that if we do our part God will not fail on his Be we first sure that we have Patience we must look to that for that is our part though not solely for we cannot have it without him as was already said but I say be we first sure of that and then we may be confident we shall have comfort sooner or later in some kind or other trust God with that for that is solely his part and he will take order for it without our further care 21. Lastly for the Order It may be demanded why the Apostle joyning both together The God of Patience and Consolation giveth Patience the precedency of Patience first and then of Consolation Is not that also to teach us that as it is a vain and causless fear if a man have patience to doubt whether he shall have comfort yea or no so on the contrary it is a vain and groundless hope if a man want patience to presume that yet he shall have comfort howsoever Certainly no Patience no Consolation It is the Devils method to set the fairer side forwards and to serve in the bestwiâ—e first and then after that which is worse He will not much put us upon the trial of our Patience at the first but rather till us on along with semblances and Promises of I know not what comforts and contentments but when once he hath us fast then he turneth in woe and misery upon us to overwhelm us as a deluge But God in his dispensations commonly useth a quite contrary method and dealeth roughliest with us at the first We hear of little other from him than self-denial hatred from the World taking up the Cross and suffering persecution exercise enough for all the Patience we can get But then if we hold out stoutly to the end at last cometh joy and comfort flowing in upon us both seasonably and plentifully like a river You have need of patience saith the Apostle that after you have done the will of God you may receive the Promise Patience first in doing yea and suffering too according to the will of God and then after that but not before the enjoying of the Promise Would you know then whether the Consolations of God belong unto you yea or no In short if you can have patience never doubt of it if you will not have patience never hope for it 22. Thus much concerning the formality of the Prayer in those former words of the Verse Now the God of patience and of Consolation grant you Proceed we now to the Matter thereof in the remainder of the Verse To be like-minded one towards another according to Christ Iesus Where the particulars are three First the thing it self or grace prayed for which is Unity or Like-mindedness To be like-minded Secondly and Thirdly Two Conditions or Qualifications thereof the one in respect of the Persons One towards another the other in respect of the Manner According to Christ Iesus Of which in their order 23. The thing first To be like-minded 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek A phrase of speech although to my remembrace not found elsewhere in holy Scripture yet often used by St. Paul in his Epistles to the Romans to the Corinthians and especially to the Philippians more than once or twice I spare the quotations for brevity sake St. Peters compound word cometh nearest it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Finally be ye all of one mind 1 Pet. 3. Now these words both the Noun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the mind and the Verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to mind this or that or to be thus or so minded although often used with special reference sometimes to the understanding or judgment sometimes to the inward disposition of the heart will and affections and sometimes to the manifesting of that inward disposition by the outward carriage and behaviour yet are they also not seldom taken at large for the whole soul and all the powers thereof together with all the motions and operations of any or each of them whether in the apprehensive appetitive or executive part And I see nothing to the contrary but that it may very well be taken in that largest extent in this place And then the thing so earnestly begged at the hand of God is that he would so frame the hearts of these Romans one towards another as that there might be an universal accord amongst them so far as was possible both in their Opinions Affections and Conversations Now the God of Patience and Consolation grant you to be like-minded 24. Like-minded first in Opinion and Judgment It is a thing much to be desired and by all good means to be endeavoured that according to our Churches Prayer God would give to all Nations unity peace and concord but especially that all they that do confess his holy name may also agree in the truth of his holy word at leastwise in the main and most substantial truths I beseech you brethren saith St. Paul by the name of our Lord Iesus Christ that ye all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions among you but that ye be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgment That is the first Like-mindedness in Iudgment 25. Like-minded secondly in heart and affection Mens understandings are not all of one size and temper and even they that have the largest and the clearest understandings yet know but in part and are therefore subject to Errors and Mis-apprehensions And therefore it cannot be hoped there should be such a consonancy and uniformity of Iudgment amongst all men no not amongst wise and godly men but that in many things yea and those sometimes of great importance they may and will dissent one from another unto the worlds end But then good heed would be taken lest by the cunning of Satan who is very forward and expert to work upon such advantages difference in judgment should in process of time first estrange by little and little and at length quite alienate our Affections one from another It is one thing to dissent from another to be at discord with our brethren Ita dissensi ab illo saith Tully concerning himself and Cato ut in disjunctione sententiae conjuncti tamen amicitiâ maneremus It is probable the whole multitude of them that believed were but we are not sure they were and it is possible they might not be all of one opinion in every point even in those first and primitive times but St. Luke telleth us for certain that they were all of one heart 26. Like-minded thirdly in a fair and peaceable outward conversation For albeit through humane frailty and amid so many scandals as are and must be in the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there be not evermore that hearty entire affection that ought to be between Christian men especially when they stand divided one from another in opinion yet should they all bear
of God's Will and Power with subordinate Agents in every and therefore even in sinful actions God's free Election of those whom he purposeth to save of his own grace without any motives in or from themselves the immutability of God's Love and Grace towards the Saints Elect and their certain perseverance therein unto Salvation the Iustification of sinners by the imputed righteousness of Christ apprehended and applyed unto them by a lively faith without the works of the Law These are sound and true and if rightly understood comfortable and right profitable Doctrines And yet they of the Church of Rome have the forehead I will not say to slander my Text alloweth more to blaspheme God and his Truth and the Ministers thereof for teaching them Bellarmine Gretser Maldonat and the Jesuits but none more than our own English Fugitives Bristow Stapleton Parsons Kellison and all the Rabble of that Crew freely spend their mouths in barking against us as if we made God the author of sin as if we would have men sin and be damned by a Stoical fatal necessity sin whether they will or no and be damned whether they deserve it or no as if we opened a gap to all licentiousness and profaneness let them believe it is no matter how they live Heaven is their own cock-sure as if we cryed down good works and condemned charity Slanders loud and false yet easily blown away with one single word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 These imputations upon us and our Doctrine are unjust but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let them that thus mis-report us know that without repentance their damnation will be just It would be time not ill spent to discover the grounds of this observation and to press the uses of it something fully But because my aim lyeth another way I can but point at them and pass If seldom Truth scape unslandered marvel not the reasons are evident On God's part on Man's part on the Devil's part God suffereth Man raiseth and the Devil furthereth these slanders against the Truth To begin ordine retrogrado and to take them backwards First on the Devil's part a kind of Contrariety and Antipathy betwixt him and it He being the Father of Lyes and Prince of darkness cannot away with the Truth and with the Light and therefore casteth up slanders as Fogs and Mists against the Truth to bely it and against the Light to darken it Secondly on Mans part And that partly in the understanding when the judgment either of it self weak or else weakned through precipitancy prejudice or otherwise is deceived with fallacies instead of substance and mistaketh seeming inferences for necessary and natural deductions Partly in the Will when men of corrupt minds set themselves purposely against the known truth and out of malicious wilfulness against the strong testimony of their own hearts slander it that so they may disgrace it and them that profess it Partly in the Affections when men overcome by carnal affections are content to cheat their own souls by giving such constructions to God's Truth as will for requital give largest allowance to their practices and so rather choose to crooken the Rule to their own bent than to level themselves and their affections and lives according to the Rule Thirdly on God's part who suffereth his own truth to be slandered and mistaken Partly in his Iustice as a fearful judgment upon wicked ones whereby their hard hearts become yet more hardened and their most just condemnation yet more just Partly in his goodness as a powerful fiery trial of true Doctors whose constancy and sincerity is the more approved with him and the more eminent with men if they flee not when the Wolf cometh but keep their standing and stoutly maintain God's Truth when it is deepliest slandered and hotly opposed And partly in his Wisdom as a rich occasion for those whom he hath gifted for it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to awaken their zeal to quicken up their industry to muster up their abilities to scour up their spiritual armour which else through dis-use might gather rust for the defence and for the rescue of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that precious truth whereof they are depositaries and wherewith he hath entrusted them These are the Grounds The Uses for instruction briefly are to teach and admonish every one of us that we be not either first so wickedly malicious as without apparent cause to raise any slander or secondly so foolishly credulous as without severe examination to believe any slander or thirdly so basely timorous as to flinch from any part of God's truth for any slander But I must not insist This from the slander Observe fourthly how peremptory the Apostle is in his censure against the slanderers or abusers of holy truths Whose damnation is just Some understand it with reference to the slanderers As we be slander ously reported and as some affirm that we say whose damnation is just that is their damnation is just who thus unjustly slander us Others understand it with reference to that ungodly resolution Let us do evil that good may come whose damnation is just that is their damnation is just for the evil they do who adventure to do any evil under whatsoever pretence of good to come of it Both expositions are good and I rather embrace both than prefer either I ever held it a kind of honest spiritual thirst where there are two sences given of one place both agreeable to the Analogy of Faith and Manners both so indifferently appliable to the words and scope of the place as that it is hard to say which was rather intended though there was but one intended yet to make use of both And so will we Take it the first way and the slanderer may read his doom in it Here is his wages and his portion and the meed and reward of his slander Damnation And it is a just reward He condemneth God's truth unjustly God condemneth him justly for it whose damnation is just If we be countable and we are countable at the day of Judgment for every idle word we speak though neither in it self false nor yet hurtful and prejudicial unto others what less than damnation can they expect that with much falsehood for the thing it self and infinite prejudice in respect of others blaspheme God and his holy Truth But if it be done on purpose and in malice to despight the Truth and the professors thereof I scarce know whether there be a greater sin or no. Maliciously to oppose the known Truth is by most Divines accounted a principal branch of that great unpardonable sin the sin against the holy Ghost by some the very sin it self I dare not say it is so nor yet that it is unpardonable or hath final impenitency necessarily attending it I would be loth to interclude the hope of
There be enormous sins of this rank which a modest man would be ashamed so much as to name especially in publick Now of these only the generalities would be touched in the publick the specialities not unfolded but in the private exercise of our ministry nor yet that promiscuously to every one that should out of curiosity desire satisfaction in them but only to such men and that but only so far as they may concern in point of Conscience and of practice Besides these there are other Cases many in which it may be more convenient to conceal than to teach some divine truths at some times and in some places But yet in the Case here proposed if it be a truth questioned about which God's people are much distracted in their opinions much mistaken by some through error in judgment much abused by sinful especially publick practice occasioning Scandals and offences among brethren likely to be overwhelmed with custom or multitude of those that think or do against it and be otherwise of material importance I take it the Omission of it upon seasonable opportunity is a grievous sin and not colourable by any pretence Beloved the Minister is not to come into the Pulpit as a Fencer upon the Stage to play his prize and to make a fair flourish against sin Here he could have it and there he could have it but hath it no where but rather as a Captain into the Field to bend his forces specially against the strongest Troops of the Enemy and to squander and break thorow the thickest ranks and to drive at the fairest It is not enough for a Prophet to cry aloud and to lift up his voice like a trumpet and to tell Iudah and Israel of sins and of transgressions at large but if he would whet them up to the battle he must give a more certain sound he must tell Iudah of her sins and Israel of her transgressions If there be in Damascus or Moab or Ammon or Tyrus or Iudah or Israel three transgressions or four more eminent than the rest it is fit they that are sent to Damascus and Moab and Ammon and Tyrus and Iudah and Israel should make them hear of three or four more than all the rest Sins and Errors when they begin to get head and heart must be handled roughly Silence in such a case is a kind of flattery and it is almost all one when sin grows outragious to hold our peace at them and to cry Peace Peace unto them Our Apostle in Act. 20. would not have held himself sufficiently discharged from the guilt of other mens blood if he had shunned as occasion was offered to have declared unto them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even the whole counsel of God In my Application of this Instance and Case blame me not if I do it with some reference to my self Being heretofore by appointment as now again I was to provide my self for this place against such a meeting as this is as in my conscience I then thought it needful for me I delivered my mind and I dare say the Truth too for substance something freely touching the Ceremonies and Constitutions of our Church And I have now also with like freedom shewed the unlawfulness of the late disorderly attempts in this Town and that from the ground of my present Text. I was then blamed for that I think unjustly for I do not yet see what I should retract of that I then delivered and it is not unlikely I shall be blamed again for this unless I prevent it You have heard now already both heretofore that to judge any man's heart and at this time that to slander any Truth are without repentance sins justly damnable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they that offend either in the one or the other their damnation is just To preserve therefore both you from the sin and my self from the blame consider I pray you with reason and charity what I shall say You that are our hearers know not with what hearts we speak unto you that is only known to our own hearts and to God who is greater than our hearts and knoweth all things That which you are to look at and to regard is with what truth we speak unto you So long as what we preach is true and agreeable to God's Word and right reason you are not upon I know not what light surmises or suspicions to judge with what spirits or with what dispositions of heart we preach Whether we preach Christ of envy and strife or of good will whether sincerely or of Contention whether in pretence or in truth it is our own good or hurt we must answer for that and at our peril be it if we do not look to that But what is that to you Notwithstanding every way so long as it is Christ and his truth which are preached it is your part therein to rejoice If an Angel from Heaven should preach any untruth unto you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let him be accursed but if the very Devil of Hell should preach the truth he must be heard and believed and obeyed So long as Scribes and Pharisees hold them to Moses's Text and Doctrine let them be as damned Hypocrites as Scribes and Pharisees can be yet all whatsoever they bid you observe that you are to observe and do Let me then demand Did I deliver any untruth It had been well done then to have shewn it that I might have acknowledged and retracted it Did I speak nothing but the truth with what conscience then could any that heard me say as yet I heard some did that I preached factiously That I came to cast bones among them That I might have chosen a fitter Text That I might have had as much thanks to have kept away For Faction I hate it my desire and aim next after the good of your souls was above all the Peace of the Church and the Unity of Brethren For casting bones if that must needs be the phrase they were cast in these parts long before my coming by that great enemy to peace and unity and busie sower of discord the Devil otherwise I should not have found at my first coming such snarling about them and such biting and devouring one another as I did My endeavour was rather to have gathered up the bones and to have taken away the matter of difference I mean the errour in judgment about and inconformity in practice unto the lawful ceremonies of the Church that so if it had been possible all might have been quiet without despising or judging one another for these things For thanks I hold not that worth the answering alas it is a poor aim for God's Minister to preach for thanks For the choice of my Text and Argument both then and now how is it not unequal that men who plead so as none more for liberty and plainness
having yet by reason of the universal use of his office in every Tribe something had in the whole all things considered a far greater proportion than any other Tribe had So in this Scripture the Iudge hath by so much a larger portion than any of the rest by how much it is more diffused Not concluded within the narrow bounds of any one but as the blood in the body temperately spread throughout all the parts and members thereof Which cometh to pass not so much from the immediate construction of the words though there have not wanted Expositors to fit the words to such construction as from that general inspection and if I may so speak superintendency which the Iudge or Magistrate ought to have over the carriage of all those other inferiour ones A great part of whose duty it is to observe how the rest do theirs and to find them out and check and punish them as they deserve when they transgress So that with your patience Honourable Worshipful and dearly Beloved I have allowance from my Text if the time would as well allow it to speak unto you of five things Whereof the first concerneth the Accuser the second the Witness the third the Iurer the fourth the Lawyer the fifth the Officer and every one of them the Magistrate Iudge and Iusticer But having no purpose to exceed the hour as I must needs do if I should speak to all these to any purpose whilst I speak to the first only I shall desire the rest to make application to themselves so far as it may concern them of every material passage which they may easily do and with very little change for the most part only if they be willing To our first Rule then which concerneth the Accuser and the Iudge in the first words of the Text Thou shalt not raise a false report The Original verb signifieth to take up as if we should read it Thou shalt not take up a false report And it is a word of larger comprehension than most Translators have expressed The full meaning is Thou shalt not have to do with any false report neither by raising it as the Author nor by spreading it as the Reporter nor by receiving it as an Approver But the first fault is in the Raiser and therefore our translations have done well to retain that rather in the Text yet allowing the Receiver a place in the Margent Now false reports may be raised of our brethren by unjust slanders detractions back-bitings whisperings as well out of the course of judgment as in it And the equity of this Rule reacheth even to those extrajudicial Calumnies also But for that I am not now to speak of extrajudicial Calumny so much as of that quae versatur in foro in judiciis those false suggestions and informations which are give into the Courts as more proper both to the scope of my Text and the occasion of this present meeting Conceive the words for the present as spoken especially or at leastwise as not improperly appliable to the Accuser But the Accuser taken at large for any person that impleadeth another in jure publico vel privato in causes either civil or criminal and these again either capital or penal No not the Accused or Defendant excepted who although he cannot be called in strict propriety of speech an Accuser yet if when he is justly accused he seek to defend himself by false unjust or impertinent allegations he is in our present intendment to be taken as an Accuser or as the Raiser and Taker up of a false report But when is a Report false or what is it to raise such a report and how is it done As we may conceive of falshood in a threefold notion namely as it is opposed not only unto Truth first but secondly also unto Ingenuity and thirdly unto Equity also accordingly false reports may be raised three ways The first and grossest way is when we feign and devise something of our own heads to lay against our brother without any foundation at all or ground of truth creating as it were a tale ex nihilo As it is in the Psalm They laid to my charge things that I never did and as Nehemiah sent word to Sanballat There are no such things as thou sayest but thou feignest them of thine own heart Crimen domesticum vernaculum a meer device such as was that of Iezebel's instruments against Naboth which cost him his life and that of Zibah against Mephibosheth which had almost cost him all he had This first kind of Report is false as devoid of Truth The second way which was so frequently used among the Roman Accusers that Custom had made it not only excusable but allowable and is at this day of too frequent use both in private and publick calumniations is when upon some small ground of truth we run descant at pleasure in our own informations interweaving many untruths among or preverting the speeches and actions of our adversaries to make their matters ill when they are not or otherwise aggravating them to make them seem worse than they are As tidings came to David when Ammon only was slain that Absalom had killed all the Kings sons It is an easie and a common thing by misconstruction to deprave whatsoever is most innocently done or spoken The Ammonitish Courtiers dealt so with David when he sent Ambassadors to Hanun in kindness they informed the King as if he had sent spies to discover the strength of the City and Land And the Iews enemies dealt so with those that of devotion repaired the Temple and the Wall of Ierusalem advertising the State as if their purpose had been to fortifie themselves for a Rebellion Yea and the malicious Iews dealt so with Christ himself taking hold of some words of his about the destroying and building of the Temple which he understood of the Temple of his body and so wresting them to the fabrick of the Material Temple as to make them serve to give colour to one of the strongest accusations they had against him This second kind of Report is false as devoid of ingenuity The third way is when taking advantage of the Law we prosecute the extremity thereof against our brother who perhaps hath done something contrary to the letter of the Law but not violated the intent of the Law giver or offended either against common Equity which ought to be the measure of just Laws or against the common good which is in some sort the measure of Equity In that multitude of Laws which for the repressing of disorders and for the maintenance of peace and tranquillity among men must needs be in every well-governed Common-wealth it cannot be avoided but that honest men especially if they have much dealings in the world may have sometimes just and necessary
daily for mercy upon the Land and that weep and mourn in secret and upon their beds for your Abominations whom you hate and despise and persecute and defame and account as the very Scum of the People and the refuse and off-scouring of all things to whom yet you owe your Preservation Surely if it were not for some godly Iehoshaphat or other whose Presence God regardeth among you if it were not for some zealous Moses or other that standeth in the gap for you God's wrath had entred in upon you long ere this as a mighty breach of water and as an overflowing deluge overwhelmed you and you had been swept away as with the Besom of Destruction and devoured as stubble before the fire It is the innocent that delivereth the Land and reprieveth it from Destruction when the Sentence of Desolation is pronounced against it and it is delivered by the pureness of his hands O the goodness of our God! that would have spared the five Cities of the Salt-Sea if among so many thousands of beastly and filthy Persons there had been found but Ten righteous ones and that was for each City but two Persons nay that would have pardoned Ierusalem if in all the Streets and broad places thereof replenished with a World of Idolaters and Swearers and Adulterers and Oppressors there had been found but one single man that executed Iudgment and sought the truth from his heart But Oh the madness of the men of this foolish World withal who seek to do them most Mischief of all others who of all others seek to do them most good thirsting most after their Destruction who are the chiefest Instruments of their preservation O foolish and mad World if thou hast but wit enough yet yet to hug and to make much of that little flock the hostages of thy Peace and the earnest of thy tranquillity if thou wouldest but know even thou at least in this thy day the things that belong unto thy peace Thou art yet happy that God hath a remnant in thee and if thou knewest how to make use of this happiness at least in this thy day by honouring their persons by procuring their safety and welfare by following their examples by praying for their continuance thou mightest be still and more and ever happy But if these things that belong unto thy peace be now hidden from thine eyes if these men that prolong thy peace and prorogue thy destruction be now despised in thy heart in this day of thy peace God is just thou knowest not how soon they may be taken from thee and though he do not bring the evil upon thee in their days when they are gone thou knowest not how soon Vengeance may overtake thee and then shall he tear thee in pieces and there shall be none left to deliver thee I have now done Beseech we God the Father of mercies for his dear Son Jesus Christ his sake to shed his Holy Spirit into our hearts that by his good Blessing upon us that which hath been presently delivered agreeably to his holy Truth and Word may take root downwards in our hearts and bring forth fruit upwards in our lives and conversations and so to assist us ever with his Grace that we may with humble confidence lay hold on his Mercies with chearful reverence tremble at his Iudgments by unfeigned Repentance turn from us what he hath threatned and by unwearied Obedience assure unto us what he hath promised To which Holy Father Son and Spirit three Persons and c. AD POPULUM The Third Sermon At Grantham Linc. Iun. 19. 1621. 3 KINGS 21. 29. I will not bring the evil in his days but in his sons days will I bring the evil upon his house I Come now this third time to entreat of this Scripture and by God's help to finish it Of the Three parts whereof heretofore propounded viz. 1. Ahab's Humiliation 2. The suspension of his judgment for his time 3. And the Devolution of â—t upon Iehoram the two former having been already handled the last only now remaineth to be considered of In the prosecution whereof as heretofore we have cleared GOD's Holiness and Truth so we shall be now occasioned to clear his Iustice from such imputations as might seem to lie upon it from this Act. And that in three respects accordingly as Iehoram who standeth here punishable for Ahab's sin may be considered in a threefold reference to Ahab that is to say either relate as the son of Ahab or disparate as another man from Ahab or comparaâ—â— as a man not altogether so bad as Ahab Now what Justice first to punish the Son for the Father or indeed secondly any one man foâ— another but most of all thirdly the less Offender for the greater It is not a matter of so much difficulty as at the first appearance it seemeth to clear these doubts if all things thereto appertaining be duly and distinctly considered The greatest trouble will be the things being of more variety than hardness to sort them in such manner as that we may therein proceed orderly and without confusion Evermore we know Certainties must rule Uncertainties and clear truths doubtful it will be therefore expedient for us for the better guiding of our Judgments first to lay down some Certainties and then afterwards by them to measure out fit Resolutions to the Doubts and then lastly from the premises to raise some few instructions for our use The first Certainty then and a main one is this Howsoever things appear to us yet God neither is nor can be unjust as not in any other thing so neither in his punishments Is God unrighteous that taketh vengeance God forbid for then how shall God judge the world shall not the Iudge of all the earth do right Indeed the Reasons of his Iustice oftentimes may be oftentimes are unknown to us but they never are they never can be unrighteous in him If in a deep point of Law a learned discreet Iudge should upon sufficient grounds give sentence flat contrary to what an ordinary by stander would think reason as many times it falleth out it is not for the grieved party to complain of injustice done him he should rather impute what is done to want of skill in himself than of Conscience in the Judge Right so if in many things Gods Proceedings hold not proportion with those characters of Justice and Equity which our weak and carnal reason would express we must thence infer our own ignorance not his injustice And that so much the rather because those matters of Law are such as fall within the comprehension of ordinary Reason whereas the ways of God are far removed out of our sight and advanced above our reach and besides an Earthly Iudge is subject to misprison mis-information partiality corruption and sundry infirmities that may vitiate his Proceedings whereas no such thing can possibly fall upon
coarse he should be content with it nay though he should want either or both he should be content without it We should all learn of an old experienced servant of God St. Paul what grace and long experience had taught him In whatsoever state we are to be therewith content We are to shew our Obedience to our heavenly Master yet further by submitting to his wholesom Discipline when at any time he shall see cause to give us correction Our Apostle a little after the Text would have servants to be subject even to their froward Masters and to take it patiently when they are buffeted undeservedly and without fault How much more ought we to accept the punishment of our iniquity as we have the phrase Lev. 26. and with patience to yield our backs to the whip when God who hath been so gracious a Master to us shall think fit to exercise some little severity towards us and to lay stripes upon us Especially since he never striketh us First but for our fault such is his justice nor Secondly such is his mercy but for our good And all this belongeth to that Obedience which the servant of God ought to manifest both by doing and suffering according to the will of his Master The third and last general duty is Fidelity Who is a faithful and wise servant Well done thou good and faithful servant as if the wisdom and goodness of a servant consisted in his faithfulness Now the faithfulness of a servant may be tried especially by these three things by the heartiness of his service by being tender of his Masters honour and profit and by his quickness and diligence in doing his business A notable example whereof we have in Abraham's servant Gen. 24. in all the three particulars For first being many miles distant from his Master he was no less solicitous of the business he was put in trust withal than he could have been if he had been all that while in the eye of his Master Secondly he framed himself in his speeches and actions and in his whole behaviour to such a discreet carriage as might best set forth the credit and honour of his Master Thirdly he used all possible diligence and expedition losing not any time either at first for the delivery of his message or at last for his return home after he had brought things to a good conclusion Such faithfulness would well become us in the service of God in all the aforesaid respects The first whereof is Heartiness in his service There are many servants in the world that will work hard and bustle at it lustily for a fit and so long as their Masters eye is upon them but when his back is turned can be content to go on fair and softly and fellow-like Such 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Apostle condemneth Col. 3. and elsewhere admonishing servants whatsoever they do to do it heartily and to obey their Masters not with eye-service but in singleness of heart Towards our heavenly Master true it is if we had but this eye-service it were enough because we are never out of his eye his eyes are in all corners of the earth beholding the evil and the good and his eye-lids try the children of men he is about our beds and about our paths and spieth out all our goings And therefore if we should but study to approve our selves and our actions before his sight it could not be but our services should be hearty as well as handy because our hearts are no less in his sight than our hands are We cannot content our Master nor should we content our selves with a bare and barren profession in the service of God neither with the addition of some outward performances of the work done but since our Master calleth for the heart as well as the hand and tongue and requireth truth in the inward parts no less rather much more than shew in the outward let us but joyn that inward truth of the heart unto the outward profession and performance and doubtless we shall be accepted Only fear the Lord and serve him in truth with all your heart 1 Sam. 12. Secondly We must shew our faithfulness to our Master by our zeal in his behalf A faithful servant will not endure an evil word spoken of his Master behind his back but he will be ready upon every occasion to vindicate his credit and to magnifie him unto the opinion of others He will make much of those that love his Master and set the less by those that care not for him And as to his credit principally so he hath an eye also in the second place to the profit of his Master He will have a care to save his goods the best he can it will grieve his very heart to see any of them vainly wasted or imbezeled by his fellow-servants yea and it will be some grief to him if any thing under his hand do but chance to miscarry though it be without his fault See we how far every of us can apply all this to our own selves in the service of God If we have no heart to stand up in our rank and place for the maintenance of Gods truth and worship when it is discountenanced or over-born either by might or multitudes If our blood will not appear a little when cursed miscreants blast the honour of God with their unhallowed breath by blaspheming oaths fearful imprecations scurrile profanations of Scripture licentious and bitter sarcasms against the holy Ordinances of God If a profound drunkard and obscene rimer an habituated swearer a complete roarer every loose companion and professed scorner of all goodness that doth but peep out with a head be as welcome into our company and find as full and free entertainment with us as he that carrieth the face and for any thing we know hath the heart of an honest and sober Christian without either profaneness or preciseness If we grieve not for the miscarriages of those poor souls that live near us especially those that fall any way under our charge what faithfulness is there in us or what zeal for God to answer the title we usurp so often as we call our selves the servants of God Thirdly If we be his faithful servants we should let it appear by our diligence in doing his businesses No man would willingly entertain an idle servant that is good at bit and nothing else one of those the old riming verse describeth Sudant quando vorant frigescunt quando laborant such as eat till they sweat and work till they freeze O thou wicked and slothful servant saith the Master in the Parable to him that napkined up his Talent Mat. 25. they are rightly joyned wicked and slothful for it is impossible a slothful servant should be good The Poets therefore give unto Mercury who is Interpres divûm the Messenger as they feign
nothing against Conscience 37 38 2. Get the mastery of thine own Will 39 43 3. Beware of Engagements to Sin 44 45 4. Resolve not to yield to any Temptation 46 The Conclusion Sermon X. Ad Aulam I. Ser. on PHIL. iv 11. Sect. 1 4. THe occasion Scope 5 Paraphrase and 6 Division of the Text. 7 12 Four Observations from the Apostles Protestation 13 14 The Nature of Contentment gathered from the Text in three Particulars viz. 15 16 I. That a man be content with his own Estate without coveting that which is anothers 17 19 Illustrated by Examples both ways 20 21 and proved from Grounds both of Justice 22 and Charity 23 Not all desire of that which is anothers forbidden 24 but the Inordinate only Whether in respect 25 26 1. Of the Object of the Desire 27 29 2. The Act or of the Desire 30 31 3. The Effects of the Desire 32 The Inference thence 33 II. That a man be content with his present Estate 34 Because 1. That only is properly his own 35 2. All looking beyond that disquieteth the mind 36 3. The present is ever best 37 38 The Duty pressed 39 40 and the misunderstanding of it prevented 41 III. That a man be content with any Estate 42 44 with the Reasons thereof 45 c. and Inferences thence Sermon VI. Ad Aulam II. Serm. on PHIL. iv 11. Sect. 1-3 THe Art of Contentment 4 1. Not from Nature 4 2. Institution 6 3. or Outward Things 7 But from God who teacheth it us 8 1. by his Spirit 9 2. by his Promises 10 c. 3. by the Rod of Discipline 12 Inferences I. Where this learning is to be had 13 II. Sundry motives thereunto 14 III. The Trial of our proficiency therein by Six Marks 15 1. The despising of unjust gain 16 2. The moderating of worldly Desires and Care 17 3. The careful using and of what we have 18 4. the charitable dispensing of what we have 19 5. The bearing both of wants with patience 20 c. 6. and losses with patience 22 Seven Helps to further us in this Learning 23 24 1. A right perswasion of the Goodness and Truth of God 25 2. A through sense of our own unworthiness 26 3. Thankfulness for what we have 27 4. A prudent comparing of our Estates with other mens 28 5. To consider the vanity of all outward things 29 30 6. Sobriety in a frugal and temperate use of the Creature 31 7. To remember that we are but Pilgrims here Sermon VII Ad Aulam on ISA. lii 3. Sect. 1. THe Sum and Division of the Text. 2 4 Part I. Mans Sale 5 Inferences thence To take knowledge 1. of our Misery therein 2 2. and Presumption therein 7 The Materials of the Contract viz. 8 10 I. The Commodity and therein our Baseness 11 15 II. The Price and therein our Folly 15 18 An Objection by way of Excuse removed 19 24 III. The Consent and therein our Inexcusableness 25 PART II. Mans Redemption wrought 26 I. EFFECTUALLY Wherein are considered 27 1. The Power of the Redeemer 28 2. The Love of the Redeemer 29 3. The Right of the Redeemer 30 And thence Inferred a threefold Duty viz. 1. of Affiance relatively to his Power 31 2. of Thankfulness relatively to his Love 32 3. of Service relatively to his Right 33 II. FREELY As to us who payed nothing towards it 34 37 But yet a valuable price payed by our Redeemer 38 Inferences thence To exclude Merit 39 But not Endeavours 40 The Conclusion Sermon VIII Ad Aulam on ROM xv 5. Sect. 1 2 THe Scope and Division of the Text. 3 5 THE FORMALITY of the Prayer Observations thence viz. I. Prayer to be joyned with Instruction 6 9 II. God the only Author of Peace 10 III. Concerning the Style FIVE ENQUIRIES viz. 11 13 1. Why the God of Patience 14 16 2. Why of Consolation 17 19 3. Of the Choice of these two Attributes 20 4. Their Conjunction 21 5. and Order 22 In the matter of the Prayer three Particulars 23 I. THE THING prayed for viz. Like mindedness 24 26 Opened 27 and Pressed upon these Considerations 28 1. That we are members of the same Body 29 2. and of the same Family 30 3. That it forwardeth the building up of Gods Church 31 33 4. but the want of it giveth Scandal to the Enemies thereof 34 35 II. The FORMER QUALIFICATION importing an agreement 1. Universal 36 38 2. Mutual 39 40 III. The Later QUALIFICATION importing an agreement 1. according unto Truth and Godliness 41 42 2. after The Example of Christ. 43 The Conclusion Sermon IX Ad Aulam on 1 TIM iii. 16. Sect. 1 4. THe Occasion Scope and Division of THE TEXT 5 6 Of the word Mystery 7 I. POINT The Gospel A GREAT MYSTERY Because 8 9 1. it could not have been known 10 13 2. had it not been revealed and 14 15 3. being revealed cannot be perfectly comprehended 16 17 INFERENCES thence I. Reason not to be the measure of Faith 18 19 II. Disquisition of Truth to be within the bounds of Sobriety 20 21 III. Offence not to be taken at the difference of Opinions among Christians 22 23 II. POINT Christianity a Mystery of Godliness In regard 24 26 1. both of the general Scope thereof 27 2. and of the special Parts thereof 28 3. and the means of conserving it 29 31 INFERENCES thence I. for the trial of Doctrines 32 33 with application to the present Church of England 34 II. For the ordering of our Lives 35 The Conclusion Sermon X. Ad Aulam on PSAL. cxix 75. Sect. 1. THe Division of THE TEXT 2 6 What is meant by the Judgments of God 7 POINT I. The righteousness of Gods Judgments 1. as proceeding from him 8 9 2. as deserved by us 10 INFERENCES thence 1. Not to murmur against the ways of Gods providence 11 2. but to submit our wills to his 12 14 Davids many troubles 15 17 and God the causer thereof 18 POINT II. That God causeth his servants to be troubled it is out of his faithfulness whether we respect 19 1. his Promises 20 22 2. or their Relations 23 The Inference thence To bear troubles chearfully 24 25 POINT III. The faithfulness of God in sending troubles evidenced from 26 30 1. The End he aimeth at therein 31 34 2. The Proportion he holdeth therein 35 36 3. The Issues he giveth thereout Sermon XI Ad Aulam I. Ser. on 1 COR. x. 23. Sect. 1 2. THe Scope and Division of the Text. 3 4 All things meant of Indifferent things only 5 What things are Indifferent 6 8 POINT I. The Liberty we have to indifferent things 9 10 The Error of those that over-much restrain this Liberty 11 14 blamed as 1. unrighteous in it self 15 22 2. Dangerous in the Consequents 23 With some APPLICATION to this Church 24 The chief Causes of that Error discovered 25 27 viz. 1. Ignorance 28 30 2. and Partiality 31
path of Truth and Godliness The word of Christ is the word of truth and the mystery of Christ the mystery of Godliness Whatsoever therefore is contrary to either of these Truth or Godliness cannot be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to Christ but rather altogether against him Here then we have our bounds set us our Ne plus ultrà beyond which if we pass we transgress and are exorbitant Alas for us the while when even our good desires may deceive us if they be inordinate and the love of so lovely a thing as Peace is mis-lead us The more need have we to look narrowly to our treadings lest the Tempter should have laid a snare for us in a way wherein we suspected it not and so surprise us ere we be aware Usque ad aras The Altar-stone that is the meer-stone All bonds of friendship all offices of neighbourhood must give way when the honour of God and his truth lie at the stake If peace will be had upon fair terms or indeed upon any terms salvis veritate pietate without impeachment of either of these it ought to be embraced But if it will not come but upon harder conditions better let it go A man may buy Gold too dear Follow peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. The gender of the article there sheweth the meaning not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without which peace but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without which holiness no man shall see the Lord. Without peace some man may having faithfully endeavoured it though he cannot obtain it that is not his fault but without holiness which if any man want it is through his own fault only no man shall see the Lord. Our like-mindedness then must be according to Christ Iesus in this first sence that is so far forth as may stand with Christian truth and godliness 41. But very many Expositors do rather understand the phrase in another sence According to Christ that is according to the example of Christ which seemeth to have been the judgment of our last Translators who have therefore so put it into the margent of our Bibles His Example the Apostle had reserved unto the last place as one of the weightiest and most effectual arguments in this business producing it a little before the Text and repeating it again a little after the Text. So as this prayer may seem according to this interpretation to be an illustration of that argument which was drawn from Christs Example as if he had said Christ sought not himself but us He laid aside his own glory devested himself of Majesty and Excellency that he might condescend to our baseness and bear our infirmities he did not despise us but received us with all meekness and compassion Let not us therefore seek every man to please himself in going his own way and setting up his own will neither let us despise any mans weakness but rather treading in the steps of our blessed Lord Iesus let every one of us strive to please his neighbour for his good unto edification bearing with the infirmities of our weaker brethren and receiving one another into our inwardest bosoms and bowels even as Christ also received us to the Glory of God 42. If the examples of the servants of Christ ought not to be lightly set by how much more ought the Example of the Master himself to sway with every Good Christian In 1 Cor. 10. St. Paul having delivered an exhortation in general the same in effect with that we are now in hand withal ver 24. Let no man seek his own but every man anothers wealth he doth after propose to their imitation in that point his own particular practice and example in the last verse of the Chapter Even as I please all men in all things saith he not seeking mine own profit but the profit of many that they might be saved But then lest he might be thought to cry up himself and that he might know how unsafe a thing it were to rest barely upon his or any other mans example in the very next following words the first words of the next Chapter He leadeth them higher and to a more perject example even that of Christ Be ye followers of me saith he as I also am of Christ. As if he had said Although my example who am as nothing be little considerable in it self yet wherein my example is guided by the example of Christ you may not despise it The original record only is authentical and not the transcript yet may a transcript be creditable when it is signed and attested with a Concordat cum originali under the hand of a publick Notary or other sworn Officer I do not therefore lay mine own example upon you as a Rule I only set it before you as a help or Encouragement that you may the more chearfully follow the Example of Christ when you shall see men subject to the same sinful infirmities with your selves by the grace of God to have done the same before you My example only sheweth the thing to be feasible it is Christs Example only that can render it warrantable Be ye therefore followers of me even as I also am of Christ. 43. Here just occasion is offered me but I may not take it because of the time first and more generally of a very profitable Enquiry in what things and how far forth we are astricted to follow the Example of Christ. And then secondly and more particularly what especial directions to take from his Example for the ordering of our carriage towards our brethren in order to the more ready attaining to this Christian unanimity and like-mindedness one towards another of which we have hitherto spoken But I remit you over for both to what our Apostle hath written Phil. 2. in the whole fore-part of the Chapter The whole passage is very well worthy the pondering and his discourse therein may serve as a Commentary upon a good part of this Text. I therefore commend it to your private meditation and you and what you have heard to the good blessing of Almighty God and that with St. Pauls votive prayer or benediction here for I know not where to fetch a better Now the God of Patience and Consolation grant you to be like-minded one towards another according to Christ Iesus That you may with one mind and one mouth glorifie God even the Father of our Lord Iesus Christ. To whom c. AD AULAM. The Ninth Sermon BERWICK JULY 16. 1639. 1 Tim. 3. 16. And without all Controversie great is the Mystery of Godliness 1. THe Ordination of Bishops Priests and Deacons being one of the principal acts of the Episcopal power our Apostle therefore instructeth Timothy whom he had ordained Bishop of Ephesus the famous Metropolis of that part of Asia somewhat fully what he was to do in that so weighty an affair What manner of persons and
an universal concurrence of judgment as there is in the main fundamental points of the Christian Faith And if we were so wise as we might and should be to make the right use of it it would not stumble us a whit in the belief of our Religion that Christians differ so much as they do in many things but rather mightily confirm us in the assurances thereof that they agree so well as they do almost in any thing And it may be a great comfort to every well meaning soul that the simple belief of those certain truths whereon all parties are in a manner agreed may be and ordinarily is sufficient for the salvation of all them who are sincerely careful according to that measure of light and means that God hath vouchsafed them to actuate their Faith with Piety Charity and good Works so making this great Mystery to become unto them as it is in its self Mysterium Pietatis a Mystery of Godliness Which is the last point proposed the Quale to which I now pass 22. As the corrupt Doctrine of Antichrist is not only a Doctrine of Error but of Impiety too called therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The mystery of iniquity 2 Thes. 2. So the wholsom doctrine of Christ is not only a doctrine of Truth but of Piety too and is therefore termed here 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Mystery of Godliness Which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Godliness since there appeareth not any great necessity in the Context to restrain it to that more peculiar sence wherein both the Greek and English word are sometimes used namely to signifie the right manner of Gods Worship according to his word in opposition to all idolatrous superstitious or false Worships practised among the Heathens I am the rather enclined to understand it here as many Interpreters have done in the fuller Latitude as it comprehenderh the whole duty of a Christian man which he standeth bound by the command of God in his Law or of Christ in his Gospel to perform 23. Verum and Bonum we know are near of kin the one to the other And the spirit of God who is both the Author and the Revealer of this Mystery as he is the spirit of truth Joh. 14. so is he also the spirit of holiness Rom. 1. And it is part of his work to sanctific the heart with grace as well as to enlighten the mind with knowledge Our Apostle therefore sometimes mentioneth Truth and Godliness together teaching us thereby that we should take them both into our care together If any man consent not to the words of our Lord Iesus Christ and to the doctrine which is after Godliness 1 Tim. 6. And Tit. 1. according to the Faith of Gods Elect and acknowledging of the Truth which is after Godliness And here in express terms The Mystery of Godliness And that most rightly whether we consider it in the Scope Parts or Conservation of it 24. First the general Scope and aim of Christianity is by the mercy of God founded on the merits of Christ to bring men on through Faith and Godliness to Salvation It was not in the purpose of God in publishing the Gospel and thereby freeing us from the personal obligation rigour and curse of the Law so to turn us loose and lawless to do whatsoever should seem good in our own eyes follow our own crooked wills or gratifie any corrupt lust but to oblige us rather the faster by these new benefits and to incite us the more effectually by Evangelical promises to the earnest study and pursuit of Godliness The Gospel though upon quite different grounds bindeth us yet to our good behaviour in every respect as deep as ever the Law did if not in some respects deeper allowing no liberty to the flesh for the fulfilling of the lusts thereof in any thing but exacting entire sanctity and purity both of inward affection and outward conversation in all those that embrace it The grace of God appearing in the revelation of this mystery as it bringeth along with it an offer of salvation to all men so it teacheth all men that have any real purpose to lay hold on so gracious an offer to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live righteously and soberly and godly in this present world 25. It is not to be wondered at if all false Religions give allowance to some ungodliness or other when the very Gods whom they worship give such encouragements thereunto by their lewd examples The Gods of the Pagans were renowned for nothing so much most of them as for their vices Mars a bloody God Bacchus a drunken God Mercury a cheating God and so proportionably in their several kinds all the rest Their great Capital God Iupiter guilty of almost all the Capital vices And where the Gods are naught who can imagine the Religion should be good Their very mysteria sacra as they called them were so full of all wickedness and filthy abominations as was already in part touched but is fully discovered by Clemens Alexandrinus Lactantius Arnobius Tertullian and other of the Ancients of our Religion that it was the wisest point in all their Religion to take such strict order as they did for the keeping of them secret 26. But it is the honour and prerogative of the Christian Religion that it alone alloweth of no wickedness But as God himself is holy so he requireth an holy Worship and holy Worshippers He exacteth the mortification of all evil lusts and the sanctification of the whole man body soul and spirit and that in each of these throughout Every one that nameth himself from the name of Christ doth ipso facto by the very taking of that blessed name upon him and daring to stile himself Christian virtually bind himself to depart from all iniquity nor so only but to endeavour also after the example of him whose name otherwise he unworthily usurpeth to be just merciful temperate humble meek patient charitable to get the habits and to exercise the acts of these and all other holy graces and vertues Nay more the Gospel imposeth upon us some moral strictnesses which the Stoicks themselves or whoever else were the most rigid Masters of Morality never so much as thought of Nay yet more it exalteth the Moral Law of God himself given by Moses to the People of Israel to a higher pitch than they at least as they commonly understood the Law took themselves thereby obliged unto That a man should forsake all his dearest friends yea and deny his own dearest self too for Christs sake and yet for Christs sake at the same time love his deadliest enemies That he should take up his Cross and if need were lay down his life not only for his great Master but even for the meanest of his fellow-servants too That he should exult with joy and abound in hope in the midst of tribulations of persecutions of death it self Surely the
Yet that decency and expediency set aside no man can truly say that the doing of any of this is simply unlawful For why might not an English Minister if he were Prisoner in Turkey to make an escape disguise himself in such a habit as aforesaid which if it were simply unlawful rather than to do it he should dye a thousand deaths And why it should not be as lawful now for a Minister as it was once for an Apostle to work journey-work to make Shoes now as then to make Tents if it might stand with decency and expediency now as well as then let him that can shew a reason Let them look how they will answer it therefore that make it unlawful for Priests either to marry as some do or to be in commission of the peace as some others do as if either the state of Wedlock or the exercise of Temporal Iurisdiction were inconsistent with holy Orders When the maintainers of either Opinion shall shew good Text for what they teach the cause shall be yielded but till that be done they must pardon us if we appeal them both of Pharisaism in teaching for Doctrine mens Precepts So long as this Text stands in the Bible unexpunged All things are lawful for me if any man either from Rome or elsewhere nay if an Angel from Heaven should teach either of those things to be unlawful and bring no better proof for it than yet hath been done he must excuse me if I should not be very forward to believe him 36. Well you see the Apostle here extendeth our liberty very far in indifferent things without exception either of things or persons All things lawful and lawful for all men In the asserting of which liberty if in any thing I have spoken at this time I may seem to any man to have set open a wide gap to carnal licentiousness I must entreat at his hands one of these three things and the request is but reasonable Either First that all prejudice and partiality laid aside he would not judge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the appearance but according to right and truth and then I doubt not but all shall be well enough Or Secondly that he would consider whether these words of our Apostle taken by themselves alone do not seem to set open the gap as wide as I or any man else can stretch it Omnia licent All things are lawful for me Or that Thirdly he would at least-wise suspend his judgment till I shall have handled the latter clauses of my Text also wherein our liberty is restrained as it is here extended Then which may be ere long if God will he shall possibly find the gap if any such be sufficiently stopped up again to keep out all carnal licentiousness and other abuse of Christian Liberty whatsoever In the mean time and at all times God grant us all to have a right judgment and to keep a good conscience in all things AD AULAM. Sermon XII HAMPTON-COURT JULY 26. 1640. 1 Cor. 10. 23. But all things are not expedient But all things edifie not THe former Clause of the Verse here twice repeated All things are lawful for me containeth the Extension as these latter Clauses do the Limitation of that Liberty that God hath left us to things of indifferent Nature That Extension I have already handled and set our Christian Liberty there where according to the constant Doctrine of our Apostle I think it should stand From what I then delivered which I now repeat not plain it was that the Apostle extendeth our Liberty very far without exception either of Things or Persons All Things lawful and lawful for all men All the fear was lest by so asserting our liberty we might seem to set open a gap to carnal licentiousness Although there be no great cause for it in respect of the thing it self yet is not that fear altogether needless in regard of our Corruption who are apt to turn the very best things into abuse and Liberty as much as any thing Yet that fear need not much trouble us if we will but take these latter Clauses of the Verse also along with us as we ought to do Where we shall find the gap if any such were sufficiently made up again to keep out all carnal licentiousness and other abuse of Christian Liberty whatsoever 2. Of those Clauses we are now to speak But all things are not expedient But all things edifie not Wherein the Apostle having before extended our liberty in the power now restraineth it in the use and exercise of that power Concerning which I shall comprehend all I have to say in three Observations grounded all upon the Text. First That the Apostle establisheth the point of lawfulness before he meddle with that of expediency Secondly That he requireth we should have an eye to the expediency also of the things we do not resting upon their lawfulness alone And thirdly that he measureth the expediency of lawful things by their usefulness unto edification Of which in their order 3. And first Expediency in St. Paul's method supposeth lawfulness He taketh that for granted that the thing is lawful before he enter into any Enquiry whether it be expedient yea or no. For expediency is here brought in as a thing that must restrain and limit us in the exercise of that liberty which God hath otherwise allowed us but God hath not allowed us any liberty unto unlawful things And this Observation is of right good use for thence it will follow that when the unlawfulness of any thing is once made sufficiently to appear all farther enquiry into the expediency or inexpediency thereof must thenceforth utterly cease and determine No conjuncture of Circumstances whatsoever can make that expedient to be done at any time that is of it self and in the kind unlawful For a man to blaspheme the holy Name of God to sacrifice to Idols to give wrong sentence in Judgment by his power to oppress those that are not able to withstand him by subtilty to over-reach others in bargaining to take up arms offensive or defensive against a lawful Sovereign none of these and sundry other things of like nature being all of them simply and de toto genere unlawful may be done by any man at any time in any case upon any colour or pretension whatsoever the express Command of God himself only excepted as in the case of Abraham for sacrificing his Son Not for the avoiding of scandal not at the instance of any Friend or command of any Power upon earth nor for the maintenance of the Lives or Liberties either of our selves or others nor for the defence of Religion not for the preservation of a Church or State no nor yet if that could be imagined possible for the salvation of a Soul no not for the redemption of the whole world 4. I remember to have read long since a Story of one of the Popes but who the
Saviours birth when they shared heaven and earth their several portions alloted us our part in peace and the good will of God but with reservation of the whole glory to him Glory be to God on high and in earth peace and towards men good will It is well and happy for us if we may enjoy our own peace and his good will full little have we deserved either of both but much rather the contrary but we were best take heed how we meddle with his glory All other things he giveth us richly to enjoy many a good gift and perfect giving He hath not with-held from us any thing that was his and useful for us no not his only begotten Son excepted the best gift that ever was given and a pledge of all the rest Yea and he will give us a kind of glory too the Lord will give grace and glory Psal. 84. and that not a light one neither nor fading away but such as neither eye nor ear nor heart of man can comprehend so massie and so durable an eternal and exceeding weight of glory But that divine infinite incomprehensible glory that belongeth to him as supream King of kings as his peculiar Prerogative and the choicest flower in his Crown of that he is most jealous in that he will brook no sharer And he hath made known to us his royal pleasure in that point Isa. 42. My glory will I not give to another 7. He will part with none you see it seemeth rather fifthly by the form of the Verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he looketh for some from us For what else is it to glorifie but to make one glorious by conferring some glory upon him which he had not or not in that degree before And to God how can that be done whose glory is perfect essential and infinite and to what is perfect much less to what is infinite can nothing be added What a great admirer of Virgil said of him tanta Maronis gloria ut nullius laudibus crescat nullius vituperatione minuatur was but a flaunting hyperbole far beyond the merit of the party he meant it to But the like speech would be most exquisitely true of him of whom we now speak indeed a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 rather than an hyperbole Whose Glory is truly such as all the creatures in the world should they joyn their whole forces together to do it could not make it either more or less than it is 8. We must therefore of necessity forsake the proper signification of the word Glorifie which is to add some glory to another either in specie or in gradu which before he had not and understand it in such a sence as that the thing meant thereby may be feasible And so to glorifie God is no more than to shew forth his glory and to manifest to our own consciences and to the world how highly we praise and esteem his glory and how earnestly we desire and as much as in us lieth endeavour it that all other men would also with us acknowledge and admire the same Sing praise to the honour of his name make his praise glorious Psal. 66. Not make his essence to be more glorious than it is in it self but make his praise to be more and more glorious in the eye and esteem of men That so his power his glory and mightiness of his Kingdom might be known unto men and that men might ascribe unto the Lord the honour due unto his name and that men might sing in the way of the Lord that great is the glory of the Lord. To endeavour by our thanksgivings confessions faith charity obedience goodworks and perseverance in all these to bring Gods true Religion and Worship into request to win a due reverence to his holy name and word to beget in others more high and honourable thoughts concerning God in all those his most eminent Attributes of Wisdom Power Iustice Mercy and the rest that is in Scripture language to glorifie God 9. One thing more from the Person of the Verb and then you have all It is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That God may be glorified and so leave it indefinite and uncertain by whom it should be done but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that ye may glorifie him The thing to be done and they to do it One would think the glorious Angels and Saints in heaven were fitter instruments for such an employment than we poor sinful worms upon earth Very true they in heaven are fitter to do it and it is best done there but there is more need of it upon earth and if it be done here in truth and singleness of heart it is very well accepted Poor things God knoweth our best services are if God should value them but according to their weight and worth But in his mercy and that through Christ he graciously accepteth our unfeigned desires and faithful endeavours according to that truth we have be it never so little and not according to that perfection we want be it never so much Alas what is the tinkling of two little bells in a Country-steeple or the peoples running to the Towns end and crying God save the King to add any honour or greatness to the Majesty of a Potent Monarch Yet will a gracious Prince take those mean expressions of his subjects love as an honour done him because he readeth therein their hearty affections towards him and he knoweth that if they knew how to express themselves better they would So it is here It is not the thing done that is looked at so much as the heart Set that right first and then be the performance what it can be God is both pleased and honoured therewithal Whoso offereth praise glorifieth me Psal. 50. That is so he intendeth it and so I accept it 10. You have now all I would say by way of explication from these words The particulars are six First we should propose to our selves some end Therein Secondly look at God Thirdly that God may have glory and that he alone may have it Fourthly Fifthly that something be done for the advancement of his glory and Lastly that it be done by us The result from the whole six taken together is That the Glory of God ought to be the chiefest end and main scope of all our desires and endeavours In whatever we think say do or suffer in the whole course of our Lives and Actions we should refer all to this look at this as the main Whatsoever become of us and our affairs that yet God may be glorified Whether ye eat or drink saith St. Paul or whatsoever else ye do let all be done to the glory of God 1 Cor. 10. He would have us not only in the performance of good works and of necessary duties to intend the Glory of God according to that of our Saviour Let your light so shine before men that they way see your good
Israelites Opprimamus sapienter let us deal wisely with them and destroy them And as Lysander was wont to say that where the Lion's skin would not reach to do the business it should be eeked out with the Foxes Both are hateful both to God and Man Sed fraus odio digna majore saith the Orator of the two Deceit is the baser and more hateful Because men had rather be thought to want strength for that begetteth pity than to want wit which doth but expose them to scorn thence it is that usually they complain more of treachery than they do of open hostility and take it deeper to heart to be defrauded than to be oppressed The loss troubleth them not so much they say but they cannot endure to be cozened Samuel you see disclaimeth this in the first place Whom have I defrauded 28. He knew the Law of God and the Law of Equity the written and the unwritten Law both were altogether against it Thou shalt not defraud thy neighbour Levit. 19. and after in the same Chapter Ye shall do no uurighteousness in judgment in mete-yard in weight or in measure In the sixth Chapter of the same book it is declared that he that committeth a trespass by deceiving his neighbour sinneth therein and the Law there enjoyneth an offering to be made for the expiating of that sin How often doth Solomon condemn false weights and false ballances as foul abominations And how frequently do the Prophets object it as a main provocation of God's heavy judgments upon the Land That they set traps and laid snares for men That their houses were full of deceit as a cage is full of birds That they were as crafty Merchants in whose hands are the ballances of deceit That they made the Ephah whereby they measured out the Commodities they sold small and the Shekel wherewith they weighed the mony they were to receive for that they sold great and falsified the ballances and the like St. Paul also if the translations speak his sence aright layeth a charge upon the Thessalonians That no man go beyond or defraud his brother in any matter both because it is the will of God sufficiently revealed in his Word that men should not do so and because God will be a sure and severe avenger of those that do so 1 Thes. 4. And he chideth the Corinthians for doing wrong and defrauding one another 1 Cor. 6. And leâ—t in what he either forbiddeth to or reproveth in others himself should prove guilty he protesteth against all such dealings more than once Receive us we have wronged no Man we have defrauded no Man 2 Cor. 7. And again 2 Cor. 12. Be it I did not burden you as the false Apostles for filthy lucre and to serve their own bellies did nevertheless it may be you will think I was crafty and caught you with guile No such matter saith he I abhor it I never made gain of you either by my self or by my Agents Titus or any other that I sent unto you Much like Samuel's challenge here Whom have I defraud 29. A very grievous thing it is to think of but a thing meerly impossible to reckon up how much less then to remedy and reform all the several kinds of frauds and deceits that are used in the World Wherein men are grown wondrous expert and so shameless withal that they think it rather a credit to them as an argument of their perfect understanding in their several mysteries and particular professions than any blemish to them in their Christian Profession to cheat and cozen they care not whom nor whom so they may get gain and gather wealth by it In the way of trade in buying selling and other bargaining what lying dessembling and deceiving It is stark nought saith the buyer It is perfect good saith the seller when many times neither of both speaketh either as he thinketh or as the truth of the thing is False weights false measures false thumbs false lights false marks false wares falfe oaths In the Markets and Shops In the common offices of neighbourhood friendship service or trust false glosses false promises false tales false cracks false shews false reckonings In the Courts of Law and all juridical proceedings false Bills false answers false suggestions false counsels false accusations false pleas false testimonies false records false motions false verdicts false judgments The hour would fail me to mention but the chief heads of those falshoods that are common and notorious but no Man's experience would serve him to comprehend no Man's breath to declare the infinite variety of those more secret and subtle falshoods that are daily invented and exercised every where under the Sun 30. Yet are they all in the mean time abominable to God that beholdeth them The Lord will abhor both the blood-thirsty and deceitful Man and will prove in the end unprofitable to those that use them and without repentance damnable He that beguileth another howsoever he may please himself therewithal onward yet shall find at length that he hath most of all beguiled himself deceiving and being deceived as the Apostles words though spoken to another purpose are According to that of Solomon The wicked worketh a deceitful work but to him that soweth righteousness shall be a sure reward Blessed is the Man then in whose heart and tongue and hands there is found no deceit That walketh uprightly and worketh righteousness and speaketh the Truth from his heart That hath not streched his wits to hurt his neighbour nor made advantage of any Mans unskilfulness simplicity or credulity to gain from him wrongfully That can stand upon it as Samuel here doth and his heart not give his tongue the lie that he hath defrauded no Man 31. The other kind of Injury here next mentioned is Oppression wherein a Man maketh use of his power to the doing of wrong as he did of his wits in defrauding Which is for the most part the fault of rich and great Men because they have the greatest power so to do and are not so easily resisted in what they will have done Do not the rich Men oppress you Jam. 2. For riches and worldly greatness list up the hearts of Men and swell them with pride Charge them that are rich in this world that they be not high minded saith St. Paul and Pride bringeth on Oppression Let not the proud oppress me saith David Ps. 119. They are the large fat kine of Basan that is the Princes and Nobles and great ones of the Land those that dwell in the mountains of Samaria that oppress the poor and crush the needy Amos 4. Yet not they only for even poor and mean Men also are in their dispositions as proud and as merciless as the greatest if their powers were answerable to their wills and their horns to their curstness and they are as ready to shew it too so oft
did in the Year 1659. And the Promise was That he would pay him that or if he desir'd it a greater Sum yearly during his Life to inable him to pay an Amanuensis to ease him from the trouble of writing what he should conceive or dictate For the moré particular account of which I refer my reader to a Letter writ to me by the said Dr. Barlow which I have annexed to the end of this Relation Towards the beginning of the Year 1600. when the many mixt Sects and their Creators and merciless Protectors had led or driven each other into a Whirl-pool of Confusion both in Church and State when amazement and fear had seized most of them by foreseeing they must now not only Vomit up the Churches and the Kings Land but their accusing Consciences did also give them an inward and fearful Intelligence that the God of opposition disobedience and confusion which they had so long and so diligently fear'd was now ready to reward them with such wages as he always pays to Witches for their obeying him When these Wretches that had said to themselves We shall see no sorrow were come to foresee an end of their cruel reign by our Kings return and such Sufferers as Dr. Sanderson and with him many of the oppressed Clergy and others could foresee the Cloud of their afflictions would be dispers'd by it Then the 29th of May following the King was by our good God restored to us and we to our known Laws and Liberties and then a general joy and peace seem'd to breath through the three Nations the suffering and sequester'd Clergy who had like the Children of Israel sat long lamenting their sad Condition and hang'd their neglected Harps on the Willows that grow by the Rivers of Babylon were after many thoughtful days and restless nights now freed from their Sequestration restor'd to their Revenues and to a liberty to adore praise and pray to Almighty God publickly in such order as their Consciences and Oaths had formerly obliged them And the Reader will easily believe that Dr. Sanderson and his dejected Family rejoyc'd to see this happy day and be of this number At this time of the conformable Clergies deliverance from the Presbyterian severities the Doctor said to a Friend I look back on this strange and happy turn of the late times with amazement and thankfulness and cannot but think the Presbyterians ought to read their own Errors by considering that by their own rules the Independants have punisht and supplanted them as they did the Conformable Clergy who are now so many as still live restor'd to their lawful right and as the Prophet David hath taught me so I say with a thankful heart Verily there is a God that judgeth the earth And a reward for the righteous It ought to be considered which I have often heard or read that in the Primitive times men of learning prudence and vertue were usually sought for and sollicited to accept of Episcopal Government and often refus'd it For they conscientiously considered that the Office of a Bishop was not made up of ease and state but of labour and care that they were trusted to be of God's Almoners of the Churches Revenue and double their care for the Churches good and the poor to live strictly themselves and use all diligence to see that their Family Officers and Clergy became examples of innocence and Piety to others and that the account of that Stewardship must at the last dreadful day be made to the Searcher of all hearts and for these reasons they were in the Primitive times timerous to undertake it It may not be said that Dr. Sanderson was accomplish'd with these and all the other requisites requir'd in a Bishop so as to be able to answer them exactly but it may be affirm'd as a good preparation that he had at the Age of 73 years for he was so old at the King's return fewer faults to be pardon'd by God or Man than are apparent in others in these days in which God knows we fall so short of that visible sanctity and zeal to God's glory which was apparent in the days of Primitive Christianity This is mentioned by way of preparation to what I shall say more of Dr. Sanderson as namely That at the King's return Dr. Sheldon the late prudent Archbishop of Canterbury than whom none knew valued or lov'd Dr. Sanderson more or better was by his Majesty made a chief Trustee to commend to him fit men to supply the then vacant Bishopricks And Dr. Sheldon knew none fitter than Dr. Sanderson and therefore humbly desired the King that he would nominate him and that done he did as humbly desire Dr. Sanderson that he would For Gods and the Churches sake take that charge and care upon him Dr. Sanderson had if not an unwillingness certainly no forwardness to undertake it and would often say He had not led himself but his Friend would now lead him into a temptation which he had daily prayed against and besought God if he did undertake it so to assist him with his grace that the example of his life his cares and endeavours might promote his glory and help forward the salvation of others This I have mentioned as a happy preparation to his Bishoprick and am next to tell that he was consecrated Bishop of Lincoln at Westminster the 28th of October 1660. There was about this time a Christian care taken that those whose Consciences were as they said tender and could not comply with the Service and Ceremonies of the Church might have a satisfaction given by a Friendly debate betwixt a select number of them and some like number of those that had been Sufferers for the Church Service and Ceremonies and now restor'd to liberty of which last some were then preferr'd to power and dignity in the Church And of these Bishop Sanderson was one and then chose to be a Moderator in that debate and he perform'd his trust with much mildness patience and reason but all prov'd uneffectual For there be some prepossessions like jealouses which though causeless yet cannot be remov'd by reasons as apparent as demonstration can make any truth The place appointed for this debate was the Savoy in the Strand and the Points debated were I think many and I think many of them needless some affirmed to be truth and reason some denied to be either and these debates being at first in words prov'd to be so loose and perplex'd as satisfied neither Party For sometime that which had been affirmed was immediately forgor or mistaken or deny'd and so no satisfaction given to either party And that the debate might become more satisfactory and useful it was therefore resolv'd that the day following the desires and reasons of the Non-conformists should be given in writing and they in writing receive Answers from the conforming party And though I neither now can nor need to mention all the Points debated nor the names of the
or credible though the same be not revealed or contained in the Scripture nor is contrary thereunto I do without scruple believe a Mathematical or Philosophical truth or a probable Historical relation when I read it or hear it and I believe an honest man upon his Word in what he affirmeth or promiseth though none of all these things be contained in the Scripture and thus to believe was never yet by any man that I know of though derogatory to the sufficiency of Scripture as it is a perfect Rule of Faith Why I may not in like manner wear such or such a Garment use such or such a Gesture or do any other indifferent thing not forbidden in Scripture as occasions shall require without scruple or why thus to do should be thought derogatory to the sufficiency of Scripture as it is a perfect Rule of Manners I confess I have not the wit to understand Since there seemeth to be the like Reason of both let them either condemn both or acquit both or else inform us better by shewing us a clear and satisfactory reason of difference between the one and the other 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is the main hinge upon which the whole dispute turneth and whereunto all other differences are but appendages The true belief and right understanding of this great Article concerning the Scripture's sufficiency being to my apprehension the most proper Characteristical note of the right English Protestant as he standeth in the middle between and distinguished from the Papists on the one hand and the sometimes styled Puritan on the other I know not how he can be a Papist that truly believeth it or he a Puritan that rightly understandeth it § XXII Having thus answered the several Objections aforesaid wherewith it may be some that stand freer from prejudice than their fellows will be satisfied if any shall yet ask me why I plead still so hard for Ceremonies now they are laid down and so no use either of them or of any discourse concerning them I have this to say First I saw my self somewhat concerned to prevent if I could the mis-censuring of these Sermons in sundry of which the Questions that concern Ceremonies are either purposely handled or occasionally touched upon which could not be done without vindicating the Ceremonies themselves as the subject matter thereof Secondly hereby they that were active in throwing them down may be brought to take a little more into their consideration than possibly they have yet done upon what grounds they were thereunto moved and how sound those grounds were that if it shall appear they were then in an Error and they consider withal what disorder confusion and libertinism hath ensued upon that change they may be sensible of it and amend But Thirdly whatsoever become of the Ceremonies which are mutable things the two Doctrines insisted on concerning them the one touching the Power that Governours have to enjoyn them the other touching the Duty that lyeth upon Inferiours to observe them when they are enjoyned being Truths are therefore always the same and change not It is no absurdity even at mid-winter when there is never a flower upon the bough to say yet Rosa est flos Lastly a time may come when either the same Ceremonies may be restored or other substituted in their rooms and then there may be use again of such reasons and answers as have been pleaded in their defence For I doubt not but those that shall from time to time have the power to order Ecclesiastical affairs if disorders or inconveniences shall continue to grow after the rate and proportion they have done for some years past will see a necessity of reducing things into some better degree of Decency and Uniformity than now they are which it is not imaginable how it should be done without some Constitutions to be made concerning Indifferent things to be used in the publick worship and some care had withal to see the Constitutions obeyed Otherwise the greatest part of the Nation will be exposed to very great danger without the extraordinary mercy of God preventing of quite losing their Religion Look but upon many of our Gentry what they are already grown to from what they were within the compass of a few years and then expede Herculem by that guess what a few years more may do Do we not see some and those not a few that have strong natural parts but little sence of Religion turned little better than professed Atheists And other some nor those a few that have good affections but weak and unsettled judgments or which is still but the same weakness an over-weening opinion of their own understandings either quite turned or upon the point of turning Papists These be sad things God knoweth and we all know not visibly imputable to any thing so much as to those distractions confusions and uncertainties that in point of Religion have broken in upon us since the late changes that have happened among us in Church-affairs What it will grow to in the end God only knoweth I can but guess § XXIII The Reverend Arch-bishop Whitgift and the learned Hooker men of great judgment and famous in their times did long since foresee and accordingly declared their fear that if ever Puritanism should prevail among us it would soon draw in Anabaptism after it At this Cartwright and other the Advocates for the Disciplinarian Interest in those days seemed to take great offence as if those fears were rather pretended to derive an odium upon them than that there was otherwise any just cause for the same protesting ever their utter dislike of Anabaptism and how free they were from the least thought of introducing it But this was only their own mistake or rather jealousie For those Godly Men were neither so unadvised nor so uncharitable as to become Judges of other Mens Thoughts or Intentions beyond what their actions spoke them They only considered as Prudent Men that Anabaptism had its rise from the same Principles the Puritans held and its growth from the same Courses they took together with the natural tendency of those Principles and Practices thitherward especially of that one Principle as it was by them mis-understood that the Scripture was adaequata agendorum regula so as nothing might be lawfully done without express warrant either from some command or example therein contained The clue whereof if followed on as sar as it would lead would certainly in time carry them as far as the Anabaptists were then gone But that it was no vain fear the unhappy event hath proved and justified them since what they feared is now come to pass and that in a very high degree Yet did not they see the thread drawn out to that length as we have seen it the name of Quakers Seekers c. not then heard of in the world but how much farther it will reach none can say for no man yet ever saw the bottom of the clue
is such a Restraint 33 34 2. That it is from God 35 3. That it is from the mercy of God and therefore called Grace 36 Inferences from the Consideration of God's Restraint 37 I. As it lyeth upon others 1. toobless God for our Preservation 38 2. not to trust wicked men too far 39 3. nor to fear them too much 40 4. to endeavour to restrain others from Sinning 41 II. As it lyeth upon our selves 1. To be humble under it 42 2. to entertain the means of such Restraint with Thankfulness 43 3. to pray that God would restrain our Corruptions 44 4. but especially to pray and labour for sanctifying Grace Sermon VII Ad Populum on 1 Pet. 2. 16. Sect. 1 2 THE Occasion Scope of the TEXT 3 5 Coherence and of the TEXT 6 Division of the TEXT 7 8 OBSERVATION I Christian Liberty to be maintained 9 12 with the Explication 13 17 and Five Reasons thereof 18 20 Inferences I. Not to usurp upon the Liberty of others 21 24 II. Nor to betray our own 25 Observation II. Christian Liberty not to be abused 26 28 The words explained and thence 29 31 Three Reasons of the Point 32 34 Four abuses of Christian Liberty viz. I. by casting off the Obligation of the moral Law 35 36 II. by exceeding the bounds of Sobriety 37 III. by giving Scandal to others 38 IV. by disobeying lawful Superiours 39-40 The Grounds and Objections of the Anti-Ceremonians 41-46 propounded and particularly answered 47-50 How mens Laws bind the Conscience 51-52 OBSERVATION III. We being the Servants of God Which is of all other 53-54 1. the most Just Service 55 2. the most Necessary Service 56-57 3. the most Easie Service 58 4. the most Honourable Service 59 5. and the most Profitable Service 60 Ought to carry our selves as his Servants with all 61-63 I. Reverence to his Person in 3 branches 64-66 II. Obedience to his Will both in Doing and Suffering 67-70 III. Faithfulness in his Business in 3 branches 69 The Conclusion AD CLERUM The first Sermon ROM 〈◊〉 _ Meats accounting them Clean or Unclean and of Days accounting them Holy or Servile according as they stood under the Levitical Law These latter St. Paul calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Weak in the Faith those former then must by the Law of Opposition be strong in the Faith It would have become both the one sort and the other notwithstanding they differed in their private Iudgments yet to have preserved the common Peace of the Church and laboured the edification not the ruine one of another the strong by affording faithful instruction to the Consciences of the weak and the weak by allowing favourable construction to the actions of the strong But whilst either measured other by themselves neither one nor other did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as our Apostle elsewhere speaketh Walk uprightly according to the truth of the Gospel Faults and offences there were on all hands The Strong faulty in contemning the Weak the Weak faulty in condemning the Strong The Strong proudly scorned the weak as silly and superstitious for making scruple at some such things as themselves firmly believed were Lawful The weak rashly censured the Strong as Prophane and Irreligious for adventuring on some such things as themselves deeply suspected were unlawful The blessed Apostle desirous all things should be done in the Church in love and unto edification aequâ lance and eódem Charitatis moderamine as Interpreters speak taketh upon him to arbitrate and to mediate in the business and like a just Umpire layeth his hand upon both parties unpartially sheweth them their several oversights and beginneth to draw them to a fair and honourable composition as thus The strong shall remit somewhat of his superciliousness in disesteeming and despising the Weak and the Weak he shall abate something of his edge and acrimony in judging and condemning the Strong If the Parties will stand to this Order it will prove a blessed agreement for so shall brotherly Love be maintained Scandals shall be removed the Christian Church shall be edified and God's Name shall be glorified This is the scope of my Text and of the whole Chapter In the three first Verses whereof there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 First there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the first Verse the Proposal of a general Doctrine as touching the usage of weak ones with whom the Church is so to deal as that it neither give offence to nor take offence at the weakness of any Him that is weak in the Faith receive you but not to doubtful Disputations Next there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the second Verse a Declaration of the former general Proposal by instancing in a particular case touching the difference of Meats There is one man strong in the Faith he is infallibly resolved there is no meat unclean of it self or if received with thankfulness and sobriety unlawful and because he knoweth he standeth upon a sure ground 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he is confident he may eat any thing and he useth his Liberty accordingly eating indifferently of all that is set before him making no question for Conscience sake One man believeth he may eat all things There is another man weak in the Faith he standeth yet unresolved and doubtful whether some kinds of Meats as namely those forbidden in the Law be clean or he is rather carried with a strong suspicion that they are unclean out of which timorousness of Judgment he chuseth to forbear those Meats and contenteth himself with the fruits of the Earth Another who is weak eateth Herbs This is Species facti this is the case Now the question is In this case what is to be done for the avoidance of scandal and the maintainance of Christian Charity And this question my Text resolveth in this third Verse wherein is contained 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 St. Paul's judgment or his counsel rather and advice upon the Case Let not him that eateth despise c. The remainder of the Verse and of the Chapter being spent in giving reasons of the judgment in this and another like case concerning the difference and observation of days I have made choice to intreat at this time of St. Paul's advice as useful for this Place and Auditory and the present Assembly Which advice as the Parties and the faults are is also two-fold The Parties two He that eateth that is the Strong and he that eateth not that is the Weak The Faults likewise two The strong mans fault that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 despising of his brothers Infirmity and the weak mans fault that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 judging of his Brothers liberty Proportionably the parts of the advice accommodated to the Parties and their Faults are two The one for the Strong that he despise not Let not him that eateth despise him that
〈◊〉 to believe and the Noun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 faith or belief are both of them found sundry times in this Chapter yet seem not to signifie in any place thereof either the Verb the Act or the Noun the habit of this saving or justifying Faith of which we now speak But being opposed every where and namely in this last verse unto doubtfulness of judgment concerning the lawfulness of some indifferent things must therefore needs be understood of such a perswasion of judgment concerning such lawfulness as is opposite to such doubting Which kind of Faith may be found in a meer heathen man who never having heard the least syllable of the mystery of Salvation by Christ may yet be assured out of clear evidence of reason that many of the things he doth are such as he may and ought to do And as it may be found in a meer heathen man so it may be wanting in a true believer who stedfastly resting upon the blood of Christ for his eternal redemption may yet through the strength of temptation sway of passion or other distemper or subreption incident to humane frailty do some particular act or acts of the lawfulness whereof he is not sufficiently perswaded The Apostle then here speaking of such a Faith as may be both found in an unbeliever and also wanting in a true believer it appeareth that by Faith he meaneth not that justifying Faith which maketh a true believer to differ from an unbeleiver but the word must be understood in some other notion Yet thus much I may add withal in the behalf of those worthy men that have alledged this Scripture for the purpose aforesaid to excuse them from the imputation of having at least wilfully handled the Word of God deceitfully First that thing it self being true and the words also sounding so much that way might easily enduce them to conceive that to be the very meaning And common equity will not that men should be presently condemned if they should sometimes confirm a point from a place of Scripture not altogether pertinent if yet they think it to be so especially so long as the substance of what they write is according to the analogy of Faith and Godliness Secondly that albeit these words in their most proper and immediate sense will not necessarily enforce that Conclusion yet it may seem deducible there-from with the help of some topical arguments and by more remote inferences as some learned men have endeavoured to shew not altogether improbable And Thirdly that they who interpret this Text as aforesaid are neither singular nor novel therein but walk in the same path which some of the ancient Fathers have trod before them The Rhemists themselves confess it of S. Augustine to whom they might have added also S. Prosper and whose authority alone is enough to stop their mouths for ever Leo Bishop of Rome who have all cited these words for the self same purpose But we are content for the reasons already shewn to let it pass as a collection impertinent and that I suppose is the worst that can be made of it There is a second acception of the word Faith put either for the whole system of that truth which God hath been pleased to reveal to his Church in the Scriptures of the old and new Testament or some part thereof or else 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the assent of the mind thereunto In which signification some conceiving the words of this Text to be meant do hence infer a false and dangerous conclusion which yet they would obtrude upon the Christian Church as an undoubted principle of truth That men are bound for every particular action they do to have direction and warrant from the written word of God or else they sin in the doing of it For say they faith must be grounded upon the word of God Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God Rom. 10. Where there is no Word then there can be no Faith and then by the Apostles doctrine that which is done without the Word to warrant it must needs be sin for whatsoever is not of Faith is sin This is their opinion and thus they would infer it I know not any piece of counterfeit Doctrine that hath passed so currently in the world with so little suspicion of falshood and so little open contradiction as this hath done One chief cause whereof I conjecture to be for that it seemeth to make very much for the honour and perfection of Gods sacred Law the fulness and sufficiency whereof none in the Christian Church but Papists or Atheists will deny In which respect the very questioning of it now will perhaps seem a strange novelty to many and occasion their mis-censures But as God himself so the Holy Word of God is so full of all requisite perfection that it needeth not to beg honour from an untruth Will you speak wickedly for God Or talk deceitfully for him I hold it very needful therefoe both for the vindicating of my Text from a common abuse and for the arming of all my brethren as well of the Clergy as Laity against a common and plausible errour that neither they teach it nor these receive it briefly and clearly to shew that the aforesaid opinion in such sort as some have proposed it and many have understood it for it is capable of a good interpretation wherein it may be allowed First is utterly devoid of Truth and Secondly draweth after it many dangerous consequents and evil effects and thirdly hath no good warrant from my present Text. The Opinion is that to do any thing at all without direction from the Scripture is unlawful and sinful Which if they would understand only of the substantials of Gods worship and of the exercises of spiritual and supernatural graces the assertion were true and sound but as they extend it to all the actions of common life whatsoever whether natural or civil even so far as to the taking up of a straw so it is altogether false and indefensible I marvel what warrant they that so teach have from the Scripture for that very doctrine or where they are commanded so to believe or teach One of their chiefest refuges is the Text we now have in hand but I shall anon drive them from this shelter The other places usually alledged speak only either of Divine and Supernatural truths to be believed or else of works of grace or worship to be performed as of necessity unto Salvation which is not to the point in issue For it is freely confessed that in things of such nature the holy Scripture is and so we are to account it a most absolute and sufficient direction Upon which ground we heartily reject all humane Traditions devised and intended as supplements to the Doctrine of Faith contained in the Bible and annexed as Codicils to the Holy Testament of Christ for to supply the
could not be denied if the word Faith were here taken in that sence which they imagine and wherein it is very usually taken in the Scriptures viz. for the doctrine of supernatural and divine revelation or for the belief thereof which Doctrine we willingly acknowledge to be compleatly contained in the holy Scriptures alone and therefore dare not admit into our belief as a branch of divine supernatural truth any thing not therein contained But there is a third signification of the word Faith nothing so frequently found in the Scriptures as the two former which yet appeareth both by the course of this whole Chapter and by the consent of the best and most approved Interpreters as well ancient as modern to have been properly intended by our Apostle in this place namely that wherein it is put for a certain perswasion of mind that what we do may lawfully be done So that whatsoever action is done by us with reasonable assurance and perswasion of the lawfulness thereof in our own consciences is in our Apostle's purpose so far forth an action of Faith without any inquiring into the means whereby that perswasion was wrought in us whether it were the light of our own reason or the authority of some credible person or the declaration of God's revealed will in his written Word And on the other side whatsoever action is done either directly contrary to the judgment and verdict of our own consciences or at leastwise doubtingly and before we are in some competent measure assured that we may lawfully do it that is it which S. Paul here denieth to be of faith and of which he pronounceth so peremptorily that it is and that eo nomine a sin About which use and signification of the word Faith we need not to trouble our selves to fetch it from a trope either of a Metonymy or Synecdoche as some do For though as I say it do not so often occur in Scripture yet it is indeed the primary and native signification of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Faith derived from the root 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to perswade Because all kinds of Faith whatsoever consist in a kind of perswasion You shall therefore find the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth properly to believe and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth properly not to be perswaded to be opposed as contrary either to other in Iohn 3. and Acts 14. and other places To omit the frequent use of the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Fides in Greek and Latin Authors in this signification observe but the passages of this very Chapter and you will be satisfied in it At the second verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one believeth that he may eat all things that is he is verily perswaded in his Conscience that he may as lawfully eat flesh as herbs any one kind of meat as any other he maketh no doubt of it Again at the fourteenth verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I know and am perswaded that there is nothing unclean of it self That is I stedfastly believe it as a most certain and undoubted truth Again at the two and twentieth verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hast thou faith have it to thy self before God thatis Art thou in thy Conscience perswaded that thou maist lawfully partake any of the good creatures of God Let that perswasion suffice thee for the approving of thine own heart in the sight of God but trouble not the Church nor offend the weaker brother by a needless and unseasonable ostentation of that thy knowledge Lastly in this three and twentieth verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that doubteth is damned if he eat because he eateth not of faith that is he that is not yet fully perswaded in his own mind that it is lawful for him to eat some kinds of meats as namely swines flesh or bloâ—dings and yet is drawn against his own judgment to eat thereof because he seeth others so to do or because he would be loth to undergo the taunts and jeers of scorners or out of any other poor-respect such a man is cast and condemned by the judgment of his own heart as a transgressor because he adventureth to do that which he doth not believe to be lawful And then the Apostle proceeding ab hypothesi ad thesin immediately reduceth that particular case into a general rule in these words For whatsoever is not of faith is sin By the process of which his discourse it may appear that by Faith no other thing is here meant than such a perswasion of the mind and conscience as we have now declared and that the true purport and intent of these words is but thus much in effect Whosoever shall enterprize the doing of any thing which he verily believeth to be unlawful or at leastwise is not reasonably well perswaded of the lawfulness of it let the thing be otherwise and in it self what it can be lawful or unlawful indifferent or necessary convenient or inconvenient it mattereth not to him it is a sin howsoever Which being the plain evident and undeniable purpose of these words I shall not need to spend any more breath either in the farther refutation of such conclusions as are mis-inferred hence which fall of themselves or in the farther Explication of the meaning of the Text which already appeareth but address my self rather to the application of it Wherein because upon this great Principle may depend the resolution of very many Cases of Conscience which may trouble us in our Christian and holy walking it will not be unprofitable to proceed by resolving some of the most material doubts and questions among those which have occured unto my Thoughts by occasion of this Text in my Meditations thereon First It may be demanded What power the Conscience hath to make a thing otherwise good and lawful to become unlawful and sinful and whence it hath that power I answer first that it is not in the power of any mans Judgment or Conscience to alter the natural condition of any thing whatsoever either in respect of quality or degree but that still every thing that was good remaineth good and every thing that was evil remaineth evil and that in the very same degree of good or evil as it was before neither better nor worse any man's particular judgment or opinion thereof notwithstanding For the differences between good and evil and the several degrees of both spring from such conditions as are intrinsecal to the things themselves which no Outward respects and much less then mens opinions can vary He that esteemeth any creature unclean may defile himself but he cannot bring impurity upon that creature by such his estimation Secondly that mens judgments may make that which is good in its own nature the natural goodness still remaining become evil to them in the use essentially good and quoad rem but quoad
and he best knew his own meaning was of two sorts the leaven of Hypocrisie Luke 12. and the leaven of corrupt and superstitious doctrine Matth. 16. We read 1 Cor. 5. of a third sort and that is the leaven of maliciousness which also usually accompanieth the other two Where any of the three are in abundance but especially where they all meet and abound as in these Pharisees it is impossible by any care or cunning so to keep them hidden as not to bewray themselves upon occasion to an observing eye As you know it is the nature of leaven though it be hidden never so deep in a heap of Meal to work up to the top so that a Man may certainly know by the effects and be able to say that there it is In the story of this present Chapter the Pharisees discover all the three Malice Hypocrisie and Superstition Their Malice against Christ although it appeared sufficiently in this that their quarrelling his Disciples for eating with unwashen hands was with the intent to bring an odium upon him for not instructing them better yet he passeth it by without taking any special notice thereof It may be for that his own person was chiefly concerned in it But then the other two their Hypocrisie and Superstition in rejecting the Commandments of God for the setting up of their own Traditions because they trencht so near and deep upon the honour of God his heavenly Father he neither would nor could dissemble But themselves having given him the occaâ—ion by asking him the first question Why do thy Disciples transgress the tradition of the Elders he turneth the point of their own weapon full upon them again as it were by way of recrimination not without some sharpness Do you blame them for that But why then do you your selves also transgress the Commandment of God by your Tradition which is a far greater matter 2. That is their Charge verse 3 Which having made good by one instance taken from the fiâ—th Commandment more he might have brought but it needed not this one being so notorious and so convincing he thenceforth doubteth not to call them Hypocrites to their faces and to apply to them a passage out of the Prophet Isaias very pat to his purpose Wherein the Prophet charged the People of those times with the very same crimes both of them whereof these Pharisees are presently appealed to wit Hypocrisie and Superstition Hypocrisie in their Worship and Superstition in the Doctrine The Leaven whereof by how much more it swelled them in their own and the common Opinion making them to be highly esteemed among Men for their outward preciseness and semblances of Holiness by so much the more it sowred them towards Almighty God rendring the whole Lump of their so strict Religion abominable in his sight So true is that of our Saviour Luke 16. That which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God Their Hypocrisie he putteth home to them in the Verses before the Text Ye Hypocrites well did Isaias prophesie of you saying This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth and honoureth me with their lips but their heart is far from me That done he forgetteth not to remember them of their Superstition too continuing his allegation out of the Prophet still in the words of my Text But in vain they do worship me teaching for Doctrines the commandments of men 3. This later verse I have chosen to entreat of alone at this time for although Hypocrisie and corrupt teaching do often go together as in those Iews whom the Prophet long before reproved and in these Pharisees whom our Saviour here reproveth yet have I purposely severed this Verse from the former in the handling moved thereunto out of a double consideration First because Hypocrisie lurking more within we are not able to pronounce of it with such certainty neither if we were have we indeed any good Warrant so to do as we may of unsound Doctrines which lie more open to the view and are allowed to our examination Secondly and especially because hundreds of those my Brethren whom I cannot in reason excuse from symbolizing with the Pharisees in teaching for doctrines the commandments of men which is the fault reproved in this verse I cannot yet in charity and in my own thoughts but acquit from partaking with them in the measure at least of that their foul Hypocrisie wherewith they stand charged in the former verses The words themselves being one entire proposition to stand upon the curious dividing of them would be a matter of more ostentation than use and the truth thereof also when the meaning is once laid open will be so evident that I shall presume of your assent without spending much time in the proof The main of our business then upon the Text at this time must be Explication Application and Use. First the Explication of the Words then the Application of the Matter and lastly some Corollaries inferred therefrom for our Use. Which for your better understanding and remembrance I shall endeavour to do as plainly and orderly as I can 4. As for the Words first There are three things in them that desire Explication First what is meant by the commandments of men Secondly what it is to teach such commandments for doctrines Thirdly how and in what respect they that teach such doctrines may be said to worship God in vain For the first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Commandment properly and strictly taken is an affirmative precept requiring something to be done the contrary whereof is a Prohibition or negative precept forbidding the doing of something But in the Holy Scriptures as in our common speech also the word is usually so extended as to comprehend both Prohibitions also as well as Commandments properly so called The reason whereof is because Affirmatives and Negatives do for the most part mutually include and infer the one the other as in the present Case it is all one whether the Pharisees should command Men to wash before meat or forbid them to eat before they had washed We call the whole Decalogue the ten commandments though there be Negative precepts there as well as Affirmative yea more Negative than Affirmative And those Negatives Touch not taste not handle not are called the Commandments of men Col. 2. 12. Which place I note the rather because the appellation here used and cited out of Isa. 29. according to the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are not found any where else in the whole Testament besides in the relation of this story save in that one place only By the analogy of which places inasmuch as there is mention made in them all as well of Doctrines as of Commandments and that in some of them with the Conjunction Copulative between them we are warranted to bring within the extent of this word according to the general intention
and scope of our Saviour in this place Doctrinals as well as Morals that is to say as well those that prescribe unto our Iudgments what we are bound to believe or not to believe in matter of Opinion as those that prescribe unto our Consciences what we are bound to do or not to do in matter of Practice Although the special occasion whereupon our Saviour fell into this discourse against the Pharisees and the special instance whereby he convinceth them do withal shew that the Morals do more principally properly and directly fall under his particular intention and scope therein In the full extent of the word then all those prescriptions are to be taken for the Commandments of men wherein any thing is by humane Authority either enjoyned or forbidden to be believed or done especially to be done which God in his Holy Word hath not so enjoyned or forbidden Ionadab's command to the Rechabites that they should not drink Wine they nor their Sons for ever and the Pharisees tradition here that none should eat with unwashen hands were both the commandments of men 5. This is clear enough yea and good enough hitherto if there were no more in it but so For you must observe or else you quite mistake the Text and the whole drift of it that it is no part of our Saviours meaning absolutely and wholly to condemn all the Commandments of men For that were to cut the sinews of all Government and Order and to overturn Churches Kingdoms Corporations Families and all other both greater and lesser Societies of men none of all which can be upheld without some positive Laws and Sanctions of mans devising We do not therefore find that either Ionadab was blamed for commanding the Rechabites not to drink Wine or that they were blamed for observing his commandments therein But rather on the contrary that God well approved both of him and them yea and rewarded them for their obedience unto that command though it were a command but of mans devising and had no more than a bare humane Authority to warrant it And therefore those Men are very wide that vouch this Text against the Ecclesiastical Constitutions or Ceremonies with such confidence as if they were able with this one Engine to take them all off at a blow not considering that it is not barely the Commandments of men either materially or formally taken that is to say neither the things commanded by men nor yet mens commanding of them but it is the teaching of such Commandments for Doctrines that our Saviour here condemneth the Pharisees for What that is therefore we are next to enquire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 teaching for Doctrines the commandments of men 6. In the 29. of Isa. the substantives have a Conjunction Copulative between them in the Septuagint and they are read in the very same manner and order 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by St. Paul alluding thereunto in Col. 2. But in the Greek Text in all Copies extant both here and in Mark 7. where the same History is related they are put without the Conjunction by Apposition as the Grammarians call it The meaning is the same in both readings only this latter way it appeareth better and it is in effect this Whosoever shall endeavor to impose upon the judgments of Men in credendis or in point of faith any thing to be believed as a part of Gods holy truth or shall endeavour to impose upon the Consciences of men in agendis or in point of manners any thing to be observed as a part of Gods holy will which cannot be sufficiently evidenced so or so to be either by express Testimony of the written Word of God rightly understood and applyed or by clear natural and necessary deduction therefrom according to the Laws of true Logical discourse is guilty more or less of that Superstition our Saviour here condemneth in the Pharisees of teaching for doctrines the commandments of men 7. And a fault it is of a large comprehension It taketh in all additions whatsoever that are made to that absolute and all-sufficient Rule of Faith and manners which God hath left unto his Church in his written Word In what kind soever they are whether in Opinion Worship Ordinance Injunction Prohibition Promise or otherwise From what cause soever they proceed whether from Credulity Ignorance Education Partiality Hypocrisie Mis-govern'd Zeal Time-serving or any other For what end soever they may be done whether those ends be in truth intended or but in shew pretended say it be the glory of God the reformation of abuses the preventing of mischiefs or inconveniences the avoiding of scandals the maintenance of Christian liberty the furtherance of Piety or whatever else can be imagined If they have not a sufficient foundation in the sacred Text and yet shall be offered to be pressed upon our Iudgments or Consciences in the name of God and as his Word they are to be held as chaff fitter to be scattered before the Wind or cast out to the dunghil than to be hoarded up in the garners among the Wheat alas what is the chaff to the wheat or as Hay Wood or Stubble meeter to become fewel for the Oven or Hearth than to be coffered up in the Treasures among Gold and Silver and precious Stones And he that bringeth any such Doctrine with him let his Piety or parts be otherwise what they can be should he in either of both or even in both match not only the Holy Apostles of Christ but the ever blessed Angels in Heaven yet should we rather defie him as a Traytor for setting Gods stamp upon his own Bullion than receive him as his faithful Embassadour and salute him with an Anathema sooner than bid him God speed Especially if the Doctrine be apparently either false or ungrounded and yet positively and peremptorily delivered as if it were the undoubted word and will of God 8. I may not now descend to particulars But thus much it will concern us all to know in the General that whosoever teacheth any thing either to be absolutely unlawful which God hath not forbidden in his Word or to be absolutely necessary which God hath not required in his Word he teacheth for doctrines the commandments of men and so far forth playeth the Pharisees part in burthening the Consciences of Gods people with the superstitious fancies of his own brain But otherwise the enjoyning of something for a time which God hath not forbidden or the forbidding of something for a time which God hath not required by those that are endued with lawful Authority in any Ecclesiastical Political or Domestical Society so as the same be not done for Conscience sake towards God or with any Opinion of worship merit or operative holiness but meerly out of prudential considerations and for the reasons of order decency expedience or other like respects of conveniency and accomodation is a thing no ways justly chargeable with Pharisaism superstition or
abolished or altered from time to time and at all times as the Governours for the time being shall judge to serve best unto Edification What should I say more If men list to be contentious and will not be satisfied who can help it yet thus much I dare say more Let any Papist or Precisian in the world give instance but in any one single thing doctrinally maintained by the Church of England which he can with any colour of truth except against as a Commandment of men if we do not either shew good warrant for it from the written word of God which we doubt not but to be able to do and is most ad rem or else which is enough ad hominem for every single instance they shall bring return them ten of their own teaching every whit as liable to the same exception as that we will yield the Bucklers and confess her guilty 20. But now what will you say if after all this clamouring against English Popish Ceremonies as of late they have blazoned them they that keep all this ado prove in the end the guilty persons themselves I am much deceived if it do not clearly prove so if we either compare her Doctrine and theirs together or take a view of some of theirs by themselves First compare them a little which will also add some confirmation to the former point for the farther justifying of the Church of England in this behalf And for example and perspicuity sake let the instance be kneeling at the Communion there being the like reason of all the rest I pray you consider well the evidence weigh the grounds and observe the course held on both sides and then give sentence accordingly If as God hath given those our Church Governours power to determine of indifferent mutable circumstances and they using the liberty of the power given them have appointed kneeling rather than sitting or standing as judging it a gesture of greater reverence and well becoming our unworthiness but without any Opinion either of the necessity of that gesture or of the unlawfulness of the other two so God had given the like Power to these our Brethren and they using the liberty of that power had appointed sitting or standing rather than kneeling as judging either of them a more proper Table gesture than it yet without any Opinion of their necessity or of the unlawfulness of kneeling the case had then been alike of both These had been as free as they neither of them had been guilty of Superstition in teaching for Doctrines the Commandments of men because there was no doctrinal necessity whereby to bind the Consciences of Gods People on either side Again if as these say to their Proselytes peremptorily in effect thus you are bound in Conscience not to kneel it is an unlawful gesture a superstitious relique of Popery and carrieth with it a shrewd appearance of their idolatrous Bread-worship and therefore we charge you upon your Consciences not to kneel so our Church-Governours should say to the People peremptorily in effect thus you are bound in Conscience to kneel or else you prophane the holy Sacrament not discerning the Lords Body and therefore we charge you upon your Consciences to kneel the case of both had here also been alike Both alike guilty of Superstition in teaching for doctrines the commandments of men because by that doctrinal necessity as well the one sort as the other had laid a perpetual obligation upon the Consciences of men in a matter which God having not any where either commanded or forbidden hath therefore left free and indifferent But now taking the case as de facto it is without Ifs and And 's set the one against the other and make the comparison right and here it is Our Brethren having no publick authority given them to order what shall be done or not done in matters of external government do yet bind the Consciences of Gods people by teaching that which they thus forbid to be simply and in it self unlawful Our Governors on the contrary though having publick authority to prescribe in such matters do yet leave the Consciences of men at liberty without teaching that which they appoint to be of absolute necessity in it self This being species facti as the Civilians speak the even true state of the case say now I beseech you in good sooth and be not partial Quid Iuris at whose door lieth the Superstition The one side teaching no such doctrine but having authority do by virtue of that authority appoint the People to kneel The other side having no such authority but teaching a doctrine do by virtue of that doctrine charge the people not to kneel Whether of both sides may rightlier be said to teach for doctrines the Commandments of men Tu quum sis quod ego fortassis nequior 21. Their guilt herein will yet farther appear if leaving comparisons we take a view of some of their doctrines by themselves I say but some of them for how many hours would serve to reckon them all or who indeed even of themselves knoweth them all There are so many Covies of new doctrines sprung up ever and anon especially in these late times of connivance and licentiousness which by that they are well hatcht presently fly abroad the Country and are entertained by some or other for as good Divinity as if they were the undoubted Oracles of the Holy Ghost I dare not affirm it because I will not put my self to the trouble to prove it and because I heartily desire and wish I be deceived in it yet I cannot dissemble my fear that it is but too true by the proportion of what we almost dayly hear or see that within little more than this one twelvemonth last past there have been more false and superstitious doctrines vented in the Pulpits and Presses in England than have been in so open and daring a manner in the whole space of almost fourscore years before I mean since the first of Queen Elizabeth of blessed memory And to make good the former charge omitting sundry other their unwarrantable positions partly concerning Church-Government Orders and Ceremonies established by Law partly concerning sundry received customs in matters wholly or in part Ecclesiastical partly concerning the use of sundry pastimes and recreations partly concerning sundry usages and customs in vita communi in things meerly Civil and not sacred or Ecclefiastical the particulars whereof would amount to many scores if not hundreds I shall present unto your view a dozen only which I have selected from the rest of those that I have observed to have been most urged of late in Sermons and Pamphlets by which you may in part judge of the rest And they are these 22. 1. That the appointing of a set form of Prayer or Liturgy to be used in the Service of God is unlawful or Antichristian or that it is a straitning or limiting of the Holy Spirit of God 2. That it is not in
without cause which if the Magistrate by diligent inquisition do not either prevent or help to the utmost of his endeavour he may soon unawares wrap himself in the guilt of innocent blood Thirdly that informations are for the most part partial every man making the best of his own tale and he cannot but often erre in judgment that is easily carried away with the first tale and doth not suspend till he have heard both parties alike Herein David failed when upon Ziba's false information he passed a hasty and injurious decree against Mephibosheth Solomon saith He that is first in his own tale seemeth righteous but then his neighbour cometh and searcheth him out Prov. 18. as we say commonly One tale is good till another be told Fourthly that if in all other things hastiness and precipitancy be hurtful then especially matters of justice would not be huddled up hand over head but handled with mature deliberation and just diligent disquisition Cunctari judicantem decet imo oportet saith Seneca he that is to judge it is fit he should nay it is necessary he should proceed with convenient leisure Who judgeth otherwise and without this due search he doth not judge but guess The good Magistrate had need of patience to hear and of diligence to search and of prudence to search out whatsoever may make for the discovery of the truth in an intricate and difficult cause The cause which I knew not I searched out That is the Magistrates third duty There yet remaineth a fourth in these words I brake the jaws of the wicked and plucked the spoil out of his teeth Wherein Iob alludeth to ravenous and savage beasts beasts of prey that lie in wait for the smaller Cattel and when they once catch them in their paws fasten their teeth upon them and tear them in pieces and devour them Such Lyons and Wolfs and Bears and Tygres are the greedy great ones of this world who are ever ravening after the estates and the livelihoods of their meaner neighbours snatching and biting and devouring and at length eating them up and consuming them Iob here speaketh of Dentes and Molares Teeth and Iaws and he meaneth the same thing by both Power abused to oppression But if any will be so curiously subtil as to distinguish them thus he may do it Dentes they are the long sharp teeth the fore teeth Dentes eorum arma sagittae saith David Their teeth are spears and arrows Molares à molendo so called from grinding they are the great double teeth the jaw-teeth Those are the Biters these the Grinders these and those together Oppressors of all sorts Usurers and prouling Officers and sly Merchants and errant Informers and such kind of Extortioners as sell time and truck for expedition and snatch and catch at petty advantages these use their teeth most these are Biters The first I know not whether or no the worst sort of them in the holy Hebrew tongue hath his name from biting 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Naschack that is to bite and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nescheck that is Usury Besides these Biters they are Grinders too men whose teeth are Lapides Molares as the over and neither mill-stone depopulators and racking Landlords and such great ones as by heavy pressures and burdens and sore bargains break the backs of those they deal withal Those first by little and little grind the faces of the poor as small as dust and powder and when they have done at length eat them up one after another as it were bread as the Holy Ghost hath painted them out under those very phrases Now how the Magistrate should deal with those grinders and biters Iob here teacheth him he should break their jaws and pluck the spoil out of their teeth that is quell and crush the mighty Oppressor and deliver the oppressed from his injuries For to break the jaw or the cheek bone or the teeth is in Scripture phrase as much as to abate the pride and suppress the power and curb the insolency of those that use their might to overbear right So David saith in the third Psalm that God had saved him by smiting his enemies upon the cheek bone and breaking the teeth of the ungodly And in Psalm 58. he desireth God to break the teeth of the wicked in their mouths and to break out the great teeth of those young Lions In which place it is observable that as Iob here he speaketh both of Dentes and Molares teeth and great teeth and those wicked great ones according as Iob also here alludeth he expresly compareth unto young Lions lusty and strong and greedy after the prey Now to the doing of this to the breaking of the jaws of the wicked and plucking the spoil out of his teeth there is required a stout heart and an undaunted Courage not fearing the faces of men should their faces be as the faces of Lions and their visages never so terrible And this is the good Magistrate's last Duty in my Text without fear to execute justice boldly upon the stoutest offender and so to curb the power of great and wicked men that the poor may live in peace and keep their own by them It was one part of Iethro's Character of a good Magistrate in Exod. 18. that he should be a man of courage And it was not for nothing that every step up Solomon's Throne for judgment was supported with Lions to teach Kings and all Magistrates that a Lion like courage and resolution is necessary for all those that sit upon the Throne or Bench for Justice and for Judgment When David kept his Fathers sheep and there came a Lion and a Bear and took a Lamb out of the flock he went out after the Lion and smote him and took the Lamb out of his Mouth and when the Lion rose against him he took him by the beard and smote him again and slew him and so he did with the Bear also Every Magistrate is a kind of shepherd and the people they are his flock He must do that then in the behalf of his flock that David did Those that begin to make a spoyl though but of the poorest Lamb of the flock be they as terrible as the Lion and the Bear he must after them and smite them and pluck the spoil out of their teeth and though they shew their spleen and turn again at it yet he must not shrink for that but rather take fresh courage and to them again and take them by the beard and shake them and never leave them till he have brought them under and broken their jaws and in spite of their teeth made them past biting or grinding again in hast He is a bare hireling and not worthy the name of a Shepherd who when he seeth the Wolf coming thrusteth his head in abush and leaveth the poor cattel
the Bench yet the Text saith he cared for none of those things as if they had their names given them by an Antiphrasis like Diogenes his man manes à manendo because he would be now and then running away so these Iustices à justitia because they neither do nor care to do Iustice. Peradventure here and there one or two in a whole side of a Country to be found that make a Conscience of their duty more than the rest and are forward to do the best good they can Gods blessing rest upon their heads for it But what cometh of it The rest glad of their forwardness make only this use of it to themselves even to slip their own necks out of the yoke and leave all the burthen upon them and so at length even tire out them too by making common pack horses of them A little it may be is done by the rest for fashion but to little purpose sometimes more to shew their Iusticeship than to do Iustice and a little more may be is wrung from them by importunity as the poor widow in the parable by her clamorousness wrung a piece of Iustice with much ado from the Iudge that neither feared God nor regarded man Alas Beloved if all were right within if there were generally that zeal that should be in Magistrates good Laws would not thus languish as they do for want of execution there would not be that insolency of Popish rescuants that licence of Rogues and Wanderers that prouling of Officers that inhancing of sees that delay of suits that countenancing of abuses those carcases of depopulated Towns infinite other mischiefs which are the sins shall I say or the Plagues it is hard to say whether more they are indeed both the sins and the Plagues of this Land And as for Compassion to the distressed is there not now just cause if ever to complain If in these hard times wherein nothing aboundeth but poverty and sin when the greater ones of the earth should most of all enlarge their bowels and reach out the hand to relieve the extreme necessity of thousands that are ready to starve if I say in these times great men yea and men of Iustice are as throng as ever in pulling down houses and setting up hedges in unpeopleing Towns and creating beggars in racking the backs and grinding the faces of the poor how dwelleth the love of God how dwelleth the spirit of compassion in these men Are these eyes to the blind feet to the lame and fathers to the poor as Iob was I know your hearts cannot but rise in detestation of these things at the very mentioning of them But what would you say if as it was said to Ezekiel so I should bid you turn again and behold yet greater and yet greater abominations of the lamentable oppressions of the poor by them and their instruments who stand bound in all conscience and in regard of their places to protect them from the injuries and oppressions of others But I forbear to do that and choose rather out of one passage in the Prophet Amos to give you some short intimation both of the faults and of the reason of my forbearance It is in Amos 5. v. 12 13. I know your manifold transgressions and your mighty sins they afflict the just they take a bribe and they turn aside the poor in the gate from their right Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in that time for it is an evil time And as for searching out the truth in mens causes which is the third Duty First those Sycophants deserve a rebuke who by false accusations and cunningly devised tales 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of purpose involve the truth of things to set a fair colour upon a bad matter or to take away the righteousness of the innocent from him And yet how many are there such as these in most of our Courts of justice informing and promoting and pettifogging make-bates Now it were a lamentable thing if these men should be known and yet suffered but what if countenanced and encouraged and under hand maintained by the Magistrates of those Courts of purpose to bring Moulter to their own Mills Secondly since Magistrates must be content for they are but men and cannot be every where at once in many things to see with other mens eyes and to hear with other mens ears and to proceed upon information those men deserve a rebuke who being by their office to ripen causes for judgment and to facilitate the Magistrates care and pains for inquisition do yet either for fear or favour or negligence or a fee keep back true and necessary informations or else for spight or gain clog the Courts with false or trifling ones But most of all the Magistrates themselves deserve a rebuke if either they be hasty to acquit a man upon his own bare denial or protestation for si inficiari sufficiet ecquis erit nocens as the Orator pleaded before Iulian the Emperour if a denial may serve the turn none shall be guilty or if hasty to condemn a man upon anothers bare accusation for si accusasse sufficiet ecquis erit innocens as the Emperour excellently replied upon that Orator if an accusation may serve the turn none shall be innocent or if they suffer themselves to be possessed with prejudice and not keep one ear open as they write of Alexander the great for the contrary party that they may stand indifferent till the truth be throughly canvassed or if to keep causes long in their hands they either delay to search the truth out that they may know it or to decide the cause according to the truth when they have found it And as for Courage to execute Iustice which is the last Duty what need we trouble our selves to seek out the causes when we see the effects so daily and plainly before our eyes whether it be through his own cowardice or inconstancy that he keepeth off or that a fair word whistleth him off or that a greater mans letter staveth him off or that his own guilty conscience doggeth him off or that his hands are manacled with a bribe that he cannot fasten or whatsoever other matter there is in it sure we are the Magistrate too often letteth the wicked carry away the spoil without breaking a jaw of him or so much as offering to pick his teeth It was not well in David's time and yet David a Godly King when complaining he asked the Question Who will stand up with me against the evil doers It was not well in Solomon's time and yet Solomon a peaceable King when considering the Oppressions that were done under the Sun he saw that on the side of the oppressors there was power but as for the oppressed they had no comforter We live under the happy government of a godly and peaceable King Gods holy name be blessed for it and yet God knoweth and we all know
repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them The other in Ezek. 33. 13 14. When I say to the wicked Thou shalt surely die if he turn from his sin and do that which is lawful and right If the wicked restore the pledge give again that he hath robbed walk in the statutes of life without committing iniquity he shall surely live he shall not die And every where in the Prophets after Denunciations of Judgment follow Exhortations to repentance which were bootless if Repentance should not either prevent them or adjourn them or lessen them You see God both practiseth and professeth this course neither of which can seem strange to us if we duly consider either his readiness to shew mercy or the true End of his Threatnings We have partly already touched at the greatness of his mercy To shew compassion and to forgive that is the thing wherein he most of all delighteth and therefore he doth arripere ansam take all advantage as it were and lay hold on every occasion to do that but to punish and take vengeance is opu◠alienum as some expound that in Esay 28. his strange work his strange act a thing he taketh no pleasure in Vivo nolo in Ezek. 33. As I live saith the Lord God I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked c. As the Bee laboureth busily all the day long and seeketh to every flower and to every weed for Honey but stingeth not once unless she be ill provoked so God bestirreth himself and his bowels yern within him to shew compassion Oh Ephraim what shall I do unto thee O Iudah how shall I intreat thee Why will ye die O ye house of Israel Run to and fro through the streets of Ierusalem and seek if you can find a man but a man that I may pardon it But vengeance cometh on heavily and unwillingly and draweth a sigh from him He◠consolabor Ah I must I see there is no remedy I must ease me of mine adversaries and be avenged of mine enemies Oh Ierusalem Ierusalem that killest the Prophets how oft would I c. How shall I give thee up Ephraim my heart is turned within me my repentings are kindled together So is our God slow to anger and loth to strike Quique dolet quoties cogitur esse ferox but plenteous in mercy as David describeth him in Psal. 103. Never was a man truly and inwardly humbled but God in the riches of his special mercy truly pardoned him never was man so much as but outwardly humbled as Ahab here but God in his common and general mercy more or less forbare him Secondly the end of Gods Threatnings also confirmeth this point For doth he threaten evil think ye because he is resolved to inflict it Nothing less rather to the contrary he therefore threatneth it that we by our repentance may prevent it and so he may not inflict it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Chrysostom he foretelleth what he will bring upon us for this very purpose that he may not bring it upon us and warneth before he striketh to make us careful to avoid the stroke In the ancient Roman State and Discipline the manner was before they made war upon any people first to send Heralds to proclaim it Bellum indicere ne inferrent to the end that if they would make their peace by submission they might prevent the war nor so only but be written also in albo amicorum enrolled as their friends and Confederates So God sendeth his Heralds the Prophets to threaten vengeance against sinners not thereby to drive them from hope of Mercy but to draw them to repentance and humiliation whereby they may not only turn away the vengeance threatned but also if they perform them unfeignedly and with upright hearts interest themselves farther in his favour and love Nor is it to be accounted among the least of Gods Mercies when he might in his just displeasure overwhelm us in the very Act of our sins as Zimri and Cosbi were run thorow in the very Act of filthiness and as Uzzah and Ananias and Sapphira and some few others whom God picked out to shew exemplary judgment upon were strucken dead upon the sudden for their transgressions When God might in justice deal with the same rigour against us all I say it is not the least of his Mercies that he forbeareth and forewarneth and foretelleth and threatneth us before he punish that if we will take any warning he may do better to us than he hath said and not bring upon us what he hath threatned A Point very useful and comfortable if it be not derogatory to God's Truth Let us therefore first clear that and then proceed to the Uses If God thus revoke his Threatnings it seemeth he either before meant not what he spake when he threatned or else after when he revoketh repenteth of what he meant either of which to imagine far be it from every Christian heart since the one maketh God a dissembler the other a changling the one chargeth him with falshood the other with lightness And yet the Scriptures sometimes speak of God as if he grieved for what he did or repented of what he spake or altered what he had purposed and for the most part such like affections are given him in such places as endeavour to set forth to the most life his great mercy and kindness to sinful mankind We all know we cannot indeed give God any greater glory than the glory of his Mercy yet must know withal that God is not so needy of means to work out his own glory as that he should be forced to redeem the glory of his Mercy with the forfeiture either of his Truth or Steadfastness We are therefore to lay this as a firm ground and infallible that our God is both truly Unchangeable and unchangeably True The strength of Israel is not as man that he should lye nor as the son of man that he should repent his words are not Yea and Nay neither doth he use lightness But his words are Yea and Amen and himself yesterday and to day and the same for ever Heaven and Earth may pass away yea shall pass away but not the least tittle of God's Words shall pass away unfulfilled They may wax old as a Garment and as a Vesture he shall change them and they shall be changed but he is the same and his years fail not neither do his Purposes fail nor his Promises fail nor his Threatnings fail nor any of his Words fail Let Heaven and Earth and Hell and Angel and Man and Devil and all change still Ego Deus non mutor God he is the Lord of all and he changeth not As for those Phrases then of Repenting Grieving c. which are spoken of God in the Scriptures that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
Promises of God they are true but yet conditional and so they must ever be understood with a conditional clause The exception there to be understood is Repentance and the Condition here Obedience What God threatneth to do unto us absolutely in words the meaning is he will do it unless we repent and amend and what he promiseth to do for us absolutely in words the meaning is he will do it if we believe and obey And for so much as this Clause is to be understood of course in all God's Promises we may not charge him with breach of Promise though after he do not really perform that to us which the letter of his Promise did import if we break the condition and obey not Wouldst thou know then how thou art to entertain God's Promises and with what assurance to expect them I answer With a confident and obedient heart Confident because he is true that hath promised Obedient because that is the condition under which he hath promised Here is a curb then for those mens Presumption who living in sin and continuing in disobedience dare yet lay claim to the good Promises of God If such men ever had any seeming interest in Gods Promises the interest they had they had but by Contract and Covenant and that Covenant whether either of the two it was Law or Gospel it was conditional The Covenant of the Law wholly and à priori conditional Hoc fac vives Do this and live and the Covenant of the Gospel too after a sort and à posteriori Conditional Crede vives believe and live If then they have broken the Conditions of both Covenants and do neither Believe nor Do what is required they have by their Unbelief and Disobedience forfeited all that seeming interest they had in those Promises God's Promises then though they be the very main supporters of our Christian Faith and Hope to as many of us as whose Consciences can witness unto us a sincere desire and endeavour of performing that Obedience we have covenanted yet are they to be embraced even by such of us with a reverend fear and trembling at our own unworthiness But as for the unclean and filthy and polluted those Swine and Dogs that delight in sin and disobedience and every abomination they may set their hearts at rest for these matters they have neither part nor fellowship in any of the sweet Promises of God Let dirty Swine wallow in their own filth these rich Pearls are not for them they are too precious let hungry Dogs glut themselves with their own vomit the Childrens bread is not for them it is too delicious Let him that will be filthy be filthy still the Promises of God are holy things and belong to none but those that are holy and desire to be holy still For our selves in a word let us hope that a Promise being left us if with Faith and Obedience and Patience we wait for it we shall in due time receive it but withal let us fear as the Apostle exhorteth Heb. 4. lest a Promise being left us through disobedience or unbelief any of us should seem to come short of it Thus much of the former thing proposed the magnifying of God's Mercy and the clearing of his Truth in the revocation and suspension of threatned Iudgments by occasion of these words I will not bring the evil There is yet a Circumstance remaining of this general part of my Text which would not be forgotten it is the extent of time for the suspending of the Judgment I will not bring the evil in his days Something I would speak of it too by your patience it shall not be much because the season is sharp and I have not much sand to spend I will not bring the evil in his days The Judgment denounced against Ahab's house was in the end executed upon it as appeareth in the sequel of the story and especially from those words of Iehu who was himself the Instrument raised up by the Lord and used for that Execution in 4 King 10. Know that there shall fall to the earth nothing of the word of the Lord which the Lord spake concerning the house of Ahab for the Lord hath done that which he spake by his servant Elijah which were enough if there were nothing else to be said to justifie God's truth in this one particular That which Ahab gained by his humiliation was only the deferring of it for this time I will not bring the evil in his days As if God had said This wretched King hath provoked me and pulled down a Curse from me upon his house which it were but just to bring upon him and it without farther delay yet because he made not a scoff at my Prophet but took my words something to heart and was humbled by them he shall not say but I will deal mercifully with him and beyond his merit as ill as he deserveth it I will do him this favour I will not bring the Evil that is determined against his house in his days The thing I would observe hence is That when God hath determined a Iudgment upon any People Family or Place it is his great mercy to us if he do not let us live to see it It cannot but be a great grief I say not now to a religious but even to any soul that hath not quite cast off all natural affection to fore-think and fore-know the future Calamities of his Country and Kindred Xerxes could not forbear weeping beholding his huge Army that followed him only to think that within some few scores of years so many thousands of proper men would be all dead and rotten and yet that a thing that must needs have happened by the necessity of Nature if no sad Accident or common Calamity should hasten the Accomplishment of it The Declination of a Common-wealth and the Funeral of a Kingdom foreseen in the general corruption of manners and Decay of Discipline the most certain Symptoms of a tottering State have fetched Tears from the Eyes and Blood from the Hearts of heathen Men zealously affected to their Country How much more grief then must it needs be to them that acknowledge the true God not only to foreknow the extraordinary Plagues and Miseries and Calamities which shall befal their Posterity but also to fore-read in them God's fierce wrath and heavy displeasure and bitter vengeance against their own sins and the sins of their Posterity Our blessed Saviour though himself without Sin and so no way accessary to the procuring of the evils that should ensue could not yet but weep over the City of Ierusalem when he beheld the present security and the future ruine thereof A Grief it is then to know these things shall happen but some Happiness withal and to be acknowledged as a great Favour from God to be assured that we shall never see them It is no small Mercy in
licentiousness These Corinthians being yet but Carnal for the point of Liberty consulted it seemeth but too much with this cursed Gloss. Which taught them to interpret their Calling to the Christian Faith as an Exemption from the duties of all other callings as if their spiritual freedom in Christ had cancelled ipso facto all former obligations whether of Nature or Civility The Husband would put away his Wife the Servant disrespect his Master every other man break the bonds of relation to every other man and all under this pretence and upon this ground that Christ hath made them free In this passage of the Chapter the Apostle occasionally correcteth this errour principally indeed as the present Argument led him in the particular of Marriage but with a farther and more universal extent to all outward states and conditions of life The summ of his Doctrine this He that is yoked with a wife must not put her away but count her worthy of all love he that is bound to a Master must not despise him but count him worthy of all honour every other man that is tied in any relation to any other man must not neglect him but count him worthy of all good offices and civil respects suitable to his place and person though Shee or He or that other be Infidels and Unbelievers The Christian Calling doth not at all prejudice much less overthrow it rather establisheth and strengtheneth those interests that arise from natural relations or from voluntary contracts either domestical or civil betwixt Man and Man The general rule to this effect he conceiveth in the form of an Exhortation that every man notwithstanding his calling unto liberty in Christ abide in that station wherein God hath placed him contain himself within the bounds thereof and chearfully and contentedly undergo the duties that belong thereto vers 17. As God hath distributed to every man as the Lord hath called every one so let him walk And lest this Exhortation as it fareth with most other especially such as come in but upon the by as this doth should be slenderly regarded the more fully to commend it to their consideration and practice he repeateth it once again verse 20. Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he is called And now again once more in the words of this verse concluding therewith the whole discourse into which he had digressed Brethren let every man wherein he is called therein abide with God From which words I desire it may be no prejudice to my present discourse if I take occasion to entreat at this time of a very needful argument viz. concerning the Necessity Choice and Use of particular callings Which whilest I do if any shall blame me for shaking hands with my Text let such know First that it will not be very charitably done to pass a hard censure upon anothers labour no nor yet very providently for their own good to slight a profitable truth for some little seeming impertinency Secondly that the points proposed are indeed not impertinent the last of them which supposeth also the other two being the very substance of this Exhortation and all of them such as may without much violence be drawn from the very words themselves at leastwise if we may be allowed the liberty which is but reasonable to take in also the other two verses the 17. and the 20. in sence and for substance all one with this as anon in the several handlings of them in part will appear But howsoever Thirdly which Saint Bernard deemed a sufficient Apology for himself in a case of like nature Noverint me non tam intendisse c. let them know that in my choice of this Scripture my purpose was not so much to bind my self to the strict exposition of the Apostolical Text as to take occasion therefrom to deliver what I desired to speak and judged expedient for you to hear concerning 1. the Necessity 2. the Choice and 3. the Use of particular Callings Points if ever need to be taught and known certainly in these days most Wherein some habituated in idleness will not betake themselves to any Calling like a heavy jade that is good at bit and nought else These would be soundly spurred up and whipped on end Othersome through weakness do not make good choice of a fit Calling like a young unbroken thing that hath metal and is free but is ever wrying the wrong way These would be fairly checkt turned into the right way and guided with a steddy and skilful hand A third sort and I think the greatest through unsetledness or discontentedness or other untoward humour walk not soberly and uprightly and orderly in their Calling like an unruly Colt that will over hedge and ditch no ground will hold him no fence turn him These would be well fettered and side-hanckled for leaping The first sort are to be taught the Necessity of a Calling the second to be directed for the Choice of their Calling the third to be bounded and limited in the Exercise of their Calling Of which three in their order and of the First first the Necessity of a Calling The Scriptures speak of two kinds of Vocations or Callings the one ad Foedus the other ad Munus The usual known terms are the General and the Particular Calling Vocatio ad Foedus or the General Calling is that wherewith God calleth us either outwardly in the ministry of his Word or inwardly by the efficacy of his Spirit or joyntly by both to the faith and obedience of the Gospel and to the embracing of the Covenant of grace and of mercy and salvation by Jesus Christ. Which is therefore termed the General Calling not for that it is of larger extent than the other but because the thing whereunto we are thus called is one and the same and common to all that are called The same duties and the same promises and every way the same conditions Here is no difference in regard of Persons but One Lord one Faith one Baptism one Body and one Spirit even as we are all called in one hope of our Calling That 's the General Calling Vocatio ad Munus Our Particular Calling is that wherewith GOD enableth us and directeth us and putteth us on to some special course and condition of life wherein to employ our selves and to exercise the gifts he hath bestowed upon us to his glory and the benefit of our selves and others And it is therefore termed a Particular Calling not as if it concerned not all in general for we shall prove the contrary anon but because the thing whereunto men are thus called is not one and the same to all but differenced with much variety according to the quality of particular persons Alius sic alius verò sic Every man hath his proper gift of God one man on this manner another on that Here is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some called to be
most part look the same way which our freest thoughts encline as the Voluptuous beast dreameth most of pleasures the Covetous wretch most of profits and the proud or Ambitious most of praises preferments or revenge the observing of our ordinary Dreams may be of good use for us unto that discovery which of these three is our Master sin for unto one of the three every other sin is reduced The Lust of the flesh The Lust of the Eyes or the Pride of Life But concerning Revelations and Dreams It shall suffice to have only proposed these few Conclusions without farther enlargement the manner of Gods revealing his will here to Abimelech by Dream being but an incidental Circumstance upon the bye and not belonging to the main of the present story We will therefore without more ado proceed to the substance of Gods Reply in the rest of the verse and therein begin with the former general part which is Gods Admission of Abimelech's Plea and Apology for himself The ground of whose Plea was Ignorance and the thing he pleaded his own Innocency and the integrity of his heart and God who is the searcher of all hearts alloweth the allegation and acknowledgeth that integrity Yea I know that thou didst this in the integrity of thy heart The Original word here translated Integrity is rendred by some Truth by others Purity and by others Simplicity and it will bear them all as signifying properly Perfection or Innocency You would think by that word that Abimelech had in this whole business walked in the sight of God with a pure and upright and true and single and perfect heart But alas he was far from that God plagued him and his for that he had done and God doth not use to punish the Carcass for that wherein the heart is single Again God withheld him or else he would have done more and worse and it is a poor perfection of heart where the active power only is restrained and not the inward corruption subdued Besides Sarah was taken into the house and there kept for lewd purposes and how can truth and purity of heart consist with a continued resolution of sinful uncleanness Abimelech then cannot be defended as truly and absolutely innocent though he plead Innocency and God himself bear witness to the Integrity of his heart For had his heart been upright in him and sincere in this very matter of Sarah he would never have taken her into his house at all as he did But that he pleadeth for himself is that in this particular wherewith it seemed to him God by so threatning him did charge him in wronging Abraham by taking his Wife from him his Conscience could witness the innocency of his heart how free he was from any the least injurious purpose or so much as thought that way It was told him by them both that she was his Sister and he knew no other by her than so when he took her into his house supposing her to be a single Woman if he had known she had been any man's Wife he would not for any good have done the man so foul an injury nor have sinned against his own soul by defiling anothers bed In the integrity of his heart and innocency of his hands he did what he had done This is the substance of his Allegation and God approveth the integrity of his heart so far viz. as free in this particular from any intent either to injure Abraham or to sin against the light of his own Conscience by committing Adultery with anothers Wife The meaning of the words thus cleared we may observe in them three things First the fact for which Abimelech pleadeth and that was the taking of Sarah who was anothers Wife into his House Secondly the ground of his plea and that was his Ignorance he knew not when he took her that she was anothers wife Thirdly the thing he pleadeth upon that ground and that was his Innocency and the integrity of his heart Each of these three will afford us some observable instruction for our use And the first thing we will insist upon from these words shall be The grievousness of the sin of Adultery hateful even in the judgment of those men who made small or no conscience at all of Fornication See how this is raised from the Text. Abimelech's heart never smote him fortaking Sarah into his House so long as he supposed her to be but a single Woman led with the common blindness and custom of the Gentiles he either knew not or considered not that such Fornication though in a King was a sin But the very frame of his Apology sheweth that if he had known her to be another mans Wife and yet had taken her he could not then have pretended the integrity of his heart and the innocency of his hands as now he doth and God alloweth it but he should have been 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his own heart would have condemned him for it and he should therein have sinned grosly against the light of his own Conscience It cannot be doubtful to us who by the good blessing of God upon us have his holy Word to be A light unto our feet and a Lanthorn unto our paths from the evidence whereof we may receive more perfect and certain information than they could have from the glimmering light of depraved Nature I say it cannot be doubtful to us but that all Fornication how simple soever is a sin foul and odious in the sight of God and deadly to the Committer As first being opposite directly to that holiness and honour and sanctification which God prescribeth in his will Secondly causing usually consumption of estate rottenness of bones and loss of good name Thirdly stealing away the heart of those that are once ensnared therewith and bewitching them even unto perdition in such powerful sort that it is seldom seen a man once brought under by this sin to recover himself again and to get the victory over it Fourthly putting over the guilty to the severe immediate judgment of God himself who for this sin slew of the Israelites in one day 23 or 24 thousand And having fifthly one singular deformity above all other sins in all other kinds that it is a direct sin against a man's own body in depriving it by making it the instrument of filthiness and the members of an harlot of that honour whereunto God had ordained it to be a member of Christ and the Temple of the Holy Ghost But yet of this foul sin the Gentiles made no reckoning So long as they abstained from married persons it never troubled their Consciences to defile themselves with those that were single by fornication because they esteemed it either as no sin or as one of the least It was not only the fond speech of an indulgent and doating
might to have had those means considered which he had afforded them of knowledge Those means even where they are scantest being ever sufficient at the least thus far 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle speaketh Rom. 1. to leave the transgressor without excuse and to make void all pretensions of Ignorance That Error then did not wholly excuse Abimelech from sin because his Ignorance was partly wilful yet we may not deny but even that error did lessen and extenuate the sinfulness of the Action something and so excuse him in part à tanto though not à toto Because it appeareth by many evidences that his ignorance therein was not grosly affected and wilful and look how much measure you abate in the wilfulness so much weight you take off from the sin The light of Nature though to a man that could have made the best of it it had been sufficient to have discovered the vicious deformity and consequently the moral unlawfulness of Fornication yet was it nothing so clear in this particular as in many other things that concerned common equity and commutative Iustice. Besides common Opinion and the Custom of the times and Consent though corrupt Consent of most Nations in making but a light matter of it might easily carry him with the stream and make him adventure to do as most did without any scruple or so much as suspicion of such foul wickedness in a course so universally allowed and practised These respects make his wilfulness less his ignorance more pardonable and his sin more excusable And I make no question the premisses considered but that Abraham's sin in denying Sarah to be his Wife notwithstanding the equivocating trick he had to help it was by many degrees greater than was Abimelech's in taking her as being done more against knowledge and therefore more wilfully Abimelech's sin in taking her though with some degrees of wilfulness being yet a sin rather of Ignorance whereas Abraham's sin in denying her was a sin of Infirmity at the least if not much rather a sin of Presumption Now although this former Error Ignorantia Iuris could not wholly excuse Abimelech from sin in what he had done but in part only for he sinned therein by giving way to unchaste desires and purposes against the seventh Commandment yet that other Error of his Ignorantia Facti in mistaking a married woman for a single doth wholly excuse his fact from the sins of injustice in coveting and taking another mans Wife against the eighth and the tenth Commandments He had not the least injurious intent against Abraham in that kind and degree and therefore though he took his wife from him indeed yet not knowing any such matter by her especially having withal made ordinary and requisite enquiry thereafter it must be granted he did it unwittingly and therefore unwilfully and therefore also unsinfully as to that species of sin S. Augustine saith truly Peccatum ita est voluntarium ut si non sit voluntarium non est peccatum without some consent of the will no complete actual sin is committed Such ignorance therefore as preventeth à toto and cutteth off all consent of the will must needs also excuse and that à toto the Actions that proceed there-from from being sins It is clear from the words of my Text that Abimelech's heart was sincere in this action of taking Sarah from any injury intended to Abraham therein although de facto he took his wife from him because he did it ignorantly By what hath been spoken we may see in part what kind of Ignorance it is that will excuse us from sin either in whole or in part and what will not Let us now raise some profitable Inferences from this Observation First our Romish Catholicks often twit us with our fore elders What say they were they not all down-right Papists Believed as we believe Worshipped as we worship You will not say they all lived and died in Idolatry and so are damned And if they were saved in their faith why may not the same faith save us And why will not you also be of that Religion that brought them to Heaven A motive more plausible than strong the Vanity whereof our present Observation duly considered and rightly applied fully discovereth We have much reason to conceive good hope of the salvation of many of our Fore-fathers who led away with the common superstitions of those blind times might yet by those general truths which by the mercy of God were preserved amid the foulest overspreadings of Popery agreeable to the Word of God though clogged with an addition of many superstitions and Antichristian inventions withal be brought to true Faith in the Son of God unfeigned Repentance from dead works and a sincere desire and endeavour of new and holy Obedience This was the Religion that brought them to Heaven even Faith and Repentance and Obedience This is the true and the Old and Catholick Religion and this is our Religion in which we hope to find salvation and if ever any of you that miscal your selves Catholicks come to Heaven it is this Religion must carry you thither If together with this true Religion of Faith Repentance and Obedience they embraced also your additions as their blind guides then led them prayed to our Lady kneeled to an Image crept to a Cross flocked to a Mass as you now do these were their spots and their blemishes these were their hay and their stubble these were their Errors and their Ignorances And I doubt not but as S. Paul for his blasphemies and persecutions so they obtained mercy for these sins because they did them ignorantly in misbelief And upon the same ground we have cause also to hope charitably of many thousand poor souls in Italy Spain and other parts of the Christian World at this day that by the same blessed means they may obtain mercy and salvation in the end although in the mean time through ignorance they defile themselves with much foul Idolatry and many gross Superstitions But the ignorance that excuseth from sin is Ignorantia Facti according to that hath been already declared whereas theirs was Ignorantia Iuris which excuseth not And besides as they lived in the practice of that worship which we call Idolatry so they died in the same without repentance and so their case is not the same with S. Paul's who saw those his sins and sorrowed for them and forsook them But how can Idolaters living and dying so without repentance be saved It is answered that ignorance in point of fact so conditioned as hath been shewed doth so excuse à toto that an Action proceeding thence though it have a material inconformity unto the Law of God is yet not formally a sin But I do not so excuse the Idolatry of our Fore fathers as if it were not in it self a sin and that without repentance damnable But yet their Ignorance being such as it was nourished by
knowledge 35 3. nor exempt from his punishment 36 The Inference thence Sermon III. Ad Magistratum on 1 SAM xii 3. Sect. 1 3. THe Occasion 4 Scope and 5 7 Division of the Text. 8 POINT I. Samuels voluntary offering himself to the trial 9 13 Five probable Reasons thereof 14 15 POINT II. Samuels confidence of his own Integrity 16 18 The Inference and Application 19 21 POINT III. Samuels Justice I. In disclaiming all unjust gain II. In general 22 24 With the general inference thence 25 26 and special application to Judicature 27 30 in the Particulars viz. 1. Fraud 31 34 2. Oppression 35 39 3. Bribery 49 41 a special property whereof is to blind the eyes 42 c. III. In offering Restitution Sermon VIII Ad Populum on PROV xix 21. Sect. 1 3. BEtween Gods ways and ours 4 5 Three remarkeable Differences in the Text. 7 14 DIFF I. in their Names 15 17 II. in their Number 18 21 III. in their manner of Existing 22 REASONS thereof taken from 23 24 1. The Soveraignty of God 25 26 2. The Eternity of God 27 28 3. The Wisdom of God 29 30 4. The Power of God 31 INFERENCES thence 32 3 The First 34 The Second 35 37 The Third 38 39 The Fourth 40 41 The Fifth 42 An Objection 43 44 Answered AD AULAM. The first Sermon WHITE-HALL November 1631. Eccles. 7. 1. A good Name is better than precious Oyntment and 1. WHere the Author professeth himself a Preacher it cannot be improper to stile the Treatise a Sermon This Book is such a Sermon and the Preacher being a King a Royal Sermon He took a very large but withal a very barren Text. His Text the whole World with all the pleasures and profits and honours and endeavours and businesses and events that are to be found under the Sun From which so large a Text after as exact a survey thereof taken as unwearied diligence in searching joyned with incomparable wisdom in judging could make he could not yet with all his skill raise any more than this one bare and short Conclusion proposed in the very entrance of his Sermon as the only Doctrinal Point to be insisted upon throughout Vanity of Vanities saith the Preacher Vanity of Vanities all is vanity This he proveth all along by sundry Instances many in number and various for the kind to make the induction perfect that so having fully established the main Doctrine which he therefore often inculcateth in his passage along that all things in the World are but Vanity he might the more effectually enforce the main Use which he intended to infer from it and reserveth as good Orators use to do for the close and Epilogue of the whole Sermon namely that quitting the World and the Vanities thereof men should betake themselves to that which alone is free from vanity to wit the fear and service of God Hear the conclusion of the whole matter fear God and keep his Commandments for this is the whole duty of man 2. To the men of the world whose affections are set upon the World and who propose and promise to themselves much contentment and happiness from the things of this World as the main Doctrine it self is so are most of the Proofs and passages of the whole Sermon very Paradoxes We may not unfitly therefore call this Book Solomons Paradoxes Look no further than a few of the next following verses of this very Chapter To prefer the house of mourning before the house of feasting sorrow before laughter rebukes before Praises the end of a thing when it shall be no more before the beginning of it when it is ing and coming on a soft patient suffering spirit before a stout and haughty mind and learning before riches as the Preacher here doth what are all these and other like many if we respect the common judgment of the World but so many Paradoxes The Writings of Zeno and Chrysippus if we had them extant with the whole School of Stoicks would not afford us Paradoxes more or greater than this little book of Solomon doth There are no less than two in this short verse Wherein quite oppositely to what value the World usually setteth upon them Solomon out of the depth of that Wisdom wherewith God had filled his heart preferreth a good Name before precious Oyntment and the day of death before the day of ones birth Paradoxes both Besides the common opinion but most agreeable to truth and reason both as to him that shall duly examine them both will clearly appear It will find us work enough at this time to examine but the former only in those words A good name is better than a precious Oyntment 3. Wherein before I come to the pith of the matter I cannot but take notice of an Elegancy observable in the very bark and rind of the Letters in the Hebrew Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Figure Paronomasia as Rhetoricians call it a near affinity both in the Letters and Sound between the words whereby the opposite Terms of the Comparison are expressed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Name and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Oyntment Such allusions and agnominations are no strangers in either of the holy Tongues but of frequent use both in the Old and New Testaments Examples might be alledged many As out of the Old Testament Jer. 1. 11. 12. Ose. 9. 15. Amos 5. 5. and 8. 2. Ezek. 7. 6. And out of the New many more 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Joh. 15. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Thes. 3. 11. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. 11. 37. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 three together as it were with a breath Rom. 1. 29. 31. But omitting the rest I shall commend unto you but two but those very remarkable ones out of either Testament one The one in Isa. 24. where the Prophet expressing the variety of Gods inevitable judgments under three several appellations The Fear the Pit and the Snare useth three several words but agreeing much with one another in letters and sound 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pachadh the Fear 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pachath the Pit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pach the Snare The other in Rom. 12. where the Apostle exhorting men not to think of themselves too highly but according to sobriety setteth it off with exquisite elegancy thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 4. The more inconsiderate that I say not uncharitable and unjust they that pass their censures very freely as I have sometimes heard some do fondly and rashly enough upon Preachers When now and then in their popular Sermons they let fall the like Elegancies scatter in here and there some flowers of Elooution among As if all use of Rhetorical ornaments did savour of an unsanctified spirit or were the rank superfluities of a carnal Wit or did adulterate corrupt and flatten the sincere milk
Non contristor quòd recepisti ago gratias quòd dedisti Thus did Iob when all was taken from him he blessed the Name of the Lord still and to his Wife tempting him to impatience gave a sharp but withal a most reasonable and religious answer Thou speakest like a foolish woman Shall we receive good things at the hand of God and shall we not receive evil also As who say shall we make earnest suit to him when we would borrow and be offended with him when we are called on to pay again We account him and so he is an ill and unthankful debtor from whom the lender cannot ask his own but he shall be like to lose a friend by it And yet how impatiently oftentimes do we take it at our Lords hand when he requireth from us but some small part of that which he hath so freely and so long lent us 21. Try thy self then Brother by these and the like signs and accordingly judge what progress thou hast made in this so high and useful a part of Christian learning 1. If thou scornest to gain by any unlawful or unworthy means 2. If thy desires and cares for the things of this life be regular and moderate 3. If thou canst find in thy heart to take thy portion and to bestow thereof for thine own comfort 4. And to dispense though but the superfluities for the charitable relief of thy poor Neighbour 5. If thou canst want what thou desirest without murmuring 6. And lose what thou possessest without impatience then mayest thou with some confidence say with our Apostle in the Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be content But if any one of these particular signs be wholly wanting in thee thou art then but a truant in this learning and it will concern thee to set so much the harder to it and to apply thy self more seriously and diligently to this study hereafter than hitherto thou hast done 22. Wherein for the better guiding of those that are desirous of this Learning either to make entrance thereinto if they be yet altogether to learn which may be the case of some of us or to proceed farther therein if they be already entred as the best-skilled of us all had need to do for so long as we are in the flesh and live in the world the lusts both of flesh and world will mingle with our best Graces and hinder them from growing to a fulness of perfection I shall crave leave towards the close of this discourse to commend to the consideration and practice of all whether Novices or Proficients in this Art of Contentation some useful Rules that may serve as so many helps for their better attaining to some reasonable abilities therein The general means for the obtaining of this as of every other particular grace we all know are fervent Prayer and the sincere love of God and goodness Which because they are general we will not now particularly insist upon it shall suffice without farther opening barely to have mentioned them 23. But for the more special means the first thing to be done is to labour for a true and lively faith For Faith is the very basis the foundation whereupon our hearts and all our hearts-contents must rest the whole frame of our contentment rising higher or lower weaker or stronger in proportion to that foundation And this Faith as to our present purpose hath a double Object as before was touched to wit the Goodness of God and the Truth of God His Goodness in the dispensation of his special providence for the present and his Truth in the performance of his Temporal Promises for the future First then labour to have thy heart throughly perswaded of the goodness of God towards thee That he is thy Father and that whether he frown upon thee or correct thee or howsoever otherwise he seem to deal with thee he still beareth a Fatherly Affection towards thee That what he giveth thee he giveth in love because he seeth it best for thee to have it and what he denieth thee he denieth in love because he seeth it best for thee to want it A sick man in the extremity of his distemper desireth some of those that are about him and sit at his bed-side as they love him to give him a draught of cold water to allay his thirst but cannot obtain it from his dearest Wife that lieth in his Bosome nor from his nearest Friend that loveth him as his own soul. They consider that if they should satisfie his desire they should destroy his life they will therefore rather urge him and even compel him to take what the Doctor hath prescribed how unpleasant and distasteful soever it may seem unto him And then if pain and the impotency of his desire will but permit him the use of his reason he yieldeth to their perswasions for then he considereth that all this is done out of their love to him and for his good both when he is denied what he most desireth and when he is pressed to take what he vehemently abhorreth Perswade thy self in like sort of all the Lords dealings with thee If at any time he do not answer thee in the desire of thy heart conclude there is either some unworthiness in thy person or some inordinacy in thy desire or some unfitness or unseasonableness in the thing desired something or other not right on thy part but be sure not to impute it to any defect of love in him 24. And as thou art stedfastly to believe his goodness and love in ordering all things in such sort as he doth for the Present so oughtest thou with like stedfastness to rest upon his truth and faithfulness for the making good of all those gracious Promises that he hath made in his Word concerning thy temporal provision and preservation for the future Only understand those promises rightly with their due conditions and limitations and in that sence wherein he intended them when he made them and then never doubt the performance For say in good sooth art thou able to charge him with any breach of promise hitherto Hast thou ever found that he hath dealt unfaithfully with thee Or didst thou ever hear that he hath dealt unfaithfully with any other There is no want of Power in him that he should not be as big as his word there is no want of love in him that he should not be as good as his word He is not as man that he should repent or as the Son of man that he should call back his word There is no lightness or inconstancy in him that there should be Yea and Nay in his Promises but they are all Yea and Amen Thy heart can tell thee thou hast often broken Vow and Promise with him and dealt unfaithfully in his Covenant but do not offer him that indignity in addition to all thy other injuries as to measure him by thy self
never rightly perform our duties either to God or man That therefore the agreement may be as it ought to be we must resolve to be patient not towards some but towards all men 1 Thes. 5. to be gentle not unto some but unto all men 2 Tim. 2. to shew all meekness not to some but to all men Titus 3. 2. The Concord should be Universal 36. It should likewise be Mutual 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 importeth that also either part being ready for charity sake to contemperate and accomodate themselves to other so far as reason requireth But herein also as in the former mens corrupt partiality bewrayeth it self extremely The strong Romans like enough could discern a censorious spirit in the weaker ones and the weak ones perhaps as easily a disdainful spirit in them But neithér of both it is to be doubted were willing enough to look into the other end of the wallet and to examine throughly their own spirits We use to say If every man would mend one all would be well Yea would How cometh it to to pass then that all hath not been well even long ago For where is the man that is not ready to mend one One said I Yea ten yea a hundred why here it is every man would be mending one but not the right one He would be mending his brother but he will not mend himself Ut nemo in sese tentat descendere O saith the strong we should soon agree but that he is so censorious and yet himself â—louteth as freely as ever he did We should hit it very well saith the weak were not he so scornful and himself judgeth as deeply as ever he did Oh the falseness and hypocrisie of mens hearts blinded with self-love how it abuseth them with strong delusions and so filleth the world with divisions and offences 37. For this our blessed Saviour who hath best discovered the malady hath also prescribed the best remedy The Disease is Hypocrisie The Symptoms are One to be cat-eyed outward in readily espying somewhat the smallest mote cannot escape in a brothers eye another to be bat-eyed inward in not perceiving be it never so great a beam in a mans own eye a third a forwardness to be tampering with his brothers eye and offering his service to help him out with the mote there before he think a thought of doing any thing towards the clearing of his own eye The Remedy is to begin at home do but put the things into their right order and the business is done Tu conversus confirma fratres Strengthen thy Brethren what thou canst it is a good office and would not be neglected But there is something more needful to be done than that and to be done first and before that and which if it be first done thou wilt be able to do that much the better then shalt thou see clearly and that is to reform thy self be sure first thy self be converted and then in Gods name deal with thy weak Brother as thou seest cause and strengthen him 38. Let them that are so forward to censure the actions of others especially of their Superiors and are ever and anon complaining how ill things are carried above but never take notice of their own frauds and oppressions and sacriledges and insolencies and peevishnesses and other enormities let them turn their eye homeward another while observe how their own pulses beat and go learn what that is Thou hypocrite cast out first the beam out of thine own eye We deal not like Christians no nor like reasonable men if we expect all men should come to our bent in every thing and we our selves not relent from our own stiffness in the least matter for their sakes Believe it we shall never grow to Christian Unanimity in any tolerable measure so long as every man seeks but to please himself only in following his own liking and is not desirous withal according to our Apostles exhortation ver 2. to please his neighbour also by condescending to his desires where it may be for his good in any thing that is not either unlawful or unreasonable The inclinations to agreement should be mutual that so we might be like-minded 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 39. And then all this must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the other qualification in the Text and now only remaineth to be spoken of According to Christ Iesus Which last clause is capable of a double interpretation pertinent to the scope of the Text and useful for our direction in point of practice both and therefore neither of both to be rejected Some understand it as a Limitation of that Unity which was prayed for in the former words and not unfitly For lest it should be conceived that all the Apostle desired in their behalf was that they should be like-minded one towards another howsoever he might intend by the addition of this clause to shew that it was not such an Unity as he desired unless it were according to Truth and Godliness in Christ Jesus There may be an agreement in falso when men hold together for the maintenance of one and the same Common Error Such as is the agreement of Hereticks of Schismaticks of Sect aries among themselves And there may be an agreement in malo when men combine together in a confederacy for the compassing of some mischievous design as did those forty and odd that bound themselves with a curse to destroy Paul Such is the agreement of Thieves of Cheaters of Rebels among themselves Such agreements as these no man ought to pray for indeed no man need to pray for The wisdom of the flesh and cunning of the Devil will bring men on fast enough to those cursed agreements without which he and his know well enough his Kingdom cannot stand The servants of God have rather bent themselves evermore by their prayers and endeavours to dissolve the glue and to break the confederacies of the ungodly Destroy their tongues O Lord and divide them is holy Davids prayer Psal. 55. And St. Paul when he stood before the Sanhedrim at Ierusalem to take off his malicious accusers the better perceiving both the Iudges and by-standers to be of two different factions some Pharisees who believed a Resurrection and other some Sadduces who denied it did very wisely to cast a bone among them When by proclaiming himself a Pharisee and professing his belief of the Resurrection he raised such a dissention between the two factions that the whole multitude was divided insomuch as the chief Captain was fain to use force to get Paul from amid the uproar and to carry him away by which means all their intended proceedings against him were stopt for that time 40. But the Unity that is to be prayed for and to be laboured for in the Christian Church is a Christian Unity that is to say a happy concord in walking lovingly together in the same
how qualified he should assume in partem curae to assist him in his Pastoral charge for the service of Gods Church and the propagation of the Gospel Which having done at large from the beginning of the Chapter unto the end of ver 13. he rendreth a reason at vers 14. why he had insisted so long upon that argument even lest the Church of God in his absence should be destitute of sufficient help for the work of the Gospel At Ephesus the hand of God had opened a wide door 1 Cor 16. but withal Satan as his manner is had stirred up many adversaries and some of them very mild ones more like savage beasts than men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the word for it 1 Cor. 15. It was at Ephesus that he fought with beasts in the shape of men Witness Demetrius the Silver-smith and that Bellua multorum capitum the mad giddy multitude in a tumultuous assembly all in an uproar and no man well wist for what Acts 19. Here was work enough to be done The door must be held open to let converts in but must be well mann'd and maintain'd too to keep adversaries out All this not to be done but with many hands The harvest being great the labourers had not need be few 2. The only thing that might perhaps make Timothy put off Ordination somewhat the longer might be the expectation of the Apostles coming to whom he might think fit to reserve that honour as to one able by reason of his Apostolick spirit to make choice of meet persons for the Churches service with better certainty than himself could do The Apostle therefore telleth him for that That true it is he had an earnest desire of a long time and still had a full purpose if God would to be with him ere long Yet because of the uncertainty of future events that was not a thing for him to rely upon so as in expectance thereof to delay the doing of any service needful for the Church of Christ. For who could tell how it might please God tâ— dispose of him Or whether the necessities of other Churches might not require his personal presence and pains rather elsewhere He would not therefore he should stay for him but go in hand with it himself with all convenient care and speed All this appeareth in the two verses next before the Text These things I wrote unto thee hoping to come unto thee shortly But if I tarry long that yet thou maist know how to behave thy self in the house of God which is the Church of the living God the pillar and ground of Truth 3. This seemeth to be the Scope and Contexture of the whole foregoing part of the Chapter and then immediately fall in the words of the Text And without all controversie great is the mystery of Godliness c. Which seem to have but a very slender dependance upon the foregoing discourse and indeed no more they have For the Apostle having in the end of the fifteenth verse and that but incidentally neither mentioned the word Truth he thereupon taketh occasion in this sixteenth verse a little and briefly to touch upon the Nature and Substance of that holy Truth The whole verse containeth Evangelii Encomium Compendium A brief description of the Nature in the former part and a brief summary of the Doctrine of the Gospel in some remarkable heads thereof in the latter part of the verse 4. With that latter I shall not now meddle In that former part we may observe Quid Quantum and Quale First Quid what is Christianity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is a mystery But there are greater and there are lesser Mysteries Quantum therefore Of the bigger sort sure 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a great Mystery 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by all confessions and without all contradiction or controversie Great But the greater the worse if it be not good as well as great Quale therefore What a kind of Mystery is it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is a mystery of Piety or Godliness CHRISTIANITY IS THE GREAT MYSTERY OF GODLINESS That is the Tota Now to the Parts and first of the Quid The Gospel a Mystery But then first What is a Mystery For the Quid Nominis and then why the Gospel a Mystery For the Quid Rei The Word first then the Thing 5. For the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I find sundry conceits ready collected to my hand by learned men out of the writings of the Greek Fathers and out of the Commentaries of Grammarians and Criticks both ancient and modern whereof I spare the recital because it would neither much conduce to my present purpose nor profit the present Auditory The word is clearly of a Greek Original from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to shut the eye or mouth Of all the mysterious rites used among the Heathens the Eleusinia sacra were the most ceremonious and mysterious insomuch as that when in their Writings the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is used by it self without any farther specification it is ordinarily conceived to be meant of those Eleusinian mysteries These none might be present at but they that were solemnly initiated thereunto who upon their first admission which yet was but to the outer and lesser mysteries were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And if after a sufficient time of probation a twelve-month was the least they were adjudged meet to be admitted to the greater and more secret mysteries they were then called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whereto there seemeth to be some allusion as there is frequently to sundry other customs and usages of the Heathens even in the holy Scriptures themselves But whether they were admitted to their lesser or the greater mysteries strait order was evermore taken with them by Oaths Penalties and otherwise as strong as could be devised that they should by no means reveal any of the passages or rites thereunto belonging to those that were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not initiated whom in that respect they counted prophane To do otherwise was reputed so heinous a crime that nothing could be imagined in their superstition more irreligious and piacular than that Quis Cereris ritus audet vulgare profanis He knew not where to find a man that durst presume so to do Vetabo qui Cereris sacrum vulgâ—rit arcanae sub iisdem Sit trabibus He would be loth to lodge under the same roof or to put to Sea in the same vessel with him that were guilty of such an high provocation as the divulging abroad of the sacred mysteries lest some vengeance from the offended Deities should overtake them for their impiety and him for company to their destruction It was in very deed the Devils cunning one of the depths of Satan and one of the most advantageous mysteries of his arts by that secrecy to hold up a reverent and religious Esteem of those mysteries which
were so replete with all filthy and impious abominations that if they should have been made known to the world it must needs have exposed their whole religion to the contempt of the vulgar and to the detestation of the wiser sort 6. Such and no better were those mysteria sacra among the Heathens whence the word Mystery had its birth and rise Both the Name and Thing being so vilely abused by them it yet pleased the holy Spirit of God to make choice of that Word whereby usually in the New Testament to express that holy Doctrine of Truth and Salvation which is revealed to us in the Gospel of grace By the warrant of whose example the ancient Church both Greek and Latin took the Liberty as what hindereth but they might to make use of sundry words and phrases fetcht from the very dregs of Paganism for the better explication of sundry points of the Christian Faith and to signifie their notions of sundry things of Ecclesiastical usage to the people The Greek Church hath constantly used this word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Heathenish superstitious word and the Latin Church in like manner the word Sacramentum a Heathen military word to signifie thereby the holy Sacraments of the Christian Church I note it the rather and I have therefore stood upon it a little longer than was otherwise needful to let you know that the godly and learned Christians of those Primitive times were not so fondly shy and scrupulous as some of ours are as to boggle at much less so rashly supercilious I might say and superstitious too as to cry down and condemn for evil and even eo nomine utterly unlawful the use of all such whether names or things as were invented or have been abused by Heathens or Idolaters 7. But this by the way I return to the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which being rarely found in the Greek version of the Old Testament indeed not at all so far as my search serveth me save only some few times in Daniel is frequently used in the New and that for the most part to signifie for now I come to the Quid Rei either the whole Doctrine of the Gospel or some special branches thereof or the dispensations of Gods providence for the time or manner of revealing it To you it is given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of God Mat. 13. We speak the wisdom of God in a mystery 1 Cor. 2. So the Gospel is called the mystery of Christ Col. 4. mystery of Faith in this Chapter at the ninth verse and here in the Text The mystery of Godliness 8. But why a Mystery That I shall now shew you First when we see something good or bad done plainly before our eyes yet cannot imagine to what end or purpose it should tend nor can guess what should be the design or intention of the doer that we use to call a Mystery The Counsels of Princes and affairs of State Regione di stato as the Italians call it when they are purposely carried in a cloud of secrecy that the reasons and ends of their actions may be hidden from the eyes of men are therefore called the Mystery of state and upon the same ground sundry manual crafts are called Mysteries for that there belong to the exercise of them some secrets which they that have not been trained up therein cannot so well understand and they that have been trained up therein could like well that none but themselves should understand In a worser sence also it is not seldom used If some crafty Companion with whom we have had little dealings formerly should begin of a sudden to apply himself to us in a more than ordinary manner with great shews and proffers of kindness and we know no particular reason why he should so do we presently conclude in our thoughts that sure there is some mystery or other in it that is that he hath some secret ends some design upon us which we understand not Iosephâ—s writing of Antipater the Son of Herod who was a most wicked mischievous person but withal a notable dissembler very cunning and close and one that could carry matters marvellous smoothly and fairly to the outward appearance so that the most intelligent and cautious men could not escape but he would sometimes reach beyond them to their destruction he saith of him and his whole course of life that it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nothing but a very mystery of wickedness 9. In this notion in the better sence of it may the great work of our Redemption by Jesus Christ which is the very pith and marrow of the Gospel be called a Mystery Who that should have seen a child of a span long to be born in an Inn of a mean parentage coursely swadled up and cradled in a manger and then afterwards to be brought up under a Carpenter and to live in a poor and low condition scarce worth a room where to rest his head and after all that to be bought and sold buffeâ—ed spit on reviled tortured condemned and executed as a Malefactor with as much ignominy and despightfulness as the malice of Men and Devils could devise Who that should have seen all these things and the whole carriage thereof could have imagined that upon such weak hinges should have moved the greatest act of Power Wisdom and Goodness that ever was or ever shall be done in the world that such Contemptible means should serve to bring about the eternal good will and purpose of God towards mankind yet so it was whiles Iudas was plotting his treason and the Iews contriving Christs death he to satisfie his Covetousness and they their Malice and all those other that had any hand in the business were looking every man but at his own private ends all this while was this Mystery working Unawares indeed to them and therefore no thanks to them for it nor benefit to them from it but yet by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God who most wisely and powerfully ordered all those various and vitious motions of the creature for the effectuating of his own most glorious and gracious purposes That is one Reason 10. Secondly We use to call all such things Mysteries as cannot possibly come to our knowledge unless they be some way or other revealed unto us whether they have or have not otherwise any great difficulty in them Nebuchadnezzar's dream is so called a Mystery Dan. 2. And St. Paul in one place speaking of the conversion of the Iews calleth it a Mystery I would not Brethren that you should be ignorant of this Mystery Rom. 11. and in another place speaking of the change of those that should be found alive at Christs second coming calleth that a Mystery too Behold I shew you a Mystery we shall not all dye c. 1 Cor. 15. In this notion also is the Gospel a Mystery it being utterly impossible that any wit of
man by the light of Nature or strength of humane discourse should have been able to have found out that way which Almighty God hath appointed for our salvation if it had not pleased him to have made it known to the world by supernatural revelation The wisest Philosophers and learnedst Rabbies nor did nor could ever have dreamt of any such thing till God revealed it to his Church by his Prophets and Apostles This mystery was hid from Ages and from Generations nor did any of the Princes of this world know it in any of those Ages or Generations as it is now made manifest to us since God revealed it to us by his Spirit As our Apostle elsewhere speaketh 11. The Philosophers indeed saw a little dimly some of those truths that are more clearly revealed to us in the Scriptures They found in all men a great proâ—livity to Evil and an indisposition to Good but knew nothing at all either of the true Causes or of the right Remedies thereof Some apprehensions also they had of a Deity of the Creation of the World of a divine Providence of the Immortality of the Soul of a final Retribution to be awarded to all men by a divine justice according to the merit of their works and some other truths But those more high and mysterious points especially those two that of the Trinity of Persons in the Godhead and that of the Incarnation of the Son of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Greek Fathers use to call them together with those appendices of the latter the Redemption of the World the Iustification of a sinner the Resurrection of the body and the beatifical Vision of God and Christ in the Kingdom of Heaven not the least thought of any of these deep things of God ever came within them God not having revealed the same unto them 12. It is no thanks then to us that very children among us do believe and confess these high mysterious points whereof Plato and Aristotle and all the other grand Sophies among them were ignorant since we owe our whole knowledge herein not to our own natural sagacity or industry wherein they were beyond most of us but to divine and supernatural revelation For flesh and bloud hath not revealed them unto us but our Father which is in Heaven We see what they saw not not because our eyes are better than theirs but because God hath vouchsafed to us a better light than he did to them Which being an act of special grace ought therefore to be acknowledged with special thankfulness Our Saviour hath given us the example I thank thee O Father Lord of heaven and earth because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes Mat. 11. 25. 13. Truly much cause we have to bless the holy Name of God that he hath given us to be born of Christian Parents and to be bred up in the bosom of the Christian Church where we have been initiated into these Sacred Mysteries being catechised and instructed in the Doctrine of the Gospel out of the holy Scriptures even from our very Childhood as Timothy was But we are wretchedly unthankful to so good a God and extremely unworthy of so great a blessing if we murmur against our Governours and clamour against the Times because every thing is not point-wise just as we should have it or as we have fancied to our selves it should be Whereas were our hearts truly thankful although things should be really and in truth even ten times worse than now they are but in their conceit only yet so long as we may enjoy the Gospel in any though never so scant a measure and with any though never so hard conditions we should account it a benefit and mercy invaluable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so St. Paul esteemed it the very riches of the grace of God for he writeth According to the riches of his grace wherein he hath abounded towards us in all wisdom and prudence having made known to us the mystery of his will Eph. 1. If he had not made it known to us we had never known it aad that is the second Reason why a Mystery 14. There is yet a Third even because we are not able perfectly to comprehend it now it is revealed And this Reason will seâ—ch in the Quantum too For herein especially it is that this Mystery doth so far transcend all other Mysteries 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a great marvellous great Mystery In the search whereof Reason finding it self at a loss is forced to give it over in the plain field and to cry out O altitudo as being unable to reach the unfathomed depth thereof We believe and know and that with fulness of assurance that all these things are so as they are revealed in the holy Scriptures because the mouth of God who is Truth it self and cannot lie hath spoken them and our own Reason upon this ground teacheth us to submit ourselves and it to the obedience of Faith for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that so it is But then for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nichodemus his question How can these things be it is no more possible for our weak understanding to comprehend that than it is for the eyes of Bats or Owls to look stedfastly upon the body of the Sun when he shineth forth in his greatest strength The very Angels those holy and heavenly spirits have a desire saith St. Peter it is but a desire not any perfect ability and that but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 neither to peep a little into those incomprehensible Mysteries and then cover their faces with their wings and peep again and cover again as being not able to endure the fulness of that glorious lustre that shineth therein 15. God hath revealed himself and his good pleasure towards us in his holy Word sufficient to save our souls if we will believe but not to solve all our doubts if we will dispute The Scriptures being written for our sakes it was needful they should be fitted to our capacities and therefore the mysteries contained therein are set forth by such resemblances as we are capable of but far short of the nature and excellency of the things themselves The best knowledge we can have of them here is but per speculum and in aenigmate 1 Cor. 13. as it were in a glass and by way of riddle darkly both God teacheth us by the eye in his Creatures That is per speculum as it were by a glass and that but a divine one neither where we may read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some of the invisible things of God but written in small and out-worn Characters scarce legible by us He teacheth us also by the Ear in the preaching of his holy Word but that in aenigmate altogether by riddles dark riddles That there should be three distinct Persons in one Essence and
only to the manners of men but almost to common sense also they gave occasion to the Wits of those times under a colour of making themselves merry with the Paradoxes of the Stoicks to laugh even true vertue it self out of countenance 22. Lastly for why should I trouble you with any more These are enow by condemning sundry indifferent things and namely Church Ceremonies as unlawful we give great scandal to those of the Separation to their farther confirming in that their unjust Schism For why should these men will they say and for ought I know they speak but reason why should they who agree so well with us in our Principles hold off from our Conclusions Why do they yet hold communion with or remain in the bosom of that Church that imposeth such unlawful things upon them How are they not guilty themselves of that luke-warm Laodicean temper wherewith they so often and so deeply charge others Why do they halt so shamefully between two opinions if Baal be God and the Ceremonies lawful why do not they yield obedience chearful obedience to their Governours so long as they command but lawful things But if Baal be an Idol and the Ceremonies unlawful as they and we consent Why do they not either set them packing or if they cannot get that done pack themselves away from them as fast as they can either to Amsterdam or to some other place The Objection is so strong that I must confess for my own part If I could see cause to admit of those principles whereon most of our Non-Conformers and such as favour them ground their dislike of our Church-Orders and Ceremonies I should hold my self in all conscience bound for any thing I yet ever read or heard to the contrary to forsake the Church of England and to fly out of Babylon before I were many weeks older 23. Truly Brethren if these unhappy fruits were but accidental events only occasioned rather than caused by such our opinions I should have thought the time mis-spent in but naming them since the very best things that are may by accident produce evil effects But being they do in very truth naturally and unavoidably issue therefrom as from their true and proper cause I cannot but earnestly beseech all such as are otherwise minded in the bowels and in the name of the Lord Iesus Christ and by all the love they bear to Gods holy truth which they seem so much to stand for to take these things into their due consideration and to lay them close to their consciences Aud as for those my brethren of the Clergy that have most authority in the hearts of such as byass too much that way for they only may have some hope to prevail with them the rest are shut out by prejudice if I were in place where I should require and charge them as they will answer the contrary to God the Church and their own Consciences that they would approve their faithfulness in their Ministry by giving their best diligence to inform the judgments of Gods people aright as concerning the nature and use of indifferent things and as in love to their souls they are bound that they would not humour them in these their pernicious errors nor suffer them to continue therein for want of their rebuke either in their publick teaching or otherwise as they shall have opportunity thereunto in private discourses 24. But you will say if these things were so how should it then come to pass that so many men pretending to Godliness and thousands of them doubtless such as they pretend for it were an uncharitable thing to charge them all with hypocrisie should so often and so grievously offend this way To omit those two more universal causes Almighty God's Permission first whose good pleasure it is for sundry wise and gracious ends to exercise his Church during her warfare here with Heresies and Schisms and Scandals And then the wiliness of Satan who cunningly observeth whether way our hearts incline most to looseness or to strictness and then frameth his Temptations thereafter So he can but put us cut of the way it is no great matter to him on whether hand it be he hath his end howsoever Nor to insist upon sundry more particular causes as namely a natural proneness in all men to superstition in many an affectation of singularity to go beyond the ordinary sort of people in something or other the difficulty of shunning one without running into the contrary extreme the great force of Education and Custom besides manifold abuses offences and provocations arising from the carriage of others and the rest I shall note but these two only as the two great fountains of Error to which also most of the other may be reduced Ignorance and Partiality from neither of which God 's dearest Servants and Children are in this life wholly exempted 25. Ignorance first is a fruitful mother of Errors Ye err not knowing the Scriptures Mat. 22. Yet not so much Gross Ignorance neither I mean not that For your mere Ignaro's what they err they err for company they judge not at all neither according to the appearance nor yet righteous judgment They only run on with the herd and follow as they are led be it right or wrong and never trouble themselves farther But by Ignorance I mean weakness of judgment which consisteth in a disproportion between the affections and the understanding when a man is very earnest but withall very shallow readeth much and heareth much and thinketh that he knoweth much but hath not the judgment to sever truth from falshood nor to discern between a sound Argument and a captious Fallacy And so for want of ability to examine the soundness and strength of those principles from whence he fetcheth his Conclusions he is easily carried away 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as our Apostle elsewhere speaketh with vain words and empty arguments As St. Augustine said of Donatus Rationes irripuit he catcheth hold of some reasons as wranglers will catch at a small thing rather than yield from their opinions quas consider antes verisimiles esse potius quam veras invenimus which saith he we found to have more shew of probability at the first appearance than substance of truth after they were well considered of 26. And I dare say whosoever shall peruse with a judicious and unpartial eye most of those Pamphlets that in this daring age have been thrust into the World against the Ceremonies of the Church against Episcopal Government to pass by things of lesser regard and usefulness and more open to exception and abuse yet so far as I can understand unjustly condemned as things utterly unlawful such as are lusorious lots dancing Stage-plays and some other things of like nature When he shall have drained out the bitter invectives unmannerly jeers petulant girding at those that are in authority impertinent digressions but above all those most bold and perverse
works and glorifie your Father which is in heaven but even in the use of the Creatures and of all indifferent things in eating and drinking in buying and selling and in all the like actions of common life In that most absolute Form of Prayer taught us by Christ himself as the Pattern and Canon of all our Prayers the Glory of God standeth at both ends When we begin the first Petition we are to put up is that the Name of God may be hallowed and glorified and when we have done we are to wrap up all in the Conclusion with this acknowledgment that to him alone belongeth all the kingdom the power and the glory for ever and ever 11. The Glory of God you see is to be the Alpha and the Omega of all our votes and desires Infinitely therefore to be preferred not only before Riches Honour Pleasures Friends and all the comforts and contentments the World can afford us in this life but even before life it self The blessed Son of God so valued it who laid down his life for his Fathers Glory and so did many holy Martyrs and faithful Servants of God value it too who laid down their lives for their Masters Glory Nay let me go yet higher infinitely to be preferred even before the unspeakable joys of the life to come before the everlasting salvation of our own souls It was not meerly a strain of his Rhetorick to give his brethren by that hyperbolical expression the better assurance of his exceeding great love towards them that our Apostle said before at Chap. 9. of this Epistle that he could wish himself to be accursed to be made an Anathema to be separated and cut off from Christ for their sakes Neither yet was it a hasty inconsiderate speech that fell suddenly from him as he was writing fervente calamo and as the abortive fruit of a precipitate over-passionate zeal before he had sufficiently consulted his reason whether he should suffer it to pass in that form or not for then doubtless he would have corrected himself and retracted it upon his second thoughts as he did Acts 23. when he had inconsiderately reviled the High-Priest sitting then in the place of Judicature But he spake it advisedly and upon good deliberation yea and that upon his conscience yea and upon his Oath too and as in the presence of God as you may see it ushered in there with a most solemn Asseveration as the true real and earnest desire of his heart I speak the truth in Christ I lie not my conscience bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost Not that St. Paul wished their salvation more than his own understand it not so for such a desire neither was possible nor could be regular Not possible by the Law of Nature which cannot but begin at home Omnes sibi melius esse malunt quam alteri Nor regular by the course of Charity which is not orderly if he do not so too That is not it then but this That he preferred the Glory of God before both his own salvation and theirs Insomuch that if Gods Glory should so require hoc impossibili supposito he could be content with all his heart rather to lose his own part in the joys of heaven that God might be the more Glorified than that God should lose any part of his Glory for his salvation 12. And great reason there is that as his was so every Christian mans heart should be disposed in like manner that the bent of his whole desires and endeavours all other things set apart otherwise than as they serve thereunto should be the Glory of God For first all men consent in this as an undoubted verity That that which is the chiefest good ought also to be the uttermost end And that must needs be the chiefest good which Almighty God who is goodness it self and best knoweth what is good proposeth to himself as the End of all his Actions and that is meerly his own glory All those his high and unconceiveable acts ad intra being immanent in himself must needs also be terminated in himself And as for all those his powerful and providential acts ad extra those I mean which are exercised upon and about the creatures and by reason of that their efflux and emanation are made better known to us than the former if we follow them to their last period we shall find that they all determine and concentre there He made them he preserveth them he forgiveth them he destroyeth them he punisheth them he rewardeth them every other way he ordereth them and disposeth of them according to the good pleasure of his Will for his own names sake and for his one glories sake That so his Wisdom and Power and Truth and Iustice and Mercy and all those other his divine excellencies which we are to believe and admire but may not seek to comprehend might be acknowledged reverenced and magnified Those two great acts of his most secret and unsearchable councel than the one whereof there is not any one act more gracious the Destination of those that persevere in Faith and Godliness to eternal happiness nor any one act more full of terrour and astonishment than the other the designation of such as live and die in Sin and Infidelity without repentance to eternal destruction the Scriptures in the last resolution refer them wholly to his Glory as the last End The glory of his rich mercy being most resplendent in the one and the glory of his just severity in the other Concerning the one the Scripture saith that he predestinated us to the praise of the Glory of his grace Eph. 1. Concerning the other The Lord made all things for himself yea even the wicked for the day of evil Prov. 16. He maketh it his End we should make it ours too if but by way of Conformity 13. But he requireth it of us secondly as our bounden Duty and by way of Thankfulness in acknowledgement of those many favours we have received from him Whatever we have nay whatever we are as at first we had it all from him so we still holdit all of him and that jure beneficiario as feudataries with reservation of services out of the same to be performed for the honour of the Donor Our Apostle therefore in our Lords behalf presseth us with the nature of our tenure and challengeth this duty from us by a claim of right Ye have them of God saith he and ye are not your own therefore glorifie God in your body and in your Spirit which are Gods Glorifie him in both because both are his As the rivers return again to the place whence they came Eccl. 1. they all come from the Sea and they all run into the Sea again So all our store as it issued at first from the fountain of his grace so should it all fall at last into the Ocean of his Glory For of him and through him and
but every man also on the things of others as St. Paul elsewhere exhorteth then should we also agree with one mind and heart to follow the work close till we had got it up That for dispatch 36. But haste maketh waste we say It doth so and in building as much as in any thing It were good wisdom therefore to bring on the work so as to make it strong withal lest if we make false work for quicker dispatch we repent our over-hasty building by leisure To rid us of that fear know secondly that unity and concord serveth for strength too as well as dispatch Ever more vis unita fortior but division weakeneth A house divided against it self cannot stand and the wall must needs be hollow and loose where the stones stand off one from another and couch not close Now brotherly love and unity is it that bindeth all fast so making of loose heaps one entire piece I beseech you brethren saith the Apostle that there be no divisions among you but that ye be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgment 1 Cor. 1. Like-mindedness you see is the thing that joineth all together and in the well-joining consisteth the strength of structure In Eph. 4. therefore he speaketh of the bond of peace and in Col. 3. he calleth love the bond of perfectness 37. In Phil. 1. he hath another expression which also notably confirmeth the same truth That I may hear saith he of your affairs that ye stand fast in one spirit with one mind They never stand so fast as when they are of one mind There is a Greek word sometimes used in the New Testament 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the word which is commonly translated confusion and sometimes tumult Not unfitly for the sence either but in the literal notation it improveth a kind of unstableness rather or unsettledness when a thing doth not stand fast but shaketh and tottereth and is in danger of falling And this St. Paul opposeth to peace 1 Cor. 14. God is not the author 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of confusion or unstableness but of peace By that very opposition intimating that it is mostly for want of peace that things do not stand fast but are ready to fall into disorder and confusion St. Iames speaketh out what St. Paul but intimateth and telleth us plainly that this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the effect of discord and that contention is the mother of confusion For where envying and strife is saith he there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 inconstancy unsettledness confusion and every evil work The builders make very ill work where the building is not like to stand but threatneth ruine and is ready to drop down again by that it be well up And yet such ill work doth envying and strife ever make it is concord only and unity that maketh good work and buildeth strong Let Ierusalem be built as a City at unity in it self and Ierusalem will be like to stand the faster and to stand up the longer 38. For a conclusion of all I cannot but once again admonish and earnestly entreat all those that in contending with much earnestness for matters of no great consequence have the glory of God ever and anon in their mouths that they would take heed of embarquing God and his glory so deep in every trifling business and such as wherein there is not dignus vindice nodus But since it clearly appeareth from this and sundry other Texts of holy Scripture that peace and love are of those things whereby our gracious Lord God taketh himself to be chiefly glorified that they would rather faithfully endeavour by their peaceable charitable and amiable carriage towards others especially in such things as they cannot but know to be in the judgment of sundry men both learned and godly accounted but of inferiour and indifferent nature to approve to God the World and their own Consciences that they do sincerely desire to glorifie God by pleasing their brethren for their good unto edification Which that we all unfeignedly may do I commend us and what we have heard to the grace and blessing of Almighty God dismissing you once again as I did heretofore with the Apostles Benediction in the Text for I know not where to fit my self better Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be like-minded one towards another according unto Christ That ye may with one mind and with one mouth glorifie God even the Father of our Lord Iesus Christ. To which God the Father and his Son Iesus Christ our Lord and the blessed Spirit of them both three Persons c. AD AULAM. Sermon XIV WOBURNE 1647. AUGUST Psal. 27. 10. When my Father and my Mother forsake me the Lord taketh me up 1. THings that have a natural weakness in them to bear up themselves do by a natural instinct lean towards and if they can find it clasp about something that may sufficiently support them but in default of such will catch and twine about whatsoever is next them that may be any little stay to them for any little time So a Hop for want of a strong Pole will wind it self about a Thistle or Nettle or any sorry weed The heart of man whilst it seeketh abroad for somewhat without it self to rest it self upon doth even thereby sufficiently bewray a secret consciousness in it self of its own insufficiency to stand without something to support it If it find not that which is the only true support indeed it will stay it self as long as it can upon a weak staff rather than none Chariots and Horses and Riches and Friends c. any thing will serve to trust in whilst no better appeareth 2. But that our hearts deceitful as they are delude us not with vain confidences we may learn from the Text where it is and where alone that we may repose our selves with full assurance of hope not to fail David affirmeth positively what he had found true by much experience that when all others from whom we expect help either will not or cannot God both can and will help us so far as he seeth it good for us if we put our trust in him When my Father and Mother forsake me the Lord will take me up The words import First a possibility of failing in all inferiour helps It is supposed Fathers and Mothers and proportionally all other friends and helps may forsake us and leave us succourless When my Father and my Mother forsake me Secondly a never-failing sufficiency of help and relief from God though all other helps should fail us Then the Lord will take me up The two points we are to speak to 3. Father and Mother First who are they Properly and chiefly our natural Parents of whom we were begotten and born to whom under God we owe our being and breeding Yet here not they only but by Synecdoche all other kinsfolks neighbours
Semen Dei as St. Iohn calleth it the seed of the second Adam Iesus Christ God blessed for ever derived unto us by the communication of his holy Spirit inwardly renewing us together wherewith is also derived a measure of inherent supernatural grace as the inward principle whence all these choice fruits of the Spirit do flow 11. So that upon the whole matter these two Points are clear First clear it is that all the wicked practices recited and condemned in the foregoing verses with all other of like quality do proceed meerly from the corruption that is in us from our own depraved minds and wills without any the least cooperation of the holy Spirit of God therein It cannot stand with the goodness of God to be the principal and neither with his goodness nor greatness to be an Accessory in any sinful action He cannot be either the Author or the Abettor of any thing that is evil Whoso therefore hath committed any sin let him take heed he do not add another and a worser to it by charging God with it rather let him give God and his Spirit the glory by taking all the blame and shame of it to himself and his own Flesh. All sinful works are works of the Flesh. 12. Secondly it is clear also that all the holy affections and performances here mentioned with all other Christian vertues and graces accompanying Salvation not here mentioned though wrought immediately by us and with the free consent of our own wills are yet the fruit of Gods Spirit working in us That is to say They do not proceed originally from any strength of nature or any inherent power in mans free-will nor are they acquired by the culture of Philosophy the advantages of Education or any improvement whatsoever of natural abilities by the helps of Art or Industry but are in truth the proper effects of that supernatural grace which is given unto us by the good pleasure of God the Father merited for us by the precious blood of God the Son and conveyed into our hearts by the sweet and secret inspirations of God the holy Ghost Love Ioy Peace c. are fruits not at all of the Flesh but meerly and entirely of the Spirit 13. All those very many passages in the New Testament which either set forth the unframeableness of our nature to the doing of any thing that is good Not that we are sufficient of our selves to think a good thought In me that is in my flesh there dwelleth no good thing and the like or else ascribe our best performances to the glory of the grace of God Without me you can do nothing All our sufficiency is of God Not of your selves it is the gift of God It is God that worketh in you both the will and the deed and the like are so many clear confirmations of the Truth Upon the evidence of which truth it is that our mother the Church hath taught us in the Publick Service to beg at the hands of Almighty God that he would â—ndue us with the grace of his holy Spirit to amend our lives according to his holy Word And again consonantly to the matter we are how in hand with almost in terminis that he would give to all men encrease of grace to hear meekly his word and to receive it with pure affection and to bring forth the fruits of the Spirit As without which grace it were not possible for us to amend our lives or to bring forth such fruits according as God requireth in his holy Word 14. And the Reason is clear because as the tree is such must the fruit be Do men look to gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles Or can they expect from a salt Fountain other than brackish water Certainly what is born of Flesh can be no better than Flesh. Who can bring a clean thing out of that which is unclean Or how can any thing that good is proceed from a heart all the imaginations of the thoughts whereof are only and continually evil If we would have the Fruit good reason will and our Saviour prescribeth the same method that order be taken first to make the tree good 15. But you will say It is as impossible so to alter the nature of the Flesh as to make it bring forth good spiritual fruit as it is to alter the Nature of a Crab or Thorn so as to make it bring forth a pleasant Apple Truly and so it is if you shall endeavour to mend the fruit by altering the stock you shall find the labour altogether fruitless A Crab will be a Crab still when you have done what you can and you may as well hope to wash an Ethiopian white as to purge the Flesh from sinful pollution 16. The work therefore must be done quite another way not by alteration but addition That is leaving the old principle to remain as it was by superinducing ab extra a new principle of a different and more kindly quality We see the experiment of it daily in the graffing of trees A Crab-stock if it have a Cyen of some delicate apple artly grafted in it look what branches are suffered to grow out of the stock it self they will all follow the nature of the stock and if they bring forth any fruit at all it will be sowre and stiptick But the fruit that groweth from the graft will be pleasant to the taste because it followeth the nature of the Graft We read of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an engrafted word Jam. 1. Our carnal hearts are the old stock which before the Word of God be grafted in it cannot bring forth any spiritual fruit acceptable to God But when by the powerful operation of his holy Spirit the Word which we hear with our outward ears is inwardly grafted therein it then bringeth forth the fruit of good living So that all the bad fruits that appear in our lives come from the old stock the Flesh and if there be any good fruit of the Spirit in us it is from the virtue of that word of grace that is grafted in us 17. It should be our care then since the Scriptures call so hard upon us for fruits to be fruitful in good works to bring forth fruits meet for repentance c. and threaten us with excision and fire if we do not bring forth fruit and that good fruit too it should be our care I say to bestow at least as much diligence about our hearts as good husbands do about their fruit-trees They will not suffer any suckers or luxuriant branches to grow from the stock but as soon as they begin to appear or at least before they come to any bigness cut them off and cast them away By so doing the grafts thrive the better and bring forth fruit both sooner and fairer God hath entrusted us with the custody and culture of our own hearts as Adam was put into â—he Garden to keep
God of admirable Wisdom by whom are weighed not only the actions but also the spirits of Men and their very hearts pondered neither is there any thing that may escape his Enquiry Trust not therefore to vain excuses for certainly thy heart shall be throughly sifted and thy pretensions narrowly looked into when he taketh the matter into his consideration Doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it The next step is for Deprehension or Conviction and that grounded upon his knowledg or Omniscience And he that keepeth thy soul doth not he know it As if he had said Thou mayest by colourable pretences delude Men who are strangers to thy soul and cannot discern the thoughts and intents of the heart But there is no dissembling before him unto whose eyes all things are naked and open nor is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight He that made thy soul at the first and hath ever since kept it and still keepeth it observing every motion and inclinatinon of it he perfectly knoweth all that is in it and if there be any hidden guile in any secret corner of it tho obscured from Man's search by never so many windings and labyrinths yet he will undoubtedly find it out He that keepeth thy soul doth not he know it 3. The last step is for Retribution and that grounded upon his justice And shall not he render to every Man according to his Works As if he had said If mortal Man was to decide the Matter thou mightest have some hope that time and other means that might be used might frame him to thine own bent either to connive at a gross fault or to admit of a slender excuse But God is a most righteous Iudg not to be wrought upon by any artifice to do iniquity or to accept the persons of Men. According therefore as thy works are so without all question shall thy doom be Shall not the Iudg of all the World do right And shall not he render to every Man according to his Works 6. Thus you see the Text opened and therewithal opened a large field of matter if we should beat out every particular But that we may keep within some reasonable bounds and within the time we will hold us to these three principal points or conclusions First That the several excuses before mentioned as supposed to be pointed at in the Text may be sometimes pleaded justly and reasonably and in such case are to be admitted and allowed Secondly That they may be also all of them and are God knoweth too often pretended where there is no just cause for it Thirdly That where they are causlesly pretended tho they may blear the eyes of Men yet will they be of little avail in the sight of God Of each of these in the order as I have now proposed them and first of the first If thou sayest Behold we know it not 7. Questionless if that Allegation could never be just Solomon would wholly and absolutely have rejected it Which since he hath not done but referred it to judgment we may conclude there are times and cases wherein it will be allowed as a good and sufficient plea if it shall be said Behold we knew it not We esteem it the Fool 's Buckler and it is no better as it is many times used to say Non putâram Yet may a right honest and wise Man without the least blemish to his reputation be sometimes driven to take up the very same buckler and to use his own just defence When he is charged with it as his crime that his brother hath been oppressed and he hath not delivered him be he a private Man or be he a publick Minister of Justice it will sufficiently acquit him both in the Judgment of God and of his own heart and of all reasonable Men if he can say bonâ fide as it is in the Text Behold I knew it not The truth whereof I shall endeavour to make appear to you in each of the three forementioned respects First Men may want due information for matter of Fact or secondly Their judgments may be in suspence for point of right or Thirdly Where they perfectly comprehend both the whole business and the equity of it there may lie such rubs in the way as all the power and skill they have will not be able to avoid so that tho the cause be good they cannot tell for their lives which way to do good in it In any of which cases may they not well say Behold we knew it not 8. First They may want information for matter of Fact Not to speak of things farther off which therefore less concern us of those things that are done amongst them that live under us or near us how many passages are there that never come to our knowledg Much talk there is indeed in all our meetings and much bold censuring of the actions of those that are above us at every table Yet much of this we take up but upon trust and the credit of flying reports which are ever full of uncertainty and not seldom of malice and so we run descant upon a false ground But as for the affairs of them that are below us whereon especially the Duty of the Text is to be exercised other than what we chance to hear of obiter and by imperfect or partial relations very little thereof is brought to our ears by way of just complaint or according to pure truth And of all Men the greatest are sure evermore to know the least It is one of the unhappinesses of Princes and Magistrates and all that are in high place that whereas all their speeches and actions are upon the publick Stage exposed to the view and censure of the very meanest as a Beacon on the top of a hill open to every eye and bleak to every wind themselves on the contrary can have very little true information of those abuses and disorders in their Inferiors which it properly belongeth to them both to punish and reform If in private Families which being of a narrow compass are therefore easily looked into the Masters commonly be the last that shall hear of what is amiss therein Dedecus ille domus sciet ultimus how much more then is it improbable in a great Township in a spacious County in a vast Kingdom but that manifold â—usances and injuries should escape the knowledg of the most vigilant and conscionable Governors When both Court and City and the whole Empire rang of wanton Livia's impudent lasciviousness and Messalina's audacious courtings of Silius the Emperors themselves Augustus Father to the one and Claudius Husband to the other heard nothing of either till the news was stale every where else Principes omnia facilius quam sua cognoscunt saith the Historian concerning the one and the Satyrist concerning the other Dum res Nota urbi populo contigat Caesaris aures And no doubt but many pious and
according to truth and pronounce of them as they are and not as they seem may we not much rather invert the Proverb and say One tale cannot be good till the other be told that is whether it be good or not the Iudg may not give credit to either till he hath heard both Nay may we not many times farther say when both tales are told that neither is good Because there is most-what in every Man's tale a mixture of some falshoods with some truths whereby it may so happen sometimes that he which hath in truth the more equity on his side by the mingling in some easily discoverable falshoods in telling his tale may render his cause the more suspicious to him that heareth it to think the whole tale naught and he that hath indeed and upon the whole matter the worst cause may yet by the weaving in some evident truths or pregnant probabilities in the telling of his tale gain such credit with him that heareth it that he will be very inclinable to believe the whole tale to be good Or howsoever they may be both so equally false or at least both so equally doubtful as no one that heareth them can well tell whether of both to give credit to It was so in the famous case of the two inmate Harlots whereof King Solomon had the hearing The living Child is mine the dead one thine faith the one No faith the other The dead Child is thine and the living mine Here were presumptions on both sides for why should any Woman challenge another Woman's Child but proofs on neither for being there were none in the house but they two neither of them could produce any witnesses The case hung thus even no more evidence on the one side than on the other no less confidence on the one side than on the other Solomon indeed by that wisdom wherewith God had endowed him in a transcendent measure found out a means whereby to turn the scales to unty that hard knot and to discover the hidden truth But what could a Iudg or a Iury of no more than ordinary wisdom then have been able to have said or done in such a case but even to have left it as they found it And truly for any thing I know Ignorance must have been their best excuse 12. And as first in the Information so there may be a defect secondly in the Proofs He that hath the better cause in veritate rei may yet fail in his proofs and not be able to make it judicially appear that he hath the better cause In which case the old Axiom holdeth Idem est non esse non apparere it is all one in foro externo and as to the determination of a Judg upon the Bench who is to pronounce secundum allegata probata for a Man not to have a right and not to be able to make it appear in a legal way and by such evidence as is requisite in a judicial proceeding that he hath such a right Or he may be out-sworn by the depositions of the witnesses produced on the behalf of the adverse part tho it may be utterly false yet direct and punctual against him and so strong enough howsoever to cast him in his Suit For what Judg but the great Judg of Heaven and Earth can certainly and infallibly know when two or three Men swear directly to a point and agree in one whether yet they swear a falshood or no Or what should induce a mortal Iudg not to believe them especially if withal he see the proofs on the other side to fall short And if in such a case following the evidence in the simplicity of his heart he gave away an honst Mans right from him to a knave he is not to be charged with it as a perverter of justice but hath his Apology here ready fitted for him in the Text Behold we knew it not 13. Add hereunto in the third place the great advantage or disadvantage that may be given to a cause in the pleading by the artificial insinuations of a powerful Orator That same flaxanimis Pitho and Suadae medulla as some of the old Heathens termed it that winning and persuasive faculty which dwelleth in the tongues of some men whereby they are able not only to work strongly upon the affections of Men but to arrest their judgments also and to encline them whether way they please is an excellent endowment of nature or rather to speak more properly an excellent gift of God Which whosoever hath received is by so much the more bound to be truly thankful to him that gave it and to do him the best service he can with it by how much he is enabled thereby to gain more glory to God and to do more good to human Society than most of his brethren are And the good blessing of God be upon the heads of all those be they few or many that use their eloquence aright and employ their Talent in that kind for the advancement of justice the quelling of opression the repressing and discountenancing of insolency and the encouraging and protecting of innocency But what shall I say then of those be they many or few that abuse the gracefulness of their elocution good speakers but to ill purposes to enchant the ears of an easie Magistrate with the charms of a fluent tongue or to cast a mist before the eyes of a weak Iury as Juglers may sport with Country people to make white seem black or black seem white so setting a fair varnish upon a rotten post and a smooth gloss upon a course cloth as Protagoras sometimes boasted that he could make a bad cause good when he listed By which means judgment is perverted the hands of violence and robbery strengthned the edge of the sword of justice abated great offenders acquitted gracious and vertuous Men molested and injured I know not what fitter reward to wish them for their pernicious eloquence as their best deserved Fee than to remit them over or what David hath assigned them in Psal. 120. What reward shall be given or done unto thee O thou false tongue Even mighty and sharp arrows with hot burning coals I might add to those how that sometimes by the subtilty and cunning of a sly Commissioner sometimes by the wilful misprision of a corrupt or the slip of a negligent or the oversight of an ignorant Clerk and by sundry other means which in regard of their number and my inexperience I am not able to recite it may come to pass that the light of Truth may be so clouded and the beams thereof intercepted from the eyes of the most circumspect Magistrate that he cannot at all times clearly discern the Equity of those Causes that are brought before him In all which cases the only Apology that is left him is still the same as before even this Behold we knew it not 14. But when he perfectly understandeth the whole business and seeth