treadeth under foot from fear of the Law when we should have no other law but Piety That which is born of the flesh is flesh saith our Saviour John 3.6 Nor can the flesh work in us a love to and chearfulness in the things of the Spirit The flesh perfecteth nothing contributeth nothing to a good work Nor doth any thing work kindly till it come to perfection Perfection and Sincerity work our joy In Scripture we find even inanimate and senseless things said to be glad when they attain unto and abide in their natural perfection a Ps 19.5 The Sun is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber and rejoyceth as a strong man to run a race b Ps 65.12 â—3 The little hills rejoyce on every side The valleys are covered over with corn they shout for joy they also sing Prata rident So Solomon c Prov. 13.9 The light of the righteous rejoyceth because it shineth clear and continually The blessed Angels are in a state of perfection and their motion from place to place the Schools say is instantaneous and in a moment as sudden and quick as their will by which they move Therefore they are drawn out with wings Isa 6. and said to go forth like lightning Which signifieth unto us their alacrity speed in executing all God's commands Their constant office is to be ready at his beck and they ever have the heavenly characters of his will before their eyes as a Father speaketh And such also will our activity and chearfulness be in devotion and the service of God if we be thus animated and informed as it were with the love thereof if our minds be shaped and configured to it as S. Basil saith If either the Word or the Sword either the power of the truth or calamity and persecution hath made it sweet unto us and stirred up in us an earnest expectation and longing after it then IBIMUS We will go go with chearfulness to the house of mourning and sit with those who are in the dust go to that Lazar and relieve him to that prisoner and visit him to our friends and counsel them to our enemies and reconcile them with the Jews here go to the Temple to the Church and pray for the Nation Joel 2.17 and say Spare thy people O Lord and give not thine heritage to reproch go and fall down and worship him yea go to the stake and dy for him Psal 39.3 When this fire burneth within us we shall speak with the tongue and that with a chearful accent IBIMUS We will go into the house of the Lord. And so we are fallen upon our last circumstance 5. The place of their devotion the house of the Lord. When a company go to serve the Lord they must needs go to some place For how can they serve him together but in a place Adam and his sons had a place Gen. 4.3 4. The Patriarchs had a place altars and mountains and groves In the wilderness the people of God had a movable Tabernacle And though Solomon said that a Acts 7.48 1 Kings 8.27 God dwelleth not in temples made with hands yet b Acts 7.47 Solomon that said so built him an house And the work was commended by God himself not onely when it was finished and brought to perfection but even while it was yet but in design and was raised no further then in thought The Lord said unto David 2 Chron. 6.8 Forasmuch as it was in thine heart to build an house for my name thou didst well in that it was in thine heart And when Christ came he blessed in this house prayed in it taught in it disputed in it he drove the profaners out of it he spake by his presence by his tongue by his gesture he giveth it its name and in a manner Christneth it Matth. 21.13 by calling it his house and the house of prayer For though he came to strike down the Law yet he came not to beat down right Reason Though he did disanull what was fitted but for a time as Sacrifices and all that busy and troublesome that ceremonious and typical Worship yet he never abolished what common reason will teach us is necessary for all ages How could he require that men should meet together and worship him if there were to be no place at all to meet in Or what needed an express command for that which the very nature of the duty enjoyneth and necessity it self will bring in He that enjoyneth publick worship doth in that command imply that there must be a certain publick place to meet in We hear indeed Christ saying to the Jews John 2.19 Destroy this Temple but it was to make a window in their breasts that they might see he knew their very hearts 21. He bid them do what they meant to do He spake of the Temple of his body saith the Text and they did destroy both his body and their own Temple For they who had nothing more in their mouthes then The Temple of the Lord Jer. 7.4 set fire on the Temple of the Lord with their own hands as Josephus relateth And so their Ceremonies had an end so their Temple was destroyed but not to the end that all Churches and places of publick meeting should be for ever buried in its ruines before they were built That house of the Lord was dissolved indeed but at the dissolution thereof there was no voice heard that did tell us vve should build no more in any other place The first Christians we may be sure heard no such voice For assoon as persecution suffered them to move their arms they were busy in erecting of Oratories in a plain manner indeed answerable to their present estate But when the favour of Princes shined upon them and their substance encreased they poured it out plentifully this way and founded Churches in every place Nor did they think they could lay too much cost upon them none counted that wast which was expended about so good a work They built sumptuous houses for God's worship and rejoyced and after-ages applauded it both by their words and practice they magnified it and did the like Such cost hath ever gone under the name of Piety and Devotion till these later times when almost all are ready with Judas to condemn Mary Magdelene for pouring forth her ointment John 12 3-6 Churches were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Houses of the Lord and so were esteemed and not Idole Synagogues not Styes till Swine entred into them and defiled them and holp to pull them down We know God dwelleth not in Temples made with hands Acts 7.48 17.24 nor can his infinite Majesty be circumscribed we remember and therefore need not to be told that Christ said to the woman of Samaria that the hour was coming when men should neither in that mountain nor yet at Jerusalem worship the Father John 4.21 23. but should worship him
Ye Angels that do his will They are but finite agents and so not able to make good an infinite loss They are in their own nature mutable and so not fit to settle them who were more mutable more subject to change then themselves not able to change our vile bodies much less to change our souls which are as immortal as they yet lodged in tabernacles of flesh which will fall of themselves and cannot be raised again but by his power whom the Angels worship In prison we were and CVI ANGELORVM written on the door miserable captives so deplorably lost that the whole Hierarchie of Angels could not help us And if not the Angels not Moses sure though he were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nearest to God and saw as much of his Majesty as Mortality was able to bear Heb. 3.5 6. The Apostle tells us he was faithful in all his house 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a servant but Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a Son Smite he did the Aegyptians and led the people like sheep through the wilderness But he who was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Captain of our salvation as he is stiled v. 10. was to cope with one more terrible then Pharaoh and all his host to put a hook into the nostrils of that great Leviathan to lead not the people alone but Moses also through darkness and death it self able to uphold and settle an Angel in his glorious estate and to rayse Moses from the dead Not Moses then but one greater then Moses Not the Angels but one whom the Angels worship who could command a whole Legion of them Not a Prophet Or if a Prophet the great Prophet which was to come If an Angel the Angel of the Covenant Certè hic Deus est even God himself Now Athanasius's Creed will teach us that there is but one God yet three Persons the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost We must then find out to which of the Persons this oeconomie belongeth Not to the Father That great 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is his He bringeth his first begotten into the world ch 1.6 that he may declare his name unto his brethren ch 2. Not the Holy Ghost We hear him ch 3. as an Herald calling to us To day if yee will hear his voyce And he is Vicarius Christi Christs Vicar on earth supplyeth his place in his absence and comforteth his children It must needs then be media Persona the second and middle Person the Son of God Matth. 8.29 Luke 4.41 The office will best fit him to be a Mediatour Ask the Divels themselves when he lived they roared it out Ask the Centurion and them that watched him at his death they speak it with fear and trembling Matth. 27.54 Truly this was the Son of God Christ then our Captain is the Son of God But God hath divers Sons some by Adoption and they are made so some by Nuncupation and they are but called so and some by Creation and they are created so They who rob and devest Christ of his Essence yet yeild him his Title and though they deny him to be God yet call him God's Son We must follow then the Philosophers method in his description of moral Happiness proceed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by way of negation and to establish Christ in his right of Filiation tell you 1. he is not a Son not adoptivus filius God's adopted Son who by some great merit of his could so dignifie himself as to deserve that title This was the dream or rather invention of Photinus A very dream indeed For then this Similation were not of God to Man but of Man to God the Text inverted quite No Imitatur adoptio prolem Adoption is but a supply a grafting of a strange branch into another stock But he whose name is The Branch grows up of himself of the same stock and root God of God very God of very God made manifest in the flesh 1 Tim. 3.16 2. not Filius nuncupativus God's Son by nuncupation his nominal Son Such a one Sabellius and the Patro-passiani phansied as if the Father had been assimilated and so called the Son impiously making the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost not three Persons but three Names 3. Lastly not Filius creatus God's created Son 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a mere Creature and of a distinct essence from his Father as the more rigid Arians nor the most excellent Creature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in substance like unto the Father but not consubstantial with him as the more moderate whom the Fathers called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 half-Arians conceived To these Hereticks we reply Non est Filius Dei He is not thus the Son of God And as Aristotle tells us that his Moral Happiness is the chief Good but not that Good which the Voluptuary phansieth the Epicures Good nor that which Ambition flyes to the Politicians Good nor that which the Contemplative man abstracteth an universal notion and Idea of Good So may the Christian by the same method consider his Saviour his chief bliss and happiness and by way of negation draw him out of those foggs and mists where the wanton and unsanctified wits of men have placed him and bring him into the bosome of his Father and fall down and worship God and man Christ Jesus Behold a voyce from heaven spake it Matth. 3.17 17.5 This is my beloved Son We may suspect that voice when Photinus is the Echo An Angel from heaven said He shall be called the Son of the most High Luke 1.32 Our Faith starts back and will not receive it if Sabellius make the Glosse Our Saviour himself speaks it I and my Father are one John 10.30 The Truth it self will be corrupted if Arius be the Commentator To these we say He is not thus the Son of God Naz. Orat. 39. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To contract the Personality with Sabellius or to divide the Deity with Arius are blasphemies in themselves diametrally opposed but equally to the truth The Captain of our salvation is the true Son of God begotten not made the Brightness of his Father streaming from him as Light from Light his Image not according to his humane Nature as Osiander but according to his Divine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Image and Character not of any qualities in God but of his Person the true stamp of his substance begotten as Brightness from the Light as the Character from the Type as the Word from the Mind Which yet do not fully declare him Quis enarrabit saith the Prophet Who shall declare his generation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Isa 53.8 Thy faith is thy honour a great favour it is that thou art taught to believe that he is the eternal begotten Son of God The manner is known only to the Father who begat and to the Son who is begotten If thy busy curiosity lead thee further 〈◊〉
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
Echo by which he heareth himself at the rebound and thinketh the Wiseman spoke unto him Flattery is the ape of Charity It rejoyceth with them that rejoyce and weepeth with them that weep it frowneth with them that frown and smileth with them that smile It proceedeth from the Father of lies not from the Spirit of truth Hebr. 13.8 who is the same yesterday and to day and for ever Who reproveth drunkenness though in a Noah adultery though in a David want of faith though in a Peter His precepts are plain his law is in thunder his threatnings earnest and vehement What he writeth is not in a dark character Thou mayest run and read it He presenteth Murder wallowing in the blood it spilt Blasphemie with its brains out Theft sub hasta under sale He calleth not great plagues Peace nor Oppression Law nor camels gnats nor great sins peccadillos but he setteth all our sins in order before us He calleth Adam from behind the bush striketh Ananias dead for his hypocrisie and for lying to the holy Spirit depriveth him of his own Thy excuse with him is a libel thy pretense fouler than thy sin Thy false worship of him is blasphemy and thy form of godliness open impiety And where he entereth the heart Sin which is the greatest errour the grossest lye removeth it self heaveth and panteth to go out knocketh at our breast runneth down at our eyes and we hear it speak in sighs and grones unspeakable and what was our delight becometh our torment In a word he is a Spirit of truth and neither dissembleth to deceive us nor flattereth that we may deceive our selves but verus vera dicit being Truth it self telleth us what we shall find to be most true to keep us from the dangerous by paths of Errour and Misprision in which we may lose our selves and be lost for ever And this appeareth and is visible in those lessons and precepts which he giveth so agreeable to that Image after which we were made to fit and beautifie it when it is defaced and repair it when it is decayed that so it may become in some proportion and measure like unto him that made it and then so harmonious and consonant and agreeing with themselves that The whole Scripture and all the precepts it containeth may in esteem as Gerson saith go for own copulative proposition This Spirit doth not set up one precept against another nor one Text against another doth not disanul his promises in his threats nor check his threats with his promises doth not forbid all Fear in Confidence nor shake our Confidence when he bids us fear doth not set up meekness to abate our Zeal nor kindleth Zeal to consume our Meekness doth not teach Christian Liberty to shake off Obedience to Government nor prescribeth Obedience to infringe and weaken our Christian Liberty This Spirit is a Spirit of truth and never different from himself He never contradicteth himself but is equal in all his wayes the same in that truth which pleaseth thee and in that which pincheth thee in that which thou consentest to and in that which thou runnest from in that which will raise thy spirit and in that which will wound thy spirit And the reason why men who talk so much of the Spirit do fall into gross and pernicious errours is from hence That they will not be like the Spirit in this equal and like unto themselves in all their wayes That they lay claim to him in that Text which seemeth to comply with their humour but discharge and leave him in that which should purge it That upon the beck as it were of some place of Scripture which upon the first face and appearance looketh favourably upon their present inclinations they run violently on this side animated and posted on by that which was not in the Text but in their lusts and phansie and never look back upon other testimonies of Divine Authority that army of evidences as Tertullian speaketh which are openly prest out and marshalled against them and might well put them to a halt and deliberation stay and drive back their intention and settle them at last in the truth which consisteth in a moderation betwixt two extremes For we may be zealous and not cruel devout and not superstitious we may hate Idolatry and not commit Sacrilege Gal. 5.1 1 Pet. 2.16 stand fast in our Christian liberty and not make it a cloak of maliciousness if we did follow the Spirit in all his wayes who in all his wayes is a Spirit of truth For he commandeth Zeal and forbiddeth Rage he commendeth Devotion and forbiddeth Superstition he condemneth Idolatry yea and condemneth Sacrilege he preacheth Liberty 1 Cor. 12.4.8 9 11. and preacheth Obedience to Superiours and in all is the same Spirit And this Spirit did come and Christ did send him And in the next place to this end he came to be our Leader to guide us in the wayes of truth to help our infirmities to be our conduct to carry us on to the end And this is his Office and Administration Which one would think were but a low office for the Spirit of God and yet these are magnalia spiritûs the wonderful things of the Spirit and do no less proclaim his Divinity then the Creation of the world We wonder the blind should see the lame go Matth. 11.5 the deaf hear the dead be raysed up but doth it now follow The poor receive the Gospel Weigh it well in the balance of the Sanctuary and this last will appear as a great miracle as the former And this Advent and Coming was free and voluntary For though the Spirit was sent from the Father and the Son yet sponte venit he came of his own accord And he not onely cometh but sendeth himself say the Schools as he daily worketh those changes and alterations in his creature These words Dicit Mittam ut propriam autoritatem ostendat Tum denique veniet quo verbo Spiritûs potestas indicatur Naz. Orat. 37. to be sent and to come and the like are not words of diminution or disparagement He came in no servile manner but as a Lord as a friend from a friend as in a letter the very mind of him that sent it Which sheweth an agreement and concord with him that sent him but implyeth no inferiority no degree of servility or subjection Yet some there have been who have stumbled at the shadow which this word hath cast or indeed at their own and for this made the holy Spirit no more then a Creature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a supernumerary God brought in to serve and minister and no distinct Person of the blessed Trinity But what a gross error what foul ingratitude is this to call his goodness servility his coming to us submission and obedience and count him not a God because by his gracious operation he is pleased to dwell in men and make them his tabernacle Why may we
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
to raise thee from thy grave this sepulchre of rotten bones and baneful imaginations that thou mayest walk before him in the land of the living to beget Repentance and to beget Hope Hebr. 2.18 to pity us in our tentations who was sensible of his own and to drive Despair from off the face of the earth For why should the name of a Saviour and Despair be heard of in the same coasts If it breathe within the curtains of the Church it is not Christ but the Devil and our Sensuality that bringeth it in The end of Christs coming was to destroy it For this he came into the world for this he died Ask Christ saith S. Basil what he carrieth on his shoulders It is the lost sheep Luke 15.5 7 10. Ask the Angels for whom they rejoyce It is for a sinner that repenteth Ask God for what he is so earnest as to call and call again It is for those who are now in their evil wayes Ask the Shepherd Matth 18 12. Luke 15.4 and he will tell you he left ninety and nine to find but one lost sheep His desire is on us and he had rather we would be guided by his shepherds-staff then be broken by his rod of iron If thou wilt return return His Wisdom hath pointed out to it as the fittest way His justice yeildeth and will look friendly on thee whilst thou art in this way and his Mercy will go along with thee and save thee at the end If thou wilt thou mayest turn and if thou wilt turn thou shalt not daspair or if a cloud overspread thee it shall vanish at the brightness of Mercy as a mist before the Sun Here then is balm of Gilead Turn ye turn ye a loving and compassionate call to turn even those who despair of turning a Doctrine of singular comfort But this Balm is not for every wound nor will it drop and distill upon him who goeth on in his sin Mercy is as strong drink and wine Prov. 31.6 to be given to them who are ready to perish and to such who have grief of heart Many times it falleth out by reason of our presumption and hardness of heart that there is more danger in pressing some truths then in maintaining some errours Care not for the morrow is as musick to the Sluggard Matth. 6.34 Prov. 6.10 and he heareth it with delight and foldeth his hands to sleep If we commend Labour the Covetous hath encouragement enough to drudge on to rise up early and lie down late to gain the meat that perisheth Psal 127.2 John 6.27 John 4.23.24 If we but mention a worship in spirit and truth the Sacrilegious person taketh up his hammer and down goeth Ceremony and Order and the Temple it self How many Solifidians hath Free grace occasioned How many Libertines hath the indiscreet pressing of the Freedom we have by Christ raised The Gospel it self we see hath been made the savour of death unto death and Mercy malevolent At what time soever c. hath scarce with many left any time to repent Therefore it will concern us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Nazianzene speaketh Epist 20 ad Basil Magn. 2 Tim. 2.15 Luke 12.42 with art and prudence to dispense the word of truth or as S. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to cut it out as they did their sacrifices by a certain method to give every one his proper food in due season Some dispositions are so corrupted that they may be poisoned with antidotes Therapeut Theodoret observeth that God himself did not fully and plainly teach the Jews that doctrine of the Trinity lest that wavering and fickle nation might have took it by the wrong handle and made it an occasion of relapse into that idolatrous conceit which they had learnt in Egypt of worshipping many Gods The Novatians errour who would not accept of Penance after Baptisme so much as once though no Physick for a sinner yet might have proved a good antidote against Sin For men had they believed it would some at least have been more shy of sin and more wary in ordering their steps and shunned that sin as a serpent which would excommunicate them and shut them for ever out of the Church And therefore the orthodox Fathers even there where they oppose that assumed and unwarranted severity of the Novatian deliver the doctrine of Repentance with great caution and circumspection and with a seeming reluctancy Invite loquor saith Tertullian Tert. De poeui◠Bas tom 1. hom 14. I am made unwilling to publish this free mercy of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Basil I speak the truth in fear For my desire is that after Baptisme you should sin no more and my fear is you will sin more and more upon presumption of repentance and mercy He would and he would not publish the free mercy of God in Christ He was bound to preach Repentance and yet he feared What meaneth that profuse yet sparing tender of Gods Mercy those large Panegyricks and as great jealousies Why did they so much extoll Repentance and yet malè ominari presage such an evil consequence out of that which they had presented to all the world in so desirable a shape Before the Father was so taken and delighted with the contemplation of it and discovered so much power in it that he thought the Devils themselves in the interim and time between their Fall and the Creation of Man might have repented and been Angels of light still but now he draweth in his hand and putteth it forth with fear and trembling Before he held out Repentance as a board or plank to every shipwrackt soul but now he he feareth lest Repentance it self should become a rock One would think the holy Father himself were turned Novatian And to speak truth that which was the Novatians pretense to deny Repentance after Baptism drew those expressions from him and was the true cause which made him publish it with so much fear nè nobis subsidia paenitentiae blandiantur That men might not be betrayed by the flattery and pleasing appearance of that which should advantage them and level their thoughts on that benefit which it might bring to them and boldly claim it as their own though they be willing to forget and leave unregarded that part of it which should make way to let it in That hearing of so precious an antidote they might not presume it will have the same virtue and operation at any time and so after many delayes make no use of it at all That the doctrine of Repentance might not make us stand in more need of repentance in a word That that which is a remedy might not by our ill handling and applying it be turned into a disease Look into the world and you will see there is great need of so much fear and of such a caution For more fall by presumption then by despair Non tam morbis quà m
his Topick and hopeth it will melt him he beggeth of into compassion and yet he hath not power to unfold his hands to work that he may need no relief Grace soundeth in every ear and every ear is delighted with it and it is to them as the sound of a consecrated Bell is to the superstitious and they conceive it hath power to drive the Devil out of their coast whilst they not fall but run into those temptations which they might have overcome by that Grace they talkt of What speak we of these Even they who have a great name for learning and are of the first rank and file have not brought it forth â—o the Sun and to the people in that simplicity and nakedness that upon the first sight they may say This is it Sometimes it is an infused Habit sometimes it is a Motion or Operation sometimes they know not how to distinguish it from Faith and Charity It is one and the same yet it is manifold It exciteth and stirreth us up it worketh in us and it worketh with us it preventeth and followeth us And thus they handle Grace as the Philosophers do the Soul they tell us what wonders it worketh but not its essence they tell us what it doth but not plainly what it is But let us take it in its most plain and vulgar sense for that special and supernatural assistance which promoteth and upholdeth us in that course and those actions which carry us on to a supernatural end but not shut out that Grace of God by Christ Jesus by which we are justified which in Scripture is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Grace and favour of God and in most places is opposed to the Works of the Law nor those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those gifts and graces as Quickness of wit Depth of understanding and the like nor Gods Mercies by which we are so often intreated nor his promises which do even woo and allure us nor any beams of the glory of that Gospel which are all agents and instruments in working us out a crown in bringing us to that end for which we were made and designed And he that shall look back upon these cannot conceive that God will shorten his hand and be deficient and wanting to us in that help and assistance which is fit and necessary for us in this our race that he will speak to us by his Son speak to us by his blood speak to us by his mercies speak to us from heaven and then leave us as the Ostrich doth her young ones in the sand open to injuries and temptations naked and without help to defend us against that violence which may tread us to death This certainly cannot consist with his Justice and his Goodness Rom. 8.32 who having given us Christ will with him give us all things for how should it be otherwise saith S. Paul who giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not Jam. 1.5 saith S. James To pretend a want of Grace and assistance from God what is it but to cast all our imperfections upon him as well as upon Adam as if we sinned and were defective in our duty not through our own negligence and corrupt and perverse wills but because God refused to give us strength to do it gave us a Law and left us in fetters bid us go and meet him in our obedience 2 Sam. 19.26 when we were as lame as Mephibosheth and had no servant to help us as if the heavens were as brass and denied their influence and God did on purpose hide himself and withdraw his grace that we might fall from him and perish And therefore Hilary passeth this heavy censure upon it Impiae est voluntatis It is the sign of a wicked heart and one quite destitute of those graces and riches which are the proper inheritance of believing Christians to pretend they therefore want them because they were not given them of God A dangerous errour it is And we have reason to fear it hath sunk many a soul to that supine carelessness and deadness from whence they could never rise again For this is one of the wiles of our enemy to make use not onely of the flying and fading vanities of this world but even of the best graces of God to file and hammer them and make them snares and so work temptations out of that which should strengthen us against them Faith is suborned to keep out Charity the spirit of Truth is named to lead us into errour and the power of Gods Grace hath lost its authority and energy by our unsavoury and fruitless panegyricks We hear the sound and name of it we bless and applaud it but the power of it is lost not visible in any motion in any action in any progress we make in those wayes in which alone Grace will assist us It floateth on the tongue but never moveth either heart or hand Non est bonae solidae fidei omnia ad voluntatem Dei referre ut non intelligamus aliquid esse in nobis ipsis Tertull Exhort ad castitatem For do we not lie still in our graves expecting till this trump will sound Do we not cripple our selves in hope of a miracle Do we not settle upon our lees and say God can draw us out wallow in our blood because he can wash us as white as snow Do we not love our sickness because we have so skilful a Physician and since God can do what he will do what we please This is a great evil under the Sun and one principal cause of all that evil that is upon the earth It maketh us stand still and look on and delight in it and leave it to God alone and his power to remove it as if it concerned us not at all and it were too daring an attempt for us mortals the sons of Adam to purge and clense that Augean stable which we our selves have filled with dung as if Gods Wisdom and Justice did not move at all and his Mercy and Power were alone busie in the work of our salvation Busie to save the adulterer 1 Cor. 6.15 for though he be the member of an harlot yet when God will he shall be made a member of Christ to save the seditious for though he now breath nothing but hail-stones and coals of fire yet a time will come where he shall be made peaceable whether he will or no to save them who resolve to go on in their sin for God can check them when he please and bring them back to obedience and holiness in a word 2 Pet. 2.3 to save them whose damnation sleepeth not I may say with the Father Vtinam mentirer Would to God in this I were a lier But we have too much probability to induce us to believe it as a truth that they who are so ready to publish the free and irresistible power of God's Grace and call it his honour dishonour him more
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
his devotions there No he goeth to the Temple And in the Temple Christ findeth him and sheweth him yet a more excellent way To make some use of this I know the Temple is demolished not a stone left upon a stone But yet all places of publick worship did not fall with the Temple Even common Reason doth teach all Nations to erect and set apart places for this end For how can many meet together but in one place Temples we still must have where we may offer though not beasts as the Jews did yet the calves of our lips and the breathings and groans of a broken and contrite heart which is a sacrifice that God will not despise where we may worship the Father in spirit and in truth and also present our bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable to God which is our reasonable service Yet I do not plead the absolute necessity of our publick meetings in Churches Indeed there is not there cannot be any such necessity For God will not suffer necessity to lye upon any thing but that which is in our power It is absolutely necessary that we should pray For that we may do if our tongue were tacked to the roof of our mouth It is necessary that we should eat the flesh and drink the bloud of Christ For that we may do though we receive not the Sacrament It is necessary that we should serve the Lord For that we may do though every Church were beat down with axes and hammers Necessitas lex temporis Necessity is the Law of the times And whilest this Law is over us we are free from all Law of Order or Ceremony not tied to circumstances of Time and Place neither to the Sabbath nor the Temple which otherwise might well require our due observation For where Necessity is of a truth there in truth is no Law Quicquid cogit defendit Whatsoever it compelleth us to do it excuseth when it is done Then a grot or a cave or an upper room may serve for a Church But when the fetters of Necessity are once shaken off and this Law cancelled then even Convenience it self is Necessity and that which is most advantageous for us bindeth us most Then not to go to Church out of humour or out of a groundless phansie that any other place is as holy is to be a Recusant indeed and in the worst sense Heb. 10.25 Then to forsake the assembling of our selves together as the manner of some is is a ridiculous schism and the first step downwards to Apostasie We see men run first from one congregation and then from another and at length from all and so from Religion from the Truth from Christ himself Stocks they are and stones who attribute Holiness to walls And yet stocks they are and stones that do profane and disgrace them What are Churches holy A stout question to be put up by the masters of the Assembly a nail to be driven home to open the heart and to discover a Papist or Prelatical Protestant Which terms have now the same signification What are Churches holy Yes they are but no otherwise then as set apart for holy uses no otherwise then in relation to the end And then certainly they are as holy as they who are so witty to give them new names and who prefer their Parlors or their Stables before them For these will be as holy as they are if men do not profane them And they will serve for that end for which they were erected but these men ever wanton in their religion and never religious but in wantonness and contention set up other ends of their own and soon forget and fly from that for which they were created that they may overtake the other and then write Holiness in their forhead and proclaim it to all the world thâ—t they are holy and they alone And no marvel they will not admit the Church the place of publick worship to be holy who dare not call the Mother of Christ himself a Saint The time was Beloved when this was counted a holy language and holy men of God the Doctors and Martyrs of the Church spake it and feared not to gain thereby that foul imputation of being superstitious The time was when Sacrilege was a sin But now men have learned an art to do what that Lamb of God never did to take away sins by committing them to take them away and make them no sins to take them away and make them virtues And to them nothing is holy For first they look upon the Holy things as a prey and in a manner sweep away the rest with them For to compass this the Word must be no more the Word of God but what they will make it a nose of wax to be tempered and fitted to what form they please Prayer is made a formality a babling formality The Sacraments are not so much as signs The Water is dried up in the Font and the Lord's Supper is no more then what the Anabaptists heretofore called it a twopeny feast And for Discipline 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 where is it the very name of it is lost First they condemn what they hate because it standeth in the way in which Covetousness leadeth them and then they study arguments to ratifie and make good that sentence of condemnation which if you be so bold as to answer and confute they pursue you as a troubler of Israel as if they should give you a blow on the face and tell you it were to this end to keep you off from making a riot Oh Folly whence art thou come to cover the face of the earth and to shake the pillars of the Church How hath the Love of the world filled our mouths with arguments with murmurings and disputings Phil. 2.14 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with bitter disputings which adde not one cubit one hair to the body of Religion or growth of Piety Wherein when we have run never so far the one from the other if common Reason may prevail we shall meet again and find it nothing else but a quarrel and controversie about words But how shall common Reason find a place in those hearts which are so filled with the World And therefore men are bold to ask the question Whether the Word of God be his Word or no Whether there be a Temple or a Church Whether there be any Priests or Ministers of the Gospel Whether every man may not take that Office upon him What use there is of the Sacraments When and How and By whom they are to be administred God grant it be not at last put to the question Whether there be any God or no. But you will say This will not fit nor can it be set to our Meridian I wish it may not nor to any other but rather to any then ours But surely I cannot see how Profaneness and Sacrilege can drive out Superstition I will say no more but methinks I see them opening a
as a command on us to sin no more if such a necessity lay upon us that we must needs sin again For he that is born of God that is is a Christian indeed sinneth not that is falleth not into any sin which is inconsistent with the Covenant of Grace For would we have Christ perform his part of the Covenant and we break ours Can we love him and not keep his commandments or can we keep his commandments and break them Can we lift up our hearts with this talent of lead upon them Can we hope to go to heaven and yet remain in that sin which in the sight of God is as loathsome as hell it self No saith S. John He that is born of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 keepeth himself that the wicked one toucheth him not toucheth him not so as to bring him into his snare toucheth him not so as to strike him down For 1. God requireth no other obedience but that which is given up with all our mind with all our heart with all our understanding and with all our strength He is no such hard Master as to require brick and give no straw to bid us do that which he knoweth we cannot do 2. God hath promised to circumcise the heart of his people Deut. 30.6 to love him with all their hearts to teach them to write a new Law in their hearts that they shall do his will and if they do it not the sin must lie at their door and God be true and they lyars 3. God himself beareth witness of many that they did it of the people that they sought the Lord with their whole desire 2 Chr. 15.15 of Asa that his heart was perfect all his dayes 2 Chr. 15.17 2 Kings 22.2 of Josiah that he did that was right in the sight of the Lord and turned not aside to the right hand or to the left Quid disperamus quid deficimus quicquid fieri potuit potest Why then should we despair why should we thus faint and fall under the command as under a burthen which neither we nor our fathers could bear If the dry tree they under the Law could bring forth such fruit shall the green tree watered with more abundant grace be barren and bear none at all Shall temporal blessings and but a shadowed light draw them to that height of Perfection which the rich promises of the Gospel and a full sight of heaven it self and the gracious assistance of a good God cannot lift us up unto Shall Publicans and Sinners shall Jewish worshippers enter before us into the kingdom of God and shall we whom the Sun rising from on high hath visited onely look upon the light and gaze at heaven till we are shut out Shall they be able to do their duty and we shut up all in an humble confession as we call it of our weakness and inability Shall we be strong to nothing but sin Beloved God requireth Obedience as he doth our Almes according to that which we have and not according to that which we have not an obedience answerable and proportioned to our strength Not to sin against the dictate of conscience Not to omit that which we know we ought to do Not to commit that which we condemn before and when we do it To press forward with S. Paul to the mark He requireth that Perfection of parts that it be universal though not total in every part though but in part And this part of the distinction we run away with and delight in and think we are seasoned well enough with sanctifying qualities when we are in the gall of bitterness think our hearts clean when they are receptacles and a very stew of polluted thoughts our Phansies sanctified when they are but the shops of vanity our Wills rectified when they do but look on that which is good and fasten and joyn on that which is evil Therefore besides this Perfection of parts God requireth also that Perfection of degrees not such a perfection to which nothing can be added but to which something is added every day For Perfection in the highest degree which cannot be increased and improved is impossible in this life But such a Perfection as by the assistance of Grace we may attain unto such as is alwaies accompanied with an earnest and serious endeavour of growing in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is the work and business of this life not to be reserved for the future not to be begun in earth and finished in heaven as some of late have loved to speak For that Perfection in the other world is not a duty but a reward When our breath is gone from us we are extra statum merendi aut demerendi Precepts were given for this world not for the next Here we are to work out our salvation there to enjoy it Our labour is in the vineyard there is the peny Our wedding garment must be worn here there we shall put on immortality All that is to be done is to be done in this life the next is either misery or bliss And shall we be content with any degree of perfection in hope that the same hand of Mercy will crown and perfect us at once Shall we yield to God any measure of obedience in this world upon this most dangerous presumption that he will fill it up in the world to come Shall we come short of our duty here because some have taught us what we are willing to learn that God will make it up for us in the highest heavens I am no Pelagian nor Perfectionist nor would I make the way to heaven narrower then it is yet I am unwilling to betray either the Truth or my Text and say Christ doth not require what he doth require that we may do what we list and have what we list They who make the way wider for flesh and bloud to walk in are but false guides and to avoid the needle's eye run into the very mouth of destruction It is good advice that of S. Augustine Nemo sibi promittat quod non promittit Evangelium Let no man make the promise larger then the Gospel hath made it Let no man take upon him to be wiser then Christ Let no man say that is impossible which he is unwilling to do and which he never attempted Let no man say This cannot be done when he is resolved to do the contrary It is a good observation of the Fathers That many things seem very absurd to weak and unskilful men which wise men embrace as truths eò elatiùs laudant quò abjectiùs stulti aspernantur and do therefore more extoll and magnifie because they who will not understand have set them at a low price And the Philosopher will tell us That those opinions which bear no shew of truth with them are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more powerful to perswade ignorant men then the truth it self though never so
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
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
the Truth hath no power at all over us we may look upon our selves as Temples dedicated to the Truth and yet we put it far from us These two evil Spirits then we must cast out before the Spirit of Truth will enter into us I shall now therefore shew the horrour and danger of them both that ye may eject them and so become fit merchants of the Truth I. Praejudicium est quod obstat futuro judicio saith the Civilians Prejudice is that which hindreth and keepeth off any further and future judgment It hath alwaies Pertinacie to accompany it which as a rock beateth back all those batteries which Reason can make The mind is so setled upon one conclusion that it looketh upon all others as false though they be true Dan. 6.8 12. Our own sentence is like the Law of the Medes and Persians unalterable We are resolved 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Philosopher speaketh to hold fast our conclusion against all the strength of reason and argument that can be brought to the contrary This is in effect to do what the Spies did who were sent to view the land of Canaan Numb 13.32 to bring up an evil report of the Truth that we dare not venture to buy it this is to condemn the Truth and suffer no advocate to stand up and speak in its defense Nor indeed do we lie and labour so much under the rage of our Affections as under the tyranny of Prejudice For our Affections most commonly are blind and so without prejudice When they carry us along with violence we do not judge but chuse Vnicuique sua cupiditas tempestas est Every mans inordinate desire is not onely a wind to drive him forward but a tempest to wheel and whirl him about from errour to errour till a spirit of giddiness possess him that he cannot discern any thing as it is And as according to the common saying nulla tempestas diu durat no tempest is long but soon breatheth it self out so is it here the cloud of Passion is quickly blown over Gen. 27.41 44 45. Gen. 33.4 and then the eye is clear In his Wrath Esau will kill his brothor Jacob but when time had turned his fury away he became a brother again and ran to meet Jacob and embraced him and fell on his neck and kissed him and wept Then he would shed his brothers bloud now his own tears David's Lust brought him to a forbidden bed but the voice of a Prophet maketh him wash it with tears Fear made Peter deny and forswear his Master but the crowing of a cock and a look from Christ make him deny his denial and weep bitterly What is done out of Affection we do we know not how we do it and the greatest reason we have many times is because we do it If in passion we pass any judgment it is not long-lived but wasteth and decayeth and dieth with the passion But Prejudice is a rooted and lasting evil an evil we are jealous of because we think it good we build upon it as upon a foundation and he that but breatheth upon it that but looketh towards it appeareth as an enemy that cometh to dig it up Sometimes indeed Prejudice is raised in us by the Affections sometimes the Affections intermingle and interweave themselves with it but commonly the Affections come in the rear of Prejudice and follow as its effects and help to strengthen it We love him that is of our opinion because it is ours and we hate him that contradicteth it Upon the same reason we are afraid of every profer angry at every word that is spoken against it And this gathereth every conventicle mouldeth every sect coineth every heresy This is that Sword which our Saviour speaketh of Matth. 10.34 35 36. that divideth a man from his father and the daughter from her mother and maketh enemies of those who are of a mans own houshold This is that East wind which bringeth in those Locusts that cover the face of the Church Exod. 10 13 15 and make it dark and eat up all those fruits which we should gather Prejudice then doth suppose Judgment Judgment doth in a manner form it otherwise it could not be Prejudice Nor do we understand by Prejudice all judgment made and passed before-hand in the mind For such judgment may be true as well as false Nor would we so free the mind from Prejudice as to leave it unsetled and in doubt determining and concluding nothing For this were to cast out the soul it self by depriving it of Reason and Judgment which is the prime act and proper effect of Reason without which it cannot be an humane Soul We leave the mind free to judge but not so to dote on and deifie its own decree and determination as to fall down and worship it so to favour and fix upon it so to stand to it as to stand strong or rather stubborn against all those reasons that are fit and ready and may be brought to oppose and demolish it Nor do we hear mean those conclusions which are known and assented to as soon as they are tendred and presented to us which with their light overcome us and make us yield at the first sight as That we ought to worship God live honestly injure no man give every one that is his be grateful to our benefactors honour our parents and the like For here Prejudice hath no place In these our first judgment is our last because it must needs be right Once we determine and proceed no further But we understand those deductions and inferences which we make when we apply those known truths to particular practice which peradventure we may do with diligence and with the help and advice of others and yet not so build and establish our conclusions as to make them necessary everlasting and indisputable For a man may dishonour God when he thinketh he worshippeth him one may oppress his neighbour and call it justice be profane yet canonize himself for a Saint conclude one beholding to him whom he injureth be disobedient to his parents and think he honoureth them lift up his heel against his patrone and yet perswade himself that he exactly observeth all the rules of gratitude Here Prejudice may come in and be as a veil before our eyes that we cannot see the Truth which we should buy for our use which must needs withdraw it self when we worship our own imaginations when we conclude and rest upon that judgment as right which we have preconceived when we set up those reasons which peradventure we framed when we consulted with flesh and bloud against all that can be said to the contrary and precondemn all other judgment as false because it steppeth from this and cannot agree with it Suppose the first judgment in these be true yet is it no derogation from the Truth in this kind to be put to the question 2 Cor. 13.5 If we be in
we know he was but a man and we know he erred or else our Church doth in many things It were easie to name them But suppose he had broached as many lies as the Father of them could suggest yet those who in their opinions had raised him to such an height would with an open breast have received them all as oracles and have licked up poison if it had fallen from him For they had the same inducement to believe him when he erred which they had to believe him when he spake the Truth We do not derogate from so great a person we are willing to believe that he was sent from God as an useful instrument to promote the Truth But we do not believe that he sent him as he sent his Son into the world that all his words should be spirit and life John 6.63 that in every word he spake whosoever heard him heard the Father also Thus ye see how Prejudice may arise how it may be built upon a Church and upon a person and may so captivate and depress the Reason that she shall not be able to look up and see and judge of that Truth which we should buy I might instance in others and those too who have reformed the Reformation it self who have placed the Founder of their Sect as a star in a firmament and walk by the light which he casteth and by none other though it come from the Sun it self Who fixing their eye upon him alone follow as he led and in their zele and forward obsequiousness to his dictates many times outgo him and in his name and spirit work such wonders as we have shrunk and trembled at But manum de tabula we forbear lest whilest we strive to charm one serpent we awake an hundred and those such as can bite their brethren as Prejudice doth them I shall but instance in two or three prejudicial opinions which have been as a portcullis shut down against the Truth The first is That the Truth is not to be bought nor obtained by any venture or endeavour of ours but worketh it self into us by an irresistible force so as that when we shall have once got possession of it no principalities or powers no temptation no sin can deprive us of it but it will abide against all storms and assaults all subtilty and violence nay it will not remove though we do what in us lieth to thrust it out so that we may be at once possessours of it and yet enemies to it Now when this opinion hath once gained a kingdome in our heads and we count it a kind of treason or sacrilege to depose it why should we be smitten Isa 1.5 why should we be instructed any more Argument and reason will prove but paper-shot make some noise perhaps but no impression at all What is the tongue of the learned to him who will hearken to none but himself We talk of a preventing Grace to keep us from evil but this is a preventing ungracious perversness to withhold us from the Truth For when that which first speaketh in us which we first speak to our selves or others to us who can comply with that which is much dearer to us then our selves our corrupt humour and carnality when that is sealed and ratified for ever advice and counsel come too late When Prejudice is the onely musick we delight to hear what is the tongue of Men and Angels what are the instructions of the wise but harsh and unpleasant notes abhorred almost as much as the howlings of a damned spirit When we are thus rooted and built up in errour what can shake us It is impossible for us to learn or unlearn any thing For there is no reason we should be untaught that which we rest upon as certain and which we received as an everlasting truth written in our hearts by the finger of God himself and that as we think with an indeleble character Or why should we studie the knowledge of that which will be poured by an omnipotent and irrefragable hand into our minds Who would buy that which shall be forced upon him When the Jew is thus prepossessed when he putteth the Word of God from him Acts 13.46 and judgeth himself unworthy of everlasting life then there is no more to be said then that of the Apostles Lo we turn to the Gentiles Another Prejudice there is powerful in the world somewhat like the former namely a presumption that the Spirit of God teacheth us immediately and that a new light shineth in our hearts never seen before that the Spirit teacheth us not onely by his Word but against it That there is a twofold Word of God 1 Verbum praeparatorium a Word read and expounded to us by the ministery of men 2. Verâ—um consummatorium a Word which consummateth all and this is from the Spirit The one is as John Baptist to prepare the way the other as Christ to finish and perfect the work It pleaseth the Spirit of God say they by his inward operation to illuminate the mind of man with such knowledge as is not at all proposed in the outward Word and to instill that sense which the words do not bear Thus they do not onely lie to the holy Ghost but teach him to dissemble to dictate one thing and to mean another to tell you in your ear you must not do this and to tell you in your heart you may to tell you in his proclamation Matth. 5.21 you may not be angry with your brother and to tell you in secret you may murder him to tell you in the Church Matth. 21.13 you must not make his house a den of thieves and to tell you in your closet you may down with it even to the ground Juven Sat. 8. Inde Dolabella est atque hinc Antonius inde Sacrilegus Verres From hence are wars contentions heresies schismes from hence that implacable hatred of one another which is not in a Turk or a Jew to a Christian For tell me What may not they say or do who dare publish this when their Phansie is wanton It is the Spirit when their Humour is predominant It is the Spirit when their Lust and Ambition carry them on with violence to the most horrid attempts It is the Spirit when they help the Father of lies to fling his darts abroad It is the Spirit It is indeed the Spirit a Spirit of illusion a bold and impudent Spirit that cannot blush For when it is agreed on all sides that all necessary truths are plainly revealed in Scripture what Spirit must that be which is sent into the world to teach us more then all In a word it is a Spirit that teacheth us not that which is but that which our Lusts have already set up for truth A new light which is but a meteor to lead us to those precipices those works of darkness which no night is dark enough to cover Such a Spirit as proceedeth
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
forbid it me that I should give the inheritance of my fathers unto thee Beloved the Truth is our lot our inheritance Agnoscite haereditatem in Christo saith the Father Acknowledge and keep the inheritance ye have by Christ not Peace onely but Truth also which is the mother of Peace Let no temptation though as strong as the King as Money as Profit make us yield to the sale of it but let our answer be like that of Naboth God forbid that we should give away the inheritance of Christ God forbid that when the World proferreth fairly to us we should give it for a smile or when our Lusts solicit we should give it up to satisfie them or when the Persecutor breatheth nothing but terrour we should sell it to our fears and at every question that is asked us deny and forswear it God forbid we should sell it as bankrupts do their lands for want or as wantons do for pleasure or as cowards do for safety or as Esau did his birthright for hunger or as the Patriarchs sold Joseph for envy For this were to sell our selves for that which is not bread Isa 55.2 Let the Truth be like the Land of promise which might not be sold for ever Levit. 25.23 because it was the Lord's and so Truth is the Lords and to be destitute of the Truth Ephes 2.12 is to be without God in this world Let us therefore love the Truth and keep it and hold it fast and we shall find the merchandise thereof better then the merchandise of silver Prov. 3.14 and the gain thereof then fine gold Isa 23.8 The merchants hereof are princes and the most honourable traffickers of the earth even Kings and Priests unto God The Lawyers question to Christ was Revel 1.6 What good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life Matth. 19.16 17. The answer whereunto is Keep the commandments that is being interpreted the Truth for they both interpret each other This is the price of eternity With this in our hearts in our inward parts but made manifest by our hands in our outward actions we draw near unto happiness in full assurance of faith With this we purchase peace here for it is one seal to the covenant of peace and it shall open the gates of heaven and give us possession of the kingdome of peace with the God of Truth and Peace for evermore Which God grant Amen The Twelfth SERMON MATTH V. 10. Blessed are they who are persecuted for righteousness sake for theirs is the kingdom of heaven THis is the last Beatitude of the eight and looketh back upon all the rest For by this the Christian is brought to his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to his height and perfection being never nearer heaven then when he is trod under foot upon earth never more righteous then when he suffereth for righteousness never more glorious then in his bloud The first seven consist in action Where we may behold the Poor man fighting against the Pomp of the world the Mourner slighting of Pleasure the Meek subduing his Anger the Just man hungring and thirsting after righteousness feeding on it himself and commending it as the best food to others working it himself and promoting it in others the Merciful binding up wounds and scattering his bread the Pure man washing his hands in innocency and clensing his heart and the Peace-maker closing up every breach and tying the bond of love at peace with himself and all men drawing all men together as far as in him lieth to be of one mind and one heart This last which I now propose unto you consisteth in passion in a willingness and readiness of mind to suffer for all these And this is the seal and ratification of the rest an argument a protestation a demonstration that the rest were in us of a truth And as the first fit us for the last so this declareth and manifesteth the first Then we may know we are righteous when we are ready to suffer for righteousness sake then our Love is made known when we bear about with us the marks of the Lord Jesus For it is a higher degree of perfection to suffer for doing of good then it is to do it In the first we stand out against our selves in the last against our selves and others In the first we fight against our lusts and affections in the last against principalities and powers against fire and sword against the king of terrours Death it self Greater love then this hath no man John 15.13 that a man lay down his life for his friends And therefore Aquinas telleth us that this last Beatitude carryeth with it the perfection of all the rest For he that to nourish and uphold the rest is ready as S. Paul speaketh to spend himself and to be spent to lose his own head and life rather then one hair one tittle or Iota should fall from them doth manifest to God and proclaim to the world that he hath discovered beauty and glory and a heaven in them that his body and goods and life laid in the scales are found too light in comparison of them that they are of no use unless it be to make up a sacrifice to be offered for them When we are willing to part with our goods when we can leave the pleasures which last but for a season and go into the house of mourning when we can chase away our anger and make it set before the Sun when we can make righteousness our daily bread and long for it more then for the honey or the honey comb when we have melting and compassionate hearts when we have clean hearts unspotted of the world when we are at peace with all men and strive to make all men at peace with one another we have made a fair progress in the waies of righteousness But nondum ad sanguinem Hebr. 12.4 we have not yet resisted unto bloud When we can lay down our lives for righteousness sake when we can do that which is just and suffer for that we do then have we crowned the rest and fitted our own heads for a crown of glory He that can suffer what the rage of man or Devil can inflict rather then let go his righteousness he maketh it plain that it is his possession his inheritance his life fastned to his soul never to be divorced his honour when he is in disgrace his riches when he hath not a hole to hide his head in his tabernacle in a storm his delight in torment and when the sword shall part the soul from the body ascending up to heaven and accompanying it to the place of bliss For when the man is killed the Saint is gone home and is escaped to the holy hill In this relation and dependance doth this Beatitude stand with the rest If we be not righteous we cannot suffer for righteousness sake and if we be truly righteous Persecution is a
their eternal rest For such an high Priest became us saith the Apostle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 separate from sinners Heb. 7.26 separate from the Gentile's blindness and separate from the Jew's stubbornness and imperfection of a transient mortality and a permanent beatitude a God and a Man that he might 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 gather together into one both Jew and Gentile Law and Reason make the Law Natural useful and the Law written useful that so those fair whispers of Truth which mis-led the Gentile and that loud accusing Truth which affrighted the Jâ—w may be in subserviency and attendance on Christ himself that the light of Nature and the light of the Law which were but scattered beams from his eternal Brightness may be collected and united in Christ again who is Α and Ω the Beginning and the End in which Circle and Compass they are at home brought back again to their Original And do we not now begin to look upon our Reason as useful indeed but most insufficient to reach unto the End Do we not renounce the Law our selves all things Do we not melt in the same flame with our Apostle Is it not our ambition to be lost to all the world that we may be found in Christ Shall we not cast all things behind us that we may look forward upon him What would we not be ignorant of that we may know him That we may know him we will know nothing else Our understandings here are fixed and cannot be removed Nor shall our contemplation let him go till we have seen him rising from the dead and known 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the power of his resurrection Which is the next Object we are to look upon and our next Part. That Christ is risen from the dead is an article of our Faith fundatissimae fidei saith the Father a principle of the Doctrine of Christ a truth so clear and evident that the malice and envy of the Jew cannot avoid it For let them be at charge to bribe the watchmen and let the watchmen sleep so soundly that an earthquake cannot wake them and then say his Disciples stole him away this poor shift is so far from shaking that it confirmeth our faith For if they were asleep how could they tell his Disciples stole him away Or if they did steal him what could they take away more then a carcase He is risen he is not here If an Angel had not said it yet the Earthquake the Clothes the Grave it self did speak without an epitaph Or if these were silent yet where such strange impossibilities are brought in to colour and promote it a Lie doth confute it self and Malice helpeth to confirm the Truth For it we have a verdict given up by Cephas and the twelve 1 Cor. 15.5 we have a cloud of witnesses even five hundred brethren and more who saw him We have a cloud of bloud too the testimony of Martyrs who took their death on it so certain of this Truth that they sealed to it with their bloud and because they could not live to publish it proclaimed it by the loss of life And can we have better evidence Yes we have a surer word the word of God himself a surer verdict then of a Jury a better witness then five hundred a louder testimony then the bloud of Martyrs And we have our Faith too which will make all difficulties easie and conquereth all And therefore we cannot complain of distance or that we are so many ages removed from the time wherein it was done For now Christ risen is become a more obvious object then before The diversity of the Mediums have increased and multiplied him We see him through the bloud of Martyrs and we see him in his Word and we see him by the eye of Faith Christ is risen according to the Scriptures 1 Cor. 15. Offenderunt Judaei in Christum lapidem saith S. Augustine When the Jews stumbled at him he presented but the bigness of a stone but our Infidelity can find no excuse if we see him not now he appeareth as visible as a mountain Christ then is risen from the dead And we have but touched upon it to give you one word of the day in the Day it self But that our Easter may be a feast indeed and our rejoycing not in vain let us as the Apostle speaketh go on to perfection and make a further search to find the reason of our joy in the power of his resurrection And what is the power of his resurrection The Apostle telleth us it was a mighty power Eph. 1.19 Indeed it rent the rocks and shook the earth and opened the graves and forced up the dead bodies of the Saints We may adde It made the Law give place and the Shadows vanish it abolished the Ceremonies broke down the Altars levelled the Temple with the ground 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 great wonders all Magnitudo virtutis ostenditur in effectu The greatness of power is most legible in the effects it worketh And here the volume is so great that the world cannot contain it Come see saith the Angel the place where the Lord lay A Lord he was though in his grave And by the same power he raised both himself and us By the same power he shook the earth and will shake the heaven also Heb. 13. disannulled the Law and established the Gospel broke down one alter and set up another abolished Death and brought Life and Immortality to light 2 Tim. 1.10 shall raise our vile bodies and shall raise our vile souls Shall raise them He hath done it already Conresuscitavit saith the Apostle Eph. 2.6 we are raised together with him both in soul and body and all by the power of his resurrection For 1. Christ's Resurrection is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 at least an exemplary cause of our spiritual rising from the death of sin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Nazianzene Christ is risen from the dead that we may follow after him we who are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 planted together in the likeness of his death Rom. 6.5 dead to our lusts as he was to the functions and operations of life and planted with him in the likeness of his resurrection rising and exalting our selves and triumphing over Sin and Death so grafted in him that we may spring and grow green and blossom and bring forth fruit both alike and by the same power Now as Christ's Resurrection is a patern of our soul's resurrection so is it of our bodie 's also For we are not of Hymenaeus and Philetus mind to think the resurrection past already and make it but an Allegory No Christ hath cast the model of our bodie 's Resurrection also Plato's Idea and common Form by which he thought all other things had their exsistence was but a dream This is a real patern The Angel descended at his and shall at ours He is risen in our nature Isaac's figurative Resurrection
presently be your master These bodies of ours are at the best but Gibeonites And if we come to terms of truce with them it must be but as Joshua did with the Gibeonites that they may be our bond slaves hewers of wood and drawers of water our Almoners to distribute our bounty our servants to bear our burthens to sweat to smart to pine away that the Soul may be in health For what was noted of Caligula is true of our Body It is the worst master and the best servant And as S. Paul at first was the greatest persecutor of the Gospel of Christ yet afterwards proved the greatest propagator and preacher of it so the Body that presseth down the soul may be disciplined and taught to lift it up to carry it along to act with it in the way of righteousness That Body which is a prison may be a theatre for the Mind to shew it self in all its proper operations That Body which is but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a sepulchre of a dead soul may be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Temple wherein we may offer up sacrifices of a sweet-smelling savour unto the Lord. That Body in which we dishonoured God stood out against him and defied him may bow and fall down before him and glorifie him When the Body is subject to the Soul the Sense obedient to Reason and the Will of man guided by the supreme rule the Will of God not swerving either to the right hand or the left then every string is in its right place then every touch every action is harmonious then there is order which indeed is the glory of the God of Order In the third place as the Body is thus hewed and squared and made up a Temple of God so is it also made fit to be a sacrifice When it is purged and disciplined and subdued then is it best qualified for that lavacrum sanguinis to enter the laver of persecution and to be baptized with its own bloud and being now taken out of the mouth of the roaring Lion by the same power to tread him under foot nec solùm evadere sed devincere and not onely to escape his paws but to overcome him Let us phansie as we please an easie passage to the Tree of life we shall find there is a flaming sword still betwixt us and it Let us study to make our wayes smooth and plain to Happiness yet we are all designati martyres no sooner Christians then culled out and designed to Martyrdom And if there were no other prison yet the world it self is one and we are sometimes brought out to be spit upon sometimes as Samson to make men sport sometimes to be stripped and not pitied sometimes to the block or to the fire sometimes to fight with beasts with men more savage then they Our prison is not so much our custody as our punishment and we are in a manner thrown out of it whilest we are in it and whilest we are in it we suffer For to glorifie God is to speak the truth of him and to speak the truth of him many times costeth us our tongues and our lives John Baptist may speak many things to Herod and Herod may give him the hearing but if to the glory of God he tell Herod that truth which above all it concerneth him to know this at the first shall lose John his liberty and at the last his head Nay our Saviour Jesus Christ to discharge his message faithfully to bear witness to the Truth and glorifie his Father must be content to lay down his life The Truth of God by which he is most glorified like the Tyrant's fiery furnace scorcheth and burneth up those that profess it hominem martyrem excudit forgeth and fashioneth the man into a Martyr He that endureth to the end glorifieth God and is glorified himself Nec aliud est sustinere in finem quà m pati finem To endure to the end is nothing else but to endure the end We all speak it often Glory be to thee O Lord and the calves of our lips are a cheap and easie sacrifice For we speak it in the habitations of peace But should we hear the noise of the whip should Persecution rush in with a sword in her hand Deficient vires nec vox nec verba sequentur our heart would fail us and we should not have a word to speak for the Glory of God Would any take in Truth and Sword and all into his bowels Would we so glorifie God as to lay our Honour and Life in the dust We do not well consider what the Glory of God is and yet it is the language of the whole world and the worst of men speak it as well as the best the Hyeocrite loudest of all You may hear it from the mouth of the bloud-thirstty man and it is more heard then his Murther which maketh the greatest noise in the other world But it is not done in a word or a breath For then God might have a MAGNIFICAT from Hell Even the Devils may cry Jesus thou Son of the living God It is not to enter his house with praise and his courts with thanksgiving No not to comprehend with all Saints what is the length and heighth and depth and breadth of his Greatness to know that it is in breadth immense in height most sublime in length eternal in depth unfoordable No not to suck out ubera beata praeconii as Cassiodore calleth the Psalms those breasts which distill nothing but praise No A MAGNIFICAT an EXSULTATE a Triumph a Jubilee will not reach it Then we truly glorifie God in our body when we do it openly when Persecution rageth when the fire flameth in our face when the Sword is at our very breasts Then to speak his glory when for ought we know it may be the last word we shall speak to profess his name in the midst of a crooked and froward generation to defend his Truth before Tyrants and not be ashamed to be true Prophets amongst a thousand false ones to suffer for his name's sake this is to glorifie him in our body And these three Chastity Temperance Patience present our bodies a living sacrifice holy and acceptable unto God which is our reasonable service For good reason it is that we should be chaste for he is pure that we should fast and afflict our bodies for it is a lesson which he taught us himself in our flesh that we should offer up our bodies for him whose body was nailed to the cross for us A chaste body a subdued body a body ready to be offered up is his Temple indeed the place where his glory dwelleth And now we pass to a fourth the Glorifying God by those outward Expressions which are commanded by the Spirit but performed by the Body alone glorifying of him by our Voice and Gesture and reverent Deportment by our outward Worship And indeed if the three first were made good we need not be
it is not written Jacob set up a pillar and poured oyl upon the top of it and called it the house of God But we do not read that God ever spake to him concerning the erecting of that pillar Let us stand to Calvin's judgment in this and he with many is an authour one of ten thousand He in the fourth Book of his Institutions and tenth chapter proveth that Bowing of the knee in the service of God is of Divine authority by no other argument then S. Paul's general rule 1 Cor. 14.40 Let all things be done decently and in order For saith he in that DECORUM which is here prescribed is included Adgeniculation He might have added the Uncovering of the head which is of the same nature and by which we acknowledge our subjection and dependance both in civil religious worship What talk we of an express command There were never yet any boggled at this or were afraid to be reverent who were not bold enough to beat down all before them which stood between them and their ends and break those commands which are as express and manifest as if they had been written with the Sun-beams Truly religious and not reverent You might as well say A man without a soul Neque vera neque falsa religio sine ceremoniis consistit saith S. Augustine against Faustus the Manichee So necessary is Ceremonious and outward worship that neither true nor false Religion can subsist without it I might here much enlarge my discourse but the time is spent and I fear your patience Therefore instead of pressing you with argument I shall put up but this request to those who are so scrupulous of a bare head or a bended knee in the house of God That they would in their retirement commune with their own hearts and ask themselves the question What is the principal motive of that their too-familiar and bold deportment Whether it be indeed Religion that maketh their knees as the knees of the Elephant and putteth them in the same posture at Church which they use in a Theatre and maketh them more bold with their God then with their fellow-Dust and ashes Or whether it may not be Pride and then why should Pride set her foot within God's Sanctuary Or Phansie or Humour and what is a phansiful and humorous worshipper Or a Custom ill taken up and which hath no more to speak for it but that it is taken up and what custom is that in religious worship which destroyeth it In a word Whether Reverence and Devotion be not better seen in those expressions and gestures which are proper to it and best shew it forth then in those which are more then probable arguments against it and openly deny it If men would truly ask this question and impartially answer themselves I think the Preacher would have less reason to open his mouth again in the defence of God's glory nor should we see that profaneness and irreverence which that Church we call the whore of Babylon blusheth at nay for I mistook rejoyceth in and proclaimeth to all the world that having no reverence we have no Church so that one is bold to tell us we worship not God but the Devil And indeed we cannot deny but some such there are amongst us who place religion in irreverence and think themselves never more devout then when they are most profane They call it their familiarity and fellowship with their elder Brother little considering that we are then most familiar with our God when we stand at an humble distance that not Presumption and Boldness but Modesty and Humility draw us near unto him that when we are united to him we must tremble before him that our kissing him is our worship that when in all humility we serve him then he will gird himself and come forth and serve us and embrace us as his friends for being his servants For our familiarity with God is our subjection and submission to his will which maketh us one in Christ and God as the Father is in him and he in the Father What John 17.21 shall we be so familiar as to neglect God so familiar as to sit in his throne so familiar as to defie him to his face Think what we please and please our selves if we will in these our Seraphical or rather Diabolical imaginations A devout soul and a lofty eye a high look a stiff knee a withered hand a covered head a careless gesture or rather a careful and affected irreverence are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and cannot meet together are as inconsistent as fire and cold It is not possible that this fire should burn within us and our reverence be so congealed and bound up as with a frost Beloved the time was when heaven was thought a purchace when Devotion came forth in this dress multo deformata pulvere with ashes sprinkled on her head and her garments rent and that was called the purest time They had their genuflexions their incurvations of their body which they called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the name of that Repentance which they exprest I might tell you they signed themselves with the sign of the Cross and by that sign when they were led muzzled to execution made confession of their faith They presented themselves at Church as before the Throne of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let us stand decently 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let us stand before God with fear and reverence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let us stand wisely and soberly and with great care and vigilant observation But the face of Christendom is much altered and the hour is come when men will not worship God but in spirit and truth which they cannot do especially in publick unless they worship him with the body also Our Holiness is in the inward man so inward that prohibet extraneum it forbiddeth all outward worship Had Nazianzene's mother devout Nonna lived in these days what a superstitious Papist had she gone for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to honour and reverence the holy consecrated things with an humble and silent admiration never to turn her back to the Communion-Table nay not to spit upon the pavement what a piece of ceremonious and needless curiosity would this have been taken for in these days Not turn the back to the Communion-Table we dare sit upon it Be reverent in the Temple No make it a Market-place to bargain in a Theatre to swagger in to make our selves a spectacle but not in S. Paul's sense to God to men and to Angels here to display our colours to try our Titles to blazon our Arms. What was Religion and devout Reverence in the first age in this latter age must needs go for Superstition and Idolatry Many of our women are too spiritual to be like Nazianzen's mother Nonna Pardon the nearness and like-sounding of the words sure I think some Nunn she was And this is it saith S. Ambrose which blasteth and spoileth the whole
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
we sit down aâ—d dispute As he is a Saviour we will find him work enough but as he is a Lord we will do nothing When we hear he is a Stone we think onely that he is LAPIS FUNDAMENTALIS a sure stone to build on or LAPIS ANGULARIS a corner stone to draw together and unite things naturally incompatible as Man and God the guilty person and the Judge the Sinner and the Law-giver and quite forget that he may be LAPIS OFFENSIONIS a stone of offence to stumble at a stone on which we may be broken and which may fall upon us and dash us to pieces And so not looking on the Lord we shipwreck on the Saviour For this is the great mistake of the world To separate these two terms Jesus and the Lord and so handle the matter as if there were a contradiction in them and these two could not stand together Love and Obedience nay To take Christ's words out of his mouth and make them ours MISERICORDIAM VOLO NON SACRIFICIUM We will have mercy and no sacrifice We say he is the Lord it is our common language And though we are taught to forget our Liturgy yet we remember well enough 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our Lord have mercy And here Mercy and Lord kiss each other We say the Father gave him power and we say he hath power of himself Psal 2. Ask of me and I will give thee the heathen for thy inheritance saith God to Christ And Christ saith I and the Father are one We believe that he shall judge the world John 5.22 and we read that the Father hath committed this judgment to the Son Dedit utique generando non largiendo God gave him this commission when he begat him and then he must have it by his eternal generation as the Son of God So Ambrose But S. Augustine is peremptory Whatsoever in Scripture is said to be committed to Christ belongeth to him as the Son of Man Here indeed may seem to be a distance but in this rule they meet and agree God gave his commission to Christ as Man but he had not been capable of it it he had not been God As he is the Son of God he hath the capacity as the Son of man the execution Take him as Man or take him as God this Jesus is the Lord. Cùm Dominus dicatur unus agnoscitur saith Ambrose There is but one Faith Vers 4 5 6. and but one Lord. In this chapter operations are from God gifts from the Spirit and administrations from the Lord. Christ might well say You call me Lord and Master and so I am a Lord as in many other respects so jure redemtionis by the right of Redemption and jure belli by way of conquest His right of Dominion by taking us out of slavery and bondage is an easie Speculation For who will not be willing to call him Lord who by a strong arm and mighty power hath brought him out of captivity Our Creation cost God the Father no more but a DIXIT He spake the word and it was done But our Redemption cost God the Son his most precious bloud and life onely that we might fall down and worship this our Lord A Lord that hath shaken the powers of the Grave and must shake the powers of thy soul A Lord to deliver us from Death and to deliver us from Sin to bring life and immortality to light and to order our steps and teach us to walk to it to purchase our pardon and to give us a Law to save us that he may rule us and to rule us that he may save us We must not hope to divide Jesus from the Lord for if we do we lose them both Save us he will not if he be not our Lord and if we obey him not Our Lord he is still and we are under his power but under that power which will bruise us to pieces And here appeareth that admirable mixture of his Mercy and Justice tempered and made up in the rich treasury of his Wisdom his Mercy in pardoning sin and his Justice in condemning sin in his flesh Rom 8.3 and in our flesh his Mercy in covering our sins and his Justice in taking them away his Mercy in forgetting sins past and his Justice in preventing sin that it come no more his Mercy in sealing our pardon and his Justice in making it our duty to sue it out For as he would not pardon us without his Son's obedience to the Cross no more will he pardon us without our obedience to his Gospel A crucified Saviour and a mortified sinner a bleeding Jesus and a broken heart a Saviour that died once unto sin and a sinner dead unto sin Rom. 6.10 these make that heavenly composition and reconcile Mercy and Justice and bring them so close together that they kiss each other For how can we be free and yet love our fetters how can we be redeemed from sin that are sold under sin how can we be justified that resolve to be unjust how can we go to heaven with hell about us No Love and Obedience Hope and Fear Mercy and Justice Jesus and the Lord are in themselves and must be considered by us as bound together in an everlasting and undivided knot If we love his Mercy we shall bow to his Power If we hope for favour we shall fear his wrath If we long for Jesus we shall reverence the Lord. Unhappy we if he had not been a Jesus and unhappy we if he had not been a Lord Had he not been the Lord the world had been a Chaos the Church a Body without a Head a Family without a Father an Army without a Captain a Ship without a Pilot and a Kingdom without a King But here Wisdom and Mercy and Justice Truth and Peace Reconcilement and Righteousness Misery and Happiness Earth and Heaven meet together and are concentred even in this everlasting Truth in these three words JESUS EST DOMINUS Jesus is the Lord. And thus much of the Lesson which we are to learn We come now to our task and to enquire What it is to say it It is soon said It is but three words JESUS EST DOMINUS Jesus is the Lord. The Indian saith it and the Goth saith it and the Persian saith it totius mundi una vox CHRISTUS est Christ Jesus is become the language of the whole world The Devils themselves did say it Matth. 8.29 Jesus thou Son of God And if the Heretick will not confess it dignus est clamore daemonum convinci saith Hilary What more fit to convince an Heretick then the cry of the Devils themselves Acts 19. The vagabond Jews thought to work miracles with these words And we know those virgins who cried Lord Lord open unto us were branded with the name of fools and shut out of doors Whilest we are silent we stand as it were behind the wall we lie
resolve together To go alone is dangerous S. Cyprian and others of the Fathers will tell us that Schism is a sin not to be expiated no not with martyrdom and that to dy for the Head will little avail him who hath divided the Body But the truth is If we resolve to serve the Lord though we be millions we shall all agree and be one Religion pure Religion and undefiled cannot raise a schisme in the Church For if there be an errour she teacheth us to pardon it if an injury to forget it A religious man saith Nazianzene is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 simple and sincere in himself ever like himself but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 various and manifold towards others He applieth himself as S. Paul did to all and is made all things to all men And when they do not gather together 1 Cor. 9.19 c there is nothing in him to hinder it Look upon all the contentions that ever were in the world observe the persons that raised them mark their original and ye shall see that the name of Religion was onely taken in to carry them on but it was something else that gave them life and continued them Private ends and love of the world first kindle the fire and then the name of Christ is taken up that it may rage the more the name of Christ who hath left unto us that water of life which would easily quench it For I cannot yet see how a truly-religious man should be a schismatick If he be he doth it oblitus professionis suae quite beside the meaning of his profession the chief end whereof is to gather all into one Eph. 4.3 and to preserve the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace 4. They went chearfully and with great alacrity A prompt and ready mind an active and vigorous will in God's service is all in all My son give me thy heart saith God Prov. 23.26 And when we have given him that then Awake viol and harp Awake all the powers of my soul Stir up your selves all the parts of my body then we do our duty and serve God with all our strength and might then our feet are as hinds feet and we run the wayes of God's commandments Hab. 3.18 Psal 119.32 Chrysostom saith the Church is the place of Angels and Archangels the presence-chamber of God yea heaven it self And shall not we go more chearfully towards heaven then others do to hell If we go to Church but for fashion for company or out of formality if Love drive us not forward it is plain that we are not willing to come into God's presence and had rather mingle ourselves with our worldly affairs then appear before God and his Angels in his house Shame or fear or compliance may serve as wings to bear us to Church but they will never carry us up so high as heaven He that mounteth thither ascendeth in a jubilee with melody and joy 5. The Church is the house of God Let us therefore enter his gates with joy Psal 100.4 and his courts with rejoycing and not raise needless questions which edifie not Here we receive the doctrine of truth the commands of God which are as Angels descending from above here we breathe out our souls and send up our holy desires which are as so many Angels of commerce between God and us Hoc opus hic labor est This is the business of the day this is the work of the place What gaze we upon the walls the fabrick the fashion the beauty of it Why perplex we our selves and others where there is no reason and blow up bubbles which swell and are straight nothing It is an observation of the Ancients That they who can once prevail with themselves to desire nothing more then piety and vertue and to have no other intent then to be good men will rest in that contentedness which Religion bringeth as on a holy hill and will never descend and stoop to low considerations True Devotion never questioneth what fashion what form what beauty the place hath where it must shew it self He that fighteth against his lust and so beateth down the beast within him he that presseth forward onely to that end for which he should go to the house of the Lord and maketh it his chief aim to serve him will never startle at that which cannot hinder but may facilitate and promote the end he aimeth at he will not fall out with colours nor tremble at the sight of a picture it may be of a leg or an arm much less will he question the fashion that he may pull down the fabrick No this humour springeth not from devotion or from a tender conscience neither indeed can it For a tender conscience is alway so it doth not stumble at a straw and leap over a mountain it doth not check at a feather at that which is nothing in it self but hath all its value and dignity from its end This humour hath its original from Pride and Covetousness as Hippocrates saith all the distempers of the body have their original from Choler and Phlegme from pride I say foolish pride which misliketh every thing and covetousness that would make every thing a prey 1 Cor. 11.16 But as S. Paul saith if any man seem to be thus contentious we have no such custome neither the Churches of God Neither was there any such contention till those latter times when Sacrilege lifted up the ax and the mattock to break down the carved works yea to dig up the very foundations of the houses of the Lord. 1 Pet. 2.1 Wherefore as S. Peter exhorteth let us lay aside all malice and all guile and hypocrises and envies and all evil speakings and so go together to the house of God It is his house therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the ancient form was let us appear there with reverence What though he be no more present here then in any other place Yet I am sure thou oughtest to be as reverent as if he were It is his holy place What though it hath no inherent holiness we cannot say it hath Yet it is thy part to carry thy self as one that hath Raise not idle questions but be serious in thy duty Do not bring a groundless phansie along with thee and leave thy duty behind thee in the land of oblivion Sanctorum vel sola recordatio sanctitatem parit saith a Father The very remembrance of the Saints by a kind of influence and insinuation may vvork holiness in us And if vve could once chace avvay these empty and insignificant phansies these impertinent and heretogeneous thoughts which spring from the Flesh as serpents out of carrion or dung I see no reason but we might gain some advantage from the places of God's worship To conclude this point IBIMUS We will go or EAMUS Let us go into the houses of the Lord and bless his name for these blessed
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
they neglect that rule by which they were to walk the one upon the rock of Superstition the other as it oft falls out in disputes of this nature not onely from the errour they oppose but from the Truth it self which should be set up in its place Between these two we may walk safely and guide our selves by the Womans voice and the Angels voice and call her Blessed and Saint though not God and we may place her in heaven though we set her not in the throne BLESSED as the occasion of so much good For when we see a clear and sylver stream we bless the Fountain And for the glory and quickning power of the beams some have made a God of the Sun Whatsoever presents it self unto us in beauty or excellency doth not onely take and delight us but in the midst of wonder forceth our thoughts to look back to the coasts from whence it came For Virtue is not onely glorious in it self but casts a lustre back upon generations past and makes them blessed it blesseth the times wherein it acts it blesseth the persons wherein it is and it blesseth all relations to those persons and the neerest most We often find in Scripture famous men and women mentioned with their relations Arise Barak thou son of Abinoam Blessed shal Jael be Judg. 5. the wife of Heber the Kenite David the son of Jesse Solomon the son of David Blessed was Abraham who begat Isaac and blessed was Isaac who begat Jacob and then thrice blessed was she who brought forth the Blessing of the world JESVS CHRIST a Saviour Therefore was Barrenness accounted a curse in Israel because they knew their Messias was to be born of a woman but did not know what woman should bring him forth Again if it be a kind of curse to beget a wicked son or as Solomon did the foolishness of the people Eccl. 47.23 The Historian observes that many famous men amongst the Romans either died childless or left such children behind them that it had been better their name had quite been blotted out and they had left no posterity And speaking of Tully who had a drunken and a sottish son he adds Huic soli melius fuerat liberos non habere It had been better for him to have had no child at all then such an one Who would have his name live in a wanton intemperate sâ—t who would have his name live in a betrayer of his countrey in a bloudy tyrant If this curse reflect upon those who have been dead long ago and is doubled on the living who look upon those whom they call affectus their affections and caritates their love as their greatest grief and torment then certainly a great blessing and glory it is for a parent to have a virtuous child in whom he every day may behold not onely his own likeness but the image of God which shines in the face of every looker on and fills their hearts with delight and their mouths with blessings If it be a tyrant a Nero we wish the doors of his mothers womb had been shut up Job 3.10 and so sorrow and trouble hid from our eyes Ventrem feri saith the mother her self to the Centurion who was sent to kill her Strike strike this cursed belly that brought forth that monster But if it be a Father of his country if it be a wise just and merciful Prince if he be a Titus we bless the day wherein he was born we celebrate his Nativity and make it a holy-day and we bless the rock from whence he was hewen the very loynes from whence he came And therefore to conclude this we cannot but commend both the Affection of this Woman and her Speech the one great and the other loud For the greatness the intention of the affection is not evil so the cause be good and it cannot move too fast if it do not erre If the sight of virtue and wisdome strike this heat in us it is as a fire from heaven in our bowels And such was this womans affection begot in her by Wisdome and Power and both Divine It rose not from any earthly respect secular pomp or outward glory but she hearing Christs gracious words and seeing the wonders which he did the fire kindled and she spake with her tongue And she still speaketh that we may behold the same finger of God as efficacious and powerful in Christ to cast out the devil out of us the devil which is dumb that we may speak his praises and the devil that is deaf that we may hearken to his words the devil that is a serpent that we may lay aside all deceit the devil that is a lyon that we may lay aside all malice the devil that wicked one that we may be freed from sin that so we may put on the affection of this Woman and with her lift up our voice and say Blessed is the womb that bare Christ and the paps which he sucked And further we carry not this consideration We come next to our Saviours gentle Corrective IMO POTIUS Yea rather And this Yea rather comes in seasonably For the eye is ready to be dazled with a lesser good if it be not diverted to a greater as he will wonder at a storm that never saw the Sun We stay many times and dwell with delight upon those truths which are of lesser alloy and make not any approch towards that which is saving and necessary we look upon the excellencies of Christ and find no leisure to fall down and worship him we become almost Christians and come not to the knowledge of that truth which must save us and make us perfect men in Christ Jesus The Philosopher will tell us that he that will compare two things together must know them both What glory hath Riches to him who hath not seen Virtue as Plato would have her seen naked and not compassed about and disguised with difficulties disgraces and hardships What a brightness hath Honour to bind that hath not tasted of the Favour of God What a Paradise is carnal pleasure to him that a good Conscience never feasted What a substance is a Ceremony to him that makes the Precepts of the Law but shadows How doth he rely on a Priviledge who will not do his duty How blessed a Thing doth she think it to bring forth a Son that can work miracles who knows not what it is to conceive him in her heart who can save her Therefore it is the method of Wisdome it self to present them both unto us in their just and proper weight not to deny what is true but to take off our thoughts and direct them to something better that we may not dote so long on the one as to neglect and cast off the other From wondring at his Miracles Christ calleth us to the contemplation of the greatest miracle that was ever wrought the Redemption of a sinner from his Miracles to his Word for
Church and we grope as in darkness and follow meteors and illusions and false lights That we should read of Joseph's Chastity and be caught with every smile of Mose's Meekness and storm at every breath that crosseth us of Job's Patience and when calamity is but in the approch roar as upon a rack of Paul's Beating down his body and pamper ours of Paul's Keeping a good conscience and lay down ours at every beck That we should read of the acts of so many Saints and do contrary and yet hope to be as good Saints as they That we should do the works of the Father of lyes and yet call him our Father who is the Good of Truth Beloved if we look upon the command we shall find that every man should be a Joseph a Moses a Job a Paul For it looketh alike upon all The same Law bindeth us the same reward inviteth us the same promises allure us the same heaven openeth to receive us if we obey Our God is the same and we are the same and heaven is the same Our great mistake is that we conceive that a demensum a certain measure of saving and sanctifying grace is given to every man and so no man can be better then he is that God hath set a bound to Piety as he hath done to the Sea Hitherto it shall go and no further Hereupon we lye down and comfort our selves and turn the grace of God into wantonness as if it were our duty not to be the best and God would take it ill at our hands if we were as good as S. Paul Be not deceived We are called here to follow S. Paul not as Peter did Christ a far off but to come up close to him as near as we can in all holiness and righteousness to stretch our endeavours to the farthest and with him to press on towards the mark We may come too short it is impossible we should exceed For though there be degrees of Holiness and the Saints as the Stars differ from each other in glory yet his light will soon be put out that maketh it not his ambition to be one of the greatest magnitude If we come short God will accept us but not if we fall short because we thought it as needless as troublesom to mend our pace consulting with flesh and bloud which soon concludeth It is enough and will teach us to ask our selves that unprofitable question What should we be as good as S. Paul Fear not It is no presumption to follow Paul in all the wayes of holiness it is no presumption to exceed him Not to follow him and expect the same crown is great presumption But to strive to follow him to the highest pitch is that holy Ambition which will fit our heads for a diadem And it was his wish whilst he was on earth that every man were as he was except his bonds To conclude then Whatsoever things are true whatsoever things are honest whatsoever things are just whatsoever things are pure whatsoever things are lovely whatsoever things are of good report if there be any vertue if there be any praise in any Saint let us think on these things Let us chew and digest and turn them into good bloud let us shape and fashion them in our hearts till they break forth into the like actions that we acting the Saints and following them here on earth may with them follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth that our good works by which we resemble them whilest we live may follow us when we are dead and make us like unto the Angels of heaven blessed as they are and blessing God for evermore But so it is Good examples glitter in our eyes and we look up and gaze upon them as little children do upon a piece of gold which they are ready to exchange for a counter We are swift enough to follow the Saints of God in their errours and deviations but are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ill expressers of their piety and religion And there is as great danger in their examples where they betray themselves to be men as there is profit where they are led by the Spirit of God Therefore S Paul putteth in a Caution commendeth Imitation but limiteth it exhorteth the Corinthians to follow him but withall restraineth them with a SICUT Be ye followers of me but even as I also am of Christ My last Part Of which briefly Those things which degenerate are so much the worse by how much the more useful they had been if they had been levelled by the rule Therefore in Imitation besides the Persons we must also consider What it is we must imitate in them We must no farther follow them then they do the Rule Ut in pessimis aliquid optimi ita in optimis aliquid pessimi saith St. Hierom. The best men are not priviledged from sin and errour And as in the most men there is some good thing though clouded with much corruption so in the best Saints of God there may be something amiss though scarcely seen because of the splendor of those many vertues with which it is incompassed For as many vices do darken one single vertue so many vertues may cast a colour upon some one sin and errour and make it in appearance fair and beautiful even like unto them and commend it to our imitation Here then is need of a SICUT of a Caution and Limitation For proclivis malorum imitatio Men are too prone to follow that which is evil especially where the person by his other better endowments not onely palliateth but addeth authority to his fault or errour Examples of famous men are like unto two-edged swords which cut deep both wayes both for the good and for the bad Against good examples we too oft hold up some buckler of defence that they may not reach us but evil examples we receive toto corpore with an open body and with a willing mind and are well pleased they should wound us unto death The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 many times of good men those actions which fall from them by chance or inadvertency we are more ready to take out then their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the works which made them famous to all the world and canonized them for Saints Saepe vitium pro exemplo est If there be any thing irregular in them that we set up for a patern and example Tully telleth us of Fusius that he fell short of those sinews and strength of eloquence which was in Caius Fimbria and atteined nothing but a bad gesture and the distortion of his countenance And Quintilian observeth that there were many in his time who thought they had gained a Kingdom in Eloquence if they shut up every period and clause with esse videatur But that is most remarkable which Gregory Nazianzene relateth of divers who were admirers of Basil that they did imitate in their behaviour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his corporal defects and blemishes his paleness
proceeded to the attaining of it The Stork in the air knoweth her appointed times Jer. 8.7 and the Turtle and the Crane and the Swallow observe the time of their coming Pliny speaking of the Bees telleth us Quod maximè mirum est mores habent A wonderful thing it is to see that natural honesty and justice which is in them Onely Man the soveraign Lord of all the creatures whom it most principally concerned to be thus endowed was sent into the world utterly devoid of any such knowledge nisi alienâ misericordiâ sustinere se nequit as Ambrose speaketh and without forein and borrowed help never so much as getteth a sight of his own proper end Amongst natural men none there are in whom appetite is so extinct but that they see something which they propose unto themselves as a scope of their hopes and reward of their labours and in the obtaining of which they suppose all their happiness to reside Yet even in this which men principally incline to direction is so faulty particulars so infinite that most sit down in the midst of their way and come far short of that mark which their hopes set up And if our Wisdom be so feeble and deficient in those things which are sensible and open to our view what laws what light what direction have we need of to carry us on in the way to that happiness which no mortal eye can approch Hannibal in Livy being to pass the Alps a thing that time held impossible yet comforteth himself with this Nullas terras coelum contingere nec inexsuperabiles humano generi esse That how high soever they were they were not so high as heaven nor unpassable if men were industrious The pertinacy of Man's industry may find waies through desarts through rocks through the roughest seas But our attempt is far greater The way we must make is from earth to heaven a thing which no strength or wit of man could ever yet compass Therefore Christ our King who knoweth Man to be a wandring and erring creature would not leave it to his shallow discretion who no sooner thinketh but erreth nor setteth down his foot but treadeth amiss but he cometh himself into the world promulgeth his Laws which may be to him as Tiresias his staff in the Poet able to guide his feet were he never so blind and in his Gospel he giveth him sound directions no way subject unto errour guideth him as it were with a bridle putteth his Law into his heart chalketh out his way before him and like a skilful Pilot sheweth him what course to take what Syrtes what rocks to avoid lest he make an irrecoverable shipwreck of body and soul His Laws are the Compass by which if he steer his course he shall pass the gulf and be brought to that haven where he would be 1 Pet. 2.9 Rom. 2. 6. Therefore hath Christ called us out of darkness into his wonderful light And we are the called of Jesus Christ gathered together into a Church an House a Family a City a Republick Our Conversation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 municipatus as Tertullian rendreth it our Burgership is in heaven And the Philosopher will tell us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that will erect a Society a Commonwealth must also frame Laws and fit and shape them to that form of Commonwealth which he intendeth For Lavvs are numismata Reipublicae the coins as it were by vvhich vve come to knovv the true face and representation of a Commonvvealth the different complexions of States and Societies And Christ our King hath dravvn out Laws like unto his Kingdom vvhich are most fit and appliable to that end for vvhich he hath gathered us into one body His sceptre is a sceptre of righteousness and his Laws are just He came down from heaven and his Laws carry us back thither He received them from his Father John 10.18 as himself speaketh and these make us like unto his Father These govern our Understanding nè assentiat that it yield not assent to that errour which our lusts have painted over in the shape of Truth and these regulate our Will nè consentiat that it do not bow and chuse it and these order our Affections that they may be servants and not commanders of our Reason These make a heaven in our Understanding these place the image of God in our Will and make it like unto his these settle peace and harmony in the Affections that they become weapons of righteousness and fight the battels of our King and Law-giver My Anger may be a sword my Love a banner my Hope a staff and my Fear a buckler In a word Christ's Laws will fit us for his Kingdom here and prepare us for his Kingdom hereafter Therefore in the next place they are necessary for us as the onely means to draw us nigh unto himself and to that end for which he came into the world Every end hath its proper means fitted and proportioned to it Knowledge hath study Riches have labour and industry Honour hath policy Even he that setteth up an end which he is ashamed of and hideth from the Sun and the people draweth a method and plot in himself to bring him to it The Thief hath his night and darkness and the Wanton his twilight And his hope entitleth and joyneth him to the end though he never reach it In the Kingdom of Satan there are rules and laws observed A thought ushereth in a Sin and one Sin draweth on another and at last Destruction And this is the way of that wisdome which is but foolishness And shall men work iniquity as by a law and can we hope to be raised to an eternity of glory and be left to our selves or to attain it by those means which hold no proportion at all with it Will the Gospel the bare Tidings of peace do it Will a phansie a thought a wish an open profession have strength enough to lift us up to it Happiness in phansie is a picture and no more In a wish it is less for I wish that which I would not have And barely to profess the means and acknowledge the way unto it is to give my self the lie nay to call my self a fool for what greater folly can there be then to say This is the way and not to walk in it If we were thus left unto our selves all our happiness were but a dream and every thought a sin against the holy Ghost We should wish our King neither just nor wise nor holy we should call him our King and leave him no sceptre in his hand no power to make a Law look forward toward the mark and run backward from it give Christ a Hail and crucifie him call an innocent Christ our King and be men of Belial an humble Christ and swell above our measure a merciful Christ and be cruel a just Christ and be oppressours hope to attain the end without the means and against
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
an Ear listening after lies are the faculties and passions and members or rather the marks and reproches of a stigmatized slave For can he be thought free who imployeth all the power he hath to make himself a prisoner No liberty then without subordination and subjection to this Law Behold I shew you a mystery which you may think rather a paradox A Christian a Gospeller is the freest and yet the most subject creature in the world the highest and yet the lowest delivered out of prison and yet confined set at liberty and yet kept under a Law S. Paul saith to the Galatians Brethren you have been called unto liberty Gal. 5.13 He meaneth Liberty in things indifferent neither good nor evil in their own nature There our fetters are broken off Onely use not your liberty as an occasion to the flesh There we are limited and confined So that Christian Liberty it self is under a Law which bindeth us ab illicitis semper quandoque à licitis from unlawful things alwayes and sometimes from that which is lawful Nay it is under many Laws 1. The Law of Sobriety and Temperance which must bound and limit the outward practice of it God hath given as I told you before every moving thing that liveth to be meat for us Gen. 9. â— All meats under the Gospel all drinks are lawful fish and flesh bread and herbs and the rest But there is a Law yet to bound us We are free but not so free as to surfeit and be drunken and to devour our souls with care for our bodies to make an art of eating and indulge so long to luxury till we can indulge no more Wine is from the vine In which saith S. Augustine God doth every year work a miracle and turn water into wine But if Sobriety be not the cup bearer if we look not on Temperance as a Law it may prove to us what the Manichees feigned it to be fel principis tenebrarum the gall of the Prince of darkness Again all apparel all stuff all cloth all colours are lawful Foâ— he that clotheth the grass of the field will doe much more for us But this Liberty doth not straight write us Gallants nor boulster out our excessive pride and vanity this doth not give us power to put the poor's and Christ's patrimony on our backs Modesty must be our Tire-woman to put on our dress and our garments and not Phansie and Pride Tertullian thought it not fit to supplicate God in silk or purple Cedò acum crinibus distinguendis Bring forth saith he your crisping-pins and your pomanders and wash your selves in costly baths and if any ask you why you do so Deliqui dicito in Deum say I have offended against God Itaque nunc maceror crucior ut reconciliam me Deo and therefore I thus macerate and afflict my self and am come in this gay and costly outside that I may reconcile my self to God Thus did he bitterly and sarcastically lâ—sh the luxury of his times What think you would he say if he saw what we see every day even when the dayes are gloomy and black Ecclesia in attonito when mens hearts even fail them for fear and Vengeance hovereth over us ready to fall upon our heads But if he were too streight-laced we ought to remember that Apparel was for covert and not for sight to warm the body that weareth it and not to take the eye of him that beholdeth it We have freedom to use but Modesty and Temperance must be as Tribunes and come in with their Veto and check and manage this Liberty that we abuse not the creature 2. Our Liberty is bounded with another Law even the Law of Charity Of Charity I say both to my self and to my brethren For our selves A right hand is to be cut off and a right eye plucked out if they offend us We must remove every thing out of the way which may prove a stone to stumble at though it be as useful as our Hand and as dear as our Eye at least make a covenant with our Eye and with our Hand to forbear those lawful things which may either endanger the body or occasion the ruine of the soul For what is an Eye a Hand to the whole And what a serpent is that occasion which If I touch it will sting me to death And as for our selves so also for others we must not use the creature with offence or scandal of our weaker brethren LICET It is lawful is the voice of Liberty but the Charity of the Gospel which is as a Law to a Christian bâ—â—ngeth in an EXPEDIT and maketh onely that lawful in this case which is expedient For as every thing which we please as Bernard speaketh is not lawful so every thing that is lawful is not expedient Nihil charitate imperiosius There is nothing more commanding then Charity and no command fuller of delight and profit then hers For how quickly doth she condescend to the weakness of others How willing is she to abridge her self rather then they should fall What delight doth she take to deny her self delight that she may please them She will not touch nor taste that they may not be offended And then thus in matters of this nature to restrain Liberty bringeth with it huge advantage For how will he flie with ease from that which â—e may not do who can for another's sake abstain from that which he may Liberty is a word of enlargement and giveth us line biddeth Rise and eat but a NON EXPEDIT It is not expedient which is the language of Charity putteth the knife to our throat cometh in case of scandal to pinion us that we reach not our hand to things otherwise lawful A NON EXPEDIT maketh a NON LICET It is not expedient in matters of this indifferencie is the same with It is not lawful The Gospel you see then is a Law of liberty but it is also a Law to moderate and restrain it Lastly as it is a Law of liberty so it limiteth and boundeth it in respect of those relations which are between man and man between Father and Son Master and Servant Superiour and Inferiour For Christ came not to shake these relations but to establish them He left the Servant the Son the Subject as he found them but taught them to bow yet a little lower before their Master their Father their Lord for the Gospel's sake to do it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with fear and reverence as to the Lord 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not as the heathen slaves in chains but in simplicity and truth as unto Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with good will not driven on with the goad and whip and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as servants not of men but of Christ He giveth them liberty yet tieth them up and confineth them in the Family in the Commonwealth in the Church A Christian is the most free and the most
in spirit and truth But this they cannot do together but in some place and the Spirit which breatheth upon the Church will not blow it down nor the place where they meet who make up a Church We remember also that S. Paul enjoyneth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that men pray every where 1 Tim. 2.8 But those words carry not any such tempest with them as to overthrow the houses of the Lord. S. Basil who had as clear an eye and as quick an apprehension as any that age or after-ages have afforded could spy no such meaning in them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he doth not take-in those places which are deputed to humane and profane uses but extendeth and dilateth the worship of God beyond the narrow compass of Jerusalem to every place in the whole world It is written that all shall be Priests of God but yet it is not meant that all shall exercise the Priests office I am ashamed to exercise my self against rotten posts set up by wanton and malicious men which will fall to the dust to nothing of themselves and to spend my time and pains to beget a good opinion of the house of God in their minds who know not what to think or what they would have who fear their own shadow which their ignorance doth cast and run from a monster of their own begetting the creation of a troubled or rather a troublesome spirit and an idle brain God then hath an House and he calleth it his Nor can he be guilty of a Misnomer And if it be God's then it is holy not holy as he is holy but holy because it is his Why startle we It is no ill-boding word that we should be afraid of it Donatus the Grammarian observeth Si ferrum nominetur in comoedia transit in tragoediam that but to name a Sword in a Comedie is enough to turn it into a Tragedie I know not whether that word have such force or no sure I am there is nothing in this word Holy why so much noise and tumult should be raised about it as if Superstition had crept in and were installed and inthroned in our Church The house of God is holy What need we boggle at it or what reason is there of fear when the lowest degree of charity might help us to conclude that it is impossible that he who calleth it so should mean that holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. I ask Hebr. 12.14 Is it possible that this should ever enter into the heart of any man who is not out of his wits I will be bold to say Matth. 3.9 that God who can raise up children unto Abraham out of stones cannot infuse holiness into stones till they be made children of Abraham I dare not shorten his hand or lessen his power yet I may say His Power waiteth in a manner upon his Wisedome and He cannot do what becometh him not He cannot do what he hath said he never will do But when Stones are piled together and set apart for his service he himself calleth it his holy place because of the relation it beareth to his service and to holiness and in respect of the end for which it was set up Holy that is set apart from common use 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Acts 10.14 common and profane signifie the same in holy Writ So the Gentiles were common and profane and the Jews were holy that is culled and taken out from the rest of the world sanctified and set apart to the Lord. For as holy a people as they were how many of them did embrace that holiness which beautifieth the inward man and might make them like to the Holy one of Israel Again SANCTUM est ab hominum injuria munitum That which is holy is fenced from the injuries of men and the hand of Sacrilege Things thus holy God looketh upon as his with an eye of jealousie And as he gave charge concerning his Anointed so he doth concerning his House Psal 105.15 Nolite tangere Touch it not And he that toucheth it with a profane and sacrilegious hand toucheth the apple of his eye and if he repent not of his wickedness God will one day put him to shame for that low esteem he had of the place where his honour dwelleth Psal 16 8. It is the end which maketh it holy and to hinder it of its end is to profane it though the pretense be never so specious What is it then to laugh and jest at this name that we may pull it down in earnest Oh trust not to a pretense And if we lean upon it whilest we deface the house of God it will fail and deceive us and our fall will be the greater for our support we shall fall and be bruised to pieces our punishment shall be doubled and our stripes multiplied first for doing that which is evil and then for taking in that which is good to make it an abettour and assistant to that which is evil which is to bring in God pleading for Baal and to suborn Religion to destroy it self Oh why do men boast in their shame What happiness can it be to devour holy things Prov. 20.25 and then be caught in that snare which will strangle them To dance in the ruines of the Church and then sink to hell Time was Beloved when this was counted an holy language and holy men of God and blessed Martyrs of Christ spake it Then it was not superstition but great devotion And no other language was heard almost till the dayes of our grandfathers But then Covetousness under the mask of false Zele which was rather burning then hot and carried with it more rage then charity swallowed up this Devotion in victory led it in triumph disgraced and vilified it and gave it an ill name Then the Devil shewed himself in the colours of light and did more mischief then if he had appeared as a roaring Lion Then the very name of holy was a good argument to beat down a Temple which must down for this because it was called so Before this There were Holy Means and they were called so the Word Prayer Sacraments Ecclesiastical Discipline and for the applying of these Means to the end for which they were ordained there were Holy Times when and Holy Persons by whom they were to be administred and there were Holy Places too or else the rest were to no purpose And holy things S. Paul calleth them 1 Cor. 9.13 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 holy things out of the holy place All these are so linked together as a chain that you cannot sever them For neither can there be Holiness without fit means nor Means administred without fit Persons nor Persons do their office but in a fit Place Holiness indeed is properly inherent in none but God Angels and Men in God essentially in the blessed Spirits and Men by participation as far as their