begin a worse this Heavenly flame should but kindle that of Hell Thus unconceivably heavy was the revenge but what was the offence We have learned not to think any indignity light that is offered to the Son of God but we know these spiritual affronts are capable of degrees Had these Samaritans reviled Christ and his train had they violently assaulted him had they followed him with stones in their hands and blasphemies in their mouths it had been a just provocation of so horrible a vengeance Now the wrong was onâ—ly negative they received him not And that not out of any particular quarrell or dislike of his Person but of his Nation onely the men had been welcome had not their Country distasted All the charge that I hear our Saviour give to his Disciples in case of their rejection is If they receive you not shake off the dust of your feet Yet this was amongst their own and when they went on that sacred errand of publishing the Gospel of Peace These were strangers from the commonwealth of Israel This measure was not to Preachers but to Travellers only a mere inhospitality to misliked guests Yet no lesse revenge will serve them then fire from Heaven I dare say for you ye holy sons of Zebedee it was not your spleen but your zeal that was guilty of so bloody a suggestion your indignation could not but be stirred to see the great Prophet and Saviour of the world so unkindly repelled yet all this will not excuse you from a rash Cruelty from an inordinate Rage Even the best heart may easily be miscarried with a well-meant Zeal No affection is either more necessary or better accepted Love to any Object cannot be severed from hatred of the contrary whence it is that all creatures which have the concupiscible part have also the irascible adjoined unto it Anger and displeasure is not so much an enemy as a guardian and champion of Love Whoever therefore is rightly affected to his Saviour cannot but finde much regret at his wrongs O gracious and divine Zeal the kindely warmth and vitall temper of Piety whither hast thou withdrawn thy self from the cold hearts of men Or is this according to the just constitution of the old and decrepit age of the world into which we are fallen How many are there that think there is no wisdome but in a dull indifferency and chuse rather to freeze then burn How quick and apprehensive are men in cases of their own indignities how insensible of their Saviour's But there is nothing so ill as the corruption of the best Rectified zeal is not more commendable and usefull then inordinate and misguided is hatefull and dangerous Fire is a necessary and beneficial element but if it be once misplaced and have caught upon the beams of our houses or stacks of our corn nothing can be more direfull Thus sometimes Zeal turns Murder They that kill you shall think they doe God service sometimes Phrensie sometimes rude Indiscretion Wholesome and blessed is that zeal that is well grounded and well governed grounded upon the word of Truth not upon unstable fancies governed by wisdome and charity Wisdome to avoid rashnesse and excesse Charity to avoid just offence No motion can want a pretence Elias did so why not we He was an holy Prophet the occasion the place abludes not much there wrong was offered to a servant here to his Master there to a man here to a God and man If Elias then did it why not we There is nothing more perillous then to draw all the actions of Holy men into examples For as the best men have their weaknesses so they are not priviledged from letting fall unjustifiable actions Besides that they may have had perhaps peculiar warrants signed from Heaven whether by instict or speciall command which we shall expect in vain There must be much caution used in our imitation of the best patterns whether in respect of the persons or things else we shall make our selves Apes and our acts sinfull absurdities It is a rare thing for our Saviour to finde fault with the errous of zeal even where have appeared sensible weaknesses If Moses in a sacred rage and indignation brake the Tables written with Gods own hand I finde him not checked Here our meek Saviour turns back and frowns upon his furious suitors and takes them up roundly Ye know not of what spirit ye are The faults of uncharitablenesse cannot be swallowed up in zeal If there were any colour to hide the blemishes of this misdisposition it should be this crimson die But he that needs not our Lie will let us know he needs not our Injury and hates to have a good cause supported by the violation of our Charity We have no reason to disclaim our Passions Even the Son of God chides sometimes yea where he loves It offends not that our Affections are moved but that they are inordinate It was a sharp word Ye know not of what spirit ye are Another man would not perhaps have felt it a Disciple doth Tender hearts are galled with that which the carnal minde slighteth The spirit of Elias was that which they meant to assume and imitate they shall now know their mark was mistaken How would they have hated to think that any other but God's Spirit had stirred them up to this passionate motion now they shall know it was wrought by that ill spirit whom they professed to hate It is far from the good Spirit of God to stir up any man to private revenge or thirst of blood Not an Eagle but a Dove was the shape wherein he chose to appear Neither wouldst thou O God be in the whirlwinde or in the fire but in the soft voice O Saviour what do we seek for any precedent but thine whose name we challenge Thou camest to thine own thine own received thee not Didst thou call for fire from Heaven upon them didst thou not rather send down water from thy compassionate eyes and weep for them by whom thou must bleed Better had it been for us never to have had any spirit then any but thine We can be no other then wicked if our mercies be cruelty But is it the name of Elias O ye Zelots which ye pretend for a colour of your impotent desire Ye do not consider the difference betwixt his Spirit and yours His was extraordinary and heroical besides the instinct or secret command of God for this act of his far otherwise is it with you who by a carnal distemper are moved to this furious suggestion Those that would imitate Gods Saints in singular actions must see they goe upon the same grounds Without the same Spirit and the same warrant it is either a mockery or a sin to make them our Copies Elias is no fit pattern for Disciples but their Master The Son of Man came not to destroy mens lives but to save them Then are our actions and intentions warrantable and praise-worthy when they accord with
had been witnesses of this man's want of eyes He sate begging at one of the Temple gates not only all the City but all the Country must needs know him thrice a year did they come up to Jerusalem neither could they come to the Temple and not see him His very blindness made him noted Deformities and infirmities of body do more easily both draw and fix the eye then an ordinary symmetry of parts Besides his Blindness his Trade made him remarkable the importunity of his begging drew the eyes of the passengers But of all other the Place most notified him Had he sate in some obscure village of Judaea or in some blinde lane of Jerusalem perhaps he had not been heeded of many but now that he took up his seat in the heart in the head of the chief City whither all resorted from all parts what Jew can there be that knows not the blinde begger at the Temple gate Purposely did our Saviour make choice of such a Subject for his Miracle a man so poor so publick the glory of the work could not have reach'd so far if it had been done to the wealthiest Citizen of Jerusalem Neither was it for nothing that the act and the man is doubted of and inquired into by the beholders Is not this he that sat begging Some said It is he others said It is like him No truths have received so full proofs as those that have been questioned The want or the suddain presence of an eye much more of both must needs make a great change in the face those little balls of light which no doubt were more clear then Nature could have made them could not but give a new life to the countenance I marvell not it the neighbours which had wont to see this dark visage led by a guide and guided by a staffe seeing him now walking confidently alone out of his own inward light and looking them chearfully in the face doubted whether this were he The miraculous cures of God work a sensible alteration in men not more in their own apprehension then in the judgment of others Thus in the redresse of the Spiritual blindnesse the whole habit of the man is changed Where before his Face looked dull and earthly now there is a sprightful chearfulness in it through the comfortable knowledge of God and Heavenly things Whereas before his Heart was set upon worldly things now he uses them but injoyes them not and that use is because he must not because he would Where before his fears and griefs were only for pains of body or losse of estate or reputation now they are only spent upon the displeasure of his God and the peril of his Soul So as now the neighbours can say Is this the man others It is like him it is not he The late-blinde man hears and now sees himself questioned and soon resolves the doubt I am he He that now saw the light of the Sun would not hide the light of Truth from others It is an unthankfull silence to smother the works of God in an affected secrecy To make God a loser by his bounty to us were a shamefull injustice We our selves abide not those sponges that suck up good turns unknown O God we are not worthy of our spiritual eye-sight if we do not publish thy mercies on the house top and praise thee in the great congregation Man is naturally inquisitive we search studiously into the secret works of Nature we pry into the reasons of the witty inventions of Art but if there be any thing that transcends Art and Nature the more high and abstruse it is the more busie we are to seek into it This thirst after hidden yea forbidden Knowledge did once cost us dear but where it is good and lawful to know inquiry is commendable as here in these Jews How were thine eyes opened The first improvement of humane Reason is inquisition the next is information and resolution and if the meanest events passe us not without a question how much lesse those that carry in them wonder and advantage He that was so ready to professe himself the Subject of the Cure is no niggard of proclaiming the Author of it A man that is called Jesus made clay and anointed mine eyes and sent me to Siloam to wash and now I see The blinde man knew no more then he said and he said what he apprehended A man He heard Jesus speak he felt his hand as yet he could look no further upon his next meeting he saw God in this man In matter of Knowledge we must be content to creep ere we can goe As that other recovered blinde man saw first men walk like trees after like men so no marvel if this man saw first this God only as man after this man as God also Onwards he thinks him a wonderfull man a mighty Prophet In vain shall we either exspect a suddain perfection in the understanding of Divine matters or censure those that want it How did this man know what Jesus did He was then stone-blinde what distinction could he yet make of persons of actions True but yet the blinde man never wanted the assistance of others eyes their relation hath assured him of the manner of his Cure besides the contribution of his other Senses his Eare might perceive the spittle to fall and hear the injoined command his Feeling perceived the cold moist clay upon his lids All these conjoined gave sufficient warrant thus to believe thus to report Our eare is our best guide to a full apprehension of the works of Christ The works of God the Father his Creation and Government are best known by the Eye The works of God the Son his Redemption and Mediation are best known by the Eare. O Saviour we cannot personally see what thou hast done here What are the monuments of thine Apostles and Evangelists but the relations of the blinde man's guide what and how thou hast wrought for us On these we strongly relie these we do no lesse confidently believe then if our very eyes had been witnesses of what thou didst and sufferedst upon earth There were no place for Faith if the Eare were not worthy of as much credit as the Eye How could the neighbours doe lesse then ask where he was that had done so strange a cure I doubt yet with what minde I fear not out of favour Had they been but indifferent they could not but have been full of silent wonder and inclined to believe in so Omnipotent an Agent Now as prejudiced to Christ and partial to the Pharisees they bring the late-blinde man before those professed enemies unto Christ It is the preposterous Religion of the Vulgar sort to claw and adore those which have tyrannically usurped upon their Souls though with neglect yea with contempt of God in his word in his works Even unjust authority will never want soothing up in whatsoever courses though with disgrace and opposition to the Truth Base mindes
steps in his temptations of the second The stones must be made bread there is the motion to a Carnal appetite The guard and attendance of Angels must be presumed on there is a motion to Pride The Kingdomes of the Earth and the glory of them must be offered there to Covetousnesse and Ambition Satan could not but have heard God say This is my welbeloved Son he had heard the Message and the Carol of the Angels he saw the Star and the journey and Offerings of the Sages he could not but take notice of the gratulations of Zachary Simeon Anna he well knew the Predictions of the Prophets yet now that he saw Christ fainting with hunger as not comprehending how infirmities could consist with a Godhead he can say If thou be the Son of God Had not Satan known that the Son of God was to come into the World he had never said If thou be the Son of God His very supposition convinces him The ground of his Temptation answers it self If therefore Christ seemed to be a mere man because after forty daies he was hungry why was he not confessed more then a man in that for forty daies he hungred not The motive of the Temptation is worse then the motion If thou be the Son of God Satan could not chuse another suggestion of so great importance All the work of our Redemption of our Salvation depends upon this one Truth Christ is the Son of God How should he else have ransomed the World how should he have done how should he have suffered that which was satisfactory to his Fathers wrath how should his actions or Passion have been valuable to the sin of all the World What marvel is it if we that are sons by Adoption be assaulted with the doubts of our interest in God when the natural Son the Son of his Essence is thus tempted Since all our comfort consists in this point here must needs be laid the chief battery and here must be placed our strongest defence To turn Stones into Bread had been no more faulty in it self then to turn Water into Wine But to do this in a distrust of his Fathers Providence to abuse his power and liberty in doing it to work a Miracle of Satans choice had been disagreeable to the Son of God There is nothing more ordinary with our spiritual enemy then by occasion of want to move us to unwarrantable courses Thou art poor steal Thou canst not rise by honest means use indirect How easie had it been for our Saviour to have confounded Satan by the power of his Godhead But he rather chuses to vanquish him by the Sword of the Spirit that he might teach us how to resist overcome the powers of darknesse If he had subdued Satan by the Almighty power of the Deity we might have had what to wonder at not what to imitate now he useth that weapon which may be familiar unto us that he may teach our weaknesse how to be victorious Nothing in Heaven or earth can beat the forces of Hell but the word of God How carefully should we furnish our selves with this powerful munition how should our hearts and mouths be full of it Teach me O Lord the way of thy Statutes O take not from me the words of Truth Let them be my Songs in the house of my pilgrimage So shall I make answer to my Blasphemers What needed Christ to have answered Satan at all if it had not been to teach us that Temptations must not have their way but must be answered by resistance and resisted by the Word I do not hear our Saviour aver himself to be a God against the blasphemous insinuation of Satan neither do I see him working this miraculous Conversion to prove himself the Son of God but most wisely he takes away the ground of the Temptation Satan had taken it for granted that man cannot be sustained without bread and therefore infers the necessity of making bread of stones Our Saviour shews him from an infallible Word that he had mislayed his suggestion That man lives not by usual food only but by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God He can either sustain without bread as he did Moses and Elias or with a miraculous bread as the Israelites with Manna or send ordinary means miraculously as food to his Prophet by the Ravens or miraculously multiply ordinary means as the Meal and Oyle to the Sareptan Widow All things are sustained by his Almighty Word Indeed we live by food but not by any virtue that is without God without the concurrence of whose Providence bread would rather choak then nourish us Let him withdraw his hand from his creatures in their greatest abundance we perish Why do we therefore bend our eyes on the means and not look up to the hand that gives the blessing What so necessary dependance hath the blessing upon the creature if our Prayers hold them not together As we may not neglect the means so we may not neglect the procurement of a blessing upon the means nor be unthankful to the hand that hath given the blessing In the first assault Satan moves Christ to doubt of his Fathers Providence and to use unlawful means to help himself in the next he moves him to presume upon his Fathers protection and the service of his blessed Angels He grounds the first upon a conceit of want the next of abundance If he be in extremes it is all to one end to mislead unto evil If we cannot be driven down to despair he labours to lift us up to presumption It is not one foil than can put this bold spirit out of countenance Temptations like waves break one in the neck of another Whiles we are in this warfare we must make account that the repulse of one Temptation doth but invite to another That Blessed Saviour of ours that was content to be led from Jordan into the Wildernesse for the advantage of the first Temptation yields to be led from the Wildernesse to Jerusalem for the advantage of the second The place doth not a little avail to the act The Wildernesse was fit for a Temptation arising from Want it was not fit for a Temptation moving to Vain-glory the populous City was the fittest for such a motion Jerusalem was the glory of the World the Temple was the glory of Jerusalem the Pinnacles the highest piece of the Pinnacle there is Christ content to be set for the opportunity of Tentation O Saviour of men how can we wonder enough at this Humility of thine that thou wouldest so farre abase thy self as to suffer thy pure and sacred Body to be transported by the presumptuous and malicious hand of that unclean Spirit It was not his Power it was thy Patience that deserves our admiration Neither can this seem over-strange to us when we consider that if Satan be the head of wicked men wicked men are the members of Satan What was Pilate or the Jews
that wrencht his hip and changed his name and dismist him with a blessing and now he cannot forget his old mercy to the house of Israel To that only doth he profess himself sent Their first brood were shepherds now they are sheep and those not garded not empastured but strayed and lost O Saviour we see thy charge the house of Israel not of Esau sheep not goats not wolves lost sheep not securely impaled in the confidence of their safe condition Woe were to us if thou wert not sent to us He is not a Jew which is one without Every Israelite is not a true one We are not of thy fold if we be not sheep thou wilt not reduce us to thy fold if we be not lost in our own apprehensions O Lord thou hast put a fleece upon our backs we have lost our selves enough make us so sensible of our own wandrings that we may finde thee sent unto us and may be happily found of thee Hath not this poor woman yet done Can neither the silence of Christ nor his deniall silence her Is it possible she should have any glimpse of hope after so resolute repulses yet still as if she saw no argument of discouragement she comes and worships and cries Lord help me She which could not in the house get a word of Christ she that saw her solicitors though Christ's own Disciples repelled yet she comes Before she followed now she overtakes him before she sued aloof now she comes close to him no contempt can cast her off Faith is an undaunted Grace it hath a strong heart and a bold forehead even very denials cannot dismay it much lesse delaies She came not to face not to expostulate but to prostrate her self at his feet Her tongue worshipt him before now her knee The eye of her Faith saw that Divinity in Christ which bowed her to his Earth There cannot be a fitter gesture of man to God then adoration Her first suit was for mercy now for help There is no use of mercy but in helpfulness To be pitied without aide is but an addition to misery Who can blame us if we care not for an unprofitable compassion The very suit was gracious She saith not Lord if thou canst help me as the father of the Lunatick but professes the power whiles she beggs the act and gives glory where she would have relief Who now can expect other then a faire and yielding answer to so humble so faithfull so patient a suppliant What can speed well if a prayer of Faith from the knees of Humility succeeds not And yet behold the further she goes the worse she fares her discouragement is doubled with her suit It is not good to take the childrens bread and to cast it to dogs First his silence implied a contempt then his answer defended his silence now his speech expresses and defends his contempt Lo he hath turned her from a woman to a dog and as it were spurns her from his feet with an harsh repulse What shall we say is the Lamb of God turned Lion Doth that clear fountain of mercy run blood O Saviour did ever so hard a word fall from those milde lips Thou called'st Herod sox most worthily he was crafty and wicked the Scribes and Pharisees a generation of Vipers they were venemous and cruell Judas a Devil he was both covetous and treacherous But here was a woman in distresse and distresse challenges mercy a good woman a faithfull suppliant a Canaanitish Disciple a Christian Canaanite yet rated and whipt out for a dog by thee who wert all goodnesse and mercy How different are thy wayes from ours Even thy severity argues favour The Triall had not been so sharp if thou hadst not found the Faith so strong if thou hadst not meant the issue so happy Thou hadst not driven her away as a dog if thou hadst not intended to admit her for a Saint and to advance her as much for a pattern of Faith as thou depressedst her for a spectacle of contempt The time was when the Jews were children and the Gentiles dogs now the case is happily altered the Jews are the dogs so their dear and Divine country-man calls the Concision we Gentiles are the children What certainty is there in an external profession that gives us only to seem not to be at least the being that it gives is doubtfull and temporary We may be children to day and dogs to morrow The true assurance of our condition is in the decree and covenant of God on his part in our Faith and Obedience on ours How they of children became dogs it is not hard to say their presumption their unbelief transformed them and to perfect their brutishnesse they set their fangs upon the Lord of life How we of dogs become children I know no reason But O the depth That which at the first singled them out from the nations of the world hath at last singled us out from the world and them It is not in him that willeth nor in him that runneth but in God that hath mercy Lord how should we blesse thy Goodnesse that we of dogs are Children how should we feare thy Justice since they of Children are dogs Oh let not us be high-minded but tremble If they were cut off who crucified thee in thine humbled estate what may we expect who crucifie thee daily in thy glory Now what ordinary patience would not have been over-strained with so contemptuous a repulse How few but would have faln into intemperate passions into passionate expostulations Art thou the Prophet of God that so disdainfully entertainest poor suppliants Is this the comfort that thou dealest to the distressed Is this the fruit of my humble adoration of my faithfull profession Did I snarl or bark at thee when I called thee the Son of David Did I flie upon thee otherwise then with my prayers and tears And if this terme were fit for my vileness yet doth it become thy lips Is it not sorrow enough to me that I am afflicted with my daughters misery but that thou of whom I hoped for relief must adde to mine affliction in an unkinde reproach But here is none of all this Contrarily her Humility grants all her patience overcomes all and she meekly answers Truth Lord yet the dogs eat of the crums which fall from their masters Table The reply is not more witty then faithfull O Lord thou art Truth it self thy words can be no other then truth thou hast call'd me a dog and a dog I am give me therefore the favour and priviledge of a dog that I may gather up some crums of mercy from under that table whereat thy children sit This blessing though great to me yet to the infinitenesse of thy power and mercy is but as a crum to a Feast I presume not to presse to the board but to creep under it Deny me not those small offalls which else would be swept away in the dust After this
they straight vent it into the eare of their Master O Saviour whiles thou art in Heaven thy school is upon earth Wherefore serve thy Priests lips but to preserve knowledge What use is there of the tongue of the learned but to speak a word in season Thou teachest us still and still we doubt and ask and learn In one short question I finde two Truths and two Falshoods the Truths implied the Falshoods expressed It is true that commonly man's suffering is for sin that we may justly and do often suffer even for the sins of our Parents It is false that there is no other reason of our suffering but sin that a man could sin actually before he was or was before his being or could before-hand suffer for his after-sins In all likelihood that absurd conceit of the Transmigration of Souls possessed the very Disciples How easily and how far may the best be miscarried with a common errour We are not thankfull for our own illumination if we do not look with charity and pity upon the grosse mis-opinions of our brethren Our Saviour sees and yet will wink at so foul a misprision of his Disciples I hear neither chiding nor conviction He that could have inlightned their mindes as he did the world at once will doe it by due leisure and only contents himself here with a milde solution Neither this man nor his Parents We learn nothing of thee O Saviour if not meekness What a sweet temper should be in our carriage towards the weaknesses of others judgment how should we instruct them without bitterness and without violence of Passion exspect the meet seasons of their better information The tender Mother or Nurse doth not rate her little one for that he goes not well but gives him her hand that he may goe better It is the spirit of lenity that must restore and confirm the lapsed The answer is direct and punctual neither the sin of the man nor of his Parents bereaved him of his eyes there was an higher cause of this privation the glory that God meant to win unto himself by redressing it The Parents had sinned in themselves the man had sinned in his first Parents it is not the guilt of either that is guilty of this blindness All God's afflictive acts are not punishments some are for the benefit of the creature whether for probation or prevention or reformation all are for the praise whether of his Divine Power or Justice or Mercy It was fit so great a work should be usher'd in with a preface A suddain and abrupt appearance would not have beseemed so glorious a demonstration of Omnipotence The way is made our Saviour addresses himself to the Miracle a Miracle not more in the thing done then in the form of doing it The matter used was clay Could there be a meaner could there be ought more unfit O Saviour how oft hadst thou cured blindnesses by thy word alone how oft by thy touch How easily couldst thou have done so here Was this to shew thy liberty or thy power Liberty in that thou canst at pleasure use variety of means not being tied to any Power in that thou couldst make use of contraries Hadst thou pull'd out a box and applied some medicinal ointment to the eyes something had been ascribed to thy skill more to the natural power of thy receit now thou madest use of clay which had been enough to stop up the eyes of the seeing the virtue must be all in thee none in the means The utter disproportion of this help to the Cure addes glory to the worker How clearly didst thou hence evince to the world that thou who of clay couldst make eyes wert the same who of clay hadst made man since there is no part of the body that hath so little analogie to clay as the eye this clearness is contrary to that opacity Had not the Jews been more blinde then the man whom thou curedst and more hard and stiffe then the clay which thou mollifiedst they had in this one work both seen and acknowledged thy Deity What could the clay have done without thy tempering It was thy spittle that made the clay effectual it was that Sacred mouth of thine that made the spittle medicinal the water of Siloe shall but wash off that clay which this inward moisture made powerfull The clay thus tempered must be applied by the hand that made it else it avails nothing What must the blinde man needs think when he felt the cold clay upon the holes of his eyes or since he could not conceive what an eye was what must the beholders needs think to see that hollowness thus filled up Is this the way to give either eyes or sight Why did not the earth see with this clay as well as the man What is there to hinder the sight if this make it Yet with these contrarieties must the Faith be exercised where God intends the blessing of a Cure It was never meant that this clay should dwell upon those pits of the eyes it is onely put on to be washed off and that not by every water none shall doe it but that of Siloam which signifies Sent and if the man had not been sent to Siloam he had been still blinde All things receive their virtue from Divine institution How else should a piece of wheaten bread nourish the Soul How should spring-water wash off spiritual filthiness How should the foolishness of preaching save Souls How should the absolution of God's Minister be more effectual then the breath of an ordinary Christian Thou O God hast set apart these Ordinances thy Blessing is annexed to them hence is the ground of all our use and their efficacy Hadst thou so instituted Jordan would as well have healed Blindness and Siloam Leprosie That the man might be capable of such a Miracle his Faith is set on work he must be led with his eyes daubed up to the pool of Siloam He washes and sees Lord what did this man think when his eyes were now first given him what a new world did he finde himself now come into how did he wonder at Heaven and earth and the faces and shapes of all creatures the goodly varieties of colours the chearfulness of the light the lively beams of the Sun the vast expansion of the aire the pleasant transparence of the water at the glorious piles of the Temple and stately palaces of Jerusalem Every thing did not more please then astonish him Lo thus shall we be affected and more when the scales of our mortality being done away we shall see as we are seen when we shall behold the blessedness of that other world the glory of the Saints and Angels the infinite Majesty of the Son of God the incomprehensible brightness of the all-glorious Deity O my Soul that thou couldst be taken up before-hand with the admiration of that which thou canst not as yet be capable of foreseeing It could not be but that many eyes
oh when in the height of his pain and misery thou heardst him cry out My God my God why hast thou forsaken me what a cold horrour possessed thy Soul I cannot now wonder at thy qualms and swoonings I could rather wonder that thou survivedst so sad an hour But when recollecting thy self thou sawest the Heavens to bear a part with thee in thy mourning and feltest the earth to tremble no less then thy self and foundst that the dreadful concussion of the whole frame of Nature proclaimed the Deity of him that would thus suffer and dye and remembredst his frequent predictions of drinking this bitter cup and of being baptized thus in blood thou beganst to take heart and to comfort thy self with the assured exspectation of the glorious issue More then once had he foretold thee his victorious Resurrection He who had openly professed Jonas for his type and had fore-promised in three daies to raise up the ruined Temple of his Body had doubtless given more full intimation unto thee who hadst so great a share in that sacred body of his The just shall live by Faith Lo that Faith of thine in his ensuing Resurrection and in his triumph over death gives thee life and chears up thy drouping Soul and bids it in an holy confidence to triumph over all thy fears and sorrows and him whom thou now seest dead and despised represents unto thee living immortal glorious The Resurrection GRace doth not ever make show where it is There is much secret riches both in the earth and sea which never eye saw I never heard any news till now of Joseph of Arimathea yet was he eminently both rich and wise and good a worthy though close Disciple of our Saviour True Faith may be wisely reserved but will not be cowardly Now he puts forth himself and dares beg the Body of Jesus Death is wont to end all quarrels Pilate's heart tells him he hath done too much already in sentencing an innocent to death no doubt that Centurion had related unto him the miraculous symptoms of that Passion He that so unwillingly condemned Innocence could rather have wished that just man alive then have denied him dead The body is yielded and taken down and now that which hung naked upon the Cross is wrapped in fine linen that which was soiled with sweat and blood is curiously washed and embalmed Now even Nicodemus comes in for a part and fears not the envie of a good profession Death hath let that man loose whom the Law formerly over-awed with restraint He hates to be a night-bird any longer but boldly flies forth and looks upon the face of the Sun and will be now as liberal in his Odors as he was before niggardly in his Confession O Saviour the earth was thine and the fulness of it yet as thou hadst not an house of thine own whiles thou livedst so thou hadst not a grave when thou wert dead Joseph that rich Councellor lent thee his lent it so as it should never be restored thou took'st it but for a while but that little touch of that Sacred Corps of thine made it too good for the owner O happy Joseph that hadst the honour to be Landlord of the Lord of life how well is thy house-room repai'd with a mansion not made with hands eternall in the heavens Thy Garden and thy Tombe were hard by Calvary where thou couldst not fail of many monitions of thy frailty How oft hadst thou seasoned that new Tombe with sad and savory meditations and hadst oft said within thy self Here I shall once lye down to my last rest and wait for my Resurrection Little didst thou then think to have been disappointed by so Blessed a guest or that thy grave should be again so soon empty and in that emptiness uncapable of any mortal in-dweller How gladly dost thou now resign thy grave to him in whom thou livest and who liveth for ever whose Soul is in Paradise whose Godhead every where Hadst thou not been rich before this gift had enriched thee alone and more ennobled thee then all thine earthly Honour Now great Princes envie thy bounty and have thought themselves happy to kiss the stones of that rock which thou thus hewedst thus bestowedst Thus purely wrapped and sweetly embalmed lyes the precious body of our Saviour in Joseph's new vault Are ye now also at rest O ye Jewish Rulers Is your malice dead and buried with him Hath Pilate enough served your envie and revenge Surely it is but a common hostility that can die yours surviveth death and puts you upon a further project The chief Priests and Pharisees came together unto Pilate saying Sir we remember that this Deceiver said whiles he was yet alive After three daies I will rise again Command therefore that the Sepulcher be made sure till the third day lest his Disciples come by night and steal him away and say to the people he is risen How full of terrors and inevitable perplexities is guiltiness These men were not more troubled with envie at Christ alive then now with fear of his Resurrection And what can now secure them Pilate had helpt to kill him but who shall keep him from rising Wicked and foolish Jewes how fain would ye fight against God and your own hearts How gladly would ye deceive your selves in believing him to be a Deceiver whom your consciences knew to be no less true then powerful Lazarus was still in your ey That man was no phantasme his death his reviving was undeniable the so fresh resuscitation of that dead body after four daies dissolution was a manifest conviction of Omnipotence How do ye vainly wish that he could deceive you in the fore-reporting of his own Resurrection Without a Divine power he could have raised neither Lazarus nor himself with and by it he could as well raise himself as Lazarus What need we other witnesses then your own mouths That which he would doe ye confess he foretold that the truth of his word might answer the power of this deed and both of them might argue him the God of Truth and Power and your selves enemies to both And now what must be done The Sepulcher must be secured and you with it An huge stone a strong guard must doe the deed and that stone must be sealed that guard of your own designing Methinks I hear the Souldiers and busy Officers when they were rolling that other weighty stone for such we probably conceive to the mouth of the vault with much toile and sweat and breathlesness how they brag'd of the sureness of the place and unremovableness of that load and when that so choice a Watch was set how they boasted of their valour and vigilance and said they would make him safe from either rising or stealing Oh the madness of impotent men that think by either wile or force to frustrate the will and designs of the Almighty How justly doth that wise and powerful Arbiter of the world laugh them to scorn in
crack and the ship to sink with store so here when he threw forth his first drag-net of Heavenly Doctrine and reproof three thousand Souls were drawn up at once This Text was as the sacred Cord that drew the Net together and pull'd up this wondrous shoal of Converts to God It is the summe of Saint Peter's Sermon if not at a Fast yet at a general Humiliation which is more and better for wherefore fast we but to be humbled and if we could be duely humbled without fasting it would please God a thousand times better then to fast formally without true Humiliation Indeed for the time this was a Feast the Feast of Pentecost but for the estate of these Jews it was dies cinerum a day of contrition a day of deep hunger and thirst after righteousness Men and Brethren what shall we doe Neither doubt I to say that the Festivity of the season added not a little to their Humiliation like as we are never so apt to take cold as upon a sweat and that winde is ever the keenest which blows cold out of a warm coast No day could be more afflictive then an Ashwednesday that should light upon a solemn Pentecost so it was here every thing answered well The Spirit came down upon them in a mighty wind and behold it hath ratled their hearts together the house shoo◠in the descent and behold here the foundations of the Soul were moved Fiery tongues appeared and here their breasts were inflamed Cloven tongues and here their hearts were cut in sunder The words were miraculous because in a supernatural and sudden variety of language the matter Divine laying before them both the truth of the Messiah and their bloody measure offered to that Lord of Life and now Compuncti cordibus they were pricked in their hearts Wise Solomon says The words of the wise are like goads and nails here they were so Goads for they were compuncti pricked yea but the goad could not goe so deep that passeth but the skin they were Nails driven into the very heart of the Auditors up to the head the great Master of the Assembly the divine Apostle had set them home they were pricked in their hearts Never were words better bestowed It is an happy blood-letting that saves the life this did so here We look to the figne commonly in Phlebotomy it is a signe of our idle and ignorant Superstition S. Peter here saw the signe to be in the Heart and he strikes happily Compuncti cordibus they were pricked in their hearts and said Men and brethren what shall we doe Oh what sweet Musick was this to the Apostles ear I dare say none but Heaven could afford better What a pleasing spectacle was this anguish of their wounded Souls To see men come in their zealous Devotions and lay down their moneys the price of their alienated possessions at those Apostolick feet was nothing to this that they came in a bleeding contrition and prostrated their penitent and humbled Souls at the beautiful feet of the Messengers of Peace with Men and Brethren what shall we doe Oh when when shall our eyes be blessed with so happy a prospect How long shall we thunder out God's fearful judgements against wilful sinners How long shall we threaten the flames of Hell to those impious wretches who crucifie again to themselves the Lord of life ere we can wring a sigh or a tear from the rocks of their hearts or eyes Woe is me that we may say too truely as this Peter did of his other fishing Master we have travailed all the night and have caught nothing Surely it may well goe for night with us whiles we labour and prevail not Nothing not a Soul caught Lord what is become of the success of thy Gospel Who hath believed our report or to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed O God thou art ever thy self thy Truth is eternal Hell is where it was if we be less worthy then thy first Messengers yet what excuse is this to the besotted world that through obduredness and infidelity it will needs perish No man will so much as say with the Jews What have I done or with Saint Peter's Auditors What shall I doe Oh foolish sinners shall ye live here always care ye not for your Souls is there not an Hell that gapes for your stubborn impenitence Goe on if there be no remedy goe on and die for ever we are guiltless God is righteous your Damnation is just But if your life be fickle death unavoidable if an everlasting vengeance be the necessary reward of your momentany wickedness Oh turn turn from your evil waies and in an holy distraction of your remorsed Souls say with these Jews Men and Brethren what shall we doe This from the general view of the occasion we descend to a little more particularity Luke the beloved Physician describes Saint Peter's proceeding here much after his own trade as of a true spiritual Physician who finding his Country men the Jews in a desperate and deadly condition gasping for life struggling with death enters into a speedy and zealous course of their cure And first he begins with the Chirurgical part and finding them ranck of blood and that foul and putrified he lets it out compuncti cordibus Where we might shew you the incision the vein the lancet the orifice the anguish of the stroke The Incision compuncti they were pricked The Vein in their hearts Smile not now ye Physicians if any hear me this day as if I had passed a solecisme in telling you these men were pricked in the vein of the heart talk you of your Cephalica and the rest and tell us of another cistern from whence these tubuli sanguinis are derived I tell you again with an addition of more incongruities still that God and his Divine Physician do still let blood in the median vein of the heart The Lancet is the keen and cutting reproof of their late barbarous Crucifixion of their Holy and most innocent and benigne Saviour The Orifice is the ear when they heard this Whatever the local distance be of these parts spiritually the ear is the very surface of the heart and whosoever would give a medicinal stroke to the heart must pass it through the ear the sense of discipline and correction The Anguish bewrays it self in their passionate exclamation Men and brethren what shall we doe There is none of these which my speech might not well take up if not as an house to dwell in yet as an Inne to rest and lodge in But I will not so much as bait here onely we make this a through-fare to those other sacred prescriptions of saving remedies which are three in number The first is Evacuation of sins by a speedy repentance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The second the soveraign Bath or Laver of Regeneration Baptisme The third dietetical and prophylactical receipts of wholesome Caution which I mean with a determinate preterition of
but dead in sin Colos 2. 13. yea with Lazarus quatriduani and ill-senting yea if that will adde any thing as St. Jude's trees or as they say of acute Scotus twice dead Would ye arise It is only Godliness that can doe it Ye are risen up through the faith in the operation of God Col. 2. 12. This only can call us out of the grave of our sins Arise thou that sleepest and stand up from the dead and christ shall give thee life Christ is the Author Godliness is the means All ye that hear me this day either ye are alive or would be Life is sweet every one challenges it Do ye live willingly in your sins Let me tell you ye are dead in your sins This life is a death If you wish to live comfortably here and gloriously hereafter it is Godliness that must mortifie this life in sin that must quicken you from this death in sin Flatter your selves how you please ye great Gallants of both Sexes ye think your selves goodly pieces without Godliness ye are the worst kinde of carkasses for as death or not-being is the worst condition that can befall a creature so death in sin is so much the worst kind of death by how much Grace is better then Nature A living Dog or Toad is better then a thus-dead sinner Would ye rise out of this loathsome and woful plight it is Godliness that must breath Grace into your dead lims and that must give you the motions of holy Obedience Is it not a wonder to cast out Devils I tell you the corporal possession of ill spirits is not so rare as the spiritual is rise No natural man is free One hath the spirit of errour 1 Tim. 4. 1. another the spirit of fornications Ose 4. 12. another the spirit of fear 2 Tim. 1. 7. another the spirit of slumber another the spirit of giddiness another the spirit of pride all have spiritum mundi the spirit of the world 1 Cor. 2. 12. Our story in Guliel Neubrigensis tells us of a Countryman of ours one Kettle of Farnham in King Henry the Second's time that had the faculty to see spirits by the same token that he saw the Devils spitting over the Drunkards shoulders into their pots the same faculty is recorded of Antony the Eremite and Sulpitius reports the same of Saint Martin Surely there need none of these eyes to discern every natural mans Soul haunted with these evil Angels Let me assure you all ye that have not yet felt the power of Godliness ye are as truely though spiritually carried by evil spirits into the deeps of your known wickedness as ever the Gadarene hogs were carried by them down the precipice into the Sea Would you be free from this hellish tyranny only the power of Godliness can doe it 2 Tim. 2. 26 27. Is peradventure God will give them repentance that they may recover themselves out of the snares of the Devil and Repentance is you know a main part of Godliness If ever therefore ye be dispossessed of that Evil one it is the power of Godliness that must doe it What speak I of power I had like to have ascribed to it the acts of Omnipotencie And if I had done so it had not been much amiss for what is Godliness but one of those rayes that beams forth from that Almighty Deity what but that same Dextra Excelsi whereby he works mightily upon the Soul Now when I say the man is strong is it any derogation to say his arme is strong Faith and Prayer are no small pieces of Godliness and what is it that God can doe which Prayer and Faith cannot doe Will ye see some instances of the further acts of Godliness Is it not an act of Omnipotence to change Nature Jannes and Jambres the Aegyptian Sorcerers may juggle away the Staffe and bring a Serpent into the room of it none but a Divine power which Moses wrought by could change the Rod into a Serpent or the Serpent into a Rod. Nothing is above Nature but the God of Nature nothing can change Nature but that which is above it for Nature is regular in her proceedings and will not be crost by a finite power since all finite Agents are within her command Is it not a manifest change of the nature of the Wolf to dwell quietly with the Lamb of the Leopard to dwell with the Kid of the Lion to eat straw with the Oxe of the Aspe to play with the child How shall this be It is an idle conceit of the Hebrews that savage beasts shall forgo their hurtful natures under the Messias No but rational beasts shall alter their dispositions The ravenous Oppressor is the Wolf the tyrannical Persecutor is the Leopard the venemous Heretick is the Aspe these shall turn innocent and useful by the power of Godliness for then the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord Esay 11. 6 c. Is it not a manifest change of nature for the Ethiopian to turn white for the Leopard to turn spotless This is done when those doe good which are accustomed to evil Jer. 13. 23. And this Godliness can doe Is it not a manifest change of nature for the Camel to pass through a needles eye this is done when through the power of Godliness ye Great and rich men get to Heaven Lastly it is an easie thing to turn men into beasts a cup too much can doe it but to turn beasts into men men into Saints Devils into Angels it is no less then a work of Omnipotencie And this Godliness can doe But to rise higher then a change Is it not an act of Omnipotencie to create Nature can go on in her track whether of continuing what she actually finds to be or of producing what she finds to be potentially in pre-existing Causes but to make new matter transcends her power This Godliness can doe here is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a new Creature 2 Cor. 5. 17. There is in Nature no predisposition to Grace the man must be no less new then when he was made first of the dust of the earth and that earth of nothing Novus homo Eph. 4. 24. How is this done by Creation and how is he created in righteousness and holiness Holiness to God Righteousness to men both make up Godliness A Regeneration is here a Creation Progenuit is expressed by Creavit Jam. 1. 18. and this by the word of truth Old things are passed saith the Apostle all must be new If we will have ought to doe with God our bodies must be renewed by a glorious Resurrection ere they can enjoy Heaven our Souls must be renewed by Grace ere we can enjoy God on earth Are there any of us pained with our heart of stone We may be well enough the stone of the reines or bladder is a woful pain but the stone of the heart is more deadly He can by this power take it out and give us an
with Christians Let us speak truth every man to his neighbour Farre farre be it from any of you to have a mercenary tongue either sold or let out to speak for injury for oppression Where the justice of the cause seems to hang in an even poise there exercise the power of your wit and eloquence in pleadings but where the case is foul abhor the Patrocination discourage an unjust though wealthy Client and say rather Thy gold and thy silver perish with thee resolving that the richest fee is a good conscience and therefore with the Apostle that ye can doe nothing against the truth but for the truth Thus fashion not your Tongue to the falshood of the world 2. The world hath a tongue as Malicious as false he carries poisons arrows swords razors in his mouth whether in reviling the present or backbiting the absent What have our tongues to walk in but this round of detraction Barre this practice there would be silence at our bords silence at our fires-side silence in the Tavern silence in the way silence in the Barbers-shop in the Mill in the Market every where yea very Gossips would have nothing to whisper Lord what a wilde licentiousnesse are we grown to in this kinde Every mans mouth is open to the censures to the curses of their betters neither is it cared how true the word be but how sharp Every Fidler sings Libels openly and each man is ready to challenge the freedome of David's Ruffians Our tongues are our own who shall controll us This is not a fashion for Christians whose tongues must be ranged within the compasse as of Truth so of Charity and silent Obedience we know our charge Diis non detrahes Thou shalt not revile the Gods nor curse the ruler of thy people Exod. 22. 28. No not in thy bed-chamber no not in thy thoughts Eccles 10. 20. And for our equalls God hath said it Whoso privily slandereth his Neighbour him will I cut off Psal 101. 5. The spightfull tongue as it is a fire and is kindled by the fire of hell Jam. 3. 6. so shall it be sure once to torment the Soul that moves it with flames unquenchable Thus fashion not your Tongue to the maliciousnesse of the world 3. As the world hath a spightfull tongue in his anger so a Beastly tongue in his mirth No word sounds well that is not unsavoury The onely minstrell to the world is ribaldry Modesty and sober Merriment is dulnesse There is no life but in those cantiones cinaedicae which are too bad even for the worst of red Lattices yea even those mouths which would hate to be palpably foul stick not to affect the witty jests of ambiguous obscenity Fye upon these impure brothelries Oh that ever those tongues which dare call God Father should suffer themselves thus to be possessed by that unclean spirit that ever those mouths which have received the Sacred body and blood of the Lord of Life should indure these dainty morsels of the Devil For us Let no corrupt communication proceed out of our mouth but that which is edifying and gracious Ephes 4. 29. and such as may become those tongues which shall once sing Allelujahs in the Heavens Fashion not your Tongues to the obscenity of the world From the Tongue we passe to the Palate which together with the gulf whereto it serves the throat and the paunch is taken up with the beastly fashion of Gluttony and excesse whether wet or dry of meats or liquors surfeits in the one drunkennesse in the other insomuch as that the vice hath taken the name of the part Gula as if this piece were for no other service The Psalmist describes some wicked ones in his time by Sepulcrum patens guttur eorum Their throat is an open Sepulchre Psal 5. 9. How many have buried all their Grace in this tomb how many their Reputation how many their Wit how many their Humanity how many their Houses Lands Livings Wives Children Posterity Health Life Body and Soul Saint Paul tels his Philippians that their false teachers made their belly their God Oh God what a Deity is here what a nasty Idol and yet how adored every where The Kitchins and Taverns are his Temples the Tables his Altars What fat Sacrifices are here of all the beasts fouls fishes of all three Elements what pouring out yea what pouring in of drink-offerings what incense of Indian smoak what curiously-perfumed cates wherewith the nose is first feasted then the maw More then one of the Ancients as they have made Nebuzaradan principem Coquorum Jer. 52. 12. the chief Cook of Nebuchadnezzar so they have found a mysticall allusion in the story that the chief Cook should burn the Temple and Palace both Gods house and the Kings and should destroy the walls of Jerusalem Surely gluttonous excesse destroies that which should be the Temple of the Holy Ghost and is enough to bring a fearfull vastation both upon Church and State I could even sink down with shame to see Christianity every where so discountenanced with beastly Epicurisme what street shall a man walk in and not meet with a Drunkard what rode shall he passe and not meet some or other hanging upon the stirrup waving over the pummel Saint Peter's argument from the third hour of the day and Saint Paul's from the night would be now a non sequitur Day is night night is day no hour is priviledged I cannot speak a more fearfull word then that of Saint Paul Whose belly is their God whose end is damnation Oh wofull wofull condition of that damned glutton in the Gospel Oh the flames of that delicious tongue which beg'd for a drop but should in vain have been quenched with rivers with Oceans As ye desire to be freed from those everlasting burnings Awake ye drunkards and howl ye drinkers of wine Joel 1. 5. Return your superfluous liquors into tears of repentance which onely can quench that fire and for the sequel put your knife to your throats Take heed lest at any time your hearts be overtaken with surfeiting and drunkennesse Luk. 21. 34. Thus fashion not your selves to the Excesse of the world From the pampered Belly we passe to the proud Back of the world whereon he is blind that sees not a world of fashions in all which the price of the stuffe strives with the vanity of the form There is a Luxury in very Cloaths which it is hard to look besides O God how is the world changed with us since our Breeches of fig-leaves and Coats of skin The Earth yields Gold Silver rich Stones the Sea Pearls the Aire feathers the Field his stalks the Sheep her Fleece the Worm her web and all too little for one back After necessity Cloaths were once for distinction as of Sexes so of Degrees How curious was God in these differences the violation whereof was no lesse then deadly Deut. 22. 5. What shall we say to the Dames yea to the Hermaphrodites of
〈◊〉 c. The Holy Scriptures inspired by God are in themselves all-sufficient to the instruction of truth and if Chemnitius construe it all truth This needs not raise a cavil the word signifies no lesse for if they be all-sufficient to instruction they must needs be sufficient to all instruction in the truth intended Tertullian professes openly Adoro Scripturae plenitudinem c. I adore the fulnesse of Scripture Let the skill of Hermogenes shew where it is written if it be not written let him fear that woe which is propounced against those that adde or detract Thus he Who can but fear that the Cardinal shifts this evidence against his own heart For saith he Tertull. speaks of that one point That God created all things of nothing and not of a pre-existent matter as Hermogenes dreamed now because this Truth is clearly expressed in Scripture therefore the fulness of Scripture as concerning this Point is adored by Tertullian and for that Hermogenes held an opinion contrary to Scripture he is said to adde unto Scripture and to incur that malediction Now let any Reader of common sense judge whether the words of Tertullian be not general without any limitation and if the first clause could be restrained the second cannot Scriptum esse doceat c. Whatsoever therefore is not written by this rule may not be obtruded to our belief Neither doth he say If it be written against but If it be not written and his challenge is nusquam legi that the words are no where read as if this were quarrell enough without a flat contradiction to what is read So as the Cardinals Glosse merely corrupts the Text. How easie were it for me to tire my Reader with the full suffrages of Origen Cyprian Chrysostome Basil Cyril Epiphanius Hierome Ambrose Theodoret Hilarie Vincentius Lirinensis and in a word with the whole stream of Antiquity which though they give a meet place to Traditions of Ceremony of History of Interpretation of some immaterial Verities yet reserve the due honour to the Sacred monuments of Divine Scriptures Our learned Chemnitius hath freely yielded seven sorts of Traditions such as have a correspondence with or an attestation from the written Word the rest we do justly together with him disclaim as unworthy to appear upon that awfull Bench amongst the inspired Pen-men of God Sect. 2. Traditions against Scripture IT is not to be imagined that the same word of God which speaks for all other Truths should not speak for it self how fully doth it display its own sufficiencie and perfection All Scripture saith the Chosen Vessel is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction in righteousness Profitable saith the Cardinal but not sufficient Many things may avail to that end whereto they suffice not so meat is profitable to nourish but without natural heat it nourisheth not Thus he Hear yet what followeth That the man of God may be perfected and throughly furnished unto all good works Loe it is so profitable to all these services that thereby it perfects a Divine much more an ordinary Christian That which is so profitable as to cause perfection is abundantly sufficient and must needs have full perfection in it self That which can perfect the Teacher is sufficient for the Learner The Scriptures can perfect the man of God both for his calling in the instruction of others and for his own glory Thou hast known the Scriptures from a childe saith S. Paul to his Timothy which are able not profitable only to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus It is the charge therefore of the Apostle not to be wise above that which is written The same with wise Solomon's The whole word of God is pure Adde thou not unto his words lest he reprove thee and thou be found a lier Loe he saith not Oppose not his words but Adde not to them Even Addition detracts from the majestie of that Word For the Law of the Lord is perfect converting the Soul the Testimony of the Lord is sure making wise the simple The Statutes of the Lord are right rejoicing the heart the Commandement of the Lord is pure enlightning the eyes As for those Traditions which they do thus lift up to an unjust competition with the written Word our Saviour hath beforehand humbled them into the dust In vain do they worship me teaching for doctrines the commandements of men making this a sufficient cause of abhorring both the persons and the services of those Jews that they thrust humane Traditions into Gods chair and respected them equally with the institutions of God Cardinal Bellarmine would shift it off with a distinction of Traditions These were such saith he quas acceperunt à recentioribus c. as they had received from some later hands whereof some were vain some other pernicious not such as they received from Moses and the Prophets And the Authors of these rejected Traditions he cites from Epiphanius to be R. Akiba R. Juda and the Asamoneans from Hierome to be Sammai Hillel Akiba But this is to cast a mist before the eyes of the simple For who sees not that our Saviours challenge is generall to Traditions thus advanced not to these or those Traditions And where he speaks of some later hands he had forgotten that our Saviour upon the Mount tells him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that these faulted Traditions were of old And that he may not cast these upon his Sammai and Hillel let him remember that our Saviour cites this out of Esay though with some more clearness of expression who far overlooked the time of those pretended Fathers of mis-traditions That I may not say how much it would trouble him to shew any dogmatical Traditions that were derived from Moses and the Prophets in parallel whereof let them be able to deduce any Evangelical tradition from the Apostles and we are ready to imbrace it with all observance Shortly it is clear that our Saviour never meant to compare one Tradition with another as approving some rejecting others but with indignation complains that Traditions were obtruded to God's people in a corrivalty with the written Word which is the very Point now questioned Sect. 3. Traditions against Reason EVen the very light of Reason shews us that as there is a God so that he is a most wise and most just God needs therefore must it follow that if this most just and wise God will give a Word whereby to reveal himself and his will to mankinde it must be a perfect Word for as his Wisdome knows what is fit for his creature to know of himself so his Justice will require nothing of the creature but what he hath enabled him to know and doe Now then since he requires us to know him to obey him it must needs follow that he hath left us so exquisite a Rule of
this knowledge and obedience as cannot admit of any defect or any supplement This Rule can be no other then his written Word therefore written that it might be preserved entire for this purpose to the last date of time As for orall Traditions what certainty can there be in them what foundation of truth can be lai'd upon the breath of man How do we see the reports vary of those things which our eyes have seen done How do they multiply in their passage and either grow or die upon hazards Lastly we think him not an honest man whose tongue goes against his owne hand How hainous an imputation then do they cast upon the God of Truth which plead Traditions derived from him contrary to his written Word Such apparently are the worship of Images the mutilation of the Sacrament Purgatory Indulgences and the rest which have passed our agitation Since therefore the authority of Romish Traditions is besides Novelty Erroneous against Scripture and Reason we have justly abandoned it and are thereupon unjustly condemned As for those other dangerous and important Innovations concerning Scriptures their Canon inlarged their faulty Version made authentical their fountains pretended to be corrupted their mis-pleaded Obscurity their restraint from the Laity we have already largely displai'd them in another place CHAP. XVII The Newnesse of the universall Headship of the Bishop of Rome THose transcendent Titles of Headship and Universality which are challenged to the Bishop and See of Rome are known to be the upstart brood of noted ambition Simple and holy Antiquity was too modest either to require or tolerate them Who knows not the profession of that holy Martyr in the Councill of Carthage Neque enim c. There is none of us that makes himself a Bishop of Bishops or by a tyrannous fear compels his underlings to a necessitie of obedience but perhaps at Rome it was otherwise Heare then with what zeal their own Pope Gregory the Great inveighs against the arrogance of John Bishop of Constantinople for giving way to this proud style His Epistles are extant in all hands so clear and convictive as no art of Sophistry can elude them wherein he calls this Title affected by the said John and Cyriacus after him a new name a wicked profane insolent name the generall plague of the Church a corruption of the Faith against Canons against the Apostle Peter against God himself as if he could never have branded it enough And lest any man should cavil that this style is onely cried down in the Bishops of Constantinople which yet might be justly claimed by the Bishops of Rome Gregorie himself meets with this thought and answers beforehand Nunquam pium virum c. That never any godly man never any of his Predecessors used those Titles and more then so That whosoever shall use this proud style he is the very fore-runner of Antichrist If in a foresight of this Usurpation Gregory should have been hired to have spoken for us against the Pride of his following Successors he could not have set a keener edge upon his style Consonant whereto it is yet extant in the very Canon Law as quoted by Gratian out of the Epistle of Pope Pelagius the second Universalis autem nec etiam Romanus Pontifex appelletur Not the Bishop of Rome himself may be called Universall Yet how famously is it known to all the World that the same Gregorie's next Successor save one Boniface the third obtained this title of Universall Bishop from the Emperour Phocas which the said Emperour gave him in a spleen against Cyriacus Patriarch of Constantinople for delivering Constantina the Wife of Mauritius and her Children or as some others relate it upon a worse occasion And accordingly was this haughty Title communicated by the same power to the See of Rome and by strong hand ever since maintained This qualification their Register Platina confesses was procured not without great contention And Otho Frisingensis fully and ingenuously writeth thus Gregory departed hence to the Lord after whom the next save one Boniface obtained of Phocas that by his authority the Romane Church might be called the head of all Churches for at that time the See of Constantinople I suppose because of the seat of the Empire translated thither wrote her self the first Thus their Bishop Otho Now if any man shall think that hence it will yet follow that the See of Rome had formerly enjoyed this Honour however the Constantinopolitan for the present shouldred with her for it let him know the ground of both their challenges which as it was supposed by Otho so is fully for the satisfaction of any indifferent judgement laid forth in the Generall Council of Chalcedon The same say those Fathers we determine of the priviledges of the most holy Church of Constantinople called new Rome For the Fathers have justly heretofore given priviledge to the Throne of old Rome because that City was then the Governesse of the world and upon the same consideration were the hundred and fifty Bishops men beloved of God moved to yield equall priviledges to the Throne of new Rome rightly judging that this City which is honoured with the Empire and Senate and is equally priviledged with old Rome the then Queen of the world should also in Ecclesiasticall matters be no lesse extolled and magnified Thus they And this act is subscribed Bonifacius Presbyter Ecclesiae Romanae statui subscripsi I Boniface Presbyter of the Church of Rome have so determined and subscribed Et coeteri c. And the rest of the Bishops of divers Provinces and Cities subscribed What can be more plain This Headship of the Bishop was in regard of the See and this headship of the See was in regard of the preeminence of the City which was variable according to the changes of times or choice of Emperours But Binius wrangleth here Can we blame him when the free-hold of their Great Mistresse is so nearly touched This Act saith he was not Synodicall as that which was closely and cunningly done in the absence of the Popes Legates and other Orthodox Bishops at the instance of Anatolius Patriarch of Constantinople an ambitious man by the Eastern Bishops onely How can this plea stand with his own confessed subscription Besides that their Caranza in his Abridgement shews that this Point was long and vehemently canvassed in that Council between Lucentius and Boniface Legates of the Romane Church and the rest of the Bishops and at last so concluded as we have related not indeed without the protestation of the said Legates Nobis proesentibus c. The Apostolick See must not in our presence be abased Notwithstanding this act then carried and after this Pope Simplicius succeeding to Hilarius made a Decree to the same purpose not without allusion to this contention for precedency that Rome should take place of Constantinople Yea so utterly unthought of
to their sin then to my wrong The main ground of the Exception is That I yield the Church of Rome a true visible Church wherein the harsh noise of a mis-construed phrase offends their eare and breeds their quarrell For this belike in their apprehension seems to sound no lesse then as if I had said The Church of Rome is a true-believing Church or a true part of the mysticall body of Christ a sense which is as far wide from my words or thoughts as from truth it self Wherefore serves this Book but to evince the manifold Corruptions of that foul Church That she is truely visible abates nothing of her abominations For who sees not that Visible refers to outward Profession True to some essentiall Principles of Christianity neither of them to soundnesse of Belief So as these two may too well stand together A true visible Church in respect of outward Profession of Christianity and an Hereticall Apostaticall Antichristian Synagogue in respect of Doctrine and Practice Grant the Romanists to be but Christians how corrupt soever and we cannot deny them the name of a Church Outward Visibility gives them no claim either to Truth or Salvation Shortly then in two things I must crave leave to vindicate my self One that I do no whit differ from my self the other that I differ not from the Judgement of our best Orthodox and approvedly-classicall Divines Both which cleared what have I done It is a grievous challenge this of Inconstancy for though whiles we are here in this region of Mutability our whole man is subject to change yet we do all herein affect a likenesse to the God of Truth in whom there is no shadow by turning especially in Religion so much more as that doth more assimilate and unite us to that unchangeable Deity Lo say they the man that once wrote No peace with Rome now cries nothing but Peace with Rome whiles he proclaims it a true visible Church and allows some Communion with it Alas brethren why will ye suffer a rash and ignorant Zeal thus to lye palpably in your way to Truth Be but pleased to cast your eyes upon the first Chapter of that Book of mine which is thus objected to me in a causelesse exprobration that which long since I wrote of the Irreconcilablenesse of Rome and see if that Section be not a full expression of the same Truth and that in the same words which I have here published There shall you finde taught That there is no other difference betwixt us and Rome then betwixt a Church miserably corrupted and happily purged betwixt a sickly languishing dying Church and one that is healthfull strong and flourishing That Valdus Wiclef Luther did never goe about to frame a new Church which was not but to cleanse restore reform that Church which was That they meant onely to be Physicians to heal not Parents to beget a Church There you shall finde That we are all the same Church by virtue of our outward Vocation whosoever all the world over worship Jesus Christ the only Son of God the Saviour of the world and professe the same common Creed that some of us doe this more purely others more corruptly that in the mean time we are all Christians but sound Christians we are not There ye shall finde this very Objection so fully answered as if it had been either formerly moved or so long since prevented the words are these But how harshly doth this sound to a weak reader and more then seems to need reconciliation with it self that the Church should be one and yet cannot be reconciled Certainly yet so it is The dignity of the outward forme which comprehends this Unity in it self avails nothing to Salvation nothing to Grace nothing to the soundnesse of Doctrine The Net doth not straight make all to be Fish that it hath dragg'd together ye shall finde in it vile weeds and whatsoever else that devouring element hath disgorged The Church is at once one in respect of the common Principles of Faith and yet in respect of consequences and that rabble of opinions which they have raked together so opposed that it cannot as things now stand by any glew of Concord as Cyprian speaketh nor bond of Unity be conjoined That which Rome holds with us makes it a Church that which it obtrudes upon us makes it Hereticall the truth of Principles makes it one the Error and impiety of Additions makes it irreconcilable c. Look on the face therefore of the Roman Church she is ours she is Gods look on her back she is quite contrary Antichristian More plainly Rome doth both hold the Foundation and destroy it she holds it directly destories it by consequent In that she holds it she is a true Church howsoever impured in that she destroies it what semblance soever she makes she is a Church of malignants If she did altogether hold it she should be sound and Orthbox if altogether she destroied it she should be either no Church or devilish but now that she professes to hold those things directly which by inferences she closely overthrows she is a truely visible Church but an unsound one Thus I wrote well-near twenty years agone without clamor without censure And since that in my Latine Sermon to the Convocation did I very ought from this hold Did I not there call heaven earth to record of our innocence in separating from the Romane Church Did I not cast the fault upon their violence not our will Did I not professe Lubentes quidem discessimus c. We willingly indeed departed from the Communion of their Errors but from the Communion of the Church we have not departed Let them abandon their Errours and we embrace the Church Let them cast away their Soul-killing Traditions and false appendances of their new Faith we shall gladly communicate with them in the right of the same Church and hold with them for ever This I freely both taught and published with the allowance with the applause of that most Reverend Synod and now doth the addition of a Dignity bring envy upon the same Truth Might that passe commendably from the pen or tongue of a Doctor which will not be endured from the hand of a Bishop My brethren I am where I was the change is yours Ever since I learned to distinguish betwixt the right hand of Veritie and the left of Errour thus I held and shall I hope at last send forth my Soul in no other resolution And if any of you be otherwise minded I dare boldly say he shall doe more wrong to his Cause then to his adversary That I differ not from my self you have seen see now that I differ not from our learned judicious approved Divines That the Latine or Western Church subject to the Romish Tyranny unto the very times of Luther was a true Church in which a saving profession of the truth of Christ was found and wherein Luther himself received his Christianity
Ordination and power of Ministery our Learned Doctor Field hath saved me the labour to prove by the suffrages of our best and most renowned Divines amongst whom he sites the Testimony of Calvin Bucer Melanchthon Beza Mornay Deering And if since that time it be foully corrupted so as now that acute Author is driven to the distinction of Verè Ecclesia and Vera Ecclesia yet at last he thus concludes But will some man say Is the Roman Church at this day no part of the Church of God Surely a◠Austine noteth that the societies of Hereticks in that they retain the profession of many parts of heavenly truth and the ministration of the Sacrament of Baptisme are so far still conjoined with the Catholick Church and the Catholick Church in and by them bringeth forth children unto God so the present Roman Church is stil in some sort a part of the visible Church of God but no otherwise then other societies of Hereticks are in that it retaineth the profession of some parts of heavenly truth and ministreth the true Sacrament of Baptisme to the Salvation of the Souls of many thousand infants c. Thus he Junius distinguishing betwixt the Church and Papacie determines the Church of Rome to be a truely-living though sick Church whereof the Papacie is the disease marring the health threatning her life and punctually resolves Ecclesia Papalis qua id habet c. The Popish Church in that it hath in it that which pertaines to the definition of a Church is a Church Doctor Raynolds makes it his Position That the Church of Rome is neither the Catholick Church nor a sound member of the Catholick yielding it a member whiles he disproves it sound Paraeus Accusant nos c. They accuse us saith he that we have made a division in departing from the Church Nos verò c. But we have not departed from the Church but from the Papacie Master Hooker is most pregnant for this point Apparent it is saith he that all men are of necessitie either Christians or not Christians If by external Profession they be Christians they are of the visible Church of Christ and Christians by external profession they are all whose mark of recognisance hath in it those things which we have mentioned yea although they be impious Idolaters wicked Hereticks persons Excommunicable yea and cast out for notorious improbitie Thus he and going on he shews how it is possible for the self-same men to belong to the Synagogue of Satan and to the Church of Jesus Christ The passages are too long to transcribe and the Books are obvious Doctor Crakenthorp in his learned answer to Spalatensis defends heretical Churches to be truely members of the Catholick Church though unsound ones subscribing herein to the determination of Alphonsus and descending to this particular concludes Haec tamen ipsa tua Romana c. This your Romane Church must be accounted both to be in the Church and to be a Church not simply not according to the integrity of Faith not according to any inward virtue not so effectually that it should avail to Salvation for a man to be in it but yet a Church it is in some respects according to the external profession of Faith and of the Word of God according to the administration of the Sacraments according to some Doctrines of true belief by which as by so many outward Ligaments she is yet knit to the Orthodox and Catholick Church Thus he fully to my words and meaning I might swell up the bulk with many more a Catalogue whereof Brierley hath for his own purpose fetcht up together I will onely shut up this Scene with out late most Learned Soveraign King James who in the Conference at Hampton Court with the acclamation of all his judicious hearers avowed that no Church ought further to separate it self from the Church of Rome in Doctrine or Ceremony then she hath departed from her self when she was in her flourishing and best estate and from Christ her Lord and Head Well therefore doth my Reader see that I have gone along with good company in this assertion Although I am not ignorant that some worthy Divines of ours speak otherwise in the height of Zeal denying the Church of Rome to be a true Church to be a Church at all whose contradiction gives colour to this offence But let my Reader know that however their words are opposite yet not their judgement a mutuall understanding shall well accord us in the matter however the terms sound contrary Our old word is Things are as they are taken The difference is in the acception of True and Church both which have much latitude and variety of sense Whiles by True they mean right believing and by Church a company of Faithfull which have the Word of God rightly understood and sincerely preached and the Sacraments duly administred it is no marvell if they say the Church of Rome is neither true nor Church who would who can say otherwise But whiles we mean by a true Church a multitude of Christians professing to agree in the main Principles of Religion how can they but subscribe to us and in this sense yield the Church of Rome both a Church and truely visible So as shortly in a large sense of True Church these Divines cannot but descend to us in a strict sense of both we cannot but ascend to them in fine both agree in the substance whiles the words cross Certainly in effect Master Perkins saith no other whiles he defines his Reformed Catholick to be one that holds the same necessary Heads of Religion with the Romane Church yet so as he pares off and rejects all Errours in Doctrine whereby the same Religion is corrupted wherein that well-allowed Author speaks home to my meaning though in other terms That the Roman Church holds the necessary Heads of Religion gives it a right in my sense to a true Visibilitie that it holds foul Errours whereby the Doctrine is corrupted makes it false in belief whiles it hath a true Being This then may give sufficient light to that passage in my sixth page whereat some have heedlesly stumbled That which I cited from Luther out of Cromerus I finde also alledged by Doctor Field out of Luther himself the words are that under the Papacy is the very kernel of Christianity much good yea all Know Reader the words are Luther's not mine neither doth he say in the Papacy but under it under it indeed to trample upon not to possess or if to possess yet not to injoy Their fault is not in defect of necessary Truths but in excess of superfluous additions Luther explicates himself For his Kernel is the several Articles of Christian belief his all good is Scriptures Sacraments Creeds Councils Fathers all these they have but God knows miserably corrupted That they thus have them is no whit worse for us and little
better for themselves would to God they were theirs as well in true use as in possession It was an ill descant that a nimble Papist made upon those words of Luther which yield them the kernel of Christianity If we have the kernel saith he let them take the shell Soft friend you are too witty Luther did not give you the kernell and reserve us the shell He yielded you both kernell and shell such as it is but the shell rotten the kernell worm-eaten Make much of your kernell but as you have used it it is but a bitter morsel swallow that if you please and save the shell in your pocket Neither think to goe away with an idle misprision We are a true visible Church what need we more why should we wish to be other then we are Alas poor souls a true Visibility may and doth stand with a false Belief Ye may be of a true visible Church and yet never the nearer to Heaven It is your interest in the true mysticall body of Christ that must save your Souls not in the outwardly visible your Errours may be and are no less damnable for that ye are by outward profession Christians yea so much the more Woe is me your danger is more visible then your Church If ye persist wilfully in these gross Corruptions which do by consequent raze that foundation which ye profess to lay ye shall be no less visible spectacles of the wrath of that just God whose Truth and Spirit ye have so stubbornly resisted The God of Heaven open your eyes to see the glorious light of his Truth and draw your hearts to the love of it and make your Church as truely sound as it is truly visible Thus in a desire to stand but so right as I am in all honest judgements I have made this speedy and true Apologie beseeching all Readers in the fear of God before whose bar we shall once give an account of all our overlashings to judge wisely and uprightly of what I have written in a word to doe me but justice in their opinions and when I beg it favour Farewell Reader and God make us Wise and Charitable THE RECONCILER AN EPISTLE PACIFICATORY Of the seeming Differences of Opinion concerning the Trueness and Visibility of the Roman Church By JOS. EXON TO THE Right Honourable and Truly Religious My singular good Lord EDWARD Earl of NORWICH My ever Honoured Lord I Confess my Charity led me into an Errour Your Lordship well knows how apt I am to be overtaken with these better deceits of an over-kinde credulity I had thought that any dash of my Pen in a sudden and easie advertisement might have served to have quitted that ignorant Scandal which was cast upon my mistaken Assertion of the true Visibility of the Romane Church The issue proves all otherwise I finde to my grief that the misunderstanding tenacity of some zealous spirits hath made it a quarrel It cannot but trouble me to see that the Position which is so familiarly current with the best Reformed Divines and which hath been so oft and long since published by me without contradiction yea not without the approbation and applause of the whole representative body of the Clergy of this Kingdom should now be quarrelled and drawn into the detestation of those that know it not As one therefore that should think it corrosive enough that any occasion should be taken by ought of mine to ravell but one thred of that seamless Coat I do earnestly desire by a more full explication to give clear satisfaction to all Readers and by this seasonable Reconcilement to stop the flood-gates of contention I know it will not be unpleasing to your Lordship that through your Honourable and Pious hands these welcome Papers should be transmitted to many Wherein I shall first beseech yea adjure all Christians under whose eyes they shall fall by the dreadful Name of that God who shall judge both the quick and the dead to lay aside all unjust Prejudices and to allow the words of Truth and Peace I dare confidently say Let us be understood and we are agreed The Searcher of all hearts knows how far it was from my thoughts to speak ought in favour of the Romane Synagogue If I have not sufficiently branded that Strumpet I justly suffer Luther's broad word is by me already both safely construed and sufficiently vindicated But do you not say It is a true visible Church Do you not yield some kinde of Communion with these clients of Antichrist What is if this be not Favour Mark well Christian Reader and the Lord give thee understanding in all things To begin with the latter No man can say but the Church of Rome holds some Truths those Truths are God's and in his right ours why should not we challenge our own wheresoever we find it If a very Devil shall say of Christ Thou art the Son of the living God we will snatch this Truth out of his mouth as usurped and in spight of him proclaim it for our own Indeed there is no communion betwixt light and darkness but there is communion betwixt light and light Now all Truth is Light and therefore symbolizeth with it self With that light therefore whose glimmering yet remains in their darkness our clearer light will and must hold communion If they profess Three Persons in one Godhead Two Natures in one Person of Christ shall we detrect to joyn with them in this Christian Verity We abhor to have any Communion with them in their Errours in their Idolatrous or Superstitious practices these are their own not ours If we durst have taken their part in these this breach had not been Now who can but say that we must hate their evil and allow their good It is no countenance to their Errours that we imbrace our own Truths it is no disparagement to our Truths that they have blended them with their Errours Here can be no difference then if this Communion be not mistaken No man will say that we may sever from their common Truths no man will say that we may joyn with them in their hateful Errours For the former He that saith a Thief is truly a man doth he therein favour that Thief He that saith a diseased dropsied dying body is a true though corrupt body doth he favour that Disease or that living carkass It is no other no more that I say of the Church of Rome Trueness of Being and outward Visibility are no praise to her yea these are aggravations to her falshood The advantage that is both sought and found in this Assertion is onely ours as we shall see in the sequel without any danger of their gain I say then that she is a True Church but I say withall she is a false Church True in Existence but false in Belief Let not the homonymie of a word breed jarres where the sense is accorded If we do not yield her the true Being of a Church why do we
doth not cease to be a Wife unless being despoiled of her marriage-ring she be manifestly divorced The Church of Rome therefore is yet the Church of Christ but what manner of Church Surely so corrupted and depraved and with so great tyrannie oppressed that you can neither with a good Conscience partake with them in their holy things nor safely dwell amongst them Thus he again wherein you see he speaks as home for me as I could devise to speak for my self and as appositely professeth to oppose the contrary Look now how this Learned Author may be reconciled to his own pen and by the very same way shall my pen be reconciled with others Either he agrees not with himself or else in his sense I agree with my gainsayers Nothing is more plain then that he in that former speech and all other Classick Authors that speak in that Key mean by a True Church a sound pure right-believing Church so as their vera is rather verax Zanchie explicates the terme whiles he joines veram puram together so as in this construction it is no true Church that is an unsound one as if truth of Existence were all one with truth of Doctrine In this sense whosoever shall say the Church of Rome is a true Church I say he calls evil good and is no better then a teacher of lyes But if we measure the true Being of a Visible Church by the direct maintenance of Fundamental Principles though by consequences indirectly overturned and by the possession of the Word of God and his Sacraments though not without foul adulteration what judicious Christian can but with me subscribe to Learned Zanchius that the Church of Rome hath yet the true Visibility of a Church of Christ What should I need to press the latitude and multiplicity of sense of the word Church there is no one term that I know in all use of Speech so various If in a large sense it be taken to comprehend the Society of all that profess Christian Religion through the whole world howsoever impured who can deny this title to the Roman If in a strict sense it be taken as it is by Zanchius here and all those Divines who refuse to give this style to the Synagogue of Rome for the Company of Elect Faithful men gathered into one mystical Body under one Head Christ washed by his Blood justified by his Merits sanctified by his Spirit conscionably waiting upon the true Ordinances of God in his pure Word and holy Sacraments who can be so shameless as to give this title to the Roman Church Both these sentences then are equally true The Church of Rome is yet a true Church in the first sense The Church of Rome long since ceased to be a true Church in the second As those friendly Souldiers therefore of old said to their fellows 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 why fight we Stay stay dear brethren for Gods sake for his Churches sake for your Souls sake stay these busie and unprofitable litigations put up on both sides your angry pens turn your Swords into Siths to cut down the rank corruptions of the Roman Church and your Spears into Mattocks to beat down the walls of this mystical Babylon There are enemies enough abroad let us be friends at home But if our sense be the same you will ask why our terms varie and why we have chosen to fall upon that manner of expression which gives advantage to the Adversary offence to our own Christian Reader let me beseech thee in the bowels of Christ to weigh well this matter and then tell me why such offence such advantage should be rather given by my words then by the same words in the mouth of Luther of Calvin of Zanchie Junius Plessee Hooker Andrews Field Crakenthorp Bedell and that whole cloud of Learned and Pious Authors who have without exception used the same language and why more by my words now then twentie years agoe at which time I published the same Truth in a more full and liberal expression Wise and charitable Christians may not be apt to take offence where none is given As for any advantage that is hereby given to the Adversaries they may put it in their eye and see never the worse Loe say they we are of the true visible Church this is enough for us why are we forsaken why are we persecuted why are we sollicited to a change Alas poor souls do they not know that Hypocrites leud persons Reprobates are no less members of the true visible Church what gain they by this but a deeper damnation To what purpose did the Jews cry The Temple of the Lord whiles they despited the Lord of that Temple Is the Sea-weed ever the less vile because it is drag'd up together with good fish They are of the visible Church such as it is what is this but to say they are neither Jews nor Turks nor Pagans but misbelievers damnably Heretical in opinion shamefully Idolatrous in practice Let them make their best of this just Eulogie and triumph in this style may we never prosper if we envie them this glorie Our care shall be that besides the Church sensible as Zuinglius distinguisheth we may be of the Church spiritual and not resting in a fruitless Visibility we may finde our selves lively lims of the mystical body of Christ which onely condition shall give us a true right to Heaven whiles fashionable Profession in vain cries Lord Lord and is barred out of those blessed gates with an I know you not Neither may the Reader think that I affect to goe by-waies of speech no I had not taken this path unless I had found it both more beaten and fairer I am not so unwise to teach the Adversary what disadvantage I conceive to be given to our most just Cause by the other manner of explication Let it suffice to say that this form of defence more fully stops the Adversaries mouth in those two main and envious Scandals which he casts upon our holy Religion Defection from the Church and Innovation then which no suggestion hath wont to be more prevalent with weak and ungrounded hearts What we further win by this not more charitable then safe Tenet I had rather it should be silently conceived by the judicious then blazoned by my free pen. Shortly in this state of the Question our gain is as clear as the Adversaries loss our ancient Truth triumphs over their upstart Errours our Charity over their merciless Presumptions Fear not therefore dear Brethren where there is no room for danger suspect not fraud where there is nothing but plain honest simplicity of intentions censure not where there is the same Truth clad in a different but more easie habit of words But if any mans fervent zeal shall rather draw him to the liking of that other rougher and harder way so as in the mean time he keep within the bounds of Christian Charity I tax him not let every man abound
in his own sense onely let our hearts and tongues and hands conspire together in peace with our selves in warre with our common enemies Thus far have I Right Honourable in a desire of peace poured out my self into a plain explication and easie accordance Those whom I strive to satisfie are onely mistakers whose censures if some man would have either laught out or despised yet I have condescended to take off by a serious deprecation and just defence It is an unreasonable motion to request minds prepossessed with Prejudice to hear Reason Whole Volumes are nothing to such as have contented themselves onely to take up Opinions upon trust and will hold them because they know where they had them In vain should I spend my self in beating upon such anviles but for those ingenuous Christians which will hold an eare open for Justice and Truth I have said enough if ought at all needed Alas my Lord I see and grieve to see it it is my Rochet that hath offended and not I in another habit I long since published this and more without dislike it is this colour of innocence that hath bleared some over-tender eyes Wherein I know not whether I should more pity their Errour or applaud my own Sufferings Although I may not say with the Psalmist What hath the righteous done let me I beseech your Lordship upon this occasion have leave to give a little vent to my just grief in this point The other day I fell upon a Latine Pamphlet homely for style tedious for length zealously uncharitable for stuff wherein the Author onely wise in this that he would be unknown in a grave fierceness flies in the face of our English Prelacie not so much inveighing against their Persons which he could be content to reverence as their very Places I blest my self to see the case so altered Heretofore the Person had wont to bear off many blows from the Function now the very Function wounds the Person In what case are we when that which should command respect brands us What black Art hath raised up this spirit of Aerius from his pit Wo is me that zeal should breed such monsters of conceit It is the Honour the Pomp the Wealth the Pleasure he saith of the Episcopal Chair that is guilty of the depravation of our Calling and if himself were so overlay'd with Greatness he should suspect his own Fidelity Alas poor man at what distance doth he see us Foggie Air useth to represent every Object far bigger then it is Our Saviour in his Temptation upon the Mount had only the Glory of those Kingdomes shewed to him by that subtile Spirit not the Cares and vexations Right so are our Dignities exhibited to these envious beholders little do these men see the Toiles and Anxieties that attend this supposedly-pleasing eminence All the revenge that I would wish to this uncharitable Censurer should be this that he might be but for a while adjudged to this so glorious seat of mine that so his experience might taste the bewitching Pleasures of this envied Greatness he should well finde more danger of being over-spent with work then of languishing with ease and delicacy For me I need not appeal to Heaven eyes enough can witness how few free hours I have enjoyed since I put on these Robes of Sacred Honour Insomuch as I could finde in my heart with holy Gregory to complain of my change were it not that I see these publick troubles are so many acceptable services to my God whose Glory is the end of my Being Certainly my Lord if none but earthly respects should sway me I should heartily wish to change this Palace which the Providence of God and the Bounty of my Gracious Soveraign hath put me into for my quiet Cell at Waltham where I had so sweet leisure to enjoy God your Lordship and my self But I have followed the calling of my God to whose service I am willingly sacrificed and must now in an holy obedience to his Divine Majesty with what chearfulness I may ride out all the storms of Envie which unavoidably will alight upon the least appearance of a conceived Greatness In the mean time whatever I may seem to others I was never less in my own apprehensions and were it not for this attendance of Envie could not yield my self any whit greater then I was Whatever I am that good God of mine make me faithfull to him and compose the unquiet spirits of men to a conscionable care of the publick peace with which Prayer together with the apprecation of all happiness to your Lordship and all yours I take leave and am Your Lordships truly devoted in all hearty Observance and Duty JOS. EXON TO THE Right Reverend Father in GOD THOMAS LORD Bishop of Coventry and Litchfield MY Lord may your leisure serve you to read over this poor sheet of Paper and to censure it Your Name is left out in the Catalogue of some other famous Divines mentioned in the body of it that you might not be forestalled I suffer for that wherein your self amongst many renowned Orthodox Doctors of the Church are my partner As if you had not already said it enough I beseech your Lordship say once more what you think of the true Being and Visibility of the Roman Church Your excellent and zealous Writings have justly wone you a constant reputation of great Learning and no less Sincerity and have placed you out of the reach of suspicion No man can no man dare misdoubt your decision If you finde any one word amiss in this Explication spare me not I shall gladly kiss your Rod and hold your utmost severity a favour But if you here meet with no other then the words of a commonly-professed Truth acquit me so far as to say there is no reason I should suffer alone And let the wilfull or ignorant mistakers know that they wound Innocencie and through my sides strike their best friends I should not herein desire you to tender my Fame if the injury done to my name did not reflect upon my holy Station upon my well-meant Labours upon almost all the famous and well-deserving Authors that have stood for the Truth of God and lastly if I did not see this mistaken Quarrell to threaten much prejudice to the Church of God whose Peace is no less dear to us both then our Lives In earnest desire and hope of some few satisfactory lines from your Reverend hand in answer to this my bold yet just suit I take leave and am Your much devoted and loving Brother JOS. EXON TO THE Right Reverend Father in GOD My very good Lord and Brother JOSEPH Lord Bishop of EXON these RIght Reverend and as dearly beloved Brother I have I confess been too long in your Lordships debt for these Letters which are now to Apologize for me that although I had my payment ready and in numeratis at the first reading of your Reconciler yet I reserved my Answer untill I had perused
the two other Books and seconds that so I might return my payment cum foenore In that your Lordships Tractate I could not but observe the lively Image of your self that is according to the generall interpretation of all sound Professours of the Gospel of christ of a most Orthodox Divine And now remembring the Accordance your Lordship hath with others touching the Argument of your Book I must needs reflect upon my self who have long since defended the same Point in the defence of many others I do therefore much blame the Petulcity of whatsoever Author that should dare to impute a Popish affection to him whom besides his excellent Writings and Sermons God's visible eminent and resplendent Graces of Illumination Zeal Piety and Eloquence have made truely Honourable and glorious in the Church of Christ Let me say no more I suffer in your suffering not more in consonancy of Judgement then in the sympathy of my Affection Goe on dear Brother with your deserved Honour in God's Church with holy courage knowing that the dirty feet of an adversary the more they tread and rub the more lustre they give the figure graven in Gold Our Lord Jesus preserve us to the glory of his saving Grace Your Lordships unanimous friend and Brother THO. Covent and Litchfield TO THE Right Reverend Father in GOD JOHN LORD Bishop of SALISBURY MY Lord I send you this little Pamphlet for your censure It is not credible how strangely I have been traduced every where for that which I conceive to be the common Opinion of Reformed Divines yea of reasonable men that is for affirming the true Being and Visibility of the Roman Church You see how clearly I have endeavoured to explicate this harmless Position yet I perceive some tough misunderstandings will not be satisfied Your Lordship hath with great reputation spent many years in the Divinity-Chair of the famous University of Cambridge Let me therefore beseech you whose Learning and Sincerity is so throughly approved in God's Church that you would freely how shortly soever express your self in this Point and if you finde that I have deviated but one hairs breadth from the Truth correct me if not free me by your just Sentence What need I to intreat you to pity those whose desires of faithful offices to the Church of God are unthankfully repaied with Suspicion and Slander whose may not this case be I had thought I had sufficiently in all my Writings and in this very last Book of mine whence this quarrell is picked shewed my fervent zeal for God's Truth against that Antichristian Faction of Rome and yet I doubt not but your own ears can witness what I have suffered Yea as if this calumny were not enough there want not those whose secret whisperings cast upon me the foul aspersions of another Sect whose name is as much hated as little understood My Lord you know I had a place with you though unworthy in that famous Synod of Dort where howsoever sickness bereaved me of the houres of a conclusive Subscription yet your Lordship heard me with equall vehemency to the rest crying down the unreasonableness of that way God so love me as I do the tranquillity and happiness of his Church yet can I not so overaffect it that I would sacrifice one dram of Truth to it To that good God do I appeal as the witness of my sincere heart to his whole Truth and no-less-then-ever-zealous detestation of all Popery and Pelagianisme Your Lordship will be pleased to pardon this importunity and to vouchsafe your speedy Answer to Your much devoted and faithfull Brother JOS. EXON TO THE Right Reverend Father in GOD JOSEPH Lord Bishop of EXON these My LORD YOU desire my Opinion concerning an Assertion of yours whereat some have taken offence The Proposition was this That the Roman Church remains yet a True Visible Church The occasion which makes this an ill-sounding Proposition in the ears of Protestants especially such as are not throughly acquainted with School Distinctions is the usuall acception of the word True in our English Tongue For though men skilled in Metaphysicks hold it for a Maxime Ens Verum Bonum convertuntur yet with us he which shall affirm such a one is a true Christian a true Gentleman a true Scholar or the like he is conceived not onely to adscribe Trueness of Being unto all these but those due Qualities or requisite Actions whereby they are made commendable or praise-worthy in their severall kinds In this sense the Roman Church is no more a True Church in respect of Christ or those due Qualities and proper Actions which Christ requires then an arrant Whore is a true and loyall Wife unto her Husband I durst upon mine oath be one of your Compurgators that you never intended to adorn that Strumpet with the title of a true Church in this meaning But your own Writings have so fully cleared you herein that suspicion it self cannot reasonably suspect you in this Point I therefore can say no more concerning your mistaken Proposition then this If in that Treatise wherein it was delivered the Antecedents or Consequents were such as served fitly to lead the Reader into that Sense which under the word True comprehendeth onely Truth of Being or Existencie and not the due Qualities of the thing or Subject you have been causelesly traduced But on the other side if that Proposition comes in ex abrupto or stands solitarie in your Discourse you cannot marvell though by taking the word True according to the more ordinarie acception your true meaning was mistaken In brief your Proposition admits a true sense and in that sense is by the best Learned in our Reformed Church not disallowed For the Being of a Church does principally stand upon the gracious action of God calling men out of Darkness and Death unto the Participation of Light and Life in Christ Jesus So long as God continues this Calling unto any people though they as much as in them lies darken this Light and corrupt the means which should bring them to Life and Salvation in Christ yet where God calls men unto the Participation of Life in Christ by the Word and by the Sacraments there is the true Being of a Christian Church let men be never so false in their Expositions of God's Word or never so untrustie in mingling their own Traditions with God's Ordinances Thus the Church of the Jews lost not her Being of a Church when she became an Idolatrous Church And thus under the government of the Scribes and Pharisees who voided the Commandements of God by their own Traditions there was yet standing a true Church in which Zacharias Elizabeth the Virgin Mary and our Saviour himself was born who were members of that Church and yet participated not in the Corruptions thereof Thus to grant that the Romane was and is a True Visible Christian Church though in Doctrine a False and in Practice an Idolatrous Church is a true Assertion and of greater
of muck but beaten down and burned with the fire of Gods Word the walls of Wood Hay Stubble which the Babylonian builders had raised upon the old Foundation which is Christ Jesus and edified upon it a fair Palace of Silver Gold precious Stones This same is the Opinion also of my Collegues of the French Church of this City of London If any self-conceited Christian thinketh this an advantage rather then a disparagement and disgrace to that punk the Roman Church and taketh thereby occasion to persevere to be her Bawd or Stallion and to run a whoring with her I say with the Psalmist The wicked hath left off to be wise and to doe good and with the Angel He that is unjust let him be unjust still and he which is filthy let him be filthy still For neither must an honest heart speak a lie for the good that may come of it nor conceal in time and place a necessary Truth for any evil that may insue of it If it harden more and more the flinty hearts of some unto death it will soften and melt the iron hearts of others unto life that seeing among us the mud and dirt of humane Traditions wherewith the Pope and his Clergy had furred and soiled the bright-shining glasse of the Gospel wiped away from this heavenly mirror of God's favour they may come unto us and beholding with open face as in a glasse the glory of the Lord may be changed with us into the same image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord. Which last effect I pray with my heart your Reconciler may have with those that are children of Peace And so recommending your Lordship with all your learned eloquent sound and usefull Labours to Gods most powerfull blessing and my self to the continuance of your godly Prayers and old Friendship I remain for ever Your Lordships most humble and affectionate Servant GILBERT PRIMROSE From London the 26. of February 1629. To my Worthy and much respected Friend Mr. H. CHOLMLEY MAster Cholmley I have perused your Learned and full Reply to Master Burton's Answer wherein you have in a judicious eye abundantly righted your self and cleared a just Cause so as the Reader would wonder where an Adversary might finde ground to raise an opposition But let me tell you were iâ— a Book written by the Pen of an Angel from Heaven in this Subject I should doubt whether to wish it publick How true how just soever the plea be I finde such is the self-love and partiality of our corrupt nature the quarrell is inlarged by multiplying of words When I see a Fire quenched with Oyle I will expect to see a Controversie of this nature stinted by publick altercation New matter still rises in the agitation gives hint to a fore-resolved Opposite of a fresh disquisition So as we may sooner see an end of the common Peace then of an unkindly jarre in the Church especially such a one as is fomented with a mistaken Zeal on the one side and with a confidence of Knowledge on the other Silence hath sometimes quieted such like mis-raised brabbles never interchange of words This very Question was on foot some forty years agoe in the hote chace of great Authors but whether through the ingenuity of the parties or some over-ruling act of Divine Providence it soon died without noise so I wish it may now doe Rather let the weaker Title goe away with the last word then the Church shall be distracted For that Position of mine which occasioned your Vindication you see it sufficiently abetted and determined by so Reverend Authority as admits no exception I dare say no Learned Divine of our own Church or the forain can but subscribe in this our sense to the Judgement of these Worthies To draw forth therefore this cord of contention to any further length were no lesse needlesse then prejudiciall to the publick peace He is not worthy to be satisfied that will yet wrangle As for those Personall aspersions that are cast upon you by Malice be perswaded to despise them These Western parts where your reputation is deservedly pretious know your zeal for Gods Truth no lesse fervent though better governed then the most fiery of your Censurers No man more hateth Popish Superstition onely your fault is that you do not more hate Errour then Injustice and cannot abide wrong measure offered to the worst enemy Neither be you troubled with that idle exprobration of a Prebendary retribution who would care for a contumely so void of truth God knows that worthlesse gift was conferred upon you ere this task came into either of our thoughts and whoso knows the entire respects betwixt us from our very Cradles till this day may well think that a Prebend of three pounds by the year need not goe for a Fee where there is so much and so ancient cause of dearness I am sorry to see such rancour under the coat of Zeal Surely nothing but mere Malice can be guilty of this charge no lesse then of that other envious challenge of your decay of Graces of falling from your first Love from industry to ease from a weekly to a monethly preaching when those that know the state of your Tiverton the four-parted division of that charge and your forced confinement to your own day by publick authority both Spirituall and Temporall must needs acquit you and cry down the wrong of an accuser As for the vigour of Gods good Graces in you both common and sanctifying all the Country are your ample witnesses I that have interknown you from our childhood cannot but professe to finde the entrance of your age no lesse above the best of your youth in abilities then in time and still no lesse fruitfull in promises of increase then in eminent performances What need I urge this your Adversaries do enough feel your worth So as to speak seriously I cannot sufficiently wonder at the liberty of those men who professing a strict conscience of their wayes dare let their Pens or Tongues loose to so injurious and uncharitable a detraction whereof they know the just avenger is in Heaven It should not be thus betwixt Brethren no not with Enemies For the main business there wants not confidence on either side I am appealed to by both an unmeet Judge considering my so deep ingagements But if my umpierage may stand I award an eternall silence to both parts Sit down in peace then you and your worthy Second whose young ripeness and modest and learned discourse is worthy of better entertainment then contempt and let your zealous Opponents say that you have overcome your selves in a resolved cessation of Pens and them in a love of Peace Farewell from Your loving Friend and ancient Collegue JOS. EXON OCCASIONALL MEDITATIONS BY JOS. EXON Set forth by R. H. TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE My very good Lord JAMES Lord Viscount Doncaster Right Honourable FInding these Papers amongst others lying aside
other services it failed me not now that I have rested upon it I finde cause to complain It is no trusting to an arm of flesh on whatsoever occasion we put our confidence therein this reliance will be sure to end in pain and disappointment O God thine arm is strong and mighty all thy Creatures rest themselves upon that and are comfortably sustained Oh that we were not more capable of distrust then thine Omnipotent hand is of weariness and subduction LXVII Upon the Sparks flying upward IT is a feeling comparison that of Job of man born to labour as the sparks to flie upward That motion of theirs is no other then natural neither is it otherwise for man to labour his Minde is created active and apt to some or other Ratiocination his Joynts all stirring his Nerves made for helps of moving and his occasions of living call him forth to action So as an idle man doth not more want Grace then degenerate from Nature Indeed at the first kindling of the fire some sparks are wont by the impulsion of the bellows to flie forward or sideward and even so in our first Age youthly vanity may move us to irregular courses but when those first violences are overcome and we have attained to a setledness of disposition our sparks flie up our life is labour And why should we not doe that which we are made for Why should not God rather grudge us our Being then we grudge him our work It is no thank to us that we labour out of necessity Out of my Obedience to thee O God I desire ever to be imployed I shall never have comfort in my toil if it be rather a purveyance for my self then a Sacrifice to thee LXVIII Upon the sight of a Raven I Cannot see that Bird but I must needs think of Eliah and wonder no lesse at the Miracle of his Faith then of his Provision It was a strong belief that carried him into a desolate retiredness to exspect food from Ravens This fowl we know is ravenous all is too little that he can forage for himself and the Prophets Reason must needs suggest to him that in a drie barren Desart bread flesh must be great dainties yet he goes aside to exspect victuals from that purveyance He knew this Fowl to be no lesse greedy then unclean unclean as in Law so in the nature of his feed what is his ordinary prey but loathsome carrion Yet since God had appointed him this Caterer he stands not upon the nice points of a fastidious squeamishness but confidently depends upon that uncouth provision And accordingly those unlikely purveyors bring him bread and flesh in the Morning and bread and flesh in the Evening Not one of those hungry Ravens could swallow one morsell of those viands which were sent by them to a better mouth The River of Cherith sooner failed him then the tender of their service No doubt Eliah's stomack was often up before that his incurious diet came when exspecting from the mouth of his Cave out of what coast of Heaven these his Servitors might be descried upon the sight of them he magnified with a thankfull heart the wonderfull Goodness and Truth of his God and was nourished more with his Faith then with his Food O God how infinite is thy Providence Wisdome Power We creatures are not what we are but what thou wilt have us when thy turn is to be served we have none of our own Give me but Faith and doe what thou wilt LXIX Upon a Worm IT was an homely expression which God makes of the state of his Church Fear not thou Worm Jacob. Every foot is ready to tread on this despised creature Whiles it kept it self in that cold obscure Cell of the Earth wherein it was hidden it lay safe because it was secret but now that it hath put it self forth of that close Cave and hath presented it self to the light of the Sun to the eye of Passengers how is it vexed with the scorching beams and wrings up and down in an helplesse perplexity not finding where to shrowd it self how obnoxious is it to the fowls of the aire to the feet of men and beasts He that made this creature such and calls his Church so well knew the answerableness of their condition How doth the world overlook and contemn that little flock whose best guard hath ever been secrecy And if ever that despicable number have dared to shew it self how hath it been scorched and trampled upon and entertained with all variety of Persecution O Saviour thy Spouse fares no otherwise then thy self to match her fully thou hast said of thy self I am a Worm and no man Such thou wert in thine humbled estate here on earth such thou wouldest be But as it is a true word that he who made the Angels in Heaven made also the worms on earth so it is no lesse true that he who made himself and his Church Worms upon Earth hath raised our Nature in his Person above the Angels and our Person in his Church to little lesse then Angels It matters not how we fare in this valley of tears whiles we are sure of that infinite amends of Glory above LXX Upon the putting on of his Cloaths WHat a poor thing were Man if he were not beholden to other creatures The Earth affords him flax for his linen bread for his belly the Beasts his ordinary Cloaths the Silk-worm his bravery the back and bowels of the earth his metalls and fewell the Fishes Fowls Beasts his nourishment His wit indeed works upon all these to improve them to his own advantage but they must yield him materials else he subsists not And yet we fools are proud of our selves yea proud of the cast suits of the very basest Creatures There is not one of them that have so much need of us They would enjoy themselves the more if Man were not O God the more we are sensible of our own indigence the more let us wonder at thine All-sufficiency in thy self and long for that happy condition wherein thou which art all perfection shalt be all in all to us LXXI Upon the sight of a great Library WHat a world of Wit is here pack'd up together I know not whether this sight doth more dismay or comfort me It dismaies me to think that here is so much that I cannot know it comforts me to think that this variety yields so good helps to know what I should There is no truer word then that of Solomon There is no end of making many Books this sight verifies it there is no end indeed it were pity there should God hath given to man a busie Soul the agitation whereof cannot but through time and experience work out many hidden Truths to suppresse these would be no other then injurious to Mankinde whose Mindes like unto so many Candles should be kindled by each other The thoughts of our deliberation are most accurate these we vent into our Papers
what a task the Stomack must be put to in the concoction of so many mixtures I am not so austerely scrupulous as to deny the lawfulnesse of these abundant provisions upon just occasions I finde my Saviour himself more then once at a Feast this is recorded as well as his one long Fast Doubtlesse our bountifull God hath given us his creatures not for necessity only but for pleasure but these Exceedings would be both rare and moderate and when they must be require no lesse Patience then Temperance Might I have my option O God give me rather a little with peace and love He whose provision for every day was thirty measures of fine Flower and threescore measures of Meal thirty Oxen an hundred Sheep besides Venison and Fowl yet can pray Give me the Bread of sufficiency Let me have no perpetuall Feast but a good Conscience and from these great preparations for the health both of Soul and Body let me rise rather hungry then surcharged LXXXII Upon the hearing of a Lute well played on THere may be for ought we know infinite inventions of Art the possibility whereof we should hardly ever believe if they were fore-reported to us Had we lived in some rude and remote part of the World and should have been told that it is possible only by an hollow piece of Wood and the guts of Beasts stirred by the fingers of men to make so sweet and melodious a noise we should have thought it utterly incredible yet now that we see and hear it ordinarily done we make it no wonder It is no marvell if we cannot fore-imagine what kinde and means of Harmony God will have used by his Saints and Angels in Heaven when these poor matters seem so strange to our conceits which yet our very Senses are convinced of O God thou knowest infinite wayes to glorifie thy self by thy Creatures which do far transcend our weak and finite capacities Let me wonder at thy Wisdome and Power and be more awfull in my Adorations then curious in my Inquiries LXXXIII Upon the sight and noise of a Peacock I See there are many kinds of Hypocrites of all Birds this makes the fairest shew and the worst noise so as this is an Hypocrite to the Eye There are others as the Black-bird that looks foul and sooty but sings well this is an Hypocrite to the Eare. There are others that please us well both in their shew and voice but are crosse in their carriage and condition as the Popingay whose colours are beautifull and noise delightfull yet is it apt to doe mischief in scratching and biting any hand that comes neare it these are Hypocrites both to the Eye and Eare. Yet there is a degree further beyond the example of all brute Creatures of them whose shew whose words whose actions are fair but their hearts are foul and abominable No outward Beauty can make the Hypocrite other then odious For me let my Profession agree with my words my words with my actions my actions with my heart and let all of them be approved of the God of Truth LXXXIIII Upon a penitent Malefactor I Know not whether I should more admire the Wisdome or the Mercy of God in his proceedings with Men. Had not this man sinned thus notoriously he hâ—d never been thus happy whiles his courses were fair and civil yet he was gracelesse now his miscarriage hath drawn him into a just Affliction his Affliction hath humbled him God hath taken this advantage of his Humiliation for his Conversion Had not one foot slipt into the mouth of Hell he had never been in this forwardnesse to Heaven There is no man so weak or foolish as that he hath not strength or wit enough to sin or to make ill use of his sin It is only the goodness of an infinite God that can make our sin good to us though evil in it self O God it is no thank to our selves or to our sins that we are bettered with evill the Work is thine let thine be the Glory LXXXV Upon the sight of a Lilly THis must needs be a goodly Flower that our Saviour hath singled out to compare with Solomon and that not in his ordinary dresse but in all his Royalty Surely the earth had never so glorious a King as he Nature yielded nothing that might set forth Royall magnificence that he wanted yet he that made both Solomon and this Flower sayes that Solomon in all his Royalty was not clad like it What a poor thing is this earthly Bravery that is so easily overmatched How ill judges are we of outward Beauties that contemn these goodly Plants which their Creator thus magnifies and admire those base Metals which he in comparison hereof contemns If it be their transitorinesse that embaseth them what are we All flesh is Grasse and all the glory of man as the flower of Grasse As we cannot be so brave so we cannot be more permanent O God let it be my ambition to walk with thee hereafter in white Could I put on a robe of Stars here with proud Herod that glittering garment could not keep me from Lice or Worms Might I sit on a Throne of Gold within an house of Ivory I see I should not compare with this Flower I might be as transitory I should not be so beautifull What matters it whether I goe for a Flower or a Weed here whethersoever I must wither Oh thou which art greater then Solomon do thou cloath me with thy perfect Righteousnesse so shall I flourish for ever in the Courts of the House of my God LXXXVI Upon the sight of a Coffin stuck with Flowers TOO fair appearance is never free from just suspicion Whiles here was nothing but mere Wood no Flower was to be seen here now that this Wood is lined with an unsavoury Corps it is adorned with this sweet variety The Firre whereof that Coffin is made yields a naturall redolence alone now that it is stuffed thus noisomely all helps are too little to countervail that sent of corruption Neither is it otherwise in the Living Perpetual use of strong perfumes argues a guiltiness of some unpleasing savour The case is the same Spiritually an over-glorious outside of Profession implies some inward filthinesse that would fain escape notice Our uncomely parts have more comelinesse put on Too much Ornament imports extreme deformity For me let my shew be moderate so shall I neither deceive applause nor merit too deep censure LXXXVII Upon the view of the World IT is a good thing to see this materiall World but it is a better thing to think of the intelligible World This thought is the sight of the Soul whereby it discerneth things like it self Spirituall and Immortall which are so much beyond the worth of these sensible Objects as a Spirit is beyond a Body a pure substance beyond a corruptible an infinite God above a finite Creature O God how great a word is that which the Psalmist sayes of thee that
illis ingluviosis quibus cingitur raso capite ministris solis vivere fas est Occipite caeco edictis vetare ne quisquam hic faxit oletum sacra capita reprehendat Nam vos Romulidae vobis ignoscitis quae Turpia Cerdoni Papam sacrósque decebunt Presbyteros At Tu Antistes Dignissime eos liberâ ad URBANUM responsione liberas doces audire voces ingratiis discere in Anglia mutire fas esse sine scrobe altâ voce exclamare Auriculas Asini Papam Cardinales habere Quantum autem ego fideli erga me amicitiae tuae debeam Reverende Pater quod mihi homini privato tantus Eruditione Pietate Dignitate Praesul Responsionem illam inscribere voluisti nec rudi calamo exprimere nec linguâ inexplanatâ expromere nec impari mente consequi possum Scilicet ut Episcopum decet tui semper similis es id est optimus Honores novos adeptus veterem amicitiam non deponis magnus licet sis omniumque bonorum votis minor ad minima te demittis Quod verò electissimum Scriptum meo arbitrio stare aut cadere prodire aut latere malignâ ignis flammâ extingui aut praeclarâ doctorum luce frui publici juris aut in mei solius bonis esse jubes id verò Modestiae est tuae quae inter multas claras Virtutes quae in te maximae sunt clarissimae in scriptis in voce in vultu in oculis in composito mentis habitu in tota vita tua fulgentibus micat radiis velut inter ignes Luna minores Macte istâ morum suavitate quâ operto vivens ostio facta tua omnia ad Pietatis rectae Rationis obrussam exigis Macte isto viri boni charactere qui Index ipse sui totum se explorat ad unguem Quid proceres vanique ferat quid opinio vulgi Securus Teque ipsum semper verens omnium quotquot te novere quique tuos in scriptis nitida oratione pellucentes mores vidêre amorem tibi conciliasti Macte iterum atque iterum praeclarae Eruditionis gloriâ altissimâ rerum Divinarum Humanarum scientiâ literatissimis variarum disciplinarum monumentis quibus tibi jure merito jucundi nervosi Oratoris Christiani Senecae clarissimi doctissimi Theologi nomen comparasti Quod vivet seclis innumerabilibus Sed age eat Qui dono meus est bonus libellus Qui Auro est carior aureus libellus Eat pedibus celer per Alpium aeternis horrentium nivibus invias rupes per Apennini ardua praerupta juga viam sibi faciat Arcem Sanctangeli velox conscendat Angelo Satanae Urbi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 securè procul extra teli jactum incubanti in faciem narret esse in Anglia Episcopos haud paucos qui inhumanae infestae pecori lupae sub ovina pelle Regibus populo Christiano Romae horrendae lac ferinum immulgenti personam alienam detrahere bestiam ovium sanguinis sitientem à Christi caulis arcere Ecclesiae laeta pura pascua à turpi spumantium Aprorum dente foedo lutulentarum Suum rostro pura intemerata conservare Aesopicam corniculam PETRI PAULI plumis insolescentem furtivis coloribus nudare Cuculi Romani qui Christianos omnes pro Currucis habet ova in ipso Dei Templo posita pertundere Meretricem Babylonicam Christiani nominis cerussâ minio fucatam traducere possint quia Doctissimi velint quia Integerrimi faciant quia Vigilantissimi Atque ut odor illa morte in mortem sit quia RESIPISCERE dedidicit denuncietut tota men te atque omnibus artubus contremiscat appetente jam die illo decretorio quo ardebit BABYLON Meretricis magnae negotiatores adulteri omnes lugebunt Diabolus mundi seductor Bestia Pseudopropheâ—a in stagnum ignis sulphuris praecipites abibunt aeternas justè irato Numini poenas daturi Filiumque perditionis Dignus principio exitus exodiumque sequetur Interea temporis veni Domine Jesu veni Antichristum se truci in unctos tuos rabie efferentem comprime Hostibus tuis qui asperum paternae castigationis tuae vinum nobis plenis cyathis educendum dedêre acinosas pannosas indignationis tuae faeces plenis doliis exhauriendas invitis reluctantibus porrige Captivam Sionis Filiam ferreo Aagyptiacae servitutis jugo oppressam liberali causa manu assere LUDOVICI Regis fulgentes hastas coruscantes enses arma mortali fulgore crispantia tormentorum bellicorum horrisona fulmina in ipsum Pseudoprophetam lutosos BABYLONIS muros converte ut fatidicum vatem veri nescium sua sibi mala laevâ mente verè profatum esse pudeat poeniteat Ecclesiis transmarinis solidam pacem subdolis ereptamartibus restitue Damna nos voti hanc quâ Major Britannia tuo solius beneficio fruitur pacem tranquillitatem nobis fidam posteris verò nostris perpetuam praesta Huic autem aureo libello da ut vivat vigeatque Antichristo Principum invidiam conflaturus Ecclesiae tuae almam pacem coagmentaturus Ejusque autori largire beneficus ut vitâ honestissimè sanctissimè in terris actà coelo potiatur ubi tecum Immortali aevo summa cum pace fruatur AMEN The End Rom. 11. 33. Matth. 17. 14. compared with Mar. 9. 14. Luc. 4. 31. compared with 38. Vide Chap. 10. ver 31 39. For the full explicatioÌ„ whereof I referre my Reader to my Passion SermoÌ„ wherein the particularities are largely discussed Gal. 4. 9. 1 Chron. 15â—2 Psal 6. 1. Psal 12. 1. Psal 3â— 23. Vers 7. Prov. 31. 29. Jer. 15. 10. Dan. 9. 16 19. 1. Tim. 3.16 Jer. 6. 26. Epist 120. ad Honoratum No Creature is more humble then God The Temple of the Lord. Neat in words if foul in fact Heavy ear Deaf ear Herod within John without Either all or none at all The whole world is set in evil Wickedness blinds the understanding The right hand of the most High They told truth and yet lyed My dove my fair one In the wounds of Christ 1 Joh. 2. 17. In librum Sapientia Ecclus 10. 13. Esay 21. 11. Bellarm. Recogn Nic. l. 2. â— 25. Act. 19. 29. 2 Cor. 11. 24. De Ira Dei l. 1. c. 7. Jer. 15. 10. Epist 23. John 14. 27. Adrichom desc Hiero. foi fig. 192. a Faciunt favos vespae faciuÌ„t Ecclesias Marcionita Tertull. advers Marcion lib. 4. cap. 5. b Ecclefiae nomeÌ„ consensus concordiaeque est Chrylost com in Ep. ad Gai. c Sit inter nos una fides illico pax scquetur Hier. advers Ruff. d Erasm Epist lib. 20. Pauâ—o Decimario e 1 Cor. 11. 19. f Victor Peâ—sar Atric lib. 5. Spalat de histor Eccles toâ—n ult lib. 7. Melancht Postil de Baptismo Christ Diog. Laert. Hooker Eccles Pol. lib. 4. â— 3. a Commentar in
where they finde possession never look after right Our Saviour had pick'd out the Sabbath for this Cure It is hard to finde out any time wherein Charity is unseasonable As Mercy is an excellent Grace so the works of it are fittest for the best day We are all born blinde the Font is our Siloam no day can come amisse but yet God's day is the properest for our washing and recovery This alone is quarrel enough to these scrupulous wranglers that an act of Mercy was done on that day wherein their envie was but seasonable I do not see the man beg any more when he once had his eyes no Burger in Jerusalem was richer then he I hear him stoutly defending that gracious author of his Cure against the cavils of the malicious Pharisees I see him as a resolute Confessour suffering excommunication for the name of Christ and maintaining the innocence and honour of so Blessed a benefactor I hear him read a Divinity Lecture to them that sate in Moses his chair and convincing them of blindness who punish'd him for seeing How can I but envie thee O happy man who of a Patient provest an Advocate for thy Saviour whose gain of bodily sight made way for thy Spiritual eyes who hast lost a Synagogue and hast found Heaven who being abandoned of Sinners art received of the Lord of Glory The stubborn Devil ejected HOW different how contrary are our conditions here upon earth Whiles our Saviour is transfigured on the Mount his Disciples are perplexed in the valley Three of his choice Followers were with him above ravished with the miraculous proofs of his Godhead nine other were troubled with the business of a stubborn Devil below Much people was met to attend Christ and there they will stay till he come down from Tabor Their zeal and devotion brought them thither their patient perseverance held them there We are not worthy the name of his clients if we cannot painfully seek him and submissely wait his leisure He that was now awhile retired into the Mount to confer with his Father and to receive the attendance of Moses and Elias returns into the valley to the multitude He was singled out awhile for prayer and contemplation now he was joyned with the multitude for their miraculous cure and Heavenly instruction We that are his spiritual agents must be either preparing in the mount or exercising in the valley one while in the mount of Meditation in the valley of Action another alone to study in the assembly to preach here is much variety but all is work Moses when he came down from the hill heard Musick in the valley Christ when he came down from the hill heard discord The Scribes it seems were setting hard upon the Disciples they saw Christ absent nine of his train left in the valley those they flie upon As the Devil so his Imps watch close for all advantages No subtile enemy but will be sure to attempt that part where is likelihood of least defence most weakness When the Spouse misses him whom her Soul loveth every watchman hath a buffet for her O Saviour if thou be never so little stept aside we are sure to be assaulted with powerful Temptations They that durst say nothing to the Master so soon as his back is turned fall foul upon his weakest Disciples Even at the first hatching the Serpent was thus crafty to begin at the weaker vessell experience and time hath not abated his wit If he still work upon silly Women laden with divers lusts upon rude and ungrounded Ignorants it is no other then his old wont Our Saviour upon the skirts of the hill knew well what was done in the plain and therefore hasts down to the rescue of his Disciples The clouds and vapors do not sooner scatter upon the Sun's breaking forth then these cavils vanish at the presence of Christ in stead of opposition they are straigth upon their knees here are now no quarrells but humble salutations and if Christ's question did not force theirs the Scribes had found no tongue Doubtlesse there were many eager Patients in this throng none made so much noise as the father of the Demoniack Belike upon his occasion it was that the Scribes held contestation with the Disciples If they wrangled he fues and that from his knees Whom wil not need make both humble and eloquent The case was wofull and accordingly expressed A son is a dear name but this was his only son Were his grief ordinary yet the sorrow were the lesse but he is a fearfull spectacle of judgment for he is Lunatick Were this Lunacy yet merely from a natural distemper it were more tolerable but this is aggravated by the possession of a cruell spirit that handles him in a most grievous manner Yet were he but in the rank of other Demoniacks the discomfort were more easie but lo this spirit is worse then all other his fellows others are usually dispossessed by the Disciples this is beyond their power I be sought thy Disciples to cast him out but they could not therefore Lord have thou mercy on my Son The despair of all other helps sends us importunately to the God of power Here was his refuge the strong man had gotten possession it was only the stronger then he that can eject him O God spiritual wickednesses have naturally seized upon our Souls all humane helps are too weak only thy Mercy shall improve thy Power to our deliverance What bowels could chuse but yearn at the distresse of this poor young man Phrensy had taken his brain that Disease was but health in comparison of the tyrannical possession of that evil spirit wherewith it was seconded Out of Hell there could not be a greater misery his Senses are either berest or else left to torment him he is torn and racked so as he foams and gnashes he pines and languishes he is cast sometimes into the fire sometimes into the water How that malitious Tyrant rejoices in the mischief done to the creature of God Had earth had any thing more pernicious then fire and water thither had he been thrown though rather for torture then dispatch It was too much favour to die at once O God with how deadly enemies hast thou matched us Abate thou their power since their malice will not be abated How many think of this case with pity and horror and in the mean time are insensible of their own fearfuller condition It is but oftentimes that the Devil would cast this young man into a temporary fire he would cast the sinner into an eternal fire whose everlasting burnings have no intermissions No fire comes amisse to him the fire of Affliction the fire of Lust the fire of Hell O God make us apprehensive of the danger of our sin and secure from the fearfull issue of sin All these very same effects follow his spiritual possession How doth he tear and rack them whom he vexes and distracts with inordinate cares and sorrows How