of God What saith Christ Verily verily I say unto you he that heareth my word Joh. 5.13 and believeth in him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation but is passed from death unto Life And I will raise him up at the last day He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting Life Joh. 12.44 that is right unto it and he that believeth not the Son shall not see Life but is condemned already and the wrath of God abideth on him We know that we have passed from Death unto Life because we love the Brethren He that loveth not his Brother abideth in Death 1 Joh. 3.14 Eph. 2.5 c. Even when we were dead in sins hath he quickened us together with Christ by Grace ye are all saved and hath raised us up together and made us to sit together in Heavenly places in Jesus Christ That in ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his Grace in his kindness towards us through Jesus Christ For by Grace ye are saved through Faith and that not of our selves it is the Gift of God The method of this our Assurance is 1. Hearing the Son 2. Believing in him and the Father that sent him 3. Justification 1. From Damnation and Death to Salvation and Life 2. From Sin to Grace 3. From Death in Sin to Life in Righteousness 4. From Death for Sin to Life for Grace 5. From Darkness to Light 6. From Bondage to Liberty SECT III. Matter of Witness 3. The third Ground for all the Assurance that is possible and convenient to be had in this Life concerning our Salvation is in matter of Witness or Earnest thereof which is the Spirit of God When Christ departed from his Disciples by leaving the World he bid them not be troubled at his corporal absence for he would send his Holy Spirit the Comforter to abide with them and so would be spiritually present with them all all that should succeed them in the Faith unto the end of the World Therefore accordingly when they were troubled exceedingly after his death and doubted that he was not the Messiah because he was dead and buried And after his Resurrection they were not fully satisfied but strange thoughts arose in their hearts He shew'd them his hands and his feet Luc. 24.38 c. that they might know that it was he himself and bid them handle him and feel him and look well upon him for a Spirit cannot be seen nor hath Flesh and Bones as he had And while they yet were not fully assured doubting for joy and wonder for their farther satisfaction he took meat and did eat before them And moreover for the greater Assurance he by his Spirit opened their Understandings that they might understand the Scriptures and gave them a Commission to preach the Gospel Joh. 20.22 And farther yet He breathed on them and said Receive ye the Holy Ghost whosoevers sins ye remit they are remitted and whosoevers sins ye retain they are retained And last of all for the greatest assurance of all he said Behold I send the promise of my Father upon you Luc. 24.49 c. Vid. Act. 1.4 c. But tarry ye in the City of Jerusalem untill ye be endued with power from on High And he lift up his hands and blessed them and in their sight and of above five hundred Brethren together he was carried up to Heaven And then they were satisfied and worshipped and returned to Jerusalem as Christ had commanded them with great joy and waited there for the performance of the Promise Act. 2.1 c. Act. 1. which was performed upon the day of Pentecost by the Mission of the Holy Ghost upon them so as never was before When therefore all the Assurances and Confirmations that could be given to Christ's Disciples were given for their
his friends a Rod of Iron for his enemies Christ's most glorious rule is in Heaven therefore after his Resurrection his first work was to send his Ambassadours to preach his Kingdom to every Creature As my Father hath sent me so send I you Whos 's sins ye remit they are remitted and whose sins ye retain they are retained Whatsoever ye bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and whatsoever ye loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven He that receiveth you receiveth me and he that despiseth you despiseth me and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me And after his Ascension he sent down the Holy Ghost with great power to work wisdom and Miracles When he ascended up on high he led Captivity captive and gave gifts unto men In Christs life time upon Earth the Holy Ghost was not given and the reason was because Christ was not yet glorified This Mission of the Spirit being the most glorious administration of his Kingdom when the great Wisdoms and Powers of the World were not able to resist the wisdom and power of his Spirit by which his Disciples spake When the foolishness of God was wiser than the wisdom of men and the weakness of God was stronger than the power of men SECT II. Corol. Thus Christ considered as a Mediator is the Conditional Heir of all things under God And so Christians as Christians are the Conditional Heirs of all things under Christ Thus God Covenanted with Christ to give him a Kingdom but he must get it by Conquest according to the nature of a Feudal kingdom So God Covenants with Christians to give them a kingdom with Christ and under Christ but they must get it by Conquest The kingdom of Heaven must be pressed into and the violent take it by force and no otherwise The good fight of Faith must be fought out before we can lay hold upon the Crown of Righteousness So the Children of Israel had the kingdom of Canaan given them but they must fight for it before they could be put in possession And this is the true nature of getting and of keeping a Feudal Kingdom SECT III. Christs New way of conquest Thus a New way had Christ of conquering by Obedience and Sufferings So do Christians conquer by Self denial Love of enemies Patient suffering for Righteousness sake outward force against force and learning against learning and policy against policy may clash together like rocks of equal force and come off from each other safe and as strong as ever but when Weakness is advanced against Power in the Name of God and Simplicity and Innocence against Learning and deep Policy then is the mighty Power of God discovered Who sees not as man sees nor judges according to outward appearance Whose wayes are not like mans waies but of another fashion Christ is the Heir of all things therefore God covenanted with Christ as the Testator covenants with his Heir to enjoy his Inheritance upon such terms as to convey part of his Estate to such or such Legates or Co-heirs So the Promise was made to Christ that it might be sure to all the Seed for in Christ the Promises of God are Yea and Amen And therefore if God covenanted with Christ he hath also covenanted with his Seed Behold I and the Children which God hath given me Of those whom thou hast given me have I lost none for they are mine and I am thine SECT IV. And this is all that can be made of the Covenant of Grace Covenant of Grace and this is conditional which some make absolute contrary to the nature of a Covenant If a Covenant therefore be conditional with Christ how can it be absolute with Christians Thus they confound and perplex all things A Donative may be absolute a Testament may be absolute a Law or Constitution may be absolute a Promise may be absolute but a Pact or Covenant is upon some condition and the non-performance of the Condition dissolves the Pact and brings in a penalty of forfeiture And such a Condition there is in Gods Testament namely Faith and Repentance which some make the Effect or Means or they know not what If so then the main point of the Scriptures must be quite laid aside or quite expunged Because the whole Tenour of the Scriptures runs along clear contrary If thou believest thou shalt be saved Repent for the kingdom of God is at hand c. This is to have and to hold of God in Fide So God gives his Estate first to Christ to have and to hold of him in Fee Secondly to Christians to have and to hold of Christ in Fee This is free Grace and the more free because of meer grace and upon such noble terms as 1. To have all good of God 2. To hold all good of God 3. To do all good of God and for God As for conceits of Merit in this case they are vain and idle speculations producing aery notions and words without knowledge which darken the counsel of the wisdom of God SECT V. Thus Christ shares all things with Christians Christ shares with Christians 1. Christ shares his Holiness with them For therefore he hath anointed himself that we might be anointed with him and by him of whose fullness we all receive and grace for grace 2. Christ shares his Sufferings with Christians We fill up that which is behind of the Sufferings of Christ for his Body's sake which is the Church Saul Saul why persecutest thou me He that toucheth them toucheth the apple of his eye In as much as ye did it unto them ye have done it unto me And Christ is crucified in his members 3. Christ shares his Victory with Christians In him and through him we are more than Conquerors I thank God through Jesus Christ my Lord. We shall bruise Satan under every one of our feet This is our victory whereby we overcome the World even our Faith Thus Christ could not have the benefit of Gods Promise on Gods part till he had performed the condition on his part And how then can Christians expect the benefit of the Promise on Gods part except they perform the condition on their part 1. Christs Condition was Obedience and Sufferings 2. Gods Reward was Resurrection Kingdom and Glory 3. Christians Condition is Faith Repentance and Sufferings 4. Gods Reward is Resurrection and Eternal life By Christs death though faith is our Justification 1. From sin to righteousness 2. From bondage to adoption By Christs Resurrection through faith is our Justification 1. From death to life 2. From Jus ad Rem to Jus in Re. 4. Christ shares his kingdom and Priesthood with Christians Christ the principal Heir Christ the chief Priest And Christians are all Kings and Priests with him by him and under him In my Fathers house are many Mansions I go before to prepare a place for you that where I am there ye might also be If I be lifted
fight of Faith the whole Armor of God the Tenure and Service of a Vassal to his Lord and King according to the Feudal Laws of Faith and Homage in peace or war The Laws are Fundamental to which all must trust to be known and understood by all SECT III. COLLECTIONS Thus the Kingdom is God's Thus God hath given the Kingdom to Christ to fight for it Thus God hath given the Kingdom to Christians to fight for it Collections Thus Christ shall deliver up the Kingdom to God the Father when he hath put all his enemies under his feet that God may be all in all because it is the nature of an Estate in trust to be delivered up Thus Christ is Lord over our Souls and Bodies over the World and the Devil Thus kingly power is given to Christ to rule over the Church and the World Thus Priestly power is given to Christ to Sacrifice and propitiate for the Church and the World Thus Prophetical power is given to Christ to teach and instruct the Church and the World Thus Christ fights in his Person by sufferings by preaching and Miracles Thus Christians fight in their Persons by sufferings Faith and obedience Thus Kings hold under Christ by waiting at the Altar of Justice under the Throne of his Power Thus Priests hold under Christ by waiting at the Altar of Mercy under the Throne of his Grace Thus Service and Tribute is due to Kings for their waiting and they must live by the Crown Thus Honour and Offerings are due to Priests for their waiting and they must live by the Altar Thus Christs kingdom is a kingdom of Grace and his Ambassadors invite all to accept and hold of his Grace Thus Christ intercedes in his own person and by his Ambassadors for Sinners that have broken their faith and forfeited their Fee that they may be restored again Thus earthly Vassals to Satan savour of Earthly things worship and serve the god of this World Thus heavenly Vassals to Christ savour of Heavenly things worship and serve the God of Heaven Thus the wicked are in Fee to the Devil faithful in wickedness inherit shame and destruction Thus the Righteous are in Fee to Christ faithful in Religion inherit glory and salvation Thus a man may forfeit his Fee to Satan and lose his Tenure to darkness and enter into Fee to God and become the child of Light And so è contra A man may forfeit his Fee to God and lose his Tenure to Light and enter into Fee to Satan and become the child of Darkness Thus he that is fighting against God may be overcome i. e. willingly not against his will as in other battels The good Spirit may perswade his Spirit and bring him back or translate him from the power of Darkness into the kingdom of the dear Son of God Thus he that is fighting for God may be overcome i. e. willingly not against his will as in other battels The evil Spirit may perswade his Spirit and bring him back Heb. 6. or translate him from the power of Light into the kingdom of the Devil Thus a Vassal that breaks his Faith may return to his Liege lord and submit and be restored for any man may lose his right or he may give it away or leave it to the wide World The Natural branches may be cut off and others engrafted and they may be grafted in their own stock again The Wheat may be chaff and the Chaff wheat The Devil may be cast out and enter in again The good Spirit may depart and return A Citizen may be disfranchised a free Head lessened an Heir disinherited And after all to all these there may be restitution in Integrum Thus Portae dignitatum non patent infamibus personis The gates of Honour are shut against Infamous persons Feuda non capiunt Infideles False men Felons and Rebels cannot hold a Fee There is no blemish in Christs kingdom every one that maketh and loveth a Lie must be gone from thence Christ knows not Hypocrites that have broken their faith and forsaken their first Love Without are Dogs and Murtherers and no unclean thing shall ever enter into the kingdom of Heaven Thus all Liege Lords are Patrons and Benefactors and all Liege Subjects are Clients and Beneficiaries The Devil rewards his Servants and God rewards his Servants No Schism or Heresie in Satans kingdom no Schism or Heresie in Christs kingdom because it is a breach of Fee Thus the Covenant of Works is not a Fee or Grace but a Debt but the Covenant of Grace is a Fee or of grace and a gift Adam was in Covenant of Works in his Innocency but after his Fall he was in the Covenant of Grace and entred into a Fee Moses was not a Liege Lord nor his Subjects in Fee with him but Christ is a Liege Lord and his Subjects in Fee with him All Feudataries are fellow-Souldiers and fellow-Subjects Though some are called Lords yet all are Servants to one Lord. The genius of a Feudist is Love and Obedience because he is a Beneficiary and hath nothing but what he hath received and can call nothing his own but is in continual dependency upon his Lords free Grace and bounty and cannot but serve him by all the tyes of Love and Honour as Children are tyed by the bonds of Nature to love and honour their Parents The CONTENTS Transition Foundation of Merit Supererogation Demerit Rewards and Punishments TITLE IV. Of Merit IN a Feudal kingdom there can be no place for Merit Transition because Beneficiaries and Usufructuaries receive all upon grace from their Lord and Benefactor and hold what they have from him for love honour and service which they owe him for all that they have neither can they recompense the Donor by all that they do or can do for him but must account themselves unprofitable Servants when all is done The foundation and source of Merit is Foundation of Merit the performance of a work which is not due to another or which no Right on our part could compel us nor the party for whose sake it is done had any right to enforce the doing of the same from us Therefore no mortal man can merit any thing at Gods hands though it were possible for him to fulfil the Law of God exactly and therefore God can be a Debtor to no man but as he is pleased to make himself so by his free and gracious Promise which gives him to whom the Promise was made a right by Grace which by works he could not have And if by Grace then it is no more of Works otherwise Grace is no more Grace Ro. 11.6 7. But if it be of Works then it is no more Grace otherwise Work is no more Work Therefore it is of Faith or Covenant that it might be by Grace to the end the Promise might be sure Ro. 4.16 Therefore no mortal man can merit any thing at the hands of his
out the pure Channels that refresh the World into divers muddy streams that sterilize as well as bastardize the race of Mankind Virginity Not disparaging Virginity that sister of Angels and resemblance of the glorified Spirits who neither marry nor are given in marriage nor those that are innocently blemished by unlawful conceptions and births because they could not help it Why Marriage was ordained But still Marriage is what it ever was and ever will be a most honourable estate instituted of God in Paradise in the time of Man's innocency signifying the Mystical union that is betwixt Christ and his Church Which holy estate Christ adorned and beautified with his presence and first Miracle that he wrought in Cana of Galile and is commended of St. Paul to be honourable among all men and therefore is not to be enterprized or taken in hand unadvisedly lightly or wantonly to satisfie mens carnal lusts and appetites like brute beasts which have no understanding but reverently discreetly advisedly soberly and in the fear of God duly considering the causes for which Matrimony was ordained First it was ordained for the procreation of Children to be brought up in the fear and nurture of the Lord. Secondly it was ordained a Remedy against sin and to avoid fornication that such persons as have not the gift of Continency might marry and keep themselves undefiled Members of Christ's Body Thirdly for the mutual Society help and comfort that the one ought to have of the other both in prosperity and adversity This so honourable Estate makes not only Flesh of our Flesh and bone of our bone but Spirit of our Spirit and that two are one Flesh and one Spirit So God and Man Christ and his Church Man and Wife Fathers and Children Fathers and Mothers Sons and Daughters Brothers and Sisters Husbands and Wives and all Relations are mutually each others Christ the King is the Betrothed and Husband as well as Father of his Church and Kingdom And Christ's Church is the Subje ct the Spouse and Wife of Christ her Husband Therefore SECT V. Were it but for a bare civil respect it stands the Kingdom of the World in very great stead carefully to look after the right ordering of Marriages And surely there are weighty reasons for it It keepeth the purity of the Bloud from commixtion of base Seed Benefits of Marriage It gives a right to the true Sons and Daughters to take comfort in them and receive help from them to honour and enrich our own and not anothers Issue It preserves from the greatest usurpation of Natural rights to each Man's Body to each Man's Wife to eat the Fruit of my own Tree and drink the Waters of mine own Cistern not to own and feed anothers Cattel in my proper Ground It prevents the greatest cheat in the World Abuses of Marriage to be cosened in my own Progeny and not be able to distinguish it from anothers What is more entirely mine own than the off-spring of my own loyns and she that is next to me and one Flesh with me It is the greatest dishonour imaginable to be thus chouced it is a wonder it is no more regarded nor stood upon I would gladly eat my own Bread and till my own Land I am nearest and dearest to my self and all the Love Honour and Estate I have I would willingly reserve to me and mine and my virtue wisdom and wit too if it were in my power Bastardy But contrary to Nature all that I have must flow from my genuine Breed to a spurious generation This misconveyes all Inheritances and breaks the bonds of Nature love and descent The Brood may be fair hopeful and wise for their parts of Body and Mind but they are none of mine and yet all that is mine must be theirs This distroies all the great Priviledges of Wills and Testaments so direct a part of the Law and so much useful to Mankind it jumbles together the Bloud of Mankind it befools the Labourers of Mankind Nobility is dasht and quite destroy'd by it Virtue and Honesty Religion and Laws are quite destroy'd by it It infatuates all the labours and studies of Mankind which should do good first to their own private Families and then to the publick state In a word it confounds all rihgts of Persons things and actions It lays all in common and wastes all and no body can express the mischief that redounds to the World by it To engraft wild plants into a natural stock To puddle pure Fountains to poyson wholsom waters to defile every nest and throw dung upon every clean place SECT VI. Rights by Marriage My chiefest right of Soul and Body and all that I have is to my God whose they are the next is to my self the next is to my second self or my Wife the next is to my Children and their Children Friends and Allies and mine for all these God hath given me Now all these are lost by my giving my right to the Devil and to harlots this is my own act and deed But some of these are lost by being torn from me by Extortioners and Adulterers this is their act and deed I must have a Father or else I could not be but he may be such a one as I never knew or never shall and this is not only a loss but a shame and misery to me but no sin because I could not help it I am in the condition of a Slave to possess nothing at all and Slaves usurp possession of all that is mine In Christ's Church and Kingdom there must be Chastity In Christ's Church and Kingdom there must be Fidelity in Families and Kingdoms Christ's Church consists of Families Therefore the solemn Covenant of Marriage must be kept inviolable in all Families because they are altogether married unto Christ their Husband Lord and King and not go a whoring from under their God Laws about Marriage For this purpose the good Laws of Men especially of the Romans are carefully to be observed who have taken a very strict course in every particular for the pure undertaking and performing of this great Business of Life that so much concernes the happy condition of Men in this World and in the World to come It is profitable therefore for Christians to take a survey of all those wholsom Constitutions set down in the Body of the Civil Law concerning Marriage Age of Persons 1. As first for the age of the Persons that are to marry The Law allowes of twelve in Females and fourteen in Males to be ripeness of years to contract for themselves Quality of Persons 2. The Persons condition that are to marry is considered that they be Liberi Cives Romani as hath been spoken of before Infamous 3. The Roman Law greatly abhorred Scenicos Lenones c. i. e. all ludicrous histrionical and mimical Persons that came upon the Stage as commonly most unchast and all pimps
the abundance of light and grace which it affordeth Do we not count the last Adam stronger than the first Is not he able to cast down all the strong holds all the towring imaginations which flesh and blood though tainted in the womb can set up against him And therefore if we be truly what we profess our selves Christians this weakness cannot hurt us and if it hurt us it is because we are not Christians To conclude If in Adam we were all lost in Christ we are come home and brought nearer to heaven Et post Jesum Christum when we have given up our names unto Christ and profest our selves Members of that mystical Body whereof he is the Head all our complaints of weakness and disability to move in our several places are vain and unprofitable and injurious to the Gospel of Christ which is the power of God unto salvation Ro. 1 16. And a gross and dangerous errour it is when we run on and please our selves in our evil ways to complain of our hereditary infirmities and the weakness and imperfection of Nature for God may yet breath his Complaints and Expostulations against every Son of Adam that will not turn Though you are weak though you have received a bruise by the Fall of your first Parents yet in me is your strength and then Why will ye die O house of Israel Hos 13.5 Dr. Spencer of Prodigies Praef. Religion is easily concluded a great adversary to a true generousness and universal freedom of spirit and that its whole business is to subdue the Spirits of men to some cold and little observances Generousness pale and feminine fears Hence men quickly grow weary of it as of a yoak that continually galls them and conclude themselves gainers if they may but purchase manhood with Atheism Id. ib. Religion is not to be dallied with non patitur ludum fides Pious frauds as Strong-waters do the body may perhaps help religion in a fit but if used familiarly disable the native heat and strength thereof Hay and stubble laid upon a good foundation such I count well-meant forgeries in Religion will catch fire and consume at last and leave a great stain and soil upon the foundation As it reports Religion a system of some pitiful rites sneaking and beggarly Elements Elements there is nothing more effectually inclines subtil minds to Atheism as the evaporating religion into a multitude of touchy and critical modes and observations which cannot command reverence to themselves before discerning minds which soon see through them they are so thin and aery Id. ib. No two things do so usurp and waste the faculty of Reason as Enthusiasm and Superstition the one binding a faith the other a fear upon the Soul Pessimum est plane pestis tabes Intellectûs si vanis accedat veneratio Id. ib. p. 10. When our Saviour came into the world the Religion of the greatest part of it through the agency of the Devil ran out into a multitude of little rites weak observations bodily postures And he appoints a Religion directly opposite plain simple rational life and spirit whose main design was to employ and perfect the mind and spirit of a man And can it be thought that heaven and hell now touch each other so far that we must borrow the measures of our biggest fears and hopes and motives to Repentance from the Ethnick Divinity or from the Jewish Rites in which if there had been aliquid sani to be sure the Devil would have hindred its gaining so great a regard as it did among his Votaries must we look for such a Jewel as the intimations of the Counsels of Wisdom are in the dunghil of obscene and monstrous Births c. Id. ib. p. 11. God was pleased heretofore suitable to the Nonage of the Church to address himself very much to the lower faculties of the Soul Phancy and Imagination accordingly we find Prophesies delivered Nonage of the Church in vehement and unusual schemes of speech such as are greatly adapted to strike and affect imagination Christ was pro-raised as one speaks sub magnificis admirationem facientibus ideis the mysteries of the Gospel were held forth in most splendid types and symbols and the Law of God forc't upon the spirits of men heretofore by the terrours of a thundering heaven and a burning Mountain and speedy vengeance upon the despisers thereof The spirits of good men carried out to actions and tempers beyond their natural capacities by the pregnant and vigorous Impresses of the divine Spirit and the fears of the Church excited and her faith assisted by many signs and wonders the withdrawing whereof the Church bewails they all vanishing at the light of Divine Revelation prevailed as Stars do upon the approach of the day-light But they which talk of and look for any such vehement expressions of Divinity now mistake the temper and condition of that Oeconomy which the appearance of our Saviour hath now put us under Wherein all things are to be managed in a more sedate cool and silent manner in a way suited to and expressive of the temper our Saviour discovered in the World Who caused not his voice to be heard in the streets Is 42.2 and to the condition of a reasonable Being made to be managed by steady and calm Arguments and the words of Wisdom heard in quiet in a smooth and serene temper the mysteries of the Gospel come forth cloathed in sedate and intelligible forms of speech The minds of men are not now drawn into extasie Eccles 9.17 by any such vehement and great examples of Divine power as attended the lower and more servile state of the World The Miracles our Saviour wrought were of a calm and gentle nature curing the blind restoring the sick and lame not causing of thunder and storms as Samuel but appeasing them Matth. 16.1 None of them such as the Jews called for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signs from heaven such prodigious and affrighting thunders and fires which attended the delivery of the Law and the Spirit of Elijah Indeed the Veil of the Temple was rent the Sun dreadfully eclips't the Earth terribly shaken at his death but these astonishing wonders were made use of as his last reserve to conquer the prejudices of an obdurate people upon whom his more gentle and obliging instances of divine Majesty made no impression and perhaps these prodigious changes in Nature were intended as Prophetick Emblems of the great change shortly to ensue in heaven the way and worship of Religion and earth the powers and kingdoms of the World by the power and doctrine of the Person Heb. 12.26 27 who then died upon the Cross The mighty rushing wind at Pentecost which was issued in a soft and lambent fire upon the heads of the first preachers of the Gospel was possibly a figure of that more vehement and terrible state of the Law which usher'd the way for and was determined in the more sedate and gentle
dispensation of the Gospel God hath now in a great measure left frighting of men to heaven by visible terrors The Law of the Messias was delivered upon the Mount in the small and still voice and is set home upon the hearts of men by the terrour only of a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Matth. 23.14 a more heavy vengeance in another world than what overtook the despisers of Moses Law God expects now that we should be judiciously religious and acted to his service by a spirit of love and of a sound mind to fear his threatning more than the burnings of Sinai to look upon a bad man since the appearance of Christ to take away sin as the greatest prodigy and to expect the signs of an approaching Judgment non in Erratis naturae sed Saeculi Id. ib. p. 18. Fanaticks Now we shall ever find that all Persons which take up Opinions from their own poetical genius and busie fancy are impregnable to all the assaults of reason The Rosicrucians acted so hugely by imagination in Philosophy Some kind of Chymists in Medicks The Cabalists in Scripture Expositions Enthusiasts in Religion Figure-casters in Astrology are so invincibly resolved upon their Hypotheses that like him in the story when their hands those little reasonings wherewith they hold them are cut off they will mordicùs defendere hold them with their teeth biting and reviling language thrown upon their opposers and neglecters They are entertained with pleasant and easie dreams and therefore angry with those that attempt to awaken them and discompose them Ib. p. 19. As the assistance of God the Spirit with our holy endeavours doth not take away the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the weaknesses attendant on Christian practises because he acts us ad modum nostrum so neither doth the Co-assistance of God the Father with all natural Agents quite remove the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Errours of Nature Ib. p. 23. Terrible Representations of God The opinion of Prodigies represents God before the Soul with a rod of Vengeance perpetually in his hand A Belief of a God is that Fort which the Devil could never storm force by any direct temptation and therefore he designs by such terrible and servile conceits wrought in the hearts of men to undermine it For perpetual jealousies and slavish fears of God like over-heated waters boyl over at last and extinguish that fire that faith and sense of God which first produc't them When the Notion of a Deity stands alway before the mind like a Gorgons head pregnant with nothing but horrours and dismaies it quickly works and turns it to a stony stupid neglect of him so to get rid of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that mighty Fear which was its continual Executioner Moreover the Devil no doubt loves to bring men off from a noble and generous temper And as it is the design of Religion to cast out fear and to introduce a spirit of true freedom and confidence toward God so it is the work of the Devil to call on a spirit of Bondage and Fear that so he see may in men the more lively and express images and pourtraictures of himself who believes and trembles He would have his Rites of Worship of old 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 frightful and amazing mysteries the Idols wherein he was worshipped bear in their very Names and Titles a remembrance of that Baseness and Servility of spirit which attended his Votaries in the service of so absolute a Tyrant being styled sometimes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 horrours Is 40 5. Jer. 50.38 Ps 106.36 as 't is rendred in the Margin 2 Chron. 15.16 sometimes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying trouble and terrour and the Devils are styled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 coming from a word which signifies horrour because usually tendring themselves to view in the most frightful forms Now this Superstitious perswasion of Prodigies doth hugely minister to bondage of Spirit and tends to seal men with the mark of Cain according to the Jews a perpetual Trembling and Astonishment P. 24. That which possibly assisted this Tradition was the succeeding of Rome Christian as into the place so into very many of the Rites and usages of Rome Pagan as might be easily made appear at large were that our business and into as large a power over the Faiths and Consciences of men as Rome Pagan had over their Bodies and so was enabled to mold them into what Opinions or Practises they might best serve themselves upon Ib. p. 29. As in Heresie Populus sequitur Doctiores ☜ Popular Errors the People follow the Learned as being in a matter more abstract and subtil more apt to believe than to judge so in Superstition Doctiores sequuntur Populum the Learned are not seldom observed to follow the People because early surprized into an opinion that can enter so valuable a plea for its self as common Consent This Notion of presages by Prodigies being so popular and Catholick Wise men in their first and unwary years when they are Discipuli Plebis may entertain conceits thereof which shall plead prescription against the strongest reasons to dispossess them As Iron in a greater and more massie body sequitur Naturam communem follows the Law of common Nature in all heavy bodies and moves to the earth but in smaller pieces sequitur Naturam privatam it follows its own private Nature and directs it self to the Load-stone Thus Learned men where they are prest by the force and weight of Education and a Common prejudice generally follow common Nature in men which inclines to embrace Society and therefore more in Judgment Secundum viam Terrae but in matters out of vulgar ken and where they cannot be tempted by a common Agreement they move Secundum viam Consilii and pursue the dictates of their private light and understanding Even wise men in many instances held Aras Focos their Faith and their Estates by the same Tenure Tradition from Ancestours and therefore we may receive their Judgments tanquam ex Cathedrâ as engagements to consider not alwaies tanquam ex Tripode as obligations to believe Ib. p. 39. They look upon their Gods as a kind of Fairies which would throw Firebrands and Furies about the house for the omission of some petty Criticisms in their Rites and that therefore they gave forth frequent intimations of those impotencies and distastes They thought they were lost with a Trifle and won again to a good opinion of them by paying them the homage of a little crouching and circumstantial Devotion ☞ Fathers not all pure To the Testimony of Fathers I answer in general That 't were no wonder to find them living so near the times of Gentilism speaking in favour sometimes for some of the Doctrines thereof The main trunk and body of the Gentile Superstition was indeed hewen down in their minds but still there were some small roots and fibres remaining which are observed to spring up ever
and anon and trouble their Writings Ib. p. 34. Did God generally under the weak and worldly state of the Jewish Church send forth those Prophets whose learning education holy lives great works admirable gifts commanded even prophane men to a reverence of their Persons and Message And doth he now make use of Monsters Comets Meteors or the Apparitions of unclean Spirits as his Praecones Publici Id. ib. p 47. Signa Moralia signs of a Moral nature such as were the gradual lessening of the lustre and glory of the Jewish Polity and Pedagogy Oeconomy of Moses decaying by the ceasing of Prophecy the absence of Heavenly fire the Ark of the Covenant the Schechinah the Oracles by Urim and Thummim From the Second Temple the lapsing of the government from Kings to Dukes from Dukes to the Sanhedrim from them to the Romans there having been no Kings types of Christ after David and Solomon except Hezekiah be admitted a Candidate for that hand this vanishing splendour of the face of Moses that Oeconomy whereof he was the Minister was a sign that the Sun of Righteousness was now arising under whom a state of more Spiritual and Inward glory was shortly to obtain Ib. p. 48. All the Shadows and Rites of the Law were to expire and conclude like the Phoenix in a Nest of Spices in the Graces and Truths and Glories of the Gospel state that the wall of Partition was now to be taken away and all Nations to own themselves Brethren under one Common-Father The Times there intended were times rather present than future Times wherein the Mosaical Oeconomy brought on with mighty Signs and Wonders was to determine Times wherein the Church was to be put under an immutable and excellent form of Administration and therefore the last time in Scripture Signs The Jews were a people so used to Signs that the Apostle tells us 1 Cor. 1.22 The Jews require a Sign And it was the vulgar opinion amongst them That as all extraordinary Prophets were to seal their Commission with a Miracle so all events extraordinary were to be foreshewn by a Sign Hence the Jews came to our Saviour with that bold demand What Sign shewest thou unto us Mar. 8.11 seeing thou dost all these things Jo. 2.18 God perhaps gave them Signs to assure them that the evils which befell them arose not out of the dust but came upon them from the fore-appointing Counsels of heaven and to awaken their dull and worldly minds into a lively sense of his Justice and Providence But now in the broad day light of the Gospel 't is expected that we should not need awakening by any such Monitors into a sense and awe of the Divine Majesty We must now believe without a Sign and derive our Repentance not from mighty Earthquakes and Prodigies but an ingenious and understanding sense of sin Id. ib. p. 74. We are to discard all sowr Jealousies concerning God Sowr jealous conceits of God Synesius hath observed that however the Nations were distanced from each other like the lines in the Circumference 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by very different opinions and sentiments in reference to God and Religion in other matters yet still 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all center'd and met in this great Doctrine both wise and unwise That God was a good bountiful and benign Being The greater wonder to me it is that so many Doctrines among the Heathens and Christians too which I am not here to take notice of should be received with a Non obstante to this native and easie sense of the Divine goodness and Philanthropy lodged in their minds the Leaven of a Sowr conceit which cannot dwell with a belief of Gods goodness Plutarch justly challengeth in Herodotus That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Deity is of an envious and troublesom disposition That God is only ingeniosus in malis that his Counsels are especially taken up with the contrivances of new plagues and miseries for the hated World than which did never a more pestilential Air breath from the bottomless pit crazing the very vitals of Religion and corrupting the first and earliest notions rising up in the Soul when conceiving of a God Whereas if men did not measure the Nature of God by that froward and envious Spirit which commands themselves they might easily understand all the Evils sometimes sent down upon the World to be in the language of the Moralist only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Divine Testimony given in against sin and intended but to discipline the mad World into some sober and wise thoughts and they would believe the fairer reports which Scripture makes of God which tells us He doth not willingly grieve the Children of men that fury dwells not with him that Judgment is his strange work Ib. p. 77. A generous indifferency as to the good and evil things of this world Indifferency to the world The more the heart of a man outgrows the joys and fears of this world the more will all things therein appear to him much too little for the solemnity of a Prodigy The more will he think nothing here of value enough to have its fall come with pomp and observation and the less will he concern himself to know the future condition of such a vanity as this world is 'T is only when mens hopes and fortunes are much embarked in this world that they are impressive to any great fears in reference to its future state The Gentiles of old that could never lift up their heavy and drossie minds above the dull flats of things sensible and worldly were the greatest Professors of all the Arts of Divination by all manner of strange and unusual Accidents And the Jews to whom God had promised a heaven on this side thereof in the literal enjoyment of this Worlds blessings were very solicitous about the meaning of strange Prophecies the signs of the times the issue of things And God was pleased by many Oracles Signs and Prophecies to accommodate himself to this low and worldly temper of theirs But since the introduction of a Better hope the Tenders of such Spiritual promises we have scarce any intimations and notices given us of things future unless some very dark Prophecies in the Revelation which some Learned men conceive already accomplish't God hereby supposing our eyes now to be fixt so upon the more clearly revealed felicities of another world as not much to look down to the futurities of this P. 80. Shall we value our Faith at so cheap a rate as to trust it with the oracles of the Father of lies Can the Devil be presumed able to give us true Resolutions to any Questions de Futuro Did God ever make him of his Counsel or deliver times and seasons into his power or willing if able to do it with any fair and single purposes and intentions Have the beams of the Sun of Righteousness put out all the fires on his Altars the glory and power of the Divine Oracles and Miracles
ought to be exploded and rooted out of minds innocently tender and good and willing to be taught better Discerning Party The honest searching and discerning Clergy and Laity discover them to be pious frauds to get Reputation and Gain and labour wisely and carefully to undeceive and satisfie the world by the few necessary and plain Truths of Christ as he and his Disciples have published them to all Mankind in the four Gospels and the Acts and Epistles of the Apostles And till this course be taken the Church and the World will never be at peace Primitive Times This Course was prosecuted in the first four hundred years with plainness and simplicity of Life and Doctrine by the best of Saints not without some intrusion of Judaism and Gentilism betimes even in the daies of the Apostles with other workings of men of Antichristian spirits But afterwards when Riches and Honour and with them Pride and Worldly Interests came crowding in amongst Church-men out went the old plain way of preaching and living and in came vain Philosophy Oratory Flattery Ambition Persecution Division and what not most unlike to the profession of Christianity and contrary to the power of godliness Many noble Souls had their eyes fixed and their hands exercised in the old way of Truth and grieved for the Deviations which they could not help or reform at all but protested manfully against them like faithful Witnesses and Followers of their Lord and Master and kept the Faith all along which was once delivered to the Saints and some died for it But at last after many overtures of Truth that could not be hid Reformation a greater assault was made than ordinary to shake off her chains bring her out of the Dungeon and rowse her up against Lies and it was done effectually to rare intents and purposes Then were the Ages filled with more learned and unbiassed men than ever since the Apostles daies Then together with Religion Arts and Sciences revived and flourished not without great augmentations of Honour Plenty and Peace that accrued thereunto in the kingdoms of the World which fared the better for the Church Yet envious men were never wanting nor ever will to sow Tares still foggs and vapours arise but the Sun shines and climbs his Meridian The strong man keepeth his house and there is none stronger than he to turn him out The old abominable Heresies though revived and new ones added nevertheless their monstrous heads are and will be cut off by the mighty Giants defenders of the Faith They sneak into corners hang down their heads dare not shew their guilty faces save to the ignorant and rebellious others hiss them out of doors The Ancient paths are now more and more enquired for and glorious Captains lead the way They that do not follow are nevertheless convinced and cannot but approve of the things they refuse to practice Those therefore that aspire to this Evangelical temper are the noblest Souls and tread in the stateliest paths of Vertue and Peace and bring more Souls unto God For which their labour and moderation they feel the odium of the World and the unlucky blows of their Enemies but are commended and defended by God and all good men for their so honourable and gallant undertakings Besides what Errors have been of old there have been since by degrees brought in so many as threaten corruption of the whole Mass of Christian Doctrine As the setting up Infallibility and Supremacy where none should seek to be the greatest the Idol of the Masse the Worship of Daemons the Diana for Gain Purgatory and Pardons the cheat of Auricular Confessions Images Penances Reliques and innumerable Ceremonies repugnant to the simplicity of Gospel worship To these may be added the Chymistry of Rosicrucians Behemists Cabbalists Casuists Summists School-men Postillers and Enthusiasts of all sorts These high and Magisterial dictates imposed upon the pain of Damnation together with the intolerable Pride Avarice and Luxury of Church-men open the mouths of the Adversary to cry down the Clergy for Cheats and Robbers of the Souls Honours and Estates of Mankind cause them to question all Truths and fall into direct Atheism and Profaneness Yet am I not without powerful hopes and do already see and wonder at the wise and gracious Providence of God in stirring up the spirits of Rare men to baffle the Carnal Fallacies and Superstitious Riddles that have bewitched the Age and advance the power of Godliness and pure worship with obedience to Princes 1. God hath abolished the Jewish Service 2. God hath silenced the Heathenish Oracles 3. God hath ceased from Miracles frighting Mortals by Comets Plagues Famines c. into faith and obedience 4. Never purer Wits since the world stood 5. Never braver Clergy since the World stood 6. Never holier Souls since the world stood 7. Never baser Spirits since the world stood As for this Dross of the Age the Ranters and Atheists they will die and be damned like base fellows as they are they will soon be kick't off the stage and drove out of the Hives as useless and hurtful in Church and State the very shame of Mankind a fair riddance in God's good time and Truth which is greatest will prevail Wisdom shall be justified of her Children shame shall be unto Fools and God shall be glorified above all Amen The Clench for good and all The Dispositions of God's Will and Estate by Testament are concerning Things to be had videlicet a present Right to a future Inheritance and concerning Things to be done for the having them or for Justification to them by Faith and for the holding of them by Sanctification or Tenure of Love In Gods last Will and Testament managed and ratified for ever by Christ's death and performed by his Resurrection Ascension Oblation Session and Last Judgment is disposed a present Right to a future estate of Eternal Blessedness The Earnest and Assurance whereof is sealed unto us by the Spirit of God in the means of Faith justifying thereunto The Last stroke God is the Sole Lord of Blessedness to which the Faithful have the true Right by oath of Fealty to their Liege Lord to hold it in Fee by personal homage and service When they have performed their Faith and Allegiance and done their full homage constantly to the end of their Spiritual warfare then are they invested in the full and indefeisable Estate of Blessedness in a quasi Allodium for ever The End of the Second Volume