Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n
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A58810
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A sermon preached before the Honourable Military Company at St. Clements-Danes, July 25 by John Scott ...
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Scott, John, 1639-1695.
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1673
(1673)
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Wing S2064; ESTC R38223
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15,491
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32
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A SERMON PREACHED Before the Honourable Military Company at St. Clements-Danes July 25. BY JOHN SCOTT Minister of St. Thomas Southwark LONDON Printed for Tho. Taylor at the Hand and Bible in the New Buildings on London-Bridge 1673. To the Right Worshipful Sir ROBERT PEYTON President and one of the Stewards elect Captain JOHN PERRY Lieut. GEORGE CLERK Lieut. THOMAS LOW Lieut. WILLIAM PEPPER Ensign JOHN MERYDALE Serjeant RALPH HOLLAND Stewards of the Honourable the Military Company and to the Stewards elect Sir RICHARD COMBES JAMES LONG Esq. CHARLES HUMPHREVILE Esq. CHRIST OPHER VANE Esq. JOHN AYLOFFE Esq. and to Captain JOHN HOOKER Treasurer Worthy Gentlemen EVer since I consented to your desires to Print this rude Discourse I have been hardly put to it to make an Apology for it at first I resolved to go the way of all Authors and indite my Patrons for committing a rape upon my modesty and dragging this poor offering like an unwilling Sacrifice to the Altar but upon second thoughts I could not but disapprove such a kind address as too disingenious and unmannerly for to avouch your importunities for the publication of so mean a discourse I might reasonably think would be to libel your Judgments and to make the world believe I designed Revenge rather than Obedience and therfore in conclusion I rather resolved to take all the blame upon my self hoping that in the great crowd of silly things that come abroad into the world this little trifle may pass unobserved but if it should be so unhappy as to be taken notice of I hope the world will not be so unconscionable as to deny me the priviledge of playing the fool as well as others whatsoever imperfections there may be in the Sermon the subject of it is so great and excellent that 't is no shame for any man to lie prostrate under it for intreating of such high Arguments insufficiency is both Art and Rhetorick If therefore I have not given it a Character as great as it deserves I hope this will in some measure excuse me that I am a man and not an Angel but however I fare in the esteem of others this comfort I have that the weaker the Discourse is the greater Argument it will be of the gratitude and obedience of Your humble and affectionate Servant JOHN SCOTT ERRATA PAge 1. for aley read aloy line 5. for our bodies r. as for our bodies p. 5. and us p. 8. for menaceth r. meaneth and to be left out p. 9. for infer r. infere put in can p. 10. for understa understandings p. 12. for By r. A. p. 13. add all other p. for ride r. run p. 15. for clutering r. clattering p. 17. acknowledge Epes 6. 11. Put on therefore the whole Armour of God THat which giveth us the advantage of Brutes and ranketh us in a form of Beings above them is the Rational and Immortal Spirits we carry about with us for our Bodies they are but clods of earth steeped in phlegme and kneaded into Humane shapes and do derive their Pedegree from the same Principles with flies and scare-bees and the most contemptible Animals but our Souls are of a purer alley and by their nature are allied to Angels and do border upon God himself and it is by the Title of these Rational Natures that we are now superior to Beasts and hope hereafter to be equal with Angels and yet besotted Creatures that we are how do we prefer our Bodies before our Souls imploying all our cares in providing for and pampering of our flesh as if our Reason were given us for no other end but to be Cook and Taylor to our Bodies to study Sauses and fashions for them whilst our Immortal Spirits pine and famish and like forlorn things are wholly abandoned by us to wretchedness and misery that it is so is apparent by too many woful instances the poor Labourer that sweateth and toileth all day for his Body thinketh much at night to bestow upon his Soul a Prayer of a quarter of an hour long the Tradesman that thinks no Industry too much to make a fair and ample provision for his Body grudgeth to expend a few good thoughts and endeavours in the purchase of an eternal Inheritance for his Soul the Souldier that shuts up his Body in ribs of Iron and Coats of Male to secure it from the Sword and Bullets of his Enemies exposeth his Soul unarmed to all the fiery darts of the Devil and though his understanding hath as much need of Knowledge as his Head hath of an Helmet his Will as much need of Justice as his Breast of a Bucklen his Affections as much need of Fortitude and temperance as his Legs and hands have of Greaves and Gantlets yet he ventures them all naked amongst a thousand Enemies as if his little Toe or Finger were more dear and precious to him than his Immortal Soul But if we would be good Souldiers and good men too we must arm our selves with in as well as without and as we harness our Bodies in Iron so must we put on upon our Souls the whole Armor of God and this is the councel of the Apostle in the Text which I have chosen for the subject of my ensuing Discourse Put on therefore the whole armour of God By the whole Armor of God here we are to understand the Christian Religion that is the Doctrine and Duties of Christianity as you may see at large from the fourteenth to the eighteenth Verses of this Chapter where the Apostle instances in the particular parts of which this whole armour consisteth the first is the Girdle of Truth that is the Doctrine of the Gospel in opposition to all Heathen errors and heretical insinuations The second is the Breast-plate of Righteousness that is sincere and faithful obedience unto Christ the third is the preparation of the Gospel of Peace that is the practice of Christian Charity and Peaceableness the fourth is the Shield of Faith that is the belief of the Promises and threats of the Gospel the fifth is the Helmet that is the hope of Salvation the sixth is the Sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God and the last is Prayer and Watchfulfulness These are the several parts of this Divine armour in which you see are reckoned both the Doctrines and Duties of Christianity by the putting on of these therefore nothing else can be meant but only our hearty belief of the Doctrines and our sincere Practice of the Duties of Christian Religion for to this sence the Phrase is frequently used in the New Testament thus when the Apostle exhorteth us to put on the Lord Jesus Christ in Rom. 13. 14. it is plain he meaneth nothing else but believing in Christ and obeying him And so also when in Ephes. 4. 22 24. he exhorteth them to put off the old man and put on the new he meaneth nothing else but that they should forsake their Heathen Superstitions and Idolatrous uncleannesses and
wiseâ— than we and loveth us far better than we do our selves than that they should always jump with our childish hopes and keep pace with our extravagant fancies and if the Government of all events that besal us were put into our own hands would it not be our wisdom and our interest to resign it it back into Gods hands again who as we must needs acknowledged can carve a thousand times better for us than we for our selves why then should we be troubled that our affairs sometimes run counter to our humours and fancies did we understand the reason of Gods dealings and see what he seeth and know what he knoweth we should praise him on our bended knees for those crosses which are now the innocent causes of our repinings against him This therefore in Reason ought to satisfie us that we are under the Protection of a most wise and gracious Providence and that if afflictions do befal us they are but Rods in the hands of our Benefactor and tokens of love from a reconciled Father For what reason can we have either to fear or complain when we know our selves sheltered within the bosome of that Providence in which all the Divine Attributes like so many Guardian Angels do pitch their Tents about us Within this blessed Ark if we please we may live securely whilst all the floods of misery do swell and rove about us here we may sing Requiems in the loudest Thunders and sleep securely in the midst of storms for what should we be afraid of when we have Omniscience for our Pilot Omnipotence for our Convoy and All-sufficient Goodness for our Purveyer and Caterer by the help of this one confideration a man may bid defiance to misery and stand impregnable against all the Batteries of the world Fourthly and lastly Christianity armeth us against the evil of misery by assuring us of a blessed Immortality and verily were it not for the hope of this man were of all Creatures the most miserable For his very Reason by which he is capable of a larger happiness doth most commonly in this life prove an Instrument of grief and vexation to him and as for the Beasts they are as sensible of sensual pleasures as we they relish their morsels with as great a gust and enjoy their delights with as quick a sense as the greatest Epicures in the world Besides which their Harmony is not mingled with the sad discords of a wounded Conscience which often interrupts our mirth and puts a sting to all our pleasures And as for troubles the beasts only feel them whilst they are present and are not alarmed with fear at the approach of them nor vexed with despair in the presence of them nor wracked with fruitless cares of removing them to all which inconveniencies our Reason exposeth us So that were it not for the hope of a future happiness man that is the top of this lower Creation would be the most miserable part of it and we should have reason to envy the happiness of the pretty Birds that sit merrily singing on the trees and to wish that we could change conditions with the Fishes that sport and play in the silver-streams devoid of all those griefs and sorrows cares and anxities with which we are wrackt and tortured every moment the only thing therefore that maketh our life desirable and giveth it the advantage of Non-entity is this that how mean soever our condition is here yet we are born to higher hopes and are now but Candidates for an Immortal preferment and of this the Christian Religion giveth us the most certain assurance even by the Resurrection of Christ from the dead By this it is that we are begotten into a lively hope of an eternal Inheritance as the Apostle tells us 1 Peter 1. 3. and indeed this is a proof of the Immortal state beyond all other Arguments whether Moral or Physical for had not this Doctrine of Immortality been true it cannot be imagined that the God of Truth would have sealed and confirmed it as he did by raising the Author of it from the dead since in so doing he must have been guilty of cheating the world and seconding the most rank Imposture than which we cannot form a conceit more black or incongruous to the nature of God Wherefore now life and Immortality are as clear and evident as the Resurrection of Christ from the dead of which we have as full assurance as we can possibly have of any matter of fact in the world for the eye-witnesses of it confirmed their Testimony with their blood which is the highest pledge that a man can give of his honesty and there is no credit to be given to men if they may not be believed upon this security Thus Christianity you see hath sounded our hopes of Immortal happiness upon the surest Foundations in the world which hope is sufficient to raise any considering man above the reach of misery For would we but keep our thoughts within those higher and untroubled Regions we should be able to look down upon these little affairs about which poor mortals scramble with as much contempt and scorn as we do upon the toils and labours of a little world of Ants about a Molehil who are not altogether so ridiculous because they do not divide their molehil into little Empires nor desraud and murder nor be false and treacherous to one another for the greater share nor were they ever so extravagant as to march out in Armies to kill their neighbouring Ants so to extend their Dominion over the next handful of a turf but he whose hope hope hath mounted him to Heaven can from thence look down and sigh and smile at all these fooleries and slight and undervalue whatsoever sensual men poor souls do fear or hope or long for or pursue for he hath such a glory within the prospect of his faith and hope as do at one glimpse foil all the glory of the world and unsting all its miseries The sight of that flowery Canaan of Rest and pleasure that lieth before him incourageth him to march on with joy and alacrity through this howling desert of sorrow and misery and make the wilderness to seem a Paradise to him and at worst all the ill usage that he meets with here will but make earth more loathsome now and Heaven more welcome to him hereafter When therefore he is tossed in this tempestuous Sea he considereth with himself that a few Leagues farther lieth that blessed Port where he shall be crowned as soon as he is landed and concludes that when he is gotten safe on shore he shall then look back with pleasure and delight upon those threatning waves he now encountreth and for ever bless the storms and winds that drave him thither and so resolveth with St Paul That the sufferings of this present life are not worthy to be compared with the Joys that shall be revealed Rom. 8. 18. and thus you see what incomparable armour the Christian