tell you of them Sing unto the Lord a new song and his praise from the end of the earth ye that go down to the sea and all that is therein the Isles and the inhabitants thereof Let the Wilderness and the cities thereof lift up their voice the villages that Kedar doth inhabit Let the inhabitants of the rock sing let them shout from the top of the mountains let them give glory unto the Lord and declare his praise in the islands The Lord shall goe forth as a mighty man he shall stir up jealousie like a man of war he shall cry yea roar he shall prevail against his enemies I have long time holden my peace I have been still and refrained my self now will I cry like a travailing woman I will destroy and devour at once I will make wast mountains and hills and dry up all their hearbs I will make the rivers Islands and I will dry up the pools And I will bring the blind by a way that they know not I will lead them in paths that they have not known I will make darkness light before them and crooked things straight These things will I doe unto them and not forsake them 4. It is a very high representation of that mighty power of God from above that assists his Church and how Christ by the dispensation of the Gospel does set us free from the bondage of sin how he opens the understandings of the ignorant and procures liberty for those that were shut up in the dungeon of a dark conscience and held in captivity under sin how those that are dry and barren like the wilderness and the tops of rocks shall be watered with springs of living water and how the villages that Kedar possesses that is those that are overshadowed with sorrow and darkness a light shall spring up unto them and how they shall give glory unto the Lord for that he himself will be their champion he shall fight their battels and by the power of his Spirit and by that fire wherewith he will plead with all flesh wither the top and flower of their pride and dry up their restagnant lusts and lighten their paths before them and lead them forth into the land of Righteousness These are the true Warfares and Victories of the Church of Christ as those that have the veil taken off from their eyes and hearts can easily discover And surely with any other usefull sense then this cannot we ordinarily read the like descriptions of the Churches triumphs by Christ over her enemies or by those that have been Types of him as David was an eminent one And therefore if I would read the 18 Psalm I will love thee O Lord my strength c. I should hope for very small edifying thereby but in such a Mystical sense as this is that is by supposing that in me which partakes of Christ that is my inward Mind or Spirit raising war against Saul which is the power of the Flesh the craving pit of Hell that sin that lodges in this mortal body whose vain desires have no bottom nor end 5. I might abound with these allegations out of the Prophets and Psalms but I have given a Key into the hand of the judicious and he may unlock those treasures himself if he desires to have his Faith enriched and strengthened by those plentiful Promises of this assistance we speak of made to them that are serious professors of the Gospel I shall only adde one testimony more which in my apprehension is very express and that is Isa. 35. Strengthen the weak hands and confirm the feeble knees Say to them that are of a fearfull heart Be strong fear not behold your God will come with vengeance even God with a recompence he will come and save you Then shall the eyes of the blinde be opened and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped Then shall the lame man leap as an Hart and the tongue of the dumb shall sing For in the wilderness shall waters break out and streams in the desart And the parched ground shall become a pool and the thirsty land Springs of water In the habitations of dragons in the places where they lay shall be grass with reeds and rushes And an high-way shall be there and a way and it shall be called a way of holiness the unclean shall not passe over it but he shall walk in the way with them and the simple shall not erre No Lion shall be there nor any ravenous beast shall go up thereon it shall not be found there but the redeemed shall walk there And the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Sion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads they shall obtain joy and gladnesse and sorrow and sighing shall flee away CHAP. IX 1. The great use of the belief of The Promise of the Spirit 2. The eating the flesh of Christ and drinking his bloud what it is 3. Further proof of the Promise of the Spirit 4. That we cannot oblige God by way of Merit 5. Other Testimonies of Scripture tending to the former purpose 1. THese places which we have recited out of the Old Testament cannot but warm and encourage him that reads them by reason of the loftinesse of their Prophetical style provided that he have in himself a facility of mystically applying of things to the great purpose they drive at But what we shall adde out of the New though they will not strike the phansy with so high language yet they will it may be reach ones Reason more surely and extort assent more powerfully even from them that are loth to finde it true That there is such a mighty supernatural assistance afforded from God viz. the Cooperation of his holy Spirit in our conflicts against sin Which perswasion is of great consequence to make us resolute in resisting all Temptations and to gain the victory in every assault and therefore we will produce sufficient evidences of the truth thereof 2. And the first that occurs to my minde is that of our blessed Saviour Luke 11.13 If ye being evil know how to give good gifts to your Children how much more shall your Heavenly Father give the holy Spirit to them that ask him And that this Dispensation of the Spirit of Sanctification is a common gift to all Christians appears out of what we have already recited out of S. Matthew where Iohn professes himself only able to baptize with water unto repentance but that the Baptisme of Christ should be with the holy Ghost and with fire that is with the power of the Spirit that will melt and purifie us as silver is purified in the fire Also from Ioh. 6. where Christ styleth himself the Manna that came down from Heaven and declareth that he that eateth his flesh and drinketh his bloud hath eternal life with other expressions of the like nature Wherefore his Disciples began to be scandalized at it but Jesus answered and
of God Be not deceived neither Fornicatours nor Idolaters nor Adulterers nor Effeminate nor Abusers of themselves with mankind nor Thieves nor Covetous nor Drunkards nor Revilers nor Extortioners shall inherit the kingdome of God And Hebr. 12.14 Follow peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. And thus we see that all the Happiness of man and his real good is utterly subverted and destroyed by this mischievous imagination of being righteous otherwise then by true and living Righteousness 10. And it is as plain that this imposture will rob God of his Glory as well as defeat man of his Happiness For whether we understand by the Glory of God the Image of God communicable to men as the Image that is the light of the Sun is the glory of the Sun or whether we understand the acknowledgment of that Excellency and Perfection that is in God first deeply conceived in our hearts and then fully and freely professed by our mouths both these are assuredly taken away by this false conceit And of the former there is no doubt being that the Spirit of Righteousness is that very Glory of God or Image of Christ. Wherefore whatever does intercept this does really eclipse the Glory of God And it is as true also of the other For seeing that the most rich and precious Excellencies of the Divine Nature cannot be discovered by the Soul as they ought to be but by becoming Divine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If thou beest it thou seest it as Plotinus speaks it must needs be that they cannot be worthily admired and extolled by any Soul but such as is Divine that is such a Soul as God has poured the Spirit of Righteousness and true Holiness on without which it is impossible to see God To all which Particulars that concern every private man you may add that great summe of an incomputable damage that respects the Publick For what Peace or Faithfulness can there be amongst men where the professed Mysterie of their Religion is the Explosion of real Righteousness Or what can possibly take place in stead thereof but Fraud and Falshood foul Lusts phrantick Factions rude Tumults and bloudy Rebellions To which you may cast in the loss of our very hopes that the World should ever grow better or that the holy Promises of God should take effect For there is not a more cruel or butcherly weapon for the slaying of the Witnesses nor a more impregnable Fort against the approaching Kingdome of Christ and that millennial Happiness which many good and faithfull Christians expect then this hell-hatch'd doctrine of Antinomianisme CHAP. XII 1. Of the attending to the Light within us of which some Spiritualists so much boast 2. That they must mean the Light of Reason and Conscience thereby if they be not Fanaticks Mad-men or Cheats And that this Conscience necessarily takes information from without 3. And particularly from the Holy Scriptures 4. That these Spiritualists acknowledge the fondness of their opinion by their contrary practice 5. An appeal to the Light within them if the Christian Religion according to the literal sense be not true 6. That the Operation of the Divine Spirit is not absolute but restrained to certain laws and conditions as it is in the Spirit of Nature 7. The fourth Gospel-Power The Example of Christ. 8. His purpose of vindicating the Example of Christ from aspersions with the reasons thereof 1. WE have now gone through the Three first Powers of the Gospel of which Three the last namely The Promise of the Spirit may seem so sufficient of it self to some without any thing further and I am sure does so to others that professedly they take up here and exclude or at least neglect all that advantage that accrues from the History of Christ and hereby do antiquate the Christian Religion These are those great Spiritualists that talk so much of The Light within them and the Power within them and boast that they want nothing without to be their Guide and Support but that they can goe of themselves without any external help For keeping to the Light within them the Power of God and the Spirit of God will assist them and will lead them into all truth And truly I cannot but say Amen to what they declare For I know assuredly that it is most true if they would leave off their canting language and say in down-right terms That keeping sincerely to the dictates of Reason and Conscience and the perpetually denying themselves in such things as they know or suspect to be evil with devout addresses to the Throne of Grace for the assistance and illumination of the Holy Spirit to discover and overcome all Errour Falseness Pride and Hypocrisie that may lurk in their hearts I say I am well assured that this Dispensation faithfully kept to will in due time lead unto all Saving Truth and that such a one at the last cannot fail to become a Christian in the soundest and the fullest sense such as firmly adhered to Christ in the first and most unspotted Ages of the Church But if they will call any hot wild Imagination or forcible and unaccountable Suggestion the Light within them and follow that this is not to keep to Reason and Conscience but to be delivered up to a reprobate sense and to expose a mans self to all the temptations that either the Devil or a mans own Lust or a sordid Melancholy can entangle him in 2. Wherefore by the Light within them they must understand an accountable and rational Conscience within them unless they be perfect Fanaticks or Mad-men or what is worse mere Impostors and Cheats who would pretend to a Conscience but yet irrational and unaccountable to any one and hereby have the liberty of doing what they please being given up at length to nothing but Fury and Lust. And then lastly This Conscience within them is not a thing so absolutely within them that it can take no information from what is without For it is manifest that this Lamp of God that burneth in us is fed and nourished from external Objects For the invisible things of him from the Creation of the World are clearly seen being understood by things that are made for by these from without are we advertised of his Eternal power and Godhead And as we are thus taught by the outward Book of Nature concerning the Existence of God and his general Providence in the world as to the necessities of life both of Men and Beasts so may we also by external VVritings or Records be more fully informed of a more special Providence of his to the Sons of men concerning the State in the other world and of that Eternal life manifested by Christ. But I grant that it is still this Light within us that judges and concludes after the perusal of either the Volumes of Nature or of Divine Revelation 3. But as he that gives his Mind to Mathematicks Architecture Husbandry
Angels of light and fit to enter into the presence of God if they be but neatly elegantly trimm'd up in these fine ornaments of Orthodoxality â—esotted fools blinde and carnal that think to recommend themselves to the Majesty of Heaven by being array'd in these motly coats this strip'd stuff of their own spinning While they thus affect the favour oâ— God by opinionative Knowledge how do they betray their gross Ignorance For how can that which is more pleasing to the natural man nay I may say to the Devil himself then to a regenerate Soul how can that render any one acceptable to God And yet in all the Divisions of the Churches they lay the greatest stress upon this bear the greatest zeal toward it recommend it the most vehemently to the people who following the example of their Pastours if they be but busie hot in these rending points they think themselves fully possest of the life of Christ and that they are very choicely religious though in the mean time Charity to their neighbour be cold they have attain'd to no measure of true Righteousness and Holiness Herein chiefly lies the mystery of Hypocrisy in all the Churches of Christendome counting all pious that are but zealous for the waies and opinions of their Sect and those that are not for it be they never so unblameable and cordial Christians they are either hated as Hereticks or at best pitied for poor Moralists mere Natural Men. 5. These are the most general and very potent Impediments for the hindring the Gospel of taking that effect which it would otherwise have in the Christian World and for making most of the professours of Christianity Hypocrites that is such as make a great show of Godliness but deny the power thereof which should mainly appear in our duty to our Neighbour and in a sober and just conversation doing all things as in the sight of God Now this Hypocrisy in Professours begets Prophaneness Atheisme and Unbelief in such persons as naturally have not so strong propension to matters of Religion that is to say that have not so superstitious a Complexion as to be tied to Religion upon any termes in any dress and from any kinde of Recommenders of it For their natural Nasuteness suggests that if there be any Religion at all most certainly it is not to be divided from sound Morality to which truly both the Prophets Apostles and Precepts of Christ do plentifully witness But they observing that they that make the greatest noise about Religion and are the most zealous therein do neglect the Laws of Honesty and common Humanity that they can easily invade other mens rights that they can juggle dissemble and lie for advantage that they are proud and conceited and love the applause of the People that they are envious fierce and implacable that they are unclean and sensual that they are merciless and cruel and care not to have Kingdomes to flow in bloud for the maintaining of their Tyranny over the consciences of poor deluded Souls when yet the contest is nothing but about hay and stubble the combustible superstructures of Humane Invention of which every vainglorious Superstitionist that would make a show in the flesh has cast on his handfull if not his arm-full for the hiding and smothering of the indispensable Truths of the Gospel and to put men into perplexities and labours for that which is not bread to rack their heads with Nonsense Contradictions and Impossibilities to weary out their bodies with the thankless toyle of endless and needless Ceremonies and to carry out their heart to toyes and trifles and so make them neglect the holy and weighty commands of our Saviour which are intelligible to all men and in some measure approved by all such as are To deal as we would be dealt with To love our neighbours as our selves and the like I say those that are not of so religious a Complexion naturally but have wit and sagacity enough to smell out the Corruptions and discern the Incoherences of the Actions of Professors making observation of these things are by this Scandal exceedingly tempted and very hardly escape the being quite overcome by so perverse a Scene of pretended Piety to think that the whole Business of Religion is nothing but Humour and Madness or at the best but a Plot to enrich the Priest and keep the People in awe 6. This is one great Scandal and effectual counterplot against the power of the Gospel the Vilifying and despising of Moral honesty by those that are great Zelots and high Pretenders to Religion This does advance Atheisme and Prophaneness very much But there is another Miscarriage which I have hinted at already as Epidemical and Universal and at least as effectual to this evil purpose as the former There is scarce any Church in Christendome at this day that does not obtrude not only Falshoods but such Falshoods that will appear to any free spirit pure Contradictions and Impossibilities and that with the same Gravity Authority and Importunity that they doe the holy Oracles of God Now the consequence of this must needs be fad For what knowing and consciencious man but will be driven off if he cannot profess the truth without open asserting of a gross lie If he sees good wine poured out of one bottle but rank poison out of another into the same cup who can perswade him to drink thereof This is a heavy sight to the truly-Religious but the joy and triumph of the Prophane who willingly take this advantage against the whole Mystery of Piety as if there were no truth at all in it because that so gross Falshoods are urg'd upon them with the same Indispensableness with the same Solemness Devoutness as those things that were it not for the serious Impudence of the Priest in other open falsities might pass with them for true But they being not at leisure to perpend things to the bottom but it may be not altogether indisposed to believe a faithfull report from an honest man they finding the Relater foully tripping in some things that he so earnestly urges discredit the whole Narration and so become perfect Atheists and Unbelievers though for their own security they juggle with the Juglers that is comply and doe outward reverence and devotion though they cannot but laugh in their sleeves at either the Ignorance or cunning Deceitfulness of their Ghostly Leaders 7. And that I may not seem to slander the state of Christendome I mean of the whole visible Church in what Nation soever under Heaven if we may believe Historians there is none neither Greek nor Roman neither Lutheran nor Calvinist but will be found guilty of this fault I shall particularize in some one thing in all The Greek as well as the Roman hold Transsubstantiation the Lutheran Consubstantiation things that have no ground in Scripture and are a palpable contradiction to Reason And yet not more contradictious then Absolute Reprobation according as our rigid
not look then like a piece of irreligious rudeness which is truly a kinde of Prophaneness to expect that Almighty God and his Son Jesus Christ should give us the meeting in squalid and sordid places even then when we pretend most to shew our Reverence and Devotion to him For though we may make bold one with another to meet where we please yet we making our approaches to God in those places and he thereby making his special approaches to us for in a Philosophical sense he is every where alike questionless it cannot but be an expression of our Reverence unto him to have the Structure of the place proportionably capacious well and fairly built and handsomely adorned and as properly and significantly of our Religion and devotional homages we owe to our crucified Saviour as can be without suspicion of Idolatry or any scandalous Superstition For it is true from the very light of Nature which the knowledge of Christ does not extinguish but direct and perfect That Houses of Publick worship ought to have some Stateliness and Splendour in them expressive of the Reverence we bear to the Godhead we do adore And therefore the Christian Magistrate for the honour of his Saviour who suffered so much shame for him as also for making Christian Religion more recommendable to them that are without for Religion will not seem Religion to any without Publick worship nor a desirable Religion unless this Publick worship be performed with inoffensive Splendour and Decency ought to assist and abett such good practices as these 3. It is beyond the limits of my present Discourse to make any curious inquisition or determination concerning the particularities of this Publick Worship though I cannot abstain from giving some general hints concerning the due managements of the chief matters thereof such as are most obvious to think of and most useful to consider And such are the Enquiries into the nature of the Place of this Publick worship and the Holiness thereof and our Demeanour therein and especially of those chief performances of Preaching Praying Receiving the Sacrament of Baptisme also and of Holy-days To which we may adde those accessory helps of Devotion as some account them Musick and Pictures Concerning which I shall rather simply declare my sense of things then solicitously endeavour to demonstrate my Conclusions by over-operose Reasonings which will but raise a dust and provoke the Polemical Rabble 4. Concerning therefore this House of Publick Worship the Christians meet in I conceive there is no need to phansie it a Temple nay rather it seems fit to look upon it as no Temple the use of that Ceremony being antiquated by the excellency and supereminency of our Religion For the famed Iehovah is not now a Topical Deity nor Christ confined to this or that City or People but is the declared Worship of the whole Earth and is not contained within the wals of any Temple but has his personal Residence in Heaven whither our Devotions are to be directed and our Mindes suspended and lifted up thitherward not debased nor defixed to the corners of any earthly Edifice into which when a man looks he findes nothing worthy of adoration To which Truth both Stephen and Paul give their suffrage the one declaring to the Iews the other to the Areopagites That the most High who is Lord of Heaven and Earth dwelleth not in Temples made with hands And our Saviour himself to the Samaritan woman who was solicitous which of those Temples that of Samaria or that of Ierusalem was the right place of Worship he tels her plainly that such Topical or Figurative worshipping of God was shortly to cease That the hour was coming and then was when the true Worshippers shall worship the Father in Spirit and in truth For the Father seeketh such to worship him God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in Spirit and in truth that is by the inward Sanctity of their Souls and with the true service of Prayers and Praises and Alms-deeds of which Incense and Sacrifices were but the figures and shadows Let my prayer be set forth before thee as Incense and the lifting up of my hands as the Evening Sacrifice To do good and to communicate forget not for with such Sacrifices God is well pleased And lastly S. Iohn in his Apocalyps describing the condition of the New Ierusalem which is the Church of Christ in her best state I saw saith he no Temple there for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the Temple of it That is their worship is directed immediatly towards God and Christ not to any place as the Jews ever worshipped toward the Temple of Ierusalem 5. But though the nature and name of a Temple does not belong to this House of Publick worship according to the sense of Scripture which made also the Primitive Christians carefully abstain from that nomination yet I do not see any ground at all why some of our phanciful Sects should take offence at the name of Church applied thereto For the Church being an house wherein we meet to serve the Lord whether God the Father or Christ his Son both which are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this house is naturally there from denominated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greek whence is our English word Church as every trivial Grammarian can tell them 6. But now it being thus plain that it is an house for Divine worship and therefore has a special relation to God though it be not dedicated in such a solemn manner as Solomon's Temple yet it does necessarily contract a kinde of Holiness hereby and by this Holiness some measure of respect namely that it should be kept in handsome repair and be carefully defended from all foulness and nastiness both within and without And because Custome has appropriated it to the service of God unless very great necessity urge it is not to be made use of to any other purposes Those that are otherwise affected in this matter may justly seem guilty of a kinde of Incivility against God as I may so call it and hazard the being accounted Clowns in the sight of the Court of Heaven and all the holy Angels As that also might be reputed a piece of unskilfulness and obsolete Courtship to complement any one part of this House as if there were the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there and the Ark of the Covenant For this would be to turn the Church of Christ into a Temple Wherefore those that at their entrance into the Congregation either kneel down or standing do their private devotion and continue bare-headed before Divine Service begin they mean not this Devotion to the Edifice but testifie only with what fear and reverence they make their approaches to God and their Hearts being in preparation to a nearer approach shew their sense of his coming nearer to them by this reverential observance For Veneration is done at the coming of great
persons at great distances off nor doth cease till a due distance after the congress 7. Concerning Preaching that which is most remarkable is this That whereas there are three chief kindes thereof namely Catechizing Expounding a Chapter and Preaching usually so called whereof the first is the best and the last the least considerable of them all this worst and last is the very Idol of some men and the other rejected as things of little worth But assuredly they are of most virtue for the effectual implanting the Gospel of Christ in the mindes of men and of the two as I said Catechizing the better because it enforces the catechized to take notice of what is taught him and what is thus taught him is not so voluminous but that he can carry it away and remember it for ever and withall the most Useful as being the very Fundamentals comprized in the Christian Creed or the first and most natural results from them tending to indispensable duties of life and therefore will alone if sincerely believed and faithfully practised carry a man to Heaven But the next profitable way of Preaching is Expounding of a Chapter provided that he that does so makes it his only business without any vain excursions to shew his reading to render those places of the Chapter that are obscure easie and intelligible to the capacity of the Auditors with some brief but earnest urging of their duties from such passages as most necessarily tend thereto This will make the private Reading of Scripture pleasant to his charge And it will prove the more effectual for their good if he contain himself within the New Testament and fetch only so much out of the Old as will be subservient for the full understanding of the New There is nothing so likely to convince the Conscience as this when men are able to reade and understand the Text of Scripture it self and are sensibly beat upon by the power of that Spirit that is found in those Writings far beyond all the fine Speeches and Phrases of humane Eloquence Which yet is the greatest matter in this Third way of Preaching and the truest use that can be made of it namely not to fill the peoples head with unprofitable or hurtful Opinions but by the artifice of a more florid and flowing style to raise the affections of the Auditors to the love and pursuit of such things as are commanded us by the Precepts of the Gospel I confess therefore This exercise may be of laudable use in such a Congregation where all the people are throughly grounded in the Fundamentals of Christianity and are well skilled in the knowledge of the Bible otherwise if the other Two necessary wayes of Preaching be silenced by this more overly and plausible way it is to the unspeakable detriment of the flock of Christ. Which will happen even then when it is performed after the very best manner How great then is the evil think you when the exercise of their popular Eloquence is nothing but a Stage of ostentation and vain-glory to the Speaker and begets nothing but an unsound blotedness and ventosity of Spirit in his hearers and admirers they being intoxicated with lushious and poisonous Opinions which tend to nothing but the extinguishing of the love and endeavour after true Righteousness and Holiness and the begetting in them a false security of minde and abhorred Libertinisme Had it not been far better that they had rested in the Fundamentals of their Faith comprised in the Apostles Creed with an obligation on their Conscience to live according to the Laws of Christ and his holy Precepts then to be led about and infatuated by the heat and noise of such false Guides 8. Concerning Praying it is an Epidemical mistake That men think extemporary Prayers are by the Spirit and that the Spirit is not in a Set Form Whenas in truth the Spirit may be absent in the highest extemporary heats and present in the use of set Forms where there may appear greater calmness and coolness For the Spirit of Praier does not consist in the invention of words and phrases which is rather a Gift of Nature as the Faculty of extemporary speaking in other cases is proceeding from heat and phansy and copiousness of the Animal Spirits but in a firm belief in God through Christ and in an hearty liking and sincere desire of having those holy things communicated to us that we pray for And therefore he that reads or hears a publick Liturgy read in such a frame of minde as I have described does as truly pray by the Spirit as he that invents words and phrases of his own For there is nothing Divine but this holy Faith and Desire the rest is mere Nature And it is a demonstration how ignorant these men are that talk so loud of the Spirit whenas they cannot so much as discern what is truly Spiritual from what is but Animal and Natural To which you may adde That if none pray by the Spirit but those that invent their own words the whole Congregation are very Spiritless Prayers they all hanging upon the lips of the Minister who alone will be acknowledged to pray by the Spirit Whose pretended assistance is not yet always so powerful as to protect him from the incurring of the danger of Non-sense and of making the Publick Worship of God insipid or else distasteful and loathsome or which is even as ill contemptible and ridiculous 9. Wherefore it is far more safe as it is undoubtedly more solemn to use a publick Liturgy that bears the authority of the whole Church then to venture so holy and devotional a performance upon the uncertainty of any mans private spirit who will be but tempted to ostentate his own conceited Eloquence or forced to discover his own weakness and folly Whenas a set Form will prevent all Pride and knackishness and preserve the publick worship in its due reverence and honour especially where it is contrived with that cautiousness that nothing is expressed therein that engages the Minde in controverted Opinions but speaks according to the known tenour of Scripture undepraved by humane glosses 10. But you will say if a Minister be cut so short in these performances of extemporary Praier and expatiating Preachments how shall he be able to give any eximious Testimony of his abilities in his calling how shall he have the opportunity of shewing his Gifts To which I answer That the end of the Ministry is not the Ostentation of any mans particular Gifts but the Edification of the People which are better edified by diligent catechizing and faithful and judicious expounding of the Scripture then by loose and ranging Discourses out of the Pulpit where he that speaks having taken leave of his short Text may fill the ears of his Auditors with nothing but the noise of his own conceits and inventions whenas in the Exposition of a whole Chapter suppose at a time the peoples mindes will be kept closer to those
could not be so perfect they not living in an Age of such liberty which has tempted all sorts of men to shew themselves in their own colours Besides that what they wrote being onely concerning this Sect of Familisme in Pamphlets apart by themselves the matter was not of such general concernment as to invite or engage men to read But the Subject of this present Treatise being of so Universal and so Weighty importance it cannot fail to prove a more effectual Monitour to the World of the deadly danger that lies under that fair enticing Title of The Family of Love 17. Nor ought my earnest diligence against Familisme embolden you to think me partial or defectuous in that you observe me so eagerly opposing no other Sect for the design of my Discourse leads me not to such Particularities as are controverted amongst Christians that still hold the Fundamentals of our Religion against whom I profess my self eager in nothing so much as in hearty Exhortation that they would not make their Difference of Opinion any breach of Friendship but an exercise of their Christian Charity and tender forbearance one of another not insulting over one anothers supposed ignorance nor forcing one another to external compliance and profession of what they do not believe by harsh Antichristian compulsions but by calme reasoning and kind treating one another with mutuall love and patience which is an exercise more pleasing in the sight of God then the exactest Uniformity of Opinions and Worship that the greatest Formalist can propound or desire This is all that I find my self bound in conscience to be earnest in against such like Sects as these But Familisme is no such Sect nay to speak properly and to yield them their own boast they are no Sect at all I mean of Christians but a totall Apostasy from Christianity as you may easily understand out of what I have writ in the following Discourse And therefore my present purpose being The Demonstration of the Solidity of the Fundamentals of Christianisme as it is apparently comprehended in the Holy Writ it was proper and unavoidable for me to deal with all such as did oppose or undermine those undispensable Truths of our Religion and therefore I had been wanting to the Cause if I had not thus industriously set my self against this dangerous and mischievous Mystery of Unbelief which is ordinarily called Familisme And as I have not spared them so there is no Sect that has stoln away any one Essential of Christianity whether appertaining to Life or Speculation but I have bid them battel and I hope rescued the prey out of their hands and led them Captive into the Truth at least they have not escaped their share of chastisement for their committing of so hainous a crime And this is all that I could in reason attempt unless I would break all the Lawes of Method and make useless Excursions beyond the set limits of my Discourse 18. My forbearing therefore to squable with every petty Sect I hope will be accounted no part of defectuousness But there are other Omissions I must confess that may seem more justly liable to that imputation As for example in that I have not endeavoured to clear the Prophecy of Daniel's weeks to that accuracy as to bring the Passion of our Saviour to the middle of the last week as the Prophecy seems most naturally to imply but have contented my self with that Chronological account of Funccius that suffers it to fall in the last day of the week But as I have already intimated in the place there may be that latitude of the meaning of the middle of the week that it may signifie any time of the week begun and not yet expired In which sense Funccius his account is within a year or thereabout of the exact completion of the Prophecy Which is so near the matter that one may easily suspect that it is some mistake in their computations that it does not happen just according to the Prophecy so little time being easily misreckoned in so large an account Besides it was sufficient for my purpose onely to take notice and to make evident That this Prophecy of Daniel is understood of the Messias and That the weeks are long ago expired For by this alone we may demonstratively conclude That he is already come which was the onely thing pertinent to my present Subject And lastly for thy further satisfaction as the task thou expectedst had been too laborious for me to performe so thou thy self wilt hold it needless when thou shalt understand with what accuracy and solidity it is already perfected by the learned Master of our Colledge Dr. Cudworth in his publick Lectures in the Schools wherein he has undeceived the world misled too long by the over-great opinion they had of Joseph Scaliger and taking Funccius his Epocha has demonstrated the Manifestation of the Messiah to have fallen out at the End of the sixty ninth week and his Passion in the midst of the last in the most natural and proper sense thereof Which demonstration of his is in my apprehension of as much price and worth in Theologie as either The Circulation of the Bloud in Physick or The Motion of the Earth in natural Philosophy as I have already noted in its proper place 19. Again I may haply seem unto thee defectuous in that I have so expressely professed my hope and expectation of Better times in the Church and yet not gone about to produce that copiousness of Arguments that might have befitted the management of so desirable a Truth But I have to answer for my self That that subject was too big for my hands especially being as full already as they could grasp and That the Theory also was not essential to the scope of my present Discourse and lastly That certain friends of mine whose more then ordinary skill and happy rellish of the best and choicest things has made them fit undertakers of so usefull a design will I hope ere long gratifie the world with their excellent performances in that subject The promotion of which Opinion cannot but be profitable to the Church of Christ provided the case be rightly stated namely That these good Times which we expect and hope for will not be the exaltation of this or that Sect. For the childish conceit of some is that the future prosperity of the Church will be nothing but the setting up this Forme or that Opinion and so every Faction will be content to be Millennists upon condition that Christ may reign after their way or mode that is in Calvinisme in Arminianisme in Papisme in Anabaptisme in Quakerisme in Presbytery in Episcopacy in Independency and the like But the true happiness of those days is not to be measured by Formalities or Opinions but by a more corroborated Faith in Christ and his Promises by Devotion unfeigned by Purity of Heart and Innocency of Life by Faithfulness by common Charity by comfortable provisions
themselves yet to be so streight to one another as not to acknowledge that mutual Right seems enormously harsh and unchristian For we all agreeing in the Truth of the Scriptures which certainly are sufficient to Salvation since the Belief and Practice of what is plain in them will not fail to carry a man to Heaven what an unreasonable thing is it that there should be that hatred and persecution against those that God so well approves that he will save them and Christ so dearly loved that he gave his life a ransome for them Again there being also a necessity as I have said in the Persecuted of thinking as he does and an uncertainty in the Opinions that the Persecutour would promote as being demonstrable by neither Reason nor Scripture how unwarrantable an action is it to do a certain injury for an uncertain conceit To all which you may adde That the Love of Knowledge is but the work of the Devil how much more then is bitter Zeal and brawling about it but the depretiating of humane devices tends much to the exaltation of true Sanctity that mask of Hyprocrisie patcht up of empty Opinions and Formalities being by this means torn off and leaving the face bare that their Complexion may be more discernable how pure and sincere it is or how unsound cadaverous and deformed And lastly a mutuall agreement of bearing with one anothers dissents in the Non-fundamentals of Religion is really a greater Ornament of Christianity then the most exact Uniformity imaginable it being an eminent act or exercise of Charity the Flower of all Christian graces and the best way I think at the long run to make the Church as Uniforme as can justly be desired For if true Christian Love could once get the rule in the Hearts of men the Apostle will undertake for her that she shall do nothing unseemly For Charity is indeed the Mother of Unity and bond of Perfection and he that is really spirited thereby I dare promise for him that he will never oftentate his Sanctimony by a pretended queziness of Conscience as if he had a more delicate sense and a more peculiar discernment in things appertaining to Godliness then others have But whatever a good round force would urge him to out of love to himself and his own safety he would not fail of his own accord to comply therewith out of the love of Order and the Reverence he bears to the authority of the Church he lives under Nor on the other side would the Church ever offer to obtrude upon her children what is either false or useless For they both of them being once imbued with that Divine sense we speak of cannot but be well assured That neither Circumcision nor Uncircumcision availeth any thing but Faith working by Love And whosoever walketh by this Rule peace be upon him and upon the true Israel of God H. M. From my Study at Christs Coll. in Cambridge Iune 12. 1660. AN EXPLANATION OF The grand Mystery OF GODLINESS CHAP. I. 1. The Four main Properties of a Mystery 2. The first Propertie Obscurity 3. The second Intelligibleness 4. The third Truth 5. The fourth Usefulness 6. A more full Description of the Nature of a Mystery 7. The Distribution of the whole Treatise 1. EVery legitimate Mystery comprehends in it at least these Four Properties It is a piece of Knowledge First competently Obscure Recondite and Abstruse That is It is not so utterly hid and intricate but that in the Second place It is in a due measure Intelligible Thirdly It is not only Intelligible what is meant by it but it is evidently and certainly True Fourthly and lastly It is no impertinent or idle Speculation but a Truth very Usefull and Profitable We may well add also for some Religious End 2. This Obscuritie and Abstruseness makes not only the Mystery more solemn and venerable to those to whom it is communicated but hides it also from their eyes that are not worthy to partake thereof From whence some Criticks have derived Mysterium from the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to hide Which is well aimed at as to the sense But others with more judgment in Grammar acknowledge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be a proper Greek word and fetch the Derivation of it from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because they to whom it is communicated are to keep silence and not to impart it to unmeet persons And in this sense Chrysostome expounds Mysterium 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A matter wonderfull unknown and not to be easily or rashly communicated to others 3. Nor indeed could it be at all if it were utterly Unintelligible Wherefore Intelligibleness adds this further requisite also to a Mystery that it thereby becomes Communicable to such as are fitly prepared to be instructed therein For which reason the Etymologists give also this Notation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is to teach and instruct a man in Divine matters so far forth as the party is fit to receive Hence is also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mysta a Scholar or Commencer in Divine Mysteries one that is more slightly imbued in the knowledge of such Holy things 4. But there is afterward a clearer manifestation and a fuller satisfaction and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then becomes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being now more firmly ascertained of the Truth which he did but obscurely apprehend before From which Clearness and Certainty of the thing represented there necessarily arises a full and free assent of his Understanding without any further doubt or hesitancy the Proverb being made good in this case That Seeing is Believing 5. But that there may not be a mere dry Belief without any love or liking of the Object thereof we added also that this Mystery is not only certainly True but very concerningly Usefull and Profitable which though the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it self does not implie yet another in the same language and of the like sense does which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Initiations into sacred Mysteries The Usefulness whereof a Platonist admirably well describes not without a verbal allusion in this manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which if we would render it in our more familiar language sounds thus The scope or aim of all Religious Mysteries is the bringing back faln man into his pristine condition of Happiness and to lead him again to that high station which he then first forsook when he preferr'd his own Will and the pleasure of the Animal life before the Will of God and that Life and Sense which is truly Divine 6. Wherefore not to dwell too long on the threshold we conclude briefly and in general that a Mystery is a piece of Divine knowledge measurably Abstruse whereby it becomes more Venerable but yet Intelligible that it may be Communicable and
True and Certain that it may win firm Assent and lastly very Usefull and Effectual for the perfecting of the Souls of men and restoring them to that Happiness which they anciently had faln from that so near a Concernment may as well gain upon their Affections as the Evidence of Truth engage their Understandings and so the whole man may be carried on to a devout embracement of what is exhibited unto him by the knowledge of his Religion 7. What we have thus Generally proposed we shall now applie more Particularly and more fully prosecute those Four primary Properties in that Grand Mystery of Godliness which we call Christianity distributing our Discourse into these Four main Parts The First whereof shall insist somewhat upon the Abstruseness and Obscurity of our Religion the Second upon the Intelligibleness of it the Third upon the Certainty of it and the Fourth on the great concerning Usefulness thereof To which we shall add what Considerations we think fittest concerning the Secondary Properties which emerge out of these Primary ones CHAP. II. 1. That it is fit that the Mystery of Christianity should be in some measure Obscure to exclude the Sensuall and Worldly 2. As also to defeat disobedient Learning and Industry 3. And for the pleasure and improvement of the godly and obedient 4. The high Gratifications of the Speculative Soul from the Obscurity of the Scriptures 1. THat there is a considerable Obscurity and Abstrusenesse in Christian Religion is easily made evident as well from the Cause as the Effects of this Obscurity For besides that from the common nature of a Mystery Christianity ought to be competently Obscure and Abstruse that it may thereby become more Venerable and more safely removed out of all danger of contempt we cannot but see what a speciall Congruity there is in the matter it self to have so holy and so highly-concerning a Mystery as our Religion is Abstruse and Obscure For that Divine wisdome that orders all things justly ought not to communicate those precious Truths in so plain a manner that the Unworthy may as easily apprehend them as the Worthy but does most righteously neglect the Sensuall and Careless permitting every man to carry home wares proportionable to the price he would pay in the open market for them And when they can bestow so great industry upon things of little moment will not spare to punish their undervaluing this inestimable Pearle by the perpetual losse of it For what a palpable piece of Hypocrisie is it for a man to excuse himself from the study of Piety by complaining against the Intricacies and Difficulties of the Mystery thereof whenas he never yet laid out upon it the tenth part of that pains and affection that he does upon the ordinary trivial things of this world 2. Thus are the careless voluptuous Epicure and over-careful Worldling justly met with But not they alone For the Obscurity of this Mystery we speak of is such that all the knowledge of Nature and Geometry can never reach the Depth of it or rellish the Excellency of it nor all the skill of Tongues rightly interpret it unless that true Interpreter and great Mystagogus the Spirit of God himself vouchsafe the opening of it unto us and set it on so home in our Understandings that it begets Faith in our Hearts so that our Hearts misgive us not in the profession of what we would acknowledge as True For as for the outward Letter it self of the Holy Scriptures God has not so plainly delivered himself therein that he has given the staff out of his own hands but does still direct the humble and single-hearted while he suffers the proud searcher to lose himself in this Obscure field of Truth Wherefore disobedient both Learning and Industry are turned off from obtaining any certain and satisfactory Knowledge of this Divine Mystery as well as Worldliness and Voluptuousness According as our Blessed Saviour has pronounced in that devout Doxology I thank thee O Father Lord of heaven and earth because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes Even so Father for so it seemed good in thy sight 3. Nor are the Wicked onely disappointed but the Godly very much gratified by the Intricacy of this sacred Mystery For the Spirit of man being so naturally given to search after Knowledge and his Understanding being one of the chiefest and choicest Faculties in him it cannot be but a very high delight to him to employ his noblest endowments upon the divinest Objects and very congruous and decorous they should be so employ'd Besides the present Doubtfulness of Truth makes the holy Soul more devout and dependant on God the onely true and safe guide thereunto From whence we should be so far from murmuring against Divine Providence for the Obscurity and Ambiguity of the Holy Scriptures that we should rather magnifie his Wisdome therein We having discovered so many and so weighty Reasons why those Divine Oracles should be Obscure The wicked thereby being excluded the due Reverence of the Mystery maintained and the worthy partakers thereof much advantaged and highly gratified 4. For what can indeed more highly gratifie a man whose very Nature is Reason and special Prerogative Speech then by his skill in Arts and Languages by the Sagacity of his Understanding and industrious comparing of one place of those Sacred pages with another to work out or at least to clear up some Divine Truth out of the Scripture to the unexpected satisfaction of himself and general service of the Church the dearest Faculty of his Soul and greatest glory of his Nature acting then with the fullest commission and to so good an end that it need know no bounds but Joy and Triumph may be unlimited the Heart exulting in that in which we cannot exceed viz. the Honor of God and the Good of his people All which gratulations of the Soul in her successful pursuits of Divine Truth would be utterly lost or prevented if the Holy Scriptures set down all things so fully plainly and methodically that our reading and understanding would every where keep equal pace together Wherefore that the Mind of man may be worthily employ'd and taken up with a kind of Spiritual husbandry God has not made the Scriptures like an artificial Garden wherein the Walks are plain and regular the Plants sorted and set in order the Fruits ripe and the Flowers blown and all things fully exposed to our view but rather like an uncultivated field where indeed we have the ground and hidden seeds of all precious things but nothing can be brought to any great beauty order fulness or maturity without our own industry nor indeed with it unless the dew of His grace descend upon it without whose blessing this Spiritual Culture will thrive as little as the labour of the husbandman without showres of rain CHAP. III. 1. The Obscurity of the Christian Mystery argued from the Effect as from the Iews
and what he utters concerning the Spirit chap. 16.14 He shall glorifie me for he shall receive of mine and shew it unto you Wherefore I say the Fathers being every way so fairly invited to bring the Platonick Notion of the Trinity into the Church assuredly if themselves had been Platonists and had fetched the Mystery from that School they would not have failed to have done it 7. Secondly Admit that the ancient Fathers were Platonists and brought the Mystery of the Trinity into the Church of the Christians it does not straight follow That it is therefore a Pagan or Heathenish Mystery Pythagoras and Plato having not received it from Pagans or Heathens but from the learned of the Iews as sundry Authors assert the Iews themselves in long succession having received it as a Divine Tradition and such is Platonisme acknowledged to be by Iamblichus who sayes it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And assuredly if there had not been some very great reason for it men so wise and profoundly knowing as Pythagoras Plato Plotinus and others would never have made so much adoe about it 8. Thirdly and lastly I say it is not only impious but vain and foolish to asperse that Mystery with the reproch of Paganisme that is so plainly to them that be not prejudiced set down and held forth in the Holy Scripture For the very Forme of Baptisme prescribed by our Saviour evidently enough denotes Three Divine Hypostases Of the Father there is no question Concerning the Divinity of the Sonne we shall speak more fully in the Second point we proposed That the Holy Ghost is not a mere Power Property or Attribute of God but an Hypostasis one free enough from being swai'd by Tradition or Authority of any Church and as himself conceits a very close and safe adherer to Scripture does grosly enough acknowledge while he makes it some created Angel that bears the sacred Title of the Holy Ghost and undergoes those Divine functions that are attributed to him But we need not maintain Truth by any mans Error it being sufficiently able to support it self and therefore we will make use of no advantage but what Scripture it self offers us And this Forme of Baptisme affords us something to the evincing that the Holy Ghost is not an Attribute but an Hypostasis For sith that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to give up a mans self to the Discipline Government and Authority of this or that Person it is the most natural sense to conceive that all Three mentioned in the Forme are Persons we being so well assured that two of them are But there are other passages of Scripture that will make the point more clear Rom. 15.13 The God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing that ye may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost Now if the Holy Ghost were but a Power not a Person what a ridiculous Tautology would it be for the sense would be through the power of the holy power Again John 16.13 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are very ill Syntax were it not that there is a Personality in the Holy Spirit which by what follows is most undeniably evident For he shall not speak of himself but whatsoever he shall hear that shall he speak To receive of one and communicate to others by way of hearing and speaking what can that belong to but a Person or Hypostasis To this you may adde also Mark 13.11 Whatsoever shall be given you in that hour that speak ye for it is not you that speak but the Holy Ghost Now that this Hypostasis is not a created Angel amongst other Reasons the Conception of Christ may well argue it being more congruous That that spirit that moved upon the waters and created the world should form that holy Foetus in the womb of the Virgin then that any created Angel should apply himself to that work for he had not then been the Son of God but of an Angel as in reference to his birth in time 9. Besides this one Individual Spirit in Scripture in represented as every where ready to sanctify to regenerate to distribute various gifts and graces to the Church to have spoke by the mouth of the Prophets to be a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a discerner of the thoughts of the heart Baptisme also and Benedictions are imparted in his name he is also called to witness which is a piece of Divine worship all which seems more naturally to be understood of him whom we properly call the Spirit of God then of any particular created Angel whatsoever 10. We shall onely adde one place more which will put all out of doubt to them that do not doubt of the Text it self 1 John 5.7 There are three witnesses in Heaven the Father the Word and the Spirit and these three are One What can be writ more plain for the proof of the Triunity of the Godhead But for those that suspect the Clause to be supposititious I shall not trouble my self to confute them that task being performed so solidly and judiciously by a late Interpreter that nothing but Prejudice and Wilfulness can make a man depart unsatisfied with so clear a demonstration Wherefore secure of this Point Concerning the Trinity we go on to the next concerning The Divinity of Christ. CHAP. V. 1. That the natural sense of the First of S. Iohn does evidently witness the Divinity of Christ. 2. A more particular urging of the circumstances of that Chapter 3. That S. Iohn used the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Iewish or Cabbalistical notion 4. The Trinity and the Divinity of Christ argued from Divine worship due to him and from his being a Sacrifice for sin 5. That to deny the Trinity and Divinity of Christ or to make the Union of our selves with the Godhead of the same nature with that of Christ's subverts Christianity 6. The uselesness and sauciness of the pretended Deification of Enthusiasts and how destructive it is of Christian Religion 7. The Providence of God in preparing of the Nations by Platonisme for the easier reception of Christianity 1. THat Christ is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a mere Creature but a divine Hypostasis or truly really and Physically not Allegorically and Morally joyn'd with that Divine Hypostasis which is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if men would not bring their own sturdy preconceptions but listen to the easy and natural aire of the Text the Beginning of S. Iohns Gospel would put out of all controversy For I 'le appeal to any supposing the Union of Christ's Humanity with the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be true in what fitter more significant or better-becoming way could it be expressed then already it is in the Beginning of that Gospel Wherefore to interpret it in any other sense is to delude themselves and to abuse the Scripture through the prepossessions of their
as with the Ocean who changes his name according to the Coasts he beats upon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Dionysius notes in his Geographicall Poem 6. And if they took into their Religious consideration the worship of the Genii or Spirits whether such as whole appearance was so horrid and terrible that it caused affrightment or such as whose benign aspect was accompanied with a more pleasing wonderment and joy these they look'd upon also as eminent manifestations of that One Eternal Deity which runs through all things giving life and Being to all whom therefore they called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whom though they make three viz. Iupiter coelestis Iupiter marinus and Iupiter infernalis the latter two whereof they also call Neptune and Pluto yet it is one Eternal Spirit say they which we worship in these Three whose Kingdome and Dominion is over all though the administration thereof differ according to the nature and merit of them that are Governed The same Apology we may make for that Honour we do to the deceased Heroes whose noble persons and refined Spirits the Divine excellencies more illustriously shone through then ordinary For in truth we do not so much worship them as God shining through them as he that bows to the Sun or Moon through a glass-window intends not his obeisance to the glass but to those Celestial Luminaries nor do we bow our body to those Luminaries but to God who to us appears through all things CHAP. IV. 1. The Heathens Festivals Temples and Images 2. Their Apology for Images 3. The Significancy of the Images of Jupiter and Aeolus 4. Of Ceres 5. Of Apollo 6. Their Plea from the significancy of their Images that their use in Divine worship is no more Idolatrous then that of Books in all Religions as also from the use of Images in the Nation of the Iews 7. Their Answer to those that object the Impossibleness of representing God by any outward Image 8. That we are not to envy the Heathen if they hit upon any thing more weighty in their Apologies for their Religion and why 1. NOW according to the various appearances of This One Divinity that puts forth it self every where our Ancestors instituted various Religious Rites and Ceremonies appointed sundry sorts of Festivals and Sacrifices built Temples set up Altars with several inscriptions and erected Images proper and significative of that or this Divine Power which at set times and places they were to worship To which Religious Customes under which we were born we submitted our selves without being obnoxious as we conceive to any just imputation of Idolatry 2. For we worshipped not those Images which were thus erected no more then any other Nation does the Holy Volumes of their Law or Religion when either they pray out of them have them read or use them in the administring of an Oath For that reverence that is done is not done to the Book but to him whose Word it is said to be to him whom they pray to or swear by and those Images to us are not unlike the Religious Books of others they being very expressive of the circumstances of the exertion of that Divine Power which we at any time adore As you may see in the Images of Iupiter Aeolus Ceres Apollo and the rest 3. For Iupiter who was their God of Thunder as he bore in his left hand a royal Scepter his right hand was charg'd with Thunder according to that of the Poet Cui dextra trisulcis Ignibus armata est Aeolus the God of the Winds he was made standing at the Mouth of a Cave having a linnen garment girt about him and a Smiths bellows under his feet at his right hand stood Iuno covered with a cloud putting a Crown upon his head as having given her Kingdome to him and on his left hand stood a Nymph up to the middle in Water which Iuno gave him to wife Which Image is very significative of the Nature and Causes of the Windes and so intelligible if we do but take notice that Iuno is the Aire that it wants no further explication 4. Ceres was made in the figure of a country-woman sitting upon an Oxe having in her right hand a Plough-share and a basket of Seeds hanging from her arme in her left hand a sickle and a flayle Iuno the Goddess of the Aire and of the Clouds was on one side and Apollo or the Sun on the other intimating how the warmth of the Sun and kindly showrs are to second the labour of the Husbandman or else nothing will prosper 5. The figure of Apollo or the Sun was thus His Image had a Youthful countenance in his right hand he held a Quiver of arrows and a Bow in his left an Harp under his feet was a terrible Monster in the form of a Serpent having three heads viz. of a Wolf of a Lion and of a fawning Dog on the Top of his head was a golden Trivet and about his temples a Crown of Twelve precious stones The meaning whereof though it may seem abstruse at first sight yet if you consider it a while it very fitly sets out the nature of the Sun and of Time whose knowledge depends on him and of Knowledge which depends on Time His Bow and Arrows signify nothing but the darting of his Beams from so far a distance whence he is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the Poets and his youthful countenance nothing but his unfading vigour which Age seems not at all to diminish His Harp signifies the dance of the Planets about him as if he sate and played to them or at least according to the other Hypothesis as if he led the dance himself playing on his Harp and the rest of the Planets followed him The twelve precious stones signifie the twelve signes of the Zodiack with which he is incircled and the three-headed Serpent deciphers Time in the threefold notion of it Past Present and to come The time past as Macrobius notes like a ravenous Wolfe devouring the memory of things the time present being urgent and raging like a Lion through its instant actuosity and the time to come flattering us with hopes like a fawning Dog And lastly the golden Trivet or Tripod denotes the Threefold object of Knowledge which Time affords them that are wise such as Homer makes Calchas the Priest of Apollo to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Who knew what was what is and what 's to come So that it is apparent how strange soever the use of these Images may seem that it was no other then that of Books they raising our minds and it may be with a greater advantage of devotion and admiration into the sense and consideration of that Divine Power which we were to adore 6. Wherefore that imputation is very unjust that would charge us with Idolatry properly so called as if we did worship the Idols themselves But to use Images in Divine worship there being
that convenience of them which we have alledged we question not but that it is lawfull in it self where there is no Command from God to the contrary And where his Command is most express as it is to the Nation of the Jews yet it is very well known that there was also there a religious use of Images as is plain in the Cherubims that covered the Mercy-seat and the Brasen Serpent which they were to look up to in the wilderness For through that did the Almighty exert his healing power upon those that were stung with fiery Serpents For such Effects as these are not from Nature or Art but from the efficacie of Religion as the very word Telesme does plainly bewray Now it seems to us a thing incredible that God should command any thing absolutely evil in it self and therefore undeniable but that the use of Images in Divine worship is not in it self evil 7. Nor does that which is mainly and most ordinarily alledged against Images in Religious worship viz. That it is impossible to represent God by any outward figure seem of any weight at all to us For neither do we admit that these Images are intended for Figures and Representations of God but only for the Sensible setting out to our sight the Effects and Objects of those Powers and Attributes which we adore in him And if we did admit it yet we have wherewith to defend our selves For it we are not to use Images in Divine worship because they cannot set out the Nature of God as he is in himself we are not at all to think of him when we worship him the Thoughts concerning his very Nature or Person which we frame of him though haply they be not without some truth having yet as little similitude with him whom we worship as the Imagination of a man born blind hath with the glorious Image of the Sun He feels indeed the comfortable Effects of his presence upon his body but his Eyes did never see nor can his Mind conceive how illustrious he is to look upon 8. To this purpose the most witty cautious and subtile sort of the Pagans apologize for themselves nor are we to envy them if they hit upon any thing more weighty and substantial in their Apologie For Christianity is so excellent in it self that we need not phansy any Religions worse then they are the better to set off its eminency Besides the more tolerable sense we can make of the affairs of the ancient Pagans the easier Province we shall have to maintain against prophane and Atheistical men to whom if you would grant That Providence had utterly neglected for so many Ages together all the Nations of the world except that little handfull of the Iews they would whether you would or no from thence infer That there was no Providence over them neither consequently no God it being a thing incredible that there should be any Providence at all in things of the highest concernment unless it dispread it self further then into such an inconsiderable part of the World as some imagine But that the Heathen were not so utterly destitute of means as some would make them S. Paul seems largely enough to declare in his Epistle to the Romans And that their condition was not so horridly desperate he may perhaps seem to intimate from that favourable expression in his Speech to the Athenians where he saith God connived at the times of their Ignorance But I had almost forgot my self my design being not to apologize for the Heathen but to answer what they apologize for themselves which I shall doe very briefly CHAP. V. 1. An Answer to the last Apology of the Pagans as first That it concerns but few of them 2. and that those few were rather of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then pure Pagans 3. That the worship of Images is expresly forbid by God in the Law of Moses 4. That they rather obscure then help our conceptions of the Divine Powers 5. That there is great danger of these Images intercepting the worship directed to God 6. He referrs the curious and unsatisfied to the fuller Discussions in Polemical Divinity 1. FIrst therefore we are to consider that what has been here alledged in defence of the Pagans concerns but very few of them the generality of them being Idolaters in the grossest sense as is manifest out of the complaints of David Psalm 135. as also out of the Epistle of Ieremy and other places 2. Secondly It is questionable whether those few such as Pythagoras Socrates Plato Plotinus Plutarch and the like are to be reputed mere Pagans or whether they came nearer to the nature of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 having been imbued with the Knowledge of that one Eternal Spirit which is the Creator and Governor of all things by conversing with the Iews or by conversing with them that had conversed with them And that they had the Knowledge of Him by the communication of some such hidden Tradition or Cabbala seems manifest in that these more holy and more expert men in Divine Mysteries amongst the Heathen taught also the Triunity as well as the Immateriality of the Godhead I mean the First and Chiefest of them such as Pythagoras and Plato which being a reach above humane wit and a thing so usefull to be taken into Christianity is to me a strong Argument that it was none of their own invention but that they had it either from those that were inspired themselves or had received it from those that were inspired 3. Thirdly The making of graven Images and falling down before them is a thing expressly forbidden to the people of God in that Religion where himself thought fit to appear in the framing of it which is an evident sign of the faultiness of the Use of Idols in Divine worship 4. Fourthly The pretended serviceableness of Images for the instructing the people and the setting out to them the nature of that Divine Power which they are to adore seems very questionable For the presence of so strange an object before their eyes striking the outward Sense so strongly may rather hinder the inward operation of their Mind from more pure and genuine conceptions of God then at all further them in the framing of them and as Memory is too often lost by the use of writing so the power of Imagination as to Divine things may be spoiled and enfeebled by these false props of external representations 5. Fifthly and lastly There is a great danger of which the Jealousie of God seems very sensible that these Vice-Royes and Representatives of the Divine Majesty as they would have them to be may prove treacherous to the highest Soveraignty intercepting and keeping to themselves all those Praiers and Praises all those immolations and sacrifices that are offered by the people For the unskilfull Multitude seeing the Priest sacrifice and all the people pour forth their devotions with their eyes fixed on the Idol
discern out of the very causes For whenas not only the Fear of Persecution was taken away but great Honours and outward Advantages added to the Church the very worst and most Atheistical of the Pagans would be most forward to close with the Christian Religion and if any of the Heathen stood out it is not unlikely but they were such as had most conscience though in an erroneous worship So that the Net then drew up more mud and dirt then good fishes The garden of God which had before nothing else but wholesome herbs and flowers was all overrun with weeds Or if you will the true Church which was before as conspicuous as a City on an Hill was now hid and dispersed in the wide wilderness of the Roman Empire which though it bore the name of Christian yet for life and manners was worse then Pagan 2. But yet not to make things less considerable then they were First The true Christian Church was I say but hid not lost as it fares at this very day For she is still hid in the Wilderness and like that Voice in the Wilderness complains and witnesses against the beastly sensual and abominable lives and salvage dealings in that part of the World which is called Christendome For there alwaies were and still are in this great rude mass of Christianity some that are truly regenerate and rightly form'd by the hand of God into the lovely image of Christ who give witness of the loathsome and detestable deviations of those that so impudently and imperiously boast themselves to be the only Christians when in truth they are not Christians at all that is no true members of Christ as having nothing at all of his Spirit as their works do evidently declare 3. And Secondly Though I must confess that the Divine life it self as communicable to the Church is very much under the hatches since Christianity and Political Interest went hand in hand yet after the Church became so rich and pompous they have laid out their riches very much in honour not only to our Saviour in whom the Divine Life dwelt in a transcendent manner but to his blessed Mother to the holy Apostles and Martyrs who were also great Examples of it And being that these generations were such that God could expect no better of them his Providence I think did wisely permit that they might be so deeply engaged in their External homage to Christ and his most faithfull followers that that might be fulfilled in some measure in the Martyrs also which was prophesied concerning Christ Therefore I will divide him a portion with the great and he shall divide the spoile with the strong because he hath powred out his Soul unto death And therefore the Martyrs sharing so deeply in the sufferings of Christ were permitted also in a measure to partake of that glory and honour that is done to great Princes and Emperours after their decease to have Images and Temples erected to their name This makes me not so much wonder at that passage of Providence which allowed so much virtue to the Bones of the Martyr Babylas once Bishop of Antioch as to stop the mouth of Apollo Daphneus when Iulian would have enticed him to open it by many a fat Sacrifice To say nothing of several other memorable Miracles that were done by the Reliques of Saints and Martyrs in those times 4. Hitherto therefore the Pagan World since they became Christians have been very religiously complemental according to the ancient guize of Paganism devoutly cringing and courting with many sacred Rites and Ceremonies not only Christ but the blessed Virgin and all the holy Martyrs Confessours very freely and forwardly bestowing upon them all external Reverence consecrating Chappels Daies to their honour and memories So that the personal worship of the Divine Life as it is seated in Christ in the blessed Virgin in this or in that Saint or Martyr is as punctually performed as the worship of those excellent dowries of the Animal Life in ancient Paganism which they honoured in Belus Bacchus Ceres Apollo Venus and other Eminent persons amongst the Heathens who were great gratifiers of the natural life of man 5. Methinks Spencer's description of Una's Entertainment by Satyrs in the Desart does lively set out the condition of Christianity since the time that the Church of a Garden became a Wilderness They danc'd and frisk'd and play'd about her abounding with external homages and observances but she could not inculcate any thing of that Divine law of life that she was to impart to them The Representation is so lively and the Verses so musical that it will not be tedious to recite some of the chief of them as Stanza 11. where he makes the Satyrs to lay aside their rudeness and roughness as much as they could to revive the dismaied Virgin after her great distress Their frowning foreheads with rough horns yclad And rustick horrour all aside they lay And gently grenning shew a semblance glad To comfort her and fear to put away Their backward bent knees teach her humbly to obay And then again in the following Stanza They in compassion to her tender youth And wonder to her beauty soverain Are won with pitty and unwonted ruth And all prostrate upon the lowly Plain Do kis her feet and fawn on her with count'nance fain 13. Their hearts she guesseth by their humble guise And yields her to extremity of time So from the ground she fearless doth arise And walketh forth without suspect of crime They all as glad as Birds of joyous Prime Thence lead her forth about her dancing round Shouting and singing all a Shepheards rime And with green branches strowing all the ground Do worship her as Queen with Olive girlond crown'd 14. And all the way their merry pipes they sound That all the woods with double Echo ring And with their horned feet do wear the ground Leaping like wanton kids in pleasant Spring c. But in all this alacritie and activity in their Ceremonies and complemental observances Una could beat nothing of the inward law of life into them but all was spent in an outward Idolatrous flattery as the Poet complains Stanza 19. Glad of such luck the luckless lucky maid Did her content to please their feeble eyes And long time with that salvage people stai'd To gather breath in many miseries During which time her gentle wit she plies To teach them Truth which worship her in vain And made her th' Image of Idolatries But when their bootless zeal she did restrain From her own worship they her Ass would worship fain 6. But though it has been thus so long yet it seems incredible it should be always so and while it is as it is yet the Divine life is in its personal Triumph And now the enemies of Christ even while they are such and such are all unregenerate men let them be called Christians never so loudly do lick the very dust of his
God and which had not worshipped the Beast neither his Image neither had received his mark upon their foreheads or in their hands and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years But the rest of the dead lived not again untill the thousand years were finished This is the First Resurrection Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the First Resurrection on such the second death hath no power but they shall be priests of God and of Christ and shall reign with him a thousand years There was never any Book penned with that artifice as this of the Apocalypse as if every word were weighed in a balance before it was set down which is manifest out of other places as well as this In which I conceive a double design is aimed at a prediction of a proper Resurrection of the Witnesses to the Truth by their deaths and of a Political Resurrection to the true and Apostolical Church that does survive upon Earth The former are the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the latter those that worshipped not the Beast c. which if they were not distinct from the other it had been better to have omitted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and to have read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Wherefore this is the first intimation that there are two Orders of men there set down The one that suffered death for the cause of the Gospel The other that are still alive but resolute Opposers of the Beast But there is also a second hint in the following words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They lived and reigned The Spirit of God seems on set purpose to make choice of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 rather then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he might not bear too hard toward the sense of a literal Resurrection and so urge the Reader too forcibly to understand both these Orders above distinguished to be Candidates of a real and literal Resurrection at this time And therefore he uses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which in reference to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 will naturally implie a literal Resurrection and in reference to the other no literal Resurrection they being not supposed naturally dead but merely a living upon Earth and reigning there with Christ which is their Moral and Political Life and Resurrection The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall reign with Christ in Heaven and those other with Christ on Earth he being universal Prince over both Churches and therefore neither Heaven nor Earth is here mentioned that the sense may be accommodated to either the reigning with Christ in Heaven or in Earth according to the distinct capacities of the persons And the like caution is used in the prefiguration of the time of which there is no necessity to conceit that it signifies just a thousand years literally but that it signifies at least a thousand years and certainly not more then there are daies in that thousand nor in likelihood near so many But the signification is rather Symbolical as the ten daies are chap. 2. v. 10. And ye shall have the tribulation of ten daies that is the utmost extent of tribulation beyond which there is nothing further as there is no number beyond Ten by which therefore must be meant death And that is the reason why presently is added Be thou faithfull unto death and I will give thee the Crown of life So this thousand years upon earth is a symbol of the Churches stable duration to the end of the world that there shall no Politie flourish beyond it it being a Cube whose root is Ten. And the application of it to the reigning of the children of the Resurrection with Christ in heaven discovers the unshaken stability and endless duration of that celestial Kingdome also beyond which absolutely there is nothing at all But the rest of the dead 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 lived not again The using of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 has plainly respect to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and intimates that their Resurrection was real and literal to which others should not attain till after the Thousand years upon earth After which it is plainly said that there is a general Resurrection and that all the dead do rise ver 12 13 14. Wherefore this general Resurrection being literal and real it is too too harsh and violent to understand this First Resurrection mentioned in this fifth verse to be only Figurative and Mystical But understanding it literally that which follows has a wonderfull natural and easie sense Blessed and holy is he that has part in the first Resurrection which he speaks thus in the singular number one would think on purpose to keep men off from conceiting he means it of the successive body of the Church during the thousand years 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 upon these the second death has no power namely The lake of fire ver 14. into which Hades or the whole region of mortality is cast the Earth being all on fire But blessed are those that have part in the First Resurrection for they are sped already safe having obtained those celestial bodies that do certainly exempt them from this Fate For these and all such as God shall afterward make partakers of this blessed kind of Resurrection are naturally free from the reach of the second death But they shall be priests of God and of Christ and reign with him not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but for sureness and for distinction sake simply 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is They shall be holy sacred and divine persons and live with Christ in his immutable and everlasting Kingdome in Heaven for ever and ever This I conceive to be the most easie and natural sense of this place and that the Personal Reign of Christ upon Earth and of his holy Martyrs is a very rash and groundless and unsafe conceit fit for nothing but heat and tumult both of phansie and action Nor do I think it necessary that the Sons of this first Resurrection should at all appear to us their celestial bodies into which they are vivificated being naturally invisible and therefore a kind of miracle for us to see them and no more necessary then the exhibiting those Souls to view which Christ carried to Heaven in triumph after his Resurrection which yet he did not exhibit to the sight of the world And if he doe here I can imagine no better end then that of Mr. Mede's that it may be for a sign or beckening to the Jews to help on their Conversion but I can affirm nothing of these things Only I am well assured that if Christendome were once well purged of all her Idolatries foolish and contradictious opinions and wicked practices it would be a very great Miracle if the Jews could be kept off from being converted 7. Wherefore in brief to conclude seeing the truth of Mr. Mede's Synchronisms as far as respects this present subject is
and more answerable to the very Phrase of Scripture he is accompanied with Angels as well as Saints some of his Elders being adorned with the glittering title of Seraphims as is to be seen in the Legend of his life entituled Mirabilia Dei as also in his Glass of Righteousness CHAP. XIII 1. An Examination of all possible Grounds of this fanatick Boaster's magnifying himself thus highly 2. That there are no Grounds thereof from either the Matter he delivers or from his Scriptural Eloquence Raptures and Allegories 3. The unspeakable Power and Profit of the Letter above that of the Allegorie instanced in the Crucifixion Resurrection Ascension of our Saviour and his coming again to Iudgement 4. That Allegorizing the Scripture is no special Divine gift but the fruit of either our Natural Phansie or Education 5. That he had no grounds of magnifying himself from any Miracles he did 6. Nor from being any Special Preacher of Perfection or Practiser thereof 7. Of that Imperfection that is seated in the impurity of the Astral Spirit and ungovernable tumult of Phansy in Fanatick Persons 1. BUT enough has been related to shew that transcendent esteem this Enthusiast had both of himself and also would insinuate into others of his own Person and Doctrine Let us now consider what Right or Ground he had to assume so much to himself or others may have to attribute so much unto him And to bring all the Inducements imaginable into view This high conceit of his of being so supereminent a Person must arise either from the Matter he does deliver or his Eloquence or the Raptures he was in when he penn'd down his Revelations as he would have them thought or from the Mysteriousness of his Allegories or from his Evangelizing the Perfection or lastly for that he was prophesied of in the Scriptures as he in whom all things should be fulfilled 2. Now for the main Matter he delivers plainly and above-bord it is the excellency of Love Which is so Essential a Truth to Christianity and plainly inculcated in the Gospel and so effectually recommended that there is no true Christian can miss of it So that we need no new Instructer in that divine Grace much less any inspired Prophet to teach us what is so plain to us already And therefore if there be any thing new in this doctrine of Love it must be such a kind of Love that is new to Christians I mean to true Christians but not to the Gnosticks nor the School of Simon Magus who spoke as magnificently of himself as this Impostor can do possibly And for his Scriptural Eloquence his Raptures and Transportations in the penning down his Writings how that such things arise frequently from Nature and Complexion is abundantly declared in my Enthusiasmus Triumphatus to say nothing of worser Assistences then mere Complexion as also the dexterity of Allegorizing which yet how distortedly he performs I shall note anon 3. In the mean time I hold it well worth our observation how giddy and injudicious those persons are that are so mightily taken with the Mystical sense of such parts of the History of Christ as are most profitable in the belief of the mere Letter such as his Passion Resurrection Ascension his Session at the right hand of God and his coming again to Iudgement when he will change these vile bodies of ours into the similitude of his Heavenly body For making this a mere Representation of something to be performed within us namely his Crucifixion of our mortifying of the old man his Resurrection of our rising to newness of life his Ascension into Heaven and sitting at the right hand of God of our entrance into and rule and reign in the Heavenly Being with Christ in the Spirit and his Returning to Iudgement the judging and governing our natural and earthly man with Righteousness and Equity which Allegories or rather not so good is the deepest Wisdome and divinest Revelation that is to be found in this admired Prophet such Allusions I say and Similitudes as these have no more force nor efficacy to urge us or help us on to those Accomplishments they represent then if the History of Christ were a mere Fable But if in stead of making them Resemblances we should use them as Arguments from a true History they have a power unspeakable for the making us good For thus any ingenuous Spirit would melt into remorse when he considers how the Son of God out of mere love and compassion to him was crucified for him and thereby will willingly submit to all the pain of Mortification in a kindly Gratitude to his Saviour And from the belief of the Resurrection of Christ from the dead will be the further animated in his pursuance of the Resurrection to an holy life being assured of Eternal enjoyment of his labours by a blessed Immortality of which also His Ascension into Heaven is a further pledge and his sitting at the right hand of God the greater motive to take off his mind from earthly desires and to think of those things that are above And lastly his certain hope of obtaining that crown of glory which Christ the righteous Judge shall give unto him at the last day I mean that glorified and Heavenly Body will be the greatest ingagement imaginable to spend the strength of his natural body in his service to expose it to all hardships yea to death it self if need so require for the honour of his Saviour and in the mean time to possess it in all Sanctity possible in a gratefull observance of his commands from whom we expect the Redemption of our Bodies 4. Wherefore the Literal meaning of the History of Christ being so powerful and effectual to the making of us good it is a sign of a great deal of folly and levity to dote upon mere Allegories and Allusions that have no force at all in them to move us to Godliness and Vertue or to surmise that there is any thing Spiritual or Divine in the mere allegorizing of the Scripture For there is nothing Divine saving our full assurance of the holy Truths themselves that are delivered in the Gospel whether they be Life or History for this is a spiritual gift indeed But that we conceive that one may represent the other that is only the natural Nimbleness of our Phansy or a Dexterity accruing to us from Use and Education such as I question not but was in Saint Paul who was brought up a Pharisee theâ—efore was well versed in their Midrash or Mystical meaning of the History of the Old Testament which made him so prone to such applications in the New But this was no such special Inspiration or peculiar spiritual Attainment in him above the rest of the Apostles but merely a Cast of his Office a Specimen of his former Education which accustomed him to Allusions and Allegories in the interpreting of the Law So that I much pity those poor souls
honoured as the Son of God Prayers offered unto him and in his Name and Praises sung unto him with all solemnity and devotion imaginable 3. And for the Duration of this his royal Priesthood it has continued already a faire time about one thousand six hundred years as may be infallibly gathered out of History And as appears from these ancient Prophecies of the Jews he is a Person so holy and sacred and upon whom the eyes of Providence have been in such a wonderfull manner fixed infinitely above any Person that ever was yet in the World that it is impossible that the Testimonies given of him should ever be obliterated by succession of Time nothing but an universal Conflagration being able to make an end of all the copies of the Jewish Oracles or of the Christian Gospel And therefore it is a thing beyond all Likelihood nay I may say all Possibility that this Honour and Kingdome of Christ upon Earth should ever cease till the Earth cease to have Inhabitants I do not deny but the insupportable Wickedness of the Christians their Faithlesness Ferocity and Uncleanness their accursed Hypocrisie and open Prophaneness may make this Kingdome of Christ very itinerant and to pass from one Nation to another People but it will ever be the Religion of some People and Nation or other Or if not there will at least be sincere Professors of his Name in several Nations and Kingdomes as in the persecuted estate of the Primitive Church which will certainly leaven the World again with the Christian Religion with more glory and purity then ever unless a fiery Vengeance from heaven step betwixt and Christ come again visibly so Judgement in the clouds 4. The thing therefore that I say is this That though a man should be so cautious forsooth and so crafty as that because these latter Ages have been guilty of so much Falseness and Forgery he will believe no Records of the Church at all no not so much as the Holy Gospels and the Epistles of the Apostles yet he may have sufficient assurance from the Prophecies of the Old Testament which unless he will be egregiously foolish and unreasonable he cannot have any pretense to suspect as supposititious That Christianity is no Fiction but a real Truth if he will but compare the Prophecies with the Events of things as they lye before his eyes and with the free Confession of those that are open Enemies to the Christian Religion I mean the Nation of the Iews 5. For the firmer belief whereof he may also help himself something from those strinklings that are found in prophane Writers For if thou wilt be so prodigiously melancholick and suspicious as to doubt whether there ever were such a man as Christ the very History of the Heathens may assure thee thereof they mentioning these things so timely as that there could be no errour about the existence of the Person they speak of whether he ever were in the World or no. For Plinie Tacitus Lucian and Suetonius all of them flourished so near the time of the taking of the City of Ierusalem viz. Plinie about twenty Tacitus thirty Lucian and Suetonius about forty or fifty years that they could not but have certain information whether he was a fictitious Person or real from the captive Iews who would not have failed to stifle a Religion they hated so if it had been but a Figment at the bottome Plinie in his Epistle to Trajan finds the Christian professours in good earnest even to death Whose dangerous and mischievous errour he might easily have confuted if the History of Christ had been but a Romance but he found them immovable nor could he help it Which constancy of theirs he calls pervicaciam inflexibilem obstinationem a Pervicacity and inflexible Obstinacy Which is ridiculous to think can befall men in a mere Fiction within the time that search may easily discover to be false and that they should stand out to the exposing of themselves to death and torture He writes in the same Epistle that he put two maid-servants on the rack Sed nihil aliud inveni quà m superstitionem pravam immodicam But I found nothing else saith he but a perverse and immoderate Superstition And of those that fear made desist from the profession of their Religion Affirmabant hanc fuisse summam vel culpae suae vel erroris quod essent soliti stato die ante lucem convenire carmenque Christo quasi Deo dicere c. They affirmed that this was the sum of their either fault or errour that they were wont on a set day to meet together early in the morning before day-break and sing an hymne to Christ as to a God Which is a sign that betimes the Christians followed Christ not as a mere eminent Moralist that gave excellent precepts of life better then ever any did but that they held his Person truely Divine and adorable for some wonderful considerations or other 6. But this Inquisition and bloudy Persecution of the Christians began higher then Trajan's time to wit in Nero's who to smother that abominable act of his in firing the City of Rome did most salvagely punish the Christians as if they had been the Authors of it Tacit. Annal lib. 15. Ergo abolendo rumori Nero subdidit reos quaesitissimis poenis affecit quos per flagitia invisos vulgus Christianos appellabat Auctor nominis ejus Christus qui Tiberio imperitante per Procuratorem Pontium Pilatum supplicio affectus erat Repressaque in praesens exitiabilis superstitio rursus erumpebat non modò per Judaeam originem ejus mali sed per Urbem etiam quò cuncta undique atrocia aut pudenda confluunt celebranturque Igitur primò correpti qui fatebantur deinde indicio eorum multitudo ingens haud perinde in crimine incendii quà m odio humani generis convicti sunt Et pereuntibus addita ludibria ut ferarum tergis contecti laniatu canum interirent aut crucibus affixi aut flammandi atque ubi defecisset dies in usum nocturni luminis urerentur Wherefore Nero to suppress the rumour of his own vile act by suborning false witnesses got those to be accused who being hatefull for their wickedness were commonly called Christians and punished them with exquisite tortures The Author of that Sect was one Christus who in the reign of Tiberius was put to death by Pontius Pilate the Deputy Which damnable superstition suppressed for a time broke out afresh not only in Judaea the first source of that Mischief but also in the City of Rome whither all villainous and shamefull things flow from all parts and are held in great esteem Wherefore they were first laid hold of that confessed themselves Christians afterward by their discovery a huge multitude were condemned not so much for being guilty of firing the City as that they were hated of all mankind They added also reproaches to their death clothing some of
and Miraculous in him Whence he could not escape having his Life and Death written by some Pen or other especially it being so certain he rose from the dead as it is 5. For the Jews having crucified him nothing could be more odious to them then that report of his Followers That God miraculously raised him from the dead whereby Christ was acquitted by a special hand of Providence of all their wicked aspersions and false accusations and themselves condemned of the highest crime they could imagine themselves capable of even the murdering of their Messiah Wherefore the attestation of that which would make them so odious and execrable even in their own eyes if it were true must needs make the Attestors thereof very hatefull to them and unsupportable and therefore raise against them all the mischief they possibly could Whence it is impossible that the Disciples of Christ should maintain so hainous a falshood no not if they had made no conscience of lying and yet still more impossible if we consider their Simplicity and Innocency a property in them of which I think it never came into the mind of any one to doubt I conclude therefore That a Person so plainly prefigured by ancient and sacred Prophecies so refulgent in miraculous Vertues and unheard-of Providences one who for the Wonders he did by the unbelieving Iews was accounted a Magician by the Heathen Philosophers and Atheists acknowledged a Worker of Miracles and by his own Followers proclaimed the expected Messiah and the onely-begotten Son of God whom he had miraculously raised from the dead after the Iews had crucified him I say That a Person thus wonderfully qualified above any that ever yet came into the World should fail of having his Life historically recorded is a thing farre more incredible then the greatest Miracle that ever was yet upon Record 6. And now in the second place That this History or Record of his Life and Death was timely enough written viz. while the Eye-witnesses of those things which he did or hapned to him were yet living is also very clear if we consider the great importance of compleating such an History in due time For certainly it could not but seem a matter of very weighty moment Christ being believed by his Disciples to be so holy and divine a Person as he was and that their faithful adherence to him was their onely assurance of Everlasting Life Which great Truth of a blessed Immortality they were evidently taught by that success their Messiah had upon earth which was as ill as could be he being so spightfully abused and crucified in so ignominious a manner whenas yet they might with the rest of the Iews have expected that he should have broke the Romane yoke and been a glorious and victorious Prince to their great advantage in this World But they saw that Providence waved this and by an high hand exalted him into another Kingdome raising him from the dead and taking him visibly into Heaven Which was so palpable a Demonstration of the Soul's Immortality and of a peculiar advantage to the followers of this great Favourite of the Almighty when they were to enter into that other state that the power of Conscience and the Sense of their own good in the other Life would make them very careful and officious to preserve the memory of their Divine Teacher who both shewed them the way to and the certainty of Immortal Happiness Which piece of Gratitude they were still more strictly bound to perform it being so obvious for them to look upon Christ as a publick gift of God to the World not to be restrained to that Age then present but to be transmitted to all Posterity nor confined within that little handful of Followers he left behind him but to be made known to all Israel nor could they long be ignorant but that the Gentiles also should have share in him especially upon his Rejection by the Jews and so he was to become the Light and Salvation of all Nations from Age to Age according to the Prophets 7. That this was the early sense of the Church concerning the knowledge of Christ for eternal Salvation the nature of the thing it self as I have already intimated doth plainly demonstrate For what meaning could they possibly make of God's raising him from the dead and visibly assuming him into Heaven but that he should be a palpable Pledge of that future Happinesse which was to accrue to them that would be his faithfull Adherents and Followers This questionlesse was the belief of the Apostles and all succeeding Christians as the Heathens themselves witnesse of them though in a jearing manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But being catechized and instructed be perswaded by me if you desire to live for ever This Theam is much insisted upon by the Apostle Paul every where in his Epistles Which though I may seem too hasty in naming so soon while I am but driving on a method to demonstrate That there are very timely Records of Christianity within the Ages of Eye-witnesses of the things that are recorded yet I think I have not done preposterously if we consider that there is a peculiar kind of Self-evidence in that Apostle's writings that they are not supposititious or fictitious It being in my judgement out of the power of man to imitate that unaffected fervour those natural and yet unexpected Schemes of high and serious zeal those parenthetical exundances of weighty sense and matter swelling out I had almost said beyond the bounds of Logical coherence that vigorous passion and elevation of spirit and yet all so unsuspectable of any humane artifice that we cannot but be assured that he that wrote these Epistles was throughly possessed and transported with the belief of the things he wrote I am sure I cannot but be assured and find my self in an utter incapacity of doubting thereof who yet am naturally as melancholy and suspiciou◠as other Mortals as I could prove by early specimens of this kind if modesty would permit me to parallel the follies and errours of my childhood with the mature conclusions of such as have affected the repute of being the great Wits of the World 8. Wherefore being so fully perswaded in my self and never meeting with any one that could have the face to deny but the Epistles of S. Paul were the Writings of one that was in very good earnest my appeal to them in this place for the sense and meaning of the first and Apostolick faith I could not hold unseasonable But it is evident in these Epistles that the Writer of them lived within the Age of the Eye-witnesses of the wonderful things that were either done by or hapned to Christ. Whence it plainly appears also That that sense of the Gospel which Paul declares in these Epistles was the first and most early meaning that the Apostles conceived concerning the Mystery of Christianity viz. That Christ's Passion was an
that Iustice Meekness and power of working of Miracles were deriv'd upon our Saviour from the Natural influence of the Configuration of the Heavens at his Birth and as if he did not willingly lay down his life for the World as he himself professes but were surprized by Fate and lay subject to the stroke of an Astrological 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Sidereal Interfector As also to meet with that enormous Boaster and self-conceited Wit the prophane and giddy-headed Vaninus a transported applauder and admirer of that wild and vain supposition of Cardan upon which he so much dotes that it is the very prop and master-piece of his impious Writings the both Basis and Finishing of all his villainous distorted doctrines against the Truth and Sacredness of Christian Religion To which two you may add also Apollonius though long before them a high pretender to divine Revelations and hot Instaurator of decaying Paganism but withall a very silly affected of Astrological predictions by which it is easily discoverable at what a pitch he did either divine or philosophize And methinks it is a trim sight to see these three busie sticklers against Christianity like three fine Fools so goodly gay in their Astromantick Disguises exposed to the just scorn and derision of the World for their so high pretensions against what is so holy and solid as the Christian Faith is and that upon so fond and frivolous grounds as this of Astrology BOOK VIII CHAP. I. 1. The End and Usefulness of Christian Religion in general 2. That Christ came into the World to destroy Sin out of it 3. His earnest recommendation of Humility 4. The same urged by the Apostle Paul 1. WE have no finished the Third part of our Discourse and have sufficiently proved That Christianity is not only a Reasonable and Intelligible Idea of something that may be worth Providence's setting on foot some time or other or as a seminal Form lurking unactive in the seed under ground but that it has shot it self into Real existence and is as a grown Tree that spreads its arms far and wide It remains now that we consider the Branches and Fruit thereof And I dare boldly pronounce that this is the Tree whose leaves were intended for the Healing of the Nations not for a Pretence and Palliation for Sin and that the Fruit thereof to the true Believer is Life and Immortality This is a brief comprehension of the glorious End and great Usefulness of the Gospel But we shall be something more explicate in a matter of so mighty importance You may understand out of what has been said in the First part concerning the Nature of the Mystery of Godliness that the Gospel is a kind of Engine to raise the Divine life into those Triumphs that are due to it and are designed for it from everlasting by the all-seeing Providence of God Let us now consider how fit the Dispensation of the Gospel is for this purpose that is to say Those things that are testified in it or prophesied of it or intimated by it how all these things aim and conspire to this End partly by affording the most effectual means imaginable for the re-installing the Soul into an higher state of Righteousness here then any other Dispensation that has yet appeared in the World and thereby more certainly transplanting her hereafter into a blessed state of immortal Life and partly by exhibiting such warrantable grounds of doing Divine Homage to the Lord Jesus Christ in whom this Life we speak of resideth so plentifully he being anointed therewith far above the measure of his fellows So that in this respect though the other design has taken so little effect in the World yet we cannot but acknowledge that the Divine life has not been disappointed of all her exteriour Pomps and Triumphs We shall begin with the former kinds of the Powers of this Engine 2. The First wherof consists in this In that it is so plainly and clearly declared in the New Testament That the great End of Christs coming into the World was to remove Sin out of it and to purifie mens Souls from all uncleanness and wickedness as is apparent from sundry places As 1 John chap. 3. He that committeth sin is of the Devil for the Devil sinneth from the beginning For this purpose the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the Devil Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin for his seed remaineth in him and he cannot sin because he is born of God Again Tit. chap. 2. For the grace of God that bringeth Salvation hath appeared to all men teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts we should live soberly righteously and godly in this present world Looking for that blessed hope and glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Iesus Christ who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purifie to himself a peculiar people Zealous of good works Also Ephes. ch 5. v. 25. Husbands love your wives even as Christ also loved the Church and gave himself for it that he might sanctifie and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word That he might present it to himself a glorious Church not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing but that it should be holy and without blemish I might add several other places but I shall content my self with but one ratification more of this truth from the mouth of our blessed Saviour who professes he came not to destroy the Law but to fulfill it that is to set it at an higher pitch as appears by the whole scope of his Sermon upon the Mount The observance of which Precepts he does seriously require of his disciples and followers as appears from that Similitude he closes his discourse withall where he pronounces that they that kept and practised his sayings should be safe as one that builds his house upon a Rock but those that heard and practised not should be as he that built on the Sand that is upon a false and deceitfull foundation And a little above he does plainly protest even against such that may have prophesied cast out Devils and done Miracles in his name which yet are greater matters then either the making or hearing of long Praiers or long Sermons because they kept not this Law of Righteousness he there propounds he does protest that in the day of Judgment he will not know them but bid them depart from him as Workers of Iniquity This is sufficient to demonstrate That the End of the Gospel is to renovate the Spirits of men into true and real inherent Righteousness and Holiness which in counter-distinction to the Animal life which had domineered in the World so long not only in the prophane Actions but also in the very Religious Rites of the Heathens as I have already shewn at large I have denominated the Life Divine and numbred out those Three parts
Dispensation are we well approved of by God and being justified thus by faith we have peace with him through our Lord Iesus Christ Rom. 5.1 So that this Iustification is not a mere belief that Christ died for us in particular or that he was raised from the dead whereby anothers Righteousness is imputed to us but a believing in God that he has accepted the bloud of Christ as a Sacrifice for sin and that he is able through the power of the Spirit to raise us up to newness of life whereby we are encouraged to breath and aspire after this more inward and perfect righteousnesse Which advantages God propounds to all the hearers of the Gospel without any respect of works or former demurenesse of life if so be they will but now come in and close with this high and rich dispensation and be carried on with couragious resolutions to fight against and pull down the man of sin within themselves that this living and new way of real Divine righteousnesse may be set up and rule in their hearts I say if they be encouraged to this holy enterprise by Faith in Christ for the remission of sins and for the power of his Spirit to utterly eradicate and extirpate all inward corruption and wickednesse this Faith is presently imputed to them for Righteousnesse that is they are and are approved by God as dear children of his and as good men and are of the seed of the Promise For they are born now not of the will of man nor of the will of the flesh but of the will of God and their will is wholly set upon righteousnesse and true holinesse which they hunger and thirst after as sincerely and eagerly as ever they did after their natural meat and drink and God who feeds the young Ravens is not so cruell as to deny them this celestial food which food they reach at and as it were wrest out of his hands by Faith in the power of his Spirit whereby they account themselves able to doe all things 9. And this is the only warrantable notion that I can finde of being justified by faith Nor do those places above recited prove any other then this For that which seems to make most of all for another viz. Rom. 4.5 But to him that worketh not but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly his faith is counted for righteousness may very well be interpreted according to that tenour of sense I have already declared For that is the great and comfortable priviledge of the Gospel that without any respect of former works if so be we do but now believe remission of sins in Christ and believe in his power that justifies the ungodly i. e. that makes just the ungodly and purifies and purges them from all sin and iniquity from which by their own naturall power they could not purged and restores them to inward reall righteousnesse by the working of his Spirit this Faith is imputed for Righteousnesse For they that do thus believe are good and righteous men for matter of sincerity so that they have peace with God through the bloud of Christ and by the power of that Spirit that is now working in them are renewed daily more and more into that glorious image and desirable liberty which arises in the further conquest of the Divine life in them and makes them righteous even as Christ was righteous And now the hardest is satisfied the other places alledged will easily fall of themselves by the application of what has been said concerning this nature of Faith and Iustification 10. As for those places of Scripture that seem to attribute the Righteousness of Christ to us as where he is said to be made unto us wisedom righteousness sanctification and redemption the sense is only this that he works in us wisedom righteousness c. Otherwise it might be inferred that we shall have only an imputative Redemption and that we shall not be really saved and redeemed As for that other As by the disobedience of one man many were made sinners so by the obedience of one man many shall be made righteous I say it is a place against themselves For by Adam we became really sinners and sinful contracting original corruption from his loins therefore by Christ we are to be made really righteous And this was the end of his obedience that was obedient even to the death of the crosse that we being buried with him by baptisme into death like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father even so we also should walk in newness of life Rom. 6. Wherefore there really being no ground in Scripture for this childish mistake and it being as unreasonable that one Soul should be righteous for another as that one Body should be in health for another if I shew that the Scripture it self does expresly require of us that we be righteous and holy in our own persons there is then nothing wanting to the full discovery of this childish and ungrounded conceit of being righteous without any Righteousness residing in us 11. And in my apprehension this very Text of S. Iohn is a clear eviction of this Truth it plainly declaring that they are mistaken who ever conceit themselves righteous without doing righteousnesse or without being righteous in such a sense as Christ himself was righteous There are also several other Testimonies of the Apostles to the same purpose some whereof I have noted already as where he saith That Christ was manifested to take away our sins and that he came to destroy the works of the Devil and that he that is born of God sinneth not because the seed of God abideth in him that is a permanent Principle of Divine life and sense whereby he seeth and abhorreth whatsoever is wicked and unholy And again 1 Ioh. â— Hereby we know that we know him if we keep his commandements He that saith I know him and keepeth not his commandements is a lyar and the truth is not in him but whose keepeth his word in him verily is the love of God perfected Hereby know we that we are in him He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also to walk even as he walked Like that 2 Tim. 2.19 Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity CHAP. VI. 1. Their alledgement of Gal. 2.16 as also of the whole drift of that Epistle 2. What the Righteousnesse of faith is according to the Apostle 3. In what sense those that are in Christ are said not to be under the Law 4. That the Righteousness of faith is no figment but a reality in us 5. That this Righteousnesse is the New Creature and what this new Creature is according to Scripture 6. That the new Creature consists in Wisedom Righteousness and true Holiness 7. The Righteousnesse of the new Creature 8. His Wisedom and Holinesse 9. That the Righteousness of faith excludes not good Works The wicked treachery of those
who is the Truth that makes one free indeed by not admitting or gainsaying these high and divine inventions of theirs concerning God and Christ wherewith they have wrapped him and clothed him though they doe but what Dionysius did to the golden vestments of Iupiter take them off and put on a linsy-wolsy one may well be suspected and accused of Blasphemy and injury to God when it is nothing but a refusal of the groundless Conclusions of rash and inconsiderate men or else worse that of purpose cloth God and Christ and represent him to the people in such a dress as will make most for the countenancing their own Hypocrisie Profit and Interest I will only name one instance of many How has the Roman Clergy forced and rack'd their wits to make good the grand mystery of Transubstantiation whose ordinary Priests must have greater power of working miracles then the Devil could invent to puzzle our Saviour withall For what is the turning a stone into bread in comparison of turning bread into God incarnate And yet a Mass-priest after the uttering of a few formal words of Consecration has brought about the prodigie And he that will be so bold as to call bread but bread and not Christ or God how can he chuse but be thought to blaspheme But yet this Blasphemy is not against the Nature of God or Christ but against the forgery and fictions of men and so indeed is no more Blasphemy then Bread is Christ or mans Phansy the Deity The Rule therefore that Christians are to take notice of here is this There being so much Humour and Interest and Stupour of Education that may begin or continue false conceptions of God if any one professe himself that he cannot conceive such things as some so peremptorily and imperiously obtrude upon his belief that he is not straightway to be accounted a Blasphemer of God it haply being but a dissent only from the conceits of men 5. The second Aspersion cast on our Saviour was That that miraculous good that he did was from the power of Satan not of God And methinks it is not hard to find something parallel to this in some Aspersions cast upon his true members by rash Pharisaical censure Which is this The eximious and exemplary life of good and holy men is many times by those that are more addicted to such a dress or outward platform of Religion consisting of certain Ceremonies and Opinions then to the truth and essence of Religion it self imputed to corrupt natural principles such as Vain-glory and the esteem of the World Political advantage and the like which answers to the Pharisees giving out that Christ cast out Devils by Beelzebub the Prince of the Devils So say our modern Pharisees of such as are not of their Sect if those men live never so holily and unblamably in this present evil World exercising Vertue and avoiding Vice that it is not from any Divine Principle in them but from the instigation of Pride the Prince of Vices 6. So in the third place They that affect even more then a Iudaical strictness in the observation of the Sabbath though God knows it is too many times that their consciences may be the more free to work unrighteousness all the week after yet they will take upon them to censure them of no less crime then Prophaneness that observe neither the same measure of Superstition nor Hypocrisie with themselves 7. Fourthly Neutrality and cold Indifferency in publick controversies how can it possibly chuse but seem very abominable to the Pharisee or formal Professour For they knowing no other Religion then what consists in certain dispensable and unnecessary Opinions and Performances when they are shaken and hazarded he that will not engage to the utmost then as if God and true Religion it self were at stake cannot but be deemed very unworthy and detestable Whenas to be but coldly and indifferently affected in things indifferent is in all reason to be esteemed just and good 8. Nor is it a whit strange to hear the Pharisaical Tribe complain of the true regenerate Christian as Unjust whenas the one acts according to an outward Rule or Tradition which was made for the meeting with their own wicked and untamed corruptions malo nodo malus cuneus and which notwithstanding they craftily and perversly make use of by leguleious cavills to the injuring of one another or them that are better then themselves but the true Christian acts and judges according to the living Law of Equity and the Eternal Love of God springing up in his heart 9. Sixthly As for the accusation of Railings and Revilings even a sober and wel-carriaged Christian may well be subject to that calumnie For the Pharisee bearing himself very high in the opinion of his own either Formal or Phantastical righteousness making a shift rather any way to perswade himself he is righteous and religious then by partaking of true Religion and Righteousness indeed he acting therefore according to the nature he really has not according to what he phansies himself to be it cannot but happen that the true Christian endued with the Divine nature and spirit of Righteousness not intending at all to raile or revile but using the most easie and unaffected propriety of words calling a Spade a Spade as the Proverb is doing but so as Adam did in innocency giving the creatures names according to their natures it cannot but happen I say that the Actions and Persons being foully bad of such as notwithstanding be in their own conceit as good as any when they be called by what names express the truth of their natures and no more that yet they will presently judge the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Railer and Reviler 10. Now for tumultuary Zeal I must confess that Pharisaical Hypocrisie is such an abominable provoking thing in the sight of all the Sons of God that it can scarce fail scorching and heating their tender and lively spirits no more then a natural flame can fail to swinge and pain our natural flesh which none of us can suffer with such patience but we are ready to testifie our sensibleness both by gestures actions and words Besides that in a moderate and well-guided zeal against the Pharisaical Interest all being so rotten there so sore and patched over with pitiful plaisters the least Action or Opposition will make them cry out even afore they be hurt being conscious to themselves how unsound and unable they are to abide the least measure of rough handling So that the least vigour of Opposition in good earnest against their hypocritical and unwarrantable waies will by them be deemed but bitter and tumultuous Zeal Eighthly The just and seasonable bemoanings of the dear servants of God and fellow-members of Christ when Nature is very much oppressed with adversity or torment are not to be judged rashly the Symptomes of Impatience or Despair For the expressing of the sense of ones Misery is no Vice since the suppressing
nothing should be exhibited to their belief but what they will all affirm they have a satisfactory conception of they will at last tread down Religion to nothing For they will not stint themselves there I mean in the rejection of the Divinity of Christ and of a Triune Deity but the notion of Angels and Spirits and of an Immateriall Soul and lastly of any Being whatsoever that is truly spiritual will appear so inconceivable to some that at last Religion will be tumbled down as low as mere Body and Matter and will find no Object but the visible World and the Sun and Starrs must be the greatest Deities And so either the ancient Pagan Superstition or else down-right Atheisme must take place CHAP. IV. 1. The due demeanour of a Christian Mystagogus in communicating the Truth of the Gospel 2. That the chiefest care of all is that he speak nothing but what is profitable for life and godliness 3. A just reprehension of the scopeless zeal of certain vain Boanerges of these times 4. That the abuse of the Ministery to the undermining the main Ends of the Gospel may hazard the continuance thereof 5. That any heat and zeal does not constitute a living Ministery 1. SOme such account as this will the prudent Communicatour of the Mystery of Christianity give to him that asks a reason of his Faith declaring his sense of things with meekness and fear as S. Peter speaks that is to say with patience and mildness towards him whom he informs and with holy respect and reverence towards God whose Messenger in some sort he is and therefore ought to be careful that he mistake not his errand in any thing nor mingle of his own what he has no commission to speak nor distort the truth out of fear or favour nor make himself suspected by any levity or affected vanity in style or words that are misbecoming a matter of so great importance For quaintness of wit and studied eloquence may tickle the Ear for a time like a Musical aire the while it is playing but a faithful and serious declaration of the most weighty parts of our Religion will wound the very Heart and captivate the Soul to the Obedience of Christ. 2. And above all things he that either of himself adventures or has any better call to this office let him ever have in his eye the Usefulness of the Mystery he indeavours to communicate remembring that that is an Universal property thereof and that if either his inadvertency or curiosity has carried him into any Useless speculations or Theories he is most certainly led out of his way and that he is now imparting humane inventions which are nothing at all appertaining to the Gospel of Christ that he is now feeding his charge not with the sincere milk of the Word but the brackish sweat of some over-heated Brain This is the most common and the most dangerous mistake that is to be observed in this Function as if their very Art and Faculty were to let fly words for whole hours together whereof not one is directed or intended towards the mark and scope of the Gospel which is the rooting out of Sin and destroying the Kingdome of the Devil 3. And yet it is a wonder to see the zeal and heat and hear the noise of these Boanerges these Sons of thunder as if every sentence were fire and lightning from Heaven against the strong holds of Sin and Satan and that they would humble every thought to the obedience of Christ who came into the World to redeem us from all iniquity and to purchase to himselfe a Church pure holy and undefiled without either spot or blemish Which End notwithstanding is for the most part not onely not aimed at but too often crossed and supplanted by Hypocritical insinuations of either the Needlesness or Impossibility of these things To be short For the most part the discourse is so off and on that a man knows not what they would have but it is as if one should bring Grey-hounds into the field and let them slip and cry allooe when yet there is no game before them Which noise though it may make them skip up and look about a while yet they will presently finde themselves unconcern'd there being nothing in sight for them to pursue 4. But if they would exhort to follow peace and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord this were worth our pursuance indeed as being the known and certain end of the preaching of the Gospel But if we see no such design therein and therefore act opposite to it and vilify the dawnings of that Day of righteousness that is to arise upon the World and to make that Habitations of Christendome a Land of joy and peace and discourage the people of God by telling them dreadful stories of the Sons of Anak those invincible Giants whenas there is nothing too hard nor invincible to the true Iosua our Lord Jesus the wisdome power of God verily it is to be feared that this Function which was intended by God a Fortress against Sin if it prove by unskilful zeal such a Bulwark of unrighteousness that He may dig it down and remove it as a ruinous wall of a garden whose dead rubbish and stones ever falling on the innocent herbs and flowers do smother and stifle them or as an old decaied hedge which is to be pull'd up and carried away the quick-set being grown 5. But if we will work the works of the Lord in faithfulness and according to the design of the Gospel we our selves shall become part of that Quick-set and be made living stones to hold up one another in the Temple of God And that those that are not thus enlivened may not take themselves to be so by reason of their extraordinary promptitude and vivacity I must not forbear to declare that this life we speak of is no natural heat nor the external effects of it Nor is that a living Ministry according to this sense that makes shew of the greatest zeal For verily it is well known that cooling Physick may be administred in very hot broth And it is too-too possible that such things may be delivered with the greatest heat and fervency imaginable which once received into the Minds of the hearers are so far from warming them afterwards and spiriting them to true holiness and righteousness that they even slake and extinguish the desire thereof which yet is no less a crime then stifling the life of God in the World as much as in us lies and undermining the Kingdome of Christ upon Earth These things I could not but take notice of concerning the Communication of the Gospel as being of very great use as well to the Hearer as the Teacher that neither the one might mistake himself nor the other be deceived by him CHAP. V. 1. The nature of Historical Faith 2. That true Saving Faith is properly Covenant and of the various significations of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
and is on the right hand of God Angels and Authorities and Powers being made subject unto him There is a further enumeration of the Angelical classes Colos. 1. where the Apostle speaking of this high exaltation of the Person of Christ he intimates not only the Subjection of the Orders of Angels to him but their Reconciliation to God by him and as some would have it a fuller Confirmation of them in his favour vers 15. Who is the Image of the invisible God the First-born of every Creature For by him were all things created that are in Heaven and that are in Earth visible and invisible whether they be Thrones or Dominions or Principalities or Powers all things were created by him and for him and he is before all things and by him all things consist And he is the Head of the body the Church He is the Beginning the First-born from the dead that in all things he might have the preeminence For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell And making peace through the bloud of his Crosse to reconcile all things by him unto himself whether they be things in Earth or things in Heaven So mighty and wonderfull was the result of the Humiliation of our Saviour and so clear and warrantable an Object is he of Divine Adoration 3. Thus is the Divine Life Triumphant in the Person of Christ the Head of his Church But another main design of the Gospel is That the Divine Life may be advanced in us that is that Faith in God through Christ that Humility Love and Purity may have their due growth in us here that thereby we may be fitted to receive that immortal Crown of Glory which he will bestow upon all true believers at the last day when he shall carry his whole Church with songs of Joy and Triumph into his celestial Kingdome That this is the main purpose of the Gospell I have already sufficiently proved and therefore need adde nothing in this place 4. The fourth and last Rule or Measure of Opinions is The Recommendableness of our Religion to those which are without that is to say We must have a special care of affixing thereto any of our own Inventions or Interpretations of Scripture for Christian Truths which may seem uncouth and irrational to strangers and such as are as yet disengaged For though those that by reason of their education have had full acquaintance with Christianity will adhere to their Religion though it may be corrupted with many false glosses and fond opinions of men as indispensably obtruded as the undoubted Scripture it self yet strangers that are free and unaccustomed to them will not fail to boggle at them and being offered to them also with equal Authority with the very Word of God they will be necessitated to fly back and to relinquish the Holy Truth by reason of the indissoluble intertexture of the gross falshoods they find interwoven with it A thing that is seriously to be considered by all those that bear any love to the Gospel and desire that it may be propagated and promoted in the World For certainly it was intended for a more general good and larger diffusion then has been hitherto by reason of its having fallen into faithless and treacherous hands who make it only an instrument of gaining wealth and power to themselves and of riding the people and not of gaining souls to God CHAP. IV. 1. The general use of the foregoing Rules 2. A special use of them in favour of one anothers persons in matters of opinion 3. The examination of Election and Reprobation according to these Rules And how well they agree with that Branch of the Divine Life which we call Humility 4. The disagreement of absolute Reprobation with the first Rule 5. As also with the third 6 And with the second and fourth 1. THese are the four main Rules which I conceive very usefull to examine either other mens Opinions or our own And if the heat of our spirits or the confidence of others would urge upon us pretended Truths for to admit of open falsities or forgeries for what advantage soever is intolerable that are not subservient to these designs above named we may well look upon them as idle curiosities and if they pretend also to Revelation or Inspiration that it is nothing but Madness and fanatick Delusion But if they do not only not promote but countermine those designs above mentioned they are to be looked upon then not as frivolous but dangerous and impious and so to be declined by all means possible And lastly though they appear such as may contribute something to those designs if followed and embraced yet I must adde also this caution that they are not to be forc'd so as that unless a man will profess them he must be accounted no good Christian. For they coming from a fallible and doubtfull hand they ought not in reason to infringe that undoubted right of Christian liberty the Scripture alone being full enough to perfect a Christian both in life and doctrine 2. There is also a further use to be made of these Rules in favour of one anothers persons though of different Opinions that is by taking notice what good they drive at as well as what evil they tend to which makes much for peace and brotherly kindness and may blunt the edge of eager and bitter zeal that makes the over-fervid Zelot think that he that is of a contrary opinion to him intends nothing but mischief by his opposite doctrine In examining therefore every Opinion we are to observe what design of the Gospel it agrees with as well as what it crosses And that the Use of our Rules may the better appear I shall now shew the practice of them by trying some few Opinions of no small note by this Touchstone For it were an endless business to examine all and needless because by these examples he that lists may examine the rest indeed any that either has been or ever will offer it self to the World in matters of Religion 3. The first that occurrs is such an Election and Reprobation that wholly excludes Free will The Controversie is so well known that I need not state it Applying this doctrine to the four Rules I have set down I find in the Third that it has some compliance with that choice branch of the Divine Life namely Humility and a submission of a mans self and all the World to the will of God It is the Lord let him doe what he pleases And that therefore a serious and humble Soul being much taken up and transported with this consideration may think of nothing else but take this Doctrine to be very Truth nay live and die in it and go to heaven when he has done Whence it were a piece of Satanical Fury to persecute any such Opinionist and want of Charity these living as well as other Christians not to bear as good affection to them as to
when others in civil respect put it off are the main Effects of that Spirit that distinguisheth you from others of the Nation 3. Is this therefore the great purchase you have obtained by turning your back on Christ and contemning of his Person to grow rude and clownish to all the World beside But methinks I hear you answer again As for this man we know not what is become of him but behold the Spirit is sensibly present amongst us even at this day But I demand by what Signs O we shiver and quake every joynt of us But that is no certain signe of the Spirit of God Was not the winde suddenly turned into the North or had you not an Ephemera or was not your over-excited Choler entangled or turned out of the way by Phlegme or Melancholy What miraculous power is there in all this O but there are also amongst us that have fallen down into a trance that have foamed and swelled till their buttons break off Wherefore of a truth these men could not but be full of the Spirit and this be a Miracle indeed If your Religion oweth not its growth to the tricks of Juglers and Tumblers or to artificial Epilepsies I do confesse it is a Miracle from these Symptomes if Satan himself drives not on the designe For these are plainly the passions of Pythonicks such a kinde of possession as seized the Pagan-Prophets and Priests of old who were no better then the worshippers of Devils whose Oracles Christ has silenced long since Wherefore examine your selves if you glory not in your shame See how you tread look behinde you or rather search within you who is the Prompter or first Mover in this new Scene of things 4. For tell me I beseech you what did your foaming Prophets when they vented themselves discharge into your ears whereby they may be deemed more Divine then those Fanatick Pagans Was not their continual song so soon as they got upon their feet the burning up of all Ordinances From whence therefore could this voice come but out of the flames of hell or what could swell the bodies of your Inspired but the venome and poison of the Devil which at last working up to their mouths he spit out enviously against the worship of Christs Person and all his holy Offices Which is another evidence against you that your pretended Inspirations are not divine but diabolical and that the mystery of Satan worketh amongst you who would fain pull down Him whom of a truth God hath set up to be a King and Priest to the Nations for ever 5. But the sweetest satisfaction of all is that you are so extraordinarily illuminated that you understand all the Mysteries of Christs kingdom better then any one else and can in a supercilious pity bemoan the ignorance of the World or with an imperious bitterness fly in their faces and reproach them for it especially the Teachers of the people that they have not taken up your Allegorical knacks nor know how to give a mystical meaning of the Gospel from the preaching of Iohn the Baptist to the coming of Christ to Judgement But you are indeed so unilluminated as not to understand that such devices as these are merely Allusions of humane Wit and help very little to the enforcing of that they are made to signifie namely Repentance and Mortification of every evil lust and concupiscence and a renovation of our mindes into the perfect image of Christ that his spirit may rule in us and that the works of death and darknesse may be utterly destroied For this Truth is plainly and literally contained in the Scripture so that if your mindes were not more set upon fancies then savoury instruction you need not run a gadding after any new Guide for the attainment of this light And God be thanked many honest plain-hearted Christians that do not swagger and make such a noise with Mystical phrases as you both hear and live according to these Gospel-Precepts using a secret and silent severity upon themselves not acting the rough and hairy Baptist upon others as you do who love to oâ—tentate your self-chosen austerities to the eyes of the world like the Pharisees who made sowr faces for fear the people should not take notice that they afflicted their bodies with fasting What purchase therefore have you got by your Allegorical Mysteries unlesse you have been emboldned thereby to let go the Historical truth of the Gospel and have found your selves much at ease that your belief is not charged with such miraculous things as are written of Christ partly done already and partly to be done at the end of the World For hereby you do proclaim your selves Infidels and that for all your boasting your spirits are so foul and impure that they are no fit receptacles of the holy Christian Faith but that you have levelled your selves as low as Epicures and Atheists who are no more capable of the belief of these things then the Beasts of the Field 6. If it be thus with you I dare appeal unto you whether you keep so precisely to the light within you but that you have consulted with that blinde Guide H. Nicolas and tasted of the treacherous sops of his abhorred Passover whose Fanatick boldness has led the dance to this mad Apostasy Have you not celebrated his detestable Phase who has gone about to perswade the World that the greatest and truest Arcanum of the Lords Supper is Iudas-like to betray their Master to kill Christ according to the flesh that is to lay aside and misbelieve the Truth of his History Ask your own hearts if the warmth of this sop has not so encouraged you nay inflamed you with insufferable bitternesse against the Ministers of Christ as teaching nothing but lies because they have not ceased to believe the Truth Has not this with him that entred in with it so intoxicated you with rage that you have trampled the holy Bible under your feet Is it not this that hath made you so often roar against and revile the Preacher in the Pulpit and disturb the publick Assemblies by your rude and frantick interpellations Which Extravagancies demonstrate by what Spirit you are led and that you are plainly Rebels against Christ and are revolted to the Powers of the dark Kingdom 7. These things I could not forbear to write as being very much pressed in Spirit thereunto For the Light within me that is my Reason and Conscience does assure me that the ancient and Apostolick Faith according to the Historical meaning thereof is very solid and true and that the Offices of Christ are never to be antiquated till his visible return to Judgement according to the literal sense of the Creed and that Familisme is a mere Flam of the Devil a smooth tale to seduce the simple from their Allegeance to Christ. And therefore I beseech every man in these daies of Liberty to take heed how they turn in thither especially those that are of an