made the Centurion say Truly this was the Son of God but also in all points agreed with the Prophesies in the Old and his own words in the New Testament after which having rose again according to the Scripiure he appear'd to above five hundred at once and having commanded his Apostles to teach and baptize all Nations he fitted those illiterate men for so great a task by extraordinary gifts of the Holy Ghost by which they spake in so many tongues as wrought admiration in all the Proselytes that heard them all which both proves his Divinity and shews he came to Buy us with a price Now God having such an absolute Soveraignty over right to and propriety in us as he is our Creator and Redeemer the conclusion very strongly follows Therefore glorifie God in your body and spirit which are Gods As man is compounded of matter and form so God commands us to glorifie him in both glorifie God in your body and spirit the Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the same with the Soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The meaning of which words we may take thus Glorifie i. e. declare the divine perfections and excellencies of God which is done several wayes By intention of the Soul in all the duties In Spirit and Body or exercises of religious worship By innocence and purity of life which is opposed to the Corinthians fornication And also by decent gestures reverent behaviour and corporal adoration in all places and times of divine worship Without intention of the Soul you give God but the husk and shadow Without such reverence and adoration you offer him but an imperfect service Therefore those which God hath joyned together let no man put a sunder but Glorifie him in your body and spirit which are his In all the several factions and parties amongst us there is scarce a man that will not grant it a duty to glorifie God in the Spirit and indeed they separate from us meerly upon pretence of setting up a more pure and spiritual worship and when we speak of such reverence and adoration they think to stop our mouths with that Text John 4.24 The true worshippers shall worship in spirit and in truth if we take the words as much in their sense as we can they do not exclude such reverence and adoration for this is in and flows from a spiritual devotion they may as well hold that he that prays or sings should not speak at all because the Apostle saith 1 Cor. 14.15 That he will do both in the spirit and in the understanding but though this be a Text very illy and absurdly applyed to their purpose as having quite another design for by this Christ shews the Samaritan woman that the time is coming when the true worshippers shall worship not with types and shadows of things to come as in the Old Testament but according to the verity of things exhibited in Christ yet their quoting and wresting of this Scripture doth plainly shew that as on the one hand they seem very zealous of glorifying God in their spirits so on the other they are very averse from and resolute against glorifying him in their bodies I need not therefore insist on the chiefer part it being own'd not only by our Church but by all those who would make themselves our Adversaries too consider them under what notion or terms you please and will therefore discourse on glorifying God in our bodies by decent gestures reverent behaviour and corporal adoration They cannot deny but that God made the body as well as the soul for else the body can be no creature or part of the creation Neither can they deny but that God redeem'd both for else the body can never partake of future happiness seeing without redemption there is no salvation and consequently if there be any glorified souls they shall never be re-united to their bodies after the resurrection but remain in perpetual separation and if so what reason can they give for denying God that glory and worship which is due from one seeing he hath the same right and title to both They likewise as well as we expect and hope that their bodies should be saved in the day of our Lord Jesus and we know that a reward doth necessarily presuppose a duty upon what ground then can they hope that God should glorifie their bodies hereafter if they refuse to glorifie him in their bodies here Should they say they do it sufficiently by keeping their bodies as much as in them lyes from being instruments of sin as fornication or the like I think I may answer this is but a negative devotion which alone cannot denominate any man religious for ex puris negativis nihil concluditur as there is a positive happiness for body and soul so there are positive commands and consequently positive duties to be perform'd by each But because they may instance in some positive duties they perform with their bodies as well as the soul such as be singing praying and preaching I therefore add As God hath by Creation Redemption Preservation Promises and the like lay'd all the obligations upon us that can be to be religious so we should use all means or wayes possibly of glorifying him and if such reverence and adoration be not one I hardly know what is for as the soul is the chiefer part of man but yet is no man till it be joyn'd with the body so the internal devotion of the soul is the chiefer part of religious worship but yet this worship is imperfect till it be accompanied with the reverence and adoration of the body and that exercise of the body before mention'd in singing praying and preaching if there be any other such small things do make up but a very lame service whilst reverent gestures and corporal adoration is wanting they throw in their Annis and Cummin whilst the greater matters of the body are still neglected Let me urge for adoration which being proved decent gestures and reverent behaviour will be proved too as omne majus continet minus or as they are smaller parts of such adoration God did forbid the Jews Exod. 20.5 to bow down to any graven Image which corporal adoration is a part of divine worship else it would not be forbid to be done to Idols whence it appears that this bowing the head or body is unlawful only when terminated to wrong objects as Images and consequently is lawful and necessary too when terminated to the right as the true God and therefore this manner of worship must needs be at least lawful nay necessary if done to the true God only or out of reverence to him toward the place where he is most especially present and accordingly we find that this was practis'd by the Jews without any imputation of sin as I shall shew anon Neither can they say that this was abolished by Christ For the morality of this command doth sufficiently shew it's perpetuity as it is a
Corporal Worship Discuss'd and Defended IN A SERMON Preached at the VISITATION April 21. 1670. In Saviours-Church Southwark And Published to prevent farther Calumny By W. B. LONDON Printed for Tho. Basset at the George near Cliffords-Inne in Fleet-street 1670. To the Right Worshipful Sir Mondeford Bramston Knight Dr. of Laws and one of the Masters of his Majesties High Court of Chancery and Chancellour of the Right Reverend Father in God George by Divine Permission Lord Bishop of Winton my Diocesan Right Worshipful COnsciousness of my own weakness sufficiently deters me from publick censure therefore I should not have entertain'd one thought of appearing abroad had not this discourse been made both a Chimney and as I may speak a Pulpit-talk amongst the froward Enemies of our Church yet had they any thing of truth and modesty in their reflections I should have layn unconcern'd beneath them but as it is their practice to load whatever makes against them to speak modestly with all the aggravations it is capable of receiving so it is the peoples pleasure to imbrace whatever they say as Folia Sibyllae articles of faith or undoubted maxims of truth be pleas'd to take one instance I have heard several particular persons affirm I am loth to say one of their Preachers too who pretended he had read and understood the book that the Author of the Eccles Pol. declares it more excusable for any man to be guilty of all manner of debauchery than to go to a private Meeting and though I knew it was so grand an abuse of that Ingenious Author yet could by no means drive them from that perswasion some of their Leaders had brought them to and if they had the confidence to abuse that piece that was offered to the view of any that would give themselves the trouble of reading how much more will they abuse my Notes if not suffered to speak for themselves These considerations put me upon some inlargements in transcribing the first Copy a task You was pleased to lay upon me but since your commands of making it publick have brought my wavering thoughts to a fixed resolution and since it is abroad I wish them more candour and ingenuity in the reading than some had in the hearing of it shall they think fit to oppose I am ready as much as in me lyes to strengthen those assertions which too much hast hath hudled over but as you was pleased to call this piece to skirmish from the Pulpit and since to face its Enemies in the open Field I leave it under your Conduct and Protection wishing your Authority may be both its Incouragement and also a Bulwark to secure our Church against the assaults of her peevish Enemies so having fought for Religion in this Church which they have made Militant more than in a figure you may be a Member of that which is Triumphant is the Prayer of Your Humble Oratour W. B. 1 Epist Cor. 6.19 20. Ye are not your own For ye are bought with a price therefore glorifie God in your body and your spirit which are Gods MAn being a rational Creature we should deal with him by reason not endeavouring to affright him into the worship of a Deity or the closer imbraces of Virtue and Religion by some thundring speeches which have it may be neither sufficient ground to stand on nor are strengthen'd with any considerable arguments which is a folly that would certainly be not only decry'd but easily amended too if in this all would frame their discourses by the Apostles pattern who layes down such arguments that the duty he presses to doth flow as a necessary consequence from them for disswading the Corinthians from fornication he shews they belong to God by dedication and redemption and consequently by that double tye are oblig'd to all manner of virtue and religious worship For Know ye not that your body is the Temple of the Holy Ghost and Ye are not your own For ye are bought with a price therefore glorifie God in your body and your spirit The Text is a perfect Enthymeme or if you will an imperfect Syllogisme with an argument inserted between the proposition and conclusion 1. A proposition Ye are not your own 2. An argument to prove it For ye are bought with a price 3. A conclusion from that proposition which is usher'd in with the Illative therefore Therefore glorifie God in your body and spirit which are Gods The meaning of the proposition is clear Ye are not your own i. e. not proprii juris to live as you please your selves for it is contrary to the law of reason as well as the express law of the land that any man should imploy that which is alienum belonging to another as he thinks fit himself But lest the proposition should be deny'd the Apostle brings an argument to prove it Ye are bought with a price and therefore belong to him that purchas'd you But certainly there is another way at least in order of time before that of redemption or dedication by which we belong to God and that is Creation He made he redeem'd us therefore we are not our own Seeing our duty of glorifying God will follow more strongly from both I shall discourse on each That we belong to God by creation is evident for man and all the world must Have been from Eternity Or be made by chance Or be the makers of themselves Or else be made by another which can be none but God to whom they belong No other way surely can be imagin'd how things could possibly come to an actual existence therefore the three first being evidently false the last must needs be true that we belong to God by creation and therefore are not our own Had the world been from Eternity Unless from Scripture what is the reason that we have no certain knowledge of any thing done before a few of the last Generations nor any monuments of Antiquity whose beginning is not either known or shrewdly guest at If we come to the Pyramids in Aegypt they were thought by Josephus to have been built by the Jews during their bondage there and by others more probably since whereas It is but of late years since many parts of the world were discover'd and no longer since than in the time of Alexander the Great that little which was known was so poorly fortified and thinly inhabited by unskilful and timerous people that he soon made himself Master of it all Many ingenious Arts are but of late invention and Seneca tells us it was not in his time one thousand years since ingenuity and learning began to flourish in the world therefore if any savour this opinion they must have very high thoughts of this and some few of the last Generations and but little or no charity at all for millions before them in leaving them like Bruits without understanding and be beholding to a few of the last for whatever is worthy of notice Hence the world
Religion and First for you Fathers and Brethren if I may assume the confidence of speaking to those who are so much my Seniors as we are set over so we should be both Teachers and Leaders of the people by Doctrine and Example bringing them into these pathes of Religious worship As the Priests lips should preserve knowledge so we should inable our selves not only to shew but also to defend the lawfulness and goodness of that Old way in which our happy Fathers walk'd before our late unhappy divisions as Cicero speaks of some points of Philosophy so may we of some of Divinity there is so great obscurity in the things themselves so much weakness in our own judgements that we may almost dispair of finding out the truth and idely fall into a Socratical dubitation but this path of religious worship is plain and easie in which the Primitive Churches all along did walk only of late years it hath met with so many adversaries who have made it their design and business to lay stumbling-blocks before the dim-sighted people and to bury it in the mire of frivolous objections and nicer scruples that now the generality look upon it as on Vaults about antiquitated Monasteries which were made and used only by the Sons of Rome therefore we should make it our business too to remove the filth of these objections and make it again plain and passable but because most if not all of us are blest with such a people that will hate us if we tell them the truth we should therefore prudently insinuate these things by degrees and by this innocent lenocinium unawares steal their affections into all the pathes of truth for I cannot see how it is consistent with our duties to conceal any part of religious worship which is necessary to be known and practis'd much less should we tread in the dirty steps of those worse than Non-conforming Brethren who to gain the affections of the giddy and injudicious vulgar and make their low parts seem tall and reverend discover a dislike of that innocent Garment and those Rites and Ceremonies which they have voluntarily oblig'd themselves to wear and observe by which means they work a kind of averseness in those who were in a fair way to be brought to all the parts of divine worship and confirm those who have already forsaken them and our Church together And because many are more easily led by example than drawn by the sweetest strains of Rhetorick or strongest arguments in Divinity we should therefore be ensamples to others not only pointing out but leading our people into the pathes of duty Cicero lib. 2. Tuscul Quest speaking of some of the Philosophers saith we may see alios pecuniae cupidos gloriae nonullos multos libidinum servos cum quorum vita mirabiliter pugnat oratio quod quidem mihi videtur turpissimum and with good reason too but let it not be so with us for sad observation tells that this present age makes such things as these a main argument upon which they build the lawfulness of a separation from us our Adversaries round about have so much charity as to proclaim us all either Swine or Asses that either know or practice nothing that by this means they may gather the more Disciples and the better colour their own separation which should teach us especially in these perillous times to abstain not only from those things which are really evil but from those too that have any appearance of it that so the people having our precepts and seeing our good examples may be brought both in body and soul to glorifie our Father which is in Heaven And as We should teach both by Doctrine and Example so You ought to be followers of us as we are of Christ Especially those who are chosen Officers in the several Parishes should be carefull to walk in all the parts of religious worship for the meaner sort are ready to shelter themselves under your wings and think the example of those whom they stile the Masters of their Parish a sufficient authority either in good or evil And know that a separation from us is farr from glorifying God for how can that which rends the seamless Coat of Christ into fractions and divisions tend to his glory or the interest of Religion Whilst one saith I am of Paul another I am of Apollos a third I am of Cephas are you not carnal But whilst we press all to Uniformity the leaders of these people do make them erre who being depos'd as I may speak like the Priest at Jerusalem presently fled to Samaria and set up a worship in opposition to ours and ever since cry the Mount of the Lord the Mount of the Lord being like those spirits which some fabulous stories tells us have pull'd down Churches in the night as fast as they were built in the day undoing in private what we endeavour in the publick for they affright men by making a noise about Idolatry though none of them are able to prove it nor as farr I as can hear â—â—er seriously endeavour'd it amongst their people and especially since this last Act past against them some of their meetings have sounded as loud with a Take ye joyfully the spoyling of your Goods as some of their Pulpits have done formerly with a Curse ye Meroz Curse bitterly Wonder will hardly suffer me to proceed to think that men who make so great a shew of Purity and holiness to the people that wrap up themselves in Doublets of Zeal and write Precifian on their Brow should have the confidence nay impudence rather so miserably to wrest the Sacred Scriptures for we know that then the Church was Persecuted by the Heathens and constrain'd either to suffer or to part both with a good Conscience and the totum of Religion together whereas we differ only about decent Ceremonies and reverent Gestures which best become the house of him who is the God of decency and order now I wonder how any man can tell the ignorant people that they may take as much joy and comfort in the spoyling of their goods because they unjustly refuse to satisfie authority in securing the peace of the Nation and comply with some things that are but decent ceremonies and others that are necessary parts of worship whilst they are suffered freely to imbrace all the Fundamentals of Religion as those Primitive Christians did who must otherwise have parted with the whole substance of Religion and have imbrac'd Heathenisme it self but though some Jehu's drive thus furiously yet I hope the most have more wit and reason than to talk at this rate but as I would not have these men charge us with Idolatry before they can prove it amongst us nor press the people to persevere to the spoyling of their goods and a resisting unto blood with I know not what beside unless they can prove that we are all in the wrong and themselves only in the right for if salvation may be had from the publick Ordinances as well as from private Preaching which none of them dare deny I think it their prudence to secure their peace and estates by coming over to us so neither would I have the poor people regard what is spoken out of a loose ungrounded zeal without a sufficient foundation of arguments to stand on we may easily handle them with their own weapons for I can instance in some of the chief of their party who speak a separation or any thing that tends that way utterly unlawfull as Mr. Baxter in particular about the end of his reasons of the Christian Religion denyes it lawfull for any man to separate though he finds he can really profit more elsewhere which is but pretended or sansied by most of our Separatists and the reason he gives for it is because we should preferr the good and peace of the Church in general above our own particular profit and to press the people to this necessary duty he tells them in the same Paragraph That if any do out of such an end deny themselves some present advantage there is no question but that God will make him amends one way or other what I wonder can be spoke more rational and advantagious to our cause than this And yet these are the words of your great Father Mr. Baxter and Vine's on the Sacrament denyes it lawful for any one to separate from the Sacrament much less from the Church which is not so barr'd and fenc'd about as the Table of the Lord upon any thing less than flat Idolatry and gives the challenge to any man in the world to bring one place of Scripture that doth in the least favour the contrary understanding those places which many wind to their own cause such as bee have no fellowship with them that walk disorderly be ye separate and the like of a moral not a local conjunction and adds further that such Principles tends to the utter overthrow of the Church and I wish I may not add of the State too if not timely prevented Wherefore if our Arguments can prevail nothing let a Presbyterian Authority oversway you unless you can prove us Idolaters be perswaded as we have all but one Creator but one Redeemer as we agree I hope in all the Fundamental points of Religion and expect to meet together in a blessed Eternity to joyn with us and walk hand in hand in Glorifying God both in our bodies and our spirits which are his FINIS ADVERTISEMENT SInce I Preached this Sermon I met with an excellent Book newly Published Entituled A Perswasive to Conformity Written by way of a Letter to the Dissenting Brethren which I wish all Dissenters would peruse Imprimatur Tho. Tompkins R. R mo in Christo Patri ac Domino Dom. Gilberto Divina Providentia Archi-Episc Cant. a Sac. Dom. Ex Aed Lambethaniâ— Apr. 29. 1670.