of those profitable and honourable evils which we have set up as our mark but cannot so fairly reach to if we stand in open defiance to all Religion And therefore when that will not joyn with us but looketh a contrary way to that which we are pressing toward with so much eagerness we content our selves with some part of it with the weakest and poorest and beggerlyest part of it and make use of it to go along with us and countenance and secure us in the doing of that which is opposit to it and with which it cannot subsist And so well and feelingly we act our parts that we take our selves to be great favourites and in high grace with him whose laws we break and so procure some rest and ease from those continual clamours which our guiltiness would otherwise raise within us and walk on with delight and boasting and through this seeming and feigned paradise post on securely to the gates of Death In what triumphant measures doth a Pharisee go from the Altar What a harmless thing is a cheat after a Sermon What a sweet morsel is a widows house after long Prayers What a piece of justice is Oppression after a fast After so much Ceremony the blood of Abel himself of the justest man alive hath no voice For 3. These outward performances and this formality in Religion have the same spring and motive with our greatest and foulest sins The same cause produceth them the same considerations promote them and they are carried to their end on the same wings of our carnal desires Do you not wonder that I should say The formality and outward presentments of our Devotion may have the same beginnings with our sins may have their birth from the same womb that they draw the same breasts and like twins James 3.11 are born and nurst and grow up together Doth a fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter No it cannot But both these are salt and brinish our Sacrifice as ill smelling as our Oppression our Fast as displeasing as our Sacrilege and our Hearing and Prayers cry as loud for vengeance as our Oppression We sacrifice that we may oppress we fast that we may spoil our God and we pray that we may devour our brethren Ezek. 16.44 Like mother like daughter saith the Prophet They have the same evil beginning and they are both evil Ambition was the cause of Absaloms Rebellion 2 Sam. 15. 1 Kings 21. Gen. 34. and Ambition sent him to Hebron to pay his vow Covetousness made Ahab and Jezebel murderers and Covetousness proclaimed their fast Lust made Shechem the Son of Hamor a ravisher and Lust made him a Proselyte and circumcised him Covetousness made the Pharisee a ravening Wolf and Covetousness clothed him in a Lambs skin Covetousness made his Corban and Covetousness did disfigure his face and placed him praying in the Synagogues and in the corners of the streets Ex his causam accipiunt quibus probantur saith Tertullian They have both the same cause for the same motives arise and shew them both The same reason maketh the same man both devout and wicked both abstemious and greedy both meek and bloody a seeming Saint and a raging Devil a Lamb to the eye and a roaring Lion Scit enim diabolus alios continentiâ alios libidine occidere saith the same Father The Devil hath an art to destroy us with the appearance of virtue assoon as with the poyson of sin For 4. This formality in Religion standeth in no opposition with him or his designs but rather advanceth his kingdome and enlargeth his dominion For how many Sacrificers how many attentive Hearers how many Beadsmen how many Professours are his vassals How many call upon God Abba Father who are the Devils Children How many openly renounce him Ex malitia ingenium habet Tertull. de Idololat and yet love his wiles delight in his craft which is his Malice How many never think themselves at liberty but when they are in his snare And doth not a fair pretense make the fact fouler Doth not Sacrifice raise the voice of our Oppression that it cryeth louder Doth not a form of Godliness make Sin yet more sinful When we talk of heaven and love the world are we not then most earthly most sensual most devilish Is the Devil ever more Devil then when he is transformed into an angel of light And therefore the Devil himself is a great promoter of this art of pargetting and painting and maketh use of that which we call Religion to make men more wicked loveth this foul and monstrous mixture of a Sacrificer and an Oppressor of a Christian and a Deceiver of a Faster and a Blood thirsty man And as he was most enraged and impatient as Tertullian telleth us to see the works of God brought into subjection under Man who was made according to Gods image so is it his pride and glory to see Man and Religion it self brought under these transitory things and even made servants and slaves unto them Oh to this hater of God and Man it is a kind of heaven in hell it self and in the midst of all his torment to see this Man whom God created and redeemed do him the greatest service in Christs livery to see him promote his interest in the name of Christ and Religion to see him under his power and dominion most when he waiteh most diligently and officiously at the altar of God The Pharisee was his beloved disciple when he was on his knees with a disfigured face These Jews here were his disciples who did run to the Altar but not from their evil waies who offered up the blood of beasts to God and of the innocent to him He that fasteth and oppresseth is his disciple for he giveth God his body and the Devil his soul He that prayeth much and cozeneth more is his disciple for he flattreth God but serveth the enemy speaketh to the God of truth with his lips but hearkneth to the Father of lyes and deceit I may say the Devil is the great Alchymist of the world he transelementeth the worst things to make them more passable and to add a kind of esteem and glory to them We do not meet with counterfeit Iron or Copper but Gold and Pretious stones these we sophisticate and when we cannot dig them out of the mine or take them from the rock we strive to work them by art out of Iron or Copper or Glass and call them Gold and Diamonds Thus doth the Devil raise and sublime the greatest Impiety and gild it over with a Sacrifice with a Fast with Devotion that it may appear in glory and deceive if it were possible the very elect We see too many deceived with it who having no Religion themselves are yet ready to bow down to its Image wheresoever they see it and so fix their eye and devotion upon it that they see not the Thief the Oppressour the
it self in his mouth will be heretical and whatsoever droppeth from his pen will be poyson Hence it hath come to pass that we have heard the innocent condemned and things laid to their charge which they never did that they have been branded with the name of murderers who abhorred murder of injurious who suffered wrong of persecutors who were oppressed of idolaters who hated idoles of hereticks who were the strongest pillars of the Truth We are wont to say Love is blind and tell me now Is not Hatred blind also In the next place let one Feaâ— chase away another Let the Fear of God whose wrath is everlasting expell the Fear of Man whose breath is in his nostrils whose anger and power like the wind breathe themselves out who whilest he destroyeth destroyeth nothing but that which is as mortal as himself The reason why we miss of Truth is because we are so foolish and ignorant that we Fear man more then God and the shaking of his whip then the scorpions of a Deity How hath this ill-placed Fear unmanned us how hath it shaken the powers of our soul and made us say what we do not believe and believe that to be true which we cannot but know is false There hath passed an ungracious speeâ—h amongst us and often rung in our ears and this base degenerate Fear did dictate it Men have been so bad and bold as to say They had rather trust God with their souls then Man with their estates and lives Had they not thought they had stated the question they would not have proclaimed it with such ostentation they would not have sung it out and rejoyced in it Certainly if a proverb as the Philosopher saith be a publick testimony and do discover the constitution of the place where it is taken up then our Jerusalem is not the city nor our Countrey the region of Truth Trust man with our estates When we persevere in the Truth and suffer for it we trust not our estates with Man but put them into his hands who gave them and who can make the greatest Leviathan that playeth in the sea of this world Job 41.31 and maketh it boil like a pot disgorge himself and cast out the prey We do not trust them with Man but offer them a sacrifice to the Lord. But we will trust God with our souls say they See how a lie multiplieth in our hands We will trust God with our souls and pollute them and when we have polluted them still trust in the Lord. It is good to trust in the Lord but it is good too to take heed what a soul we trust him with Wilt thou trust an unclean soul with the God of purity a soul guilty of bloud with the God of mercy a distracted soul with the God of peace an earthy soul with the God of heaven a perjured soul with that God who is Truth it self Let not thy love of the world and thy fear of losing it draw so false and foul conclusions from so radiant and excellent a truth And if thou art in earnest and wouldst buy the Truth Matth. 10.28 then fear not them which kill the body and after that have no more that they can do Luke 12.4 5. but fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell yea I say unto you fear him Now in the last place what is our Hope If it be in this life onely we are of all men the most miserable 1 Cor. 15.19 For this world is not the region of Truth here is nothing to be found but vanity and lies Pergula pictoris veri nihil omnia falsa Here are false Riches painted Glories deceitful Honours I may say the world is a monument a painted sepulchre and within it lie Errour Delusions and Lies like rotten bones And wilt thou place thy Hope here upon that which is a lie Shall this be thy compass to steer by in thy travel and adventure for Truth Shall the lying Spirit the God of this world be thy holy or rather unholy Ghost to lead thee to it O spem fallacem This is a deceitful Hope and will lead thee into by-paths and dangerous precipices wheel and circle thee about from one lie to another Mark 9.22 cast thee like that evil spirit into fire and water waste and wash away thy intellectual and discerning faculties which should sever Falshood from Truth make thy religion as deceitful as thy hopes and when all thy hopes and thoughts perish deliver thee over to the Father of lies Be sure then to take of thy Hope from these things on eâ—rth why should it stoop so low And raise it up to enter into that within the veil Hebr. 6.19 that it may not flie after shadows and phantasms but lay hold on the Truth it self that the World and the Devil may find nothing in thee to lead thee from the light into that ignorance which is darker then darkness it self that thou mayest say to them What have I to do with you and so pass on with courage and chearfulness to the purchase of that Truth which abideth for ever The Eleventh SERMON PART II. PROV XXIII 23. Buy the truth and sell it not also wisdome and instruction and understanding YE have heard of part of the payment But the price of the Truth is yet higher and there is more to be given And indeed we shall find that the merchandise is unvaluable and that it will be cheap when we have given all for it What are the Vanities of the world yea what is the whole World it self nay what is our Understanding Will and Affections what is Man in comparison of that Truth without which he is worse then nothing What is it then that we must lay down more when we come to this mart We must part with that which cleaveth many times so close unto us that we cannot so much as offer any thing for the Truth First we must remove all Prejudice out of our minds that they may be still tanquam rasa tabula though they have something written in them yet that they receive not any opinion so deeply in as not to be capable of another which hath more reason to commend it that they cleave not so close to that which was first entertained upon weak peradventure carnal motives as to stand out against that which bringeth with it a cloud of witnesses and proofs yea light it self to make entrance for it Secondly we must remove all Malice all distast and loathing of the Truth we must take heed we do not wilfully reject it as if it concerned us not nor were worth the buying Till our mind be clear of both these Prejudice and Malice we may talk of the Truth but onely as a blind man doth of the light we may commend the Truth but as a man of Belial may honour a Saint we may cry out Magna est Veritas praevalebit 1 Esdr 4.41 and yet
not from the Father and the Son but from our fleshly Lusts 1 Pet 2.11 from the beast within us that fighteth against our Soul I am weary of this Spirit I am sure the world hath reason to be so and to cast it out There is a third which I am ashamed of and I have much wondred that ever any who with any diligence had searched the Scriptures or but tasted of the word of truth could have so ethnick a stomach as to digest it But we see some have taken it down with pleasure and it serveth as hot waters to ease them of a pang of that worm which gnaweth within them Shall I name it to you It is Tying of the Truth to the wheel of Fortune or to set it forth in its fairest dress to the Providence of God which moveth in a certain course but most uncertain to us and is then least visible when it is most seen A Prejudice raised out of prosperity and good success Which befalleth the bad as well as the good 2 Sam. 11.25 as the Sword devoureth one as well as another If Event could crown or condem an action Virtue and Vice were not at such a distance as God and Nature have set them That would be Virtue in this age which was Vice in the former that which is true to day might be false to morrow For the same lot befalleth them both That storm which now beateth upon the one may anon be as sharp and violent against the other And indeed Virtue is most fair and glorious in the foulest weather This action hath prospered in my hand Therefore God hath signified it as just is an argument which an Heathen would deny who had but seen the best intentions and goodliest resolutions either by subtilty or violence oft beaten down to the ground Certainly no true Israelite could thus conclude 2 Kings 22.2 who had seen Josiah walking in all the wayes of David his father 2 Kings 23.29 and yet at the last stricken down by the hand of Pharaoh Nechoh in the battel at Megiddo It was indeed the argument of the Epicure against the Providence of God Lucret. l. 2. Aedes saepe suas disturbat That Jupiter let fall his thunderbolts upon his own houses and temples But the Christian can draw no such inferences and conclusions who knoweth the wayes of God are past finding out Rom. 11 3◠Gal. 6.14 that the world must be crucified unto him and he unto the world that he must * Acts 14.22 make his way through many afflictions and troubles to his everlasting rest All that can be said is God permitteth it For for any command 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 where is it to be found And how can we conclude of that which we do not cannot know Permit it he doth and so he doth all the evil in the world for if he did not permit it it could not be done Hence it is that the storm falleth upon the best as well as upon the worst But to the one though ye call it a Storm it is indeed a gracious rain to water and refresh them as for the other it sweepeth them away and swalloweth them up for ever God's Judgements are like his Spirit Joh. 3.8 a wind that bloweth where it lifteth and we hear the sound thereof but cannot tell whence it cometh nor whither it goeth neither for what cause in particular they are sent nor what is their end Permission is no fit basis to build a Command upon Nor can Approbation be the consequent where Permission onely is the antecedent We can no more draw such a conclusion from such premisses then we can strike water out of a flint or fire out of a cake of ice The wicked prosper in their wayes Every Sorcerer is not struck blind Every sacrilegious Ananias is not stricken dead Every Sodom is not consumed with fire But this doth not justifie Sorcery and Sacrilege and Unnatural lust And The righteous are cast down and perish Every just man doth not flourish as a green bay-tree Nay rather as the Apostle saith Not many wise not many noble 1 Cor. 1.26 c. so not many just not many righteous do flourish But this doth not condemn Innocency nor on the sudden as it were transubstantiate and change Virtue into Vice I have the rather brought this Prejudice forth and exposed it to shame because it is common especially amongst the common sort who are as good Logicians as they are Divines whose very natural Logick their Reason is tainted and corrupted by the world in which they live and to which in a manner they grow It is vox populi the language of the Many and it is taken up too oft He hath taken a wrong course Ye see God doth not bless it This is not just For it doth not thrive A Prejudice this which quite putteth out their eyes that they cannot distinguish evil from good nor good from evil the Devil's snare and he hath scarce such another in which he taketh so many He was unfortunate Therefore he was not wise He prospered in his wayes Therefore his wayes were right It is plebiscitüm an Ordinance of the people And sometimes it is senatus consultum an Ordinance of those who count themselves wise And it hath been rescriptum Imperatoris the rescript and determination of the highest A Prejudice which may drive a man like Nebuchadnezzar amongst beasts and make him worse then they An opinion which first withereth a soul that it can bear no fruit and then leaveth it as fuel for hell fire for ever An opinion bellied like the Trojane horse in which lie lurking oppression Deceit Treason all the enemies of Truth and the Father of lies the Devil himself ready to break forth and destroy and devour a soul A foundation and basis large enough to raise a Babel upon all the evil we can do all the evil we can think even confusion it self The hope of good success may flatter me into the greatest sin and when success hath crowned that hope it will dress that sin in the grave mantle of Virtue and Piety and so shut out Repentance for ever Ye see the danger of Prejudice It lieth as a serpent in our way Gen. 49.17 as an adder in our path to bite our heels to hinder us that we cannot travel to the market where Truth is to be bought Let us therefore lay aside all Prejudice and as new born babes desire the sincere milk of the Truth 1 Pet. 2.2 that we may grow thereby Let us not build our faith upon any particular Church or Sect For it is possible that a Church may erre and so deceive us Hear O Israel when the Church speaketh but not so as when God speaketh and publisheth his commands Hear the Church Matth. 18.17 but then when she speaketh the words of God Let not a name and glorious title dazle our eyes He will make but an ill
them were not an act of our Faith but of our Knowledge Therefore Christ shewed not himself openly to all the people at his resurrection Tert. Apol. ut fides non mediocri praemio destinata non nisi difficultate constaret that faith by which we are destined to a crown might not consist without some difficulty but commend it self by our obedience the perfection and beauty whereof is best seen in making its way through difficulties And so Hilary Habet non tam veniam quà m praemium ignorare quod credis Lib. 8. De Trin Not perfectly to know what thou certainly believest doth so little stand in need of pardon that it is that alone which draweth on the reward For what obedience can it be for me to assent to this That the whole is greater then the part that the Sun doth shine or any of those truths which are visible to the eye What obedience it is to assent to that which I cannot deny But when the object is in part hidden in part seen when the truth we assent to hath more probability to establish it then can be brought to shake it then our Saviour himself pronounceth John 20.29 Blessed are they who have not seen and yet have believed Besides it were in vain he should afford us more light who hath given us enough For to him that will not rest in that which is enough nothing is enough When God had divided the Red sea when he rained down Manna upon the Israelites and wrought many wonders amongst them the Text saith For all this they sinned still Psal 78.31 and believed not his wondrous works The Pharisees saw Christ's miracles yet would have stoned him They saw him raise Lazarus from the dead and would have killed them both The people said He hath done all things well Mar. 7.37 John 7.48 yet these were they that crucified the Lord of life Did any of the Pharisees believe in him We might ask Did any of his Disciples believe in him Christ himself calleth them Fools and slow of heart to believe what the Prophets had foretold Luke 24.25 Their Fear had sullied the evidence that they could not see it the Text sayth they forsook him and fled Matth. 26.56 And the reason of this is plain For though Faith be an act of the Understanding yet it dependeth upon the Will and men are incredulous nor for want of those means which may raise a faith but for want of will to follow that light which leadeth unto it they do not believe because they will not and so bear themselves strongly upon opinion preconceived beyond the strength of all evidence whatsoever When our affections and lusts are high and stand out against it the evidence is put by and forgot and the object which calls for our eye and faith begins to disappear and vanish and at last is nothing Quot voluntates tot fides saith Hilary So many Wills so many Creeds For there is no man that believeth more than he will To make this good we may appeal to men of the slendrest observation and least experience we may appeal to our very eye which cannot but see those uncertain and uneven motions in which men are carried on in the course of their life For what else is that that turneth us about like the hand of a Dial from one point to another from one perswasion to a contrary How cometh it to pass that I now embrace what anon I tremble at What is the reason that our Belief shifteth so many scenes and presenteth it self in so many several shapes now in the indifferency of a Laodicean anon in the violence of a Zealot now in the gaudiness of Superstition anon in the proud and scornful slovenry of factious Profaneness that many make so painful a peregrination through so many modes and forms of Religion and at last end in Atheists What reason is there There can be none but this the prevalency and victory of our Sensitive part over our Reason and the mutability yea and stubbornness of our Will which cleaveth to that which it will soon forsake but is strongly set against the Truth which bringeth with it the fairest evidence but not so pleasing to the sense This is it which maketh so many impressions in the mind Self-love and the Love of the world these frame our Creeds these plant and build these root and pull down build up a faith and then beat it to the ground and then set up another in its place James 1.8 2 Tim. 2 8 A double-minded man saith S. James is unstable in all his wayes Remember saith S. Paul that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised up from the dead according to my Gospel That is a sure foundation for our faith to build on There we have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fair and certain pledges of faith as it were a commentary upon EGO VIVO or as so many beams of light to make it open and manifest to every eye which give up so fair an evidence that the malice of the Jew cannot avoid it Matth. 28.13 Let them say His Disciples stole him away whilest their stout watchmen slept What stole him away and whilest they slept It is a dream and yet it is not a dream it is a studied lye and doth so little shake that it confirmeth our faith so transparent that through it we may behold more clearly the face of Truth which never shineth brighter than when a lye is drawn before it to vail and shadow it Matth. 28.6 He is not here he is risen if an Angel had not spoken it yet the Earthquake the Clothes the Clothes so diligently wrapt up the Grave it self did speak it And where such strange impossibilities are brought in to colour and promote a lye they help to confute it Id negant quod ostendunt They deny what they affirm and Malice it self is made an argument for the truth 1 Cor. 15.5 6. For it we have a better verdict given by Cephas and the twelve yea we have a cloud of witnesses above five hundred brethren at once who would not make themselves the fathers of a lye to propogate that Gospel which either maketh our yea yea and nay nay or damneth us Nor did they publish it to raise themselves in wealth and honour For it teacheth them to contemn these matters maketh Poverty a beatitude and sheweth them a sword and persecution which they were sure to meet with and did afterwards in the prosecution of their office and publication of that faith Nor could they take any delight in such a lye as would gather so many clouds over their heads which would at last dissolve in that bitterness that would make life it self a punishment and at last take it away And how could they hope that men would ever believe that which themselves knew to be a lye These witnesses then are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 many and beyond exception
is a main difference nor can we expect an ocular and visible descent Therefore if we will be taught by the Spirit we must use the means which the same Spirit hath prescribed in those lessons which he first and extraordinarily taught the Apostles and not make use of his name to misinterpret those lessons or bring in new of our own and as new so contrary to them For what is new must needs be contrary because he then taught all truth and what is more then all is nothing what is more then all truth must needs by a lye Nor did he lead them into all truth for themselves alone but for those who should come after them for all generations to the end of the world He made them Apostles and sent them to make us Christians to make that which he taught them a rule of life and to fix it on the Church as on a pillar that all might read it that none should adde to it or take away from it Eph. 2.20 And for this they are called a Foundation and we are said to be built upon them Jesus Christ being the head corner-stone But this we could not be if their testimony were so scant and defective that there were left a kind of necessity upon us to hew and square out what stones we please and lay new ones of our own to cast down theirs withal and to bear up whatsoever our insolent and boundless lusts will lay upon them And now what is become of my Text For if this be admitted we cannot say the Spirit led them For what leading is that which leaveth us so far behind at such a distance from the end thâ—â— in every age the Spirit must come again and take us by the hand and draw us some other way even contrary to that which he first made known And what an all is that to which every man may adde what he please even to the end of the world For every mans claim and title to the Spirit is the same as just and warrantable in any as in one And when they speak contrary things the evidence is the same that is none at all unless this be a good Argument He hath the Spirit because he saith so which is as strong on his side that denyeth it upon the same pretense Amongst the sons of men there are not greater fools then they who have nothing to say for what they say but That they say it and yet think this Nothing enough and that all Israel are bound to hearken to them as if God himself did speak This is an evil a folly a madness which breatheth no where but in Christendome was never heard of in any other body or society but that of Christians Though many Governours of Common-wealths did pretend to a kind of commerce and familiarity with some God or Goddess when they were to make a law yet we do not read of any as far as I remember that did put up the same pretense that they might break a law but when the law was once promulged there was nothing thought of but either obedience or punishment But Christians who have the best Religion have most abused it have played the wantons in that light in which they should have walkt with fear and trembling finding themselves at a loss and meeting with no satisfaction to their pride and ambition to their malice to their lusts from any lesson the Spirit hath yet taught have learnt an art to suborn something of their own to supply that defect and call it a dictate of the Spirit Nor is this evil of yesterday nor doth it befall the weakest onely But the Devil hath made use of it in all ages as of the fittest engine to undermine that truth which the Spirit first taught Tertullian as wise a man as the Church then had being not able to prove the Corporeity of the Soul by Scripture Post Ioannem quoque prophetiam meruimus consequi c. Tertull. de Anim. montanizans flyeth to private Revelation in his Book De anima Non per aestimationem sed revelationem What he could not uphold by reason and judgment he striveth to make good by Revelation For we saith he have our Revelations as well as S. John Our sister Priscilla hath plenty of them and trances in the Church She converseth with Angels and with God himself and can discern the hearts and inward thoughts of men S. Hierome mentioneth others Contra Libertin and in the dayes of our forefathers Calvine many more who applyed the name of the Spirit to every thing that might facilitate and help on their design as Parish-priests it is his resemblance would give the name of six or seven several Saints to one image that their offerings might be the more I need not go so far back for instance Our present age hath shewn us many who though very ignorant yet are wiser then their teachers so spiritual that they despise the word of God which is the dictate of the Spirit This monster hath made a large stride from foreign parts and set his foot in our coasts If they murder the Spirit moved their hand and drew their sword If they throw down Churches it is with the breath of the Spirit If they would bring in Parity the pretence is The Spirit cannot endure that any should be supreme or Pope it but themselves Our Humour our Madness our Malice our Violence our implacable Bitterness our Railing and Reviling must all go for Inspirations of the Spirit Simeon and Levi Absalom and Ahithophel Theudas and Judas the Pharisees and Ananias they that despise the holy Spirit of God these Scarabees bred in the dung of sensuality these Impostors these men of Belial must be taken no longer for a generation of vipers but for the scholars and friends of the holy Ghost Whatsoever they do whithersoever they go he is their leader though it be to hell it self May we not make a stand now and put it to the question Whether there be any holy Ghost or no and if there be Whether his office be to lead us Indeed these appropriations these bold and violent ingrossings of the blessed Spirit have I fear given growth to conceits well near as dangerous That the Spirit doth not spirare breath grace into us That we need not call upon him That the Text which telleth us the holy Ghost leadeth is the holy Ghost that leadeth us That the Letter is the Spirit and the Spirit the Letter an adulterate piece new coyned an old heresie brought in a new dress and tire upon the stage again That he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a strange unheard of Deity and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nazianz. Orat 37. Quis vetâ—rum vel recentium adoravit Spiritum quis or avit c. Sic Macedoniani Eunomiani Ibid. an ascriptitious and supernumerary God I might say more dangerous For to confess the Spirit and abuse him to draw him on as an accessory and
spiritual wisdome which is that Salt which every Teacher should have in himself Matth. 5.13 Mark 9.50 to urge and press it to the multitude who are too ready to make an idol of that Serpent which is lifted up to cure them For how many weak hands and feeble knees and cowardly hearts hath this made How willing are we to hear of weakness and impossibilities because we would not keep the Law How oft do we lye down with this thought and do nothing or rather run away with it even against the Law it self and break it What polluted blind impotent cripled wretches are we ready to call our selves which were indeed a glorious confession were it made out of hatred to sin But most commonly these words are sent forth not from a broken but a hollow heart and comfort us rather than accuse us are rather flatteries then aggravation the oyl of sinners to break their heads and to infatuate them not to supple their limbs but benum them And they beget no other Resolution in us but this Not to gird up our loins because we are weak To sin more and more because we cannot but sin Not to do what God requireth because we have already concluded within our selves that it is impossible To conclude this The question is not Whether we can exactly keep a Law so as not to fail sometimes as men for I know no reason why this question should be put up but Whether we can keep it so far forth as God requireth and in his goodness will accept Whether we can be just and merciful and humble men And if this be impossible then will follow as sad an impossibility of being saved For the not doing what God requireth is that alone which shutteth the gates of Heauen against us and cutteth off all hope of eternal happiness And this were to unpeople Heaven this were a Dragons tail to draw down all the stars and cast them into hell But the Saints are sealed and have this seal That they did what God required And it is a thing so far from being impossible that the Prophet maketh but a But of it It is not impossible it is but to do justly to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God Secondly it is so far from being impossible that it is but an easie duty My yoke is easie Matth. 11.30 saith our Saviour and my burden light For it is fitted to our necks and shoulders and is so far from taking from our nature or pressing it with violence that it exalteth and perfecteth it All is in putting it about our necks Prov 1.9 and then this yoke is an ornament of grace as Solomon's chain about them And when this burden is layd on then it is not a burden but our Form to quicken us and our Angel to guide us with delight in all our waies And this the beloved Disciple suckt from his Master's bosome 1 John 5.3 This is the love of God that we keep his commandments and his commandments are not grievous For here is Love and Hope to sweeten them and make them easie and pleasant Nor doth he speak this as an Oratour to take men by craft by telling them that that which he exhorted them to was neither impossible nor difficult and so give force to his exhortation and make a way for it to enter and work a full perswasion in them to be obedient to those commands but as a Logician he backeth and establisheth his affirmation with an undeniable reason in the next verse For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world and so his commandments are not grievous to those who have the true knowledge of God He that is born of God must needs have strength enough to pass through all hindrances whatsoever to tread down all Principalities and Powers to demolish all imaginations which set up and oppose themselves and so make these commands more grievous then they are in their own nature And this he strengthneth with another reason in the next verse For he that is born of God hath the help and advantage of Faith and full perswasion of the power of Jesus Christ which is that victory which overcometh the world So that whosoever saith the commandments are grievous with the same breath excommunicateth himself from the Church of Christ and maketh himself an hypocrite and professeth he is that which he is not a Christian when Christ's words are irksome and tedious unto him that he is born of God when he hath neither the language nor the motion of a child of God doth not what God requireth but doth the works of another father the Devil When men therefore pretend they cannot do what God requireth they should change their language for the truth is they will not If they would there were more for them then against them Salvian Totum durum est quicquid imperatur invitis To an unwilling mind every command carrieth with it the fearful shew of difficulty Mavult execrari legem quà m emendari mentem praecepta odisse quà m vitia A wicked man mavult emendare Deos quà m seipsum saith Seneca had rather condemn the Law then reform his life rather hate the precept then his sin Continence is a hard lesson but to the wanton Liberality to a Miser Temperance to a Glutton Obedience to a Factious and Rebellious spirit All these things are hard to him that loveth not Christ But where there is will there is strength enough Cant. 8 6. and Love is stronger then Death What was sweeter then Manna Isid Pelus 2. ep 67. what sooner gathered yet the children of Israel murmured at it What more bitter then Hunger and Imprisonment yet S. Paul rejoyced in them Nay 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Wickedness in its own nature is a troublesome and vexations thing Vitia magno coluntur saith Seneca Scarce any sin we commit but costeth us dear What more painful then Anger what more perplext and tormenting then Revenge what more intangled then Lust what can more disquiet us then Ambition what more fearful then Cruelty what sooner disturbed then Pride Nay further yet How doth one sin incroch and trespass upon another I fling off my Pleasure and Honour to make way to my Revenge I deny my Lust to further my Ambition and rob my Covetousness to satisfie my Lust and forbear one sin to commit another and so do but versuram facere borrow of one sin to lay it out on another binding and loosing my self as my corruption leadeth me but never at ease Tell me Which is easier saith the Father to search for wealth in the bowels of the earth nay in the bowels of the poor by oppression then to sit down content with thy own night and day to study the world or to embrace Frugality to oppress every man or to relieve the oppressed to be busie in the Market or to be quiet at home to take other mens goods or to give my own to be
by them who will receive her nor dwell with those persons which contemn her nor save those who will destroy themselves To conclude this He is most unworthy to receive Grace who in the least degree detracteth from the power of it And he is as unworthy who magnifieth and rejecteth it and maketh his life an argument against his doctrine saith Grace cannot be resisted and resisteth it every day He that denieth the power of God's Grace is scarse a Christian And he is the worst of Christians who will not gird up his loins and work out his salvation but loitreth and standeth idle all the day long shadoweth and pleaseth himself under the expectation of what God will do and so turneth his grace into wantonness Let us not abuse the Grace of God and then we cannot magnifie it enough But he that will not set his hand to work upon a phansie that he wanteth Grace he that vvill not hearken after Grace though she knock and knock again as Fortune vvas said to have done at Galba's gate till she be vveary hath despised the Grace of God and cannot plead the vvant of that for any excuse vvhich he might have had but put it off nay vvhich he had but so used it as if it had been no Grace at all They that have Grace offered and repel it they that have antidotes against Death and vvill not use them can never ansvver the expostulation Why will ye die And certainly he that is so liberal of his Grace hath given us knovvledge enough to see the danger of those vvayes vvhich lead to Death And therefore in the next place Ignorance of our vvayes doth not minuere voluntarium make our sin less vvilful but rather aggrandize it For first vve may if vve vvill knovv every duty that tendeth to life and every sin that bringeth forth death 2 Cor. 2.11 We may know the Devils enterprises saith S. Paul And the ignorance of this findeth no excuse when we have power and faculty light and understanding When the Gospel shineth brightly upon us to dispell those mists which may be placed between the Truth and us Sub scientiae facultate nescire repudiatae magìs quà m non compertae veritatis est reatus Hil. in Psal 118. then if we walk in darkness and in the shadow of death we shall be found guilty not so much of not finding out the truth as of refusing it as Hilary speaketh of a strange contempt in not attaining that which is so easily atchieved and which is so necessary for our preservation I know every man hath not the same quickness of apprehension nor can every man make a Divine and it were to be wisht every man would know it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is not for him that thresheth out the corn to resolve controversies or State questions But S. Peter requireth that every man should be able to give an answer 1 Pet. 3.15 a reason of his faith And if he can do that he knoweth the will of God and is well armed and prepared against death and may cope with him and destroy him if he will And this is no perplext nor intricate study but fitted and proportioned to the meanest capacity He that cannot be a Seraphical Divine may be a Christian He that cannot be a Rabbi may be an honest man And if men were as diligent in the pursuit of the truth as they are in managing their own temporal affairs if men would try as many conclusions for knowledge as they do for wealth and were as ambitious to be good as they are to be rich and great if they were as much afraid of Gods wrath as they are of poverty and the frown of a mortal this pretense of want of knowledge would be soon removed and quite taken out of the way Tit. 2.11 Acts 17.30 For now the Grace of God hath appeared unto all men and commanded all men every where to repent and turn from their evil wayes What apologie can the Oppressour have when Wisdome it self hath sounded in his ears and told him Lev. 19.18 Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self for even flesh and bloud would soon conclude that no man will oppress himself What can the Revenger plead after the thunder Rom. 12.19 Vengeance is mine What can the Covetous pretend when he heareth Go sell all and give to the poor What can the Seditious say Matth. 19.21 when he is plainly told He that resisteth shall receive damnation Rom. 13.2 Can any man miss his way where there is so much light to direct him when he brought a great part of his lesson along with him into the world which he may run and read and understand How can he there erre dangerously where the Truth is fastned to a pillar where there is such a Mercury to shew him his way And therefore in the second place if we be ignorant it is because we will be ignorant If we could open a window into the breasts of men we should soon perceive a hot contention between their Knowledge and their Lusts strugling together like the twins in Rebekah's womb till at last their Lust supplanteth their Knowledge and gaineth the preeminence Nolunt intelligere nè cogantur facere saith Augustine They will not understand their duty lest that many draw upon them an obligation to do it nor will they see their errour because they have no mind to forsake it For their Knowledge pointeth towards life but not to be attained to but by sweat and blood which their Lust loatheth and trembleth at And therefore this knowledge is too wonderful for them Psal 139.6 nay it is as the gall of bitterness unto them As Nero's mother would not suffer him to study Philosophy quia imparaturo contraria Suet. Nerone c. 25. because it prescribeth many moral virtues as Sincerity Modesty and Frugality which sort not well with the Crown and must needs fall cross with those actions which Politie and Necessity many times ingage the Monarchs of the earth so do these look upon the Truth as a thing contrary to them as checking their Pride bridling their Malice bounding their Ambition chiding their Injustice threatning their Tyranny and so they study to unlearn suppress and silence it and will not hear it speak to them any more but set up a Lie first the childe then the parasite of their Lusts and enthrone it in its place to reign over them and guide them in all their waies I remember Bernard in one of his Sermons upon the Canticles telleth us that he observed many cast down and very sad and dejected upon the knowledge of the Truth not so much for that it did shew them the danger they were in and withal an open and effectual door to escape but that it choaked the passages and stopped up the way to their old asylum and sanctuary of Ignorance For Truth is not onely a light but a fire to scorch and burn
us not onely a direction but a Satyre It teacheth us to deny ungodly lusts Tit. 2.12 and if we obey not it censureth and condemneth us This Ignorance then cannot excuse our Sin or make our Death less voluntary because our Lust hath taken the place of Knowledge and dictateth for it and we grope at noon-day and will not see those sins which though they be works of darkness yet are as visible as the light it self Rebellion is not therefore no sin because it cometh gravely towards us in the habit of Zeal and Religion Profaneness is not excusable because fanatick persons count Reverence Superstition Deceit is not warrantable because I hold it as a positive truth That the wicked have title to the things of this world and my phantastick Lusts have drawn out another conclusion where there was no medium no premisses to be found That I am a righteous person and then followeth a conclusion as wilde as that That I may rob and spoil them But these are but bella tectoriala artificial daubings and the weakest eye may see through them and discover a monster And as Tully in one of his books De Finibus telleth us that those Philosophers who would not plainly say that Pleasure was their summum bonum or chiefest happiness but Vacuity of sorrow and trouble did vicinitate versari bordered and came near to that which they first called it so the world hath found out divers names to colour and commend their foulest sins but bring them to the trial and they must needs mean one and the same thing and that Zeal and Rebellion Devotion and Profaneness Taking from the wicked and downright Cosenage are at no greater distance then these two a Fiend and a Devil but that the Devil is then worst when he taketh the name of an Angel of light 2 Cor. 11.14 The truth is plain enough but the Prince of this world hath so blinded men that they will not see it For their Lust which laid their Conscience asleep hath taken the chair and prescribeth for it and driveth them on to do that which was never done nor seen Judg. 19.30 Wisd 2.11 to tread all Laws of God and man under feet and make their strength the Law of unrighteousness I know not whether we may call this Ignorance or no. It is too good a name for it and nothing but our Charity can make it so or grace it so much If it be Ignorance it is a proud puffing majestick insolent ignorance Maimonid More Neroch part 3. c. 41. The Jewish Rabbies might well say Error doctrinae reputatur pro superbia This ignorance is nothing but pride or the issue of it even of that pride which threw Lucifer down from heaven and raiseth men here upon earth to fling them down after him But in the last place to conclude this If this Ignorance be not affected or rather forced and made a pillow to sleep on yet if it proceed onely from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 non-attention and supine negligence to keep it out yet in matters which concern life and death we are as much bound to know the means how as to strive to attain the one and escape the other Pet. Aerod de Reb. Iudicat de Eide Relig. c. 5. Idem For what I ought to do I ought to know The Jews have a saying Delinquit propheta qui à propheta decipitur It is a great fault in a Prophet to be deceived though by another Prophet The Civilians Imperitia medicorum dolo comparatur Ignorance in a Physician is a kind of cheat and a bloody cheat Plin. N. Hist. for the ignorant Physician negotiatur animas hominum saith old Cato in Pliny doth trade and deceive men out of their lives when they most trust in him If a man be ignorant and will administer Physick he will kill If a man be ignorant and will preach he will also prophesie lies If he be a Magistrate and will govern he will also shake the pillars of the Common-wealth If he be a Christian and be ignorant then as he will profess so also will he run into the snares of the Devil And this his Ignorance is no plea against that Law which he was bound to know as well as to keep Ex toto noluisse debet Sen. Contr. l. 5. c. 5. qui imprudentia defenditur He that will plead ignorance â—r Errour for an excuse must have his whole will strongly set up against it and then the great difficulty or impossibility of avoiding it may be his advocate and speak for him but if he make room for it when he might exclude it if he embrace that which may let it in or make no use of the light that detecteth it if he will or reject not or be indifferent if he distast the truth for some cross aspect it hath on his designs and love a lie because it smileth upon them and promoteth them then this Ignorance is a sin and the last the greatest and therefore cannot make up an excuse for another sin for those sins which it bringeth in in triumph but it is so much the more malignant in that he had light but did turn his face away and would not see it or did hate and despise it and blow it out For he that will not know the wayes of life or calleth his evil wayes by that name may vvell be asked the question Why he will die Ignorance then is not alvvayes an excuse For some are negligent and indifferent will not take the pains to lift themselves up to the truth by those steps and degrees which are set for them and are the way unto it and so walk as in the night which themselves have made because they would not look upon the Sun Others study and affect it and when the truth will not go along with them to the end of their designes they perswade themselves into those errours which are more proportioned to it and will friendly wait upon them and be serviceable to fill and answer that expectation which their lust had raised and call them by that name They will not know what they cannot but know nor see Death though he stand before them in their way and so are led on with pomp and state with these false perswasions with these miserable comforters to their grave But in the next place when we find some check of conscience some regret some gainsayings in our mind that vve are unvvilling to go on in these evil vvayes and yet take courage and proceed vve are ready to please our selves vvith this thought and are soon of the opinion that vvhat vve are doing or have done already if it be evil yet is done against our vvill And if Destruction overtake us it seiseth on them that did so much hate and abhor it that they shook and trembled vvhen it did but shevv it self to them in a thought And this I take to be an errour as full of danger
best and most experienced Masters so doth he condescend and indulge to our infirmity and appointeth the fittest for us and those of whom we will soonest learn Our first question commonly is Who is the Preacher We deliver up our Judgments to our Affections and converse rather with mens fortunes then their persons and make use of no other rule in our censure of what is done or said then the Man himself that did or spake it If Honour or Power or Wealth have made the man great in our eyes then whatsoever he speaketh is an oracle though it be a doctrine of Devils and have the same Father which all other lyes have Truth doth seldome go down with us unless it be presented in the cup in which we love to divine and prophesie Eccl. 9.15 There was a poor wise man found saith Solomon that delivered the city by his wisdome but none remembred or considered this poor wise man For Poverty is a cloud and casteth a darkness over that which is begot of light sullieth every perfection that is in us hideth it from an eye of flesh which cannot see Wisdome and Poverty together in one man whereas Folly it self shall go for Wisdome and carry away that applause which is due to it if it dwell in the heart or issue from the mouth of a purple and gallant fool Vt sumuâ— sic judicamus As we are so we judge and it is not our Reason which concludeth but our Sense and Affection If we love Beauty every painted wanton is as the Queen of Sheba and may ask Solomon a question If Riches Dives with us will be a better Evangelist then S. Luke If our eyes dazle at Majesty Acts 12.21 22 Herodes royal apparel will be a more eloquent oratour then he that speaketh and the people shall give a shout and cry The voice of a God and not of a man Do but ask our selves the question Doth not Affection to the person beget Admiration in you and Admiration commend whatsoever he saith and gild over Errour and Sin it self and make them current Do not your Hopes or Fears or Love make up every opinion in you and build you up in your most unholy faith Is not the Coward or the Dotard or the Worldling in your Creed and Profession Do you not measure out one another as you do a tree by the bulk and trunk and count him best who is most worth Is not this the compass by which you steer Is not this the bond of your peace the cement of all your friendship Doth not this outward respect serene or cloud your countenance and as the wind and the state of things change make you to day the dearest friends and to morrow the deadliest enemies Can you think ill of them you gain by or speak ill of them you fear Can he be evil who is powerful or dare you be more wise then he that hath thirty legions We may say this is a great evil under the sun But it is the property of the blessed Spirit to work good out of evil to teach us to remember what we are by those who so soon make us forget what we are to make use of Riches which we dote on of Power which we tremble at of that Glory which we have in admiration to instruct us to the knowledge of our condition and to put us in mind of our mortality and frailty by Kings whom we count as Gods Behold a King from his throne proclaimeth it to his subjects and all the world That his Power is but as a shadow cast from a mortal his Glory but his garment which he cannot wear long and his Riches but the embroidery which will be as soon worn out And when we have gazed and fallen down and worshipt and are thus lost in our own thoughts if we could take away the film from our eye which the world hath drawn over it and see every thing in its nature and substance as it is we should behold in all these raies of glory and power and wealth nothing but David the stranger So that we see Kings who are our nursing-Fathers are become our School-masters to teach us Psal 49.10 For we see that ignorant and foolish men perish and they dye as fools dye not remembred nor thought on as if nothing fell to the ground but their Folly The begger dyeth Luke 16.22 but what is that to the rich who cannot see him carried by the Angels into Abrahams bosome The righteous also perish and no man layeth it to heart I Isa 57.1 but Kings of the earth fall and cannot fall but with observation they fall as a star are soon mist in their orb and soon forgot But then living Kings make their Throne a Pulpit and preach from thence and publish to the world their own frail and fading condition measure out their life by a span Psal 39.5 12. Psal 85.8 and prophesie the end of it call their life a Pilgrimage and shall we not hearken what the Lord God doth say by such royal Prophets Shall their Power make us beasts of burden to carry it whithersoever their beck shall direct us and shall not their Doctrine and Example perswade us that we are men travelling men hasting to another counâ—ry Behold then here David a Prophet and a King made and set up an ensample to us And if David be a stranger upon the earth we can draw no other conclusion then this Then certainly much more we If David and all his Fathers if pious Kings and bloudy Tyrants if good and bad found no setled estate no abiding place here why should we be so foolish and ignorant as to turmoil or sport and delight our selves under the expectation of it If Kings be pulled down from their thrones and fall to the dust we have reason to cast up our accounts and reckon upon it that we are gliding and passing nay posting and flying as so many shadows and that our removal is at hand 1 Cor. 10.11 For these things happened to them for ensamples and they are written for our admonition They prophesied to us and they spake to us I may say They died to us and to all that shall follow them to the last man that shall stand upon the earth When Adam had lived nine hundred and thirty years Gen. 5.5 he dyed led the way to his posterity not that they should live so long but that they should surely dye every son of his till the second coming of the second and last Adam Abraham was a stranger and Moses a stranger and David a stranger that we might look back upon them and see our condition When Patriarchs and Prophets and Kings preach not onely living but dying not onely dying but dead we shall not onely dye but dye in our sins if we take not out the lesson and learn to speak in their dialact and language ACCOLAE SVMVS ET PEREGRINI We are strangers and pilgrimes on the
sold an infected house And indeed I might tell you that Truth is a virtue like unto the Plague which will not onely destroy us but make all that know us to shun us I might shew you that the retinue which usually wait upon her are Sequestration Nakedness Disgrace Persecution the Sword and Death it self Bona mens si esset venalis non haberet emtorem saith Seneca And we find it true that Truth is so dangerous and troublesome that if she were to be sold in the market she would hardly meet with a chapman But when I present the Truth as a dangerous displeasing costly thing I intend not like the Spies to bring up an evil report upon that good land Nâ—mb 13.32 as if it did eat up the inhabitants and so to dishearten any man from the pursuit of Truth No the land is pleasant and fruitful flowing with milk and honey go up and possess it But as Antigonus when he heard his soulders murmure because he had brought them into a place of disadvantage having by his wisdom freed them from that danger and brought them to a fairer place where they might hope for victory Now saith he I expect ye should not murmure but praise my art that have brought you forth into a place so convenient So if any under the conduct of Truth be at any time in great streights and difficulties let him but possess his soul with patience under the leading of the same Truth and he shall at last be brought forth into pleasant and delightful places even into the paradise of God For as our Master Aristotle speaketh of Pleasures that if they did but look upon us when they come to us as they do when they turn their backs and leave us we should never entertain them so may we on the contrary say of this Truth If we saw the end of it as we do the beginning we should run after it and lay hold on it with restless embraces For though at the first meeting we see nothing written in her countenance but Wo and Desolation yet if we spend our time with her we shall find her to be the fairest of ten thousand And it is the wisdom of God to place the greatest good in that which to flesh and bloud hath the appearance of the greatest evil And when the beauty and glory of Truth is once revealed unto us the horrour of it will scarce appear or if it do but as an atome before the Sun And now to shew you the fairer and better side of Truth I might tell you Prov. 3.18 14. Matth. 13.46 that She is a tree of life to them that lay hold upon her that The merchandise of her is better then the merchandise of silver and the gain thereof then fine gold that she is that rich Pearl in the Gospel that She is that Girdle Ephes 6.14 cingulum omnium virtutum as the Father speaketh It not onely girdeth and enricheth the man as Faithfulness shall be the girdle of his reins but also confineth Virtue it self Isa 11.4 and keepeth it within the bounds of moderation whereas Falshood is boundless and infinite and passeth over all limits I might tell you further that Truth is a Pillar and such a one as is both a Pillar and a Foundation too For though we read that the Church is the pillar and ground of the truth 1 Tim. 3.15 yet she is such a pillar as those were in the Temple of Diana which being tied to the roof were upheld by the Temple and not the Temple by them For indeed it is the Truth that upholdeth the Church and not the Church the Truth further then to present and publish it If you take truth away the Church will not be invisible onely but nothing We believe One Catholick and Apostolick Church but that which maketh her One and Catholick and Apostolical is the Truth alone For what Unity is that whose bond is not Truth And how is that Catholick which is not and that which is not true is not at all is but an Idole and so nothing in this world Or can we call that Apostolical where Truth it self is anathematized and shut out of doors No. It is this saving Truth which maketh the Church one Catholick and Apostolick without which they are but bare and empty names without which all that we hear of Antiquity Consent Succession Miracles is but noyse but the paintings of a Church but the trophees of a conquered party but as the vain hopes of dying men or indeed but as flattering Epitaphs on the graves of Tyrants which dishonour them rather then commend them As it was said of Pallas Epitaphium pro opprobrio fuit His glorious Epitaph did more defame him then a Satyre Yea yet further I might tell you how that in some sense that may be spoken of this Truth which was spoken of Christ himself John 1.3 That all things were made by it and that without it not any thing was made that was made not any thing that concerneth our everlasting peace It is it that sealed the promises signed the New Testament and made it Gospel finished our faith gathered the Church upheld it militant and will make it triumphant But all this is too general To make this Truth therefore appear to be a precious merchandise indeed let us consider that 1. It is fit and proportionable to the Soul of Man which is made capable of it and is but a naked yea which is worse a deformed thing till this Truth array and beautifie it is under want and indigence till this Truth enrich and supply it till it give wings unto it as Plato saith wherewith it may lift up it self aloft and flie from the land of darkness to the region of light Whilest our soul receiveth no impressions whilest it doth no more but onely inform the body whilest it is simplex as Tertullian speaketh qualem habent qui solam habent is but such a soul as those creatures have whose soul serveth onely to make them grow and be sensible so long in respect of outward operation we little differ from the Beasts of the field When instead of this Truth it receiveth the characters of darkness the spots and pollutions of the world when it is nothing else but as a table written with lies we are far worse then the brute Beasts When we savour of the things of God Matth. 16.23 our Saviour hath given us the name we are as Devils But when the soul is characterized with the Truth when the true light shineth in our hearts we are Men we are Saints and shall be like unto the Angels the soul is what she was made to be a receptacle and temple of God and destined to happiness Now in Christ Jesus that is in this Truth ye Eph. 2.13 who sometimes were far off 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are made nigb by the bloud of Christ and behold those things which concern your happiness
many times then that which we gain by lawful and prescribed means then that which we buy For it moveth like a tempest and driveth down all even the Truth it self before it Look over the whole catalogue of the sons of Belial and take a view of all the turbulent spirits that have been in the world and ye shall find the most of them to have been Enthusiasts pretenders to an unsought for and suddain revelation most wicked because so soon good and extremely ignorant because wise in an instant James 3.17 But the Truth which is from above and is not thrown down but bought from thence is pure and peaceable and easie to be intreated full of good works and without hypocrisie And it self is conveyed into us the right way so it ordereth every motion and action regulateth the whole progress of our life and maketh it like unto it self That may seem an harsh saying of Metellus Numidicus and had a Christian Divine uttered it Gell. lib. 1. c. 6. he had gone for a Pelagian His demum Deos propitios esse aequum est qui sibi adversarii non sunt Dii immortales approbare virtutem non adhibere debent It is a kind of justice that God should be favourable to those who are not enemies to themselves God sitteth above as one that hath set us our task and observeth our hands and doth not do all himself But his reason certainly is orthodox Quid nos à Deo diutiùs exspectemus nisi errationibus finem faciamus What can we expect from the God of truth if we still follow lies and will make no end of running from the truth God hath so ordered that nothing of great moment can be suddenly done Every work must find us fitted and prepared or else we shall find it will fly out of our reach Hence the Philosopher giveth this reason why there be so few wise men Quia pauci Sapientiam dignam putant nisi quam in transitu cognoscant Because the most have so low an opinion of the Truth that they think her not worth saluting unless it be by the by The reason why men know not the Truth is because they reverence it not but think it is a wind which will blow when they list that it will enter them without entreaty become theirs when they please yea whether they will or no. This is the cause why Truth which is the best merchandise is so seldom bought and phansies of our own are entertained in its place Hence it is that all our silver is dross our coyn counterfeit and our actions bear so little of the image and face of Truth upon them that To be merciful is but to fling a mite into the treasury To fast is to abstain for a day To pray is but to say Lord hear me or which is worse to multiply words without sense To love the Truth is but to hear it preached To be a Christian is onely to profess it To have faith is to boast of it To have hope is to say so and To be full of charity is but to do good to our selves These graces we deny not are infused yet they are gained encreased and confirmed in us by care and diligence Faith cometh by hearing saith the Apostle Rom. 10.17 We cannot but observe that in our greener years we are catechized and instructed and in our riper age when reason is improved in us we look over our evidence again and again and by the miracles and innocency of our Saviour and by the excellency of his doctrine and by the joynt testimony of the Apostles and the huge improbability that they should deceive us Jude 20. we are built up and building implieth labour on our most holy Faith which worketh by Charity Gal. 5.6 When that Faith which is not thus bought but is brought in without any motives or inducements without study or meditation which is not bought but created by our selves and so is a phansie rather then Faith bringeth forth nothing praiseworthy is not a foundation of good works but a mere pillar of our own setting up to lean upon and to uphold and comfort a spirit that would otherwise droop when we have committed evil If mens Faith did cost them more sure they would make more use of it then they do And for Hope What is it but a conclusion gathered by long experience by curious and watchful observation by a painful peregrination through all the powers of our soul and an exact search of all the actions of our life which if answerable to the Truth produce a firm Hope if not our Hope we may call an anchor Heb. 6.19 but it is of no more use then an anchor painted upon a wall or rather it is not an anchor but a rock at which we may shipwreck and sink I might instance in more For thus it is in all the passages of our life There is nothing wrought in us but with pains at least nothing that is worth possessing Nay those evils which we should dispossess our selves of do not alwayes enter with ease 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Chrysostome Even the things of the Devil are not attained without labour and cost How laborious is thy Revenge how busie thy Cruelty how watchful and studious thy Lust what penance doth thy Covetousness put thee to And if our vices cost us so dear and stand us at so high a rate shall we think that that Truth will run after us and follow us in all our wayes which bringeth along with it an eternal weight of glory Can a negligent and careless glance upon the Bible can our airy and empty speculations can the wantonness of our ear can our confidence and ignorance straight make us Evangelists Or is it probable that Truth should come è profundo putei out of the bottom of the well and offer her self to them who stand idle at the mouth and top of it and will let down no pitcher to draw it up 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Olymp. od 5. as Pinder speaketh Labour and cost wait still upon the Truth Nor will she visit and abide with us unless these usher her in and attend upon her Like Jabez Truth is most honourable but we bear it with pain 1 Chron. 4.9 In a word Truth is the gift of God but conditional given on condition that we fit our selves to receive it It cometh down from heaven but it must be called for here on earth Think not it will fall upon thee by chance or come to thee at any time Eccl. 11.9 12.1 if not in the dayes of thy youth yet in the evil dayes and the years in which thou shalt have no pleasure that it will offer it self in thine old age on thy bed of sickness that it will joyn and mingle it self with thy last breath and carry thy soul to happiness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now is the market now is the Truth set to sale as it
that where the article 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is added to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there we are to understand the Person of the Holy Ghost yet we rather lay hold on the pronoun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 When He the Spirit of truth shall come He shall lead you which pointeth out to a distinct Person If as Sabellius saith our Saviour had onely meant some new motion in the Disciples hearts or some effect of the Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 had been enough but ILLE He designeth a certain Person and I LLE He in Christ's mouth a distinct Person from himself Besides we are taught in the Schools Actiones sunt suppositorum Actions and operations are of Persons Now in this verse Christ sayth that he shall lead them into all truth and before he shall reprove the world v. 8. and in the precedent chapter he shall testifie of me v. 26. which are proper and peculiar operations of the blessed Spirit and bring him in a distinct Person from the Father and the Son And therefore S. Augustine resteth upon this dark and general expression Lib. 6. De Trinit Spiritus S. est commune aliquid Patris Filii quicquid illud est The Holy Ghost communicateth both of the Father and the Son is something of them both whatsoever we may call it whether we call him the Consubstantial and Coeternal communion and friendship of the Father and the Son or nexum amorosum with Gerson and others of the Schools the essential Love and Love-knot of the undivided Trinity But we will wave these more abstruse and deeper speculations in which if we speak not in the Spirit 's language we may sooner lose than profit our selves and speak more than we should whilest we are busie to raise our thoughts and words up to that which is but enough It will be safer to walk below amongst those observations which as they are more familiar and easy so are they more useful and to take what oar we can find with ease than to dig deeper in this dark mine where if we walk not warily we may meet with poysonous fogs and damps in stead of treasure We will therefore in the next place enquire why he is called the Spirit of Truth Divers attributes the Holy Ghost hath He is called the Spirit of Adoption Rom. 8.15 the Spirit of Faith 2 Cor. 4.13 the Spirit of Grace Hebr. 10.29 c. For where he worketh Grace is operative our Love is without dissimulation Rom. 12.9 our Joy is like the joy of heaven as true though not so great Gal. 5.6 Isa 6.6 Rom. 10 2. our Faith a working faith and our Zeal a coal from the altar kindled from his fire not mad and raging but according to knowledge He maketh no shadows but substances no pictures but realities no appearances Luke 1.28 but truths a Grace that maketh us highly favoured a precious and holy Faith 1 Pet. 1.7 8. full and unspeakable Joy Love ready to spend it self and Zeal to consume us Psâ—l 69.9 of a true existence being from the Spirit of that God who alone truly is But here he is stiled the Spirit of Truth yet is he the same Spirit that planteth grace and faith in our hearts that begetteth our Faith dilateth our Love worketh our Joy kindleth our Zeal and adopteth us in Regiam familiam into the Royal family of the first-born in heaven But now the Spirit of Truth was more proper For to tell men perplext with doubts that were ever and anon and somtimes when they should not asking questions of such a Teacher was a seal to the promise a good assurance that they should be well taught that no difficulty should be too hard no knowledge too high no mystery too dark and obscure for them but All truth should be brought forth and unfolded to them and having the veyl taken from it be laid open and naked to their understanding Let us then look up upon and worship this Spirit of Truth as he thus presenteth and tendereth himself unto us 1. He standeth in opposition to two great enemies to Truth Dissimulation and Flattery By the former I hide my self from others by the later I blindfold another and hide him from himself The Spirit is an enemy to both he cannot away with them 2. He is true in the Lessons which he teacheth that we may pray for his Advent long for his coming and so receive him when he cometh First dissemble he doth not he cannot For Dissimulation is a kind of cheat or jugling by which we cast a mist before mens eyes that they cannot see us It bringeth in the Devil in Samuel's mantle and an enemy in the smiles and smoothness of a friend It speaketh the language of the Priest at Delphos As to King Philip whom Pausanias slew playeth in ambiguities promiseth life when death is neerest and biddeth us beware of a chariot when it meaneth a sword No this Spirit is an enemy to this because a Spirit of truth and hateth these involucra dissimulationis this folding and involvedness these clokes and coverts these crafty conveyances of our own desires to their end under the specious shew of intending good to others And they by whom this Spirit speaketh are like him and speak the truth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Cor. 1.12 in the simplicity and godly sincerity of the spirit not in craftiness 2 Cor. 4.2 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 handling the Word of God deceitfully not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eph. 4.14 not in the slight of men throwing a die and what cast you would have them not fitting their doctrine to men and the times that is not to men and the times but to their own ends telling them of heaven when their thoughts are in their purse Wisd 1.5 6. This holy Spirit of Truth flieth all such deceit and removeth himself far from the thoughts which are without understanding and will not acquit a dissembler of his words There is nothing of the Devil's method nothing of the Die or Hand no windings or turnings in what he teacheth He speaketh the truth and nothing but the truth and for our behoof and advantage that we may believe it and build upon it and by his discipline raise our selves up to that end for which he is pleased to come and be our Teacher And as he cannot dissemble so in the next place flatter us he cannot This is the inseparable mark and character of the evil Spirit qui arridet ut saeviat who smileth upon us that he may rage against us lifteth us up that he may cast us down whose exaltations are foils whose favours are deceits whose smiles and kisses are wounds Flattery is as a glass for a Fool to look upon and behold that shape which himself hath already drawn and please himself in it because it is returned upon him by reflection and so he becometh more fool than before It is the Fools
silence Though Corah and his complices perish in their gainsayings Jude 11. yet God forbid that all Israel should be swallowed up in the same gulf Samuel ran to Eli 1 Sam. 3 5-10 when the voice was God's but was taught at last to answer Speak Lord for thy servant heareth Though Ahab had many false Prophets 1 Kings 22. yet Micaiah was a true one And though there be many false Teachers come into the world 1 Joh. 4.1 yet the Spirit of God is a Spirit of truth and he shall lead us into all truth And that we may follow as he leadeth we must observe the wayes in which he moveth For as there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a way of peace Luk. 1.79 so there are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the wayes of truth and in those wayes the Spirit will lead us 2 Pet. 2.2 I may be in the wayes of the wicked in the wayes of the Gentiles and profane men in my own wayes in those wayes which my Phansie and Lust have chalked out on that pinnacle and height where my Ambition hath placed me in that mine and pit where my Covetousness hath buried me alive and in these I walk with my face from Jerusalem from the Truth and in these wayes the Spirit leadeth me not How can he learn Poverty of spirit who hath no God but Mammon and knoweth no sin but Poverty How can he be brought down to obedience and humility who with Diotrephes loveth to have the preeminence 3 Joh. 9. and thinketh himself nothing till he is taller than his fellowes by the head and shoulders How can he hearken to the Truth who studieth lies And do we now wonder why we are not taught the truth where the Spirit keepeth open School There is no wonder at all The reason why we are not taught is Because we will not learn Ambition soareth to the highest seat and the Spirit directeth us to the ground to the lowest place Love of the world filleth our barns and the Spirit pointeth to the bellies of the poor as the better and safer granaries My private factious Humour trampleth under foot Obedience to superiours because I my self would be the highest and challenge that as my peculiar which I deny to others but the Spirit prescribeth Order Doth Montanus lead about silly women and prophesie doth he call his dreams Revelations 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Euseb l. 1. c. 21. Contr. Valent. c. 4. Eusebius telleth us that the spirit which led him about was nothing else but an unmeasurable Desire of precedency Doth Valentinus number up his Aeones and as many Crimes as God's Tertullian informeth us that he hoped for a Bishoprick but being disappointed of his hopes by one who was raised to that dignity by the prerogative of Martyrdome and his many sufferings for the Truth he turned Heretick Doth Arius deny the Divinity of the Son Read Theodoret Lib. 1◠c. 2. and he will shew you Alexander in the chair before him Doth Aerius deny there is any difference between a Bishop and Presbyter The reason was he was denied himself and could not be a Bishop so that he fell from a Bishoprick as Lucifer did from Heaven whose first wish was to be God and whose next was That there were no God at all From hence those stirs and tumults in the Church of Christ those storms and tempests which blew and beat in her face from hence those distractions and uncertainties in Christian Religion that it was a matter of some danger but to mention it This made Nazianzene in some passion as it may seem cry out Orat. 28. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. I would there were no precedency no priority no dignities in the Church but that mens estimation did only rise from virtue but now the right hand and the left the higher and the lower place these terms of difference have led men not into the truth but into that ditch where Errour muddeth it self Caeca avaritia saith Maximus Covetousness and Ambition are blind and cannot look upon the Truth though she be as manifest as the Sun at noon It fareth with men in the lust of their eyes in the love of the world as it did with the man in Artemidorus who dreamt he had eyes of gold and the next day lost them had them both put out Now no smell is sweat but that of lucre no sight delightful but of the wedge of gold By a strange kind of Chymistry men turn Religion into Gold and even by Scripture it self heap up riches and so they lose their sight and judgement and savour not the things of God but are stark blind to that Truth which should save them But now grant that they were indeed perswaded of the truth of that which they defend with so much noyse and tumult yet this may be but opinion and phansie which the Love of the world will soon build up because it helpeth to nourish it And how can we think that the Spirit led them in those wayes in which Self-love and Desire of gain drive on so furiously Sure the Spirit of truth cannot work in that building where such Sanballats laugh him to scorn Now all these are the very cords of vanity by which we are drawn from the Truth and they must all be broken asunder before the Spirit will lead us to it For he he leadeth us not over the Mountains nor through the bowels of the earth nor through the numerous atoms of our vain and uncertain and perplext imaginations but as the wisdome which he teacheth Jam. 3.17 so the method of his discipline is pure peaceable gentle without partiality without hypocrisie and hath no savour or relish of the earth For he leadeth the pure he leadeth the peaceable he leadeth humble In a word he leadeth those who are lovers of peace and truth And now to draw towards a conclusion You know the wayes in which the Spirit walketh and by which he leadeth us Will you also know the rules we must observe if we will be the Spirit 's Scholars I will be bold to give them you from one who was a great lover of truth even Galene the Physician Who though an heathen man yet by the very light of Nature found out those means and helps in the pursuit of humane knowledge which the Spirit hath set down in Scripture to further us in the search of Divine Truth They are but four The first is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Love of Truth the second 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Love of Industry a frequent meditation of the truth the third 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Orderly and methodical proceeding in the pursuit of Truth the last 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Exercitation our conformity to the Truth in our conversation This gold though brought from Ophir yet may be useful to adorn and beautifie those who are the living Temples of the holy Ghost 1. First Love is a passion imprinted in us to
urge and carry us on toward the Truth It is the first of all the passions and operations of the soul the first mover as it were being a strong propension to that we love And it is fitted and proportioned to the mind seeking out means and working forward with all heat of intention unto the end It is eminent among the affections calling up my Fear my Hope my Anger my Sorrow my Fear of not finding out what I seek yet in the midst of fear raising a Hope to attain to it my Sorrow that I find it not so soon as I would and my Anger at any thing that is averse or contrary at any cloud or difficulty placed between me and the Truth The love of Christ saith S. Paul 2 Cor. 5.14 constraineth us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is a resemblance taken from women in travel Love constraineth urgeth me worketh in me such a desire as the pain in travel doth in a woman to be delivered For do we not labour and travel with a conclusion which we would find out and what joy is there when we have like that of a woman in travel when a man-child is brought into the world If ye love me keep my commandments John 14.15 saith Christ If ye love me not ye cannot but if ye love me ye will certainly keep them Will you know the reason why the wayes of Truth are so desolate why so little Truth is known when all offereth it self and is even importunate with us to receive it There can be no other reason given but this Our hearts are congealed our spirits frozen and we coldly affected to the Truth nay averse and turn from it This Truth crosseth our profit that our pleasure other Truths stand in our light and obstruct our passage to that we most desire S. Paul speaketh plainly 2 Cor. 4.3 4. If the truth be hid it is hid to them that perish In whom the God of this world hath so blinded their mind that the light of this truth should not shine upon them If we have eyes to see her she is a fair object as visible as the Sun If we do but love the Truth the Spirit of Truth is ready to take us by the hand and lead us to it Hebr. 10.38 but those that withdraw themselves doth his soul hate 2. In the next place the Love of Truth bringeth in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Psal 1.2 a Love of Industry If we love it it will be alwayes in our thoughts and we shall meditate of it day and night Gen. 29.20 To Love seven years are but a few dayes great burdens are but small and labour is a pleasure when we walk in the region of Truth viewing it and delighting in it gathering what may be for our use we walk as in a paradise Truth is best bought when it costeth us most it must be wooed oft and seriously and with great devotion As Pithagoras said of the Gods Non est salutanda in transitu it is not to be spoken with in the By and passage it is not content with a glance and salutation and no more but we must behold it with care and anxiety make a kind of perigrination out of our selves run and sweat to meet it and then this Spirit leadeth us to it And this great encouragement we have In this our labour we never fail of the end we labour for But in our other endeavours and attempts we have nothing to uphold us under those burdens we lay upon our own shoulders but a deceitful hope which carrieth us along to see it self defeated and the frustration of that hope is a greater penalty and vexation than that pains we undertook for its sake How many rise up early to be rich and before their day shutteth up are beggers How many climb to the highest place and when they are near it and ready to sit down fall back into a prison But in this labour we never fail the Spirit working with us and blessing the work of our hands He maketh our busie and careful thoughts as his chariot and then filleth us with light Such is the privilege and prerogative of Industry such is the nature of Truth that it will be wrought out by it Never did any rise up early and in good earnest travel towards it but this Spirit brought him to his journeyes end Prov. 2.4 5. If thou seekest her as silver saith the wise man if thou search for her as for hid treasures which being hid we remove many things turn up much earth and labour hard that we may come to them then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God In this work our Industry and the Spirits help are as it were joyned and linked together You will say perhaps that the Spirit is an omnipotent Agent and can fall suddenly upon us as he did upon the Apostles this day that he can lead us in the way of Truth though we sit still though our feet be chained though we have no feet at all But the Proverb will answer you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If God will you may sail over the sea in a sieve But we must remember the Spirit leadeth us according to his own will and counsel not ours As he is an omnipotent so is he a free Agent also and worketh and dispenseth all things according to the good pleasure of his will Eph. 1.5 And certainly he will not lead thee if thou wilt not follow he will not teach thee if thou wilt not learn Nor can we think that the Truth which must make us happy is of so easie purchase that it will be sown in any ground and as the Devil's tares Matth. 13.25 grow up in us whilest we sleep 3. The third rule is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Method or an Orderly proceeding in the wayes of Truth As in all other Arts and Sciences so in spiritual Wisdome and in the School of Christ we may not hand over head huddle up matters as we please but we must keep an orderly and set course in our studies and proceedings Our Saviour Christ hath a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Seek ye first the kingdome of God Mat. 6.33 and in that Kingdome every thing in its order There is something first and something next to be observed and every thing to be ranked in its proper place The Authour of the Epistle to the Hebrews telleth us of principles of doctrine Hebr. 6.1 which must be learned before we can be led forward to perfection Heb. 5.13 14. of milk and of strong meat of plainer lessons before we reach at higher Mysteries Nor can we hope to make a good Christian veluti ex luto statuam as soon as we can make a statue out of clay Most Christians are perfect too soon which is the reason that they are never perfect They are spiritual in the twinkling of an eye they know not how nor no
full of business for others or to have no business but for my soul to be solicitous for that which cannot be done or to have no other care but to do what God requireth To do this will cost us no sweat nor labour We need not go on pilgrimage or take any long journey it will not cost us money nor engage us to our friends we need not sail for it nor plough for it nor fight for it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. saith Chrysostome If thou beest willing Orat. de ira obedience hath its work and consummation If thou wilt thou art just merciful and humble As Aristotle spake of his Magnanimous man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eth. l. 4. c. 3. Liber rectus animus omnia subjiciens sibi se nulli Sen. ep ult so to a resolved Christian nothing is great nothing is difficult It is not to dig in the minerals or labour in chains it is not to cleave wood or draw water with the Gibeonites but thy lines are fallen unto thee in a fair place it is but to do justly love mercy c. Lastly it is not onely easie but sweet and pleasant to do what God requireth For obedience is the onely spring from whence the waters of Comfort flow an everlasting foundation on which alone Joy and Peace will settle and rest For what place canst thou find what other foundation on which thou mayst build up a true and lasting joy Wilt thou look on all the works which thy hands have wrought Wilt thou prove thy heart with mirth and gather together all that is desireable and say Here it will lye All that joy will soon be exhausted and draw it self dry That Pleasure is but like that beast of the Apothecary to whom Julian the Pelagian likeneth S. Augustine Non sum similis pharmacopolae ut dicis qui promittebat bestiam quae seipsam comesset August Cont. Jul. Pelag. l. 3. c. 21. which he promised to his patient to be of great virtue which before the morning was come had eaten up himself But the doing what God requireth our Conformity to his will is the onely basis upon which such a superstructure will rise and towre up as high as heaven For it hath the Will and Power of God to uphold and perpetuate it against all those stormes and tempests which are sent out of the Devils treasury to blast or imbitter it Do you take this for a speculation and no more Indeed it is the sin and the punishment of the men of this world to take those truths which most concern them for speculations for groundless conceptions of thoughtful men for School-subtilties rather then realities Mammon and the World have the preeminence in all things and spiritual Ravishments and Heaven it self are but ingens fabula magnum mendacium as a tediously or a long tale that is told And there is no reason of this but their Disobedience For would men put it to the trial deny themselves and cleave to the Lord and do what he desireth there would then be no need of any Artist or Theologue to demonstrate it or fill their mouth with arguments to convince them of the truth of that which would so fill their souls Of all the Saints and Martyrs of God that did put it to the trial did we ever read that any did complain they had lost their labour but all of them upon a certain knowledge and sense of this truth betook themselves chearfully to the hardship of mortification renounced the world and laid down their lives poured out their blood for that Truth which paid them back again with interest even with fulness of joy Let us then hearken what this Lord will say and answer him in every duty which he requireth and he will answer us again and appear in glory and make the terrours and flatteries of the world the object not of our Fear and Amazement but of our Contempt and the displeasing and worser side of our Obedience our crown and glory the most delightful thing in the world For to conclude this why are we afraid why should we tremble at the commands of God why should their sound be so terrible in our ears The Lord requireth nothing of us but that which is 1. possible to rouse us up to attempt it 2. easie to comfort and nourish our hopes and 3. pleasant and delightful to woe and invite and even flatter us to obedience and to draw us after him with the cords of men Hos 11.4 We have now taken a view of the Substance of these words and we have looked upon them in the Form and Manner in which they lye What doth the Lord require Let us now draw them nearer to us And to this end they are sharpned into an Interrogation that as darts they might pierce through our souls and so open our eyes to see and our ears to hearken to the wonders of his Law First this word Lord is a word of force and efficacy It striketh a reverence into us and remembreth us of our duty and allegiance For if God be the Lord then hath he an absolute Will a Will which must be a rule to regulate our wills by his Jubeo and his Veto by his commands and prohibitions by removing our wills from unlawful objects and confining them to that which may improve and perfect them from that which is pleasing but hurtful to his Laws and commands which are first distastful and then fill us with joy unspeakable And this is the true mark and character of a servant of God To be then willing when in a manner he is unwilling to be strong when the flesh is weak to have no will of his own nor any other spring of spiritual motion but the will of his Lord. And therefore as God is the Lord over all so are his Laws over all Laws As to him every knee must bowe so to his Laws all the Laws of men must yield and give place Isa 45.23 Rom. 14.11 which are no further Laws or can lay any tye or obligation but as they are drawn from his and wait upon them and are subservient to them Common Reason will tell us and to that the Apostles Peter and John appeal when the rulers of the Jews commanded them to speak no more in the name of Christ Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more then to God Acts 4.18 19 20. judge you For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard And we cannot but be obedient for the Lord requireth it When Creon the Tyrant in Sophocles asked Antigone how she dared to bury her brother Polynices when he had enacted a law to the contrary her answer was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. That this was not Jupiter's Law and that she buried he brother in obedience to a Law more ancient then that of the Tyrant's even to the Law of Nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
shipwrack of a good conscience 1 Tim. 1.19 and then with the swelling sails of Impudence hasten to that point and haven which their boundless lusts have made choice of as we should do to eternal happiness per calcatum patrem as S. Hierome speaketh over father and mother over all relations and Religion it self forsake all these not for Christs sake and the Gospel but for Mammon and the world What foul pollutions what grinding and cruel oppressions and what open profaneness have there been in the world And we may ask with the Prophet Jeremiah Were they ashamed when they committed abomination Jer. 8.12 Eph. 4.18 Nay they were not at all ashamed neither could they have any shame 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the hardness and blindness of their heart For in sin and by sin they at last grow familiar in sin clothe themselves with it as with a robe of honour bring it forth into open view like Agrippa and Bernice in the Acts Acts 25.23 Dan. 3.1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with great state and pomp They set it up as Nebuchadnezzar did his image of gold threescore cubits high to be seen of all They boast of their Atheism and look down upon them with a contemptuous pity as shallow and weak men who go about to perswade such men as they of quick and searching wits â—hat there is a God who both seeth and heareth them and they take it very ill if we do but wish them well Thus it is in every bold presumptuous sinner even as it was with the Devil Depuduit No sooner do they cast themselves down from Heaven but they cast away all shame and their Modesty flyeth from them in the very fall and their Motto is Tush God doth not see And this sure is not to walk with God Psal 94.7 but to walk and strut as Nebuchadnezzar did in his palace Dan. 4.30 This is the palace which I have built Thus thus have I done and who dareth fling a stone at it to walk as Goliath did in a coat of brass and defie the host of Israel 1 Sam. 17. and God himself Golias in fronte c. saith Augustine Goliath was smitten in the forehead and so are they The disease indeed is in the heart but it hath made an impression and left a mark in the forehead He that hath forgot to blush doth not well remember that there is a God who looketh upon him Secondly the Dissembling sinner the Hypocrite walketh not with God For he is but a Player of Religion and being but a Slave cometh forth a King and then treadeth his measures putteth it to the trial whether God hath an eye whether he will take dross for silver the superficies for the substance a Fast for Repentance a Picture for the New creature Archidamus said well of an old man that had died and discoloured his hair It is not likely he should speak truth qui mendacium in capite circumfert who carrieth about with him a lye on his head Nor can he walk as with his God whose very speach and gesture whose very look is a lye Where there are false lights there the ware is not warrantable where there are privy doors there the Priests will practise collusion Bell Dr. v. 21. and eat up the Idoles meat If you see a Labyrinth it is either to conceal a Strumpet or a Minotaur That is true of the Hypocrite which the Rabbies conceived of their Priests He is like an Angel visible or invisible as he please Now this is not to walk with God but to walk with our Lusts with our Malice and Covetousness to look upon them as we should do upon our God to be careful that they be pleased and satisfied to reverence them to follow their behests and commands to provide that these Horse-leaches be fed our Lust with Pleasure and our Covetousness with Gold for these are the Hypocrites Gods As for the true God they leave him behind them and walk with nothing but his Name Thirdly the Apologizing sinner walketh not with God but runneth himself into the thicket of excuses Covereth his transgressions as Adam Job 31.33 and hideth his iniquity in his bosome covereth himself over with those leaves which have no heat nor solidity in them but will wither and dye when the Sun sheweth it self and be scattered before the wind and leave him naked and miserable He hath learnt an art and he may quickly learn that of his Sin which needeth and teacheth it pavimentare peccata it is S. Augustine's phrase to smooth and plaster and parget over his deformities He excuseth the breach of one commandment with his zeal to another his breach of Charity by his love to Faith He exexcuseth his Sacrilege by his hatred of Idolatry his Malice by his Zeal He pleadeth Ignorance where there is light enough Weakness when he might be strong Infirmity where he presumeth and Willingness when he had no will and will not consider that the Devil speaketh by all these as he did to our first Parents by the Serpent For Gen. 3.4 This is no sin at all and You shall not dye at all are all one He speaketh saith S. Augustine by the Mathematician That he sinneth not but his Star He speaketh by the Manachee That he sinneth not but the Prince of darkness I may add he speaketh by the Anabaptist It is not he sinneth but the Ass his Body By the Libertine That God sinneth in him and by the Many That the Devil onely is in fault If we look upon it well and send our eye abroad into the world we may peradventure be tempted to think that the World and all that therein is were onely made to yield matter out of which to forge and fashion an excuse For what is there almost in the world which we do not lay hold on for that end Adam the first man is the first excuse and we drew it out of his loins Original sin and after that the Law the Flesh the Will the Understanding Sin Obedience the Devils and God himself are forced in to speak for us What was made the matter of Virtue and Obedience is by us made the matter of excuse We may be bold to say This is not to walk with God as if he had an all-seeing eye Gen. 8.7 but to flutter up and down as the Raven did upon the waters from excuse to excuse but far from God and the Ark so to walk as if we were quite out of Gods reach and fight Last of all the speculative sinner doth not walk with God I mean the man that breaketh not out into action but yet perfecteth his work in his mind Here the sinner doth that which he never doth joyneth with that object which he shall never touch committeth adultery and yet may be an eunuch plotteth revenge and yet never striketh a stroke graspeth the wealth which he will not labour for marryeth that Beauty which he saw
For nihil aequalitate ipsâ inaequalius There is no greater inequality in the world then in a body politick where all the parts are equal That Equality which commendeth and upholdeth a Commonwealth ariseth from the difference of its parts moving in their several measures and proportions as Musick doth from discords When every part answereth in its place and raiseth it self no higher then that will bear when the Magistrate speaketh by nothing but the Laws and the Subject answereth by nothing but his obedience when the greater shadow the less and the less help to fortifie the greater when every part doth its part and every member its office then there is an equality and an harmony and we call it Peace For if we move and move chearfully in our own sphere and calling we shall not start forth to discompose and disorder the motion of others in theirs If we fill our own place we shall not leap over into anothers our Desires will dwel at home our Covetousness and Ambition die our Malice cease our Suspicion end our Discontent vanish or else be soon changed and spiritualized our Desires will be levelled on Happiness we shall covet the best things be ambitious of Heaven malice nothing but Malice and destroy it suspect nothing but our Suspicion and be discontent with nothing but that we are discontent and so in this be like unto God himself have our centre in our selves or rather make Peace our centre that every motion may be drawn from it that in the compass and circumference of our behaviour with others all our actions as so many lines may be drawn out and meet and be united in Peace And this is not onely enjoyned by Religion and the Gospel but it is also the method of Nature it self which hath so ordered it that every thing in its own place is at quiet and rest and no where else The Earth moves not in its place Water is not ponderous in its proper place The Fire burneth not in its sphere but out of it it hath voracitatem toto mundo avidissimam saith Pliny it spreadeth it self most violently and devoureth every thing it meeteth with Nay Poyson is not hurtful to those tempers that breed it Epist. 81. Illud venenum quod serpentes in alienam perniciem proferunt sine suâ continent saith Seneca The venome of the Scorpion doth not kill the Scorpion and that poyson which serpents cast out with danger and hurt to others they keep without any to themselves And as it is in Nature so is it in the Society of men Our diligence in our own business is soveraign and connatural to our estates and conditions but most times poysonous abroad and dangerous and fatal to our selves and others 2 Sam. 6.6 7. When Vzzah put forth his hand to hold up the Ark of God and keep it from falling though his intention were good yet God struck him for his errour and rashness in moving out of his place and struck him dead because he did not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do his own business When Uzziah invaded the Priests office 2 Chron. 26 16-21 and would burn incense and Azariah the Priest told him It pertaineth not to thee It is not thy business even while the censer was yet in his hand his sin was writ in his forehead he was struck with a leprosie and cut off from the house of the Lord. When Peter was busie to enquire concerning John Joh 21.21 22. What shall this man do our Saviour was ready with a sharp reply What is that to thee thy business is to follow me When Christians out of a wanton and irregular zeal did throw down Images and were slain by the Heathen in the very fact the Church censured them as Disturbers of the peace rather then Martyrs and though they suffered death in defiance of Idolatry yet allowed them no place in the Diptychs in the Catalogue of those who laid down their lives for the Truth Dathan and Abiram rise out of their place Numb 16 1-30 2 Sam. 20.1 22. 2 Sam. 15. c. and the earth swalloweth them up Sheba is up and bloweth a Trumpet and his head flyeth over the wall Absalom would up into the tribunal which was none of his place and was hanged in the Oak which was fitter for him And if any have risen out of their place as we use to say on the right side and been fortunate villains their purchase was not great Honey mingled with Gall Honour drugged with the Hatred and Curses of men with Fears and Cares with Gnawings within and Terrours without All the content and pleasure they had by their great leap out of their place was but as musick to one stretcht out on the rack or as that little light which is let in through the crack or flaw of a wall into him that lyeth fettered in a loathsome dungeon And at last their wages was Death eternal Death and Howling for ever Nay when we are out of our place and busie in that which concerneth us not though what we do may be in it self lawful and most expedient to be done yet we make that act a sin in us which is another mans duty and so shipwrack at that point to which another was bound perish in the doing of that which he shall perish for not doing The best excuse that we can take up is That we did honestâ mente peccare That we did that which is evil as we say for the best That we did sin and offend God with a good intention and pious mind Which Gloss may be fitted to the greatest sin and is the fairest chariot the Devil hath to carry us to hell If we would be particular the instances in this kind would be but too many For such Agents the Enemy of the Truth hath alwayes had in all the ages of the Church who have unseasonably disturbed the publick peace and their own whose business it was and sure it could be none of their own to teach Pastours to govern and Divines how to preach every day to make a new coat for the Church to hammer and shape out a new form and discipline as if nothing could be done well because they stood not by and had a hand in the doing it and so make the Church not so fair but certainly as changeable as the Moon One Sect disliketh this and another that and a third quarrelleth at them both and every one of them if their own phansie had been set up and establisht by another hand would have kickt it down For this humour is restless and endless and for want of matter will at last feed on him that nourisheth it As it was in that experiment of the Egyptians in Epiphanius who filled a bag with serpents and when afterwards they opened it found that the greatest had eat up the rest and half of it self We may well say of them as Gregory the great doth Illos alienorum actuum sagax cogitatio
the patients though the world perhaps cannot distinguish them and Death it self which is a key to open the gates of hell to the one may be to the other what the Rabbines conceive it would have been to Adam had he not fallen but osculum pacis a kiss of peace a gentle and loving dismission into a better state To conclude this then A people a chosen people a people chosen out of this choice Gods servants and friends may be smitten Josiah may fall in the battle Daniel may be led into captivity John Baptist may lose his head and yet we may hold up our Inscription DOMINVS EST It is the Lord. Let us now a little see what use we may make of this doctrine And first since the judgments of God are many times powred out upon whole nations without respect and beat upon the righteous as well as the wicked let us not be rash either to judge others when the hand of God hath touched them or to flatter our selves when he seemeth to shine upon our tabernacle For the hand of God may touch may strike down to the dust whom notwithstanding he meaneth to lift up to the highest pitch of happiness and he may shine upon the tabernacle of others when he is coming towards them in a tempest of blackness and darkness For though affliction be often the punishment of sin yet it is not alwaies so There were worse sinners then those Galilaeans whose bloud Pilate mingled with their sacrifices Luke 13. and they were not the greatest sinners on whom the tower of Siloa fell Good and bad may fall together in the battle and they may survive and escape the edge of the sword who amongst the bad were the worst The sword as David said 2 Sam. 11.25 devoureth one as well as another But what it was that did put an edge to the sword and strength to the hand of the enemy can be certainly known to none but God whose providence he moveth by is like the light he dwelleth in so past finding out that no mortal eye can reach and attain it I will not be so bold as to make Prosperity a sign of a bad man or Affliction and Poverty of a good For in whatsoever estate we are we may work out our salvation Abraham the rich man was in heaven Luke 16. and the poor man in his bosome Through Afflictions if we bear them and through riches if we contemn them and so make them our friends we may enter into the kingdome of heaven But it will be a part of our spiritual wisdome to be jealous rather of the flatteries of this world than of its frowns because the one maketh us reflect upon our selves the other commonly corrupteth and blindeth us and where Affliction slayeth her thousand Prosperity we may justly fear killeth her ten thousand It will be good indeed when calamity seizeth upon us to seize upon our selves to judge and condemn our selves to say This Fever burneth me up for the heat of my lust This Dropsie drowneth me for my intemperance This Lethargy is come upon me for my forgetfulness of Gods commands and my drowsiness in his service And here if I erre the errour is not dangerous but advantageous for this errour leadeth me to the knowledge of my self But when the like calamities befall others to draw the same inference and positively to conclude the same of them is boldly to take the chair and deliver my uncharitable conjectures for the oracles of God The messenger that brought the sad news That Israel was fled before the Philistines 1 Sam. 4.7 said no more then what was too true but had he also inferred that the Philistine was better then the Israelite or that God did favour him more then the other he had brought the Truth to usher in a lie he had related that which he knew and affirmed that which he could not know For Israel may fly before the Philistine and yet God is not the God of Ekron but of Israel In the second place as we must not be rash to judge others when they are cast down so must we not be ready to flatter our selves when some kindly gale of prosperity hath lifted us up above our brethren or to make Prosperity a mark of a righteous person as they of the Papacy do of the true Church For this were indeed to set Dagon above the Ark to plead for Baal to consecrate every sin and make it a virtue to place Dives in Abraham's bosome and Lazarus in hell to prefer Mahomet before Christ to pull Christ out of his kingdome the Martyrs out of heaven and to pluck the white robes from those who were sealed and who washed them white in the bloud of the Lambâ— this were to countenance Nimrod Rev. 7.14 and Nebuchadnezzar and Alexander and all the priviledged thieves and robbers of the earth This were to countenance all the oppressours and murderers of the world who have been so unhappy as to be happy in bringing their bloody purposes to an end For though good intents may have an happy end yet those arts are much to be suspected which have nothing else to commend them but prosperity and good success A conquerd Israelite is not alwaies so evil as a victorious Phelistine For if Prosperity were an argument under the Law which yet it was not for who then more fat more lusty and strong then the wicked yet I do not see how it can be so under the Gospel where affliction is not threatned but promised nay given To you it is given to suffer for Christs sake Phil. 1.29 where Persecution cometh forth with a crown on her head Blessed are ye when men persecute you And indeed this conceit of temporal felicity thwarteth the scope and primary intent of the Gospel which biddeth us look upon our actions with no other perspective but the rule and in respect of our conformity to that count all the prosperity in the world as dung For if I be an adulterer can impunity make me chast if I be a murderer shall that be my sanctuary If I be an oppressour can my gathering of riches make me just If I do that which Nature and Religion forbid and a Heathen would tremble to think on shall I comfort my self that it is done without sin because I have done it without controll Let us not deceive our selves When we have plunged our selves in sin and are fast in the devils chain prosperity and good success will prove but a weak deceitful ladder to climb up by into heaven For let us on the one side behold the Israelite flying before the Philistine For ought we know he may be flying also from his sin unto his God Let us behold the four and thirty thousand dead in the field and can we think that they all together fell into hell because they all together fell in the battel Or shall we call the Philistines the people of God because they vanquisht
protestationes fidei protestations of our faith So is our Prayer for pardon a protestation and promise of Repentance which is nothing else but a continued obedience We pray to God to cast our sins behind his back Isa 38.17 with this resolution to exstirpate them And upon this condition God sealeth our Pardon Which we must make a motive not to sin and fall back but to lead a new life and to perform constant obedience If we turn and turn back again God may turn his face from us for ever Again in the third place we have reason to arm our selves against temptation after pardon because by our relapse we not onely add sin to sin but are made more inclinable to it and anon more familiar with it and so more adverse and backward to acts of piety For as Tertullian observeth Lib. 1. ad uxorem c 8. Viduitas operiosior virginitate it is a matter of more difficulty to remain a widow then to keep our virgin not to tast of pleasure then when we have tasted to forbear So it is easier to abstain from sin at first then when we are once engaged and have tasted of that pleasure which commendeth it And when we have loathed it for some bitterness it had for some misery or some disease it brought along with it and afterwards when that is forgot look towards it again and see nothing but those smiles and allurements which first deceived us we then like and love it more then we did before it gave us any such distast and at last can walk along with it though Wrath be over our heads and Death ready to devour us And what we did before with some reluctancy we do now with greediness we did but lap before with some fear and suspicion but now we take it down as the ox doth water And what an uneven and distracted course of life is this to sin and upon some distast to repent and when that is off to sin again and upon some pang that we feel to repent again and after some ease to meet and joyn with that which hath so pleased which hath so troubled us The Stoick hath well observed Homines vitam suam amant simul oderunt Some men at once both hate and love themselves Now they send a divorce to Sin anon they kiss and embrace it now they banish it anon recall it now they are on the wing for heaven anon cleaving to the dust now in their Zenith by and by in their Nadir S. Ephrem the Syrian expresseth it by the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 calleth it a falling rise or a rising fall a course of life consisting of turning and returning rising and relapsing sinning and repenting Men find it more for their ease deprecari crimen quà m vacare crimine to â—â—g pardon for sin committed then to forbear committing it after and so they sin and repent and sin again and as solemnly by their sin renounce their repentance as they do by their repentance recant their sin We deal with our beloved sin as Maecenas did with his wife quam Epist. 114. cùm unam habuit millies duxit saith Seneca who had but one yet married her and divorced her from him and then married her again a thousand times First we look upon the painted face and countenance of Sin and are taken as it were with her eye and beauty and then draw near and embrace it But anon the worm gnaweth us our conscience is loud and troublesome and then we would put it from us When it flattereth we are even sick with love but when it turneth its worst face towards us we are weary of it and have an inclination a velleity a weak and feeble desire to shake it off Our soul loveth it and lotheth it we would not and we will sin and all upon presumption of that mercy which first gave us ease upon hope of forgiveness Quis enim timebit prodigere quod habebit poste à recuperare saith Tertullian De pudicitia c. 9. For who will be tender and sparing of that which he hopeth to recover though lost never so oft or be careful of preserving that which he thinketh cannot be irrecoverably lost So Repentance which should be the death of Sin is made the Security of the Sinner and that which should reconcile us to God is made a reproch to his Mercy and contumelious to his Goodness In brief that which should make us his friends maketh us his enemies We turn and return we fall and rise and rise and fall till at last we fall never to rise again And this is an ill sign a sign our Repentance was not true and serious but as in an intermitting fever the disease was still the same Gravedinosos quosdam quosdam torminosos dicimus non quia semper sint sed quia saepe sint Tull. Tusc q. l. 4. De sanitate tuenda onely the fit was over or as in the epilepsie or falling sickness it is still the same still in the body though it do not cast it on the ground And such a Repentance is not a Repentance but to be repented of by turning once for all never to turn again Or if it be true we may say of it what Galen said of his art to those that abuse it who carry and continue it not to the end Perinde est ac si omnino non esset It is as if it were not all nay it is fatal and deleterial It was Repentance it is now an accusation a witness against us that we would be contra experimenta pertinaces even against our own experience tast that cup again we found bitter to us run into that snare out of which we had escaped turn back into those evil wayes where we saw Death ready to seize upon us so run the hazard of being lost for ever These four are the necessary requisites and properties of Repentance It must be early and sudden upon the first call For why should any thing in this world stop and stay us one moment in our journey to a better Is not a span of time little enough to pay down for Eternity It must be true and sincere For can we hope to bind the God of Truth unto us with a lie or can a false Turn bring us to that happiness which is real It must be perfect and exact in every part For why should we give him less then we should who will give us more then we can desire or how can that which is but in part make us shine in perfection of glory Last of all Rev. 2.10 it must be constant and permanent For the crown of life is promised unto him alone who is faithfull unto death Turn ye turn ye now suddenly in reality and not in appearance Turn ye from all your evil wayes Turn never to look back again This is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Septuagint render it to turn for ever and so to press
all men to behold it We shall all stand before the judgement seat of Christ 1 Tom. ep 141. S. Hierom had the last trump alwayes sounding in his ears And declaring to posterity the strictness of his life his tears his fasting his solitariness he confesseth of himself Ille ego qui ob gehennae metum tali me carcere damnaveram scorpiorum tantùm socius ferarum I that condemned my self to so strait a prison as to have no better companions then scorpions and wild beasts for fear of hell and judgement did all this And he was not ashamed to acknowledge that not so much the love unto piety nor the Authour of it as the dread of hell and punishment confined and kept him constant in the practice of it And what should I say more Hebr. 11.32 for the time would fail me to tell you of other Saints of God who through fear wrought righteousness obtained promises out of weakness were made strong Behold Love in its highest elevation in its very Zenith behold it when it was stronger then Death Cant. 8.6 look upon the glorious army of Martyrs They had tryal of cruel mockings and scourgings Heb. 11.36 37 yea moreover of bonds and imprisonment They were stoned and slain with the sword And greater love hath no man saith our Saviour then this John 15.13 that a man lay down his life for his friend In Psal 118. And yet S. Ambrose will tell us that this great love was upheld and kept in life by this gale of wind by Fear that the fear of one death was swallowed up in the fear of another the fear of a temporal in the fear of an eternal The bloody Pagans to weaken their faith urged the fear of present death Consule tibi Pont. Diac. vit Cypriani Noli animam tuam perdere Favour your self Cast not away your life Reverence your age And these they thought suggestions strong enough to shake their constancy and resolution But the consideration of the wrath of God and eternal separation from him did strengthen and establish them What is my breath to eternity What is the fire of persecution to the fury of Gods wrath What is the rack to hell Et sic animas posuerunt With these thoughts they laid down their lives and were crowned with Martyrdome We cannot now think that these Martyrs sinned in setting before their eyes the horrour of death and fear of hell or think their love the less because they had some fear or that their love was lost in that which was ordained and commanded as a means to preserve it Their love we see was strong and intensive and held out against that which laid them in the dust but lest it should faint and abate they borrowed some heat even from the fire of hell and made use of those curses which God hath denounced against all those who persevere not to the end The best of men are but men but flesh and blood subject to infirmities so that in this our spiritual warfare and navigation we should shipwrack often did we not lay hold on the anchor of Fear as well as on that of Hope Each temptation might shake us each vanity amaze us L. 6. Mor. c. 27 each suggestion drive us upon the rocks but ancora cordis pondus timoris saith Gregory the weight of Fear as an ancor poyseth us and when the storm is high settleth and fasteneth us to our resolutions We walk in the midst of snares Ecclus 9.13 saith the Wise man and if we swerve never so little one snare or other taketh us for there be many a snare in our lusts a snare in the object a snare in our religion and a snare in our very love If Fear come not in to cool and allay it to guide and moderate it our Love may grow too warm too saucy and familiar and end in a bold presumption Therefore S. Paul in that his parable of the Natural and Wild Olive advising the new-engrafted Gentile not to wax bold against the Root Rom. 11.20 maketh Fear a remedy Be not high minded saith he Trust not to your love of God nor be over-bold with Gods love to you because he hath grafted you in but fear And he giveth his reason v. 21. For if God spared not the natural branches much less will he spare you Fear then of being cut off if S. Paul's reason be good is the best means to repress in us all proud conceits and highness of mind which may wither the most fruitful and flourishing branch and make it fit for nothing but the fire Thus is fear necessary and prescribed to all sorts of men to them that are fallen that they may rise and to them that are risen that they may not fall again to them that are weak that they may be strong and to those that are strong that their strength deceive them not And yet an opinion is taken up in the world That Fear was onely for Mount Sinai that it vanisht with that smoke and was never heard of more when that Trumpet was laid by Hebr. 12.18 19 We will not have this word spoken to us any more There is no blackness nor darkness nor tempest in the Gospel but all is to be done out of pure love Luke 1.74 that we being delivered from our enemies may serve him without fear Nor is this conceit of yesterday but the Devil hath made use of it in all ages as an engine to undermine and blow up the Truth it self and so supplant the Gospel which is the wisdome of God unto salvation that so he may 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Gregory Nyssen speaketh sport with us in our evil wayes lead us on in our dance and wantonness of sin and so carry us along with musick and melody to our destruction Tertullian in his book De Praescriptionibus adversùs haeret c. 43. mentioneth a sort of Hereticks who denyed that God was to be feared at all unde illis libera omnia soluta whence they took a liberty to sin and let loose the rains to all impiety Saint Hierome relateth the very same of the Marcionites and Gnosticks In 4. Hos and it is probable Tertullian meant them For say they Iis qui fidem habent nihil timendum If we have Faith we may bid Fear adieu how many and how foul soever our sins be God regardeth what we believe not what we do and if our faith be true the obliquity of our actions cannot hurt us J. Gers T. 1. After these ex eodem semine from the same root sprung up the Begardi and Begardae and others who from their opinion That no sin could endanger the state of those who were predestinated and justified took their name and were called Praedestinatiani the Praedestinarians After these the Libertines breathed forth their blasphemy with the like impudence Calvin contra Errores Anabaptistarum whom Calvin wrote
wayes but delight themselves in their own and rest and please themselves in Errour as in Truth to awake them out of this pleasant dream we must trouble them we must thunder to them we must disquiet and displease them For who would give an opiate pill to these Lethargicks To please men then is to tell a sick man that he is well a weak man that he is strong an erring man that he is orthodox instead of purging out the noxious humour to nourish and increase it to smooth and strew the wayes of Errour with roses that men may walk with ease and delight and even dance to their destruction to find out their palate and to fit it to envenom that more which they affect as Agrippina gave Claudius the Emperour poyson in a Mushrome What a seditious flatterer is in a Common-wealth that a false-Apostle is in the Church For as the seditious flatterer observeth and learneth the temper and constitution of the place he liveth in and so frameth his speach and behaviour that he may seem to settle and establish that which he studieth to overthrow to be a Patriot for the publick good when he is but a promoter of his private ends to be a servant to the Common-wealth when he is a Traytor so do all seducers and false-teachers They are as loud for the Truth as the best champions she hath but either subtract from it or add to it or pervert and corrupt it that so the Truth it self may help to usher in a lye When the Truth it self doth not please us any lye will please us but then it must carry with it something of the Truth For instance To acknowledge Christ but with the Law is a dangerous mixture It was the errour of the Galatians here To magnifie Faith and shut out Good works is a dash That we can do nothing without Grace is a truth but when we will do nothing to impute it to the want of Grace is a bold and unjust addition To worship God in spirit and truth Joh. 4.23 our Saviour commandeth it but from hence to conclude against outward Worship is an injurious defalcation of a great part of our duty Gal. 5.1 To stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free the Apostle commandeth it but to stand so as to rise up in the face of the Magistrate is a Gloss of Flesh and Bloud and corrupteth the Text. Rom. 13.1 Let every soul be subject to the higher powers that is the Text but to be subject no longer then the Power is mannaged to our will is a chain to bind Kings with or a hammer to beat all Power down that we may tread it under our feet And when we cannot relish the Text these mixtures and additions and subtractions will please us These hang as Jewels in our ears these please and kill us beget nothing but a dead Faith and a graceless life not Liberty but Licentiousness not Devotion but Hypocrisie not Religion but Rebellion not Saints but Hypocrites Libertines and Traytors The Truth is corrupted saith Nyssene 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Orat. 1. contra Eunom by subtraction by alteration by addition And these we must avoid the rather because they go hand in hand as it were with the Truth and carry it along with them in their company as lewd persons do sometimes a grave and sober man to countenance them in their sportiveness and debauchery De nostro sunt sed non nostrae saith Tertullian De Proscript They invade that inheritance which Christ hath left his Church Some furniture some colour something they borrow from the Truth something they have of ours but ours they are not And therefore as S. Ambrose adviseth Gratian the Emperour of all errours in doctrine we must beware of those which come nearest and border as it were upon the Truth and so draw it in to help to defeat it self because an open and manifest errour carrieth in its very forehead an argument against it self and cannot gain admittance but with a veil whereas these glorious but painted falsehoods find an easie entrance and beg entertainment in the Name of Truth it self This is the cryptick method and subtil artifice of Men-pleasers that is Men-deceivers to grant something that they may win the more and that too in the end which they grant not rudely at first to demolish the Truth but to let it stand a while that they may the more securely raise up and fix that Errour with which it cannot stand long S. Paul saw it well enough though the Galatians did not Gal. 5.2 If you be circumcised Christ profiteth you nothing that is is to you as if there were no Christ at all If the false Apostles had flatly denied Christ the Galatians would have been as ready as S. Paul to have cut them off because they had received the Gospel but joyning and presenting the Law with Christ they did deceive and please them well who began in the Spirit and did acknowledge Christ but would not renounce the Law propter metum Judaeorum for fear of their brethren the Jews Now these Men-pleasers these Crows Dictam Diogenis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Athen. Deipnos l. 6. c. 17. which devour not dead but living men are from an evil eg and beginning are bred and hatcht in the dung in the love of this world and are so proud and fond of their original that it is their labour their religion the main design of their life to bring the Truth Religion and Christ himself in subjection under it And to this end they are very fruitful to bring forth those mishapen issues which savour of the earth and corruption and have onely the name of Christ fastned to them as a badge to commend them and bring them to that end for which they had a being which is to gain the world in the name but in despite of Christ And these are they who as S. Peter speaketh make merchandise of mens souls nummularii sacerdotes 2 Pet. 2.3 as Cyprian calleth them Doctours of the Mint who love the Image of Caesar more then the image of God and had rather see the one in a piece of gold then the other renewed and stampt in a mortal man And this image they carry along with them whithersoever they go and it is as their Holy Ghost to inspire them For most of the doctrines they teach savour of that mint and the same stamp is on them both The same face of Mammon which is in their heart is visible also in their doctrine Thus Hosea complained of the false Prophets in his time Hos 4.8 They eat up the sin of my people that is by pleasing them they have consented to their sin and from hence reaped gain for flattery is a livelyhood Or they did not seriously reprehend the sins of the people that they might receive more sacrifices on which they might feed Some render it Levabant animum
God's benefits whether Beauty or Wit or Riches or Health is to make them benefits indeed But if we turn them into wantonness they will be turned into judgements we shall be the verier fools for our Wit the poorer for our Riches the more deformed for our Beauty the more despicable for our Power our Health shall be worse then a disease and Miracles themselves shall stand up to condemn us But if we behold that is consider them they will be as the influences of heaven 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 defluxions from God himself distilling upon us to refresh and quicken us and make us active in those duties which return them back again with praise unto their Fountain And in the strength of them we shall walk on from faith to virtue from virtue to knowledge from knowledge to temperance from temperance to patience till we are brought into the presence of God who is the giver of all things In a word If we thus behold and consider God's benefits we shall sin no more nor shall a worse thing come unto us Which is our third and last part and cometh next to be handled The Fifth SERMON PART III. JOHN V. 14. Sin no more lest a worse thing come unto thee MAN hath not found out more wayes to destroy himself then God hath to save him You shall find God's preventing mercy his following mercy Psal 59.10 Psal 23.6 Psal 119. Psal 6.2 his reviving and quickening mercy his healing mercy Here they are all even a multitude of mercies Healing Preventing Following and Reviving Here I told you is 1. Misericordia solicita Mercy sollicitous to perfect and complete the cure The healing of this impotent mans body was but as a glimmering light as the dawning of the day Mercy will yet shine brighter upon him 2. Misericordia excitans Mercy rousing him up to remember what he was by the pool's side and to consider what he now is in the Temple And these two we have already displayed before you 3. The last now sheweth it self in rayes and light and full beauty Misericordia praecipiens Mercy teaching and prescribing for the future I may call it a Logical Rational Concluding Mercy making the miracle as the Premisses and drawing from it Salvation as the Conclusion Behold thou art made whole Therefore sin no more lest a worse thing come unto thee The words are plain and need not the gloss of any learned Interpreter And we find that those lessons which are most plain are most necessary as those things which are most common are most useful When we are to build an house we do not go to the mines for gold or to the rocks for perle but to the quarry for stone Corn which feedeth us groweth almost in every field and Sheep which clothe us grase in flocks upon the mountains But those things quibus luxuria Pretium fecit which would be of little esteem did not our luxury set a price upon them are remote and in a manner hidden from us and we find them out with labour and hazard of our lives So it is in spiritual matters Those truths which are necessary lie open and naked to the understanding so that he that runneth may read them But more abstruse and subtle speculations as they are not necessary so are they set at distance and are hard to find out For it is not Curiosity but Humility that must build us up in our most holy Faith And yet the plainest truths in Scripture require our pains and labour as much as the obscurest We may observe that in the winter-season when the Sun is far removed from us we lay our selves open and walk the fields and use means to receive the light and heat of it but in the summer when it is almost over our heads we retire our selves and draw a curtain to exclude both light and heat The same behaviour we put on in our Christian walk When the Sun of righteousness cometh near us and shineth in our very faces we run with Adam into the thicket and hide our selves in excuses but when he withdraweth and as it were hideth himself and will not tell us what is not necessary for us to know we gaze after him and are most busie to walk where we have no light The obscurer places in Scripture are like unto the Sun in winter We delight to use all means to gain the light and meaning of them But the plainest are like the Sun in summer They come too near our Zenith their light and heat offend us they scald and trouble us by telling us plainly of our duty and therefore we use art and draw the curtain against them to keep off their heat As we have heard of the people of Africk that they every morning curse the Sun because the heat of it annoyeth them These plain words of the Text are a notable instance For to defeat the true meaning of them what art do we use what curtains do we draw When we should sin no more we question the possibility of the precept and whether there be any such estate or no As if Christ did bid us sin no more when he knew we could not but sin again and again And then we multiply our sins as we do our dayes and make them keep time almost with every hour and moment of our life And to this end we draw distinctions before the words to keep of their light SIN NO MORE that is Not unto death or SIN NO MORE that is Not with a full consent Not without some reluctancy or strugling of conscience And now where is this Text Even lost and swallowed up and buried in the glosses of flesh and bloud We may we think observe it and yet sin as oft as the flesh or the world shall require it Let us then take some pains to raise the Text from this grave and take off those cloths in which it is enwrapped let us draw it from those clouds and curtains wherewith it is obscured In the course of our speech we shall meet with some of them Now we shall take the words in their natural meaning as they lie And in them you may observe 1. the Prescript or Caution Sin no more 2. the Danger of not observing it If we sin again a worse thing will come unto us And by these we may try our selves as the Eagle doth her young ones If with open eyes w◠can look upon the Text as it lies in its full strength and meaning then are we of the true airy but if we do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if we be weak sighted and cannot endure the light and heat of it we may then justly suspect our selves to be but bastard and counterfeit Christians First of all we shall consider how far the words Sin no more do extend and stretch themselves secondly the Possibility of keeping of them The first is a consideration of some consequence that we may not violate the word of God nor do the Scripture any
sport in the wayes which we have chosen as the little fishes do in the river Jordan till at last they fall into the Dead sea Our word is as vain and mortal as our selves but God's word standeth for evermore I will not press this further in this place and I hope there is no need I should For I hope better things of you that not Faction which the Devil raiseth here on earth but true Religion which God sent down from above shall now and at all times teach you how to make your choice I will conclude with that with which I should have begun the Coherence of my Text with the first verse For this is a consequent of that and we are therefore exhorted to set our affections upon things above because we are risen with Christ. For without this manifestation there is no Resurrection If we be still earthly-minded we are not risen with him In other things it is natural when we rise to shew our selves If we rise to honour you may see us in the streets like Agrippa and Bernice in the Acts with great pomp If we rise in our estates you may see it in our next purchase If in knowledge which is a rising from the grave of Ignorance then Scire tuum nihil est we are sick till we vent And shall we manifest and publish our rising in the world and not our rising with Christ Shall Dives appear in purple and Herod in his royal apparel shall the rich fool be known by his barns and every scribler be in print and may we rise and yet lye in our Graves rise with Christ and yet lie buried alive in the earth rise with him and have no affection to the things above rise with him and yet be slaves and captives to that world which by rising he overcame This were to conceal nay to bury the Resurrection it self Nay rather since we are risen with him let the same mind be in us which was also in Christ Jesus the Lord. Let us be seen in our march Walk before God in the land of the living Look upon the things above Converse with Cherubim and Seraphim Count the things on the earth but dung Let us look upon the World as an enemy and overcome it that the last enemy Death may be destroyed Let us begin to make our bodies what we believe they shall be spiritual bodies that the body being subdued to the Spirit it may appear we are risen with Christ here and when he shall come again to judge both the quick and the dead we may have our second resurrection to that glory which is reserved above for us in the highest heavens for evermore The Tenth SERMON PART I. PROV XXIII 23. Buy the truth and sell it not also wisdome and instruction and understanding IT will not be worth the while to seek out the coherence of these words with the precedent sentences or proverbs For this would be a vain curiosity to seek what is not to be found 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to plow the winds and which was imputed as folly to Caligula conari quod effici posse negatur to busie our selves in doing that which cannot be done The words are plain and they present you with a merchandise which far excelleth all other and hath one property which is not seen in any other merchandise It must be bought but not be sold It is an observation of Tullie's De offic l. 2. c. 42. That those tradesmen who buy of the merchant to sell again are commonly but a sordid and base kind of people nihil enim proficiunt saith he nisi admodum mentiantur They get nothing except they lie for advantage I am not experienced in the truth of this But we see here the wisest of men doth more then intimate that they who buy the Truth to sell it again are guilty of much baseness and profit nothing unless they lie strenuously For what but a Lie can be gained by parting with the Truth since whatsoever is not truth must needs be a lie And in this again appeareth another main difference betwixt our spiritual thrift and thriving in the world For old Cato an excellent husband for the world and one who writ of Husbandry giveth us a rule quite contrary to our Text Patremfamilias vendacem De Rè rusti◠cap. 2. non emacem oportet To buy is an argument of want to sell a sign of store Wherefore a good husband will endeavour so to abound that he may be ready to sell to supply the necessities of others rather then to buy to make up his own But ye see here Solomon a more excellent husband for the Truth then Cato was for the World giveth us a rule quite contrary to his Emaces esse oportet non vendaces Selling is no part of our spiritual husbandry there is nothing here but buying He that selleth the Truth or parteth with it upon any terms whatsoever giveth great cause to suspect that he is in danger to decoct and break Which that we may better perceive and understand let us enter upon the words of the Wise-man and see what instructions they will afford us First the merchandise presenteth it self and we must look upon it and consider what Truth it is that is here meant Secondly the nature and quality of the merchandise which will set a value and price upon it Thirdly we shall observe Neminem casu sapere That we cannot find Truth by chance neither will it fall upon us as a dream in the night but we must go towards it lay out something for it and purchase it Fourthly we shall find it necessary to enquire What it is to buy the Truth Fifthly and lastly we shall shew how the Truth may be sold These particulars without tort or violence naturally of their own accord arise from the Text Which in the general is divided as the Jews divided the Law into DOE and DOE NOT. The first part is affirmative Buy the Truth the second negative Sell it not Of these in their order First we must enquire What Truth is Aristotle defining Goodness telleth us it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quod omnia appetunt that which the appetite and desire of all is carried to And if I defining Truth should tell you that Verum est quod omnes fugiunt Truth is that which all men are afraid of I think I should not speak much amiss For I find St. Augustine thus speaking to his auditours Quod non vultis audire verum est Do ye enquire what Truth is That which ye will not hear that which with all my pains and zeal I cannot perswade you to That is Truth In the Gospel we read that Pilate asked our Saviour John 18.38 What is Truth but when he had said this he went out saith the Text. He thought the answer would not be worth the staying for Many like Pilate are content to ask what Truth is and when they have done go their way
a Lawyer or an Husbandman in the grave But the Truth here as it must be bought so it must never be sold by us It will not leave us at our death but lie down with us in the grave and rise up with us to judgment At the last day it will be our Advocate or our Judge and either acquit or condemn us If now in this our day we lay out our money our substance that is our selves upon it then in that terrible day of the Lord it will look lovelily upon us and as the bloud of Christ doth speak good things for us But if we place it under our brutish desires and lowest affections it will help the Devil to roar against us and he who now hindereth our market will then accuse us for not buying Christ himself is not more gracious then this Truth will be to them that buy it But such as esteem it trash and not worth the looking on to them shall it procure tribulation and anguish to them the Sun turned into darkness and the Moon into bloud the whole world on fire the voice of the Archangel and the trump of God shall not be so terrible as this Truth And now before I was aware I have told you what the Truth here is that we are to buy Shall I say with the Poet cujus non audeo dicere nomen that I dare not utter its name It hath no name Men it seemeth have been afraid to speak of it and therefore have given it no name The Wise-man here in the Text bestoweth on it certain titles calling it Wisdom and Instruction and Vnderstanding but all these do not fully express it being words of a large signification and comprehending a multitude of other Truths beside it Will ye know indeed what this Truth is It containeth all those Precepts and conclusions that concern the knowledge and service of God that conduce to virtue and integrity and uprightness of life and that are carefully observed by all quos Deus in aeternae felicitatis exemplis posuit whom God meaneth to bring to endless felicity and to place among the ensamples of his love If this Truth doth not manage and guide the Will then our passions those pages of opinion and errour will distract and disorder us Lust will inflame us Anger swell us Ambition lift us up to that formidable height from whence we must needs fall into the pit But the Truth casteth down all Babels and casteth out all false imaginations which present unto us appearances for realities yea plagues for peace which make us pour out our souls on variety of unlawful objects and pitifully deceive us about the nature and end of things What a price doth Luxury set on wealth and how doth it abhor poverty and nakedness What an heaven is the highest place to Ambition and what an hell disgrace though it be for goodness it self How doth a jewel glitter in the eye and what a slur is there on virtue What brightness hath the glory of the world and how sad and sullen an aspect have Religion and Piety And all this is till the purchase be made which our Text commendeth No sooner have we bought the Truth but it discovereth all pulleth off every masque and suffereth us no longer to be blinded and beguiled but sheweth us the true face and countenance of things It letteth us see vanity in riches folly in honour death and destruction in the pomp of this world It maketh poverty a blessing misery a mercy a cottage as good as the Seragglio and death it self a passage to an happy eternity It taketh all things by the right end Exod. 4.4 and teacheth us how to handle and deal with them as Moses taking the serpent by the tail had it restored to its own shape In a word the Truth here meant is that which S. Augustine calleth legem omnium artium artem omnipotentis artificis a Law to direct all arts an Art taught by Wisdom it self by the Maker of all things It teacheth us to love God with all our hearts to believe in him and to lead upright lives It killeth in us the root of sin it extinguisheth all lusts it maketh us tread under foot pleasure and honour and wealth it rendreth us deaf to the noyse of this busie world and blind to that glaring pomp which dazleth the eyes of others Hâc praeeunte seculi fluctus calcamus It goeth before us in our way and through all the surges of this present world it bringeth us to the vision and fruition of him who is Truth it self Therefore this concerneth us above all other Truths yea others are of no use at all further then by being subservient to this they help us to our chief end our union to God who is the first Truth and our communion with him If I know mine own infirmities what need I trouble my self about the decay of the world If the word of God be powerful in me what need I search the secret operations of the stars Am I desirous to know new things The best novelty is the New creature What folly it is to study the state and condition of the Saints and in the mean time to take no pains to be one to be curiously inquisitive how my soul was conveyed into me and wretchedly careless how it goeth out to dispute who is Antichrist when I my self am not a Christian to spend that time in needless controversies in which I might make my peace with God to be more careful to resolve a doubt then to cure a wounded spirit to to maintain my opinion then to save my soul to be ambitious to reconcile opinions which stand in a seeming opposition and be dull and heavy in composing my own thoughts and ordering my counsels 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aescl yl Not he that knoweth much but he that knoweth that which is useful is wise Why gaze we on a bugle or piece of glass when we are to bargain for a pearl for that Truth which doth alone adorn that mind which was made not to joyn with shadows and phantasmes but to receive wisdom and virtue and God himself Thus I have given you some kind of view of the merchandise and shewed you in general what the Truth here meant is Now that it may appear unto you the more desirable and more worth the buying in the next place I will discover the nature and quality of it Neither will I do as those are wont who expose their wares to sale over praise the commodity so to kindle the buyer and make him more easily part with his money or else shew it by an half-light but I will deal plainly with you according to that Law of the Aediles or Clerks of the market in Rome by which he who sold any thing was to disclose to the buyer what fault or imperfection it had If he were selling an house wherein the plague was he was to proclaim Pestilentem domum vendo that he
Gold All the things under the Moon are as changeable in their approches in their acquisition in their loss as that planet is Sometimes we must travel and hazard our lives for them sometimes we find them and they are even flung upon us We are wont to call such as are suddenly made rich the Children and Favourites of Fortune But in this market Fortune and Chance have no hand at all she can neither help nor hurt They who come to this Emporium or Mart know not the face of Fortune neither when she smileth nor when she frowneth but leave her behind them when they beat this bargain Nay they know her to be nothing They place their hopes neither upon Chance nor upon Necessity If Truth were brought to us any of these wayes we could not be said to buy it Do I buy that chain which I am forced to wear or that pearl which lying in my way I do but stoup for and take up I cannot think that ever Heaven did open it self and take in those who never thought of it nor that any Saint did stumble on it and enter by chance Luke 15.4 If the Truth be found it is found as the lost Sheep was we go after it and sweat and labour and search for it till we find it They were the Pharisees of old that brought Fate in and a Necessity of all events And they may well bear the same name who though they abhor the word yet countenance the thing it self and leave the Truth and all Virtues else as it were upon the cast of a die For with them we neither do nor suffer any thing but we are born and bound to it And they run upon the same absurdity which the Pharisees did attribute all to Fate and Destiny or to that which is in effect the same and yet believe a Resurrection leave us in the chains of Necessity and yet promise life to all that buy the Truth and threaten death to all that sell it make us necessarily good or evil and yet the objects for Rewards and Punishments to work upon But this fatal Necessity doth overthrow it self For if it lead or force all things to their end if it work all in us then it worketh this also That we cannot believe it And it is necessary I should deny this Necessity for I was destined to pronounce against Destiny and my fate it is to acknowledge no such thing as Fate No the Truth is established as the heavens that it cannot be moved And as it looketh toward Eternity so there is a setled and eternal course by which it is conveyed unto us Wisdome hath set it out to sale not left it in the uncertain hands of Chance nor in the infallible conduct of Fate and Destiny She standeth by the way in the places of the paths Prov. 8.2 Isa 55.1 but her voice is Come and buy It is true Truth as well as Faith is the gift of God But first every gift is not received or if it be yet he that received it might have refused it and so Necessity hath no place and a gift it is though it be not received as a Pearl may be a merchandise though it be not bought Truth is the gift of God a light kindled by him and set up in the firmament of his Church and there it shineth though men turn not their eyes that way but fix them on the earth Ephes 2.8 Faith had been the gift of God though all the world had been infidels The Civilians tell us there is a twofold Donation pura and conditionalis There is an absolute gift which the giver bestoweth to no other end but to shew his bounty he giveth it because he will give it And there is a conditional gift which exacteth something from him who must receive it It is here Do ut des I give thee this that thou mayest give something for it And such a gift is Truth such a gift is Heaven We are Men to woo and draw the Truth and not Statues to have it engraven upon us and then remain as little moved with it as insensible of it as if we were stones We read of infused Habits and though those texts of Scripture which are brought to uphold them are not so sure and firm a foundation that they may stand there unshaken yet because the opinion is so generally received we are not over-ready to lay it by But if they be infused as they are infused into us so they are not infused without us They are poured not as water into a cistern but into living vessels fitted and prepared for them For if they were infused without us they could never be lost If we did not buy the Truth we could never sell it If Wisdome were thus infused into us we should never erre If Righteousness were thus infused the Will would ever as an obedient handmaid look up upon that Wisdome and never swerve or decline from it If Sanctity were thus setled on the Affections they could never rebel The Understanding could never erre for this Wisdome would ever enlighten it the Will could not be irregular for this Righteousness would alwayes bridle it the Affections could not distract us for they would ever be under command For as they were given without us so bringing with them an irresistible and uncontrollable force they would work without us But we shall find that all these are conditional gifts and that according to the method of Truth it self we cannot receive till we ask nor find till we seek Matth. 7.7 Psal 24.7 â— nor enter the everlasting gates of Truth till we knock And those who follow this method the Truth hath its proper and powerful operation in them It is their viaticum provision for their way meat to feed them and nourish them up to an healthful constitution And it is a garment to clothe them and to defend them from those poisonous blasts and breathings of their spiritual enemy which might annoy and distemper them But in those who fancy to themselves a large and supernatural pouring in when they receive nothing nor do any thing that they may there is no room for Truth for they are filled with air with their own flitting imaginations And if the Truth do enter it entereth them not as Truth but is wrested and corrupted and made the abetter of a lie Scripture is either mangled by them or put upon the rack used as Procrustes used his guests either cut off in some part of it or stretched too far It lieth in their stomack like an undigested lump and is turned into a disease It is like a garment not well put on it sittteth not well upon them they wear it and it becometh them not They wear it either for shew to take the beholder or as a cloak of maliciousness to deceive and destroy him We may observe that that which is so easily gotten and beareth onely the name of Truth is more busie and operative
were by the voice of the cryer and if thou wilt have it thou must buy it Ye see that Truth is a rich merchandise and that it must be bought Now in the next place we must know what it is to buy it As in all purchases so here something must be laid down And though we cannot set a price upon the Truth worthy of it it being in it self unvaluable and all the world not able to weigh down the least grain of it yet something there is which must be given for it The very heathen thought nothing to dear to purchase it amongst whom we read of some who flung away their goods and riches and bid defiance to pleasures ut nudam veritatem nudi expeditÃque sequerentur saith Lactantius that being stript of all they might meet with the naked Truth and embrace her So highly did they value the Truth that therein they placed their summum bonum their chief happiness If ye ask what the price is ye must give the answer is short Ye must give your selves Ye must lay down your selves at the altar of Truth and be offered up as a sacrifice for it Ye must offer up your Understandings fit and apply them to the Truth Ye must offer up your Wills and bow them to it Ye must strip and empty your selves of all your Affections at least be free from the power of them For the Affections raise a tempest in the soul and make it swell as stormy winds do the sea so that the Mind can no more receive the Truth then the troubled waves can receive and reflect the image of our face Not onely the seeds of moral conversation those practick notions with which we were born but also those seeds of saving Truth which we gather from the Scripture and improve by instruction and practice are then most obscured and darkned when pleasures and delights take possession of our affections As we often see in persons sore distempered with sickness the light of their reason dimmed and the mind disturbed by reason of vitious vapours arising from their corrupted humours so it is in the soul and understanding which could not but apprehend the Truth being so fitted and proportioned to it as ye have heard if it were not dazled and amazed with impertinent objects and phantasmes that intervene if the affections did not draw it to things heterogeneous and contrary to it Being blinded hereby it beholdeth all objects through the affections which as coloured glasses present all things much like unto themselves Thus Falshood getteth the face and beauty of Truth and that appeareth true which pleaseth though it hurt For the Affections do not onely hinder our judgment but prevent and preoccupate it Truth is plain and open to the eye but Love or Hatred Hope or Fear coming in between teach us first to turn from it and after to dispute against it The Love of our countrey maketh Truth and Religion national and confineth it within a province The Love of those whom our worldly affairs draw us to converse with shutteth it up yet closer and tieth it to a city to an house And to put off this Love we think is to wage war with Nature The Love of riches formeth a cheap and thriving Religion The Love of honour buildeth her a chair The Love of pleasure maketh her wanton and superstitious That which we Love still presenteth it self before our eyes and thence we take materials to build up that congregation which alone we think deserveth the name of a Church So that if we never beheld the face of the men yet by the form and draught of their Religion we may easily judge which way their affections sway them and to what coast they steer And as Love so Hatred transformeth not men alone but also the Truth it self and maketh it an heresy though in an Apostle yea though in our Saviour Luke 16.13 No man can serve two masters is as undeniable a principle as any in the Mathematicks yet because Christ spake it the Pharisees who were covetous derided him Luke 16.14 Micaiah was a true Prophet but Ahab believed him not because he hated him 1 Kings 22.8 How many Truths are condemned by the Reformed party onely because the Papists teach them And how many doth that Church anathematize because the Protestant holdeth them Maldonate in his Commentary on the Gospel is not ashamed to profess of an interpretation of one passage there that he would willingly subscribe and receive it as the truest had it not been Calvin's And have not we some who have condemned even that which is Truth and which is delivered in the language of Scripture and in the very same words upon no other reason but because it is still retained in the Mass-book As Tacitus speaketh of an hated Prince Inviso semel Principe seu bene seu malè facta premunt when a person is once grown odious in our eyes whatsoever he doth or saith whether good or evil whether true or false is as odious as he If an enemy do it the most warrantable act is a mortal sin and when he speaketh it the Truth it self is a lie All the argument we have against it is the person that speaketh it for we will not use his language As it is said of Marius that he so hated the Grecians that he would not walk the same way that a Greek had gone though it were the best Further we must lay down at the feet of Truth our Fears For Fear is the worst counsellor we can have Nunquam fidele consilium dat metus saith Seneca It never giveth us true and faithful counsel but flying from that which we fear it carrieth us away in its flight from the Truth it self Perjury is a monstrous sin of that bulk and corpulency that we cannot but see it yet Fear will lift up our hands and bind us to that which we know to be false and within a while teach us to plead for it Fear saith the Wise-man Wisd 17.12 is nothing else but the betrayer of those succours which Reason offereth When we are struck with Fear we are struck deaf and will neither hearken to our selves nor to seven wise men that can render a reason Prov. 26.16 This made (a) Gen. 3.8 10. Adam hide himself This sealed up the lips of (b) John 12.42 many chief rulers among the Jewes so that though they believed on Christ yet because of the Pharisees they did not confess him lest they should be put out of the synagogue And this opened the mouth of Peter to deny him He that is afraid of what evil may befall him is not a fit merchant to buy the Truth For though he have the price in his hand Prov. 17 16. he hath no heart to it A blast a puff of wind will drive him from this market And as Fear so Hope will soon betray and deceive us The Hope of honour of profit of favour of
preferment Balaam's reward 2 Pet. 2.15 Jude 11. will make us leave the wayes of Truth and run after his errour For this taketh us from our selves enslaveth our understandings and alienateth our minds that we dare not venture and bid frankly for the Truth nay we will not admit it nor hearken after ought that is displeasing to those Balaks who can promote us to honour Numb 22.17 37. Thus we see daily the power of a mortal man is more prevalent then that which we so magnifie the Grace of God and the Court gaineth more proselytes then the Church mens religion being drawn by their hopes not of Eternity but of Riches which have wings and of Honour which is but a breath Prov 23.5 Magnus Deus est Error as Martine Luther speaketh Errour is the great God of this world and Hope waiteth upon it to bring in multitudes for reward whilest Truth with all her glorious promises Luke 12.32 findeth but a little flock For thus do those fools argue Why should we despise so good a friend who can raise us from the dung-hill and make us hold up our heads with the best and follow such a guide as Truth which will lead us upon pricks into prison unto the block This is the Sophistry of our worldly Hopes and it easily deceiveth us who are far sooner convinced with false shews then with the real arguments and enforcements of Truth Besides this we look upon it as a kind return and a piece of gratitude to joyn in errour with them who feed our lusts to make them our prophets who have made themselves our patrons to have the same authours of our faith and of our greatness and with the same chearfulness to receive their dictates and their favours The world is full of such parasites Phil. 3.19 whose belly is their God whose Hope looketh downward on the earth and so keepeth them from the sight of the Truth who cannot see a sin or an errour in them that pour down these fading and perishing graces on them For if they should grant they erre in any thing they might be brought at last to fear that they erre also in this in doing them good and heaping benefits upon them Thus do our hopes blind us And therefore if we will purchase the Truth we must cast them away And yet Beloved we need not cast our Affections quite away They are implanted in us by the same hand which set up a candle Prov. 20.27 as the Wise-man calleth the light of Reason in the soul And God hath placed them in us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in such order that they may be very usefull and advantageous to us They may indeed as ye have heard be powerful to withdraw us from the Truth and they may also be serviceable and instrumental to promote it Wherefore the Apostles counsel is that we crucifie the affections Gal. 5.24 2 Cor. 10.5 not quite extinguish them that we bring them into a glorious captivity and obedience to the Truth I may buy food with a piece of gold and I may buy poyson I may surrender my affections to Errour and I may bestow them on the Truth And happy is that man who is ready thus to spend and to be spent 2 Cor. 12.15 For he who thus spendeth himself he who thus wasteth and tameth his affections doth not quite lose them but loseth onely that of them which would destroy him Therefore in this negotiation we must observe the method of Socrates and drive out one love with another and one hatred with another supplant one hope and chase away one fear with another First Love is a passion imprinted in the soul for this end that it may be fixed on the truth And when once it is so it will be restless and unquiet till it have purchased it It will overcome all difficulties it will meet the Devil in all his horrour it will meet him in his armour of light and pass through all to this mart Nor is there any thing that can hinder it or keep it back Rom. 8.38 neither death nor life nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come No Love beareth us and carrieth us aloft over all as it were on the wings of the wind and bringeth us to the Truth Let us so love the Truth that we buy it and so buy it that we love it the more These two are alwaies in conjunction as the Heat and Light of the Sun The hotter the Sun-beams be the more light there is so the more heat there is in my Love the more bright is the light of the Truth and the more this light shineth the more servent is my Love The love of Truth and the Truth which we love are mother and daughter each to the other mutually begetting and bearing one another We speak of traffick and it is Love alone that maketh all the bargains that are made For who ever yet bought that which he loved not and can there be too great a price set upon that we love if we truly love a thing what will we not give for it As we deal with our Love so let us also with our Hatred Why should I hate any man who am my self a man But then to transferre my hatred from the person to the Truth and to revile it for his sake cometh near to that which we call the sin against the holy Ghost The Truth is the same in whomsoever it be and ought to be received for it self Else we must blot out one article of our Creed for the Devil himself confessed Jesus to be the Son of the most high God Mark 5.7 The Truth rather should force us to the love of the man then our hatred of the man make us enemies to the Truth It is true Though Socrates be a friend and Plato be a friend 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist Ethic. l. 1. c. 4. yet the Truth is to be preferred before them both And it is as true Though Socrates be an enemy and Plato an enemy yet the Truth whosoever professeth it is still to be accounted a friend Whether in Heretick or Orthodox whether in Papist or Protestant whether in Arminian or Calvinist the Truth is ever the same And he who cannot look through all these impertinent considerations and by-respects will prove as great an enemy to the Truth as those he condemneth He who casteth a veil of his own working over his face cannot behold the beauty of Truth cannot see to buy it If we will buy the Truth we must learn to hate this Hatred and to fling it out we must learn to abstract the man from his opinion what he saith or holdeth from what he appeareth to us For while we judge of things by the person whom we first hate and then draw him out in our minds in a monstrous shape Virtue and Truth in him will appear to us under the same loathed aspect yea Scripture
is not Reason if the Church say it They that will not believe their Sense how can they believe their Reason And how can they believe their Reason who have debauched and prostituted it and bound it to the high Priests chair Do they give that honour unto the Saints which is due unto God alone and call upon them in the time of trouble Psal 50.15 It is very right and meet and our bounden duty so to do for the Church commandeth it Must there be a fire more then that of Hell The Church hath kindled it Must the Merits of the Saints be drawn up into a common treasury and thence showred down in Indulgences and supplies for them who are not so rich in Good works The Church is that treasury and her breath hath called them up Whatsoever is said or done must have a Bene dictum and a Bene factum subscribed under it is Truth and Righteousness if the Church say and do it So the Church is let down as the Tragedians used to do some God or Goddess when they were at a loss or stand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as by slight and engine to solve the difficulty and untie the knot and so make up the Catastrophe Or it serveth them as Anaxagoras his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Metaphysicks to answer and defeat all arguments whatsoever And this prejudice of theirs they back and strengthen with many others Of Antiquity making that most true which is most antient and the Truth it self a lie if it shewed it self in glory but yesterday And yet omnia vetera nova fuere that which is now old was at first new and by this argument Truth was not Truth when it was new nor the Light Light when it first sprung from on high and visited us Truth though it find Professours but in its later age yet is the first born because Errour is nothing else but a deviation from it Errour cometh forth last and layeth hold on the heel of Truth to supplant it They have another prejudice of Councels as if the most were alway the best and Truth went by voices Nazianzen was bold to censure them as having seen no good effect of any of them And we our selves have seen and our eyes have dropped for it what a mere name what prejudice can do with the Many and what it can countenance Besides these they have others Of Miracles which were but lies Of Glory which is but vanity Of Universality which is bounded and confined to a certain place With these and the like that first prejudice That the Church cannot erre is underpropped And yet these depend upon that Such a mutual implication there is of Errours as in a bed of Snakes If the first be not true these are nothing And if these pillars be once shaken that Church will soon sink in its reputation and not sit so high as to dictate to all other Churches in the world And these are soon shaken for they are but problemes and may justly be called into question and brought to trial For if they have any thing of Truth it is rather verisimile then verum rather the resemblance of Truth then Truth it self And this a foul errour may have And to fix my judgement upon a resemblance is most prejudicial For a thing may be like the Truth and appear in that likeness which is not true and therefore must needs be false A resemblance or likeness participateth of both and may be either true or false I have looked too long abroad upon this Queen of Churches but it was to set her up as a glass to see our own She saith we are a schismatical we are bold upon it that we are a Reformed Church and so we are But may not Prejudice find a place even in Reformation it self May we not dote upon it as Pygmalion did upon the statue and so please and flatter and laugh our selves to death Illiacos intra muros peccatur extra Hor. l. 1. Ep. 2. Rome alone is not guilty of Prejudice but even some members of the Reformation also who think themselves most nearly united to Christ when they run furthest from that Church though sometimes by so doing they run from the Truth For what is this else but prejudice to judge all is well with us because the lines are fallen to us in so pleasant a place as a purged Church to be less reformed because that is Reformed or to think that an heaven and happiness will be raised up and rest upon a word a name What is this but to run round in a circle and to meet the Church of Rome where we left her What is this but to speak her very language That to be in this Ark this Church is to be safe and when a floud of Sin and Errour hath overwhelmed us to think we are securely sailing to our Ararat our eternal rest Or what hope is there that he should grow and encrease in grace who if he be planted once in this Church or that Sect counteth himself a perfect man in Christ Jesus Almost every Sect and every Congregation laboureth under this prejudice and feeleth it not but runneth away with its burden Oh unhappy men they that are not fellow-members with us though it be of such a body as hath but little Charity to quicken it and no Faith to move it but a phansie Yet these cannot but do all things well these cannot erre and they who will not cast in their lot with them Prov. 1.14 and have the same purse are quite out of the way can speak nothing that is true nor do any thing that is good Matth. 23.5 Do ye not see the Pharisees spread their phylacteries do ye not hear them utter the same dialect Luk. 18.11 We are not as those Publicanes I might enlarge my self but I know ye understand me and can tell your selves what might be said further by that which hath been said already To be yet more particular The Lutherane Church doth grant indeed that every particular Church may erre and so doth not exempt it self But do not many of them attribute as much to Luther as the other do to their Church Are they not ready to subscribe to whatsoever he said upon no other reason or motive but because he said it Do they not look upon him as upon a man raised up by God to redeem the Truth and shew it to the world again after it had been detained in unrighteousness and lost in ceremony and superstition And is not this Prejudice equal to the former Do not they depend as much upon a person as the Papists do upon their Church so that to them whatsoever he said is as true as an article of faith and whatsoever is not found in him is heretical quasi fas non sit dicere Lutherum errâsse as if it were unjust and an injury to think that Luther could erre in any thing I accuse him not of errour yet
agents Nor can he who maketh not use of his Reason on earth be a Saint in heaven We are rewarded because we chose that which right Reason told us was best And we are punished because we would not discover that evil which we had light enough to see but did yield to our lusts and affections and called it Reason The whole power of Man is in Reason and the vigour and power of Reason is in Judgment Man is so built saith S. Augustine ut per id quod in eo praecellit attingat illud quod cuncta praecellit that by that which most excelleth in him Reason he may attain to that which is the best of all eternal happiness Ratio omnis honesti comes est saith Seneca Reason alwaies goeth along with Virtue But when we do evil we leave Reason behind us nor is it in any of our waies Who hath known the mind of the Lord at any time Rom. 11.34 or who hath been his counseller It is true here Reason is blind Though it be decked with excellency and array it self with glory and beauty Job 40.9 10. it hath not an eye like God nor can it make a law as he or foresee his mind But when God is pleased to open his treasury and display his Truth before us then Reason can behold apprehend and discern it and by discourse which is the inquisition of Reason judge of it how it is to be understood and embraced For God teacheth not the beasts of the field or stocks or stones but Men made after his own image Man indeed hath many other things common to him with other creatures but Reason is his peculiar Therefore God is pleased to hold a controversie with his people to argue and dispute it out with them and to appeal to their Reason 1 Cor. 11.13 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Judge within your selves To judge what is said is a privilege granted to all the children of men to all who will venture for the Truth It is time for us now to proceed to the other hindrance of Truth Therefore II. We must cast away all Malice to the Truth all distasting of it all averseness from it Certainly this is a stone of offense a bulwork a mountain in our way which if we remove not we shall never enter our Canaan that floweth with milk and hony we shall never take possession of and dwell in the tabernacles of Truth Now Malice is either direct and downright or indirect and interpretative onely And both must be laid aside The former is an affected lothing of the Truth when the Will affecteth the ignorance of that which is right and will erre because it will erre when it shunneth yea hateth the Understanding when it presenteth it with such Truths as might regulate it and divert it from errour and this to the end that it may beat back all remorse silence the checks and chidings of Conscience and slumber those storms which she is wont to raise and then take its fill of sin lie down in it as in a bed of roses and solace it self and rejoyce and triumph therein Then we are embittered with hony hardened with mercy enraged by entreaties then we are angry at God's precepts despise his thunder-bolts slight his promises scoff at his miracles Then that which is wont to mollifie hardeneth us the more till at length our heart be like the heart of the Leviathan as firm as a stone Job 41.24 yea as hard as a piece of the nether mill stone Then satis nobis ad peccandum causa peccare it is a sufficient cause to do evil that we will do it And what impression can Truth make in such hearts What good can be wrought upon them to whom the Scripture attributeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 1.28 a reprobate mind who have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a reverberating mind an heart of marble to beat back all the strength and power of Truth unto whom God hath sent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Thes 2.11 Rom. 1.18 strong delusion that they should believe a lie who hold the Truth in unrighteousness and suppress and captivate it that it cannot work its work who oppose their Wrath to that Truth which perswadeth patience and their Lust against that which would keep them chast who set up Baal against God and the world against Christ Eph. 4.19 These are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 past feeling and have given themselves over to lasciviousness to work all uncleanness with greediness They are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eph. 4.18 they have their understanding darkned 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For wickedness by degrees doth destroy even the principles of goodness in us Hos 4.11 blindeth our eyes and taketh away our heart as the Prophet speaketh and maketh us as if we had no heart at all Either 1. by working out of the understanding the right apprehension of things For when the Will chuseth that which is opposite to the Truth non permittit Intellectum diu stare in dictamine recto it swayeth the Understanding taketh it off from its right dictates maketh it deny its own receptions so that it doth not consider that which it doth consider it averteth and turneth it to apply it self to something that is impertinent and maketh it find out reasons probable or apparent against that Truth which had its former assent that so that actual displacency which we found in the entertainment of the contrary may be cast out with the Truth it self We are willing to leave off to believe the Truth that we may leave off to condemn our selves When this light is dim the Conscience slumbreth but when it spreadeth it self then the sting is felt In our ruff and jollity we forget we have sinned but when the hand of vengeance removeth the veil and we see the Truth which we had hid from our eyes then we call our sins to remembrance and they are set in order before us Where there is knowledge of the Truth there will be conscience of sin but there will be none if we put that from us Or else 2. positively when the Will joyneth with Errour and embraceth that which is evil and then setteth the Understanding on work to find out the most probable means and the fairest and smoothest wayes to that which it hath set up for its end For the Understanding is both the best and the worst counseller When it commandeth the Will it speaketh the words of wisdome giveth counsel as an oracle of God and leadeth on in a certain way unto the Truth But when a perverse Will hath got the upper hand and brought it into a subserviency unto it then like the hand of a disordered dial it pointeth to any figure but that it should Then it attendeth upon our Revenge to undermine our enemy it teacheth our Lust to wait for the twilight it lackeyeth after our Ambition and helpeth us into the uppermost seat it is as active
afraid of any neglect any as if it concerned us not Why should we take any Truth down by halves To instance in the sum of Religion Matth. 5.48 Our Saviour commandeth Be ye perfect even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect but how easily do we perswade our selves that we have nothing to do with this precept how perfunctorily do we look upon it what tricks and devices do we seek to shift it off withall It may be but a Counsel we think Or if it be a Precept it is in Perfection as in Baptism Votum sufficit A wish a desire is enough God will favour our weak endeavours nay approve our negligence Hence we make no progress in the waies of piety dwell and delight in errour and neglect that Truth which might save us Quis haec instituit Tropica Christ I am sure never set up these Tropicks Do we preach to you Christian Liberty Ye kiss our lips and are ready to cast it over you as a cloak of maliciousness 1 Pet. 2.16 But do we then go about to take it from you when ye make so bad use of it and to put your wedding garment about you even Charity which should bound and confine your Liberty Then we are looked upon with an eye of contempt as bringers-in of new doctrine Do we build up to the Saints of God assurance of salvation Ye are in heaven already For when this news is brought every man almost is a Saint But do we tell you that this Assurance is no arbitrary thing to be taken up at pleasure but the offspring and fruit of something else do we beseech you not to deceive your selves do we tell you what ye call Assurance may be a groundless phansie carnal security or stupefaction Behold then your countenance is changed and we are not the same men nor our feet so beautiful as before And the reason hereof is Because we love no more Truth then is for our turn Perfection we will learn but not learn to be perfect Freedome we like but not to be restrained Assurance we will build upon but not build up an assurance Thus far we will go but proceed no further take the Truth as the Devil urged Scripture by halves take that part of it which complieth with and flattereth our distempers and neglect and never seek into the rest veritatem summâ terrâ quaerere seek for the Truth in its top and surface but never dig deep for it for fear of raising up against our selves noysome damps and poisonous fogs from this rich mine of Truth And thus we may be enemies to the Truth when we think we love it and though we do not bid open defiance to it yet be at as sad a distance from it as they that do For to defie the Truth and not to care for it differ not so much but that they both end in the same fatal ignorance and both leave us in the dark To conclude Let us offer violence to our selves and redeem our selves from these Let us moderate and regulate our Affections and take from them all the strength they have to hinder us in our purchase Let us remove all Prejudice that we may be fit to judge aright of all things And let us not harden our hearts when Truth is ready to make its impression in them nor yet have little heart to it which is in effect to harden our hearts For Truth will neither dwell with him who shutteth it out nor yet with him who maketh no preparation to receive it neither apply it self to our Pride nor to our Sloth neither enter a man of Belial nor a lukewarm Laodicean Till the mind be clear of these no light can enter till the heart be disburdened of these it is an hard and an heavy heart not fit to be lifted up unto the Truth Thus much of the Impediments to be removed It behoveth us in the next place to consider what Helps the God of Truth affordeth us for the obtaining of the Truth and to make use of them There be indeed many but I shall name but three 1. Meditation or a fixing of our thoughts upon the Truth a continual survey of the beauty of it a recollecting our selves a renewing the heat and fervour that is in us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Philosopher Meditation is a kind of augmentation or growth This will make the Truth more visible and clear and more appliable then before The Word written is but a dead letter the Word spoken is but a sound but Meditation maketh it of energy and force to quicken and enliven us It is like those Prospectives which this later age hath found out whereby we discover Stars which were never seen before and in the brightest stars find spots otherwise not to be discerned By Meditation we see Christ at the right hand of God and the glory and riches of the Gospel By it we behold the World lothsome which before we doted on God's Statutes most delightful which before we abhorred Afflictions profitable which before we trembled at By it we find out the plague of our hearts and the leprosie of our souls which before appeared to us as spots as nothing This help we have by Meditation 2. Prayer Oratio viam ostendit nos deducit saith Bernard Prayer sheweth us the way and leadeth us along in it It draweth down grace to supply the defect of nature it calleth for strength and wisdome to resist and overcome temptations it procureth the assistance of the Spirit to relieve and uphold the infirmity of the mind it carrieth us on chearfully to this Mart so that neither hopes nor fears can turn us out of the way Certainly Prayer for the Truth can never return empty seeing it asketh that which God is most ready to give which he putteth to sale continually Cic Orat. de arusp resp The heathen Oratour could discover so much Faciles sunt preces apud Deos qui ultra nobis viam salutis ostendunt When God calleth us to him and we desire to come near him we pray for that which he would have Prayers may be heard and rewarded and yet not granted Non tribuit Deus quod volumus ut tribuat quod malumus saith Hierome God doth not give us what we will that he may give us that which is better Our prayers for temporal blessings may seem to be but spiritual flatteries wherein we speak God fair for our own ends Like Quadrigarius his darts Gell. l. 9. c. 1. our prayers if shot upwards fly more sure to the marke but if downwards at our own ends seldome hit Exauditur Diabolus Matth. 8.31 32. 2 Cor. 12.8 9. non exauditur Apostolus The Devils had their request granted yet we read that the Apostle was denied But he that prayeth for the Truth prayeth in the name of Christ he that desireth that which appertaineth to salvation Joh. 16.23 orat in nomine Salvatoris prayeth in the name
of his Saviour and therefore cannot be denied Earnest Prayer for the Truth seasoneth the heart and maketh it as the Father speaketh exceptorium veritatis a fit receptacle of the Truth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Angel to the Centurion Acts 10.4 Thy prayers are come up for a memorial before God It is an illusion to the Incense under the Law Our Prayer first ascendeth as incense and cometh up unto God as a sweet-smelling savour and then down cometh an Angel the Truth to tell us so to assure us that our suit is granted Our Prayer ascendeth and in its ascent raiseth up the heart to heaven where it entreth the treasury of God and obtaineth this Pearl I will not say with some that Prayers do this ex opere operato by the very repetition by numbring them out by tale as they do their beads This hath too rank a savour Yet I know not how after the heat of devotion and fervency of Prayer there follow those holy fires and strange and glorious irradiations and illuminations which present and shew themselves to us in our search of Truth When by Prayer we have as it were reposed and lodged our souls in the bosome of our heavenly Father there are presently poured back upon us even in the midst of our common actions celestial and divine cogitations and the image and copy of our devotions is still obvious to our eye and followeth us whithersoever we go Our Prayers are as Musick in the ears of the most High and our improvement and encrease in knowledge is the resultance And as he that hath looked on the Sun with a steady eye hath the image of the Sun presented to him in every object which he beholdeth so he that fixeth his thoughts on God and is as it were lift up near near unto him by true devotion must needs find light in all his waies and feel the efficacy of his prayer in his daily conversation 3. Exercise and practice of those Truths we learn Without this Prayer doth not ascend as incense from the altar but as common smoke and hath no sweet savour at all Without this Meditation is but the motion and circulation of the Phansie the business or rather idleness of that sort of men who come into the market onely to look on and gaze the mind flieth aloft but like those birds of prey which first towre in the air and then stoop at carrion But the practice of the Truth we know doth fix it to us and make it as it were a part of us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Stoick speaketh driveth the doctrine home Eccl. 12.11 as a nail fastned by the Masters of the assemblies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Philosopher What we learn to do we learn by doing One act of Charity prompteth me to another One denial to my appetite draweth on another and that a third and at last I put on resolution and am rigid and obstinate to its solicitations One conquest over a temptation strengthneth me for a second As it was said of Alexander Quaelibet victoria instrumentum sequentis Every victory he got made way to another so every step in the waies of Truth bringeth us not onely so far on our way but enableth us with more strength to go forward and the further we go the more active we are He that giveth a peny to the poor and inureth his hand to giving may in time sell all that he hath Matth. 19.21 and at last lay down his life for the Gospel Aude hospes contemnere opes Virg. Aen. 8. It is but putting on courage and attempting it which is the fairest bidding for the Truth and then we who see it but through a cloud darkly 1 Cor. 13.12 through a cloud of Affections through a cloud of Prejudice yea through darkness it self an inward detestation of it shall with open face 2 Cor. 3.18 as the Apostle speaketh behold the glory of it and be changed into the same image from virtue to virtue from profers to resolutions from beginnings to perfection even by the power of that Truth which we behold And this is truly to buy the Truth to buy it not for ostentation but for use to buy it not to be laid up in a napkin Luke 19.20 but to demonstrate its activity against all illusions that they deceive us not against all occasions that they withdraw us not and against all temptations that we be not led into them And thus as it is with the Angels Contemplation shall not hinder but promote our Obedience and our Obedience exalt our Contemplation and by working by the Truth we shall more nearly behold the copy by which we work and be more familiar with it To conclude These things we must lay down and these means we must make use of if we intend to purchase the Truth and make it our possession And now ye see what it is to buy the Truth I now pass to the negative part of my Text Sell it not And this may serve for my Conclusion For one contrary interpreteth another If to buy the Truth be to seek and draw it to us for our use then to sell it must needs be to put it from us to give it up to our Passions our Prejudice our Distast or Malice and so to alienate it that it shall be as a thing that concerneth us not of no use to us at all Venditio omnem contractum complectitur saith the Civile Law And in this sale there is a contract with our Affections and Lusts with the World with every Trifle and Vanity which is in effect a contract with the Devil himself By this we part with all our right and title and fling it from us Now as the buying of the Truth of all bargains is the best because whereas in all other bargains let them be driven how you can the gain of one party is loss to the other in this bargain there is onely gain and no loss at all the buyer gaineth and yet no seller loseth so the sale of the Truth of all bargains is the worst and the most foolish For in other sales however somebody ever loseth yet somebody getteth what the seller loseth the buyer getteth but when the Truth is sold there is nothing but mere loss no man is no man can be the better for the sale of the Truth Vendentem tantùm deserit minuit Onely the seller groweth the worse there is no buyer groweth the better When Ahab came to Naboth to procure from him his vineyard Give me 1 Kings 21.2 saith he thy vineyard and I will give thee for it a better vineyard then it or I will give thee the worth of it in money See here three mighty tempters the King Money and Commodity whereof which is the strongest it is hard to determine the weakest of them prevaileth with most men Notwithstanding Naboth holdeth out against them all v. 3. The Lord
the unfolding and displaying his essential proprieties by acts proper to them And here they all meet and are concentred his Justice Wisdom Power Mercy His Justice satisfied his Wisdom manifested his Power raiseth us from the dead and his Mercy saveth us and in all God is glorified For this 1. we glorifie him in our spirit in our inward man by transforming our selves into the likeness of his Son who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the brightness of his Father And we are too in a lower degree 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the brightness of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is brightness but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is more then brightness even such a bright thing which hath a lustre cast upon it from some other thing As in us all the light which is seen in these dark souls of ours is from the Father of lights His Justice his Mercy his Wisdom shine upon us and all those graces in us are but the reflexion of his light And this reflexion of his Graces is his Glory Commonly when we hear mention of the Glory of God we think of nothing but the calves of our lips But there is a louder language of our Conformity to his will There his glory appeareth as in his holy Temple No quire of Angels can improve no raging Devil can diminish his Glory He is the same in the midst of all the Hallelujahs of Seraphim and Cherubim in the midst of all the blasphemies of Men or Devils But as the Woman is the glory of the Man in being subject to him so are we the glory of God when we do his will For then it may be said that God is in us of a truth shining in the perfection of beauty in those graces and perfections which are but beams of his in our Meekness in our Justice in our Courage and Resolution in our Patienc◠which are the Christian's tongue and glory and do more fully set forth God's glory then the tongues of men and of Angels can these are the best Doxology of the Saints For how well pleased is God to see his creature Man to answer that pattern which he hath set up to be what he should be and what he intended For as every artificer is delighted and glorieth in his work when he seeth it finished according to the rule by which he did work and as we use to look upon the works of our hands or wits with favour and complacency as we do upon our Children when they are like us so doth God upon Man when he appeareth in that shape and form of obedience which he prescribed Thus should the Glory of God be carried on along in the continued stream and course of all our actions and break forth and be seen in every work of our hands it should be the echo of every word we speak the echo of every word nay the spring of every thought that begat that word It may seem indeed a hard thing to keep this intention alive and not to think or speak or act but when this is present before us not to do a good deed till we have told our selves we will do it for God's glory And it is so a hard thing Nor doth God require at our hands an actual and perpetual intention of his glory Thou mayest nay thou dost work to his glory when thy thoughts are busie and intent upon thy work though peradventure his glory doth not so fill thy heart as to fix it on it The Glory of God must be the primum mobile the first motive of our Obedience and the force and virtue of that must carry it about from vertue to vertue We see an arrow flieth to the mark by the force of that hand out of which it was sent He that travelleth on the way may go forward in his journey though his thoughts sometimes be carried and look upon some occurrences in the way and do not alwayes fix themselves upon the place to which he is going So when the Will and Affections are quickned and enlivened with the love of God's Glory every word and action will carry with it a savour and relish of that fountain from whence they spring An Architect doth not alwayes think of the end for which he buildeth his house but his intention on his work doth sometimes so fully take him that that is left out and as it were forgotten when it is not forgotten but alwayes supposed And though he make a thousand pieces yet he still retaineth his art saith Basil So though we cannot make this first intention of God's glory keep time with us in all the passages of our Christian conversation and send up every action thus incensed and perfumed yet the smell of our sacrifice shall ascend and come before God because it is breathed forth from that heart which is Gloriae ara an altar dedicated wholly to the Glory of God Onely thy care must be to keep it as thy heart with diligence to nourish and strengthen it that if it seem to sleep yet it may not die in thee to guard and barricado thy heart against all contrary and heterogeneous imaginations all earthy all wandring thoughts which may as Jacob take this first-born this first intention of God's Glory by the heel and supplant it and rob it of its birth-right For these extravagant and contradicting thoughts will borrow no life from thy first intention of God's glory but the intention of God's glory will be lost and die in these thoughts Remember then to beautifie thy inward man and fill it with the glory of God that it may be as a gallery hung round with the fairest pictures and representations of his Glory those vertues perfections which will make thee like him that thou mayest be nothing else but the praise and Glory of thy Maker that thou mayest sing a new song nunc Pietatis carmen nunc modulos Temperantiae as Ambrose speaketh now a song of Sion a Psalm of Piety and again the composed measures of Temperance and Chastity that thou mayest be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so make up a Gloria Deo in a complete and perfect harmony And thus we glorifie God in our spirit But in the next place a body hast thou prepared me and we must glarifie God in our bodies also God must have our Knee our Tongue our Eye our Countenance Philosophus auditur dum videtur The Philosopher and so the Christian is heard when he is seen Come saith the Psalmist Psal 95.6 let us worship and fall down .. Nunquam vericundiores esse debemus quà m cùm de Diis agitur saith Aristotle in Seneca Modesty and reverence never better become us then in those intercourses which are made between God and us We enter Temples saith he with a composed countenance Vultum submittimus togam adducimus We cast down our looks we gather our garments together and every gesture is an argument of our inward reverence Tam corpus est Homo quà m anima saith
crop and harvest of our Devotion This is truly cum parvo peccato ad ecclesiam venire cum peccatis multis ab ecclesia recedere to bring some sins with us to Church but carry away more for fear of the smoke to leap into the fire for fear of coming too near to Superstition to shipwreck on Profaneness for fear of Will-worship not to worship at all like Haggards to check at every feather to be troubled at every shew and appearance to startle at every shadow and where GLORY TO THE LORD is engraven in capital letters to blot it out and write down SUPERSTITION I see I must conclude Beloved fly Idolatry fly Superstition you cannot fly far enough But withal fly Profaneness and Irreverence and run not so far from the one as to meet and embrace the other Be not Papists God forbid you should But be not Atheists that sure talk what we will of Popery is far the worse Do not give God more then he would have but be sure you do not give him less Why should you bate him any part who giveth you all Behold he breathed into you your Souls and stampt his Image upon them Give it him back again not clipt not defaced but representing his own graces unto him in all holiness and purity And his hands did form and fashion your Bodies and in his book are all your members written Let THE GLORY OF GOD be set forth and wtitten as it were upon every one of them and he shall exalt those members higher yet and make thy vile Body like to his most glorious body In a word Let us glorifie God here in soul and body and he shall glorifie both soul and body in the day of the Lord Jesus The Seventeenth SERMON PART I. 1 COR. XII 3. Wherefore I give you to understand that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed and that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the holy Ghost THat Jesus is the Lord was seen in his triumph at Easter made manifest by the power of his Resurrection The earth trembled the foundations of the hills moved and shook the graves opened at the presence of this Lord. Not the Disciples onely had this fire kindled in their hearts that they could not but say The Lord is risen but the earth opened her mouth and the Grave hers And now it is become the language of the whole world Jesus is the Lord. All this is true But we ask with the Apostle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What profit is it What profit is it if the Earth speak and the Grave speak and the whole World speak if we be dumb Let Jesus be the Lord but if we cannot say so he may and will be our Lord indeed but not our Jesus we may fall under his power but not rise by his help If we cannot say so we shall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fall cross with him nay 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 speak the quite contrary If we cannot call him Lord then with the accursed Jew we do indeed call him Anathema we call the Saviour of the world an accursed thing Si confiteamur exsecramur If we confess him not we curse him And he that curseth Jesus needeth no greater curse We must then before we can be good Christians go to school and learn to speak not onely Abba Father but Jesus the Lord. And where now shall we learn it Shall we knock at our own breasts and awake our Reason to lead us to this saving truth Shall we be content with that light which the Laws and Customs of our Country have set up and so cry him up for Lord as the Ephesians did their Diana for company and sit down and rest our selves in this resolution because we see the Jew hated the Turk abhorred and Hereticks burned who deny it Shall we alienis oculis videre make use of other mens eyes and so take our Religion upon trust These are the common motives and inducements to believe it With this clay we open our eyes thus we drive out the dumb Spirit And when we hear this noise round about us that Jesus is the Lord our mouth openeth and we speak it with our tongue These are lights indeed and our lights but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 deceitful My Reason is too dim a light and cannot shew me this great conjunction of Jesus and the Lord. Education is a false light and misleadeth the greatest part of Christians even when it leadeth them right For he that falleth upon the Truth by chance by this blind felicity erreth when he doth not erre having no better assurance of the Truth then the common vogue He walketh indeed in the right way but blindfold He embraceth the Truth but so as for ought he knoweth it may be a lye And last of all the greatest Authority on earth is but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a faint uncertain and failing proof a windy testimony if it blow from no other treasury then this below No we must have a surer word then this or else we shall not be what we so easily persuade our selves we are We must look higher then these Cathedram habet in coelo Our Master is in heaven And JESUS IS THE LORD is a voice from heaven taught us saith the Apostle by the holy Ghost who is vicarius Christi as Tertullian calleth him Christ's Vicar here on earth and supplieth his place to help and elevate our Reason to assure and confirm our Education and to establish and ratifie Authority Would you have this dumb spirit dispossessed The Spirit who as on this day came down in a showre of tongues must do it Would you be able to fetch breath to speak The holy Ghost must spirare breathe into us the breath of spiritual life inable us by inspiration Would we say it we must teach it If we be ignorant of this the Apostle here 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 would have us to understand that No man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the holy Ghost And now we have fitted our Text to the Time the Feast of Pentecost which was the Feast of the Law For then the old Law was given then written in tables of stone And whensoever the Spirit of the living God writeth this Law of Christ THAT HE IS THE LORD in the fleshly tables of our hearts then is our Pentecost the Feast of the holy Ghost then he descendeth in a sound to awake us in wind to move and shake us in fiery tongues to warm us and make us speak The difference is This ministration of the Spirit is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle speaketh far more glorious And as he came in solemn state upon the Disciples this day in a manner seen and heard so he cometh though not so visibly yet effectually to us upon whom the ends of the world are come Though not in a mighty wind yet he rattleth our hearts together Though no house totter
They had a full harvest we our sheaf yet our sheaf may make an offering Though our coyn be smaller yet the same image and stamp is on them both and the Spirit will own us though we weigh less All this is true But yet I must still remember you that whilest I build up the power of the Spirit I erect no asylum or sanctuary for illusions and wilful mistakes and when I have raised a fort and strong-hold for sober Christians I mean it not a shelter or refuge for mad-men and phantasticks God forbid that Truth should be banished out of the world because some men by false illations have made her factious or that Errour should straight be crowned with approbation because perhaps we read of some men who have been bettered with a lie The teaching of the Spirit it were dangerous to teach it were there not means to try and distinguish the Spirit 's instructions from the suggestions of Satan or the evaporations of a sick and loathsome brain or our own private Humour which is as great a Devil Beloved 1 John 4.1 saith the Apostle believe not every spirit that is every inspiration but try the spirits whether they be of God for many false prophets are gone out into the world that is have taken the chair and dictate magisterially what they please in the name of the Spirit when themselves are carnal And he giveth the rule by which we should try them Vers 2 Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God that is Whosoever striveth to advance the Kingdom of Christ and to set up the Spirit against the Flesh to magnifie the Gospel to promote and further men in the wayes of innocency and perfect obedience which infallibly lead to happiness is from God that is every such inspiration is from the Spirit of God For therefore doth the Spirit breathe upon us that he may make us like unto God and so draw us to him that where he is we may be also But those inspirations which bring in God to plead for Baal which cry up Religion to gain the world which call their own discipline Christ's Discipline which he never framed and spurn at his to maintain their own which tread down Peace and Charity and all that is indeed praise-worthy under their feet to make way for their unguided lust to pace it more delicately to its end which sigh out Faith and Grace and Christ like mourners about the streets which attend a funeral when the World and Satan hath filled their hearts and thus sow in tears that they may reap the profits and pleasures of this present world with joy which magnifie God's will that they may do their own these men these spirits cannot be from God By their fruits ye shall know them For their hypocrisie as well and cunningly wrought as it is is but a poor cobweb-lawn and we may easily see through it even see these spiritual men sweating and toiling for the Flesh these Saints digging in the minerals labouring for the bread that perisheth and making haste to be rich For though many times their wine be the poison of dragons and their milk not at all sincere yet they are not to be bought without money or money-worth Though GLORIA PATRI Glory to God on high be the Prologue to the Play for what doth a Hypocrite but play yet the whole drift and business of every Scene and Act is chearfully to draw altogether in this From hence we have our gain The Angel speaketh the Prologue and Mammon and the Flesh make the Epilogue Date manus Why should not every man give them his hands Surely such Roscii such cunning Actors deserve a Plaudite By their fruits ye shall know them For what though the voice be Jacobs Ye may know Esau by his hands What though the Devil turn Angel of light Ye may know him by his claws by his malice and rage For how can an Angel of light tear men in pieces By their fruits ye may know them So ye see this inconvenience and mischief which sometimes is occasioned by the Doctrine of the Spirit 's Teaching is not unavoidable It is not necessary though I mistake and take the Devil for an Angel that the holy Ghost should be put to silence Though Corah and his complices perish in their gainsayings yet God forbid that all Israel should be swallowed up in the same gulf Samuel runneth to Eli 1 Sam. 3. Vers 9. when the voice was God's but was taught at last to answer Speak Lord for thy servant heareth Though there were many false Prophets yet Micaiah was a true one Though there be many false Prophets come into the world yet the Spirit of God is a Spirit of truth and is not onely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our chief but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our sole Instructor Our last Part In which we shall be very brief We are told in the verse next after the Text There are diversities of gifts but the same Spirit And we may say There are diversities of teachers but the same Spirit because be the conveyances and conduits never so many through which the knowledge of our Lord Jesus is brought unto us if the Sririt move not along with it it may be water indeed but not of life Because all means are but instrumental but He the prime Agent we may well call him not onely the chief but the sole Instructor The Church of Christ is DOMUS DOCTRINAE the House of learning as it is called in the Chaldee Paraphrase and COLUMNA VERITATIS 1 Tim. 3.15 the Pillar of the truth because it presenteth the knowledge of Christ as a Pillar doth an Inscription and even offereth and urgeth it to every eye that it may not slip out of our memories and SCHOLA CHRISTI the School of Christ in respect of his Precepts and Discipline Such glorious things have been spoken of the Church But now methinks this House is ruinous this Pillar shaken this School broken up and dissolved and the Church which bore so great a name standeth for nothing but the walls A Jesuite telleth us that at the very name of the CHURCH hostis expalluit the Enemy that is such as he called Hereticks did look pale and tremble But what is it now amongst us Nothing or but a Name and in truth a Name is nothing And that too is vanishing for it is changed into another And yet it is the same for they both signifie one and the same thing So prevalent amongst us is that Phansie and Folly which is taken for the Spirit A Church no doubt there is and will be but we onely see it as we do the Church Triumphant through a glass darkly Or she may be fair as the Moon clear as the Sun but sure she is not terrible as an army with banners Secondly the Word is a Teacher And Christ by open proclamation hath commanded us to have recourse unto it
we were afraid of when we drink down sin for some pleasant tast it hath when we know it will be our poyson The Prophet David plainly expresseth it Nolunt intelligere They will not understand and seek God Psal 3.6 The errour then in practice is from the Will alone which is swai'd more by the flatteries and sophistry of the Sense then by the dictates of the Understanding as we many times see that a parasite finds welcome and attention when we stop our ears to seaven wisemen that can render a reason An errour of a foul aspect and therefore we look upon it but at distance through masks and disguises we seek out divers inventions and out of a kind of fear that we may not erre at all or not erre soon enough we make Sin yet more sinfull and help the Devil to deceive us Sometimes we comfort our selves with that which we call a punishment and being born weak we are almost persuaded it is our duty to fall Sometimes the countenance of the Law is too severe and we tremble and dare not come neer and because we think it hard to keep we are the more active to break it Sometimes we turn the grace of God into wantonness and since he can do what he please we will not do what we ought Sometimes we turn our very remedy into a disease make the Mercy of God a kind of tentation to sin and that which should be the death of the sin the security of the sinner Sometimes we hammer out some glorious pretense propose a good end and then drive furiously towards it though we perish in the way to defend one Law break all the rest pluck the Church in pieces to fit her with a new garment a new fangled discipline fight against the King for the good of the Common-wealth tread Law and Government under foot to uphold them say it is necessary and do it as if there could be an invincible necessity to sin This is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Basil calleth it the Devil's mothod to bring-in God himself pleading for Baal and to suborn the Truth as an advocate for Errour For to make up the cheat he paints our errour in a new dress makes it a lovely majestick errour that we begin to bow and worship it Similitudo creat errorem Errour saith Tully hath its being from the resemblance which one thing bears to another It is Presumption but it is like Assurance It is Sacrilege but it is like Zeal It is Rebellion but it is like the Love of our country For as the common principles of truth may be discovered in every sect even in those opinions which are most erroneous so the common seeds of moral Goodness have some shew and appearance in those actions which are wholly evil There is something of Love in Effeminacy something of Zeal in Fury some sound of Fidelity in the loudest Treason something of the Saint in the Devil himself These are fomenta erroris these breed and nourish Errour in us these bring forth the brat and nurse it up S. Paul's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 certain wandring and stubborn imaginations the vapors of a corrupt heart exhaled and drawn up into the brain where they hang as meteors irregularly moving and wheel'd about by the agitation of a wanton phansie and S. Pau'ls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 strong disputes and subtle reasonings against God and our own souls The Vulgar translates it consilia deleberate counsels to undo our selves We consult and advise we hold a kind of Parliament within us and the issue is we shake and ruine that State which we should establish Nor do these minuere voluntatem make our errour less wilfull but aggrandize it for of themselves they have no being no reality but are the creation of the mind the work of a wanton phansie created and set up to sanctifie and glorifie our errour There is no such terrour in the Law till we have made it a killing letter no difficulty which our unwillingness frames not no pretense which we commend not no deceiving likeness which we paint not Still that is true Cor nostrum nos decepit our Heart hath deceived us Our reason is ready to advise if we will consult and it is no hard matter to devest an action of those circumstances with which we have clothed it and to wipe out the paint which we our selves have laid on But as S. Augustine well observes Impia mens odit ipsum intellectum When we forsake our Reason and Understanding we soon begin to distast and hate it and because it doth not prophesie good unto us but evil are unwilling to hear it speak to us any more from thence we hear nothing but threatnings and menaces and the sentence of condemnation It exhorteth and corrects and instructs it is a voice behind us and a voice within us and we must turn back from the pleasing paths of errour if we listen to it Timemus intelligere nè cogamur facere we are afraid to understand our errour because we are unwilling to avoid it we are afraid to hear of Righteousness who are resolved to be unjust And what was an apologie for Ovid may be applyed to us to our condemnation Non ignoramus vitia sed amamus We are not ignorant of the errours of our life but we do love them and will be those beasts which we know must be thrust through with a dart I have now brought before your eye the Errour we must fly from and the Apostle exhorts us to make haste 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Be not deceived It is tender'd as good counsel but indeed is a law For as Tertullian speaks If the ground of every Law be Reason Lex erit omne quod ratione constiterit à quocunque productum est Whatsoever Reason commends must be a law to us though it be not written in tables of stone nor proclaimed by the voice of the herald So had not this exhortatation been Apostolical yet it might well carry with it the force of a Law because nothing is more opposite to Reason then Errour I may say it is not onely a Law but compendium totius Eâ—angelii the sum of all the precepts of the Gospel or rather a â—â—â—lar to preserve them all pressing upon us a duty which if well observed will fit and qualifie us for all the duties of our life And thâ—refore what the Pope usurps upon weak grounds or none at all is the prerogative or rather the duty of every Christian in those things which concern his peace to be infallible One is no further a Christian nâ—si in quantum caeperit esse Angelus then so far forth as by casting off errour more and more he begins to have a tast of an Angelical estate And now we should descend to application And I could wish I could not apply it But if I should apply it I must make use of the Rhetorick of the antients who in a copions subject were wont to
in evil as from Gods Grace in good proceed both the Will and the Deed. For when this Persuasion is wrought in us when by degrees we have lessened that honour and detestation of Sin which God hath imprinted in the mind of every man when we have often tasted those delights which are but for a season when this false inscription From hence is our gain hath blotted out the true one The wages of Sin is Death for we seldom take down this sop but the Devil enters when either Fear of inconvenience or Hope of gain hath made us afraid of the Truth and by degrees driven us into a false persuasion and at last prevailed with us to conclude against our own determinations and to approve what we condemn then every part of the body and faculty of the soul may be made a weapon of unrighteousness then we rejoyce like giants to run our race though the way we go be the way that leads unto Death Good Lord what a world of wickedness may be laid upon a poor thin and groundless Persuasion What a burden will Self-deceit bear What mountains and hills will wilfull Errour lie under and never feel them Hamor and Shechem must fall by the sword Gen. 34.26 and their whole city must be spoyled and what 's the ground Nothing but a mongrel Persuasion made up of Malice and Religion vers 31. Should he deal with our Sister as with an harlot Joseph must be sold and what 's the reason Behold the dreamer cometh Absalom would wrest his fathers sceptre out of his hand What puts him in arms Ambition and that which commends Ambition a thought that he could manage it better Oh that I might do justice King and Nobles and Senators all must perish together at one blow For should Hereticks live Holy things must be devoured For should Superstition flourish Such inconsequences and absurdities doth Self-deceit fall upon having no better props and pillars to uphold her then open Falshood or mistaken or misapplied Truth For as we cannot conclude well from false premisses so the premisses may be true and yet we may not conclude well For he that saith Thou shalt not commit adultery hath said also Thou shalt not kill He that condemns Heresie hath made Murder a crying sin He that forbids Superstition abhorreth Sacrilege All that we call Adulterers are not to be slain All that we term Hereticks are not to be blown up All that is or seems to be abused is not presently to be abolished For Adulterers may be punished though not by us Hereticks may be restrained though not by fire and things abused may be reserv'd and put to better uses And yet see upon what a Nothing this Self-deceit upholds it self For neither were they all adulterers that were slain by those brethren in evil nor were they Hereticks who were to be blown up nor is that Superstition which appears so to them whom the prince of this world hath blinded Oh what a fine subtle webb doth Self-deceit spin to catch it self What a Prophet is the Devil in Samuels mantle How do our own Lusts abuse us when the name or thought of Religion is taken in to make up the cheat How witty are we to our own damnation O Self-deceit from whence art thou come to cover the earth the very snare of the Devil but which we make our selves his golden fetters which we bear with delight and with which we walk pleasantly and say The bitterness of death is past and so we rejoyce in evil triumph in evil boast of evil call evil good and dream of paradise when we are falling into the bottomless pit Secondly this Self-deceit which our Apostle forbiddeth hath brought an evil report upon our Profession upon Christianity it self there having scarce been found any of any Religion who have so wilfully mistaken and deceived themselves in the rules of their Profession as Christians Christianity is a severe Religion and who more loose then Christians Christianity is an innocent Religion and full of simplicity and singleness and who more deceitful then Christians The very soul of Christianity is Charity and who more malitious then Christians The Spirit that taught Christianity came down in the shape of a Dove and who more vultures then Christians What an incongruity what a soloecism is this The best Religion and the worst men Men who have learnt an art to make a Promise overthrow a Precept and one precept supplant another sometimes wasting and consuming their Charity in their Zeal sometimes abating their Zeal with unseasonable Meekness now breaking the second Table to preserve the first and defying the image of God in detestation of Idolatry now losing Religion in Ceremony and anon crying down Ceremony when all their Religion is but a complement Invenit diabolus quomodo nos boni sectationibus perdat saith Tertullian By the deceit of the Devil we take a fall many times in the pursuit of that which is good and are very witty to our own damnation What evasions what distinctions do we find to delude the precepts of our Saviour and his Apostles As it hath been observed of those God-makers the Painters and Statuaries of the Heathen that they were wont to paint their Goddesses like their mistresses and did then think them most fair when they were most like that which they most loved so hath it been with many professors of Christian Religion they temper the precepts of it to their own phansie and liking they lay upon them glosses and interpretations as it were colours to make them look like unto that which they most love So that as Hilary observes quot voluntates tot fides there be as many Religions as there be Tempers and Dispositions of men as many Creeds as Humours We have annuas menstrnas fides We change our Religion with our Almanach nay with the Moon and the rules of Holiness are made to give attendance on those sick and loathsome humours which do pollute and defile it If I will set forth by the common compass of the world I may put in at shore when my vessel is sunk I may live an Atheist and dye a Saint I may be covetous disobedient merciless I may be factious rebellious and yet religious still a religious Nabal a religious Schismatick a religious Traytor I had almost said a religious Devil For this saith S. Paul the name of Christ is evil spoken of that worthy Name as S. James calleth it by those who by our conversation should be won to reverence that Name For this that blessed Name is blasphemed by which they might be saved Omnes in nobis rationes periclitantur that I may use Tertullians words though with some change We are in part guilty of the bloud of those deceived Jews and Pagans who now perishing in their errour might have been converted to the faith had not the Christian himself been an argument against the Gospel It might well move any man to wonder that well
it self the most disorderly thing in the world into order and maketh that which stands us against his law to meet with his Justice and that which runs from the order that his Mercy hath set up to be driven to the order of Equity For Sin is an offense against the Creation a breach and invertion of that order which the Wisdome of God did at first establish in the world My Adultery defileth my body my Oppression grindeth the poor my Anger rageth against my brother my particular sins have their particular objects but they all strike at the Universe and at that order which was at first set up Luke 15. Father I have sinned against thee and against heaven saith the Prodigal against thee and against thy Power and that Order which thou hast establisht in the highest heavens And therefore his Providence ruleth over all to reduce this inequality to an equality and this confusion into order to shew what harmony it can work in the greatest disorder what beauty he can raise out of the deformed and unnatural body of Sin striking them down by his hand who would not bow to his will Sin and Punishment are nothing of themselves but in us or rather in the wayes of Gods Providence they are something The one is voluntary that is Sin the other penal that is Smart That which is voluntary Sin is a foul deformity in nature and in that course which God hath set up and therefore the penal is added to order and place it there where it may be forced to serve for the grace and beauty of the whole that the punishment of Sin may wipe out the dishonour of Sin that he who against the will of God would tast the pleasure of Sin may against his own will drink deep of the cup of Bitterness Interest mundo Therefore it concerns the world and all that therein is that Sin be punished and that every thing be set in its own place This the whole creation seems to grone for this it earnestly expects this is the Creatures Jubilee Rom. 8. it is deliverance from the bondage of corruption Turpis est pars quae suo toti non convenit It is an ill member for which the whole body is the worse Vt in sermone litterae As Letters in a Word or Sentence so Men are the principles and parts which concur to make up a Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For Men are the World and Men are the City and Men are the Church Now every impertinent and unpunished Sinner is a letter too much or rather a blur in that sentence Let the hand of Providence therefore blot it out Let the whip be on the fools back and the sword in the murderers bowels Let Dives be in Hell let every seed have its own body and every work its proper wages and then every thing is in its own order and place and then the World is the work of Gods Hands the Church is the body of Christ and the composition is entire So this is an everlasting truth Gods Justice requires it his Providence works it the very Creature groans for it And deceive we our selves if we will and mock God if we dare If we do not well sin lyeth at the door Gen. 4.7 ready to break in with a whip and vengeance upon us For whatsoever a man sows that also shall he reap For in the next place God doth not onely punish sin but fits and proportions the punishment to the sin both in this life and in that which is to come He observes a kind of Arithmetical proportion and draws both parts together that the one may not crack of his purchase nor the other complain of his loss that the Sinner may not boast of his sin nor God lose any part of his glory The Prophet David hath fully exprest it He made a way to his anger LIBRAVlT ITER Psal 78 50. he weighed it as by the scales As they increased they sinned against me Hos 4.7 Therefore I will change their glory into shame Rom. 1.25 As they changed the truth of God into a lye so God delivered them up An Arithmetical and just proportion They took away Gods glory and they pay him with shame with the shame of a sinner which is Gods glory God under the Law did appoint particular punishments for particular sins as Famine by drought for Deteining of Tithes Pestilence for Injustice to destroy those that would not destroy the wicked nor plead the cause of the oppressed fierce and devouring Beasts for Perjury and Blasphemy and Captivity for Idolatry Lev. 10. Nadab and Abihu offered strange fire and were consumed by fire from Heaven Adonibezek had his thumbs cut off and his great toes Judg. 1.6 and in the next verse he confesseth Threescore and ten kings having their thumbs and great toes cut off gathered their meat under my table As I have done so God hath requited me Absalom's hearts desire was to get his Fathers crown and you may behold him with three darts thrust through his heart 2 Sam. 18 So in all ages it hath been observeable that men have been taken in their own net and been buried in the pit which they dig'd For this saith S. Basil is not onely a punishment but the very nature of Sin to make a net and to dig a pit for it self The Thief twists the halter that hangs him the Envious eateth out his own heart the Angry man slayeth himself the Wanton beast is burnt up with his own heat the Ambitious breaketh his own neck the Covetous pierceth his own soul and is choked as Crassus was with his own gold the Proud man breaks with his own swelling the Seditious is burnt with the fire he made So near doth Punishment follow Sin at the heels that in Scripture often one name and word serveth to signifie both and Sin is taken both for the guilt and the Punishment And this in this world But in the next Tophet is ordeined and prepared of old fitted and proportioned to every one that goes on in his sin as fit for an unrepentant sinner as a Throne is for a King or Heaven for an Angel For as there is some analogy between the joyes a good conscience yields on earth and thoss which we shall have at the right hand of God â—â—br 6.4 The Apostle calls it a tast of the heavenly gift and the Schoolmen tell us that Glory is the consummation of Grace which looked towards it and tended to it So is Sin an embleme of Hell carrying with it nothing but disorder confusion and torment Anselme thought it the uglier Hell of the two and more to be abhorred In Hell there is stench what more unsavory then Sin in Hell there is pain what more tormenting then Sin in Hell there is weeping what more lamentable then Sin in Hell there is a worm what more gnawing then Sin Sin entred in and then Hell was created Had
happiness He taketh not away the first but he doth establish the second Briefly then we may observe these two parts 1. the Womans attestation 2. Christ's reply the Womans dictor and Christ's In the first Wisdome is justified of one of her children against all the gainsayings of the Jews and contradiction of sinners to the second Wisdome her self pointeth out to true happiness openeth her treasuries to all who will receive her instructions and proclaimeth an everlasting jubilee to those who hear the word of God and keep it In the handling of the former part we shall pass by these steps First we will point out the Occasion of the speach As he spake these things it came to pass Next we will take notice of the Person who took hold of the occasion and made so good use both of Christ's miracles and doctrine We find no name at all but some upon no ground conjecture that it was Martha's maid The Text saith no more but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a certain woman of the company but one of a multitude and that an unknown obscure woman not those learned clerks the Scribes and Pharisees Thirdly we shall propose to your Christian imitation the vehemencie and heat of her Affection Her heart was hot within her and the fire burned and at last it brast forth into a pure flame and she spake with her tongue She did not conceal and suppress her thoughts nor whisper them into the ear of a stranger but lift up her voice that the deadliest enemies of Christ even the Pharisees might hear Lastly we will weigh and consider the speach it self Blessed is the womb that bare thee and the paps that thou hast sucked and tender it to you as near as we can in its full weight And all these particulars will amount to this sum That a poor silly woman saw more of the excellencie of Christ then did all the Doctors and Masters of Israel These materials our first part affordeth us to work upon Now as the Woman from what she had heard and seen took occasion to magnifie Christ so from her affection and free testimony Christ taketh occasion further to instruct her Blessed is the womb that bare thee saith the Woman Yea rather blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it saith Christ Which maketh our second part Wherein we shall consider 1. the Form 2. the Matter and Substance of the words For the Form some would have the words adversative others meerly affirmative Some place them in opposition to the Womans affection Others too jealous of that honour which is given to the blessed Mother of Christ make them a plain and naked affirmation willing rather that Christ's words should want of their weight then that one jote or tittle of the Womans honour should fall to the ground I will not be too solicitous to take up the quarrel between them nor indeed is it worth the while The very first words Yea rather make it plain that the Womans Blessed was defective and wanted weight aad therefore Christ who is the Wisdome of the Father filleth it up He doth not which is the best kind of redargution with any bitterness deny what she saith but by a gentle corrective setteth her at rights She commendeth and magnifieth a corporal he preferreth a spiritual birth For as there is fructus ventris the fruit of the womb so is there partus mentis a conception and birth of the mind We conceive Christ by our hearing the word but when we keep it Christ is fully formed in us and we bring forth fruit meet for repentance The Woman then commendeth one birth and Christ enjoyneth another and as Socrates taught his scholars so our Saviour leadeth the Woman 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from like to like from the admiration of a temporal to the knowledge of the spiritual birth from one Blessedness to another And thus the matter and substance of Christ's words affordeth us these three things 1. conceptum a kind of Conception by hearing of the word 2. partum a kind of Birth or Bringing-forth by keeping it 3. gaudium Joy after the delivery not temporal but spiritual even that Blessedness which every good Christian is as capable of as the Mother of Christ and which is laid up not onely for her who bare him in her womb but also for all those who keep him in their heart Yea rather saith Christ blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it These be the parts of my Text and of these in order Blessed is the womb that bare thee c. saith the Woman And that which occasioned and moved her thus to lift up her voice was the power of Christ's Works and Words When she saw him mighty in both when she saw the wonders that he wrought and how mightily he convinced the Scribes and Pharisees when he had confirmed his doctrine by miracles and his miracles by reason she plainly discovered the finger by which they were wrought and without any further deliberation she pronounceth him a most divine and excellent person To cure diseases with a word or with a touch to cast out devils to raise the dead could not proceed from any other power then his who doth whatsoever he will both in heaven and in earth And to this end it hath pleased God to give testimony to his truth as it were by a voice from heaven that we might believe and acknowledge that truth for the confirmation whereof such things were wrought before the sun and the people as none but God can do For what our Saviour speaketh of that voice from heaven which was as thunder John 12.28 29 30. is most true of this outward testimony This voice from heaven cometh not because of Him but for our sakes who are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luke 24.25 slow of heart to believe and will not be induced to subscribe to the truth unless we see it written with the sun-beams unless it be made plain and manifest by signs and wonders Jo. 4.48 And such a plain and clear testimony the Jew had need of For all changes especially of Religion are with difficulty it being proper to men to be jealous of every breath as of an enemy if it blow in opposition to ought they have already received and though it be the truth to suspect it because it breatheth from a contrary coast And therefore he that will remove the mind from that which it hath once laid hold on and wherein it is already settled must bring with him more then ordinary motives and inducements even such as may work a kind of conquest upon the Understanding Now the end of Christ's coming was to make such a change to alter what long-before had been established by God himself to rent the veil of the Temple in twain to abolish the law of Ceremonies which God by the hand of Moses had given vetera concutere to sound the trumpet and with it to shake
hoarcely as if they had lost their voice vvhen they faulter in their speech and speak in points of Divinity as Bassianus did vvhen he had slain his brother Geta ut qui malint intelligi quà m audiri as vvilling to be understood indeed but not to speak out and so cunningly disperse their doctrine that they may instruct their friends yet give no advantage to their enemies you may be sure the Heart is not warm nor really affected But vvhen vve speak vvith boldness vvhat vve have heard and seen vvhen vve cast down our gauntlet and stand in defense of the Truth against the vvorld vvhen neither Pharisee nor Divel can silence us but in omni praetorio in omni conscitorio in every judgment-seat in every consistory when Malice and Power come towards us in a tempest vve lift up our voice and dare speak for the Truth vvhen others dare persecute it it is an evident sign that a fire is kindled within us and we are warmed with it that vvith the Woman here vve see some excellencies in Christ some beauty and majesty in the Truth vvhich others do not whose lips are sealed up In a vvord to speak of Christ before the Pharisees to lift up our voice and speak of his name when for ought vve know it may be the last vvord vve shall speak to be true prophets amongst four hundred false ones vvhen the Pharisees call Christ Beelzebub to cry Hosanna to the Son of David to bless the womb that bare him and the paps that gave him suck vvhen others say he is a Samaritane and hath a devil is truly to make this devout Woman a patern to make that use of her voice which she did of Christs voice and of his miracle vvho could not contein her self nor keep silence but having received in her heart the lively character of Christs power and wisdome in the midst of his enemies in the midst of a multitude vvhen some reviled him and others vvere silent she lift up her voice and blessed the womb that bare him and the paps which gave him suck Which is her Diction our next part and should come now to be handled but the time being past vve shall reserve it for part of our task in the Afternoon The Four and Thirtieth SERMON PART II. LUKE XI 27 28. And it came to pass as he spake these things a certain woman of the company lift up her voice and said unto him Blessed is the womb that bare thee and the paps which thou hast sucked But he said Yea rather blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it WE have already handled the circumstantial parts of the Text We are now to treat of the substantial the Womans speach and our Saviours We begin with the Womans Blessed is the womb that bare thee c. And that the mother of Christ was blessed we need not doubt For we have not onely the voice of this woman to prove it but the voice of an Angel Blessed art thou among women Luke 1.28 v. 31 32. and Thou hast found favour with God and shalt conceive in thy womb and bring forth a son even the Son of the Highest And we have her cousins testimony in the very words of the Angel Blessed art thou amongst women v. 42. and blessed is the fruit of thy womb And we have the witness of a babe unborn who leaped in the womb prophetavit antequam natus est and spake this truth when he could not speak And indeed though the womb be not capable of true blessedness which all the privileges and prerogatives in the world of Birth or Honour or Wisdome or Strength cannot reach for neither the earth nor paradise it self can bring forth this fruit of Blessedness which is onely at the right hand of God who begins it here and compleats it in the highest heavens yet to be the Mother of Christ carries with it a kind of resemblance and likeness with that which is truly Blessedness For Blessedness is a state and condition in which is treasured up all the perfection which created substances are capable of all defects and imperfections which mingle themselves with the best things here on earth and taint and corrupt them being quite removed and taken away As if we seek for Pleasure we shall find it in Heaven both pure and fine from those dregs which do here invenom and imbitter it and make even Pleasure it self tedious and irksome If you would have honour here it is without burden Here are Riches and no fear of loosing them Here is Life without vexation here is Life without end This the Womb is not capable of yet we may see a representation of it in the Womb of the Virgin in the birth of our Saviour which was not ordinary but miraculous where she that brought the Child had the joy of a Mother and the honour of a Virgin had all things but the imperfection of a Mother I will not labour in this argument Thus far we may safely go All generations shall call her blessed and while we speak of the Mother in her own language and in the language of the Son we have truth and religion on our side But yet some there be who will not venture so far and though they allow her blessed yet bogle at the Saint as a name of danger and scandal and because others have drest her up toyishly with borrowed titles they do little less then rob her of her own and take it to themselves take it from the Mother of Christ and give it to a wicked and an adulterous generation Others on the contrary side by making her more then a Saint have made her an Idole They have placed her in the House of God as Mother of the family put into her hands the keys of Mercy to let in whom she please called her the Fountain of life the Mother of the living and the Raiser of the dead written books of her miraculous Conception and Assumption and of the Power and Majesty she hath in heaven Of which we may say as Pliny doth of the writings of the Magicians that they have been published non sinu contemptu irrisu generis humani not without a kind of contempt and derision of men not without this insolent thought that men would be so brutish as to approve and such fools as to believe whatsoever fell from the pen of such idle dreamers For thus without the least help of the breath of the Spirit and without any countenance from any syllable in the word of God they have lifted the holy Virgin up and seated her in Gods throne and every day plead her title in the very face of Christendome and as Tully spake of some superstitious frantick Philosophers quidvis malle videntur quà m se non ineptos they seem to affect and hug this gross and ungrounded errour and had rather be any thing then not be ridiculous But these extremes have men run upon whilest
God is just holy as God is holy and merciful as God is merciful Look not for the face of God in the hollow of the ear or the wrinkles of the face Look not for him in a forced sigh or grone Look not to see him alwaies in thy outward mortification For there thou seest at most but his hinder parts what he commandeth last The fullest view a mortal eye can have of him is in piety and innocency of life which are the works of his hand and weak and imperfect representations of him And this is his glory that we are like unto him and in this he rejoyceth as an artificer is delighted in his work when he seeth it finished according to that Idea which he had set up in his mind and looketh upon it with the same favour and complacency as he doth upon his child which resembleth him so looketh God upon his creature when he seeth him built up according to that pattern which he hath made and which was in himself when he seeth him in that shape and form of obedience which he prescribed when he is what God would have him be a follower of God This is his glory above all the Hallelujahs and Hosannas of men and Angels In a word this is the end for which he gave us those hard and unpleasant laws of Fasting and Abstinence and that chargeable one as we think of Hearing For this we pray for this we hear for this we fast And if these duties lift us up to this they are accepted If not they but carry us the wrong way from Bethel to Bethaven from true godliness to lying and vanity and they are an abomination And when God thundereth from heaven and breatheth forth his menaces against the greatest sinners the sentence is They shall have their portion with hypocrites For 1. Nothing is more opposite to God who is Truth then a Pharisaical hypocrite whose whole life is a lye opposite to his Justice which as it punisheth all and every part of wickedness so it exacteth all and every part of sanctity which will not dispense with a moral positive and eternal precept upon the performance of a temporay and occasional one which exacteth his will to be performed not by halves but commandeth us implere legem to fulfiâ—l his Law to fill it up with our obedience which will not take a dayes fast for an age of intemperance a bow of the head for a blow on the face nor the hearing of an hour for the deceit and cosenage of a vveek vvhich vvill not take the shadow for the substance nor a picture for a Christian in a vvord vvhich vvill not admit of our courage and resolution in sin for our active yet unactive endeavours in bodily exercise vvhich vvill not take the helps the abused helps for the end nor favour the Devil for the Saint he is like The voice of Justice is These things thou oughtest to have done and not to have left the other undone 2. Hypocrisie is opposite to God's Wisdom and is a mockery of him hiding us from his all-seeing eye as if he could not behold Oppression and Sacrilege through a Fast as if he could not discover us fighting against heaven because our march is grave and solemn and we sin against him in his name as if he could not see Jeroboam's wife in her disguise nor the Devil in Samuel's mantle as if he that made the Eye were blind and he that made the Conscience were not greater then it and saw all things even those vve will not see and those vve cannot see for vvho ever yet foorded his own heart Why should vve then provoke the Lord to jealousie Are we wiser then he Quid prodest inclusam habere conscientiam Patemus Deo Why should vve first beat and wound our conscience with sin and then heal and skin it over vvith a ceremony for howsoever it be shut to thee thy heart is open to God more open then Drusus's house in the story that had neither vvindows nor doors Though thy mask be on and thou art acting thy part upon the stage of the world yet thou art in the eye and presence of a just and wise God To him thy complement is a lye thy dissimulation open thy thoughts as vocal as thy words thy darkness as clear as the light and thy whisper as loud as thunder He can sever thy dross from thy gold thy oppression from thy fasting thy sacrilege from thy zeal And he vvho telleth the number of the stars and calleth them all by their names will tell the number of thy sins as numberless as they and call them all by their names thy Oppression oppression thy Fraud fraud thy Profaneness profaneness though they lye hid and covered over in a fast in thy ceremonious specious and hollow devotion And now vvhere is thy hope In a shadow in a ceremony in a broken reed vvhich vvill pierce through thy hand and aggravate thy sin Job 8. The hope of the hypocrite shall be cut off said Bildad Nay his joy is but a moment saith Zophar Job 20. And a Moment vve know is indivisible of less continuance then a thought Philosophers will not allow it to be a part of Time How can that hope last which hath no better a pillar to lean on then a phantasm which appeareth and is not I fast twice in the week I pay tithes of all that I possess is a fair Item in a Pharisee's catalogue but it is foisted in and when God looketh upon it it is a bill of accusation And now you have seen the Pharisee's phylacteries pulled off the hypocrite unmasked let us take a short survey of our selves by vvay of application and so conclude And here as S. Ambrose speaketh of the story of Naboth Vetus tempore usu quotidiana It is very ancient but renewed every day in the practice of men so may vve say of the Pharisees The Sect is vanished but there is a generation of such vipers still lifting up their heads and their voices as high as they as very hypocrites as they as holy as they and as seditious as they as holy as they and as deceitful as they as holy as they and as covetous as they as holy as they and as imperious as they as holy as they and as bold Dictators as they Mali thripes mali ipes Neither is better for both are bad and it is not easie to determine which is worse but when they shew us their teeth and their horns You may see them in the Temple and in every street hear them giving thanks and blessing themselves making that a Law which is none and slighting the rest straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel stumbling at a straw and leaping over a mountain startling at a child at that which is harmless and embracing a monster silent and crafty when they are over-powered and loud and cruel when they prevail Lambs when they list and Lions when they can
the means and so go to heaven with hell about us And indeed Wickedness could never so fill the hearts of men if they did not entertain this conceit that the Gospel and the Law are at as great a distance as Liberty and Captivity And by this the Gospel declineth and groweth weak and unprofitable not able to make a new creature which is made up in righteousness and holiness and obedience to those Laws which had not the Prince of this vvorld blinded us we might easily see and take notice of even in the Gospel it self For Christ did neither dissolve the Law of Nature nor abrogate the Moral Law of Moses but improved and perfected them both He left the Moral Law as a Rule but not as a Covenant pressed it further then formerly it had been understood and shewed us yet a more excellent way And as God gave to Adam a Law 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as matter for the freedom of his will to see which way it would bend and to try his obedience So did Christ in this new Creation even when he came to heal the broken-hearted and set at liberty those that were in prison publish his precepts which are not Counsels but Laws as matter of that obedience which will keep our heart from polluting again and strengthen our feet that we may standfast in that liberty wherewith he hath made us free For without obedience to these Laws the plague is still at our heart and our fetters cleave close to us He is come and hath finished all and for all this we are yet in our sins I will not say with Tertullian Quisquis rationem jubet legislator est Whosoever commandeth that which Reason suggesteth is a Law-giver For every man that can speak Reason hath not authority to make Laws But Christ was not onely the Wisdom of his Father but had Legislative power committed to him being the supreme Head over all men that by his Laws as well as his Bloud he might bind them to that obedience which may make them fit citizens of his new Jerusalem And as he is CHRIST anointed by his Father anointed to his office to teach and command so he distilleth his ointment on every member of his And the same anointing teacheth us of all things and is truth and is no lie and maketh us Christians that we may be obedient to the Christian Law Christ saith This new Commandment I give you and his Apostle calleth it a Law and we need not be afraid of the name We will but draw it down to our selves by way of use and application and so conclude And first we should not be afraid of the word Law if we were not afraid of our Duty nor look up upon God's decree which is hidden from us but fulfill the royal Law which is put into our mouth and into our hearts For his Decree and his Command are not at such opposition but the command may be a decree also And he decreed to save us by Faith and Obedience to his Evangelical Laws and he decreed to crown us but by those means which are fit to set the crown upon our heads Therefore we cannot but condemn that conceit which hath stained the papers of many who call themselves Gospellers and polluted the lives of more That Christ came into the world to do his Father's will that is to redeem us but not to do his Father's will that is to teach and command us Which is in effect to redeem us and yet leave us in chains That Christ is a Saviour and not a Law-giver That the Gospel consisteth rather in certain Articles to be believed then in certain Precepts to be observed That to speak properly there is no precept at all delivered in the Gospel That it belongeth to the Law to command That the breath of the Gospel is mild and gentle and smelleth of nothing but frankincense and myrrhe those precious promises which we gaze upon till our eyes dazle that we can see nothing we have to do no thought to stifle no word to silence no lust to beat down no temptation to struggle with but we let loose our phansie and our thoughts flie after and embrace every vanity we set no watch to the door of our lips we prove not our works but do whatsoever the flesh suggesteth because we have nothing to do we tempt even Temptation it self and will be captives because we have a Saviour for we are taught and are willing to believe it That the will of God is laid down in the form and manner of a Law but not so to be understood by the Elect which every man can make himself when he please but as a Promise which God will work in those his chosen ones but will not work in others who from all eternity are cast away That Faith it self which is the chief and primary precept of the Gospel is rather promised then left as a command Qui amant sibi somnia fingunt With such ease do men swallow the most gross and dangerous falshoods and then sit down and delight themselves in those phansies which could find no room but in the sick and distempered brain of a man sold under sin and bound up in carnality For if we would but look upon Christ or upon our selves and consider what is most proper to unite us to him if we would but hear him when he speaketh You cannot love me unless you keep my commandments we should not thus smooth and plain our way to run upon the pricks we should easily with one cast of our eye see what distance there is between a Promise and a Law and distinguish them by the very sound which flesh and bloud and our weariness in the paths of righteousness do so easily joyn together and make one Caelum mari unitur ubi visio absumitur quae quamdiu viget tam diu dividit saith Tertullian At some distance the heavens seem to close with the sea not so much by reason of the beams which are cast upon it but because the sight and visive power is weary and faint which whilest it remaineth quick and active is able to divide objects one from the other In like manner we may conceive that a Promise and a Precept which are in their own nature diverse and sâ—veral things for a Promise waiteth upon a Precept to urge and promote it and obedience to the Precept sealeth the Promise and maketh it good unto us yet may sometimes be taken for the very same For the Promises are glorious and cast a lustre upon the Precepts that they are less observable and so our duty is lost in the reward that looketh towards us Besides this it could not be that men should so mistake but that their eyes are dull and heavy by gazing too long upon the absolute decree of Predestination in which though they be never so far asunder the Precept and the Promise may well meet they think and be concentred Certainly a dangerous
Powers and Principalities Laws and Precepts and all that is named of God Ambition maketh Laws Jura perjura Swear and forswear Arise kill and eat Covetousness maketh Laws condemneth us to the mines to dig and sweat Quocunque modo rem Gather and lay up Come not within the reach of Omri's statutes of humane Laws and you need not fear any Law of Christ. Private Interest maketh Laws and indeed is the Emperour of the world and maketh men slaves to crouch and bow under every burthen to submit to every Law of man though it enjoyn to day what it did forbid yesterday to raise up our heads and then duck at every shadow that cometh over us but we can see no such formidable power in the Royal Law of Christ because it breatheth not upon it to promote and uphold it but looketh as an enemy that would cast it down biddeth us deny our selves which we do every day for our lusts for our honour for our profit but cannot do it for Christ or for that crown which is laid up for those that do it Thus every thing hath power over us which may destroy us but Christ is not hearkned to nor those his Laws which may make us wise unto salvation For we are too ready to believe what some have been bold to teach that there are no such Laws at all in the Gospel Therefore in the last place let us cast this root of bitterness out of our hearts let us look upon it as a most dangerous and baneful errour an errour which hath brought that abomination of desolation into the world and into the lives and manners of Christians which have made them stink amongst the inhabitants of the earth amongst Jews and Pagans and Infidels which tremble to behold those works of darkness which they see every day not onely done but defended by those who call themselves the children of light Because in that name we bite and devour one another for this they despise the Gospel of Christ because we boast of it all the day long and make use of it as a Licence or Letters patent to be worse then they riot it in the light beat our fellow-servants defraud and oppress them which they do not in darkness and in the shadow of death The first Christians called the Gospel legem Christianam the Christian Law and so lived as under a Law so lived that nothing but the name was accused But the latter times have brought forth subtle Divines that have disputed away the Law and now there is scarce any thing left commendable but the name A Gospeller and worse then a Turk or Pagan a Gospeller and a Revenger a Gospeller and a Libertine a Gospeller and a Schismatick a Gospeller and a Deceiver a Gospeller and a Traitor a Gospeller that will be under no Law a Gospeller that is all for Love and Mercy and nothing for Fear I may say the Devil is a better Gospeller for he believeth and trembleth And indeed this is one of the Devils subtilest engines veritatem veritate concutere to shake and beat down one Truth with another to bury our Duty in the Good news to hide the Lord in the Saviour and the Law in the covering of Mercy to make the Gospel supplant it self that it may be of no effect to have no sound heard but that of Imputative righteousness From hence that irregularity and disobedience amongst Christians that liberty and peace in sin For when Mercy waiteth so close upon us and Judgment is far out of our sight we walk on pleasantly in forbidden paths and sin with the less regret sin and fear not pardon lying so near at hand To conclude then Let us not deceive our selves and think that there is nothing but Mercy and Pardon in the Gospel and so rely upon it till we commit those sins which shall be pardoned neither in this world nor in the world to come Nemo promittat sibi quod non promittit Evangelium saith Augustine Let no man make the promise larger then the Gospel hath made it nor so presume on the Grace of God as to turn it into wantonness so extol it as to depress it so trust to Mercy as to forfeit it but look into the Gospel and behold it in its own shape and face as pardoning sin and forbidding sin as a royal Release and a royal Law And look upon Christ the authour and finisher of our faith as a Jesus to save us Psal 2. and a Lord to command us as preaching peace and preaching a Law Rom. 8.3 condemning sin in his flesh dying that sin might dye and teaching us to destroy it in our selves In a word let us so look into the Gospel that it may be unto us the savour of life unto life and not the savour of death unto death so look upon Christ here that he may be our Lord to govern us and our Jesus to save us that we may be subject to his Laws and so be made capable of his mercy that we may acknowledge him to be our Lord and he acknowledge us before his Father that Death may lose its sting and Sin its strength and we may be saved in the last day through Jesus Christ our Lord. The Two and Fortieth SERMON PART II. JAMES I. 25. But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty and continueth therein he being not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work this man shall be blessed in his deed THat the Precepts of the Gospel do bind us as Laws ye have heard already and how the Doctrine of the Gospel is a Law We must in the next place see how it is a perfect Law And first That is perfect saith the Philosopher cui nihil adimi nec adjici potest from which nothing can be taken and to which nothing can be added Such is the Gospel You cannot adde to it you cannot take from it one lota or tittle If any shall adde unto these things Rev. 22.18 God shall adde to him the plagues that are written in this book And if any shall take away from them God shall take away his part out of the book of life There needeth no second hand to supply it and that hand deserveth to be cut off that shall corrupt or alter it For look upon the End which is Blessedness There you have it drawn out in the fairest lines that flesh and bloud can read in as large a representation as our humane nature is capable of Then view the Means to bring us to that end They are plainly exprest and set out there in such a character that we may run and read them open to our understanding exciting our faith raising our hope and even provoking us to action There is nothing which we ought to know nothing which we must believe nothing which we may hope for nothing which concerneth us to do nothing which may lift us up to happiness and carry us to the end but it is written
mind whence 554. Men love to hide their sins and to make shew of their good deeds 167 168. Man is never free but while he is obedient to Law 1100 c. v. Liberty How Man is Lord of all his actions 257. Man ever laid open to tentations how and why 280. Few Men fully perswaded of their mortality 250 251. Manichees 8. 165. 171. 412. 705. 752. Many v. Multitude Marcion 8 9. 21. 23. 246. 390. 412. 808. Marie the Mother of our Lord a blessed person 985. Some will not call her Saint 986. Others make her more 986. Mark xiv 36. expounded 25. Marriage v. Husband Perfection may be had as well in a Married as in a single life 1090. The inconveniencies of Marriage nothing so dangerous as Sin 1090. Martyrdome An excellent encomium of it 754. How to be armed for Martyrdome 192. A good life and a good cause go to the making of a Martyr 705. Their gallant and triumphant carriage in their sufferings 26. 568 569. Fear of hell made them so couragious 391. v. Sufferings Every Christian is designed to Martyrdome 573. There may be a Martyrdome before Martyrdome 82. The Devil and Errour have their Martyrs as well as God and the Truth 704 705. 912. Some slain for throwing down Images not allowed the title of Martyrs 215. Massalians 705. Mass-book Some condemn some truths because they are in the Mass-book 671. Masters of families Their Duty 545. Mathematicks No such certainty to be looked for in Ethicks as in M. 1015. Matth. v. 22 28 32 34 39 44. 1079. ¶ 48. 1087. how eluded 690. ¶ vi 25 34. 222. ¶ vii 12. 127. ¶ viii 26. 314. ¶ x. 16. 130. ¶ xi 30. 481. ¶ xxii 30. 939. ¶ xxiv Christ's Sermon in this chapter concerning the signes of his second coming nearly concerneth us 1042 1043. Matrimonie and Virginity weighed together 1090. Meaning A good Meaning or intention a poor excuse for sin 443. 447 448. Means v. End Many gaze and dote on the Means and regard not the end 988 989. Means if not made good use of turne to our great disadvantage 424. 555. Measures v. Weights Meats now under the Gospel may be indifferently used or not used 1098. Mecenas 383. Mechanick A witless etymon of the word 522. Meddling with other mens matters reproved 212. 640 641. It is against not onely the laws of Christianity 213. but also the method of Nature 214 216. Meddling busy-bodies are enemies to others and themselves also 215. They are ridiculous and prodigious 216. Idleness is the root of this vice 218. Meditation on good things how advantageous 206. 691. It is to be seconded by Practice 207. Meditation what 597. 1107. Memorie Of the Memorie 828. What a gratious efficacie the Memorie of God's Mercy hath upon the soul 828 829. Our Memories are apt to forget God's mercies and have need of reviving 589. 596. ¶ What care vvas taken to preserve the Memorie of the Saints 1019. Mercy praised 138. 147. It is an inseparable companion of Justice 138 139. We are as much bound to do acts of Mercy as not to do an injurie 139. 142 143. Nothing more sutable to the Nature of Man then Mercy 140. Mercy maketh Man like unto God 279. What influence God's Mercy and ours have one upon another 815. v. Forgiveness Mercy maketh a sympathie and harmonie in the Church 141. Why worldly men like it not 142. It is often rewarded in this life but in the next infallibly 143. The M. of the primitive Christians how far beyond ours 144 145. Less danger to exceed herein then to fall short 145. Distinctions coyned to elude Texts that enjoyn Mercy 146. Compassion the spring of Mercy 147. 149. v. Almes To love Mercy what 150. Mercie is natural 150. constant 151. sincere 152. delightful 153. Objects of Mercy appear every where 154. Motives to Mercy 153. Our Mercy to others is the rent God respecteth for his M. to us 154. God's Mercy and his Justice reconciled by Christ's Death and our Repentance 347. Why the antient Fathers were so profuse yet sparing tenderers of God's Mercy 349 350. The Mercy of God fearfully abused by some 276. Make not Mercy an occasion of sin 352 353. Mercy and Judgment should compose our song 353. Judgement followeth Mercy at the heels 360. v. GOD. The use we should make of God's Mercies 579. 590. 1072. Sins after Mercy the greater 612 613. Mercy is of most efficacie to humble our hearts 643. Merits The doctrine of Merits overthrown 812 813. 1126. All we can do or suffer is far short of meriting heaven 233. 993. 1126. Messias Christ is not such a Messias as the Jews looked for and as some worldly-minded Christians frame to themselves 33. A glorious Messiah was exspected by the Jews 553 554. 559. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what 336. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what 336. Metaphors fruitfull of controversie 46. Their use 229. Metellus Numidicus 668. Method and Order how necessarie to be followed 885. as necessarie in Christ's School as in humane Arts and Sciences 68. 947. Want of Method what mischief it worketh in the world 892. c. 945 946. Meum and Tuum quarrelsome vvords 840. Milk by some not allowed to be eaten 752. Mind v. Man The Mind is the Man and the action too 622 623. It cannot intend several things at once 509. Whether it be not necessarie that the Mind should still fluctuate and be lost in uncertainties 678. The Mind is apt to be dazled with some lesser good vvhen it should be intent upon far greater 988 989. Ministers must not flatter 511 512. v. Flattery Miracles v. Conversion The end and use of Miracles 572 c. 957 c. 968 969. 978. 988. In respect of the Agent properly there is no Miracle 969. Why M. are now ceased 970. Of Popish Miracles 970. He that will not believe the Word vvould not believe a Miracle 734. 970. What Christ did in person he doth still spiritually by his Church 970. Christ's Miracles preferred before Moses's 978. Christ's M. were supernaturall publick quick perfect 979. Miracles should fill us with admiration 979. Miracles may be scoffed at by profane men 956 c. Miserie to be chosen rather then Iniquity 127. Mockery Most mens conversation is but a Mockery of God 919 c. 958. How vvicked men are said to mock God vvho in very deed cannot be mocked 923 c. God will return the Mock upon them that mock him 925. v. Scoff Moderation to be observed 56. Moderation in the pursuit of Knowledge commended 248. Modestie in apparel to be used 1101. Monitours vve should be to one another 576. Monks and Friars censured 220. v. Perfection Solitarie Montanus 65. 752. Morality scorned and derided by speculative hypocrites 83. Morall Laws v. Ceremonie Morall virtues are not natural 199. but must be studied and laboured for 205. Of the Morall virtues of the Heathen 663. v. Heathen Morose v. Christianity Mortality Of our Mortality 538. How little believed