let us look upon the sheep as they are a flock as they are Oves first in the plural number and secondly as Oves meae my sheep the sheep of Christ a multitude or number under the command of one supreme Sheepherd First Oves in the plural number otherwise Christ could have no Church and the great Sheepherd would have never a Flock One sheep can no more properly be called a Flock then one Swallow may be said to make a Summer and on the other side a multitude of sheep without rule or Government is no more a flock then several shreds of Cloth may be called a Garment So is it also with the Church one man though never so replenished with celestial Graces cannot so properly be called a Church as a Chappel of Ease and multitudes of men that live not under one Lord one Faith one Baptisme cannot with such propriety be termed a Church as a confusion of opinions To the making therefore of a Church a Flock there is a number first required and next an union or consolidation of those numbers It s true this number hath not been at all times eminent nor equally conspicuous in all places and yet there have been still a number Seven thousand knees there were in Israel which Elijah knew not that had not bowed themselves to Baal and infinite numbers in the Realm of Judah who never offered sacrifice to that wretched Idol visible Professors of Gods saving truths and devout worshippers of his holy name Nor ever was the Church so destituâ—e of the grace of God as not to hold those necessary fundamental Doctrines which are required unto salvation and those professed and taught in some place or other according to the will and pleasure of Almighty God Since God first had a Church there have still been numbers of Professors though more or lesse according unto times and seasons more in some places then in others although not alwayes in such whole and sound condition so free from erroâ— and corruptions as it ought to be But number simply is not so great a strength to the Church of God as is the unity thereof For as the holy Ghost in the Book of Psalms compares the Church not unto men but to a City a City at unity in it self and in the Canticles not unto Souldiers but an Army an Army terrible with banners so doth he liken it not unto sheep but to a flock a flock new come from washing in the same Song of Solomon a little flock as himself calls it in St. Luke And if a flock it must be then united and collected into one Fold under the leading and command of the same one Sheepherd unum â—vile and unus Pastor being joyned together in this Chapter v. 16. To finde this one Sheepherd who it is we need seek no further then my Text it is Christ our Saviour who therefore calleth them oves meas his own sheep his as the chief sheepherd and proprietary the Lord and owner of the flock And this supreme and universal sheepherd we acknowledge gladly and should account our selves in an ill condition were we not under his command fed by his blessed Word and Sacraments and safely sheltered under the wings of his protection There is indeed another who pretends to this this universal Empire over all the Flock one who cries out with Polyphemus in the Poet Hoc pâ—cus omne meum est that all the sheep upon the Downs are his or like the sheepherd in the Eclogue Mille meae Siculis errant in montibus Agnae and so are all the Lambs on a thousand Hills And whereas antiently it was conceived to be a perfect definition of the Church of Christ viz. that it was a body of men professing one Lord one Faith one Baptisme our Masters in the Church of Rome have now added this sub unius Christi in terris Vicarii Romani Pont. that this collected body must be under the command of the Bishop of Rome A patch subjoyned to the old definition of a Church much like the piece of new Cloth put to an old Garment which our Saviour speaketh of That which is added to it to make up the rent takes from the beauty of the Garment Et scissura fit pejor saith the Text the Schisme or rupture is made worse then before it was For by this patch this new addition the Churches of the East which are large and numerous those of the Moscovites and Aâ—thiopians which are farre more entire though not so populous and all the Churches also of the Reformation are cut off for ever from having any part in David or hope of an inheritance in the sonne of Jesse But with this new Divinity we have nought to do We know but one chief Sheepherd onely even the Lord Christ Jesus whose voyce we are to hear whom we ought to follow If it be asked whether the number or the unity of the flock be the more considerable no question but we must determine it in behalf of unity A small flock if it hold together are lesse obnoxious to the Wolf then multitudes of sheep dispersed and scattered without rule and order Luporum insidiis oves minus patent quod ita catervatim incedant à reliquis non aberrent as mine Authour hath it When the sheep keep together in a flock a Body the Wolf dare hardly meddle with them for it were madness in him to attempt a flock But if he meet them single or in scattered Companies divided from the main Body of their fellows or otherwise stragling from the Fold then takes he his advantage of them and destroyes them utterly As long as Dinah kept her self within the Sanctuary of her Fathers House fenced by the valour of her Brethren and guided by the counsels of a careful Parent it went well with her she preserved her honour But when the gadding humour took her and she must needs abroad to see the Daughters of the Land she forthwith met with Sichem the Sonne of Hamor who seized upon her and defiled her And so it also is with the stragling Christian such as do peevishly divide themselves from the Communion of the Church and wander from the rest of that sacred Body They either fall into the jawes of the roaring Lion who walkes about in expectation of his prey seeking out whom he may devoure or else by hearkening to the voice of strangers whom they should not follow they make themselves a spoyl unto Theeves and Robbers Keep we then all together in one Fold one Flock and so we need not fear the violence of Satan nor the power of Hell nor any mischievous design of malicious men And if we would preserve the spirit of unity in the bond of peace we cannot do it with lesse hazard nor with more assurance then if we hearken diligently to the voyce of Christ and tread with patience in his steps which are the duties to be done
the juyce and made it fit for nothing but the very fire Faction and error so behave themselves to the Word of God as Judas did to God the Word They are both of them cunning Traytors killing sometimes in their embraces and sometimes betraying in their kisses Or if not thus yet they destroy it at the last by over-spreading all the Church and eating out the truth of Doctrine if not tell me if in the Jewish Church the Pharisees had not almost made the Commandements of God of none effect by their traditions Tell me if in the Christian Church the tares of errour and false Doctrine had not even overgrown the Gospel if the Popes Canon and the proud dictates of the Schoolmen had not usurped into the Chair and Throne of Scripture certain I am that Frier Richard de Man 's in the Trent-Councel did publickly maintain and with good applause that all the points of faith had been so clearly handled by those Schoolmen ut ea ex Scripturis discere nil opus esset that now the word of God was no longer serviceable so truly was it Satans purpose not only by the sowing of his tares to corrupt Religion but by that cunning to supplant it And all this while what was become of those to whom the Lord had farmed his field and leased out his Vineyard My Text makes answer to this question and tells us that they were asleep wherein we have the Servants and their sluggishness my last Couplet cùm dormirent homines while men slept Invadunt urbem somno vinoque sepultam Cities are sometimes soonest taken when the siege is raised and all the Watch-men made secure for when the enemy is neare and a Trench cast about the Walls the Watch is doubled and there are Centinels and Scouts in every corner to mark the motions of the Enemy and observe his purposes so also was it with the grand enemy of Gods Field in generall but more especially in reference to that particular part thereof which we call the Church As long as he essay'd to batter down the Bulwarks in the House of God he was more closely watched and all mens eyes were bent upon him but having lulled it once asleep drenched it in sensuality corrupted it with ease and prohibited pleasures then was his time to venture on it and to sowe his tares an opportunity well watch'd No sooner did men sleep no sooner were the servants drowsie and regardless of so great a charge but he was straight about his business no sooner did men sleep what men Lyra makes answer the Apostles what of their negligence no God forbid but of the death the last sleep and departure of those blessed spirits St. Austin and Euthymius do a little touch at this conceit and they only touch it but Egesippus with great confidence affirms it saying that after the Apostles deaths the Hereticks did then begin to lift up their heads and advance their errors mingling their tares 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their false and commentitious Doctrines with the truth and Gospel This we believe indeed that then the Hereticks became more insolent and adventurous then before they were and did oppose the Gospel as he tells us there 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with the greater impudence but yet I am not of opinion that this should be the sleep and these the men intended in the present Scripture With how much better reason doth the Glosse expound it of a general negligence both in the Pastor and the people a negligence of private men circa custodiam suae propriae personae in the preserving and defence of their several souls a negligence of the publick Pastors circa custodiam gregis sui in the ill tending of the flock committed to them This exposition of the Glosse confirmed by Chrysostom where he informs us of a misery of no mean quality like to befall those sleepy souls to whom the Husbandman had left his field yet not the Priest or Prelate only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but the people also otherwise as the Apostle said that if there were no Resurrection then were the Christians of all men most miserable so were the Priest and Prelate the most miserable of all other Christians if all mens sins were rated only on their scores and they to give up an account of every soul in their several charges It s true indeed that both Euthymius and St. Hierome understand here only magistros praeceptores ecclesiarum the teachers and overseers of the Church And so far we may yeeld unto them that it is meant of them principally and as publick Ministers which are to have a care of the common safety but so that every private man is included also in the Parable The Devil first makes his advantage of the negligence of private persons and whiles they sleep secure and careless he scattereth in their hearts the seeds of Heresie and error that so they may be able to infect their brethren The enemy never sends out any of his Foxes to destroy Gods Harvest till he put fire-brands in their tails This done he seeks occasion to employ them in the destruction of the wheat in the infection of the Church and therein also makes advantage of the security and negligence of their Superiours of their Rulers These the Lords Bayliffs as it were to whom he hath intrusted his holy Husbandry and if they sleep if once they grow remisse and careless what else can we expect but that these tares take root and outgrow the Wheat and in conclusion overcome it Now in the Church we may observe three severall kindes of sleepiness all of them in their course predominant and of ill effect the sleep of negligence the sleep of ignorance and the sleep of sensuality The first the sleep of negligence and so St. Austin doth expound it but while men slept i. e. saith he Cùm negligentiùs agerent praepositi Ecclesiae when as the Rulers of Gods House grew dull and careless of their Watch and were not mindful of their duties This the disease even of the best and purest Ages for which is there almost of the Angels of the seven Churches which is not branded with this mark during the lives of the Apostles the falling from the love of Christ the tolerating of the Nicolaitans the suffering of the Woman Jesebel to seduce Gods servants the want of piety in one zeal in another and that poor little strength of faith which was remaining in the third what were they but the sad effects of dull and negligent security in the severall Pastors But the Apostles being gone those which did oversee the overseers there followed by degrees an infectious drowsiness over all the Church still more inclining to this sleep the more they were accustomed to it The times of Nazianzen how watchful were they in respect of those succeeding yet he complains in his Epistle to Nectarius as if the providence of God had
the modern Herbalists Nay many of the ancient writers have observed no lesse Zizania tritico similia esse in arundine dissimilia in fructu the difference is not in the blade or stalk but the fruit alone So saith Euthymius Zigabenus Between the tares and wheat whilest they are yet in herba in the blade or stalk grandis similitudo est there is no small similitude So Hierome Lastly To add no more we are told by Chrysostome that it was Satans cunning to disguise his errors under the mask and veil of truth that so he might more easily seduce the simple and beguile the ignorant And for that very cause saith he he made choice of these tares 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being so like unto the wheat in the first appearing that it was very hard to know which was right Tostatus hath affirmed as much in his work on Matthew Nam herba tritici zizaniorum similis est sed grana dissimilia the fruit saith he is different though the blades be like Lay these particulars together and they come to this that the false Doctrines noted and intended in the present Parable were such as had a shew of truth and might be easily mistook for sound Orthodox Tenets but being afterwards discovered and examined were disproved as dangerous So then the errors and false Doctrines which are noted here and said to have been sowen by Satan in medio tritici even in the middle of the Church were not like those of Arius who denied the Deity or of the Valentinians who denied the Manhood of our Lord and Saviour or of the Marcionites and Maniches which blasphemed the very Majesty of God the Father or of the Macedonians who quarrelled the Divinity of the holy Ghost Nor were they finally like those which had been set on foot in the primitive times by those desperate writers who in their severall turns and courses had impiously opposed and quarelled every or any Article of the Christian faith These we may rather liken unto briers brambles discerned as soon as in the blade or in the very first appearance The Church soon spied those Heresies and as soon condemned them nor ever were the servants eyes so heavy as not to note the time and observe the Authors of those wicked Doctrines leaving to us upon record the knowledge and relation of the whole proceedings so that those wretched and blasphemous Heresies wherewith the Church was exercised in the Primitive times were generally but like Jonahs gourd of a dayes continuance or the Solstitial Herbe in Plautus quae repentino ortae sunt repentino occidunt almost as soon supprest as risen Few of them though they had been sowen with all care and cunning came to take deep root fewer to cùm crevisset herba to the blade or blossom but none unto fecissent fructum to bring forth their fruit before they were descried and censured And however some of them as that of Arius became of universall latitude and long continuance so that ingemuit orbis as St. Hierome hath it the whole world groaned under the weight and burden of so foule an heresie yet did it never passe for Wheat or was counted Orthodox but still pursued and execrated as a wicked blasphemy But for these tares the Doctrines and erroneous tenets of the present Parable the case was otherwise either the servants were not able to discern them at first peeping forth or else conceived there was not so much danger in them as in truth there was or else were willing to believe that possibly they might prove wheat and so become a plentiful addition to Gods holy Harvest For either the opinion taken up was but the fancy of few however had in admiration for their parts and learning and so not likely to prevail or some such division from the Churches tenets as did not seem to threaten any present danger to the common quiet and so the lesse to be regarded And this is that which is observed by Lirinensis that many errors and false Doctriens had secretly been introduced into the Church quos nec cito deprehendere valeas nec facil damnare fas ducis which neither could be soon discerned nor were thought fit to be condemned on the first discovery By meanes whereof it came to passe that the said new but false opinions as they were scattered and dispersed when no man saw them so they took root when no man marked them And when they came to cùm crevisset herba when it came to that and that the blade sprung up and had shewn it self yet were they still so like the wheat both in shape and colour that few there were of such a searching and discerning eye as to pronounce aright from what seed they sprung nay when they came unto the triall to fecissent fructum and that their fruit discovered them to be but tares yet then they shewed themselves to the publick view with such a Copy of old age and reputation of Antiquity that they contended for priority with the wheat it selfe Such are the errors and false Doctrines whereof we challenge and accuse the Church of Rome such as a long time passed for truth and were not noted either in the seed or blade Errors which being set on foot by some private men and having gotten credit by continuance and long tract of time were first debated in the Schools as probable afterwards entertained in the Church as true and last of all imposed on mens souls as necessary Errors which at their first appearing did not directly ex professo either oppose the Churches Doctrine or disturb her peace but such as seemed to have upon them the character and superscription of sacred verity and grew up sensim sine sensu with Gods holy truth we charge them not with any of those impious blasphemies or wicked heresies derogatory to the honour of our Lord and Saviour or any other person of the glorious Trinity or any other common principle of the Catholick faith which Simon Magus and the rest of that damned crew have opposed and quarrelled In that they have done bravely for the Church of Christ and publickly opposed those wretched heresies which the Socinians have revived in these latter dayes Utinam sic semper errassent would they had erred thus alwayes had they erred no otherwise as once the Cardinal said of Calvin That which we have to say against them is that they have forsaken their first love like the Church of Ephesus and cast a stumbling-block before the people like to that of Pergamus and suffered the woman Jezebel which calleth her self a Prophetess to seduce Gods servants from the right way of his Commandements like the Thyatirians So that the aberration from the Gospel which we charge upon them is not from the profession but the purity of the Christian faith not from the outward signes and Sacraments but the sincerity and soundness of Religion not from the Church of Christ but in it
hill which shewes it self unto the eye of each beholder We may affirm thereof as doth St. Ambrose of the Sun deficere videtur sed non deficit the light thereof cannot be possibly extinguished although sometimes darkened Opprest sometimes it is as it hath been formerly by errors Heresies and false opinions supprest it cannot be for ever For magna veritas great is the truth and it prevaileth at the last however for a while obscured by mens subtile practises That Heresies shall arise St. Paul hath told us and he hath brought it in with an oportet oportet esse haereses in the Epistle And that there must be scandalls Christ himself hath told us and he hath told it too with a necesse est ut scandala veniant in the holy Gospel The reasons both of the oportâ—t and necesse we shall see hereafter when we shall come to scan those motives which might induce the Lord to permit these tares Sinite utraque crescere usque ad messem v. 30. Mean while it doth concern us to take special notice that as it pleased the Lord to give way to error and suffer sometimes heresies of an higher nature and sometimes false opinions of an inferior quality to take fast footing in his Church yet he did never suffer them to destroy his harvest but brought them at the last to apparuerunt The comfortable beams of truth dispersed and scoured away those Clouds of error wherewith the Church before was darkened and by the light thereof the foulness and deformity of falshood was made more notorious so that from hence two special Queres may be raised first why these tares or errors were so long concealed and secondly how they were at last revealed And first they were concealed as it were of purpose to let the Church take notice of her own condition how careless and how blinde she is in the things of God did not the eye of God watch over her and direct her goings Her carelesness we had before in dormirent homines when as we found her sleeping and regardless of the common enemy that time the tares were in their Sevit and no man would hold up his head to look unto the publick safety Her blindness we may note in this that being left unto her self she could not see them in crevisset when they put forth the leaf and the blade sprung up and that they did begin to spread abroad and justle with the truth for the preeminence If either no false Doctrines had been sowen at all or had they all been noted at the first peeping forth the Church might possibly impute it to her own great watchfulness pleaded some special priviledge of infallibility and so in time have fallen into presumption God therefore left her to her self that falling into sin and error and suffering both to grow upon her by her own remisseness she might ascribe her safety unto God alone whose eyes do neither sleep nor slumber The Church is then in most security when God watcheth over her when he that keepeth Israel hath his eye upon her Gods eye he being â—culus infinitus as the learned Gentile and totus oculus as the learned Father is her best defence Which if it be averted from her she walketh forthwith in darkness and the shadow of death subject to every rising error obnoxious to the practises of her subtile enemies And in this state she stands in this wretched state till he be pleased to shine upon her and blesse her with the light of his holy countenance the beames whereof discover every crooked way and bring them to apparuerunt to the publick view And to apparuerunt all must come every false Doctrine whatsoever there 's no doubt of that for Idem est non esse non apparere No Tenet is erroneous in respect of us till it appear to us to be so and till it doth appear to be so we may mistake it for a truth imbrace it for a tendry of the Catholick Church endeavour to promote it with our best affections and yet conceive our selves to be excusable in that it is amoris error not erroris amor In thâ—s regard our Fathers might be safe in the Church of Rome and may be now triumphant in the Church of Heaven though they believed those Doctrines which were therein taught or possibly maintained them with their best affections The errors of that Church were not then discovered nor brought to their apparuerunt and being taken or mistaken for sound Orthodox Tenets were by them followed and defended in their several stations So that we may affirm of them as once St. Peter of the Jewes novimus quia per ignorantiam fecerint we know that through ignorance they did it or if we know it not so clearly as St. Peter did yet we may charitably hope that it was no otherwise in those particular points and passages wherein we know not any thing unto the contrary He that makes any doubt of this what faith soever he pretends to shewes but little charity and makes no difference between an accidentall and a wilful blindness There are some errors in the Church like some Diseases in the body when they are easie to be cured they are hard to be known when they are easie to be known they are hard to cured but every error disease is of that condition that it must first be known the true quality thereof discovered or else it is impossible to prescribe a remedy But so it is not now with us nor any of our Masters in the Church of Rome as it was anciently with our fore-fathers in and of that Church Those errors which in former times were accounted truths or not accounted of as errors are now in the apparuerunt we see them plainly as they are and by comparing them with Scripture the true rule of faith are able to demonstrate the obliquity of those opinions and false Doctrines which they have thrust upon the Church in these latter ages And we may say of them in Tertullians Language Ipsa Doctrina eorum cum Apostolica comparata ex diversitate contrarietate sua pronunciabit neque Apostoli alicujus essâ— neque Apostolici The difference which appeares between the Doctrines of the Church of Rome delivered in the new Creed of Pope Pius quartus and those which were delivered once unto the Saints in the old Creed of the Apostles shewes plainly that they neither came from the Apostles nor any Apostolical Spirit so that in case we shut our eyes against the sacred beames of truth which now shine upon us or if they so long after the apparuerunt will not see those tares which are discovered to their hands both we and they are all 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 utterly uncapable of excuse in the sight of God If any man will be so obstinately wedded to his own opinion as to take up his Lodging in a Pest-house after he hath been made acquainted with the present danger
office either the affaires of Church or State which they are not called to dâ—sturb the order of Gods House and subvert the Discipline thereof and so become unworthy to be counted servants to so wise an Housholder But God is not an Housholder only and no more then so though so translated in my Text The Lord is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as well as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lord of the soyle as well as Master of the House the House being such as hath good store of Land and a fair demesne belonging to it Ager est mundus totus non ecclesia The whole World is the Field of God and therefore called Ager suus his Field v. 24. and Ager tuus thy field the servants speaking to their Master v. 27. The Earth is the Lords and the fulness of it the whole World and all that dwell therein as the Royal Psalmist hath it Satan was but a silly braggard when he said to Christ Haec omnia tibi dabo all these will I give thee The Kingdoms of the Earth and the glories of them are of Gods disposing And all the Princes of the World even the Mahometan and Heathen hold their Crowns of God though they do service for them to the Devil The enemy is so far from being Lord in chief of all the Universe that he hath no propriety in the smallest part No Field no not the corner of a Field which he can challenge to himself or say to any of his servants that 's mine own go plough and fallow and manure it and then sowe my seed If he be so inclined at any time as to be sowing of his tares it must be done in agro Domini some part or other of the Lords Field And then he comes but on the post fact neither after the Field was sowen with good seed before For howsoever Heresies may be antiqua yet they are not prima Heresie may be very ancient but never primitive Truth was first sowen though many times it hapneth by the Devils practises that Heresie doth overcome it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wholsom Doctrines had first of all been planted in the Church of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 other Doctrines as the Apostle calls them 1 Tim. they came in after as the fruits of a latter sowing So much of ille he the relative as it stands marshalled in my Text and what did he Et ait illis He said unto them And it was no small grace to his poor servants that he vouchsafed to look so low as to hold conference with them and admit of parlies in matters which himself alone knew how to remedy But being it was a matter which concerned his Church and in the which the servants did address themselves unto him with so great affection he thought it no disparagement to hearken to their information and return an answer Nor stops he here as if he had done too much for them but he permits them also to propose their counsels vis imus colligimus ea in the words next following and to that also he replies Such conferences between the heavenly Husbandman and his Houshold-servants God and the Prophets Christ and his Disciples are no rare matters in the Scripture Not that God either stood in need of their intelligence or was made wiser by their counsels but leaving thereby an example unto Kings and Princes and such as are in authority from and under them not to despise the information or undervalue the advice of the meanest person how much soever ranked below them both in place and power Such men as are inquisitive in asking questions or prompt in giving their advise in emergent difficulties however they may seem unseasonable yet if they do it on good grounds as the servants here are not to be rejected as unserviceable Certain I am my Housholder conceived it so He neither blames his servants for their curiosity with nolo nimiùm curiosos nor taxeth them of indiscretion in the delivering of their opinions with nolonimiùm diligentes For howsoever to their counsel he returns a non yet he acquaints them fully with those weighty reasons which did incline him thereunto And as unto the unde to the point proposed to that he makes such answer as removed the doubt which is the quid respondet and my second general inimicus homo hoc fecit Where first we must consider who it was that did this mischief and that was inimicus an enemy Dicuntur in Scripturis inimici Dei qui non naturâ sed vitiis ejus imperio adversantur It is a Maxime of St. Austins That those are called Gods enemies in holy Scripture which are not such by nature in their first creation but only by their own corrupt affections His reason is naturam non esse contrariam Deo sed vitium because that nature of it self is not contrariant unto God but subservient rather Sin is the instrument which first made the breach between God Almighty and those who in the Book of God are called his enemies So was it also with the enemy which is mentioned here God made him good though not unchangeably good By nature he created him a living and immaculate spirit inferior unto none but to God himself But he would needs aspire beyond his nature and so as many times it hapneth unto proud usurpers lost both the Crown he aimed at and his own Inheritance For whereas God professeth of the Angels that they are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and were by him created to be ministring Spirits Lucifer so the Scriptures call him did not like of that He thought himself a creature of too glorious a composition to be sent on errands or to be ready at command and therefore aimed at higher matters et ero similis Altissimo said the proud Aspirer He must be equall to the Almighty both in place and power This pride and blind ambition cast him out of Heaven and made him of an Angel and a Friend of God to become an enemy an enemy unto the Lord and to all his Saints This is the enemy which I am to speak of the enemy that took such pains to destroy Gods Harvest We met with him before in the 25. but there we found him with his clogge There he is styled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 inimicus ejus his enemy the enemy of God alone and there we did consider him accordingly To God an enemy ex professo on the ancient quaâ—rel upon the sentence passed against him for his first aspirings To man an enemy no further then he weares Gods Livery and retains unto him and therefore in that place inimicus ejus Gods enemy But here we finde him more at large an enemy or inimicus quispiam some enemy as Beza reads it An enemy to God and to Man Gods Image and the Church Gods Spouse to each of these an enemy in their several places In the first to God to God indeed an enemy but an harmless
deduction which was the Artifice of Bardesanes and Priscillian for if that God from before all eternity did purpose and decree the fall of Adam ut sua defectione periret Adam as some men have taught us there was in Adam a necessity of sinne because the Lord had so decreed it if without consideration of the sinne of man he hath by his determinate sentence ordained so many millions unto destruction and that too necessariò inevitabiliter as they please to phrase it he must needs preordain them also unto sin because as they themselves affirm there is no way unto the end but by the meanes And then what can the wicked and impenitent do but ascribe all their sins unto the Lord by whose inevitable and fatall will they were lost in Adam by whom they are particularly and personally necessitated unto death and therefore also unto sin for thus Lycomedes in Plautus pleaded for himself when he defloured old Euclio's daughter Deus mihâ— impulsor fuit is me ad illam illexit it was Gods doing none of his that he was so vicious But let us not deceive our selves God as he is not mocked so he is no mocker He tells us by his Sonne that his Seed is good by his Apostle that men are tempted by their own lusts by his Prophets that a mans destruction is from himself Perditio tua est ex te O domus Israel for his part he hath planted in our mindes many saving notions poured out upon our hearts the influence and dew of his heavenly graces and kindled many times within us the flames of an affectionate zeal to his holy service If that we quench these flames and expel these graces and root out these notions or else permit the enemy to sowe his false and dangerous Tâ—res even in the middle of Gods Wheat is it not then our faults either to do the one or permit the other God cannot possibly be accused of sowing other then good Seed who soweth the good Seed and no other Should we think otherwise the smallest error we could fall into is that of Bardesanes and Priscillian who ascribed all unto fatality and the Starres and Planets of which St. Austine tells us plainly that it aimed principally at the ruine and subversion of our whole Religion Nec aliud agit nisi ut nullus omnino aut rogetur aut colatur Deus as the Father hath it Well then the seed God sowes is good he neither made man evil at his first creation nor suggests evil thoughts unto him being once created nor did he preordain him unto sinne or dispose him to it God is the God of peace and sowes not dissention the God of order and sowes not confusion the God of love and sowes not debate the God of truth and sowes not error or false Doctrine the God of Justice and sowes not iniquity Nor doth God sowe his good Seed only in this man or that some chosen Vessels of his mercy some few selected ones of his own right hand and neglect all the rest as not worth the looking after not in his Vineyard only or in his Garden his Church the Congregation of his Saints but universally over all his field and every part and parcel of it God is here likened to the man that sowed good seed and sowed the same in agro suo in his own field my next particular Ager colendo fit bonus a field is bettered by manuring and the more large the field the greater culture it requires How great then is the labour that Gods field hath need of how great a quantity of seed must be sowen upon it Himself hath told us of this field that it is the World viz. the general corporation or bodie aggregate of mankind the World and not the Church alone mundus non tantùm Ecclesia as it is in Origen This vast and universal field the Lord hath dressed and laboured with his mighty hand and fatned with his most precious blood of his only Sonne For God so loved the World as the Scriptures tell us that he gave his onely begotten Sonne to be a propitiation for our sinnes and not for ours onely Gods selected ones but for the sinnes of all the World that the World through him might be saved It is the will of God the Father as St. Paul hath told us that all men should be saved and come to the knowledge of his holy truth It is the will of God the Sonne that all men which are heavy laden should come unto him upon the promise assurance that he will ease them It is the will of God the holy Ghost that all men should be made partakers of those meanes that lead to happiness eternal who therefore fell on the Apostles in the similitude of cloven tongues that every man might heare them speak in his own Language the wonderful works of God which being the will and pleasure of the Godhead joyntly and each person severally could not be possibly fulfilled in case the blessed word of God had been restrained to any either place or people and not proclaimed and published universally over all the World and therefore when our Saviour sent forth his Apostles he gave them a Commission of a large extent Ite in universum mundum Go into all the world saith he and preach the Gospel unto every Creature nor were they backward in performance of the Lords Commandement scattering themselves abroad over all the Earth and where they could not go themselves sending out others in their room so that they might have taken up that speech in Virgil Quae regio in terris nostri non plena laboris as well as that which is reported of them by St. Paul Exivit sonus eorum in omnes terras their sound went forth into all Lands The World then is this field not the Church alone and in this field the Sonne of man the heavenly Husbandman hath sowen his good seed generally and universally no one part excepted In toto mundo filius hominis seminavit bonum semen so saith Origen for there 's no barbarous nation either past or present which may not in the book of nature read the works of God and so attain to the first principle of Religion Deum esse that a God there is This the Apostle hath observed that the invisible things of God from the Creation of the World have been plainly seen i. e. as Austin doth expound it Per visibilia creaturae pervenisse eos dicit ad intelligentiam invisibilis creatoris and they were also well enough informed of this that God was to be worshipped by them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that too in the first place with a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Isocrates hath it nor did they know this only in the general notion which might be a remaining spark of the light of nature but some of them as Aristotle Plato Tully have written so divinely touching the nature attributes and works
separando eos à communione Ecclesiae by severing them from the Communion of the faithful The like saith Gorran also and some latter Writers others and those of more Antiquity but farre more eminency in the Church think rather that their meaning was to cut them off not only from the body of the Church but of all mankind to go against them with the Sword and destroy them utterly Chrysostom so conceives it saying that if they had gone on as they were resolved in prosecuting of the Heretick with fire and sword 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 blood-shed and warre must needs have followed over all the World Theophylact goes to work more plainly and tells us that the servants being offended at the growth of Heresies by consequence incensed against the Hereticks themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were of a minde to make quick work with them to rid them of the troubles of this wretched life and so to save the trouble of more tedious process To which of these two courses their zeal might bend them is in the next place to be considered I conceive the last And this I am induced to think by the Masters Answer who on the hearing of the Proposition returned a non for it is plain he had a negative voyce of which more hereafter He did not like of the intention and to dislike their purpose there had been no reason had their design been to proceed only by the Churches censures He that committed to the Church in St. Peters name the power and dispensation of the keyes intended not that they should serve for nothing but a dumb shew a sign and token only of a powerless Ministery And when he gave to his Apostles so direct a power of binding and retaining sins and giving over unto Satan the impenitent person think you his meaning was they shonld never use it If so St. Panl must needs be guilty of no small offence in dealing so severely with the man of Corinth and wonder 't was there was no relaxation sued for from the Court of Heaven in case of so severe and just a sentence And to what end serves Dic Ecclesiae if the poor Church have power to hear but not to censure or if upon the Churches censures none be so fit to be accounted either an Heathen or Publican as he who is intrusted by the Church to inflict the same Assuredly God would not disallow the course which himself prescribed or by removing from the Church the power of censure open a gapp to all impurity both of life and doctrine There was a time once in the Church of England I do not say it is so now wherein the censures of the Church under pretence or colour of some civill sanctions were either quite abolished or of no effect to the no small increase of vice because it nourished a presumption of impunity in vicious persons Of this old Father Latimer doth thus complain in a Sermon preached before King Edward Lechery saith he is used in England and such lechery as is used in no other place of the World And yet it is made a matter of sport a matter of nothing a laughing matter a trifle not to be passed on nor reformed Well I trust it will be amended one day and I hope to live to see it mended as old as I am And here I will make a suit to your Highnesse to restore unto the Church the Discipline of Christ in excommunicating such as be notable offenders Nor never devise any other way for no man is able to devise any better then that God hath done with excommunication to put them from the Congregation till they be confounded Therefore restore Christs Discipline for Excommunication and that shall be a meane both to pacifie Gods wrath and indignation and also that lesse abomination shall be used then in times past hath been and is at this day I speak this of a Conscience and I mean to move it of a will to your Grace and your Realm Bring into the Church of England the open Discipline of Excommunication that open sinners may be stricken withall So farre the very words of Father Latimer Let every one consider of them as he thinks most necessary perhaps the Sermon may be more effectuall with some kinde of men when one is raised up from the dead to preach unto them Besides this could not be the way which was intended by those servants if either we consider their Colligimus or the eradicetis of their Master in the following words The servants or the Church in them might have gone on to excommunication of the Heretick and the condemning of the Heresie without the least fear or imagination that by so doing eradicetur simul cum eis triticum the wheat the Lords good seed would be pulled up with them The censure of an Heretick doth rather strengthen then destroy the truth of Doctrine and he that doth correct a stubborn and impenitent sinner hindreth not but confirms the vertuous person in the way of godliness And for Colligimus that is we know a compound word as is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Original and doth not so much signifie a single gathering as a gathering up of all together and so the word is used in the following Verses It seemes the servants of my Text would have made short work and swept away these tares at once without more ado which howsoever it may be done sometimes in ore gladii which devoures all things where it is permitted to range at liberty yet is it seldom done if ever in gladio oris by Admonitions Excommunications or any other kind of spiritual punishments Non excommunicandam multitudinem was the rule of old The censures of the Church do only legere pick here and there a man out of many sinners by whose exemplary corrections others may beware of the like offences Tormenta paucorum sunt exempla omnium as my Authour hath it Colligere is none of hers in this sense and meaning And therefore here was no such meaning as to proceed by excommunication to bring these tares to be arraigned and tryed at the Churches Barre And being their meaning was not so their zeal though more remarkable was yet lesse warrantable A zeal like that of James and John the two Sonnes of Thunder Vis dicimus ut descendat ignis Wilt thou that fire come down from Heaven to destroy these miscreants No dealing with some zelots of both sides but by fire and faggot by the sword at least for which they have no warrant I am sure from either Text. Neither indeed do they which stand most on it fetch their grounds from hence or if they did how wretchedly would those grounds deceive them neither the Brethren there nor the servants here had any calling from the Lord to be the instruments of his vengeance The Apostles were ordained by Christ amongst other things to offer unto God the sacrifice of
startled those opinions which put the Church to a necessity of setting learned men on work to confute and crush them And doubt we not but that Posterity will fare the better for those monstrous Paradoxes in Divinity which have been vented since the meeting of this new Assembly and penetrate more throughly into some deep questions which now disturb the peace both of Church and State then any of the former Ages Firmior multò fides est quam reponit poenitentia Faith saith the Father stands more firmly when it is built upon repentance as doubtless Peters faith was most strongly setled after he had denyed his Master And 't is no otherwise with truth then it is with saith best setled and confirmed and planted when strugling long with error or heretical Doctrines it hath got the victory God as before I said is the God of truth and they that wilfully oppose the least truth of Gods are Rebels against God and against his truth And 't was known to be an experiment in the School of Politicks conatus subditorum irritos imperium semper promovere that the rebellion of a people when it is supprest doth make a Prince more strong and absolute then he was before But the Oportet goes yet further it reacheth not to the truth alone but to all those who do defend it There must be heresies saith St. Paul ut qui probati sint that those who are approved amongst you may be known and manifested St. Austin tells us of two sorts of enemies which do afflict the Church of Christ whereof the one is blinde with error and the other with malice And then he adds That if these enemies have leave to afflict it corporally with any kinde of persecution exercent ejus patientiam they give the Church occasion to shew forth her patience but if they do assault the same with Sects and Heresies or malè sentiendo with their false opinions exercent ejus sapientiam they give her opportunity to declare her wisdom There were no need of Champions to defend the truth should there be none that did oppose it nor could we know by any meanes who would take part with Christ and who sight against him were it not brought unto the triall Hectora quis nosset felix si Troja fuisset Hector had never been so famed for his feats of Arms had not Troy been beleaguered by the powers of Greece Nor had the valour and fidelity of Joab the wisdom and fidelity of Cushai the bounty and fidelity of Barzillai the piety and fidelity of the Priests and Levites no not so much as Shimeis slanderous tongue or the inconstant mutability of the vulgar herd been manifested and made known to David had not Achitophel contrived Absolom actually raised a Warre against him What had we known of Athanasius had not the Arian faction joyned themselves together in a League against him and spent their whole united forces on his single person Parque novum fortuna videt concurrere bellum Atque virum As if that holy Patriarch had been born unto Ishmaels destiny to have his hand against every man and every mans hand against him How little had been left unto us of Irenaeus Basil Hierome Austin and all the brave Heroes of the Primitive times had not the Gnosticks Valentinians Arians Donatists afforded them occasion to expresse their piety and manifest their zeal to the cause of Christ And to come neerer to our selves where had been all the glories of renowned Jewel or of incomparable Whitgift had not this Church been crucified from the first beginning between the Popish superstitions and the Puritan frenzies All men are apt enough to professe the Gospel in a time of peace and to declare themselves for truth when there are no heresies therefore Oportet esse haereses that so it may be known more clearly as Tertullian notes it tam qui in persecutionibus steterint quà m qui ad haereses non exorbitaverint as well who dare stand bravely out against persecutions as who dare bid defiance unto Sects and Heresies So then there are some notable reasons for the present Sinite and suffering of the Tares and Wheat to grow up together till the Harvest besides the dangers mentioned in the former verse But then a question will be made whether the Sinite in this place be so strong and binding that in no case the Tares are to be rooted up till the Harvest come Where first we take it for a truth unquestionable which we finde in Chrysostom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. It is not here forbidden saith that learned Father either to curb the Heretick or silence him or suppress his insolencies or to prohibit their Assemblies or disperse their Conventicles God hath not so disarmed his Church as to lay it open to the assaults and violence of malicious enemies and left her with no other weapons then defensive only In the spirituall Armorie which St. Paul describes there is as well the sword of the spirit as the shield of faith and truth appointed for a Girdle as well as righteousness for a Brest plate Gods Church is furnished with a power to convince gainsayers as well as to exhort or rebuke the sinner and may employ the pen though not tosse the Pike Else not the Heretick but the true Professor would be put to silence and God should send out men to fight and yet binde their hands And more then so the Lord hath given his Church Authority to deal with obstinate Hereticks and with perverse Schismaticks as St. Paul did with Hymenaeus and Alexander who having made shipwrack of the faith were by him cut off from the society of the faithfull For though some men of eminency in point of learning out of their love to that libertas Prophetandi now so much in fashion would have the Church be very wary in exercising this authority yet they profess they have no purpose utterly to deprive her of that power and priviledge segregandi eos à suis coetibus qui doctrinam adulterant of excommunicating those who corrupt her Doctrines What then is that which is denied the Church in the present Sinite Assuredly not to restrain the Heretick or confute the Heresie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but to kill and slay them The Servants as we told you formerly were much scandalized to see Gods Field indangered by those wretched Tares errors in Doctrine and corruptions in point of manners being grown so prevalent that there was little hope to preserve the Church but by a sudden extirpation of them of what sort soever and thereupon they purposed as before I told you to go against them with the Sword to raise an holy Warre and destroy them utterly Which how unfit a way it was either to plant the Gospel or reform Religion I then told you also Warre being a Tragedy of such a nature as commonly destroyes the Stage whereupon t is acted
and esteem of others as illiterate may at last own them for less than fanaticall and groundless Opinionists He did not alledge any proofes for the other part both because he knew that others would do that for him as also because he had not that esteem for quotations to the contrary which he had for these not that he is much prepossessed through prejudice but upon an old protestant consideration that records and presidents differing from the received ways and interests of men are more to be regarded from any that make for them since the forgeryes and falsifications of precedent Ages make it propable that such passages might be inserted and foysted in but why or how these should be adulterated he did not see Even in matters of common transaction in our English Courts of judicature he thought he had been told that one precedent or verdict against the juriâ—diction of a Court is of more validity than a thousand for it because it is supposed that none will contrary to right and equity infringe their own power Further if any should oppose the sayings of others in the behalf of humane learning to what he had vouched he hoped they would produce them out of Authors contemporaries with his or else they should not imagine that he would think any such averrements to be contradictory to what his query may seemingly assert nor yet satisfactory to the question nor doth he think and. Heraldus Ouzelius and others concurr with him herein that out of Antiquty they can alledg any such quotations If they oppose his query with the practise and use of humane learning which is found in Clem. Alexandr Orig. Tertullian Lactantius Arnobius Minucius Felix c. He shall not think such dealing to be fair since the question is what was their judgment not what they did practise Of the latter no man will suppose the querist to be ignorant and if any should yet would the Objection be of no value untill they shall evince that every man did in those times live up to the light he had and acted as he spake He thinks it may have been with the Ancients as with Vega that excellent methodest in Physick who being sick of a feavour a friend visited him found him drinking wine whereupon he charged him with having formerly prohibited the use thereof in feavours by his writings The infirme replyed in my books you see the practise of Physick but in me the practise of Physicians He supposes that after persons have been brought over from Paganisme to Christianity something may stick by them as an ill scent may when one comes out of a jakes yet that is their failing not their justification If Moses learnt the Egyptian skill it was whilst he remained in Pharaoh's Court And so Paul was learned in Heathen Authors but it was before he came to the School of Christ he hath used them but three or four times in his works whereas now they are more frequent than Texts of Scripture Athanasius against the Gentiles saith the Scriptures are sufficient to declare the truth of themselves and that if his friend Macarius did read other Religious writers It was but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a lover of â—legance not as a lover of Christ Other things there were which he saw might be objected which he will not now insist upon having weighed them in the ballances and found them light About the call of the Ministry and the first Reformers he hopes not to be opposed with the afterjudgment of Luther or the rest He is not of their Opinion who thinke the first reformers did use that Artifice of bending a crooked stick as much the other way that so it may at least become straight Such dealings are not to be admitted in the service of our God who is a consuming fire It is to charge them with a great hypocrisie since they never owned any such actions but delivered all as precious and glorious Truths and to make them guilty of the ruine of those poor souls who dyed in the profession of a belief their teachers did not intend them In fine it is to make the first Reformation as bad or not much better a way as thâ—t of Popery and all that embraces it and adhere thereunto to be in a different only and sinfull estate It is a slur to the greatest wonder God hath produced after the Churches being 1200. years in the Wilderness How much more ought we to prejudge all succeeding times from their Doctrines and having such pregnant motives to believe they were spirited by God let us impute their after-change to failings upon carnall considerations when Luther went to settle himself Pope in Germany and his writings were advanced as the test of truth and an Oligarchy of Ministers setled elsewhere Let us owe our Reformation to God and not Belial or Antichrist to the call and excitement of the former not consecration of the latter Let us acknowledge their zeal their chatity those more glorious principles of spirituall graces rather than prudentiall contrivements Are not those there first works which are here quoted are not those the works by which Luther said he would have men and Angels tryed If you say that there is a difference betwixt a Church setled and unsetled a question will arise if that can be questioned whether the Papists did not say their church was then setled and whether any settlement politicall will suffice to debarr those actings for then the first Reformers yea first Christians and Christ himself all are cast If only what is a settlement of truth or Gospel-settlement be intended doth not this resolve all into a tryall of doctrines a proof that the present way is the sole Gospel-way Which whosoever shall avow he need not want employment for his thoughts from the severall writings of Papists Episcoparians Presbyterians Independents c. however the Questionist should rest In Matth. 13. v. 3. In Matth. 13. Lib. 5. c. 1. In Mat. 13. Luk. 14. 16. Matth. 22. 2. Matth. 5. 1 Kings Joh. 16. 29. De Doct. Ch. l. 2. c. 3. in locum Ovid. met lib. 1. Georgic l. â— Gen. 4. 2. Lib. de Agricultura Joh. 10. 11. 1 Pet. 5. 4. 2. 25. Gen. 4. 2 Chron. 26. 10. Hist Rom. l. 1. c. 11. v. 1. Joh. 5. 17. Augustine Jâ—h 5. Joh. 6 61. Gen. 3. 15. Tertul. Exod. 21. 1. cap. 1. v. 9. c. 3. v. 17. Heb. 1. 1. 2. v. 37. Matth. 28. v. 20. In locum Ephes 4. v. 11 12. 1 Cor. 3. 9. 1 Cor. 3. 6. Ovid. Plautus Metam l. 1. Buâ—ling In Matth. 13. Homil. in Matth. 3. James 1. v. 13 14. Eusebius Hist 5. 19. Aug. de haeres c. 35. Ibid. c. 70. Ibid. c. 15. De Gen. ad lit l. 2. c. 17. Calv. Instruct adv Libertinos In Quintino Plutarch in Caesare Calv. Institut l. 3. c. 23. Se. 7. De Civit. l 5. c. 1. Joh. 3. 16 17. 1 Joh. 2. 2. 1 Joh. 2. 2. Acts 2. 3 11.