he only made a shew of faith which he never had Why so Quia Lucas aperte testatur eum credidisse because S. Luke affirms that he did believe being convinced by the signs and miracles which S. Philip wrought as many others of Samaria at the same time were And yet no doubt but Simon Magus was a Reprobate a man rejected by the Lord in regard of his wickedness and that his heart was not right in the sight of God and afterwards an author of such mischief in the Church of God that Ignatius who lived neer those times very rightly cals him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first begotten of the Devil The like mâ—y be affirmed also of Alexander Hymeneus and Philetus who had been made partakers of the Faith of CHRIST and were zealous in it for the time but afterwards made shipwrack of it denying amongst other Articles of the Christian faith that of the resurrection of the dead and thereby overthrowing the faith of some Men questionless given over to a reprobate sense or else we may be well assured St. Paul had never given them over to the hands of Satan as it is plain he did But what need search be made into these particulars when Calvin himself affirms in general Reprobis fidem tribui eosdem interdum simili fere sensu atque Electos affici eosque merito dici Deum sibi propitium credere c. that Faith is given unto the Reprobate that sometimes they are touched with the like sense of Gods grace as the Elect ones are and may deservedly be said to believe that God is favourable and propitious to them God sometimes makes the Sun of Righteousness as well as the Sun of Heaven to shine on the evil and on the good Which notwithstanding Faith is called and that most properly Fides Electorum the Faith of Gods Elect in that and other places of the Book of God because the fruits thereof are in them more visible the confession of the same more fervent the seeds thereof more fastly rooted and the fruit more durable For which cause possibly the Apostle doth there join together the faith of Gods Elect and the knowledge of the truth which is after godliness Which is indeed the special difference which is between the faith of the Elect and the faith of the Reprobates For if the fruit be unto holiness no question but the end thereof will be life everlasting It is not then the weakness or the want of faith which doth alone exclude the Reprobate from the Kingdom of Heaven and make him finally uncapable of the grace and favour of the Lord in the day of judgement but the want of a good conscience in the sight of God And therefore if we mark it well St. Peter did not charge it upon Simon Magus that he wanted faith or that his faith was only a dissembled hypocritical faith upbraiding him as formerly Ananias in another case that he had not only lyed unto men but unto God but that he was in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity not having his heart right in the sight of God Nor did St. Paul accuse the said three Apostates that they never had received the faith or that the faith which they received was not true and real but that first having put away a good conscience they afterwards made shipwrack of the faith also blaspheming God and scattering abroad their dangerous errours to the seducing of their brethren If Simon had repented of his wickedness as St. Peter advised it may be charitably supposed that the thoughts of his heart had been forgiven him And Hymeneus and Alexander if they had made good use of the Apostles censure when he delivered them unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh no question but their spirits might have been saved in the day of the Lord IESUS Which may suffice for answer to the first objection touching the faith of reprobates as they use to call them whose firm assent to supernatural truths revealed makes them not inheritable to the Kingdom of Heaven because they hold the truth revealed in unrighteousness and so become without excuse as St. Paul tels us in another case of the antient Gentiles The next Objection is that if this phrase in Deum credere import no more then this that there is a God and that all his words are Divine truths and all the world the workmanship of his hands alone the Devils do belieue as much as St. Iames assures us Thou believest saith he that there is one God thou dost well the Devils also believe and tremble Iam. 1.19 The answer unto this is easie St. Iames assures us of the Devils that they believe there is one God but doth withall assure us this that this belief of theirs confirms them in the certainty and foreknowledge of their everlasting damnation the apprehension of the which produceth nothing in them but fear and horrour The Devils do believe that there is a God and that this God is just in all his actions and righteous in all his ways unchangeable in his Decrees Yesterday and to day and the same for ever What other comfort can they reap from this faith of theirs but that being once condemned by God to eternal fire they are reserved in everlasting chains under darkness to the judgement of the great and terrible day For knowing that the judgements of the Lord are just and his doom unchangeable they must needs know withall the certainty of their own damnation or else they cannot properly be affirmed to believe this truth that there is a God And as they do believe that there is a God so they believe also that he is the Maker of heaven and earth For being at the first created by Almighty God with so great perspicacity and clearness of the understanding they could not choose but know the hand that made them and consequently believe that he made all those things which are ascribed to God in the holy Scripture Though by their fall they lost the favour of the Lord their first estate in which they were created by Almighty God the grace by which they stood and the glories which they did possess yet lost they not that quickness and agility of motion that perspicacity and clearness of the understanding wherewith they were endowed by God at their first Creation But what makes this unto their comfort when the same knowledge or belief call it which you will by which they are assured that God made the Heavens and the Earth and all the things therein contained will keep them always in remembrance of this most sad truth that he also made an Hell of fire where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth prepared for the Devill and his Angels To go a little farther yet the Devils did not only believe long since that CHRIST was come in the flesh but publickly proclaimed him in the open
seventh Chapter where we were purposely to treat of our Saviours sufferings And we have looked upon it also as an especial part of his Consecration unto the everlasting and eternal Priesthood after the Order of Melchisedech a Priesthood which consisted not in outward sacrifices but in prayers and blessings For when the Son of God our Saviour did offer himself upon the Cross for our Redemption he neither was a Priest after the Order of Aaron How could that be considering he was of the Tribe of Iudah nor after the Order of Melchisedech He was not qualified for that till his Resurrection but a Priest only in fieri as Logicians call it in the degrees and progress of his Consecration Which Consecration once performed he was no more to offer Sacrifice either bloudy or unbloudy whatsoever that so he might conform more fully to the Type of Melchisedech of whom we no where read that he offered sacrifice further then as it may be intimated in the name of Priest For though I will not say and I think I need not be put to it that Melchisedech never offered any Sacrifice yet since we do not read of any I may safely say that that part of his Sacerdotal function is purposely omitted by the holy Ghost that so he might more perfectly represent our Saviours Priesthood who after he was consecrated to that sacred Office had no more sacrifice to offer And possibly it might be done in the way of prevention to keep the Church from errour in this point of the Sacrifice who not content with the Commemoration of it the Eucharistical and Commemorative Sacrifice of his own ordaining might fall into a fancy of reiterating that one Sacrifice as is now practised and defended in the Church of Rome and make it expiatory of the sins both of quick and dead How guilty they of Rome have been in this particular and what strange positions they have broached in pursuit hereof would appear most fully if one would look no further then the Councel of Trent from the determinations whereof there lyeth no appeal though sometimes they will finde some evasions from it For in that Councel it is said that in the Masi our Saviour Christ is really offered by the Priest unto God the Father that it is the same propitiatory Sacrifice which was offered by Christ upon the Cross that it is propitiatory for all persons both quick and dead serving to purge them of their sins to ease them of their pains and satisfie for the punishment which they have deserved that being so beneficial and meritorious to all sorts of people it is to be reiterated and often offered not only day by day but many times in the same day as often as the Priest shall think fit to do it Which doctrine how plainly contrary it is unto our Apostle the scope and drift of the Epistle to the Hebrews especially the ninth and tenth Chapters of it do most clearly evidence And though it was a very uncharitable guess of our Rhemish Papists that the Protestants would have refused this whole Epistle but that they falsely imagine certain places thereof to make against the Sacrifice of the Mass yet we may finde by that where the shooe did wring them and that they thought there were some passages in this Epistle with which their Mass was inconsistent and which the Protestants might alleadge for I regard not the word falsely to their disadvantage Well therefore was it done of the Church of England not only to assert the true Catholick Doctrine of the one oblation of Christ finished on the Cross but to adde another Proposition to it in condemnation of the errours of Rome The Orthodox truth asserted is St. Pauls expressely viz. The offering of Christ once made is that perfect Redemption Propitiation and satisfaction for all the sins of the whole world both Original and actual and there is none other satisfaction for sin but that alone The conclusion followeth naturally on the former evidence viz. Wherefore the Sacrifices of Masses in which it was commonly said that the Priest did offer Christ for the quick and the dead to have remission of pain or guilt were blasphemous fables and dangerous deceits For what fable can be more blasphemous then that a poor Priest should have power to make his Maker that having made him with the breath of his mouth he should fall down and worship what himself had made that having worshipped him as God he should presume to lay hands on him and offer him in sacrifice assoon as worshipped that his oblation thus made should be efficacious both to quick and dead both to the absent and the present and finally that such as be present at it may if they finde their stomachs serve devour their God A thing of such reproach scandal to the Christian faith that Averroes the Moore but a very learned man and a great Philosopher hath laid this stain or brand on the Religion it self viz. that he had travelled over most parts of the world but never found a wickeder and more foolish Sect then that of the Christians His reason is Quia deum quem colunt dentibus devorant because they did devour the God whom they worshipped And what deceit can be more dangerous to a Christian soul then that which leads him blindfold into gross idolatry and teacheth him to give Divine honour to a Deity of a poor Creatures making for though the Elements be sanctified by the Word and prayer and are made unto the faithful receiver the very body and bloud of Christ yet are they still but bread and wine as before they were When therefore we incounter with some passages in the works of the FATHERS in which they either speak of the daily Sacrifice or say that Christ is daily offered on the Altar as sometimes they do we must not understand them of a Real Sacrifice as to the offering up of Christ unto God the Father a Sacrifice propitiatorie to the quick and dead such as is now maintained in the Church of Rome but only of an Eucharistical and Commemorative Sacrifice which by Christs death is represented to the eyes of the people which is the Sacrifice defended by the Church of England But here perhaps it will be asked that if our Saviour be to offer no more Sacrifice and that which he once offered upon the Cross be not to be reiterated as the Priest thinks necessary what use there is to us of his Priestly Office as concerning Sacrifice I answer with St. Paul on another occasion much every way For though he offereth no more Sacrifices then that made already yet the effect and fruit thereof is still to be applyed to the souls of men the merit of it still to be represented in the sight of God Of these the first may seeme to be the Office of the holy Ghost but the later most assuredly is the Office of our High Priest and of him
it a greater condemnation to our selves than men were aware of So could I wish the like Caution in all others also lest unawares they utterly exclude themselves out of Christianity For as Pope Gregory the first said unto some of the Bishops of his time concerning the Patriarch of Constantinople who had then took unto himself the title of Oecumenical or Vniversal Bishop viz. Si ille universalis or which is the same Catholicus est restat ut vos non sitis Episcopi so may we also say in the present case if we once grant them to be Catholickâ— we thereby do conclude our selves to be no Christians or at best but Hereticks Christian perhaps they have no fancy to be called the name of Christian in most parts of Italy being grown so despicable that Fool and Christian in a manner are become Synonyma Italico Idiomate per Christianum hominem stupidum stolidum solent intelligere as Hospinian tells us from the mouth of one Christian Franken who had lived amongst them Since then they have no minde to be called Christians nor reason to be called Catholicks let us call them as they are by the name of Papists considering their dependance on the Popes decision for all points of Faith And possibly we may gratifie them as much in this as if we did permit them the name of Catholicks For Bellarmine seems very much delighted with the Appellation flattering himself that he can bring in Christ our most blessed Saviour within the Catalogue of Popes and that he hath found a Prophecy in St. Chrysostom to this effect Quandoque nos Papistas vocandos esse That Papist in the times then following should be the stile and title of a true Professor Great pity it is but he and his should have the honor of their own discovery and Papists let them be since the same so pleaseth Now as the Papists make ill use of the name of Catholick so do their opposite faction in the Church of Christ conclude as falsly and erroneously from the title of Holy The Church is called Holy and is called so justly because it trains men up in the ways of godliness because it is so in its most eminent and more noble parts whom God hath sanctified by the Graces of his holy Spirit and finally because redeemed by the blood of Christ to the intent that all the faithful Members of it being by him delivered from the hands of their enemies might serve him without fear in righteousness and holiness all the days of their lives Not holy in the sense of Corah and his factious complices who made all the Congregation holy and all holy alike nor holy in the sense of some Antient and Modern Sectary who fancy to themselves a Church without spot or wrinkle a Church wherein there are no vessels of wrath but election onely and where they finde not such a Church they desert it instantly for fear they should partake of the sins and wickednesses which they observe to be in some Members of it Our Saviour Christ who better knew the temper of his Church than so compares the same in holy Scripture to a threshing floor in which there is both Wheat and chaff and to a fold wherein there are both Sheep and Goats and to a casting net which being thrown into the Sea drew up all kinde of Fishes both good and bad and to an house in which there are not onely vessels of honor as Gold and Silver but also of dishonor and for unclean uses and to a field in which besides the good Seed which the Lord had sown Infelix lolium steriles dominantur avenae the enemy had sowed his Tares In all and every one of which heavenly Parables our Saviour represented unto his Disciples and in them to us the true condition of his Church to the end of the world in which the wicked person and the righteous man are so intermingled that there is no perfection to be looked for here In which erroneous doctrines are so mixt with truth that it can never be so perfectly reserved and purified but errors and corruptions will break out upon it Perplexae sunt istae duae civitates in hoc seculo invicemque permistae saith the great St. Augustine The City of the Lord and the City of Satan are so intermingled in this world that there is little hope to see them separated till the day of judgement Though the foundation of the Church be of precious stones yet there is wood and hay and stubble in her superstructures and those so interwoven and built up together that nothing but a fatal fire is of power to part them I mean the fire of conflagration not of Popish Purgatory Were it not thus we need not pray to God for the good estate of the Church Militant here on Earth but glory as in the Triumphant as they do in Heaven And yet the Church is counted Holy and called Catholick still this intermixture notwithstanding Catholick in regard of time place and persons in and by which the Gospel of our Saviour Christ is professed and propagated Holy secundùm nobiliores ejus partes in reference to the Saints departed and those who are most eminent for grace and piety And it is called Ecclesia una one holy Catholick and Apostolick Church though part thereof be Militant here upon the Earth and part Triumphant in the Heavens The same one Church in this World and in that â—o come The difference is that here it is imperfect mixt of good and bad there perfect and consisting of the righteous onely Accordingly it is determined by St. Augustine Eandem ipsam unam Sanctam Ecclesiam nunc habere malos mixtos tunc non habituram For then and not till then as Ierom Augustine and others do expound the place shall Christ present her to himself a most glorious Church without spot or wrinkle and marry her to himself for ever Till that day come it is not to be hoped or looked for but that many Hypocrites False Teachers and Licentious livers will shroud themselves under the shelter of the Church and pass for Members of it in the eye of men though not accounted such in the sight of God The eye of man can possibly discern no further than the outward shew and mark who joyn themselves to the Congregation to hear the Word of God and receive his Sacraments Dominus novit qui sunt sui The Lord knows onely who are his and who are those occulti intus whose hearts stand fast in his Commandments and carefully possess their Souls in Truth and Godliness And yet some men there are as there have been formerly who fancy to themselves a Church in this present world without spot or wrinkle and dream of such a Field as contains no Tares of such an House as hath no Vessels but of honor sanctified and prepared for the Masters use The Cathari in
onely in their single and sole capacities but as convened in Council about sacred matters have held opinions contrary to the truth of God That therefore the whole Church or the Body collective and diffusive over all the world shall universally agree to betray the truth or be given over unto Error One might as logically conclude that because many of the Citizens and some of the Aldermen many of the Parishioners and some of the Ministers and that not onely in their Houses but the very Church or the Guild-hal were swept away at London by the last great plague that therefore the whole City was dispeopled by it not a man escaping Such Arguments as these need no other Answer than to demonstrate the non sequiturs and inconsequence of them But first before we do proceed unto further evidence it will be necessary to lay down the state of the Question which is the Litis contestatio or the point in Controversie And in my minde Becanus states it very rightly We will therefore use his terms though he were a Iesuite and propose it thus viz. An tota Ecclesia Christi vel tota multitudo Christianorum quatenus ex Pastoribus ovibus conflata est errare possit in aliquo Articulo vel puncto fidei that is to say whether the whole Church of Christ or the whole multitude of Christian people consisting both of the Flock and the Pastors too may erre in any Article and point of Faith or publickly profess any point of Doctrine contrary to the Faith and Gospel of our Lord and Saviour This we deny and we deny it on the credit of our Saviours promises Upon this Rock saith he will I build my Church and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it Where by the gates of Hell as the Fathers say he means not onely outward violence but Errors Heresies and false Doctrines which covertly or openly do aim at the ruine of it And of this minde is Epiphanius in Anchorato Origen Tract 1. on Matthew Ierome and Bede upon the place St. Augustine also hence inferreth Haereses omnes de ecclesia exiisse tanquam sarmenta inutilia à vite praecisa ipsam autem manere in radice sua in vite sua that is to say That Heresies were to the Church like unprofitable branches cut off from the Vines the Church remaining still in the Root in the Vine it self How so Quia portae inferorum non vincant eam because the gates of Hell cannot overcome it He promised his Apostles to send them a Comforter who should teach them all things Iohn 14.16 who should guide them into all truth Iohn 16.13 Not that he bound himself hereby to teach them all things or lead them into all truths of what sort soever For it is sure that some things the Apostles were still ignorant of as of the day and hour of the General Iudgment And probable enough it is that there were many Philosophical and Historical truths into which the Spirit did not lead them All things and all truth must be understood of all things truly necessary to a mans salvation In omnem veritatem i. e. Omnem quae expedit ad salutem saith Dr. Raynolds very rightly A promise made indeed to them the Apostles personally for it was unto them he spake and to none but them but made to all the Church in them the whole Church essentially whereof they were at that time the sole Representatives Consolatprium est ex hoc loco cognoscere fide audire quicquid est promissum his Apostolis promissum esse toti ecclesia saith a learned and a modest Papist It is saith he a special comfort to learn and faithfully believe from these words of Christs that the promise made to these Apostles was also made to the whole Church to the Body collective It was not Peter onely as the Papists say nor the Apostles onely as the words may seem to bear to whom these promises were made touching the not prevailing of the gates of Hell and the conducting of their feet in the ways of truth but to the whole Body of the Church represented by them Hence I conclude That the whole Church in the full latitude and universality thereof is free from Error such Errors as do lead to the gates of Hell and are destructive of salvifical supernatural Truths The Church being so far privileged by our Lord and Saviour that when the truth is banished out of one or more particular Churches it is admitted into others and some still opposing those corruptions both in Doctrine and Practise which in the others are defended The Church in this capacity is secure from Error even in the points of smallest moment and so it is confessed by Luther a man not over forwards to ascribe too much unto the Church Impossibile est illam errare posse etiam in minimo Articulo It is impossible saith he that the Church should erre conceive him of the Church essential in the smallest Article But this perhaps will be made more apparent by the matter of Fact than by any other kinde of evidence in an Argumentative way And for this matter of Fact we will take those times in which the truth may seem to be most miserably oppressed by the predominancy of the Arian faction and the tyranny and superstitions of the Popes of Rome That the Arian Heresie did extend no further than the Roman Empire we have shewn before that all the Roman Empire was not poysoned with it we will shew you now For besides all the Bishops of Rome successively from the first rising of this Heresie to the fall thereof who constantly except Liberius onely did maintain the truth the stories of those times acquaint us with the names and merits of some Catholick Bishops who with their Churches did oppose that predominant faction And because it were an endless and indeed a needless labor to recite them all take but those three whom Ierome brings together in one line or passage O Siquidem Arianus victis triumphatorem suum Egyptus excapit Hilarium ◠praelio revertentem Galliarum Ecclesia complexa est ad reditum Eusebii sui lugubres vestes Italia mutavit i. e. Upon the overthrow of the Arians Egypt received her Athanasius now returned in triumph the Church of France embraced her Hilary he was Bishop of Poictiers coming home with victory from the battel and on the return of Eusebius Bishop of Vercellis Italy changed her mourning garments By which it is most clear even to the vulgar eyes that not these Bishops onely did defend the truth but that it was preserved by their people also who never had received them with such joy and triumphs had they not been all of one opinion Or had but those three Bishops onely stood unto the truth yet had that been sufficient to preserve the Church from falling universally from the Faith of Christ or deviating from the truth in that particular
a loud voyce saying How long O Lord holy and true delayest thou to judge and avenge our blood upon them that dwell on the earth And of this nature is that passage in St. Lukes Gospel though perhaps it be but Parabolical in which the Soul of Lazarus is carryed into Abrahams bosome as soon as it had left his body So that the wonder is the greater if the tale be true that Paul the third a Christian and a Christian Prelate one of the Popes of Rome in these later Ages should make doubt hereof as they say he did Of whom it is reported that lying on his death-bed he should say to the standers by That he should shortly be assured of three particulars of which he had not been resolved all the time of his life that is to say Whether there were a God Such a place as Hell or That the souls of men were immortal or not A speech which hath so much of the Atheist in it that Christian charity forbids me to give credit to it though possibly his course of life as to say truth he was a man that sought his own ends more than the glory of God might give occasion to the world to report so of him And yet I must confesse my charity is not so perfect as not to beleeve the like report of Pope Iohn the three and twentieth who lived in safer times than this Paul the third and might take liberty to speak whatsoever he thought without fear of giving any advantage to an opposite party For he indeed as it is charged against him in the Council of Constance was of opinion that the Soul of man did die with his body like that of beasts And did not onely hold it as his own opinion but pertinaciously maintained it Quin imo dixit pertinaciter credidit Animam hominis cum corpore humano mori extingui ad instar animalium brutorum as the Council hath it Some who were called Arabici in the former times held the self same error as Eusebius telleth us for which they were accounted for no better than Hereticks and put into the Catalogue of Hereticks of St. Augustines making And yet upon a Disputation which they had with Origen they did desert their error and recant it too the story of which Nicephorus reports at large A Pope may hold the same opinion and pertinaciously maintain it against all Opponents and yet we must not say that he is an Heretick no take heed of that That were to trench too deep upon the privileges of St. Peters Chair But what need any proof be brought from the Word of God to prove the immortality of the Soul of man which was a truth confessed by the very Gentiles who saw no more than what was represented to them by the light of Nature and the dull spectacles of Philosophy By Plato one of the sagest of them it was affirmed expresly and in positive terms who useth also many Arguments in defence thereof Which Arguments though they seem too short to some Christian writers to come up close unto the point yet they approve his judgment in it confessing that De immortalitate animae verum sentiret he held the very truth in that particular But before him Pythagoras and Pherecides did affirm the same although Pythagoras for his part went a way by himself touching the passing of the Soul into other Bodies Transire animas in nova corpora as mine Author hath it It is true that Aristotle seemed to be doubtful of it and problematically sometimes to dispute against it though other-whiles the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 eternal and immortal do escape his pen. Nor was it positively denied by any in the Heroick times of learning save onely by Dicearchus Democritus and the Sect of Epicures who placing the chief happiness or summum bonum in corporal pleasures were as it were ingaged to cry down the Soul And yet Lucretius an old Poet and a principal stickler of that Sect doth now and then let fall some unluckly passages which utterly overthrow his cause As this for one Cedit item â—etro de terra quod fuit ante In terras quod missum est ex aetheris oris Id rursum Coeli fulgentia templa receptant Which may be briefly Englished in these two lines To Earth that goes which from the Earth was given And to Joves house that part which came from Heaven In this Lucretius did agree with that of Hermes or Mercurius sirnamed Trismegistus who makes man to consist of two principal parts as indeed he doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the one mortal which is the body and the other immortal which is the soul And of the same opinion was Apollo Milesius and the Sibylline Oracles both which are cited by Lactantius l. 7. c. 13. and Cap. 18.20 But what need more be said in so clear a case when Tacitus reporteth it for the general opinion of all knowing men Cum corpore non extingui magnas animas That the Souls of great and gallant persons were not extinguished with their Bodies Were it not so the Body were in better case than the Soul by far and of more continuance which doth not onely remain a Body for a while as before it was entire and uncorrupted after the Soul is taken from it but by embowelling imbalming and such helps of Art may be preserved from putrifaction many ages together Which Reasons and Authorities of so many Writers and the general consent of all learned men in the times before him prevailed so far at last on one Aristoxemus that finding no way to decry the Souls immortality he fell into a grosser error Negando ullam omnino esse animam denying that there was any Soul at all Quo nihil dici delirius potest than which a greater dotage could not be imagined as it is very justly censured by Lactantius And yet as great a dotage as it seemed to him though coming from the mouth or pen of an Heathen-man hath been revived again in these times of Liberty and a Book printed with the title of Mans Mortality wherein the Author whosoever he was doth endeavor to prove That the whole man as a rational Creature is wholly mortal contrary to that common distinction of Soul and Body Which if it be not the dotage of that Aristoxemus is questionless the Heresie of the old Arabici This Author teaching that our immortality beginneth at the Resurrection at the general judgment and they that the Soul of man dying with the Body de coetero ad immortalitatem transituram was from thenceforth to pass into immortality Such is the infelicity of the times we live in that the more gross the heresie and the more condemned by those great lights of learning in the former times the better entertainment it is sure to finde with unknowing men I purpose not to make an exact discourse
maxime that greater are the swarmes of writers then of flies in Summer And here I look it should be said that in those things wherein I thus judge others I condemn my self in doing the same things which I judge them for and so am rendred inexcusable for so great a folly And though it cannot be denyed but that I have been as great a Scribler as almost any other of my age and time yet thus much I must say in my own defence that except the first Essay and draught of my Geography digested for my private pleasure and Printed probably out of ambition and vain glory I never published any thing with or without my mane subscribed unto it but what was either by the strong hand of importunity extorted from me or else imposed by the appointment and command of the noblest power under which I lived Had I been troubled as some are with an itch of Printing or carryed on by a desire of being in action I could have offered to thy view some Pieces long before this time and those it may be not unworthy of thy consideration which hitherto I have kept by me and possibly shall do so still untill they may be found subsequent to the publick peace For that there is a time to keep silence as well as times for men to speak is as Canonical a line for a man to walke by in my poor opinion as to be instant in season and out of season is esteemed by others But the truth is I never voluntarily ingaged my self in any of those publick quarrels by which the unity and order of the Church of England hath been so miserably distracted in these latter times Nor have I ever loved to run before or against Authority but always took the just counsels and commands thereof for my ground and warrant which when I had received I could not think that there was any thing left on my part but obsequii gloria the honour of a cheerful and free obedience And in this part of my obedience it was my lot to be most commonly imployed in the Puritane controversies in managing whereof although I used all Equanimity and temper which reasonably could be expected the argument and persons against whom I writ being well considered yet I did thereby so exasperate that prevailing party that I became the greatest object of their spleen and fury Hardly a libell in those times which exercised the patience of the State for so long together in which my reputation was not blasted my good name traduced my Religion questioned and whether I would or not I must be a Papist or at the least an Under-factor for the Church of Rome But the best was I had the honour of good Company which made the burden pleasing to me not only the Bishops generally but some Particulars amongst them of most eminent note being traduced in the same Pasquils for carrying on a designe to bring in Popery the King himself given out witnesse the Popish royall Favorite amongst other Pamplets to be that way biassed And if they call the Master of the house by the name of Belzebub the servants must not look to finde better language And though I took all honest and ingenuous courses to wipe off this stain yet when the calumny once was up necesse est ut aliquid haereat it was impossible for me in a manner so to purge my self as not to suffer under the injustice of the imputation Concerning which I shall make bold to tell thee a remarkable passage which is briefly this It was about the time that my Lord of Canterbury had published his learned and laborious work against Fisher the Iesuite when I had preached some Sermons before the King upon the Parable of the Tares which Parable I had chosen for the constant argument of my Sermons intended for the Court of which some moderate and judicious men were pleased to say that in those Sermons I had pulled up Popery by the very roots and subverted the foundations of it to which it was replyed by some of those bitter spirits whether with more uncharitablenesse or imprudent zeal it is hard to say that the Arch-bishop might Print and Dr. Heylyn might Preach what they would against Popery but they should never believe them to be any thing the lâ—sse Papists for all that A censure of a very strange nature and so little savoring of Christianity that I believe it is not easie to be parrallel'd in the worst of times But from the envie hatred malice and uncharitablenesse of such kind of men no lesse then from plague pestilence and famine good Lord deliver us I could add much more not much short of this did I love to rub up these old sores as indeed I do not the clamour not being made lesse if it went not higher in the sitting of the late long Parliament though no complaint or information was made against me or if it were was thought considerable enough to be enquired into or took notice of Nor indeed had I said thus much but in compliance to the grave counsell of St. Hierome whose saying it was In suspicione hareseos se nolle quenquam fore patientem that for a man to keep silence when accused of Heresie was a selfe-conviction And yet I cannot choose but note the great and unprofitable paines which hath been taken by the Author of that Voluminous nothing entituled Canterburies Doom to finde me guilty of some points of supposed Popery only because in some particulars not determined by the Church of England I had adhered unto the words and tendries of the Antient Fathers or bound my self in matters publickly resolved on to vindicate this Church to her genuine tenents And to say truth the least endevour of this kinde was cause enough for any clamor or reproches which the tongues and pens of those bitter men could impose on them who did not stand as strongly in defence of Out-landish fancies as of the true and natural doctrines of the Church their mother Witnesse the fearfull outcry made against B. Bilson for preaching otherwise of Christs descending into hell and the great hubbub raised against Peter Baro for writing otherwise in the points of Predestination then had been taught by some of the Genevian Doctors though neither the one had Preached nor the other Printed but what was consonant to the Doctrine of approved Antiquity and to the true intent and meaning of the book of Articles here by Law established Private opinions especially if countenanced by some eminent name were looked on as the publick Resolutions of the Anglican Church and the poor Church condemned for teaching those opinions which by the artifice of some men had been fastened on her So that it was not without some ground that the Archbishop of Spalato being gone from hence did upbraid this Church in his Consilium redeundi for taking into her confession which he acknowledges of its self to be sound and profitable multa Calvini Lutheri
from the Virgin Mary The only Son and the best beloved Son equivalent in holy Scripture Christ why entituled the first born of every creature The rights of Primogeniture what they were and how vested in him CHRIST so to be accounted the Son of God as to be also God the Son That the Messiah was to come in the form of man The testimony given by Christ to his own Divinity cleared from all exceptions The story of Theodosius the Iew in Suidas touching Christ our Saviour justified The testimony given to Christs Divinity by the Heathen Oracles The falling of the Egyptian Idols the Poet Virgil and the Roman Centurion The Heresies of Ebion Artemon and Samosatenus in making Christ our Saviour a meer natural man briefly recited and condemned The perplexed niceties of the School avoided purposely by the Author The name of LORD appropriated in the Old Testament unto God the Father but more peculiar since the time of the Gospel to God the Son The title of LORD disclaimed by the first Roman Emperours and upon what reasons CHRIST made our LORD not only in the right of purchase but also by the law of Arms. CHAP. III. Of Gods free mercy in the Redemption of man the WORD why fitted to effect it The Incarnation of the Word why attributed to the holy Ghost the Miracle thereof made credible both to Jews and Gentiles THe controversie between Mercy Peace Truth and Iustice on the fall of man made up and reconciled by the oblation of Christ then designed and promised That God could have saved mankinde by some other means then by the Incarnation and death of Christ had he been so minded The Oblation of Christ rather a voluntary act of his own meer goodness then necessitated by imposition or decree Some reasons why the work of the Incarnation was to be acted chiefly by the holy Ghost The manner of the Incarnation with a more genuine explication of the Virgins answer The miraculous obumbration of the holy Ghost made more intelligible by two parallel cases The impure fancies of some Romish Votaries touching this Obumbration and the blessed Virgin The large faculties of Frier Tekell Sleidan corrupted by the Papists The strange conceit of Estius in making Christ the principal if not only Agent in the Incarnation The miracle of the Incarnation made perceptible to the natural man to the Iews and Gentiles The Virgins Faith a great facilitating to the Incarnation The Antiquity of the feasts of Annuntiation Christ why not called the Son of the holy Ghost The body of Christ not formed all at once as some Popishs writers doe affirm and the reasons why CHAP. IV. Of the birth of CHRIST the Feast of his Nativity Why born of a Virgin The Prophesie of Esaiah the Parentage and priviledges of the blessed Virgin NO cause for the WORD to be made flesh but mans Redemption Our Saviour Christ not only born but made of the Virgin Mary and the manner how That several Heresies in the Primitive times touching this particular The time and place made happy by our Saviours birth That Christ was born upon the five and twentyeth day of December proved by the general consent of all Christian Churches The high opinion of that day in the Primitive times The miracle of Christ being born of a Virgin Mother made perceptible by some like cases in the Book of God A parallel between Eve and the Virgin Mary The promise made by God to Eve The clearest Prophesie in Scripture that Christ our Saviour should be born of a Virgin-Mother That so much celebrated Prophesie Behold a Virgin shall conceive c. not meant originally and literally of the birth of Christ. The genuine meaning of the Text and how it was fulfilled in our Saviours birth Whether Christ were the direct heir of the house of David The Genealogie of Christ why laid down in such different wayes by the two Evangelists The perpetual Virginity of Christs Mother asserted against the Hereticks of former times defended on wrong grounds by the Pontificians The Virgin freed from Original sin by some zealous Papists and of the controversie raised about it in the Church of Rome What may be warrantably thought touching that particular The extreme errours of Helvidius and the Antidicomaritani in giving too little and of the Collyridians and the Papists on the other side in giving too great honour to the blessed Virgin Some strange extraâ—vigancies of the learned and vulgar Papists The moderation in that kinde of the Church of England The body of Christ a real not an imaginary substance and subject to the passions and infirmities of a natural body CHAP. V. Of the sufferings of our Saviour under Pontius Pilate and first of those temptations which he suffered at the hands of the Devil ANnas and Caiaphas why said to be High Priests at the self same time Of Pontius Pilate his barbarous and rigid nature and of the slaughter which he made of the Galileans By what SPIRIT for what reasons and into what part of the Wilderness Christ was led to be tempted A parallel between Christ and the Scape-goat Reasons for our Redeemers fast why neither more nor less then just forty days Of the Ember weeks The institution and antiquity of the Lenten fast and why first ordained St. Luke and St. Matthew reconciled A short view of the three temptations with a removal of some difficulties which concern the same How Satan could shew Christ our Saviour from the top of a mountain and in so short a space of time the Kingdomes of the earth and the glories of them In what respects it is said of Christ that he was or could be tempted of the Devil CHAP. VI. Of the afflictions which our Saviour suffered both in his soul and body under Pontius Pilate in the great work of MANS REDEMPTION THe heaviness which fel on Christ not so great and terrible as to deprive him of his senses In what respect it is said of Christ in his holy Gospel that his soul was sorrowful to the death The Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what it signifieth in the holy Penmen The meaning of our Saviours words Ioh. 12.27 No contrariety in Christs Prayer to the will of God Why death appeared so terrible in our Saviours eye The judgement of the Antients on that Prayer of Christ. The doctrine of the Schools touching the natural fear of death Why Christ desired not to receive that Cup from the hands of the Iews Of the comfort which the Angel brought unto our Saviour in the time of his heaviness A passage of St. Paul expounded Heb. 57. The meaning of the word Agony in the best Greek Writers and in the usual style of Scripture Christs Agony and bloudy sweat rather to be imputed unto a fervency of zeal then an extremity of pain The sentence put upon our Saviour in the High Priests Hall and at the Iudgement Seat of Pilate A brief survey of Christs sufferings both in soul and
f. 387. for consorti r. consortio f. 401. f. in their baptism r. in their infancy before baptism f. 414. f. most high Ghost r. most high God f. 391. f. Syrius r. Syria f. 396. f. a siquidem r. siquidem f. 397. f. Arminians r. Armenians f. 398 f. convenientem r. convenientium f. 416. f dum quo r. cum quo f. suppetas r. suppetias f. 456. f. declanative r. declarative f. 453. f an evitable r. unevitable f. 471. f. inventute r. injuventute f. 495. f. which continual r. with continual THE SUMME OF Christian Theologie Positive Philological and Polemical CONTAINED IN THE Apostles CREED Or reducible to it IN THREE BOOKS By PETER HEYLYN 1 Joh. 5.7 There are three that bear record in Heaven the Father the Word and the holy Ghost and these three are one LONDON Printed by E. Cotes for Henry Seile over against St. Dunstans Church in Fleet-street 1654. A PREFACE To the following Work CONCERNING The ANTIQVITY AVTHORITY OF THE CREED CALLED THE Apostles CREED With Answer to the chief Objections which are made against it The Drift and Project of the WORK IT was a saying of St. Ambrose Unus unum fecit qui unitatis ejus haberet imaginem that God made only one in the first beginning after the likenesse or similitude of his own unity The creation of the World was the pattern of Man Man of the Church the Almighty of all Being one himself or rather being unity he bestowed upon the World not a being only but his blessing with it that being it should be but one One in the generall comprehension of parts and therefore by the Grecians called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Latines call it universum a name of multitude indeed but of a multitude united Universi qui in uno loco versi say the old Grammarians One also in opposition unto numbers and so maintained by Aristotle in his first De Coelo against the errors of Empedocles and Democritus two old Philosophers Now as he made the world but one after the similitude of himself so out of the world and according to that pattern created he man Made by the Lord according to his own image and made but one because the Lord was so that made him because the world was so out of which he was taken The severall parts and members in him do but commend the unity of the whole Compositum for though they are many members yet but one body saith St. Paul Which mutuall resemblance and agreement as it occasioned many of the old Philosophers to call man an Abridgement of the world so might it no lesse justly have occasioned others to style the world an inlargement of man Nay more then this seeing that only man was without an helper the Lord resolved to make one for him and to make her out of his own body only that so he might preserve still the former unity Nor stayed he here but he did give her unto man to be one flesh with him that to the unity of Original he might add the union of affections Magnum mysterium saith the Apostle but I Speak only as he did touching Christ and the Church For this Creation of the woman as St. Augustine tells us was a most perfect type of the birth and being of the Church of Christ Christum enim et Ecclesiam tali facto jam tunc prophetari oportebat The woman was created out of the side of man at such time as the Lord had caused a deep sleep to fall upon him the Church was also taken out of the wounded side of Christ being cast into a deeper sleep then that of Adam And as the woman was one body both in the composition of her parts and one with Adam both in the union of love and unity of being so is it also with the Church She is at perfect union with him in the union of her affections being marryed unto him for ever one with him in the unity of her original for we are members of his body and of his flesh and of his bone and lastly one in the consent and harmony of all her parts acknowledging one Lord one Faith one Baptisme For though the Church consisted in those early days both of Iews and Gentiles Greeks and Barbarians bond and free men not alone of different countries but of different natures yet being all incorporated into that society of men which we call the Church they make but one body only as St. Paul hath testifyed And whence proceeds that unity of this visible body but in that uniformity which all those severall persons have which belong unto it by reason of that one Lord whose servants they do all professe themselves to be that one Faith of which they do all make confession and that one Baptisme wherewith they are initiated into that society the outward and uniforme profession of these three things which appertain to the very essence of Christianity being necessarily required of each Christian man Christians they neither are nor can be who call not Christ their Lord and Master From hence it came that first in Antioch and afterwards throughout all the world all who were of the visible Church were called Christians Autor nominis ejus Christus saith Cornelius Tacitus But the bare calling of CHRIST IESVS our Lord and Master is not enough to prove us to be Christians unlesse that we do also embrace that Faith which he delivered to his Apostles and was by them delivered unto all the world And though we are not reckoned members of this visible Church till we receive admittance by the door of Baptisme yet is the door of Baptisme opened unto none untill they make profession of their faith in Christ. It is not honestie of life nor morall righteousnesse which gives denomination to a Christian although the want thereof doth exclude from heaven because they are not proper unto Christian men as they are Christians but do concern them as they are men The moral Law was given to mankinde in the state of nature and after promulgated to the Iews in more solemn manner Hence was it that so many of the antient Gentiles not to say any thing of the Iews before the coming of our Saviour were eminent in so many parts of moral vertue But for the acts of Faith whereby we do confesse that IESVS CHRIST is Lord of all things and willingly believe all those sacred truths which he came to publish to the world and by confession of the which we carry as it were a key to the door of Baptisme that is the proper badge and cognizance of a Christian man by which it is made known unto all the world both to what Lord he appertaineth and by what means he was admitted for a member of his house and family Which faith or rather the doctrines of which faith being first delivered by our Saviour with this comfort and reward annexed that whosoever believed in him should not perish but have life
everlasting and after preached by the Apostles both to Iew and Gentile was finally committed unto writing to this end and purpose that by reading it or hearing it read and declared by others we may believe that IESVS is the CHRIST the Son of God and that believing we may have life through his name as St. Iohn assures us And though this be affirmed by him of his Gospel only I mean that written by himself yet we may safely say the same of all the rest of the Apostolical and Evangelical writings as being dictated by the same Spirit writ by men equally inspired and all conducing to this end to teach us to know IESVS CHRIST and him crucifyed and to enable us to give a reason to all that aske of the faith that is in us But being the writings of the Evangelists and Apostles were of too great a bulk to be committed unto memory and that there were some things in them so obscure and difficult that many ignorant and unstable but well meaning men both might and did wrest them to their own destruction other things which related rather unto moral duties then to points faith it was thought fit by the Apostles to draw the points of saving faith such as were necessarily to be believed of all Christian people into a briefe and narrower compasse It was not for the ordinary sort of men to trouble themselves with doubtful disputations as St. Paul calleth them whereof many do occurre in his Epistles disputes of too great difficulty and sublime a nature for every man especially the weak in faith either to understand or conceive aright Nor was it possible that men of mean parts and laborious callings of which the Church consisted for the most part in the first beginning should either have so much leasure as to read over their writings or so much judgment as to gather and collect from thence what of necessity was to be believed that they might be saved what not or so much memory as to treasure up and repeat by heart the infinite treasures of divine knowledge which are comprehended in the same And if it were so as no doubt it was when the Apostles and Evangelists had left those excellent Monuments of themselves in writing which the Church hath ever since enjoyed to which men might resort as occasion was for their information and instruction how necessary then must we think it was for some such Summarie and Abstract of the Christian faith to be resolved upon amongst them which men of weak memories might repeat by heart and men of shallow comprehensions righly understand Those blessed souls knew well none better how to apply themselves to the capacities of the weakest men that there were many Babes in Christ who were to be fed with milk and not with meats and that if they became not all things unto all men they must resolve amongst themselves to save but few Upon this ground then which what juster could there be to induce them to it it is conceived they drew up that brief abstract of the Christian faith which we call the CREED and couched therein whatever point was necessary for all sorts of men in all times and all places of the world both to believe in their hearts as also to professe and confesse upon all occasions though to the apparent hazard of their lives and fortunes And why this might not be that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that form of sound words whereof St. Paul saith to Timothy Hold fast that form of sound words thou hast heard of me I must confesse that I could never yet see a convincing reason Certain I am that Irenaeus who lived very near the Apostles times hath said of this confession of the faith this Creed which hath so generally and unanimously been received over all the world Ecclesia per universum orbem usque ad fines terrae c. The Church saith he throughout the world even to the ends of the earth received from the Apostles and their Disciples that faith which believeth in one God the Father Almighty maker of heaven and earth c. and in IESVS CHRIST the Son of God incarnate for our salvation and in the holy Spirit which preached by the Prophets the dispensation and coming of God and the birth of CHRIST our Lord by the Virgin his passion resurrection and ascension with his flesh into heaven and his coming from heaven in the glory of his Father to raise up all flesh and to give just judgement unto all Which words lest possibly we might interpret of the doctrine of faith which questionlesse was alwayes one and the same over all the world and not of any summary or abstract which they had digested for the use and benefit of Gods people or think that they relate rather to the substance of faith then to any set and determinate form of words in which that substance was delivered let us behold what the same Father hath delivered in another place This faith saith he which the Church though dispersed through the world received from the Apostles and their Disciples yet notwithstanding doth it keep it as safe as if it dwelt within the wals of one house and as uniformly hold N. B. as if it had but one only heart and soul and this as consonantly it preacheth teacheth and delivereth as if but one tongue did speak for all He addes which makes the point more plain that though there be different languages in the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet the effect and summe of the tradition i. e. the faith delivered in that forme is one and the same and I presume he means not by tradition those doctrines of faith which are delivered in the books and writings of the Evangelists and Apostles Finally he concludes with this expression and it is worthily worth our marking in the present case that he amongst the Governours of the Church who is best able to speak saith no more then this and no lesse then this the simplest and the most ignorant person which certainly he had not said but that there was one uniforme and determinate order of words which every one was bound to learn and adhere unto Tertullian he speaks plainer yet and affirmes expresly regulam fidei unam omnino esse solam immobilem et irreformabilem that there is but one rule of faith at all and that unmoveable and unalterable How could he say that there was but one rule of faith in the Church if every several Church had a several rule or that it was unmoveable and unalterable as he saith it was if there were no certain form of words prescribed which men were to keep to but every one might change and alter as he saw occasion So that I take it for a truth unquestionable that in the first ages nay the first beginnings of the Church of CHRIST there was a certain form of words prescribed for the ease and benefit of the Church a summarie or abstract of the Articles
of Reliques single life of Priests and the like to these Assuredly they are all so far from having the general consent of all times that generally they have had the consent of none no not so much as in the Church of Rome it self till the candle of all good literature was put out by the night of ignorance But for the Creed of the Apostles trie it according to these rules by both or either and it will evidently appear not only that it hath been universally and continually received in the Church for theirs but that the most famous and renowned men of all times and ages have so received it from their Fathers and recommended it for such to the times ensuing no man gainsaying or opposing till these later times in which the blessed Word of God cannot scape unquestioned So that we have as much authority as the Tradition of the Church the consent of Fathers and the succession of all times can give us to prove this Creed to have been writ by the Apostles by them commended to the Churches of their several plantations and so transmitted to our selves without interruption And no authority but divine immediately declared from the God of heaven is to be ballanced with this proof or heard against it Thus having proved that the Creed was writ by the Apostles and proved it by as great authority as any can be given by the Church of CHRIST and the consent of the most renowned Writers of the Primitive times Let us next see what reputation and esteem it carryed in all parts of Christendome and draw from thence such further arguments as the nature of that search will beaâ— And first it is a manifest and undoubted truth that as this Creed was universally received over all the world ab ipsis Apostolorum temporibus from the very times of the Apostles as Vigilius hath it without the least contradiction or opposition so hath it passed from hand to hand for above these 1600 years without alteration or addition This we did touch upon before but now press it further and use it for another argument that none but the Apostles were or could be the Authors of it and that if it had otherwise been esteemed of in the former times it would have been obnoxious unto alterations yea and to contradiction also as others the most celebrated Creeds in the Christian world It was the saying of Pope Gregory the Great that he esteemed of the four first General Councels no otherwise then of the four Evangelists And who is there to whom the name of Athanasius and the Nicene Councel and the first general Councel holden in Constantinople is not most venerably precious And yet the Creed of Athanasius hath found such sory welcome in some parts of the world as to be called either in dislike or scorn the Creed of Sathanasius and he himself condemned of extreme arrogance if not somewhat worse for imposing it upon the consciences of all Christian men as necessary to their salvation Non potuit Satan altius evehere humanam formulam as the Remonstrants please to phrase it The Nicene Creed was of no long continuance in the Church of Christ before these words secundum Scripturas according to the Scriptures were added to the Article of the Resurrection And to the Constantinopolitan the Churches of the West have added Filioque in another Article and no mean one neither that namely of the proceeding of the holy Ghost without the leave and liking of the Eastern Prelates The reason of which boldness is because they are and were conceived to be humane formula's of Ecclesiastical constitution only no divine authority and therefore might be altered and explained and fitted to the best edification of the Church Whereas the Creed of the Apostles is come unto our hands without alteration in the same words and syllables as it came from them none ever daring in the space of so many years to alter any thing therein though many have applyed their studies to explain the same And this I make a second argument evincing the Authority and Antiquity of the sacred Symbolum that men of most renown and credit for the times they lived in did purposely apply their studies to expound this Creed with as much diligence and care as any part or most parts at least of the holy Scriptures Witness the fourth Catechism of St. Cyril Bishop of Hierusalem two of the Homilies of St. Chrysostom some of St. Augustines Sermons de Tempore his two whole Tracts de fide Symbolo de Symbolo ad Catechumenos all principally made for explanation of this Creed together with the Commentaries of Ruffinus Maximus Taurinensis Venantius Fortunatus B. of Poyctiers antient writers all and all composed upon no other text or argument but this Creed alone Not to say any thing at all of the learned works of many eminent men in the ages following and of the present times we live in though otherwise of different perswasions in Religion A thing which cannot be affirmed of the Nicene Creed or any other Creed whatever none of which have been commented or scholied on by any of the antient Doctors of the Catholick Church or of the disagreeing parties in the present times And to say truth there was good reason why this Creed should be thus explained why such great pains should be bestowed to expound the same it being a very antient custome in the Church of CHRIST not to admit any to the sacred Font but such as made a publick profession of their faith according to the words of this Creed and understandingly recited it in the Congregation Mos ibi servatur Antiquus apud eos qui gratiam baptismi suscepturi sunt publice i. e. fidelium populo audiente Symbolum reddere so saith Ruffinus for his time of the Church of Rome we may affirme the like for those of Antioch Hierusalem Africa upon the credit of St. Chrysostome Cyril Augustine in their works now mentioned Nor was it long before it was ordained in the Councell of Agde Ann. 506. that in regard of the great confluence of all persons to the Church to receive the Sacrament of Baptisme upon Easter day the Creed should be expounded every day in the way of Sermons to the people from the Sunday we call Palme Sunday to the Feast it self Symbolum ab omnibus Ecclesiis ante octo dies Dominicae resurrectionis publice in Ecclesia competentibus praedicari as the Synod hath it Nay they conceived the learning of this Creed by heart so necessary in the former times that it was first desired and afterwards enjoyned that all should learn it and retain it in their hearts and memories who either were desirous to be counted good Catholick Christians or to partake of any of the solemne offices in the Christian Church St. Augustine commended it unto his Auditors that for the better keeping it in memory they should repeat it to themselves Quando surgitis quando vos collocatis ad
man can say that there was never any exact forme of the Nicene Creed commended by that Councell to the use of the Church because that in the Councell of Chalcedon and in the works of Athanasius and St. Basil it is presented to us with some difference of the words and phrases Of which the most that can be said must be that of Binius idem est plane sensus sed sermo discrepans i. e. that the sense is every where the same though the words do differ In the third place it is objected that the Creed could not be written by the Apostles because there are therein certain words and phrases which were not used in their times and for the proof of this they instance in these two particulars first in our Saviours descent into hell which words they say are not to be found in all the Apostolical Scriptures and secondly in that of the Catholick Church which was a word or phrase not used till the Apostles had dispersed the Gospell over all the world And first in answer to the first we need say but this that though these words of Christ descended into hell be not in terminis in the Scriptures yet the Doctrine is which we shall very evidently evince and prove when we are come unto the handling of that Article And if we finde the doctrine in the book of God I hope it will conclude no more against the authority and antiquity of the Creed we speak of then that the word Homousion in the Nicene Creed did or might do against the authority of that Creed or Symbole because that word could not be found in all the Scriptures as was objected by the Arians in the former times And for the second instance in the word Catholica there is less ground of truth therein then in that before But yet because it hath a little shew of learning and doth pretend unto antiquity we will take some more pains then needed to manifest and discover the condition of it Know then that the Apostles might bestow upon the Church the adjunct of Catholick before they went abroad into several Countries to preach the Gospel not in regard that it was actually diffused over all the world according as it hath bin since in these later Ages but in regard that so it was potentially according to the will and pleasure of their Lord and Saviour by whom the bar was broken down which formerly had made a separation between Iew and Gentile and the Commission given of Ite praedicate to go and preach the Gospel unto every creature Catholick is no more then universal The smallest smatterer in the Greek can assure us that And universal questionless the Church was then at least intentionaliter potentialiter when the Apostles knew from the Lords own mouth that it should no longer be imprisoned within the narrow limits of the land of Iewry but that the Gentiles should be called to eternal life Without this limitation of the word I can hardly see how the Church should be called Catholick in her largest circuit there being many Nations and large Dominions which are not actually comprehended within the Pale of the Church to this very day I hope their meaning is not this that there was no such word as Catholick when the Apostles lived and composed the body of the New Testament If so they mean although they put us for the present to a needless search yet they betray therein a gross peece of ignorance For the discovery whereof we may please to know that the word Catholick is derived from the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth in universum as that from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is totum all as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. that I may sum up all in brief And so the word is used by Isocrates that famous Oratour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say generally or in a word I shall endeavour to declare what studies it were fittest for you to incline unto But the proper signification of it is in that of Aristotle where he opposeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a general or universal demonstration to that which he calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that which is partial only or particular Hence comes the adjective 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. universal and so the word is taken by Quintilian saying Propter quae mihi semper moris fuit quam minimum me alligare ad praecepta quae 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vocant i. e. ut dicamus quomodo possumus universalia vel perpetualia Thus read we in Hermogenes an old Rhetorician 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of usual and general forms of speech and thus in Philo speaking of the laws of Moses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he ordained a general perpetual law for succession into mens inheritances Take which of these three senses they best like themselves and they will finde at last it comes all to one If the word Catholick do signifie the same with universal it also signified the same in and before the times the Apostles lived in and how the Church might then be called universal we have shewn already If they desire rather to translate it general Pope Iulius will tell us how the Church might be called General in the first days and hours thereof Quia sc. generalis est in eadem doctrina ad instructionem because it generally proposeth the same doctrine for edification or if by that of perpetual rather there is no question to be made but that our Saviours promise to be with them to the end of the world did most sufficiently declare unto them that the Church which they were to plant was to be perpetual There is another meaning of the word Catholicus as it denotes an Orthodox and right believer which whether it were used in the Apostles times may be doubted of it being half granted by Pacianus an antient writer sub Apostolis CHRISTIANOS non vocari Catholicos that Christians were not then called Catholicks But this at best being not the natural but an adventitious meaning of the word according to a borrowed metaphorical sense it neither helps nor hinders in the present business and in this sense we shall speak more of it hereafter when we are come unto the Article of the Catholick Church One more objection there remains and but one more which is worth the answering and is that which is much pressed by Downes namely that to affirm as Ruffinus doth that the Apostles did compose the Creed to be the rule or square of their true preaching lest being separated from one another there should be any difference amongst them in matters which pertain to eternal life were to suppose them to be guided by a fallible spirit and consequently subject unto Errour For answer whereunto we need say but this that the difference which Ruffinns speaks of and which he saith the Apostles laboured to avoid by their agreement on this sum or abstract of the Christian
praeterpluperfect tense of the passive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth to be perswaded to be taught to be induced to give assent unto such propositions as are made unto us Thus is the word used by the great Apostle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. For I am perswaded that neither life nor death c. shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Iesus our Lord. And again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Being confident of this very thing Persuasum habens hoc ipsum as Beza very properly doth translate the word That he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it till the day of Iesus Christ. So that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we render faith being hence derived may not unfitly be construed a perswasion or a firm assent persuasionem seu firmam assensionem as the learned Valla hath observed and then the verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being brought from thence will signifie in the true and proper notion of it I am perswaded verily of the truth of that which so many godly and religious men have related to me and give as full and firm an assent unto it as if I had been present when the deed was done Thus also for the Latine word Fides the Etymologie thereof is drawn from fio from the doing or performance of those things which are said or promised Fides enim dicitur saith Cicero eo quod fiat quod dictum est And therefore faith or fides call it which you will as it relates unto the promises of God is defined by Zanchius to be firma certa persuasio de promissionibus dei a strong and confident perswasion that God will graciously fulfil those promises which he hath pleased to make unto us And therefore I shall fix upon that definition of the thing it self which I finde amongst the Antient Schoolmen affirming it to be a firm assent to supernatural truths revealed Which definition lest it should fare the worse for the Authors sake is backed and seconded by so many learned men both of the Protestant and Reformed Churches as may well serve to set it free from all further cavils For thus Melanchthon for the Protestant or Lutheran Churches Fides est assensus omni verbo Dei nobis tradito Faith saith he is an assent to the veracity or â—ruth of the whole Word of God delivered to us And so saith Vrsin for the Doctors of the French or Calvinian party defining it almost in the self same words to be Vera persuasio qua assentimur omni verbo Dei nobis traditâ—o With these agree Chemnitius in Evan. Concil Trident. cap. de Iustificatione Pet. Martyr ad Rom. 3. v. 12. Polanus Partit Theolog. lib. 2. pag. 368. besides divers others Which being the true and proper definition of belief or faith according to the natural meaning of the word both in Greek and Latine I may conclude from hence without further trouble that to believe according as the word here stands in the front of the Creed is only to be verily perswaded of the truth of all those points and articles which are delivered in the same and to give a firm assent unto them agreeable unto the measure of our understanding Faith thus defined differeth not only from experience knowledge and opinion all which do come within the compass of Assents in general but from all other things whatsoever which come within the compass of our belief When we assent unto the truth of such things or matters as are discernible by sense we may call it perception or experience as when a man assents to this proposition that ice is cold or that fire is hot because he feels it to be so by his outward senses If our assent be weak unsetled or grounded only upon probabilities we then call it opinion in matters of which nature men are for the most part left at liberty their understandings being neither convinced by the power of a superior truth nor setled and confirmed by demonstrative proofs This though it be an assent is no firm assent and therefore nothing less then Faith If our assent be grounded on demonstrative proofs and built upon the knowledge of natural causes it is then tearmed Science or knowledge properly so called for Scire est per causas scire said the great Philosopher But he that gives assent unto any truth only because of the authority of the man that speaks it neither examining his proofs nor searching into the probabilty or possibility of the thing related that man in true propriety of speech is said to believe and to believe we know is the act of faith Thus it is said of the Samaritans that many of them believed on him for the saying of the woman which testified thus of him viz. He told me all that ever I did but more believed because of his own words when they had heard him speak and observed his doctrine And yet not every truth believed on the speakers credit is the proper object of belief or faith according as we use the word in the Schools of Christ but only supernatural truths such truths as our depraved nature could not reach unto without revelation from above by consequence not the authority of every speaker but only of such holy men of God who spake as they were moved by the holy Ghost is the foundation of this faith which we here define I give belief unto the Histories of Xenophon Thucydides Polybius and Corn. Tacitus because I hold a good opinion of the men that writ them And I believe that Edward the Black Prince wonne the battel of Crecie being then but 18 years of age and that King Henry the fifth subdued the greatest part of France within five or six years because I finde it so related without contradiction both by our English Chroniclers and the French Historians But I rely on no humane authority how great soever it be for a rule of Faith which as it hath truths only supernatural for the object of it so have those truths or the revelation rather of those truths no other Author then the Spirit of God So then faith is a firm assent which makes it differ from opinion which may be called an assent also but weak and wavering It is a firm assent to truths for to believe in lyes is not faith but folly A brand or character set on those by Almighty God who seeing they would not receive the love of the truth that they might be saved have been and are given over unto strong delusions and to believe in lyes that they should be damned 'T is an assent to truths revealed not grounded on demonstrative proofs or the disquisition of natural causes or the experiment of sense but only on the authority of him who reveals it to us which differenceth it most clearly both from experience and from knowledge which have surer grounds
And finally it is a firm assent to truth supernatural and supernaturally revealed which makes it differ from that credit or belief call it which you will which commonly we ascribe and give to humane authorities which being but humane must needs be fallible and therefore no fit ground for our faith to rest on according to the notion of that word in the Church of Christ. For though both knowledge and experience rest on surer grounds as to the satisfaction of the understanding to which a demonstration is of more authority then an ipse dixit that being a convincing argument which commands assent this but artificiosum argumentum as Logicians call it yet are the grounds of faith less fallible then those of any other Art or Science whatsoever it be because they are communicated to us by the Spirit of God qui nec fallere nec falli potest who being infallible in himself will most infallibly lead unto all those truths the knowledge of the which is either necessary or expedient for us 'T is true St. Paul lays down another definition or description rather of belief or faith which he defines to be Substantiam rerum sperandarum argument non apparentium that is to say The substance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen Which definition or description we will first explain and then declare to what acception of the word Faith it relates especially Now the first thing to be considered in this definition is the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Vulgar Latine rendreth by Substantia Beza more like a Paraphrast Illud quod facit ut extent quae sperantur Which being so obscure as to need a Commentary he helps our understanding with a marginal note and cals it suâ—siâ—tentiam rerum quae sperantur which is the true meaning of the word in its natural sense For faith is therefore called the subsistence or the existence as the word is sometimes translated of things hoped for because it makes those things which are yet in hope and are no otherwise ours then in expectation subsistere in corde nostro quasi ante oculos corporis to subsist or exist no lâ—ss really in our hearts or souls then if we saw them present with our bodily eyes And this he doth illustrate by the Resurrection which is not past already as some Hereticks taught nor come as yet as to the accomplishment and performance of it and yet faith makes it to subsist or exist in the minde of a Christian ac si prae oculis eam habeamus as if we were already possessed thereof The word hath other senses in the holy Scripture as in the third chapter of this Epistle to the Hebrews where we finde 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 initium substantiae as the Vulgar reads it principium illud quo sustentamur as more truly Beza The beginning of our confidence say our last Translators where that which in the Greek is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is Englished confidence according as we finde it also Psal. 39. where that which by the Septuâ—gint is translated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is in our English rendred hope Surely my hope is even in thee vers 7. Budaeus that most learned Critick in the Greek tongue will have it signifie courage or praesentiam animi deriving it from the verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies to sustain or endure a shock in which regard that Souâ—dier is called miles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who stands his ground and will not turn his back unto his adversary And in this sense we finde it also in St. Pauls Epistle unto those of Corinth twice meeting with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an unmoved constancy in boasting or praefidentem gloriationem as Beza renders it that is to say a glorying that will not shrink or be put out of countenance Which also very well agrees with the nature of faith and serves most fitly to express the full vigour of it by which a man is made assured and confident in all times of danger and scorns to give ground or to turn his back though Principalities and powers and all the rulers of the darkness of this present world were armed against him The second thing to be observed in this definition or description rather which the Apostle hath laid down in the place aforesaid is the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the evidence of things not seen as the English reads Beza translates it quod demonstrat the Vulgar Latine Argumentum and both these say the same though in divers words Arguere dicebant antiqui ostendere a quo venit argumentum quasi ostensio The old Grammarians saith Haimo used the word Argue in that sense which we use the word to declare and shew And Argumentum proprie ratio est qua quis rei dubiae facit fidem an argument saith he is the proof or evidence whereby a doubtful matter is confirmed and ratified And then the meaning of St. Paul will be briefly this Fides est ea credere quae non videntur faith makes us to believe such things as we never saw and are not subject to our senses the minde being so convicted with the evidence of divine authority as to submit it self or to give assent to every thing which is delivered in the holy Scriptures even touching the invisible things of Almighty God as the Apostle cals them in the first to the Romans But then we must observe withall that this is not a proper definition of faith it self according to the rules of Art the true character and nature of a definition but rather a description of the fruits and effects of faith in that it represents those things which are yet in hope as if they were possessed already and doth so clearly look into things invisible as if they were before our eyes And this saith Beza on the place Excellens fidei descriptio ab effectu est quod res adbuc in spepositas repraesentet invisibilia veluti oculis subjiciat So then we may define Belief or Faith as before we did St. Pauls description notwithstanding to be a firm assent to supernatural truths revealed which doth most fully manifest the true nature of faith and no way crosseth that which St. Paul delivereth For that faith represents the things hoped for and is the evidence or proof of things not seen is an effect or consequent of that firm assent to supernatural truths revealed which worketh both that evidence and existence in us It follows thereupon as we before said that to believe according as the word here stands in the front of the Creed is only to be verily perswaded of the truth of those points and Articles as are delivered in the same and to give a firm assent unto them according to the measure of our understanding This being thus stated and determined we now proceed unto the explication of the
from the sight of men And if the wise Gentile could affirme so sadly nunquam minus solum esse quam cum solus esset that he was never lesse alone then when he was by himself what need can any rational man suppose in Almighty God of having more company then himself in If this suffice not for an answer to that needlesse demand What God did before he made the World let him take that of Augustine on the like occasion who being troubbled with this curious and impertinent question is said to have returned this answer Curiosis fabricare inferos that he made Hell for all such troublesome and idle Questionists But it pleased God at last when it seemed best unto his infinite and eternal wisdome to create the World and all things visible and invisible in the same contained A point so clear and evident in the Book of God that he must needs reject the Scripture who makes question of it And as the Scripture tels us that God made the World so do they also tell us this that because he made the World he is therefore God For thus saith David in the Psalms The Lord is great and very greatly to be praised he is to be feared above all Gods As for the Gods of the Heathen they are but Idols but it is the Lord which made the Heavens Where plainly the strength of Davids argument to prove the Lord to be God doth consist in this because it was he only not the gods of the Heathen which created the World The like we also finde in the Prophet Ieremy The Lord saith he is the true God he is the living God and an everlasting King and the Nations shall not be able to abide his indignation Thus shall ye say unto them The Gods that have not made the Heavens and the Earth even they shall perish from the Earth and from under these Heavens He hath made the Earth by his power and established the World by his wisdome and hath stretched out the Heavens by his discretion In which two verses of the Prophet we have proof sufficient first that God made the World by his power and wisdome and secondly that this making of the World by his power and wisdome doth difference or distinguish him from the gods of the Heathen of whom it is affirmed expressely that they were so far from being able to make Heaven and Earth that they should perish from the Earth and from under Heaven But what need Scripture be produced to assert that truth which is so backed by the authority of the Learned Gentiles whose understandings were so fully convinced by the inspection of the Book of nature especially by that part of it which did acquaint them with the nature of the Heavenly Bodies that they concluded to themselves without further evidence that the Authour of this great Book was the only God and that he only was that great invisible power which did deserve that Soveraign title And this Pythagoras one of the first founders of Philosopie amongst the Grecians who in all probability had never seen the works of Moses as Plato and those that followed after are supposed to have done doth most significantly averre in these following verses which are preserved in Iustin Martyr 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which may be thus paraphased in our English tongue He that will say I am a Power divine A God besides that one let him first make A world like this and say that this is mine Before he to himself that title take For the next point that God the Father Almighty did create the World it is a truth so clear and evident in the Book of God that he must needs reject the Scripture who makes question of it it being not only told us in the holy Scriptures that God made the World but also when he made it and upon what reasons with all the other circumstances which concern the same The very first words of Gods book if we look no further are in themselves sufficient to confirme this point In the beginning saith the Text God created the Heaven and the Earth As Moses so the royal Psalmist He laid the foundations of the Earth and covered it with the deep as it were with a garment and spreadeth out the Heavens like a curtain He made Heaven and Earth the Sea and all that therein is And so the whole Colledge of the Apostles when they were joyned together in their prayers to God Lord said they thou art God which made Heaven and Earth the Sea and all that in them is Made it but how not with his hands assuredly there is no such matter The whole World though it be an house and the house of God cum Deo totus mundus sit und domus said the Christian Oratour yet it is properly to be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an house not made with hands How then He made it only by his word Dixit et facta sunt He spake the word and they were made saith the sweet finger of Israel There went no greater paines to the Worlds creation then a Dixit Deus And this not only said by Moses but by David too Verbo Domini coeli firmatī sunt et spiritu oris ejus omnis virtus eorum i. e. By the word of the Lord were the Heavens made and all the hosts of them by the breath of his mouth In which it is to be observed that though the creation of the World be generally ascribed unto God the Father yet both the Son and the holy Ghost had their parts therein Verbo Domini by the word of the Lord were the Heavens made saith the Prophet David In the beginning was the Word All things were made by him and without him was nothing made saith St. Iohn the Apostle The Spirit of God moved upon the waters saith Moses in the Book of the Law and Spiritu oris ejus by breath of his mouth were all the hosts of Heaven created saith David in the book of Psalmes Made by his word but yet not made together in one instant of time to teach us men deliberation in our words and actions and to set forth unto us both his power and wisdome His power he manifested in the Method of the worlds creat on in that he did produce what effects he pleased without the help of natural causes in giving light unto the World before he had created the Sun and Moon making the earth fruitfull and to bring forth plants without the motion or influence of the Heavenly bodies And for his wisdome he expressed in as high a degree in that he did not create the Beasts of the field before he had provided them of fodder and sufficient herbage nor made man after his own image before he had finished his whole work filled his house and furnished it with all things necessary both for life and pleasures
Some time then God thought fit to take for perfecting the great work of the Worlds creation six dayes in all of which the first did lay the foundation the rest raised the building The foundation of it I conceive to be that unformed matter out of which all things were extracted in the other five dayes which Moses first calleth the Heaven and the Earth because they were so in potentia but after telleth us more explicitely that that which he called Earth was inanis et vacua without forme and void and that which he called Heaven was but an overcast of darkness or tenebrae super faciem Abyssi as the Vulgar reads it Of which Chaos or confused Masse we thus read in Ovid who questionless had herein consulted with the works of Moses before his time communicated to the learned Gentiles Ante mare et terras et quod tegit omnia Coelum Vnus erat toto naturae vultus in orbe Quem dixere Chaos rudis indigestaque moles Nec quicquam nisi pondus iners congestaque eodem Non bene junctarum discordia semina rerum c. Which I shall English from Geo. Sandys with some little change Before the Earth the Sea or Heaven were fram'd One face had nature which they Chaos nam'd An undigested lump a barren load Where jarring seeds of things ill-joyn'd abode No Sun as yet with light the World adorns Nor new Moon had repair'd her waning horns Nor hung the self-pois'd Earth in thin Air plac'd Nor had the Ocean the vast shores imbrac'd Earth Sea and Air all mixt the Earth unstable The Air was dark the Sea un-navigable No certain form to any one assign'd This that resist's For in one body join'd The cold and hot the dry and humid fight The soft and hard the heavy with the light Out of this Chaos or first matter did GOD raise the World according to those several parts and lineaments which we see it in not as out of any pre-existent matter which was made before and had not GOD for the Authour or Maker of it but as the first preparatory matter which himself had made including in the same potentially both the form and matter of the whole Creation except the soul of man only which he breathed into him after he had moulded up his body out of the dust of the earth And therefore it is truly said that GOD made all things out of nothing not out of nothing as the matter out of which it was made for then that nothing must be something but as the terminus a quo in giving them a reall and corporeal being which before they had not and did then first begin to have by the meer efficacy and vertue of his powerful world And though it be a maxime in the Schooles of Philosophy Ex nihilâ— nil fit that nothing can be made of nothing that every thing which hath a being doth require some matter which must be pre-existent to it yet this must either be condemned for erroneous doctrine in the chaire of Divinity or else be limited and restrained as indeed it may conâ—idering from whence it came to visible and natural agents which cannot goe beyond the sphere of their own activity Invisible and supernatural agents are not tyed to rules no not in the production of the works of nature though nature constituted and established in a certain course work every thing by time and measure in a certain rule Now as the World was made of nothing that is to say without any uncreated or precedent matter which may be possibly conceived to have been coexistent with the God-head it self and thereby gained a being or existence which before it had not so had it a beginning too that is to say a time in which it first did begin to be what before it was not This Moses calleth principium a beginning simple In principio creavit Deus Coelum et Terram In the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth which is all one as if he had said the Heaven and the Earth had a beginning and that this unformed Masse of Chaos was the beginning or first draught of them the first in order of time because made before them not in the way of causality as the cause thereof Coelum et Terra in principio i. e. ante omnia facta sunt as Simon Pottius hath observed in his notes or Scholies on St. Iohns Gospell So that whether we do expound those words that the Heaven and Earth had a beginning or that Moses by those words did mean that out of that which he calleth the Heaven and the Earth as out of the beginning or first matter all things were created it comes all to one because it is acknowledged that that first matter was created by God and therefore of necessity was to have a beginning Nor doth the Scripture only tell us that the World had a beginning but by the help of Scripture and the works of some Learned men we are able to point out the time when it did begin or to compute how many years it is precisely from the first beginning without any notable difference in the Calculation For though it be most truly said Citius inter Horologia quam Chronologia that clocks may sooner be agreed then Chronologers yet most Chronologers in this point come so near one another that the difference is scarce observable From the beginning of the World to the birth of Christ in the account of Beroaldus are 3928. years 3945. in the computation of the Genevians 3960. in the esteem of Luther and 3963. in the calculation of Melanchthon between whom and Beroaldus being the least and the greatest there is but 35. years difference which in so long a tract of time can be no great matter Now if unto the calculation made by Beroaldus which I conceive to be the truest we add 1646. since the birth of CHRIST the totall of the time since the Worlds Creation will be 5576. years neither more nor lesse And to this truth that the World had a beginning whensoever it was and was not of eternal being or a self-existency most of the old Philosophers did consent unanimously guided thereto by this impossibility in nature that any visible work either natural or artificial should either give it self a being or have that being which it hath from no cause precedent For from that principle Tully argueth very rightly that as a man coming into a goodly house in which he found nothing but rats and mice could not conceive that either the house had built it self or had no other maker but those rats and mice which were nested in it so neither can it be imagined that either this World should be eternal of a self-existency or was composed by any natural agent of what power soever And this is that which is more briefly and expressely said by St. Paul to the Hebrews viz. That every house is built by some man but he
he plague them by the hands of Idolatrous Nations and give them over as a prey to the Babylonians whose favour they had courted in undecent ways and such as argued a distrust of Gods power or favour And when those Babylonian Princes whom God used as scourges to punish the transgressions of the house of Iudah began so far to forget God and to contemn that power which raised them to that height of Empire as to profane the Vessels of his holy Temple in their drunken Feasts did not God throw them in the fire so tender Mothers do their rods as no longer serviceable and give over to the hands of the Medes and Persians And when the Medes and Persians of a frugal People began to drench themselves in wine and prohibited pleasures growing as sordid and effeminate as Sardanapalus as drunken and gluttonous as Belshazzar how soon did God subvert their Empire and eclipse their glories by the hands of an impuissant though a valiant Prince whom also when he fell into the Persian riots he cut off in the very midst of his youth and conquests The many moral vertues in the people of Rome their Temperance Iustice Valour and Magnanimity it pleased God to reward with a temporal Monarchy the greatest that ever the Sun had shined on in the times before But when together with the conquest of Asia they had brought home the Asian vices and effeminacy making their lusts their law and their wils the rule by which their actions must be squared and the whole World governed God plagued them first with Civil and unnatural wars after subjected them unto the lust and arbitrary rule of their fellow Citizen And finally when the Christian faith was so far from reclaiming them that they became a scandal and dishonour to it he gave them over as a prey to those barbarous Nations who either knew not Christ at all or else were as erroneous in points of Doctrine as the Romans were grown scandalous in matter of practice Infinitum esset ire per singula It were an infinite attempt to follow Gods justice by the track over all the World although the foot-steps of it be so plain and evident that he would hardly lose his way that should undertake it there being no National History either old or modern in which we finde not many notable instances to evince this truth that God is just in all his ways and righteous in all his works and that he meteth such measure to the sons of men wherewith they meted unto others Some more examples of the which he that lusts to see may finde them summed up in the Preface of Sir Walter Raleigh before his History of the World though to say truth we need not look far before us For certainly if all the instances of Gods justice had been lost in the world and there were no monument of writing left to the former times the very times and Countries in which we live would give us such and so many sad remembrances as are sufficient in themselves to set forth Gods justice and make it more remarkable then all antient stories The Instances whereof I had rather the Ingenuous and discerning Reader should make unto himself then expect from me Let no man therefore in the pride of his worldly wisdome â—est in the success of a prosperous mischief or flatter and deceive his poor soul with this that God doth not see it For though God seems to wink yet his eyes are open and doth not only see but will bring to light the practices of wicked and malicious men though never so secretly contrived or so cunningly plotted And his Divine justice though slow paced at first will overtake us at long running how much soever we may seem to have got the start God dealing still with wicked and bloud-thirsty men as heretofore with Haman Absalom Achitophel and such other Instruments When they have served his turn then he hangs them up And so I close this point of the Divine Iustice of the true God with that which a false God truly said in behalf thereof for thus the Oracle of Apollo as Porphyrius citeth him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which with some little alteration may be Englished thus Let no man think to blinde the Eye of Heaven With jugling plots or colours smooth and even God fils all places and sees round about He that made all things shall not he finde out And yet I would not have it gathered out of this discourse that because GODS justice in these cares hath been quick and sudden and followed close on the offence it must be always so on the like occasions or else that question may be made whether he hath forgotten to be just and gracious or that the Divine Providence be asleep and regards us not The Providence of God in ordering humane affairs is no less eminent in suffering wicked men to prosper and sin to scape unpunished in the present world then if the Divine vengeanee of Almighty God followed them close upon the heels God useth the exorbitant lusts and passions of the wicked man as the wise Physitians do poysons in the course of Physick thereby to purge some hurtful and predominant humor out of the bodies of his Saints which otherwise might grow too corrupt and rank and draw them into such diseases as were irrecoverable For though God hath no need of the wicked man for the manifestation of his glory who can by other means effect what himself best pleaseth yet since men will be wicked and given up to sin God may and will effect by them what he hath a minde to Aut nescientibus iis aut nolentibus either against their wils or besides their purposes God neither doth incline them nor excite them to those works of wickedness whatsoever some are pleased to say unto the contrary no nor so much as to permit them but in this sense only as he affordeth them not such a measure of grace by which they must have been restrained from the acts of sin Only he makes this use of their lewd affections their cruelty ambition or such other lusts as he findes most predominant in them that they become fit instruments to set forth his glory and execute his vengeance when he seeth occasion Non operando in malis quod ei displicet sed operando per malos quod ei placet as Fulgentius hath it Thus used he the envy which the sons of Iacob did carry most unworthily towards their brother Ioseph as a great means of saving them and all their families in the following Famine with which he did intend to afflict those parts And so much Ioseph doth acknowledge when he said unto them that they should not be afraid nor troubled because they sold him into Egypt when he was a child Pro salute enim vestra misit me Deus ante vos in Aegyptum
it so doth it signifie their office for Angelus nomen est officii non naturae as the Fathers tell us which is to be the messengers from God to Man as oft as there is any important businesse which requires it of them to be the Nuncios as it were from Gods supreme holiness to manage his affaires with the sons of men And unto this the Apostle also doth agree telling us that they are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or ministring Spirits sent forth to minister unto them that shall be heires of Salvation Spirits they are according to the nature in which they were made and Ministring Spirits or Ministers as he calleth them out of David v. 7. with reference to the office unto which designed We have their nature in the word Spirits which sheweth them to be pure incorporeal substances not made of any corrupt matter as the bodies of men and so not having any internall principle of being they can have none neither of dissolution and yet as Creatures made by the hand of God they are reducible to nothing by the hand that made them although they have not in themselves any passive principle to make them naturally moral It is the priviledge or prerogative of Almighty God to be purely Simple without composition parts or passion The Angels though they come most near him yet fall short of this Who though they are not made of a matter and forme and so not naturally subject to the law of corruption yet are they made up or compounded of Act and Power or Actus aud Potentia in the School-mens language an Act by which they are a Power into which they may be reduced And being so made up of an Act of being and a Power of not being though probably that Power shall never be reduced into Act they fall exceeding short of the nature of GOD whose name is I AM and is so that it is impossible that he should not be or be any other then he is God being as uncapable of change as of composition Nay so great is the difference betwixt their nature and the nature of God so infinitely do they fall short of his incomprehensible and unspeakable Purity that though in comparison of Men as well as in themselves they are truly Spirits yet in comparison of GOD we may call them bodies But whatsoever their condition and ingredients be they owe not only unto God their continuall being by whom they are so made as to be free from corruption but unto him they are indebted for their first original without which they had not been at all St. Paul we see doth reckon them amongst things created and so doth David too in the Book of Psalmes Where calling upon all the Creatures to set forth Gods praises he first brings in the Angels to performe that office and then descends unto the Heavens and the other Creatures O praise the Lord of Heaven saith he praise him in the height Praise him all ye Angels of his praise him all his Hostes Praise him Sun and Moon c. Then addes of these and all the rest of the hosts of heaven He spake the word and they were made he commanded and they were created This with that passage of St. Paul before mentioned make it plain enough that the Angels were created by Almighty God And to this truth all sorts of writers whatsoever which do allow the being of Angels do attest unanimously Apollo in the Oracles ascribed unto him having laid down the incommunicable Attributes of God concludes it thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that such is God of whom the Angels are but the smallest portion Where though Apollo or the Devil in Apollo's statua would fain be thought to be an Angel and as an Angel would be thought to have somewhat in him which might entitle him to be a Godhead yet he confesseth plainly that he owed his being to the power of God and was to be obedient unto his commands Hosthanes one of the chief of the Eastern Magi not only did allow of Angels as the Ministers aud messengers of the only God but made them so subservient to his will and power ut vultu Domini territi contremiscant that they could not look upon him without fear and trembling A Creature therefore doubtlesse not of self-existence and a Creature of Gods making too or else what need they tremble when they look upon him Of Plato it is said by Tertullian briefly Angelos Plato non negavit but by Minutius more expressely that he did not only believe that there were Angels but came so near the knowledge of their constitution as to affirme that they were inter mortalem et immortalem mediam substantiam a substance of a middle nature betwixt immortall and mortall that is to say not so eternally immortall as Almighty God nor yet so subject to mortality as the children of men And herein Aristotle comes up close to his Master Plato affirming more like a Divine then a Philosopher that to the perfection of the World there were required three sorts of substances the first wholly invisible which must be the Angels the second wholly visible as the Heaven and Earth and the third partly visible and invisible partly or made up of both And this saith he is none but man compounded of a visible body and an invisible soul. The Angels then though reckoned amongst things invisible yet being reckoned amongst such things as necessarily concurred to the Worlds perfection must have the same Creator which first made the World and made it in that full perfection which it still enjoyeth and such as hath before been proved could be none but GOD. The matter in dispute amongst learned men is not about the Power by which but the time when they were created In which as in a matter undetermined by the word of God every man takes the liberty of his own opinion and for me they may Some think that their Creation is included in the first words of Genesis where God is said to have created the Heaven and the Earth others when God said Fiat lux Let there be light and that from thence they have the title of the Angels of light Some will not have them made till the fourth day when the Sun and Moon and others of the Stars were made whose Orbes they say are whirled about by these Intelligences Cum ab omnibus receptum sit ab illis Coelos torqueri saith Peter Martyr But that they were created in one of the six dayes is the received opinion of all late Divines whether they be of the Pontifician or the Protestant party If so I would fain know the reason why Moses writing purposely of the Worlds Creation should pretermit the Master-peece of that wondrous work and not as well take notice of the Creation of the Angels as of the making of the Heavens and the Sun and Moon or of the Earth and other sublunary Creatures I know the common
against Gods Elect. That they do compass the earth to seduce poor man we have it in the book of Iob where he is said to go to and fro in the earth to walk up and down in it and that he wandereth in the ayr we are told by St. Paul by whom he is called the Prince of the power of the ayr But that he was cast down into Hell besides those places of the Old Testament produced before we are assured by St. Peter and that they are reserved there in chains like prisoners is affirmed expressely by St. Iude Not in material chains we conceive not so but that they are restrained by the power of God and are so bridled and tyed up by his mighty hand that they are neither masters of their own abilities nor have the liberty of acting what they would themselves but only so far forth as he shall permit as is most clear and manifest in the case of Iob. And from thence came no doubt this Proverbial speech that the Devil cannot go beyond his chain And though they feel some part of that dreadful torment to which they are reserved in the house of darkness yet is it but initium dolorum or the beginning of sorrows compared with those they are to suffer in the world to come In this regard the Devils did not only cry out against Christ our Saviour that he was come to torment them before their â—ime Mat. 8.29 but they did so abominate the conceit of the bottomeless Pit that they most earnestly besought him Ne imperaret ut in Abyssum irent not to command them down to that deep Abysse Luk. 8.31 Praesentia Salvatoris est tormentum Daemonum Our Saviours presence saith St. Hierom was the Devils torment who seeing him upon the earth when they looked not for him ad judicandos se venisse crederent conceived that he was come to bring them to judgement And to say truth it is no marvel that they were so afflicted at the sight of our Saviour considering that they knew full well that howsoever he might bring Salvation to the sons of men yet for themselves they were uncapable of that mercy and were to have no part in the Worlds Redemption The reasons of which so great difference as the Schoolmen think are these especially First because the Angels fell of themselves but man at the suggestion or perswasion of others Et levius est alienamente peccaffe quam propria as S. Augustine hath it 2. The Angels in the height of their pride fought to be like God in Omnipotencie which is an incommunicable property of the Divine Nature and cannot be imparted unto any other but man desired to be like him only in Omniscience or in the general knowledge of things created which may be communicated to a creature as to the humane â—oul of Christ. Thirdly the Angels were immaterial intellectual Spirits inhabiting in the presence of God and the light of his countenance and therefore could not sin by errour or misperswasion but with an high hand and affected malice which comes neerest to the sin against the holy Ghost and so irremissible but man was placed by God in a place remote left to the frailty of his own will and wanted many of those opportunities for persisting in Grace which the others had Fourthly because the Angels are not by propagation from one another but were created all at once so that of Angels some might fall and others might stand and that though many did apostate yet still innumerable of them held their first estate but men descend by generation from one stock or root and therefore the first man falling and corrupting his nature derived the same corruption upon all his race so that if God had not appointed a Redemption for man he had utterly lost one of the most excellent creatures that ever he made Fiftly the Angels have the fulness of intellectual light and when they take view of any thing they see all which doth pertain unto it and thereupon go on with such resolution that they neither alter nor repent but man who findeth one thing after another and one thing out of another dislikes upon consideration what before he liked and so repents him of the evil which he had committed Sixthly because there is a time prefixt both to men and Angels after which there is no possibility of bettering their estate and altering their condition whether good or bad which is the hour of death in man and unto Angels was the first deliberate action either good or evil after which declaration of themselves unto them that fell there was no hope of grace or of restitution For hoc est Angelis Casus quod hominibus mors that which in man is death was this fall to the Angels as most truly Damascene Finally the Angels had all advantages of nature condition place abilities and were most readily prepared and fitted for their immediate and everlasting glorification whereas man was to pass through many uncertainties to tarry a long life here in this present World and after to expect till the general Judgement before he was to be admitted to eternal Glories In some or all of these respects Christ did not take upon him the nature of Angels nor effect any thing at all towards their Redemption but he took on him the seed of Abraham that so the heirs of Abrahams faith might be made heirs also of the Promises of eternal life So that these Angels being desperate of their own Salvation and stomaching that a creature made of dust and ashes should be adopted to those glories from which they fell have laboured ever since to seduce poor man to the like apostasie and plunge him in the gulf of the same perdition Et solatium perditionis suae perdendis Hominibus operantur saith Lactantius truly This to effect as the same Lactantius there affirmeth per totam terram vagantur they have dispersed themselves over all the World and as mankinde did increase and propagate so had they still their Instruments and Emissaries to work upon the frailty of that perishing creature by all means imaginable The principal and proper Ministery of these evil Angels whom we will hereafter call by the name of Devils is to tempt men to sin and to this end they improve all their power and those opportunities which sinful man is apt to give them And to this trade they fell assoon as the World began working upon the frailty of Eve by a beautiful fruit but more by feeding her with a possibility of being made like to God himself and by her means corrupting the pure soul of Adam to the like transgression In this regard from this foul murder perpetrated on the soul of Adam which he made subject by this means to the death of sin and consequently to the death of the body also our Saviour calleth him Homicidam ab initio a murderer from the beginning Ioh. 8.34 And as he
the Spirit of prophesie as Minutius Felix well observeth Nay being spirits as they are of an excellent knowledge and either by a foresight which they have of some things in future or by conjecturing at events out of natural causes or coming by some other means to be made acquainted with the will of God they took upon them to effect what they knew would follow and to be the Authors of those publick blessings which were hard at hand so that indeed it was no wonder Si sibi Templa si honores si sacrificia tribuuntur if thereupon the people would erect them Temples and offer sacrifice unto them and yeild them other Divine honours fit for none but Gods By means whereof they did not only raise themselves into the Throne and Majesty of Almighty God and captivated almost all the world in a blinde obedience to their will and commands Sed veri ac singularis Dei notitiam apud omnes gentes inveteraverunt as the same Lactantius rightly noteth but in a manner had defaced the knowledge of the true one and only God over all the earth And in this blindeness and Idolatry did the world continue till the birth of CHRIST the Idols of Egypt falling down flat before him when he was carryed into that countrey in his Mothers arms as Palladius telleth us and all the Oracles of the Gentiles failing at the time of his death as is collected out of that work of Plutarchs inscribed De defectu Oraculorum Which preparation notwithstanding these Devils or Daemons call them which you will had gotten such possession of the mindes of men that the Apostles and Evangelists found it a far easier matter to cast the Devils out of their bodies then out of their souls and long it was before the rising of the Sun of righteousness was able to dispel those thick clowds of darkness wherewith they had thus overspread the whole face of the Earth Which with their power and influence in the acts of sin occasioned the Apostle to make this expression that he wrestled not against flesh and bloud but against Principalities and Powers against the Rulers not of this world but of the darknesse of this world and against spiritual wickednesses in high places By which words as he means the Devils and infernal spirits against which the man of God is to combate daily so by those words he gives me a just ground to think that the Angels which did fall from the primitive purity and have since laboured noithing more then the ruine of man were chiefly of those Orders of Aâ—gels which are called Principalities and Powers in the holy Scriptures And this I am the rather induced to think because I finde them called by those names in another place where the Apostle speaking of Christs victory over Hell and Satan describes it thus that having spoiled Principalities and Powers he made a shew of them openly and triumphed over them But of this argument enough It is now time that we proceed to the Creation and fall of man as that which more immediately conduceth to the following Articles of the Incarnation death and passion of our Lord and Saviour And first for mans Creation it was last in order though first in Gods intention of the six days work it being thought unfit in Gods heavenly wisdome to create man into the world before he was provided of a decent house and whatsoever else was necessary both for life and comfort For it we look unto the end for which God made many of the inferiour creatures reperâ—â—mus eum non necessitati modo sed oblectamento voluisse consulere as Calvin rightly hath observed we shall finde that he not only intended them for the necessities of mans life but also for the convenience and delight in living And whereas all the rest of the six days work were the acts only of his power the creating of man doth seem to be an act both of power and wisdome In all the rest there was nothing but a Dixit Deus he spake the word and they were made saith the Royal Psalmist But in the making of man there was somewhat more a Faciamus hominem a consultation called about it each Person of the Trinity did deliberate on it and every one contributed somewhat to his composition For God the Father as the chief workman or the principal agent gave him form and feature in which he did imprint his own heavenly Image The Son who is the living and eternal Word gave him voyce or speech that so he might be able to set forth Gods praises and the holy Ghost the Lord and giver of life as the Nicene Fathers truly call him did breath into his nosthrils the breath of life Or if we look upon it as one act of all we shall finde man agreeing with many of the creatures in the matter out of which he was made but very different from them all both in form and figure For though God pleased to make him of the dust of Earth to humble him and keep him from aspiring thoughts as oft as he reflected on his first Original yet did he make him of a straight and erected structure advanced his head up towards the Firmament and therein gave him the preheminence over all creatures else which had been made before of the same materials And this is that which Ovid the Poet thus expresseth Pronaque cum spectant animalia caetera terram Os homini sublime dedit coelumque videre Iussit erectos ad sydera tollere vultus That is to say And where all Creatures else with down cast eye Look towards th' Earth he rais'd mans Head on high And with a lofty look did him indue That so he might with ease Heavens glories view A thing of principal moment if considered rightly not only to the beeing but well being of man who is hereby instructed by the Lord his God that in the setling of his desires and affections he should take counsell of his making so to advance his meditations as God doth his head and not by fastning both his looks and thoughts on the things below him to disgrace as much as in him is the dignity of his creation and consequently merit to have had the countenance even of those very beasts whose minde he carryeth For I am verily perswaded that if the worldly minded man and such as are not well instructed in the things of God did but consider of the figure of his body only that very contemplation would promote him in the way of godliness and rectifie such errours and misperswasion wherewith his soul hath been misguided in the way of truth Certain I am that Lactantius whom I have so often cited in this present work examining the Original and growth of Atheism with which the world had been infected in the former times makes this amongst some other causes to be one of the principal that men had formerly neglected to look up
those Prophesies which himself delivered of a spiritual Kingdome in the souls of men such as our Saviour Christ erected in his holy Church in whom the said predictions were accomplished and of whom intended and not rather of the flourishing and continuance of his temporal Kingdome the Royal seat whereof was by him setled on Mount Sion and the renown of his magnificence and personal valour had made so formidable to the Nations which were round about him And may it not be questioned also if not out of question whether that famous Prophesie Behold a Virgin shall conceive had any reference in the intention of the Prophet Isaiah to the Virgin Mary and the birth of Christ But of this more hereafter in another place The like whereof might be made good in most of the rest of the Prophets if one would put himself to the trouble of searching into all particulars which might be disputed or rather if our Saviour CHRIST himself had not already put it beyond all disputes when he thus said to his Disciples that many Kings and Prophets have desired to see the things which ye see and have not seen them and to hear those things which ye hear and have not heard them upon which words we may infer that the Evangelists and Apostles being bound to teach no other things in the Church of CHRIST then what had been foretold by Moses and the holy Prophets both knew and taught others also to believe many things of CHRIST which the Prophets no not David himself the Kingly Prophet although they very much desired it did not see nor hear of and therefore that they did not distinctly apprehend the meaning of the holy Ghost in all those things which he was pleased to utter by their mouths or express by their pens touching CHRIST to come For otherwise they must have seen all that the Evangelists saw and have known all the mysteries of the Kingdome of Heaven which the Apostles after our Saviours resurrection either knew or taught which is directly contradictory to our Saviours words and to the truth of his assertion When therefore it is said so often in the holy Gospel that some things were either done or suffered that the sayings of the Prophets might be fulfilled we must not understand it in that sense alone whereof the Prophets did intend it or of that natural proper and immediate end to which the Prophets did direct it but of some further mystical or mysterious meaning reserved in the intention of the holy Ghost and in the fulness of time accomplished by our Lord and Saviour according unto that intention though no such meaning was imparted to the Prophets themselves whose mouths he made the pen of a ready writer But then perhaps it will be said that if the Prophets had not a distinct and explicite apprehension of every thing by them delivered in the way of Prophesie but either knew not what they spake or spake what they did not understand they differed little if at all from the Heathen Sooth-sayers who foretold many things which did come to pass but without any apprehension of the truth thereof For satisfying of which scruple we may please to know that when the evil spirit did intend to foresignifie any thing to come by the mouth of the Sooth-sayers or Diviners amongst the Heathens he used to cast them into a trance or extasie so that they used to rave or speak in those sudden fits that which they neither understood at the time they spake it nor could remember when they came to their sense again These they called Arreptitii in the Latine as being snatched up as it were from the use of their senses to move divine and immaterial contemplations but generally both in Greek and Latine they were called Ecstatici from the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Hierome rightly rendreth excessus mentis an exilience or transport of minde adding that he can tell of no other word by which to express it in the Latine Aliter enim Latinus sermo 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exprimere non potest nisi mentis excessum Tertullian doth not only make it a transport of minde but such as is conjoyned with a spice of madness Extasin dicimus excessum sensus amentiae instar And such an extasie he thought had been fallen on Peter when saying on the sight of his Masters glorious transfiguration Bonum est nobis esse hic that it was good for them to continue there the Evangelist gives this character or censure of him Nesciens quid diceret that he understood not what he said Luk. 9.33 But this was only a device or conceit of his being now fallen into the heresie of Montanus to countenance by the like frenzy of St. Peter the raving follies or plain madness of Maximilla Prisca and such other Prophetesses to whom that wretched and infatuated man had given up himself Of those or one of them he telleth us in his Book De Anima that in those extasies which she suffered by the Spirit of God she had the grace of Prophesie imparted to her Est hodie soror apud nos Revelationum charismata sortita quas in Ecclesia inter Dominica solemnia per Extasin in Spiritu patitur and this he plainly calleth in another place Spiritalis extasis i. e. amentia a spiritual extasie or madness Whereof he gives this reason in another of his Books against the Marcionites In spiritu enim homo constitutus praesertim quum gloriam Dei conspicit vel quum per ipsum Deus loquitur necesse est ut excidat sensu obumbratus scilicet virtute divina that is to say a man being ravished in the Spirit especially when he beholds the glory of God which he took to be S. Peters case or when God doth please to speak by him which was the case of Prisca and her fellow Prophetesses must needs be ravished from his senses being so fully over-shadowed by the Spirit of God His exposition of the word we allow well of and doubt not but it was a plain spirit of madness which fell on Maximilla and her fellow Prophetesses as well as on any of the Heathen Soothsayers at the time of their prophesying whom for this cause the Latines called Furentes or Furiosos men besides themselves Hi sunt Furentes quos in publicum videtis excurrere vates ipsi absque Templo sic insaniunt sic bacchantur sic rotantur as Minutius hath it In which we do not only finde their name but those frantick and absurd gesticulations which they did commonly express in the time of those extasies to signifie what an heavy burden of the Spirit did then lie upon them But so it was not with the Prophets inspired by God who very well understood what they said and did and did not only prophesie what should come to pass but did it in a constant and coherent way of expression and with a grave
affirme that We are justifyed only by faith in Christ we understand not saith the Book that this our own act to believe in Christ or this faith in Christ which is within us doth justifie us and deserve our justification unto us for that were to count our selves to be justifyed by â—ome act or vertue that is within our selves but that we must renounce the merit of faith hope charity and all other vertues as things that be far too weak imperfect and insufficient to deserve remission of sins and our justification and must trust only on Gods mercy in the bloud of Christ. Where plainly it is not the intent of the Book of Homilies to exclude the act of faith from being an externall and impulsive cause of our justification but from being the meritorious cause thereof in the sight of God from having any thing to do therein in the way of merit Or if they do relate to the act of faith it is not to the act of faith as the gift of God but as to somewhat which we call and accompt our own without acknowledging the same to be given by him And in that sense to say that we are justifyed by any thing within our selves which is so properly our own as not given by God is evidently opposite to that of the holy Scripture viz. By grace ye are saved through faith and not of your selves it is the gift of God that is to say that faith by which ye are saved is the gift of God And certainly it is no wonder if faith in Christ should be acknowledged and esteemed the gift of God considering that we have Christ himself no otherwise which is the object of our faith then by gift from God who did so love the world as our Saviour telleth us that he gave his only begotten Son to the end that whosoever believed in him should not perish but have life everlasting Of which great mercy of the Lord in giving his beloved Son and of the sufferings of that Son for our redemption I am next to speake THE SUMME OF Christian Theologie Positive Philological and Polemical CONTAINED IN THE Apostles CREED Or reducible to it The Second Part. By PETER HEYLYN 1 Tim. 3.16 Without controversie great is the Mysterie of godliness God manifested in the flesh justified in the Spirit seen of Angels preached unto the Gentiles believed on in the world received up into glorie LONDON Printed by E. Cotes for Henry Seile 1654. ARTICLE III. Of the Third ARTICLE OF THE CREED Ascribed to St. IAMES 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Credo et in Jesum Christum filium ejus unicum Dominum nostrum i. e. And in IESUS CHRIST his only Son our Lord. CHAP. VIII Nothing revealed to the Gentiles touching Christ to come The name of JESUS what it signifyeth and of bowing at it Of the name CHRIST and the offices therein included The name of Christians how given unto his Disciples THUS are we come to that part of the Christian Creed which doth concern the Worlds Redemption by our Lord and Saviour IESVS CHRIST A part to which we are not like to finde much credit from the stubborn and untractable Iews except it be to so much of it as concernes his sufferings under Pontius Pilate of which they made themselves the unhappy instruments and very little help for the proof thereof from any of the learned Gentiles who being taken up with high speculations would not vouchsafe to look so low as a crucifyed IESVS The preaching of Christ crucifyed as St. Paul hath told us as to the Iews who were a proud high-minded people it became a stumbling block so to the Greeks who boasted in the pride of learning and humane wisdome it was counted foolishness And if it were so counted a parte post when he that was the light to lighten the Gentiles had shined so visibly amongst them and countenanced the preaching of his holy Gospel by such signes and wonders as did in fine gain credit to it over all the world it is not to be thought that they had any clearer knowledge of salvation by him or by the preaching of his Gospel a parte ante The Iews indeed had many notable advantages which the Gentiles had not For unto them pertained the Adoption and the glory and the Covenants and the giving of the Law and the service of God and the promises They had moreover amongst them the Prophetical writings or as St. Peter cals it the sure word of Prophesie which like a light shining in a darke place might well have served to guide them in the way of truth to keep them in a constant expectation of their Saviours coming and when he came to entertain him with all joy and cheerfulness Yet when he came unto his own they received him not that miserable obduration being fallen upon them that seeing they did see and not perceive that hearing they did hear but not understand But on the other side the Gentiles wanted all those helpes to bring them to the knowledge of their promised Saviour which were so plentifully communicated to the house of Israel For though the Lord had signifyed by the prophet Isaiah saying There shall be a root of Jesse and he that shall rise to reigne over the Gentiles in him shall the Gentiles trust yet this was more then God had pleased to manifest to the Gentiles themselves till they were actually called to the knowledge of CHRIST by the ministery of St. Peter and the accomplishment of this prophesie made known unto them by the application of St. Paul The light of natural reason could instruct them in this general principle that there was a God for nulla gens tam barbara said the Latine Oratour never was man so brutish or nation so barbarous which in the works of nature could not read a Deity And the same light of natural reason could instruct them also that that God whosoever he was was to be served and worshipped by them with their best devotions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the first place to serve and reverence the Gods was one of the most special Rules which the Greek Oratour commended to his dear Demonicus But that it should please God in the fulnesse of time to send his son made of a woman made under the Law to redeem such as were under the Law that they might receive the Adoption of sons that CHRIST should come into the world to save sinners and breaking down the partition wall between Jew and Gentile make one Church of both neither the light of nature nor the rule of reason nor any industry in their studies could acquaint them with This St. Paul calleth a mystery not made known in other ages to the sons of men a mysterie hidden from the generations of preceding times and if a mystery a secret and an hidden mystery we should but lose time did we
look to finde it in any writings or records of the antient Gentiles So that we may affirme of the knowledge of CHRIST as Lactantiuss did in generall of the ttue Religion Nondum fas esse alienigenis hominibus Religionem Dei veri justitiamque cognoscere the time was not yet come in which the Gentiles should be made acquainted with those heavenly mysteries which did concern the Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour T is true the Sibylline Oracles cited by Lactantius and others of great eminence in the Primitive times speak very clearly in some things concerning the life and death of CHRIST in so much that they seem rather written in the way of History then in that of Prophesie And though the learned Casaubon and others of our great Philologers conceive them to be pious fraudes composed of purpose by some Christians of the elder ages and added as a supplement to the true Originals the better to win credit to the faith of CHRIST yet dare I not so far disparage those good Catholick writers as to believe they would support so strong an edifice with so weak a prop or borrow help from falshood to evict the truth Or if they durst have been so venturous how easie had it been for their learned Adversaries Porphyrie Iulian and the rest of more eminent note to have detected the Imposture and silenced the Christian Advocates with reproach enough Letting this therefore go for granted as I think I may that the Sibylline Oracles are truly cited by the Fathers and that they do contain most things which hapned to our Saviour in his life and death yet could this give but little light to the Heathen people touching CHRIST to come because they were not suffered to be extant publickly and consequently came not to the knowledge of the learned Gentiles till by the care and diligence of the Christian Writers they were after published For so exceeding coy were the antient Romans of suffering the Sibyls or their works to go abroad having got into their hands the best copies of them that those times afforded that they commanded them to be kept closely in the Capitol under the care and charge of particular Officers whom from the number of fifteen for so many they were they called Quindecemviri and to whom only it was lawful to consult their papers Nec eos ab ullo nisi a Quindecemviris fâ—s est inspici as Lactantius notes it very truly And it is also very true that many of the antient and most learned Grecians had a confused notice of a second Deity whom they called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Word making him aiding and subservient to Almighty God in the Creation of the world and therefore giving him the attribute of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the worlds Creator The several testimonies to this purpose he that lists to see may finde them mustered up together in that laborious work of the Lord du Plessis entituled De veritate Religionis Christianae cap. 6. So frequently occurs this notion in the old Philosophers especially in those of the School of Plato that Porphyrie an Apostate Christian and a Platonick in the course of his sect and studies blasphemously averred that St. Iohn had stollen the first words of his Gospel viz. In the beginning was the Word c. from his Master Plato And though the affirmation of that vile Apostata intended only the disgrace of the holy Evangelist and of the Gospel by him written for the use of the Church yet had it been a truth as indeed it was not it could have been no greater a disparagement to St. Iohn to borrow an expression from a Greek Philosopher then to St. Paul to use the very words of three Grecian Poets But the truth is that both St. Iohn and the Platonicks together with the rest of those old Heroes borrowed the notion from the Doctors of the Iewish Nation as Maldonate hath proved at large in his Comment on that Text of the blessed Evangelist who withal gives it for the reason why S. Iohn made choyce rather of this notion then of any other in the front or entrance of his Gospel because it was so known and acceptable both to Iew and Gentile Philosophos non dubium est ab antiquis Hebraeis hausisse sententiam vocabulum accepisse Proinde voluit Johannes accommodate ad usum loqui saith the learned Iesuite But then withall we must observe that though we finde such frequent mention of the Word or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the writings of the antient Gentiles yet finde we almost nothing of him but the name or notion nothing that doth relate to the salvation of man the taking of our nature upon him or being made a propitiation for the sins of mankinde That as before I noted was a secret mysterie not to be manifested to the sons of the Gentiles till CHRIST himself was come to make one of both and call them to the knowledge of his grace and faith in him Being so called they were no longer to be differenced by the name of Gentiles but fellow-heirs and of the same body whereof CHRIST is Head and as the members of that body to joyn in the Confession of the self same faith not only as to God the Father in the acknowledgement of which Article all the Nations meet but as unto his only Son IESVS CHRIST our Lord from whence the faith hath properly the name of Christian. Now that which we believe touching CHRIST our Saviour and is to be the argument of this present Book is thus delivered by the pen of our Reverend Iewell in the name and for the use and edification of the Church of England Credimus Jesum Christum filium unicum aeterni patris c. i. e. We believe that IESVS CHRIST the only Son of the eternal Father as it had been determined before all beginnings when the fulness of time was come did take of that blessed and pure Virgin both flesh and all the nature of man that he might declare unto the world the secret and hidden will of his Father and that he might fulfil in his humane body the Mysterie of our Redemption and might fasten our sins unto the Cross and blot out that hand-writing which was against us We believe that for our sakes he dyed and was buryed descended into Hell and the third day by the power of his God-head rose again to life and that the fortieth day after his Resurrection whiâ—est his Disciples looked on he ascended into Heaven to fulfil all things and did place in Majesty and glory the self same body wherewith he was born in which he lived upon the earth in which he was scornfully derided and suffered most painful torments and a cruel death and finally in which he rose again from the dead and ascended to the right hand of the Father above all principalities and powers and might and dominion that there he
now sitteth and shall sit till all things be fully perfected We believe also that from that place he shall come again to execute that general Iudgement as well of them whom he shall then finde alive in the body as of them that shall be already dead This is the main of that which is to be believed touching CHRIST IESVS our Lord but so that we divide not the man CHRIST IESVS from IESVS CHRIST the Son of God For though that note of Estius be exceeding true that all things contained in the Creed concerning Christ from his conception in the womb of the Virgin to his last coming unto judgement inclusively de Christo dicuntur secundum humanam naturam are verified and affirmed of him in his humane nature yet are we also bound to believe this of him that he was so truly and indissolubly the Son of God according to the Tenor of this present Article that whilest this man was born of the Virgin Mary the Son of God was also born of the self same Virgin whilest the man CHRIST IESVS suffered under Pontius Pilate the Son of God was also crucified dead and buried Et sic de caeteris For otherwise Tacitus who reporteth his sufferings under Pontius Pilate and Pontius Pilate who gave testimony to his Resurrection in a Letter writ on that occasion to Tiberius Caesar or Nicolas one of the Seven the Founder of the Sect of the Nicolaitans who beheld him at the instant of his Ascension might pass for Orthodox professors of the Christian Faith Besides a partial assent to one or to some only of the Articles which relate to CHRIST is not enough to give denomination to a true believer It must be uniform and alike sincere unto every truth recorded of him in the Scriptures or summarily comprehended in the present Creed which qualifieth a man a right to deserve that title So that unless we fix our selves upon this Principle that IESVS CHRIST our Lord is the Son of God the only begotten Son of God as the Nicene hath it and carry the same with us through every Article which hath relation to his Person our Faith being partial only to some matters of fact and not compleat and perfect in each several lineament fals short of that assent to the Word of God and all those supernatural truths revealed in it which is required unto the constitution of salvifical faâ—th Now for the better understanding of the present Article which is so operative and influential over all the rest we will resolve it first into this Proposition that IESVS CHRIST our Lord is the Son of God the only begotten Son of God as before we had it from the Nicene And having so resolved it into this Proposition will take a view thereof in its several parts and look upon our Saviour Christ first in his Person and his Office next in his several relations unto God and man His Person we finde represented in the name of IESVS his Offices in that of CHRIST his reference or relation to Almighty God as he is his Son his only Son to man as he is made our Lord. First for his person or his nature we finde it represented in the name of IESVS for Christus nomen est officii Jesus naturae personae as the learned note and that originally Hebrew derived from the future tense of the verb Iashang which signifieth Salvavit i. e. he hath saved or from the substantive Isshagnah which is as much as salus ipsa or salvation it self If from the first it is the very same in Hebrew with that of Iehoshua or Ioshua as our English reads it the son of Nun who by St. Luke Act. 7.45 and by St. Paul Heb. 4.8 is called plainly Iesus and then the difference betwixt him and the son of Nun will consist rather in the manner of the salvation which he hath bestowed then in the property of the name If from the second we finde more in old Simeons Nunc dimittis then hath been generally observed who did not only praise the Lord because his eyes had seen his Saviour but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the salvation of God And then those Texts of holy Scripture which speak so clearly of the Salvation of God or where God is called our Salvation as Exod. 15.2 Esa. 12.1 2 3. 49.6 52.10 56.1 and also Habak 3.18 may possibly be intended of CHRIST our Saviour But whether this be so or not it can be no disparagement to the Son of God to have his name derived from the same Original with Ioshua the son of Nun who was so clear a type of the Lord himself that scarce a clearer doth occur in the book of God For as Moses the Law-giver of the Iews though he did bring that people out of the land of Egypt was not so happy as to settle them in the land of Canaan but left that work to be performed by the hand of Iesus the Son of Nun so neither could the Law which was the School-mistris unto CHRIST though it dispelled the clowds of Egyptian darkness bring them that did live under it into the Sanctum Sanctorum but left the honour of the work to IESVS the Son of God And as Ioshua or Iesus the son of Nun having subdued the heathenish Princes who possessed the land estated the whole house of Iacob in possession of it so IESVS CHRIST the Son of the living God having subdued Sin Hell and Satan who held the whole world of mankinde under their subjection brought those who are the children of Abrahams faith into a peaceable fruition of the land of Promise whereof the land of Canaan was a Type or figure The difference as unto the name was in this especially that Ioshua the son of Nun was at first called Oshea Numb 13.9 and had his name changed afterwards by Moses vers 16. on some presage perhaps of his future greatness but IESVS CHRIST the Son of God received that name from God himself in his first conception For thus the Angel Gabriel to the blessed Virgin Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb and bring forth a Son and shalt call his name IESVS The reason of which choyce or appellation is by another Angel thus given to Ioseph Ipse enim salvum faciet populum suum c. i. e. for he shall save his people from all their sins Here then we have a salvabit or a salvum faciet to manifest the true interpretation of this blessed name and therewithall the nature of a more blessed Person And so Ruffinus doth resolve it IESVS Hebraei vocabuli nomen est quod apud nos Salvator dicitur IESVS saith he is an Hebrew name and signifieth as much as Saviour Where we may note that the old Author keeps himself to the old Ecclesiastical word Salvator and was not so in love with the Roman elegancies as Beza for the most part is in his translation as to obtrude
Servator on us in the place thereof Concerning which St. Augustine hath this observation that antiently Salvator was no Latine word but was first devised by the Christians to express the greatness of the mercies which they had in Christ. For thus the Father Qui est Hebraice JESUS Graece 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nostra autem locutione Salvator Quod verbum Latina lingua non habebat sed habere poterat sicut potuit quando voluit Nay Cicero the great Master of the Roman elegancies doth himself confess that the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a word of too high a nature to be expressed by any one word of the Latine tongue For shewing how that Verres being Praetor in Syracusa the chief town in Sicily had caused himself to be entituled by the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he addes immediately hoc ita magnum est ut Latino uno verbo exprimi non possit And thereupon he is compelled to use this Paraphrase or circumlocution Is est nimirum Soter qui salutem dedit i. e. He properly may be called Soter who is giver of health So that the Latine word Servator being insufficient to express the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and consequently the Hebrew IESVS the Christians of the first times were necessitated to devise some other and at last pitched upon Salvator which to this purpose hath been used by Arnobius l. 1. adv Gentes Ambros. in Luk. c. 2. Hieron in Ezek. c. 40. August de doctr Chr. l. 2. c. 13. contr Crescon l. 2. c. 1. besides the passages from Ruffinus and the same St. Augustine before alleadged So then the name of Iesus doth import a Saviour and the name of IESVS given to the Son of God intimates or implieth rather such a Saviour as shall save his people from their sins This differenceth IESVS our most blessed Saviour from all which bare that name in the times foregoing Iesus or Ioshua the son of Nun did only save the people from their temporal enemies but IESVS CHRIST the Son of the living God doth save us from the bonds of sin from our ghostly enemies IESVS the son of Iosedech the Priest of the Order of Aaron did only build up the material Altar in the holy Temple but IESVS the High Priest for ever after the Order of Melchisedech not only buildeth up the spiritual Temple but is himself the very Altar which sanctifieth all those oblations which we make to God Iesus the son of Sirach hath no higher honour but that he was Author of the book called Ecclesiasticus a book not reckoned in the Canon of the holy Scripture but IESVS CHRIST the Son of God and the Virgin Mary not only is the subject of a great part of Scripture but even the Word it self and the very Canon by which we are to square all our lives and actions I am the way the truth and the life as himself telleth us in St. Iohn Look on him in all these capacities he is still a IESVS a Saviour of his people from their sins and wickednesses a builder of them up to a holy Temple fit for the habitation of the holy Ghost a bringer of them by the truth and way of righteousness unto the gates of life eternal a true IESVS still So properly a IESVS and so perfectly a Saviour to us that there is no salvation to be found in any other nor is there any other name under Heaven given amongst men whereby they must be saved but this name of IESVS Aâ— name if rightly pondered above every name and given him to this end by Almighty God that at the Name of Jesus every knee should bow of those in Heaven and earth and under the earth And there may be good reason besides Gods appointment why such a sign of reverence should be given to the very name not only a name above other names and therefore to be reverenced with the greater piety but as a pregnant testimony of that exaltation to which God hath advanced him above all other persons We bow the knee unto the persons of Kings and Princes And therefore Pharaoh when he purposed to honour Ioseph above all the Egyptians appointed certain Officers to cry before him saying bow the knee CHRIST had not been exalted more then Ioseph was had bowing of the knee been required to his Person only and therefore that there might appear some difference betwixt him and others the Lord requires it at his name And though the Angels in the heavens and the Spirits beneath have no knees to bow which is the principal objection of our Innovators against the reverent use of bowing at the Name of Iesus used and enjoyned to be used in the Church of England yet out of doubt the spirits of both kindes both in Heaven and Hell as they acknowledge a subjection to his Throne and Scepter so have they their peculiar ways such as are most agreeable to their several natures of yeilding the commanded reverence to his very Name Certain I am St. Ambrose understood the words in the literal sense where speaking of the several parts of the body of man he maketh the bowing at the name of JESUS the use and duty of the knee Flexibile genu quo prae caeteris Domini mitigatur offensa gratia provocatur Hoc enim patris summi erga filium donum est ut in nomine JESU omne genu curvetur The knee is flexible faith the Father whereby the anger of the Lord is mitigated and his grace obtained And with this gift did God the Father gratifie his beloved Son that at the Name of JESUS every knee should bow Nor did St. Ambrose only so expound the Text and take it in the literal sense as the words import but as it is affirmed by our Reverend Andrews there is no antient Writer upon the place save he that turned all into Allegories but literally understands it and liketh well enough that we should actually perform it Conform unto which Exposition of the Antient Writers and the received usâ—ge of the Church of Christ it was religiously ordained by our first Reformers that Whensoever the Name of IESVS shall be pronounced in any Lesson Sermon or otherwise in the Church due reverence be made of all persons young and old with lowness of curâ—esie and uncovering of the heads of the mankinde as thereunto doth necesâ—aâ—ily belong and heretofore hath been accustomed Which being first established by the Queens Injunctions in the yeer 1559. was afterwards incorporated into the Canons of King Iames his reign And if of so long standing in the Church of England then sure no Innovation or new fancy taken up of late and bâ—t of laâ—e obtruded on the Church by some Popish Bishops as the Novators and Novatians of this present age the Enemies of Iesu-Worship as they idlely call it have been pleased to say And should we grant that this were no duty of
but Dominus nosier our Lord the Lord of all that doe confess his holy Name and agree in the truth of his holy Word A title which accreweth to him in many respects as first in regard of our Creation For if all things were made by him and without him was nothing made that was made as St. Iohn affirmeth If by him all things were created both in Heaven and Earth visible and invisible as St. Paul informs us good reason that he should have the Dominion over the work of his own hands and that we should acknowledge him for the Lord our Maker In the next place he is our Lord in jure Redemptionis in the right of Redemption Concerning which we must take notice as before was said that man was made by God in his first Creation just righteous and devoide of malice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the words of Damascen Created to this purpose after Gods own Image Vt imitator sui autoris esset that so he might more perfectly imitate his Creators goodness But falling from this happiness in which he might have served the Lord with perfect innocency he made a new contract with the Devil and became his servant and put himself directly under his dominion Do ye not know saith the Apostle that unto whom you yeild your selves servants to obey his servants ye are whom ye obey If then they were the Devils servants the Devil of necessity was their Lord and Master for Dominus servus sunt relata as our Logick teacheth us A miserable and most wretched thraldome from which there was no other way to set mankinde free but by the death and passion of our Saviour CHRIST which he being willing for our sakes to undergo did by the offering of himself once for all become the propitiation for our sins and obtain eternal redemption for us cancelling the bond or obligation which was against us and nayling it to his Cross for ever Nor were poor mankinde only servants to this dreadful Tyrant but for the most part they had listed themselves under him and became his souldiers fighting with an high hand of presumptuous wickedness against the Lord God and the Hosts of Heaven And they continued in that service taking part with the Devil upon all occasions till he received his final overthrow at the hands of our Saviour who by his death overcame him who had the power of death which is the Devil and having spoiled principalities and powers made a shew of them openly and triumphed over them By means whereof another title did accrew unto him of being the sole Lord over all mankinde and that is jure belli by the laws of war that rule of Aristotle being most unquestionably true 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say those which are taken in the wars are in the power and at the disposal of the Conquerour And by the same right also of successful war men became servants unto him whose service as our Church hath taught us is perfect freedome For Servi are so called a servando from being saved and preserved in the day of battail Vocabuli origo inde ducta creditur quod ii qui jure belli possint occidi a victoribus conservabantur as St. Augustine from the Lawyers hath it because although they might be slain by the Law of Armes yet by the clemency of the Victor they were saved from slaughter and so made servants to the Conquerour And last of all he is our Lord jure Promotionis by the right of promotion because we hold of him all those temporal and eternal blessings which we enjoy in this life and expect in that which is to come He is the Lord of Life as St. Peter telleth us Act. 3.15 the Lord of glory saith S. Paul 1 Cor. 2.8 the Lord of joy Enter into the joy of the Lord as St. Matthew hath it 25.21 And he conferreth on us his servants life joy and glory out of the abundant riches of his mercy towards us and whatsoever else is his within the title and power of Lord. For having thereto a double right first by inheritance as the Son whom God appointed heir of all things Heb. 1.2 and then by purchase as a Redeemer for therefore he dyed and rose again that he might be Lord of all Rom. 14.9 contenting himself with the first alone he is well pleased to set over the latter unto us and to advance us to an estate of joynt-purchase in Heaven of life joy and glory and whatsoever else he is owner of For to that end it pleased him to come down from Heaven and be made man and be incarnate by the holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary which is the first of those great works which were performed by him in order to our Redemption and next in order of the Creed ARTICLE IV. Of the Fourth ARTICLE OF THE CREED Ascribed to St. ANDREW 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Qui conceptus est de Spiritu sancto natus ex Virgine Maria. i. e. Which was conceived by the holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary CHAP. III. Of Gods free mercy in the Redemption of Man The Word why fittest to effect it The Incarnation of the Word why attributed to the holy Ghost The miracle thereof made credible both to Iews and Gentiles IT is a very ingenious conceit of Cameracensis that when God first created Adam he gave him all precious and excellent endowments as truth to instruct him justice to direct him mercy to preserve him and peace to delight him but that when he was fallen from God and forgot all the good which the Lord had done for him they returned back to him that gave them making report of that which had happened on the earth and earnestly moving the Almighty but with different purposes concerning this forlorn and unhappy creature For Iustice pleaded for his condemnation and called earnestly for the punishment which he had deserved Truth pressing for the execution of that which God had threatned on his disobedience But on the other side Mercy intreated for poor miserable man made out of the dust of the earth seduced by Satan and beguiled under faire pretences and Peace endevoured to take off the edge of Gods displeasure and reconcile the creature unto his Creatour When God had heard the contrary desires and pleas of those excellent Orators there was a councell called of the blessed Trinity in which it was finally resolved that the Word should be made flesh and take unto himself the nature of Man that he might partake of his infirmities be subject to the punishments which man had deserved and so become the propitiation for the sins of the world By this means the desires of all parties were fully satisfyed For man was punished according as Iustice urged the punishment threatned on mans disobedience inflicted as Truth required the offender pitied and relieved as Mercy intreated and God was
by which in the beginning of time all things were created By consequence when the Word was pleased to be incarnate or to be made flesh in St. Iohns own language the person thus made Christ of the Word and flesh though he was incorporated into this flesh by the powerful influence and operation of the holy Ghost was properly to be called the Son of God in whom and of whom only he before existed the holy Ghost not being the Author of any new Person but only betroathing to the Word the humane nature of CHRIST which had no actual existence before those Espousals I know I cannot speak too reverently of so great a mysterie or think too worthily of that wonderful and miraculous Act of the Incarnation or Conception of our blessed Saviour And yet I doubt that some by thinking that he was not formed and fashioned in his Mothers womb by those gradations to perfection which are necessary to all natural births but make his body to be perfected all at once in the very moment of his Conception and at that instant the reasonable soul to be actually infused into it do unawares deprive him of a great deal of honour which his humiliation to our nature did confer upon him Of this minde is Maldonate for one whose words take here together for our more assurance Alios paulatim sensimque in utero formari antequam Corpusculâ—m animetur Christi vero corpus eodem momento quo conceptum est formari animatum fuisse Which were it so our Saviour CHRIST had not in all things been made like unto us contrary to the express words of holy Scripture nor needed to have lien so long time in his Mothers womb his body being compleatly formed and animated in the first conception But I believe the Iesuite had a further aim in it then he pleased to discover And possibly it might be an ingenuous fear of arrogating or ascribing more to a common Priest then had been granted to be done by the holy Ghost For needs it must seem harsh to most Popish ears that the Body of CHRIST should be nine moneths in forming in his mothers womb though supernaturally conceived by the Divine power and influence of the holy Ghost and yet upon the Priests saying Hoc est Corpus meum the self same body and soul with his Divinity and all into the bargain should instantly be made of a piece of bread without expecting nine minutes for so great a miracle Most happy men who come so nere the power and Majesty of Almighty God and the prerogatives of CHRIST that as the one could have raised children out of stones to Abraham and the other command stones to be made bread so they can out of bread raise a Son to God and not a son to God only but even God the Son which is more then was I dare not say or could be done by the holy Ghost whose part in this great work we have spoke of hitherto ARTICVLI 4. Pars 2da 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Natus ex Virgine Maria. i. e. Born of the Virgin Mary CHAP. IV. Of the birth of CHRIST The feast of his Nativity Why born of a Virgin The Prophecie of Isaiah The Parentage and priviledge of the Blessed Virgin PRoceed we to the second branch of this present Article from the Conception to the Birth of our Lord and Saviour the most materiall part to us of the whole mysterie It had been little to our comfort though much unto the honour of our humane nature had the WORD been only made flesh and with that flesh ascended presently into heaven and had not dwelt amongst us and shewn forth his glory as the glory of the only begotten of the Father full of grace and truth It was not Gods being in the flesh but his being manifested in the flesh which St. Paul cals 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the great mysterie of Godlinesse For without that although he might have been seen of Angels yet had he not been preached unto the Gentiles nor been believed on in the world as the Saviour of it The end of his taking on himself our flesh was to save poor man For this is an acceptable saying as St. Paul hath told us that JESUS CHRIST came into the world to save sinners and come into the world he could not in the sense he speaks of but by being born I know some thinke that though ADAM had never sinned yet it had been necessary for the exaltation of humane nature that the WORD should have been made man and Bonaventure doth approve it as a Catholick opinion and consonant to natural reason But howsoever it may seem in his judgment to agree with reason assuredly it is more agreeable to the piety and analogie of faith that the Son of God had never appeared in our flesh but for the delivery of mankinde from sin and misery neither the Scripture nor the Fathers speaking of the incarnation but with reference to mans redemption To this effect St. Augustine speaketh most divinely Si homo non periisset filius hominis non venisset nulla causa fuit Christi veniendi nisi peccatores salvos facere Tolle morbos tolle vulnera et nulla est medicinae causa That is to say If man had not perished the son of man had not come for therefore came the son of man to save that which was lost there being no other cause of Christs coming but the salvation of sinners Take away diseases and wounds from man and what need is there of a Physitian So that resolving with the Scriptures and Fathers that there was no cause for the incarnation of the WORD but that he should be born for our redemption let us proceed therein with that fear and reverence which justly doth belong to so great a mysterie as the manifestation of God in the flesh is said to be by the Apostle A mysterie in which there is not any thing beneath a miracle Nor can it easily be resolved whether of the two be more full of wonder either that God the WORD should be born of Woman or born of such a woman as was a Virgin The first and greatest of the two that which indeed is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a miracle of miracles as man is somewhere called by Plato was that the word was made flesh and did receive that flesh from a mortall womb A wonder it seemed to Nicodemus that a man should be born when he was old or enter a second time into his mothers womb and be born again A greater wonder must it be for him to enter into the womb and thence to finde a passage into the world who was far older then all time and had his being when the world but began to be A greater wonder must it seem for him to take a being from a mortal creature by whom all creatures had their being and did himself create the same womb which bare him
very month and day of our Saviours birth transmitted to us from the best and purest times of the Christian Church though not recorded in the Scriptures Theophilus Caesariensis who lived about the latter end of the second Century doth place it on the eight of the Calends of Ianuary which is the 25. of December as we now observe it and reckoneth it as a festival of the Christian Church long before his time Natalem Domini quocunque die VIII Calend. Januar. venerit celebrare debemus as his own words are And Nyssen though he name not the day precisely yet cals it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the famous day of Christian solemnity and placeth it in that point of time 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as he telleth us there in which the dayes wax longer and the nights grow shorter which is we know about the time of the Winter Solstice In an old Arabick copy of Apostolick Canons it is especially appointed that the Anniversary feast of the Lords Nativity be kept upon the 25. day of the first Canun which is the same with our December on which day he was born A Persian Calender or Ephemeris doth place it on the same day also The Syriack Churches do the like and so do the Aegyptian or Coptick Churches as Mr. Gregory hath observed out of their Records not to say any thing of Iohannes Antiochenus the Author of an old MS. Cosmography who doth affirme as much for the East parts of the Roman Empire A day so highly esteemed in the former times that the Greeks called it generally 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the feast of Gods manifestation in the flesh Chrysostom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Mother or Metropolis of all other festivals another of the Eastern Fathers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the festival of the worlds salvation A day of such a solemn concourse in the Christian Church that the Tyrants in the 10. Persecution made choise thereof as an especial opportunity for committing the greater slaughter of poor innocent souls and therefore on that day in ipso natalis Dominici die as my Author hath it burnt down the Church of Nicomedia the then Regal City of the East with all that were assembled in it for Gods publick service I know great pains have been unprofitably took to no other purpose but to prove that Christ was born at some other time of the year at least not on the day which is now pretended But the Arguments on which the disproof is founded are so slight and trivial that it were losse of labour to insist upon them Suffice it that the Church had far better reason to celebrate the birth-day of the Son of God then any of the sons of men to suppresse the same And this I call the birth-day of the Son of God because from this day forwards he was so indeed though not publickly proclaimed or avowed for such till the day of his Baptisme when it was solemnly made known by a voice from heaven The Word before In the beginning was the Word Ioh. 1.1 The Word made flesh and born of the Virgin Mary and by that birth the only begotten Son of God full of grace and truth said the same Evangelist v. 14. For though we did not look upon him as the word made flesh his being born in such a miraculous manner of an untouched Virgin would of it self assert him for the Son of God So said the Angel Gabriel the first Evangelist Therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God The Son of God as soon as born of the Virgin Mary because conceived and born in so strange a manner so far above the course of nature that none but God the God of nature could lay claim unto him For here the great miracle of the incarnation doth receive improvement in that the WORD was not only made flesh and born of a woman but born of such a woman as was a Virgin That so it was we have the warrant of the Scripture In the sixth month the Angel Gabriel was sent from God to a City of Galilee named Nazareth to a Virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph of the house of David and the Virgins name was MARY So far the Text informes us in the present business giving her in one verse twice the name of Virgin the better to imprint the same in our hearts and memories And certainly it stood with reason that it should be so For although Miracles in themselves are above our reason because beyond the reach of all natural causes yet doth it stand with very good reason that since the WORD vouchsafed to descend so low as to be born of a woman he should receive that birth from the purest Virgin and be fashioned in a womb which was unpolluted The pious care of his Disciples did conceive it fitting that his dead body should be laid in a Tomb or Sepulchre where never man was laid before And was it not as fit or fitter that his living body great with Divinity and a soul for in him dwelt the fulnesse of the Godhead bodily should be conceived in such a womb which had not been defiled with the seed of man in whose most chast embraces and unblamable dalliances there is a mixture of Concupiscence and carnal lusts Most fit it was his Mother should be like his Spouse of whom we finde it written in the Song of Solomon that she is as a Garden inclosed a spring shut up a fountain â—ealed Besides the meanes and method of mans redemption was to hold some proportion with the meanes of his fall that so that Sex might have the honour of our restauration which had been the unhappy Author of our first calamity that as by woman the Devil took his opportunity to introduce death into the world for the woman being deceived was in the transgression saith St. Paul to Timothy so by a woman and a Virgin such as Eve was then did Gods foreknowing will determine that life even life eternall should be born into it Eve the first woman out of an ambitious desire to be like to God coveted after the forbidden tree of good and evill The second Eve if I may so call her as Christ is called the second Adam 1 Cor. 15.45 out of an obedient desire that God might be as one of us did gladly bear in her womb the tree of life of which whosoever eateth he shall live for ever Eve as her name importeth was the Mother of all living of all that live this temporal and mortal life the life of nature and MARY in due time became the mother of that living Spirit by whom we are begotten to the life of grace So true is that of Gregory surnamed Thaumaturgus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that from the same Sex came our weal and wo. To drive this Parallel further yet Eve at the time of the
conteret caput tuam she shall break thy head which many of their Commentators do refer to her that Bellarmine maketh at all no difference betwixt the Veneration which is due to her and that which doth belong unto Christ as man and finally that the vulgar sort in point of practise for needes such practise must ensue on such desperate doctrines do use to say so many Ave Maries for one single Pater noster hear day by day so many masses of our Ladies and not one of Christs adorn her images with all cost and cunning which mans wit can reach whilest his poor Statues stand neglected as not worth the looking after Wonder it is they have not practised on the Creed aud told us how the Apostles had mistook the matter when they drew it up and that it was not Jesus Christ but the Virgin Mary that suffered under Pontius Pilate was crucifyed dead and buryed for the sins of man Such are and such have been the most known repugnancies which have found entertainment in the Christian world touching the Priviledges and Prierogatives of this blessed woman Between these two extremes is the vertue placed which I perswade my self hath been most happily preserved in the Church of England retaining still two annual feasts instituted in the best times to her name and memory We gladly give her all the honour which is due unto her account her for the most blessed of all women a choice and most selected Temple of the holy Ghost and happiest instrument of mans good which hath descended simply from the loynes of Adam but dare not give her divine honour by erecting Altars to her service going in pilgrimage to her shrines or powring forth our prayers unto her Finally we resolve with Epiphanius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Let the blessed Virgin be had in reverence but God only worshipped let her possesse principal place in our good opinions so she have none in our devotions But it is time to leave the Mother and return again unto the Son Now that which in this Article is expressed by the present words Natus ex Virgine Maria that is to say born of the Virgin Mary in that of Nice is thus delivered and was made man Some Hereticks had formerly called this truth in question affirming that our Saviours body was not true and real but only an ayery and imaginary body as did the Marcionites others that he received not his humane being of the Virgin Mary but brought his body from the heavens and only passed thorow her womb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as thorow a Conduit pipe as Valentinian as if our blessed Lord and Saviour had only borrowed for a time the shape of man therâ—in to act his woful tragedy on the publick Theatre of the world and made the Virgins womb his trying house And some again there were who did conceive his body to be free from passion maintaining that it was impassibilis and that he was not subject to those natural frailties and infirmities which are incident to the Sons of men by the ordinary course of nature To meet with these and other Hereticks of this kind the Fathers in the Nicene Councel expressed our Saviours being born of the Virgin Mary which every Heretick had wrested to his proper sense in words which might more fully signifie the truth and reality of his taking of our flesh upon him in words which were not capable of so many evasions declaring thus that being incarnate by the holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary factus est homo he was made man and consequently was made subject unto those infirmities which are inseparably annexed to our humane nature This that which positively is affirmed by the Apostle in his Epistle to the Hebrews where it is said that we have not such an high Priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities but was in all points tempted like as we are yet without sin The high Priest which God gave us in the time of the Gospel was to be such as those he gave unto his people in the time of the Law one who could have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are out of the way for that he himself is compassed also with infirmities The difference only stood in this that our Saviours passions and infirmities were free from sin and neither did proceed from sin or incline him to it as do the passions and infirmities of men meerly natural which is the meaning of St. Paul in the place aforesaid where he affirmeth of our high Priest that he was tempted that is to say afflicted tryed and proved in all things like as we are save only that it was without sin or sinful motions And to this truth the Catholick Doctors of the Church do attest unanimously St. Ambrose thus CHRIST saith he took upon him not the shew but the truth and reality of the flesh what then Debuit ergo et dolorem suscipere ut vinceret tristitiam non excluderet he therefore was to have a sense of humane sorrowes that he might overcome them not exclude them only Fulgentius goes to work more plainly Nunc oftendendum est saith he c. Now must we shew that the passions of grief sorrow fear c. do properly pertain unto the soul and that our Saviour did endure them all in his humane soul ut veram totamâ— in se cum suis infirmitatibus hominis demonstraret suscepti substantiam that he might shew in himself the true and whole substance of man accompanied with its infirmities The fathers of the Greek Church do affirme the same When thon hearest saith Cyril that Christ wept feared and sorrowed acknowledge him to be a true man and ascribe these things to the nature of man for Christ took a mortal body subject to all the passions of nature sin alwayes excepted Which when he had affirmed in thesi he doth thus infer Et ita singulas passiones carnis c. Thus shalt thou finde all the passions or affections of the flesh to be stirred in Christ but without sin that being so stirred up they might be repressed and our nature reformed to the better But none of all the Antients state the point more clearly then Iohn Damascene in his 3. book De fide orthodoxa where he tels us this We confesse saith he that Christ did take unto him all natural and blamelesse passions for he assumed the whole man and all that pertained to man save sin Natural and blamelesse passions are those which are not properly in our power and whatsoever entred into mans life through the occasion of Adams sin as hunger thirst weaknesse labour weeping shunning of death fear agony whence came sweat with drops of bloud These things are in all men by nature and therefore Christ took all these to him that he might sanctifie them all With this agreeth the distinction of the latter Schoolmen who divide the
wings that thou take no harm This was the Devils last attempt and he failed in this too our Saviour keeping still to his old ward and beating off all his blows with a Scriptum est to teach us that the Word of God is the best assurance we can have to rest our selves upon in the day of Temptation and that there is no readier way to quench the fiery darts of Satan then to be always furnished with the waters of life This done the Devil finding him impregnable and that he did but lose his labour in those vain assaults gives him over presently He left him to himself as St. Matthews tels us and thereby made that good in fact which is recorded of him by St. Iames the Apostle Resist the Devil and he will flie from you And yet he left him so as to come again He departed from him for a season as St. Luke informs us and he that goes away for a season only hath animum revertendi a purpose of returning when he sees occasion and when he meets with those occasions we shall finde him at it In the mean time there are some doubts to be resolved touching these temptations which we will first remove and then pass forwards For first a question may be made how the Devil could so suddenly take our Saviour up and set him on a pinnacle of the holy Temple being a place so remote from the heart of the Wilderness But the answer to this doubt is easie would there were no worse Read we not how a good Angel laid hold on Habacuc and took him by the hair of the head and carryed him with his dinner in a moment of time from the land of Iewrie unto Babylon And then why may we not conceive but that the Devil though an evil Angel yet an Angel might take up Christ into the ayr and carry him to the top of the Temple and arrest him there especially our Saviour making no resistance but rather giving way unto it and perhaps facilitating the attempt For that the Devil could do nothing against him without much less against his will is a truth past questioning But then there is a greater difficulty occurring in the story of the second temptation where it is said which seems impossible to be comprehended that having taken Christ unto the top of the mountain he shewed him all the Kingdomes of the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith St. Luke in a moment of time For resolution of which doubt we must first premise that those words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we render in the English in a moment of time are a Proverbial kinde of speech as Erasmus noteth by which the Grecians use to signifie a short space of time as where Plutarch saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our whole life is but a short time and yet far longer then a moment Agreeably whereto the Translator of the Syriack doth thus read the words which Translation is of great and approved Antiquity He i. e. Satan shewed him all the Kingdomes in a very small time And this premised the doubt may easily be resolved by those two answers or by which of them the Reader pleaseth Some think that Satan gave him not a particular inspection of every place but a general direction to the coasts and parts of the earth where those Kingdomes lay the rest being supplyed by speech and not by sight and of this minde is he that made the Expositions on St. Matthew ascribed to S Chrysostom Satan saith he did not so shew those Kingdoms unto Christ that he saw the very Kingdomes themselves or the Cities people gold and silver in them but the parts of the earth in which every Kingdome and the chief City of it stood And then it followeth to the same purpose and effect which before we spake of For Satan might most directly point with his finger unto every place and then relate in words express the state and glories of each several Kingdome With whom agreeth Euthymius Zigabenus amongst the Antients and Musculus a man of no mean learning amongst later Writers Others conceive that as the Devil can transform himself into an Angel of light so he is able also to make spectres or false shews of any thing when he is suffered so to doe by Almighty God to deceive mens eyes as the Magicians of Egypt turned their rods into Serpents and changed the rivers into bloud and brought frogs upon the land of Egypt Experience of all Ages doth confirm this truth And therefore it may be believed to be no hard thing for him to frame the appearances of Kingdomes and Cities and shew the similitudes of them from every part of the earth And to this Calvin doth incline though very modestly he leaveth every man to his own opinion A most learned Prelate of our own likes a third way better and thinks that Satan might shew and Christ might see all those places themselves with all the pomps and glories of them for that Satan being an Angel had another manner of sight even in the body which he assumed then we mortals have and Christ when it pleased him could see both what and whither he would notwithstanding all impediments which were interjected as appeareth by his own words unto Nathaniel for which Nathaniel did acknowledge him for the Son of God Before Philip called thee when thou wert under the fig-tree I saw thee In such variety of Answers each of them being satisfactory to the doubt proposed and all agreeable to the analogie or rule of faith I leave the Reader to his own choyce and to rely on that which he thinks most probable And now to draw unto an end of that part of our Saviours sufferings which consisted in diversity of strong temptations although the Devil left him for a season as before was said yet he resolved within himself not to give him over but to make use of other means and try other ways for the effecting of his enterprise And to this end he seeks to tempt him to ambition by offering him the crown of his own Country in the way of a popular election working upon the common people to come and take him by force and to make him King He tempts him also to vain glory by the shouts and acclamations of the Vulgar Nec vox hominem sâ—nat Never man spake as this man speaketh He tempts him also to self-love to have a greater care of his own preservation then of doing the will of him that sent him and therein he makes use of Peter one of Christs domâ—stickâ— his principal Secretary as it were one of counsel with him And Peter in pursuance of the dangerous drift took him aside advised him to have more care of himself then so Let this be far from thee O Lord and was rejected for it in the self same termes Get behinde me Satan wherewith the very Devill was repulsed
affliction viz. they gave me gall for meat and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink They stripped him of his garments which they shared amongst them and lifting up his naked body a lamentable spectacle of reproach and shame extended him upon the Cross stretched him in all his joints till the sinews cracked and so nailed him fast thereby accomplishing that in him which was foresignified by David but literally executed upon Christ not David they have pierced my hands and feet Psal. 22.16 Nor staid they here but to adde shame and infamy to his other sufferings they cause him to be crucified between two Malefactors to make the world believe if it had been possible that they were equally involved in the same guilt because involved alike in the same condemnation Nay more then that vinegar and gall which they gave him to drink was but a taft of that extremity of gall and bitterness which they had in their hearts which they did vomit out in blasphemous words exposing him to contempt and scorn not only with the by-standers but the passers by the very malefactors joining with them to increase his sorrows as if thereby they could have mitigated and removed their own So that he might most justly have cryed out and said Consider and behold all ye that pass by the way if ever there were sorrow like my sorrow which was done unto me wherewith the Lord afflicted me in the day of the fierceness of his wrath Never so true a man of sorrows In which extremity of pain and grief of heart no wonder if nature made a start and seemed to tremble at the apprehension of so many miseries especially considering that the most bitter draught of that deadly CVP was to drink off yet And in this anguish and distress it was that he cryed aloud Eli Eli Lamasabaâ—hthani that is to say My God my God why hast thou forsaken me Which words because they seem to some to be an argument oâ— proof for those hellish pains which they have fancied to themselves in the soul of Christ by others are conceived to proceed out of desperation which is indeed one of the greatest torments in the pit of hell we will the rather look into them to see whether any such constructions can be gathered thence Now for the clearer exposition of this text of Scripture we will lay these grounds 1. That dereliction and forsaking do no where throughout Gods book import damnation but are applyed always to the judgements of this present life 2. That in wicked and udgodly men it argueth reprobation from grace and despair of glory which to imagine of CHRIST were rather a most furious blasphemy then an erroneous folly 3. That in the godly as in David whose words they were they either note destitution of help or diminution of comfort but neither in David nor in Christ the true pains of the damned and 4. That no construction must be made of these words which may decrease in Christ the fulness of truth and grace which never wanted in his soul or draw him within the compass of mistaking or mistrusting Gods favour towards him For how could he be tainted with any distrust of Gods mercy and purpose towards him who with such confidence commended his pure Spirit into the hands of his Father who in the midst of his extremities did promise to invest the penitent Thief in the joys of Paradise and finally who in the height of his afflictions when he spake these words had such an interest in God as to call him his own God My God my God and not God only as the text informs us Which grounds so laid we may the better understand the meaning of the words before us and what construction they will bear agreeable and conform to the rule of faith And first I know that many of the antient Fathers were of opinion that as Christ took upon him at this time the person of all mankinde so he made this complaint not in behalf of himself but of his members as when he said to Saul in another case Saul Saul why persecutest thou me he did not mean it of his person which was then in heaven but of his Church militant here on earth Thus Cyprian for the Latine Fathers Quod pro iis voluisti intelligi qui deseri a Deo propter peccata meruerant this complaint of being forsaken thou wouldst have understood as spoken of them who had deserved to be forsaken of God in regard of their sins To the same purpose Augustine Epistola 120. and Leo in his 16. Sermon de Passione Thus also venerable Beda Quare dereliquisâ—i me i.e. meos c. Why saith he hast thou forsaken me i. e. mine because sin saith he did keep them back from saving me that is mine It is plain then that the head doth not speak here in his own Person for how could he be possibly forsaken or out of hope of salvation Thus Athanasius for the Greeks in fewer words but as significantly as the others Christ spake these words in our person for he was never forsaken of God And to this purpose speaks Theodoret in Psal. 21. and Euthymius on the same place also Thus also Damascene Christ saith he having put on our person and appropriated the same unto him prayed on that sort as when a man doth put on anothers person out of pity or charity and in his stead speaks such words sometimes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as do not agree unto himself But this construction of the text though both pious and profitable is not so generally received but that some others of the Fathers do expound them otherwise who think that this complaint was poured out by Christ because he saw himself left helpless to the rage of the Iews and that he seemed so long forsaken of his heavenly Father not in regard of inward grace and comfort but of outward help An exposition so agreeable to the text in all the circumstances of it that some of those who did expound the same of Christs not speaking in his own person but in the person of his members do approve thereof For thus St. Hierom Marvail not at Christs complaint of being forsaken when thou seest the scandal of the Cross. St. Ambrose thus He speaketh as a man which was no shame for him to doe because that we our selves when we are in danger do think our selves forsaken of God Which words Venerable Bede Rabanuâ— Maurus and Aquinas in their Expositions of this Scripture do repeat and follow And this St. Augustine well approves of Quare me dereliquisti tanquam dicereâ— relinquendo me c. Why hast thou forsaken me as if he should have said by leaving me in the time of my trouble because not hearing me when I call upon thee thou art far off from my salvation praesenti scilicet salute hujus vitae that is to say in reference to
at the best be they what they will neither the Fathers nor Apostles no nor Christ himself for ought I can see to be excepted Which error being thus sprung up did in an Age so apt to novelties and innovations meet with many followers and some too many indeed in this Church of England some of them teaching as it is affirmed by their learned Adversary that Christ redeemed our souls by the death of his soul as our bodies by the death of his body Now whereas the soul is subject to a twofold death the one by sin prevailing on it in this life which is the natural depriving or voluntary renouncing of all grace the other by damnation in the world to come which is the just rejecting of all the wicked from any fellowship with God in his glory and fastning them to everlasting torments in hell fire I would fain know which of these deaths it was the first or second which our Saviour suffered in his soul. I think they do not mean the last and am sure they cannot prove the first for to talk as some of them have done that there may be a death of the soul a curse and separation from God which of it self is neither sin nor conjoyned with sin is such a Monster in Divinity as was never heard of till this Age. Certain I am the Scripture only speaks of two kindes of death the first and the second both which we finde expressed in the Revelation where it is said the fearful and the unbeleeving and the abominable and murtherers and sorcerers and whoremongers and Idolaters and all lyers all which no doubt are under the arrest of the first death whereof he speaketh chap. 2. vers 11. shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone which is the second death And sure I am the Fathers if they may be credited are contrary in tearms express to this new device not only acknowledging no death in Christ but the death of the body but also utterly disclaiming this pretended death of the soul. In quo nisi in corpore expiavit populi peccata in quo passus est nisi in corpore Wherein saith Ambrose did he expiate the sins of the people but in his body wherein did he suffer death but in his body St. Austin to this purpose also Sacerdos propter victimam quam pro nobis offerret a nobis acceptam that Christ was made or called a Priest by reason of that sacrifice which he took of us that he might offer it for us which could be nothing but our body More plainly and exclusively Fulgentius thus Moriente carne non solum deitas sed nec anima Christi potest ostendi commâ—rtua that when Christ dyed in the flesh neither his Deity nor his soul can be demonstrated to have dyed also with it The greatest Doctors of the Greek Churches do affirm the same Christ saith Theodoret was called an high Priest in his humane nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and offered none other sacrifice but his body only And thus Theophylact A Priest may by no means be without a sacrifice It was necessary then that Christ should have somewhat to offer Quod autem offerretur praeter ejus corpus nihil quippiam erat and there was nothing which he had to offer but his body only Athanasius in his third Oration against the Ariâ—ns and Nazianzen on that text When Iesus had finished all those sayings do affirme the same but not so clearly and exclusively as the others did Now as here is no death of the soul which possibly may be imagined to have happened to Christ if we will be judged by the Scriptures and as the Fathers Greek and Latine do so significantly and expresly disclaime the same so is it such an horrid speech such a pang of blasphemy as should not come within the heart nor issue from the mouth of any Christian. But this I only touch at now We shall hear more of it in the next Article touching the descent into hell where it shall be presented to us in another colour I end this point at this time with that of Augustine There is a first death and there is a second The first death hath two parts one whereby the sinfull soul by transgressing departeth from her Creator the other whereby she is excluded from her body as a punishment inflicted on her by the judgment of God The second death is the everlasting torment of the body and soul. Either of these deaths had laid hold upon every man but that the righteous and immortall Son of God came to die for us in whose flesh because there could be no sin he suffered the punishment of sin without the guilt of it And to that end admitted or endured for us the second part of the first death that is to say the death of the body only by which he ransomed us from the dominion of sin and the pain of eternal punishment which was due unto it But yet there is another argument which concludes more fully against this new device of theirs then any testimonies of the Fathers before produced mamely the institution of the Sacrament of the Lords Supper by the Lord himself in which there is a commemoration to be held for ever both of the breaking of his body and of the effusion of his bloud by which his bodily death is represented and set forth till his coming again but no remembrance instituted or commanded for the death of his soul. Which if it were of such an unquestionable truth as these men conceive and of such special use and efficacie to the worlds redemption as they gave it out would doubtlesse have been honoured with some special place in that commemoration of his Sacrifice which himself ordained Who in the same night he was betrayed took bread and when he had given thankes he brake it and said Take eate this is my body which is broken for you this do in remembrance of me and likewise after the same manner also he took the cup when he had supped saying this cup is the new Testament sealed in my bloud which is shed for you this do as oft as ye drink in remembrance of me In which and more then this we finde not in the book there is not one word which doth reflect on the death of his soul or any commemoration or remembrance to be held of that Only we find that as our Saviour by his death which was then at hand did put an end to all the legal rites and sacrifices of the old Testament which were but the shadows of things to come as St. Paul cals them Coloss. 2.17 So having fulfilled in the flesh all that had been fore-signifyed and spoken of him in the Law and Prophets he did of all ordain and institute one only Eucharistical sacrifice for a perpetuall remembrance of his death and passion to his second coming And thus St.
that we see that not alone the sacred penmen of the new Testament written first in Greek but also all the Ecclesiasticall writers of the Greek Church when they speak of Hades intend not any thing thereby but hell the place prepared for the Devils and the damned souls Let us next see whether the Fathers of the Latine or Western Church have any other meaning when they speak of inferi or infernum for they use both words by which they do expound Hades or translate it rather as often as they chance to meet it And first for the Quid nominis take it thus from Augustine Inferi eo quod infra sunt the inferi are so called saith he because they are below in the parts beneath And somewhat to this purpose saith Lactantius also Nihil terra inferius humilius nisi mors inferi that there is nothing lower then the earth but death and inferi From infra the root or theme the Fathers do derive infernus of which thus St. Hierome Inferiora terrarum infernus accipitur the lower parts of the earth are called infernus to which our Saviour did descend Which as it sheweth that infernus was derived from inferius and so by consequence from infra as the word inferi was before so it directs us also where to finde the place And this he doth elsewhere also saying Simul discimus quod infernus sub terra sit and in another place quod autem infernus in inferiore parte terrae sit in both that it is under the earth and in the lowermost parts thereof Tertullian also saith the same as to the situation of it Habes regionem inferûm subterraneam credere we are to believe that the region of inferi is under the earth affirming also that it is in visceribus terrae abstrusa profunditas a bottomlesse pit in the very bowels of the earth In this there is no difference amongst the Antients in the nature or meaning of the word there is For by Tertullian the word inferi is taken for a place under the earth whither the souls of good and bad descend after death the good to a kind of refreshing the bad to punishments affirming for a certain truth or rather pronouncing so ex tripode for so the word Constituimus imports omnem animam apud inferos sequestrari in diem domini that the soul of every man is kept in Inferi till the day of the Lord. Which as it was a fancy private to himself after his lapse into the heresie of Montanus so he received no countenance in it from the rest of the Fathers by whom it is unanimously agreed upon that the souls of all good Christians are received into Paradise 'T is true indeed that Hierome seemeth to incline to the same opinion where speaking of the difference between death and inferi he saith that death is that whereby the soul is separated from the body infernus in quo animae includuntur sive in refrigerio sive in poenis and that infernus is the place wherein the souls of men are kept either in some refreshments or else in punishments Which seems to be the same with that which Tertullian had affirmed before but it doth but seem so For when he speaketh of inferi or infernus in this extension of the word he relates only to the times before the coming of our Saviour and his victory over death and hell and not at all unto the times of the Gospell For thus he doth explain himself in another place Solomon speaketh thus saith he because before the coming of our Saviour omnia pariter ad inferos ducerentur all were alike carryed to the inferi or the places below and that thereupon it was that Job complained how both the godly and the wicked were detained in inferno whereunto this expression tendeth we shall see hereafter The same he saith in his notes or Comment upon another Chapter of the same book of Solomons affirming plainly ante adventum Domini omnes quamvis sanctos inferni lege detentos that before the coming of the Lord all men how just and holy soever were detained under the Law of infernus But then immedately he addeth that since the resurrection of Christ the case is otherwise and that the souls of righteous men nequaquam inferno teneantur are by no means to be supposed to be detained in infernus and this he proveth from that of the Apostle saying I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ and he that is with Christ saith he is not held in infernus So that whatsoever he conceived of infernus before Christs coming the truth of which opinion we dispute not here t is plain that since the resurrection he leaves it for a place appointed to the wicked only there to be held in everlasting pains and torments And so elsewhere he doth define it Infernus locus suppliciorum cruciatuum est in quo videter dives purpuratus that is to say infernus is the place of punishments and torments where the richman clothed in purple was seen by Lazarus Nay even Tertullian though he had made himself an inferi of his own devising acknowledgeth the prison which the Gospel speaketh of Mat. 5.24 25. to be no other then this inferi and therefore certainly not the receptacle both for good and bad the just and unjust But none of all the Antients states this point more clearly then divine St. Augustine who looking more judiciously into the businesse doth affirme expresly Frist Of the inferi or place it self nusquam scripturarum in bono appellatos potui invenire that he could never find any place of Scripture in which the word inferi was taken in any good sense Secondly that he could never finde that the place was called inferi y ubi justorum animae requiescunt where the souls of the righteous were at rest Thirdly that past all peradventure since the descent of Christ into hell boni fideles prorsus inferos nesciunt the godly believers are acquainted with no such place And last of all Non nisi poenalia recte intelligi per inferna that infernus can be taken for nothing rightly but the place of punishments And in this sense according unto these restrictions and explanations have the words inferi and infernus been since used in most Orthodox writers and in that sense still used by the old translatour of the new Testament into Latine as often as he meeteth with the Greek Hades And so St. Ambrose also doth interpret or expound the same where saying that according to the Theologie of the old Philosophers the souls of men severed from their bodies went unto Hades he gives this glosse upon the word id est locum qui non videtur quem locum latine infernum dicimus that is to say a place unseen which in Latine we do call infernus But as there is no
peccando dejectus es that is to say Christ out of his mercy descended to that very place unto which man was fallen by sin Petrus Chrysologus in the next Age thus To suffer death and to conquer it intraffe inferos rediisse to enter into hell and return back again to come within the jaws of the dungeon of hell and to dissolve the laws thereof is not of weakness but of power Fulgentius states the point more fully It remained saith he to the full accomplishment of our Redemption that the man whom God took unto himself without sin should descend even thither whither man separated from God fell by desert of sin that is to hell where the soul of a sinner useth to be tormented and to the Grave where the body of the sinner useth to be corrupted yet so that neither Christs flesh might rot in the grave nor his soul be tormented with the sorrows of hell To omit Arator and Prudentius who affirm as much as those before but may be thought to have spoken out of Poetical liberty we will next look upon the Fathers of the fourth Councel of Toledo An. 630. after the birth of our Saviour by whom it was declared that Christ descended to hell to deliver the Saints which there were held captive and subduing the kingdome of death rose again Which after was repeated and confirmed in the Councel of Orleance holden in the 46. year of Charles the Great Finally to descend no lower Venantius Fortunatus once Bishop of Poictiers doth resolve it thus first that Christ did descend to hell and secondly that his descent into hell was no disparagement unto him for that he did it with relation to his infinite mercies as if a King should enter into a Prison not to be there detained himself but to release and loose all such as were guilty Thus have we seen the suffrages of the antient Writers in their times and ages touching the descent of Christ into hell with such a general consent and unanimity that a greater is not to be found in all or any of the Articles of the Christian faith And we have also seen the reasons which as they thought induced our Saviour unto that descent the benefits which did accrew to the Church thereby Now these being principally three that is to say the vanquishing of the powers of hell Secondly the securing of his faithful servants from coming under the dominion thereof And thirdly the deliverie of the souls of those righteous men which lived under the law and were held captive for a time by the powers of darkness till he released them by his coming two of the three I hold to be undoubtedly true and the other I consider as a matter questionable And first I take it for a truth an undoubted truth that our Saviour Christ by his descent into hell did utterly suddue and overthrow the Kingdom of Satan and gave him his last blow in his own Dominions and that thereby he took this captivity captive and having spoyled those principalities and powers which do there inhabit did make a shew of them openly and triumph over them The Scriptures explicated by the Fathers do most abundantly confirm me in the truth of that To which adde here which was before omitted in its proper place those words of Cyril Patriarch of Alexandria saying The powers principalities and rulers of the world which the Apostle speaks of there none other could conquer and carry into the Deserts of hell but only he who said Be of good hope for I have overcome the world Therefore it was necessary that our Lord and Saviour should not only be born a man amongst men but also should descend to hell that he might carry into the Wilderness of hell the Goat which was to be led away and returning thence that work performed might ascend to his Father And I do also hold for a truth undoubted that Christ by his descent into hell hath secured all his faithful servants since that time from coming under the power and dominion of it Which as it was the doctrine of the eldest times of Christianity as appeareth by the objection of Tertullian At inquiunt Christus inferos adiit ne nos adiremus that they i. e. the Orthodox Professors against whom he writ affirmed that Christ went into hell to hinder us from going thither so was it constantly maintained in the times succeeding by all the sound members of the Church This appears yet more evidently by that of Athanasius saying Christ descending to hell or Hades 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 brought us back so loosing our detention there In which it is to be observed that he speaks this of himself and others which were then alive and not them in hell but yet both might and must have come there if he had not freed them from it by his descent And so we must interpret that of Hierom also Liberavit omnes Dominus quando anima ejus descendit in infernum the Lord delivered all his servants both dead and living when his soul descended into hell and that of Hilarie Christ descending into hell nostra salus est is our salvation and that of Ambrose descendens ad ' inferos genus humanum liberavit that Christ descending into hell delivered mankinde i. e. aswell from coming thither as from tarrying there Fulgentius goes to work more clearly then any of the rest before recited and doth not only tell us this that descendentem ad infernum animum justi c. the sorrows of hell were loosed by the descending thither of Christs righteous soul but addeth that having so loosed the sorrows or pains of hell omnes fideles ab iisdem liberavit he delivered all the faithful from them But above all St. Augustine is most clear and positive in this particular as may appear in part by that which was said before in the last Section but far more fully in the passages which are yet to come In all those miseries saith he though we were not then yet because our deserts were such that we should have been in them if we had not been delivered from them it may be rightly said we were thence delivered Quo per liberatores nostros non permissi sunt perduci whither we were not suffered to come by our deliverers And who these were whom he delivered in this manner that is to say by not permitting them to come thither at all he tels us in another place where we finde it thus that it is believed not without good cause that Christs soul came into that place in which sinners are miserably tormented Vt eos solveret a tormentis quos solvendos esse occulta nobis sua justitia judicabat that he might deliver them from torments whom in his secret justice unknown to us he thought fit to deliver In a word thus most fully saith that Reverend Prelate Si enim non
favour of God pronounced against them in that day by the dreadful Judge in the word Discedite depart ye cursed by which they are not only excluded from the Kingdome of God but utterly confounded with the grief and shame of that rejection which they shall suffer at his hands before men and Angels This is that curse our Saviour speaks of in his holy Gospel where he affirmed unto the Iews that there should be weeping and gnashing of Teeth when they should see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the Prophets in the Kingdom of God and themselves thrust out Of this it is St. Augustine telleth us that to be banished for ever from the Kingdome of God to want that plentiful aboundance of the sweetness of God which he hath aboundantly laid up in store for those that fear him tam grandis poena est ut ei nulla quae novimus tormenta possint comparari is such a grievous pain or punishment that no torments which we know can compare unto it St. Chrysostom is more express where he speaks of those who seem to make it their only desire to scape the miseries of hell whereas I saith he am of opinion that to fall or be rejected from the glories of heaven multo durius est tormentum quam gehena ipsa is a far more insupportable torment then hell it self Nor do I think saith he that we ought so much to grieve at the evill of hell as at the loss of heaven and the glories of it Qui nimirum cruciatus est omnium durissimus the sense whereof will be more grievous then of all the rest And so much saith St. Basil briefly affirming that the estranging or rejecting from God is a more intolerable evil then any that is to be feared or expected in hell And yet these torments might be borne with the greater courage if there were any hope of release in time if their damnation were not so confirmed in the Court of Heaven that they are utterly deprived of all expectation of having any favour from God in the times to come if there were any end to be expected of those unsufferable torments which are laid upon them Hope makes an heavy burden light whereas despair of being eased makes a light burden insupportable And this despair is that which doth most afflict them when they are once condemned to the pit of torments Omni tormento atrocius desperatio condemnatos affliget No torment saith the same St. Basil afflicts the damned like despair So much the more by reason that to hope that Gods irrevocable judgment shall be altered or his counsel changed were to hope that God would be false in his word or wavering in his will so publickly and solemnly pronounced which were a sin that would deserve an heavier punishment then they suffer yet The punishment of the damned shal be everlasting no hope that ever it will end And it shall be an everlasting fire as the scriptures tell us a fire which shall prey upon the body and torment the soul and yet neither devour the one nor consume the other I know some late Divines do perswade themselves that the fire of hell is allegorical that there is no such real fire to be found therein as the world hath hitherto been made beleive But when I hear our Saviour Christ pronounce this sentence sitting in his most dreadful Court of Iudgement when there shall be but little use of tropes and figures Depart ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels I must crave leave to tie my faith to express words of Scripture rather then to the quaint conceits of deceitful men Of this I shall speak more at large in another place but whether in the Article of Christs coming to judgement or in that of everlasting life is not yet resolved In the mean time I take it for a good rule which we finde in Augustine that in expounding of the Scriptures we flie not unto Tropes or Figures unless the proper signification of the words in any place be either against the truth of faith or against the honestly of manners as in these it is not Which grounds thus laid I would fain know of Calvin or any of his followers whether that all or any of these punishments which belong properly to the damned and may be truly and directly called the pains of hell were suffered by our Saviour in his soul and body or his soul alone It could not be remorse of conscience for where there is no sin there is no Compunction Christ might be sorrowful and afflicted for the sins of man upon a knowledge of those miseries which attended on them Remorse there could be none where there was no guilt and guilt there could be none where there was no sin And he alone it was who could do no sin and in whose mouth was found no guile as St. Peter tels us Rejected he was never from the favour of God it were indeed an hellish blasphemy to conceive so of him The sentence of rejection is denounced against those alone who have provoked God unto anger by their sins and wickednesses and made him of a friend and Father to become an Adversary But God was neither angry with nor adversary to his Son CHRIST IESVS his well beloved Son at first in whom he was well pleased to the very end And so much Calvin doth confess Nec tamen innuimus unquam Deum fuisse adversarium illi vel iratum And yet saith he we do not intimate hereby that God was either set against him or offended with him Nor doth he say it only but gives reason for it For how saith he could God be angry with his beloved Son in whom only he was well pleased or with what confidence could Christ intercede for us with Almighty God si infensum haberet ipse sibi with whom he stood in need of a Mediator to reconcile him to himself As for despair if he were neither touched for remorse of conscience nor fallen from the love and favour of his heavenly Father there was nothing that he could despair of but a release in time from the fires of hell which though they might afflict his body could not hurt his soul. And Calvin takes it for a grievous calumny which was charged upon him Me desperationem ascribere filio Dei quae fidei contraria sit that he ascribed to Christ any such despair which was not consistent with true faith For wiping off such stain he declares expresly that though our Saviour did complain of his being forsaken ne tantillum quidem deflexit a bonitatis ejus fiducia yet he did never start nor waver in that confidence which he had in the goodness of the Lord and useth this for an especial argument to confirm the same as indeed it is that whilest he did complain that he was forsaken Non desinit vocare Deum suum he ceased not
of the Article but shall take it in the literal and Grammatical sense With which expression I conclude this long dissertation ARTICVLI 6. Pars 2da 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Tertia die resurrexit a mortuis i. e. The third day he rose again from the dead CHAP. X. Of the Resurrection of our Lord and Saviour with a consideration of the circumstances and other points incident to that Article IT was the observation of the Antient Father that the incredulity of St. Thomas did much conduce unto the confirmation of the Christian faith in this great Article of the Resurrection Quam felix incredulitas quae omnium seculorum fidei militavit as St. Augustine hath it The rest of the Apostles who had seen the Lord had made this their Colleague acquainted with so great a miracle too great indeed for one of so weak faith to assent unto And therefore he requires a more â—ull and perfect demonstration of it then any of his fellows had before exacted Vnless saith he I put my finger into the print of his wounds and thrust my hands into his side I will not believe See here the stubbornness of incredulity The same man who had seen Christ raise up Lazarus after three days resting in the grave will not believe he had ability to work the like miracle upon himself Our gracious Saviour thereupon permits his body to be handled by this unbeliever And Thomas sensibly convicted of his infidelity breaks out into this divine ejaculation MY GOD AND MY LORD Prae caeteris dubitavit prae caeteris confessus est said the Father rightly Here was a miraculous generation of belief indeed Faith came not here by hearing but by believing only And by this way of generation of belief in him the Christian Church became the more confirmed and setled in this present Article this trial and experiment of St. Thomas having clearly manifested that Christ assumed not a body in appearance only neither one of a spiritual essence or a new created one but that he rose again in the same numerical body in which he suffered on the Cross and paid the price of our Redemption So that of all that glorious company there was none more fit to testifie the truth of this point then he and to deliver it to the world for his part of this Common Symbol as it was antiently conceived he did And unto this St. Gregory may possibly relate where he tels us saying Dum in Magistro suo palpat vulnera carnis in nobis sanat vulnera incredulitatis whilest Thomas feels the wounds in his masters body he healed the wounds of incredulity in his followers souls And certainly some such experiment as this was exceeding necessary to satisfie the wavering and doubtful soul in so high an Article which by reason of the seeming impossibility and unexampled strangenesse of the matter hath been more called in question and opposed both by Iew and Gentile then any other of the Creed It was indeed a work both of weight and wonder not to be wrought by any which was simply man To man meer natural man it was no lesse impossible to give a resurrection to the dead then to grant a dispensation or indulgence not to die at all How could it be expected that one meerly moral should be of strength sufficient to destroy death and to bury the grave to raise himself first from the jawes of death and receptacles of the grave and by the power thereof to restore poor man to his lost hopes of immortality Most justly may it be presumed that had so great a work been possible to mortal man man being proud enough to attempt great matters would first have took the benefit of his own abilities and so more easily have possessed the incredulous world with the truth and reall being of a resurrection by the powerfull Rhetorick of example In cases where the issue may be doubtfull and the triall dangerous we commonly make tryall and experiment as ignorant Empericks do their potions upon other men But where the issue or event is known and certain likely to yeeld honour to our selves in the undertaking we use not willingly to let others rob us of the glory of it or be beholding unto others for that which we conceive we can do our selves He then which was to be the first-fruits of the resurrection must have something in him more then ordinary something to raise a doubt in his greatest adversaries as in Iosephus a Iew but a very modest one whether it were lawfull or not to call him man to reckon him amongst the natural sons of Adam Tantae ejus res gestae quantas audere vix hominis perficere nullius nisi Dei was spoken in the way of flattery by the Court Historian but may be truly verifyed of the acts of Christ. Those Miracles of his upon true record as they could hardly be attempted by a mortal man so could they be performed by none but a powerfull God For who but he who both in name and power was the God of nature had power not only to suspend some acts of nature but absolutely to over-rule the whole course thereof Of which great works above the ordinary reach of man and nature if we accompt the resurrection as the principall we shall rightly state it It is within the power of Art and the rules of Physick to repaire the ruines of decayed nature and perhaps prolong the number of a few miserable days He only could restore life to the dead who first gave it to the living He only can restore our bodies to our souls in the last day who did at first infuse our souls into our bodies Which miracle before it could be wrought on us he must first work it on himself and thereby raise an hope and be belief in us to expect our own The head being raised gives good assurance to the body that though it do not rise at the same time with it it shall in due time be raised by it What other uses may be made of Christs resurrection we shall see anon This is enough to shew the reasons or necessity thereof by way of preamble to let us see that all the hopes we have of our own resurrection depends upon the certainty and truth of this Which though it be a principle of the Christian faith by consequence of common course to be confessed and not disputed Oportet enim discentem credere as the old rule is yet sithence that the truth thereof hath been much suspected by the Iews and the possibility debated by the Gentiles it will be necessary for the setling of a right beliefe to satisfie the one and refell the other Which done it will be easily seen that there is reason and authority enough to confirm this truth were it not left us for a principle And first beginning with the Iews who first and most maliciously opposed this part of holy Gospel we purpose
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What saith he meaneth Pspothomphanech To which he answereth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. An interpreter of hidden things Which also very well agreeth to our Lord and Saviour to whom all hearts be open all desires known and from whom no secrets can be hidden Come said the woman of Samaria and behold a man that hath told me all the things that ever I did Ioh. 4.29 The Iew which thorough this thin vail on the face of Ioseph doth not behold the portraiture and lineaments of Christ our Saviour is not so properly to be termed blinde because he cannot see as because he will not Such also was the type of the Prophet Daniel cast by the malice of his enemies the King unwillingly consenting into the den of ravenous cruel Lyons the dore sealed up with the Kings Ring nothing but death to be expected And yet behold a resurrection in the person of Daniel exactly typifying that of Christ our Saviour in each of the particulars before remembred But of all types especially as to the circumstances of time and place that of the Prophet Ionas doth come nearest home and it comes close home too as to the occasion Ionas went down into the Sea and put himself into a Ship to flie from the presence of the Lord but a great tempest overtook him a tempest of extraordinary violence that neither art nor strength could prevail against it insomuch that the Mariners although Heathens did conclude aright that it was of Gods immediate sending and that there was some heinous sinner got aboard amongst them which drew down vengeance from above upon all the rest To Lots they went Ionas was found to be the party who willingly and cheerfully submitting to the will of God to save the rest in danger to be cast away said frankly without opposition or repining at it Tollite me take me and cast me into the sea Better one perish then so many Accordingly cast in he was and drowned as the poor men thought that had cast him in But the Lord prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights which time expired the Lord spake unto the fish and it vomited out Jonah on the dry land This is Historia vera a true relation of the story in respect of Ionah but it is Sacramentum magnum a very great mysterie withall in regard of Christ. For Ecce plusquam Ionas hic behold a greater then Ionas is presented here It was but signum Prophetae the signe of the Prophet Ionah as our Saviour cals it in respect of the history but it was Res signata too in regard of the mysterie And so it is affirmed by Christ whose death and resurrection it foreshadoweth to us viz. As Ionas was three days and three nights in the Whales belly so shall the son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth Never did type and truth correspond more perfectly For who knows not how usual a thing it is to compare the world unto a ship or argosie wherein all mankinde is imbarked all the sons of Adam and amongst them the son of man as he cals himself But all the sons of Adam being sinners from the very birth no wonder if the tempest of Gods anger fell upon them all and made them all in danger to be cast away In which amazement and affright only the son of man like Ionah in the sides of the ship slept it out securely who though he knew no sin was made sin for us by taking our iniquities upon his accompt and in that sense the greatest sinner in the vessel So that the high Priest did not prophecie amisse when he said this of him It is expedient that one man do die for the people that the whole nation might not perish Never was doubtfull Oracle fulfilled more clearly For Christ no sooner found what their purpose was but he was at his tollite too as willing to be throwne in as Ionas was and therefore said to those who came out against him Sinite hos abire let those go their way I only am the man that must stay this storme and pacifie the wrath of Almighty God And so accordingly it was done Gods wrath thereby appeased poor mankinde saved and Christ like Ionas having lain three days and three nights in the heart of the earth did on the third day rise again and by so doing vanquished death and swallowed up the grave in victory But this particular we shall hereafter meet with and more fully speak of when we are come unto the Circumstances of the resurrection of which this of the time the third day is the most materiall I add this only for the present in respect of the Iews who being by Christ foretold of his resurrection and in so evident a type thereof as this Signum Prophetae this signe of the Prophet Ionas as himself entitles it could look with an Historical faith on the resurrection of the Prophet out of the belly of the Whale and yet give no belief unto that of Christ out of the bowels of the earth though testifyed and confirmed unto them by such pregnant evidence And yet I shall crave leave to add that if Ionah was the Widow of Sereptas son he whom Elias raised from death to life 1 King 17. as many of the Iewish Doctors do affirme he was the parallel will yet come closer then before it did For Ionas in the Whales belly was but dead putative in the esteem and eye of men but in the Widowes Chamber he was dead realiter and so more perfectly resembling him whose signe he was This leads me on to the next way of evidence in regard of the Iew which is that of example Themselves had read in holy Scripture and believed accordingly that Elias had restored from death to life the son of the Sareptan woman whosoever he was and that Elisha did not only work the like wonder on the dead child of the Shunamite but that his dead body did revive a man and raised him also from the grave And to this head we may reduce the more then wonderfull deliverance of Daniel from the Lyons den and the three Hebrew Salamanders from the fierie furnace all of them putative dead all of them ransomed by the Lord from the mercilesse furie of the grave and jawes of death and that miraculous deliverance no lesse to be esteemed then a Resurrection To each of these the Iews most readily give assent How then can they deny it unto this of Christ Assuredly it was as possible to God to raise our Saviour from the dead if we consider him no further then a mortall man as to raise dead bodies by the prayers of the Prophets and by the dead carkasse of Elisha or as it had been to reprieve Daniel and the three children from the hands
power to do Non tam stultus sum ut diversitate explanationum tuarum me laedi putem quia nec tu laederis si nos contraria senserimus This was St. Hieromes resolution to St. Augustine in a point between them equally full of piety and Christian courage And of this temper was also Pope Sixtus the fift as stout and resolute a Prelate as ever wore the Triple Diadem and one who lived in the worst Ages of the Church of Rome when most ingaged in self-interresses and maintaining factions Of whom it is notwithstanding said by Cicarella non multum pugnare ut sua vinceret sententia sed potius ab aliis si ita res ferret facile passus est se vinci And to this blessed temper if we could attain diversity of opinions and interpretations so they hold the analogy of the faith may adde as much to the external beauty of the Church of Christ as it did ornament and lustre to the Spouse of Christ that her cloathing though of pure gold was wrought about with divers colours or wrought with curious needle-work as it after followeth But it is time that I look back upon our Saviour sitting at the right hand of God in whatsoever sense we conceive the words and sitting there to execute the Sacerdotal or Priestly function and so much of the Regal also as is to be discharged and exercised by him before his coming unto judgement Of which two functions by Gods grace I am next to speak The Attribute or Adjunct of the Father Almighty which we finde added to this branch of the Article hath been already handled in its proper place and therefore nothing need to be said here of it CHAP. XIII Of the Priesthood of our Lord and Saviour which he executeth sitting at the right hand of God wherein it was fore-signifyed by that of Melchisedech in what particulars it consisteth and of Melchisedech himself WE told you in the beginning of our former Chapter that they which do consider Christ in his several offices and did reduce each several office to some branch or other of the Creed did generally refer his office of high Priest unto this branch of sitting at the right hand of God the Father Almighty For being advanced to such a place of nearnesse to the throne of God he hath no doubt the better opportunities as a man may say of interceding with God in behalf of his people and offering up the peoples prayers to the throne of grace which are the two main parts of the Priestly function And yet this sitting at the right hand of God is not precisely proper and peculiar to him as he is our Priest but that he claimes the place also as he is our King and there doth execute so much of the Regall office as doth consist in governing his holy Church untill the coming unto judgment Certain I am that David findes him sitting on the right hand of God in both capacities as well King as Priest and so doth represent him to us The Lord saith he said unto my Lord sit thou at my right hand till I make thy enemies thy footstoole That David by those words My Lord meaneth Christ our Saviour is a thing past question We have the truth it self to bear witnesse to it the Lord himself applying it unto himself in his holy Gospels And that he meaneth it of Christ both King and Priest is no lesse evident from the rest of the Prophets words which do immediately follow on it For in the very next words he proceedeth thus The Lord shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion Rule thou in the middest of thine enemies Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power In which assuredly he looks upon him in his regal function And no lesse plainly it doth follow for the Priesthood also The Lord hath sworn saith he and shall not repent thou art a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedech Touching the Regal office though here also executed we shall more fully and more fitly speak in the following Article that of his coming to judge the quick and dead the power of judicature being the richest flower of the regal diademe The Priesthod we shall treat of now T is the place most proper Christs Priesthood and his sitting at the right hand of God being often joyned together in the holy Scripture Nay therefore doth he sit at the right hand of God that so he might with more advantage execute the Priestly office Every Priest saith the Apostle standeth dayly ministring and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices which can never take away sinnes But this man that is Christ our Saviour the high Priest of the new Testament after he had offered one sacrifice for our sins is set down for ever at the right hand of God From hence forth tarrying till his enemies be made his footstool And in another place to the same purpose thus We have such an high Priest that sitteth on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens A Minister of holy things and of the true Tabernacle c. Being therefore in this place to speak of the Priesthood of CHRIST we will consider it in all those particulars which may make the calling warrantable to himself and comfortable unto us To make it warrantable in respect of himself we must behold him in his calling in his consecration and finally in the order it self which was that of Melchisedech to which he was so called and consecrated To make it comfortable in regard of us we will behold him in the excercise of those three great duties wherein the Priesthood did consist viz. the offering of sacrifice for the sins of the people the offering of prayers in behalf of the people and lastly in the act of benediction or of blessing the people To these heads all may be reduced which concernes this argument and of all these according to the method now delivered which I think most natural a little shall be said to instruct the reader First for his calling to the Priesthood it was very necessary as well to satisfie himself as prevent objections For Christ our Saviour being of the line of Iudah he could not ordinarily and of common right intermedle with the Priestly function which was entailed by God to the house of Aaron and therefore he required a special and extraordinary warrant such as God gave Aaron and the sons of Aaron to authorize him thereunto No person whatsoever he was was to take this honour to himself but he that was called of God as Aaron was as St. Paul averreth Now such a calling to the Priesthood as that of Aaron our blessed Saviour had and a better too for he was called to be an high Priest after the order of Melchisedech Where this word called imports more then a name or title as if he were called Priest but indeed was none but a solemne calling
eyes of his people did he establish him in the office of the high Priest saying Thou art a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedech That so it was in his advancement to the throne of his father David shall be made evident in the course of these present Commentaries when we shall look upon him as invested with the regal power And that it was so in his establishment in the Sacerdotal shall be made evident by the testimony of the great Apostle whose words here presently ensue Christ saith he glorifyed not himself to be made the high Priest but he that said unto him Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee did confer it on him As he saith also in another place Thou art a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedech that is to say that from the day and moment of the resurrection at what time the fiâ—st of the two Prophecies were fulfilled which God delivered by the mouth of the Psalmist saying Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee was our Redeemer to begin the execution of the high Priests office after the order of Meschisedech And this appeares to be the meaning of the Apostle in the present place by the words ensuing For presently on the recitall of the words before recited viz. Thou art a Priest after the order of Melchisedech he addes of Christ that in the dayes of his flesh he offered up prayers and supplications to him that was able to save him from death if he had so pleased But finding his Fathers resolution to the contrary he learned obedience though a Son by that which he suffered and finally that being perfect or rather consecrated for so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth import most properly he was made the Authour of eternall salvation unto all those that obey him and was called or publickly declared 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of God an high Priest after the order of Melchisedech And to say truth had not the Scriptures been so clear in the proof hereof yet necessary consequence grounded upon comparing of one text with another and that applied according to the principles of natural reason would evince it for us The Priesthood of Melchiseâ—ech as the Scripture telleth us was an everlasting or eternall Priesthood Thou art a Priest for ever for no shorter term and therefore of necessity to be exercised and enjoyed by one who must be as eternal as the office is and yet a man and taken from amongst the Sons of men to offer gilts and sacrifices for the sins of the people But such our Saviour was not take him as a man though otherwise more qualifyed and prepared then any for so high an office untill he had so crushed and broken all the powers of death that death had now no longer title to him or dominion over him which doubtlesse was performed at the resurrection And therefore then and not before when all the ceremonies of his consecration were fulfilled in order did he begin to exercise the function of an endlesse everlasting Priesthood after the order of Melchisedech The order of Melchisedech that comes after next And touching that we will examine these three things 1. Who Melchisedech was 2. Wherein his high Priesthood did consist 3. In what the Parallel doth stand between Christ and him Concerning the first point who and what he was hath been a great dispute amongst learned men some thinking that he could not be a mortal man and therefore must needs be either the holy Ghost or else the Son of God then appearing to Abraham in the likenesse and similitude of an earthly Prince The last is most eagerly defended by P. Cunaeus a very learned man and a great Philosopher in his book de Republ. Hebraeorum The reason of this difficulty and his errour are those words of St. Paul where he describeth Melchisedech to be without father without mother without descent having neither beginning of dayes nor end of life And this thought he can be no other then the Son of God Others with greater probability both of proof and reason declare him to be Sem the third son of Noah out of whose loins our father Abraham was descended and this opinion hath found most acceptance generally amongst the learned though some of very eminent parts do opine the contrary But whether he were Sem or not or rather some petty King of the Land of Canaan who went forth to congratulate Abraham upon his returne they are much troubled to apply the negative character which St. Paul hath given us to any upon whom they desire to fasten The best and clearest resolution of the doubt which I yet have met with is that Meschisedech whosoever he was is said to be without father and mother in the same sense as he is after said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which our Translators render without descent of which his being without father or mother is one branch or member And he is said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. without genealogy and not without descent as our English reads because he hath no predecessour either father or mother amongst the rest of the Patriarks whose Genealogies are recorded in the book of God And in this sense as he is said to have no beginning of dayes because the time of his birth is no were remembred so is he also said to have no end of his life because neither the time of his death nor the succession of any after him in his two great offices is specifyed upon the Registers of sacred writ And yet if the Catena Arabica be of any credit we have heard more news of late touching this great man then hath been till of late made known in these Western parts For in their Marginal notes on the 10. of Genesis they say of Phaleg of whom we finde mention vers 25. And this Phaleg was the Father of Heraclim the Father of Melchisedech But in the Chapter going before his Generation is set down in this formal pedegree viz. Melchisedech was the son of Heraclim the son of Phaleg the son of Eber And his Mothers name was Salathiel the daughter of Gomer the son of Japhet the son of Noah And Heraclim the son of Eber maried his wife Salathiel and she was with child and brought forth a son and called his name Melchisedech that is the King of righteousnesse called also the King of Peace By this account Melchisedech was the sixth from Sem and Cousen german unto Serug who was Abrahams Grandfather and being of the linage and house of Sem might well confer that blessing on his Cousen Abraham which had been given to Sem by their father Noah And then one of the greatest arguments to prove Melâ—hisedech to be Sem that namely which is borrowed from the forme and manner of the blessing which he gave to Abraham will be answered easily And were this true as I can hardly reckon it
that as they sinned together or served God together so they may share together of reward or punishment But because many times the soul sins without the body and many times without it doth some works of piety which God is pleased to accept of therefore as requisite it is that the soul separated from the body should either suffer torment or enjoy felicity according as it hath deserved in the sight of God whilest yet the body sleepeth in the grave of death And on these grounds next to the dictates and authority of the book of God the doctrine of the general judgement hath been built so strongly that only some few Atheists amongst the Gentiles and none but the wicked Sect of Manichees amongst the Christians had ever the impudence to denie it That which concernes us most as Christians and doth especially relate to the present Article is that this judgement shall be executed by our Saviour Christ sitting with power at the right hand of God the Father but in the nature and capacity of the Son of man Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of the power of God and coming in the clouds of the Aire Mat. 26.64 See the same also Mark 14.62 and Luk. 22.69 The like we have also in St. Iohns Gospell The Father judgeth no man but hath committed all judgement to the Son Chap. 5 22. What to the Son according to his eternal generation as the Word of God Not so but to the Son of man For so it followeth in that Chapter viz. And hath given him power also to judge because he is the Son of man V. 27. And this we have directly from the Lords one mouth The Apostles also say the same St. Peter first God raised him up the third day and shewed him openly And he commanded us to preach unto the people and to testifie that it is he which is ordained of God to be judge both of quick and dead St. Paul next Henceforth there is laid up for me a Crown of righteousnesse which the Lord the righteous judge shall give me at that day and not to me only but to all those that love his appearing So for St. Iude Behold the Lord shall come with thousands of his Saints to give judgment against all men and to rebuke all that are ungodly amongst them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed and of all the cruel speakings which ungodly sinners have spoken against him And this he citeth out of the Prophecies of Enoch the seventh from Adam which sheweth that even the Patriarchs before the flood were thoroughly possessed with this sacred truth and therefore not concealed from the holy Prophets which have been since the world began That it was manifested also to the antient Gentiles I have no reason to believe For though they might collect upon grounds of reason that there should be a day of judgement in the world to come yet that this judgement should be executed by the man CHRIST IESVS could not in possibility be discovered to them by the light of reason nor indeed by any other sight then by his alone who was to be a light to lighten the Gentiles as well as to be the glory of his people Israel And therefore in my minde Lactantius might have spared that part of his censure upon the judgment of Hydaspes before remembred in which he approves of his opinion concerning the last day or the day of doom but addeth that his not ascribing this great work to the Son of God was omitted non sine daemonum fraude by the fraud and suggestion of the Devill If Hermes or Mercurius surnamed Trismegistus understood so much quod tamen non dissimulavit Hermes as it followeth after and that the verses by him cited from the antient Sibyls were by them spoken and intended as he saith they were of CHRIST our Saviour and of his coming unto judgement in that dreadfull day we must needs say they had a clearer Revelation of it then any of the Prophets of the most high God which for my part I have not confidence enough to say For in which of all the Prophets finde we such a description of Christs coming to judgement as this which he ascribeth to one of the Sibyls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is to say Rolling up heaven earths depths I shall disclose Then raise the dead the bonds of fate unloose And deaths sharpe sting and next to judgment call Both quick and dead judging the lives of all Letting this therfore passe as a thing improbable that any of the Heathen Prophetesses should know more of Christs coming to judgement then was revealed to any of the holy Prophets or else deliver it in more clear expressions then do occurre in any of the Prophetical writers we shall proceed unto the execution of this judgement by our Lord and Saviour according to the scope of this present Article For which although no reason was or could be given by those antient sages as those which lived before the coming of CHRIST and consequently were not made acquainted with his life and actions yet there is reason to induce a Christian unto this belief were we not biassed to it by the text of Scripture For what could be more just in Almighty God then to advance his Son to the seat of judgment to the end that having been dishonoured publickly both in life and death scorned and contemned and brought unto a shamefull end in the eye of men he might have opportunity to shew his great power and majesty in the sight of all but specially of his barbarous and ungodly enemies And unto this the Prophet Zachariah alludeth saying They shall look on me whom they have pierced Which words although St. Iohn applyeth in his holy Gospel unto the piercing of Christs side Chap. 19.37 yet in the Revelation he applyeth it to his sitting in judgement Behold saith he he cometh in the clouds and all eyes shall see him and they also that pierced him Chap. 1.17 And from these words it is conceived I think not improbably that the wounds in our Saviours body shall then be visible to the eyes of all spectatours to the great comfort of the faithfull who do acknowledge their redemption to the bloud of the Lamb and to the astonishment and confusion of all his enemies but most especially of them qui vulnera ista inflixerunt by whose ungodly hands he was so tormented Here then we have good grounds to proceed upon both in the way of faith and reason for the asserting of the day of general judgement And yet somewhat further must be said to remove a difficultie which may else disturbe us in our way before we look into the particulars of it For possibly it may be said that there will be but little use of a general judgement except it be
both be the witnesses of his Life and Doctrine and afterwards discharge so much of the Prophetical Office as he should please to delegate and entrust unto them To these he shewed himself after his Resurrection and conversed with them for the space of forty days to the intent he might the better fit them for so great a work And being even upon the instant of departing from them it seemed good to him to invest them with a sacred Power and by some outward Ceremony and set Form of words to dedicate them to the Ministry of such holy things as were not to be meddled with by vulgar hands He breathed on them saith the Text and said unto them Receive ye the Holy Ghost Whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them and whose soever sins ye retain they are retained The meaning of these words we have shewn before and need repeat no more but this That in the number of those gifts whereof the Holy Ghost is Author there is contained that sacred Power by which some men are made the Ministers of holy things to the rest of the people When therefore Christ breathed on his Apostles and said Receive the Holy Ghost he did as it were breathe out that power of Preaching the Word of Truth and doing other holy Offices in the Church of God which he had formerly received from the Holy Ghost Receive said he the Holy Ghost i. e. Such a sublime power as no Prince nor Potentate can bestow a power which gives you such an influence on the Souls of men as that of the remitting and retaining sin In which it is to be observed That our Saviour puts not down this act of remitting and retaining sins for the whole entire and adequate subject about which the Apostolical or Prophetical Office was to be employed but onely as one chief part thereof in the name of all that by the weightiness of that they might judge the better of the importance of the other He had promised them the Keys before but now he hangs them at their girdle and puts them absolutely and fully into their possession Ability and power to perform the rest they were to tarry for yet a little longer and then immediately to receive both from the Holy Ghost whom he did promise to send them after his departure And so accordingly he did the Holy Ghost descending on them upon the tenth day after his Ascension in the likeness of fiery cloven tongues and furnishing them with all those extraordinary gifts and graces which were necessary for the first propagation of our Saviours Gospel By his own breathing on them and the words that followed he gave them jus ad rem as the Lawyers call it a power to exercise a Spiritual Function in his holy Church and put them into possession of so much thereof as concerned the remitting and retaining of sins But for the jus in re the actual execution of that holy Function together with those supernatural endowments by which they were to be fitted and prepared for it that they received upon this coming of the Holy Ghost and did not onely receive it as before from Christ but repleti sunt omnes they were all filled with it saith the Text This coming of the Holy Ghost as Pope Leo noteth Was Cumulans non inchoans nec novus opere sed dives largitate rather by way of augmenting the former power and abilities which Christ had given them than of beginning a new For it is a known rule of the Antient Fathers That where the Holy Ghost had been given before and yet is said to come again it is to be understood either of an increase of the former in weight or measure or of some new gift which before men had not but was conferred after for some new effect as it is noted out of St. Ierom and Sâ— Cyril by our Learned Andrews And to say truth there was good reason why we must understand this coming of the Holy Ghost in both these respects both in regard of measure and addition too Before when Christ breathed on them and therewith said Receive ye the Holy Ghost their Ministry was confined within the Land of Iudea Go not into the way of the Gentiles or into any City of the Samaritans but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel A less proportion of the Spirit would have served for that But when he was to leave them he inlarged their bounds and put the whole world under their jurisdiction Go saith he into all the world and Preach the Gospel unto every Creature Go therefore teach all Nations as St. Matthew hath it chap. 28.19 And if they were to travel over all the World and to teach all Nations good reason they should be inabled to speak the Tongues of all Nations also and be replenished with so great a measure of the Holy Spirit as might make the conquest of the world the more easie to them Which work as it was wrought in the Feast of Penticost so hath the anniversary of that day been celebrated ever since in the Christian Church though under other names according to the language of particular Countries as the Birthâ—day of the Gospel of Christ the day on which it was preached after his Ascension after the great work of our Redemption was accomplished by him It had before been kept as a solemn Festival one of the three great Festivals ordained by Moses in memory of the giving of the Law that day upon Mount Sinai And hath been since observed as a solemne Festival one of the three great Festivals of the Christian Church in memory of the promulgation of the Gospel from Mount Sion on the same day also A day it was of so great solemnity that there were then assembled at Ierusalem of every Nation under heaven as the Text informes us The Gospell was not to be published but in such a generall concourse of people Therefore the day thereof to be solemnized by all Nations also and made a day of holy assembly to the Lord our God But our Redeemer staid not here as if he had sufficiently discharged his Propheticall Office by furnishing his Apostles with the Gifts of the Spirit and meant from henceforth to betake himselfe to the execution of the Priestly or the Kingly Offices as being in themselves more glorious and to him more honorable When he ascended up on high he led captivity captive and gave Gifts to men not unto Twelve alone which was the number of his Apostles nor to an hundred and twenty onely which was the whole number of his Disciples at that time The Harvest being great did require more labourers and therefore Gifts must be bestowed on more men than so And if we will beleeve St. Paul so it was indeed For having cited those words of the royall Psalmist he addes immediately And he gave some Apostles and some Prophets and some Evangelists and some
the East the Donatist in the South and the Novatians in the West who made one Faction onely though of several names were antiently of this opinion and set up Churches of their own of the New Edition For flattering themselves with a conceit of their own dear sanctity they thought themselves too pure and pious to joyn in any act of worship with more sober Christians and presently confined the Church which before was Catholick to their own private Conventicles and to them alone or intra partem Donati as they pleased to phrase it Who have succeeded them of late both in their factions and their follies too we all know full well The present ruptures in this State do declare most evidently that here is Pars Donati now as before in Africa A frenzy which gave great offence to the Antient Fathers who labored both by Speech and Pen to correct their insolencies and of such scandal to the Churches of the Reformation that Calvin though a ridged man and one inclinable enough unto new opinions did confute their dotages and publickly expose them to contempt and scorn The Antients and the Moderns both have agreed on this That though the Church of Christ be imperfect always and may be sometimes faulty also yet are not men to separate themselves so rashly from her Communion or make a rupture for poor trifles in the Body Mystical It argueth little Faith and less Charity saith renowned Cyprian if when we see some Errors in the Church of God De ecclesia ipsi recedamus we presently withdraw our selves and forsake her fellowship And here we might bring in St. Augustine and almost all the Fathers to confirm this point but that they are of no authority with the captious Schismatick and now of late disclaimed by our neater wits Therefore for further satisfaction of the stubborn Donatist we will behold the Constitution of the Church in the Book of God and take a view of the chief Types and Fortunes of it to see if we can finde there such a spotless Church as they vainly dream of In Adams family which was the first both Type and Seminary of the Church of God there was a Cain a murderer that slew his brother Amongst the Sons of God in the time of Noah how many that betook themselves to the daughters of men and in Noahs Ark the next and perhaps the greatest a Cham which wretchedly betrayed the nakedness of his aged father In Abraham's house there was an Ishmael that mocked at Isaac though the heir and the heir of promise in Isaac's a prophane Esau that made his belly his God and sold Heaven for a break-fast in Iacob's there were Simeon and Levi Brethren in evil besides a Reuben who defiled his old Fathers Bed And in the Church of Israel when more large and populous how many were mad upon the worship of the Golden Calf more mad in offering up their sons to the Idol Moloch Thousands which bowed the knee to Baal Ten thousands which did sacrifice in the Groves and prohibited places yet all this while a Church a true Visible Church with which the Saints and Prophets joyned in Gods publick worship Let us next look upon the Gospel and we shall finde that when the bounds thereof were so strait and narrow that there were few more visible Members of it than the Twelve Apostles yet amongst them there was a Iudas that betrayed his Master When it began to spread and enlarge it self to the number of One hundred and twenty there were among them some half Christians such as Nicodemus who durst not openly profess the Gospel but came unto the Lord by night and some false Christians such as Demas who out of an affection to the present world forsook both the Apostle and the Gospel too She then increased to such a multitude that they were fain to choose seven subordinate Ministers the better to advance the work and one of them will be that Nicholas the founder of the Nicolaitan Hereticks whom the Lord abhorred Follow it out of Iewry into Samaria and there we finde a Simon Magus as formal a Professor as the best amongst them and yet so full of the gall of bitterness within that Ignatius in plain terms calleth him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The first-born of the Devil Trace it in all the progress of it thorow Greece and Asia and we shall see the factiousness of the Corinthians the foolishness of the Galatians and six of the seven Asian Churches taxed with deadly sin Good God into what corner of the Earth will the Donatist run to finde a Church without corruption free from sin and error It must be sure into the old Utopias or the new Atlantis or some Fools Paradise of their own in terra incognita unless as Constantine once said unto Acesius a Novatian Bishop b 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they can erect a Ladder of their own devising and so climb up into the Heavens Whilest they are here upon the Earth they have no such hopes and do but fool themselves in the expectation The chief occasion of these Errors which the two opposite Factions in the Church of Christ have thus faln into is a mistake of the right constitution of the members of it For those of Rome condemning all the Protestant party for Hereticks and the Eastern Churches for Schismatical and then excluding Hereticks and Schismaticks from being any members of the Church at all not onely appropriate to themselves the name of Catholick but consequently confine the Church within their Communion And on the other side the Donatist and their Modern followers out of the dear affection which they bear themselves first make the Church to consist of none but the Elect and none to be Elect but those who joyn fellowship with them and so by the same necessary consequence have confined the Church within the Walls or Curtains of their private Conventicles Both faulty and both grounding their unsound Conclusions upon as false and faulty principles For taking it for granted first which will never be yeilded by us nor made good by them that both the Christians of the East are Schismaticks and the Protestants of the North are no better then Hereticks yet are they not presently to be cut off from being any Members of the Church at all as Bellarmine and others of the Church of Rome have been pleased to say A Schismatick in the true meaning of the word is he Who holding an entire profession of the truth of God and joyning with the Church in all points of doctrine do break the peace thereof and disturb the order by refusing to submit themselves to their lawful Pastors and yeild obedience to her power in external matters If he stay there and withal fall not into manifest Heresie and set on foot some new Opinion as most Schismaticks have used to do the better to justifie themselves in their separation so
The word of truth being established as say both Law and Gospel if there be onely two or three witnesses to attest unto it Two or three Members of the Church may keep possession of a truth in the name of the rest and thereby save the whole from Error even as a King invaded by a forein enemy doth keep possession of his Realm by some principal fortress the standing out whereof in time may regain it all The Body cannot properly be said to be wholly dead as long as any Member of it doth remain alive But in this storm raised by the Arians in the Church the Orthodox Professors had but one Error to encounter with and that discovered and opposed in the first rising of it The Church of Rome maintained so many and those promoted by such power and so subtile instruments that there was far more danger in the Mass of Popery than any single Errors in the times before yet never could they so prevail by their force or cunning but that their Errors were opposed in some Church or other and truth though banished in the West found hearty entertainment in the Eastern parts As for example The Popes Supremacy is and hath long been held at Rome as an Article of the Faith and a chief one too and held so ever since it was declared by Pope Boniface the Seventh Omnino esse de necessitate salutis omni humanae creaturae suâ—esse Romano Pontifici i. e. That it was altogether necessary to Salvation for every mortal man to be subject to the Bishops of Rome But this Supremacy was never acknowledged by the Greeks nor Muscovites nor by the Habbassines or Christians of Ethiopia nor by the Indian Churches neither till these latter days in which they have submitted to the Popes authority And in the West it self where the Pope most swayed it was continually opposed by the Albigenses the Hussites Wiclivists and others in their several times The Popes usurped a power over Kings and Princes and did not onely hold it as a matter practical but publickly maintained and taught as a doctrinal point But against this did all the Princes of the world oppose their power the French by the Pragmatical Sanction the English by the Statutes of Provisions and Praemuniri the German Emperors at once both by Sword and Pen as is apparent by the writing of Marsilius Patavinus Dante 's Occam and many others of those times whereof consult Goldastus in his Monarchia It pleased the Popes for politick and worldly ends to restrain the Clergy of that Church from marriage because that having Wives and Children they would be more obnoxious to their natural Princes and not depend so much as now on the See of Rome But on the other side the Greeks the Melchites and the Maronites which are names of several Churches of the East neither deny Ordination unto married men or force them to abstain from the use of their Wives when they are in Orders The Russes and Arminians admit none but married men into the Priesthood the Iacobites and Nestorians allow of second and third marriages in those of their Clergy as also do the Indians and Christians under Prâ—ster Iohn the Patriarck being first sued to for a dispensation In Germany when this yoke was first laid upon them by Pope Gregory the Seventh the Clergy generally opposed stiling that Pope Hominem plane haereticum vesani dogmatis an Arant Heretick and the Broacher of a mad opinion In Italy it was taught by Panormitanus Votum non esse de essentia Sacramenti That the vow of single life was not essential unto Orders How late it was before the Priests of England could be brought to forsake their Wives and what embroilments have been raised in the Church about it Henry of Huntingdon and others of our Antient Writers do declare at large Pope Innocent the Third first setled Transubstantiation in the Church of Rome a word not known unto the Fathers in the Primitive times nor any of the old Grammarians and Professors of the Latine tongue But the Armenians do reject it as an unsound Tenet and so as I conjecture did the Egyptian Maronite and the Habbassine Churches who neither do allow of the Reservation nor the Elevation of the Host as the Romanists call it which are the Pages or attendants of that Popish Error And in the Church of Rome it self it was opposed by Bertram Berengarius and Basilius Monachus as afterwards by the Pauperes de Lugduno the Albigenses Hussites Wiclivists and their descendents to the time when first Luther writ The taking of the Cup in the holy Sacrament from the Lay-Communicant and thereby sacrilegiously robbing him of the one half of his birth-right crept unawares upon the Church by a joynt negligence as it were both of Priest and People But so that it was still retained by the Eastern Churches claimed and accordingly enjoyed by the Albigenses and their followers and so tenaciously adhered unto by the Bohemians where the Hussites had their first original that in small time they got the names of Calistini and Sub utrâques from their participating of the Cup and communicating under both kindes when none else durst do it And this they did in so great numbers that Cochlaeus one of their greatest Adversaries relates that Thirty thousand of them did assemble together at one time to receive the Sacrament under both kindes The fire of Purgatory hath for a long time warmed the Popes Kitchin and kept the Pot boiling for the Monks and Friers But there is no such fire acknowledged by the Greeks and Moscovites nor by the Melchites Iacobites Armenian and Egyptian Christians nor by the Waldenses Hussites and their Descendents The Worshipping of Images hath not onely been practised but enjoyned by the Church of Rome ever since the second Nicene Council But the Christians of St. Thomas so they call the Indians admit no Images at all to be set up in their Churches The Grecians Moscovites and Ethiopians though they admit of Painted Images yet allow not of the Carved and forbid the worshipping of both The Church of Rome hath long time used Auricular Confession as a kinde of State-picklock and opening therewith the Cabinet-Counsels of the greatest Kings and laid it as a burden upon the conscience of the penitent sinner But the Nestorians and the Iacobites never did enjoyn it themselves or approved it in them that did And though the Greek Church still retains the use of Confession of the right use whereof we shall speak hereafter yet such a rigorous pressing of it as our Masters in the Church of Rome have been used unto they allow not of These are some few of many Errors which have been taught and patronized in the Church of Rome which yet were constantly opposed and condemned by others in the East and South As on the other side those Churches of the East and South and such
they were moved by the Holy Ghost It is not subject to the humor of a private spirit but to be weighed and pondered by that publick Spirit which God hath given unto his Church which he hath promised to conduct in the ways of truth and to be with her always to the end of the world Not that we do exclude any private man from handling of the holy Scripture if he come sanctified and prepared for so great a work if he be lawfully ordained or called unto it and use such helps as are expedient and necessary to inform his judgment nor that we give the Church such a supream power as to change the sense and meaning of the holy Scriptures according as her self may vary from one opinion to another in the course of times This is indeed the monstrous Paradox of Cusanus who telleth us That the Scripture is fitted to the time and variously to be understood so that at one time it is expounded according to the present fancy of the Church and when that fancy is changed that then the sense of Scripture may be also changed and that when the Church doth change her judgment God doth change his also And this I call a monstrous Paradox as indeed it is in that it doth not onely assubject the truth of Scripture but even the God of truth himself to the Churches pleasure How much more piously hath the Church of England determined in it who though it do assert its own power in Expounding Scripture yet doth it with this wise and Religious Caution That the Church may not so expound one place of Scripture that it be repugnant to another Within which bounds if she contain herself and restrain her power no doubt but she may use it to the honor of God the setling of a Publick Peace in all matters controverted and the content and satisfaction of all sober Christians The last part of the Churches power consists in the decreeing of Rites and Ceremonies for the more orderly officiating of Gods Publick service and the procuring of a greater measure of reverence to his holy Sacraments Of this she hath declared more fully in another place First In relation to it self to the Churches power viz. Every particular or National Church hath authority to ordain change and abolish Ceremonies or Rites of the Church ordained onely by mans authority so that all things be done to edifying Next in relation to the people and their conformity That whosoever through his private judgment willingly and purposely doth openly break the Traditions and Ceremonies of the Church which be not repugnant to the Word of God and be ordained and approved by common authority ought to be openly reproved that others may fear to do the like as he that offendeth against the common order of the Church and woundeth the Consciences of the weaker Brethren Which Propositions are so evidently and demonstratively true according to the constant practise of approved Antiquity that he must wilfully oppose the whole Catholick Church and all the famous National Churches in the Primitive times who doth not chearfully and readily assent unto them For who can shew me any Council in the former Ages wherein some Orders were not made for regulating both the Priest and People in the worship of God wherein the Church did not require obedience to her Constitutions and on defect thereof proceeded not to some publick censure of the party He must be utterly ignorant of all Antiquity and the affairs of holy Church that makes doubt of this Nay of so high esteem were the Churches Ordinances in matters of exterior order in the service of God that they were deemed as binding as the word it self And so St. Augustine hath resolved it Iâ— iis rebus de quibus nihil statuit Scriptura mos populi Dei instituta majorum pro lege Dei tenenda sunt as he in his Epistle to Casulanus The customs of the Church and the institutes of our fore-fathers in things of which the Scriptures have determined nothing are to be reckoned and esteemed of as the Word of God Our Saviour by his own observing of the feast of Dedication being of Ecclesiastical institution and no more than so shewed plainly what esteem he had of the Churches Ordinances and how they were to be esteemed of by the sons of men And when St. Paul left this rule behinde him That all things be done decently and in order think we he did not give the Church authority to proceed accordingly and out of this one general Canon to make many particulars Certain I am that Calvin hath resolved it so and he no extraordinary friend to the Churches power Non potest haberi quod Paulus hic exigit nisi additis constitutionibus tanquam vinculis quibusdam ordo ipse decorum servetur That which St. Paul requires saith he is not to be done without prescribing Rules and Canons by which as by some certain Bonds both order and decorum may be kept together Paraeus yet more plainly and unto the purpose Facit Ecclesiae potestatem de ordine decoro Ecclesiastico liberè disponendi leges ferendi By this saith he doth the Apostle give authority to the Church of Corinth and in that to other Churches also of making Laws for the establishing of decency and order in the Church of Christ. And Musculus though he follow the citing of this Text by Eckius in justification of those unwarrantable Rites and Ceremonies Quibus Religionis nostrae puritas polluta esset with which the purity of Religion had been so defiled yet he allows it as a rule for the Church to go by Vt quae lâ—gitimè necessario gerenda sunt in Ecclesia That all those things which lawfully and necessarily may be done in the Church should be performed with decency and convenient order So that we see the Church hath power to decree Rites and Ceremonies in things that appertain to order decency and uniformity in Gods publick service and which is more a power of making Laws and Canons to inforce conformity to the same and that too which is most of all in the opinion of those men which were no great admirers of the Churches customs and looked not so much on the Primitive as the present times Nor is this onely the opinion of particular men but the declared judgment of the eldest Churches of the Reformation The Augustane Confession published in the name of all the Protestants and onely countenanced and allowed of by Imperial Edict not onely doth ordain those antient usages to be still retained in their Churches which conduce to decency and order in the service of God and may be kept in force without manifest sin But it resolves Peccare eos qui eum scandalo illos violant c. That they are guilty of sin who infringe the same and thereby rashly violate the peace of the Church And amongst those
misunderstood dictates of those old Philosophers For where the Scripture saith They had all things common we are to understand it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the use and communication and not in referenee to the right and original title The goods of Christians were in several as to the right title and possession of them but common in the merciful inclination of the owner to the works of mercy And this appears exceeding plainly by the Text and Story of the Acts. For the Text saith That no man said of any thing that it was his own no not of the things which he possessed which plainly shews That the possession still remained to the proper owner though he was mercifully pleased to communicate his goods to the good of others But this the story shews more plainly For what need any of the Possessors of Lands or Houses have sold them and brought the prices of the things which were sold and laid them down at the Apostles feet to be by them distributed to the poorer Brethren If the poor Brethren might have carved themselves out of such estates and entred on them as their own or with what colour could St. Paul have concealed this truth and changed this natural community to a communication Charge them which be rich in this world saith he that they be willing to communicate a communication meerly voluntary and such as necessarily preserves that interess which the Communicators have in their temporal fortunes And so Tertullian also must be understood For though it be omnia indiscreta in regard of the use or a communion if you will with the Saints maintained with one another in their temporal fortunes yet was it no community but a communication in reference to that legal interess which was still preserved and therefore called no more than rei communicatio in the words foregoing The like may be replied to the other Argument drawn from the quality of friendship and the authority of Aristotle and the rest there named That which I have is properly and truly mine because descended on me in due course of Law or otherwise acquired by my pains and industry and being mine is by my voluntary act made common for the relief and comfort of the man I love and have made choice of for my friend yet still no otherwise my friends but that the right and property doth remain in me Quicquid habet amicus noster commune est nobis illius tamen proprium est qui tenet as most truly Seneca As for the practise of the Spartans and that natural liberty which is pretended to be for mankinde in the use of the Creatures It is a thing condemned in all the Schools of the Politicks and doth besides directly overthrow the principles of the Anabaptist and the Familist and their Confederates who are content to rob all mankinde of the use of the Creatures so they may monopolize and ingross them all to the use of the Saints that is themselves But the truth is that these pretences for the Saints are as inconsistent with the Word and Will of God as those which are insisted on for mankinde in general For how can this Community of the Saints or mankinde agree with any of those Texts of holy Scripture which either do condemn the unlawful getting keeping or desiring of riches by covetousness extortion theevery and the like wicked means to attain the same or else commend frugality honest trades of life and specially liberality to the poor and needy Assuredly where there is neither meum nor tuum as there can be no stealing so there needs no giving For how can a man be said to steal that which is his own or what need hath he to receive that in the way of a gift to which he hath as good a Title as the man that giveth it I shut up all with this determination of the Church of England which wisely as in all things else doth so exclude community of mens goods and substance as to require a Christian Communication of and communion in them The riches and goods of Christians saith the Article are not common as touching the right title and possession of the same as certain Anabaptists do falsly boast therefore no community Notwithstanding every man ought of such things as he possesseth liberally to give Alms to the poor according to his ability and there a Communion of the Saints in the things of this world a communication of their riches to the wants of others But the main point in this Communion of the Saints in reference to one another concerns that intercourse and mutual correspondency which is between the Saints in the Church here Militant and those which are above in the Church Triumphant The Church is of a larger latitude than the present world The Body whereof Christ is Head not being wholly to be found on the Earth beneath but a good part thereof in the Heavens above Both we with them and they with us make but one Body Mystical whereof Christ is Head but one Spiritual Corporation whereof he is Governor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as we read in Chrysostom And if he be the Head of both as no doubt he is then must both they and we be members of that Body of his and consequently that correspondence and communion must be held between us which is agreeable to either in his several place So far I think it is agreed on of all sides without any dispute The point in question will concern not the quod sit of it that there is and ought to be a communion between them and us but quo modo how it is maintained and in what particulars And even in this I think it will be granted on all hands also that those above do pray unto the Lord their God for his Church in general that he would please to have mercy on Ierusalem and to build up the breaches in the walls of Sion and to behold her in the day of her visitation when she is harassed and oppressed by her merciless enemies How long say they in the Apocalypse O Lord holy and true how long dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell upon the earth And as they pray unto the Lord to be gracious to us so do they also praise his name for those acts of mercy which he vouchsafes to shew to his Church in general or any of his servants in particular The joy that was in Heaven at the fall of Babylon which had so long made her self drunk with the blood of the Saints and Martys and that which is amongst the Angels of Heaven over every sinners that repenteth are proof enough for this were there no proof else We on the other side do magnifie Gods name for them in that he hath vouchsafed to deliver them out of the bondage of the flesh to take their souls unto his mercy and free
Of the Eleventh Article OF THE CREED Ascribed to St. IVDE the Brother of IAMES 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Carnis Resurrectionem i. e. The Resurrection of the Body CHAP. VII Of the Resurrection of the Body and the Proofs thereof The Objections against it answered Touching the circumstances and manner of it The History and grounds of the Millenarians WE are now come unto that Article of the Christian Faith which hath received most opposition both at home and abroad Abroad amongst the Gentiles of the Primitive times who used all their wit and learning to cry down this Doctrine at home within the pale of the Church it self by some who had the name of Christians but did adulterate the prime Articles of Christian belief by their wicked Heresies First for the Gentiles it was a thing much quarrelled and opposed amongst them that Christ himself should be affirmed to have risen again insomuch that St. Paul was counted mad by Festus and but a babler at the best by the great wits of Athens for venturing to Preach before them of IESUS and the Resurrection i.e. of Iesus and his resurrection for of that onely he did speak when they so judged of him but of this quarrel they grew soon weary and so gave it off For being it was a matter of fact confirmed at the first by so many witnesses who had seen him and converted with him after his raising from the dead and thereupon received in the Church with such unanimity that the faithful rather chose to lay down their lives than to alter their Beleef in that particular the world became the sooner satisfied in the truth thereof But for the Resurrection of the dead which was grounded on it and that his Resurrection was of so great efficacy as that by vertue of it all the dead should rise which had deceased from the beginning of the world to the end thereof that they accounted such a monstrous and ridiculous paradox as could not find admittance amongst men of reason For this it was which was so scoffed at by Cecilius in that witty Dialogue Reâ—ase ferunt post mortem post favillas they give it out saith he that they shall live again after death and that they shall resume those very bodies which now they have though burnt to ashes or devoured by wilde beasts or howsoever putrified and brought to nothing Putes eos jam revixisse And this saith he they speak with so great a confidence as if they were already raised from the dust of the grave and spake as of a matter past not of things to come And it did stomack them the worse in that the Christians did not onely promise a Resurrection and new life to the bodies of men which all Philosophers and men of ordinary sense knew to be subject to corruption but threaten and foretel of the destruction of the Heavenly Bodies the Sun the Moon and all the glorious Lights in the starry Firmament which most Philosophers did hold to be incorruptible as the same Cecilius doth object in the aforesaid Dialogue That Christ was raised from the dead besides the many witnesses which gave credit to it the Gentiles could not well deny especially as to the possibility of such a thing without calling some of their own gods in question For not onely the deity of Romulus did depend on the bare testimony of one Proculus who made Oath in the Senate that he had seen him ascend up into heaven augustiore forma quam fuisset in a more glorious shape than before he had but that of Drusilla and Augustus and Tiberius Caesar which were all Roman gods of the last Edition must fall unto the ground also for lack of evidence if either it were impossible for a dead man to be raised to life again or taken up into the Heavens as our Saviour was But that from this particular instance supposing it for true as it might be possibly they should infer a general Doctrine that all the dead should rise again at the Day of Judgement this would not sink into their heads unless it might be made apparent as they thought it could not that any of that sect had been raised again to confirm all the rest in that opinion Without some such Protesilaus no credit to be given to the resurrection preach it they that would It seems the Gentiles in this point were like the rich man mentioned in our Saviours Parable Except one rise up from the dead they will not beleeve It was not Moses and the Prophets nor Christ and his Apostles that could do the deed Leaving these therefore for a while and keeping those who did assume the name of Christians and yet denied this Article of the Christian Faith unto the close of this discourse Let us for our parts rest our selves on the Word of God and see what Moses and the Prophets what CHRIST and his Apostles have delivered to us in affirmation of this Doctrine For Moses first it is the general opinion of most learned men that he was the Author of the Book of Iob and that he wrote it purposely for a Cordial to the house of Israel whom he found very apt to despair of Gods mercies towards them and easily out of comfort in all times of trouble Which granted we shall have from Moses a most ample testimony where he reports these words of that Myrror of patience I know that my Redeemer liveth and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth And though after my skin worms destroy this body yet in my flesh shall I see God Whom I shall see for my self and mine eyes shall behold and not another though my reins be consumed within me St. Hierom notes upon these words that no man since Christs time did ever speak so clearly of Christs resurrection and his own as Iob doth here before Christs coming Nullum tam apertè post Christum quam ipse hic ante Christum de Christi resurrectione loquitur sua as the Father hath it And on the same a Reverend Father of our own makes this glosse or descant It is affirmed saith he by Iob that his Redeemer liveth and shall rise again which is as much as to say He is the resurrection and the life St. Iohn could say no more It is his hope He is by it regenerate to a lively hope St. Peter could say no more than that He enters into such particulars this flesh and these eyes which is as much as was or could be said by St. Paul himself There is not in all the Old there is not in all the New Testament a more pregnant and direct proof for the resurrection St. Hierom as we saw before was of this opinion St. Gregory comes not much behind who on these words of Iob gives us this short Paraphrase Victurum me certa fide credo libera voce profiteor quia Redemptor mens
God if not more possible to recreat a man from something than to creat him first of nothing Whether the natural substance of a man corrupted be not more apt to be recollected unto it self than the dust of the Earth was in it self to be first framed to such a substance Credamus ergo abeodem restitui posse veterem hominem qui novum fecit as it is excellently well prest upon them by Lactantius If for the manner of it they would know by what arts and agents so great a miracle as the raising of the same numerical body shall be wrought upon them we must refer them to themselves and in themselves they have an Answer They all know so much of themselves that they live move and have a being that they are all engendred by their natural Fathers and fashioned in the secret Closets of their Mothers womb yet certainly it is a matter if considered rightly not very capable of credit that so small a quantity of seed should either be improved into a substance of such different parts as flesh and blood and bones and sinews or else divided into so many parts of such different substance When at the last the body is made fit to receive the soul they cannot tell either by what means the soul is given or the whole birth nourished Lord I am fearfully and wonderfully made said the Royal Psalmist If then they know not by what means they were made at first but shut up their enquirie in an admiration of the unsearchable power and wisdom of the most high God why should they look to be resolved of all doubts and difficulties touching the Resurrection of the self-same bodies and not refer that also to Gods power and wisdom Which was the answer of Tertullian to the Roman Sophisters Redde si potes rationem qua factus es tunc require qua fies First render an account saith he how thou first wert made and afterwards enquire how thou shalt be raised But not to answer them with Questions after the manner of the old Socratical way of disputing to illustrate our belief more fully in this Article and gain theirs unto it I will lay before them two such instances as will clearly carry it except they think more meanly of the power of God than of subservient nature and the force of art It is the nature of the Loadstone to draw steel to it that is a thing well known And it is found of late by a strange experiment that if a massie body of steel be ground to powder and all the Atomes of it buried in a lump of Clay yet will the powerful vertue of the Stone or Adamant being gently moved upon the superficies of the Cake attract into a lump all those dusts of steel so strangely scattered and dispersed Which though it be a wondrous power and effect of nature yet comes it short of that which is done by art The substance of the steel not being altered though the parts attenuated For it is found by those who do trade in Chymistry that the forms of things are kept invisibly in store though the materials of the same be altered from what first they were and that by vertue of those forms the things themselves will be restored to their former being which they make good by this experiment They take a Flower or Plant of what kinde soever in the Spring time when it is in its fullest and most vigorous growth and beat it in a Morter Root Stalks Flowers and Leaves until it be reduced to a confused Mass. Then after Maceration Fermentation Separation and other workings of that art there is extracted a kinde of Ashes or Salt including those formes and tinctures under their power and Chaos which they put up in Glasses very close made up the mouth of the Glass being heated in the fire and the neck thereof wrung close together to keep in the Spirits Which done applying to it a soft fire or candle you shall presently perceive the Flowers or Plants to rise up by little and little out of those Ashes and to appear again in their proper forms as when they grew upon the ground But take away the fire or candle and they remove immediately to their Chaos again A wonderful effect of art and nature such as not onely doth resemble the Resurrection but so far confirm it that he who shall deny it for the time to come will make the God of Heaven less powerful than the Sons of Art The ingenuous Author of the Book called Religio Medici doth also touch upon this rarity but I have not now the Book by me to put down his words or to make use of any other of his observations to the point in hand And to say truth there need but little more be added as to the Quod sit of the Resurrection to the point it self That which remains relates unto the manner onely to some points of circumstance and to such Christian uses as are raised hereon And first Perhaps it may be demanded of us as once of the Apostle in former times Quali corpore venient How with what Bodies they shall rise Not whether in the very same Numerical Body for that hath been made good before but whether in the same shape and fashion which before it had We know that man returns again into his Earth at several ages the tender Infant and the Man of ripest years being alike subject to the stroke of impartial death In which respect it hath been questioned by the Antients whether they shall arise in the same age and disproportions of Age and Stature which they had whilest they lived St. Augustine doth resolve it Negatively and determineth thus That we shall all of us be raised in that proportion both of strength and beauty which men attain to commonly at the time of their best perfection Restat ergo saith he ut suam quisque habeat mensuram vel quam habuit in inventute vel quam habiturus esset si vixisset And this he groundeth on that passage to those of Ephesus where the Apostle speaks of that special care which CHRIST hath taken of his Church and our edification till we all come to a perfect man unto the measure of the fulness of the age or stature of CHRIST Ad mensuram plenitudinis aetatis Christi that is to say as he expounds it Ad juvenilem formam to that degree of age or stature which our Redeemer had attained to at the time of his passion which was about the four and thirtieth year of his life as may be gathered from the Scriptures A second Quere hath been made concerning them which are diffigured and deformed and mulcted as it were by nature how in what bodies they shall come in the Resurrection Not with their imperfections I conceive not so for in the Heavens there shall be nothing not compleat and of full accomplishment And on the other side were they freed
not look upon it in its first Original or as it was obtruded on the Church by Hereticks but as by some good pious men it was refined and rectified and so commended to them for a Catholick point And he that took the pains to refine it first and make it more agreeable to an Orthodox ear was Papias Bishop of Hierapolis a City of Phrygia a pious man Sed modico admodum judicio praeditus but otherwise of mean parts and of little judgement And yet because of the opinion which the world had of him he was herein followed by Irenaeus and some others as Eusebius telleth us who perhaps might think it a good bargain if they could better the opinion and thereby hope to get the Iews and the Iudaizers to come over to them St. Hierom speaks of him as the first who published that Iewish Tradition of Christs earthly Kingdom the first he meaneth that published it so refined and bettered and that after the Resurrection the Saints should reign together with the Lord in the flesh for a Thousand years Hic dicitur mille annorum Iudaicam edidisse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dicens post resurrectionem Dominum in carne cum Sanctis regnaturum as he tells us of him And then he adds That he was followed herein by Iraeneus and Apollinarius as also by Tertullian in his book De spe fidelium by Victorinus Pictaviensis and Lactantius Gennadius adds Tychonius Afer who in his Commentaries on the Revelation did affirm the same And so did also Iustin Martyr Melito Sardensis and Severus Sulpitius in the life of St. Martin So did St. Augustine for a while Hoc etiam was aliquan do opinati sumus as himself informs us but after upon better consideration he receded from it By all these it is held for a truth undoubted That Christ shall come down from Heaven in the end of the world and converse with men and govern them with Peace and Iustice and that the Saints which shall be raised and they who shall be found alive at the time of his coming shall reign with him a thousand years and serve the Lord with righteousness and perfect holiness So far they generally agree though some not fully cleared of the former errors and amongst them Lactantius must go for one conceived That those just men who were found alive should generate an infinite number of subjects infinitam multitudinem generibunt with which to people this New Kingdom The greatest difference amongst them did consist in this Whether the computation of this Millenary or thousand years was to commence before or after the day of Iudgment Lactantius being of opinion that it should be after but Iustin Martyr and most others that these thousand years should be first accomplished and then the general Resurrection and the day of Iudgment should succed immediately And though St. Augustine for his part did think the opinion thus reformed to be somewhat tolerable yet being vehemently opposed by Ierom who upon all occasions doth declare against it accounting it but a remainder of the Iewish dotages it became by little and little to be less esteemed and in a very short time after to be quite deserted Nor was it ever since revived till these later times in which the Anabaptists first gave the hint unto it and since that numerous brood of Sectaries which have swarmed from them have once more published it abroad to the view of the world As for the ground on which those Antient Writers built this Kingdomâ—hey â—hey either were some promises made by God to the house of Israel concerning the coming and the Kingdom of Christ in the time of the Gospel or else some words of Christ himself which they interpreted that way or finally some passages in the Revelation which did directly seem to give countenance to it First For the Promises made by God in the Old Testament however they may seem to favor those of that opinion yet is it candidly acknowledged by Tertullian though he held the Tenet That they were to be understood non de terrena sed coelesti promissione of heavenly not of earthly promises In the New Testament the first place which they build upon is that in the nineteenth of St. Matthew where it is said That every one who hath forsaken Houses or Brethren or Sisters or Father or Mother or Wife or Children for my Names sake shall receive an hundred fold and shall inherit everlasting life that is to say according to St. Marks expression An hundred fold now in this life time and in the world to come life everlasting But that this is not to be understood in a literal sense nor the accomplishment thereof to be made in that Golden Kingdom St. Ierom reasoneth very tartly For then saith he it needs must follow Ut qui unam uxorem pro domino dimiserit centum recipiat in futuro that he who doth forsake one wife for the love of Christ should in that Kingdom of theirs receive an hundred Which how absurd it were he leaves them to judge In the next place they fasten upon that of Luke in which our Saviour said unto his Apostles That they should eat and drink at the same Table with him in his Kingdom But neither these words must be taken literally as they seem to sound or if they be they will be found directly contrary unto that of St. Paul assuring us That the Kingdom of God is not meat and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost The like may be replied to that other place by them alleged to this purpose viz. I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the Vine until that day when I shall drink it new with you in my Fathers Kingdom These words St. Ierom doth interpret of the Blood of Christ not to be drank unless we do ascend with him into the upper Chambers of the Heavens above and from his hands receive the Cup of the New Testament Et inebriemur ab eo vino sobrietatis and be made drunken as it were with the Wine of Sobriety Which Answer how it satisfied the Millenarians I am not able to say but I profess sincerely it doth not satisfie me Nor have I met with any Exposition of this difficult place which doth not leave it as perplexed as before it was And yet I am not of the minde that it can possibly be alleged in favor of the Millenarians because it is in Regno Patris mei in my Fathers Kingdom which generally is used in Scripture for the Kingdome of Heaven and not in Regno meo my Kingdom or the Kingdom of Christ as in that of Luke Though that of Luke be but a metaphorical form of speech and signifieth no more than that degree of nearness to their Lord and Saviour which the Apostles should obtain in the Kingdome of Glory such as is commonly between those who ordinarily
of the Souls immortality but onely to assert it in such a manner as to prepare my way to the present Article which doth in part depend upon it For if there were no Soul at all or if the Soul did perish as do those of Beasts it were in vain to think of a Resurrection or flatter our selves with expectation of eternal life The immortality of the Soul is to be premised before we speak of Heaven and the life to come and that premised or granted as I hope it will be we must next fit it with an Ubi with a constant place of as great perpetuity as a soul it self and with a life as permanent as the place can be Which place or life being we cannot finde it in this present world we must look for it in another and therefore that which in this Creed is called Life everlasting is called in the Nicene Creed The life of the world to come And if it be a Life of the world to come this world and all the beauties of it must first pass away before we can possess our estates in that even as St. Paul hath told us of our Saviour Christ That he took away the first Covenant to establish the second Now that the world shall have an end is a thing so clear in Christianity that never any Heretick in all ages past did call the truth hereof in question And so it was conceived in Philosophy also till Aristotle and the Peripateticks which followed him began to hammer a conceit De aeternitate mundi of the worlds eternity Certain I am that all the old Philosophers before his time and namely Heraclitus Empedocles Anaxagoras Democritus and divers others as also the Stoicks and the whole Sect of the Epicures though in other things they did agree like fire and water were all agreed upon this point That as the world had a beginning so it should have an end The judgment in this case of those old Philosophers Diogenes Laertius will afford us on an easie search And for the said two Sects to take one of each Seneca telleth us for the Stoicks Unus hominum genus condet dies That one day shall bury all mankinde and not all mankinde onely but the whole frame of the Creation totum hunc rerum omnium contextum as he elswhere hath it dies aliquis dejiciet shall in one day be cast down and brought to end The like Lucretius saith for the Epicureans of which Sect he was Una dies dabit exitio multosque per Annos Sustentata ruet moles machina mundi In English thus The goodly frame and engine of this All So many years upheld shall one day fall Nor did they thus agree as by joynt consent touching the Quod sit of this truth That the world should end but they descended to the Quomodo or the manner of it affirming That it shall be consumed with fire St. Ierom doth affirm it of the Gentiles generally that they so conceived it I mean still the Philosophers or the learned Gentiles Quae quidem Philosophorum mundi opinio est omnia quae cernimus igne peritura The Stoiks and the Epicureans also did agree in this Quod mundus hic omnis ignescat That the whole world should be burnt with fire as Octavius telleth us in the Dialogue Eusebius not content to deal in such general terms gives us the names of Zeno Cleanthes and Chrysippus antient Stoicks all who have so declared The like saith Cicero of Panaetius whose fear it was Ne ad extremum mundus ignesceret lest the world should be consumed with fire See to this purpose also Seneca in his Book De Consolatione ad Mart. c. 26. Pliny in his Natural History l. 7. c. 16. The Sibylline Prophecies lib. 2. Oracul Lucans Pharsal and Ovids Metamorph. l. 1. who doth thus express it Esse quoque in fatis reminiscitur affore tempus Quo mare quo tellus correptaque Regia Coeli Ardeat mundi moles operosa laboret Which may be Englished as followeth Besides he call'd to minde that by the doom Of certain Fate a certain time should come When Sea and Land the Court of Heaven the frame Of this great work the world should burn in flame Who can peruse these passages of those Antient Gentiles and not conceive they had consulted with the writings of the Prophet Isaiah where it is said That the Heavens shall vanish away like smoke and the Earth wax old as doth a garment and also in another place That the Heavens shall be rolled together like a peece of parchment that is to say Like a Peece of Parchment shrivelled and shrunk up together by a scorching fire Who can peruse those passages of the antient Gentiles but must conceive that they were partly enlightned by the self-same Spirit with which St. Peter was enspired when he told us in his second Epistle saying The day of the Lord will come as a Thief in the night in which the Heavens shall pass away with a great noyse and the Elements shall melt with fervent heat the Earth also and the works that are therein shall be utterly burnt Cap. 4.10 And in the next save one as followeth Looking for and hastning to the coming of the day of God in which the Heavens shall perish with fire and the Elements melt with fervent heat Were it a thing to be admitted in Chronology I could not but believe that these antient Gentiles had ploughed with St. Peters Heifer and from him borrowed their discourses of the worlds conflagration And now I am faln into the writings of those antient Gentiles and found what they conceived of the Souls immortality and the consumption of this world by a burning fire I will not leave them till they have delivered their opinions also concerning the estate of the soul departed and the glories of eternal life in the world to come In which they have expressed themselves in so clear a manner that we may justly say as Octavius did Aut nunc Christianos Philosophos esse aut Philosophos fuisse jam tunc Christianos That either the Christians are Philosophers or the old Philosophers were Christians For that there was a Paradise or some place of delight and pleasure for the reception of the souls of vertuous persons appeareth by that sacred speech of Zoroaster the antientest of the Sages amongst the Gentiles and one not much short of the time of Abraham with whom he is supposed to have been contemporary 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Seek Paradise saith he that is to say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that all enlightned recess of souls as Pletho the Scholiast doth expound it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Quire of the divine powers encircling the Father as Psellus glosseth on that Text but Psellus on occasion of the words aforesaid goes a little further 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. It concerneth us saith he to make haste unto the light
doth exclude a Metaphor Nor do there want good Reasons to confirm this truth against the cavils and exceptions of unquiet men For first considering that the fire of Hell is so often threatned in the Scriptures to ungodly men unless we hold fast to this good old Rule in expounding Scripture to take it in the literal sense according as the native meaning of the words import but where the same may be against the truth of faith and honesty of manners it is St. Augustines Rule we shall leave nothing safe nor sound in the Book of God And then it is to be considered That Christ our Saviour shall pronounce this sentence in the day judgment Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels Which if it be not spoken in the literal sense according to the plain meaning of the words neither the guilty can perceive what they are to suffer nor the Ministers what they are to execute nor the Saints what belongs to them to approve and applaud but all things will be left in most strange perplexities Besides it was the custom of our Lord and Saviour when he had spoken to the Iews in Tropes and Parables to make an exposition of them to his own Disciples and in that exposition to speak so plainly that every one might be able to understand him As in the Parables of the Tares and the Casting Net delivered in the thirteenth of St. Matthews Gospel the Disciples understood not what he meant by either but were as ignorant of his scope and purpose as the rest of the Iews But when he did expound himself unto them in private touching the sending of his Angels in the day of judgment to sever the wicked from the just and to cast them being severed so into the furnace of fire and then demanded if they understood what was said unto them they made answer yea It must not therefore be a Metaphor but a proper Speech by which our Saviour Christ did expound his meaning and open the obscurity of the said two Parables for to expound a Parable by a Trope or Metaphor had neither been agreeable to our Saviours goodness nor any way conducing to their Edification So then the fire of Hell shall be true and real not Figurative and Metaphorical and as it is a real fire a devouring fire so is it ignis inextinguibilis an unquenchable fire in the third and ignis aeternus an everlasting fire in the five and twentieth of Matthew The smoke whereof goeth up for ever saith the Prophet Isaiah A fire which feedeth both on the body and the soul yet shall never consume them and such a fire as breeds a kinde of worm within it which shall never die but always gnaw upon the conscience of the man condemned and create far more anguish to him than all bodily torments And of this worm it is which St. Basil speaketh where reckoning up the terrors which shall be presented to the wicked in the day of judgment amongst them he recounteth a darkish fire which though it hath lost his light shall retain its burning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and a most venemous kinde of worm feeding on flesh and raising intolerable torments with continual biting See to this purpose also that of Gregory Nyssen in his Homily De Resurrectione Christi nor is it thus delivered in the writings of the Christians onely Iosephus also hath the like a Iew but a learned and a modest Iew in an Oration of his which he made to the Grecians not extant in his works indeed but mentioned by Damascene and preserved by Zonaras For speaking also his opinion of the final judgment to be executed by the Messiah in the last day he saith That there remaineth for the lovers of wickedness an unquenchable and never ending fire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. And a fiery worm not dying nor destroying the body but breaking forth of the body with unceasing anguish And to this truth as to the miserable state of those in Hell all the old Catholick Doctors do attest unanimously whether Greeks or Latines Tatianus one of the most antientest of the Grecian Doctors calleth the estate of the damned in Hell 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a death which never dieth an immortal misery Tertullian the most antient Latin Cruciatum non diuturnum sed sempiternum Not onely a long and lingring torrant but an everlasting one St. Augustine answerably unto that of Tatianus doth call it Mortem sine morte adding more over of those sires Punire non finire corpora that they torment the body but destroy it not Tertullian he goeth further yet saith That it burns the body but repairs it also and calls it poenam nutrientem A fire which so devoureth that it also nourisheth With him Lactantius doth consent so also doth Minutius Felix Prudentius Cassiodorus and indeed who not And why should this be thought a wonder so far beyond the reason and belief of a meer natural man or such who taking on themselves the names of Christians will yet believe no more than will stand with reason Doth not the Scripture tell us of a burning bush a bush that burned with the fire and was not consumed And the Historians of the Hills of Aetna and Vesuvius which do almost continually send out dreadful flames and yet never waste And the Philosophers of a Worm or Beast which they call the Salamander whose natural habitation is in the midst of the fire and the Poets of Prometheus and Titius Vultures which having fed so many hundred years upon their Bowels had not yet devoured them Doth not experience tell us daily That the lightning glanceth on our Bodies often but doth seldom hurt us And doth not Ovid say expresly Nec mortis poenas mors altera finiet hujus That there is a second death which shall never end yet I confess that the prevailing Heresie which pretends to such wit and piety hath no small reason to declare Interire posse animas aut ab exitio liberari That the souls of wicked and impenitent men shall either be annihilated or in fine released For we may safely say of these new Pretenders as once Minutius did of the old Philosophers Malunt penitus extingui quam ad supplicia reparari Considering how they have subverted all the Fundamentals of the Christian Faith it is all the reason in the world that they should rather wish to be annihilated than survive to torments such torments as shall know neither end nor measure BUt blessed JESUS why do we waste our time in such nice disputes in proving and disproving points of so clear an evidence which were much better spent in pursutes of those ways and courses by which we might have hope to flie from the wrath to come Thou Lord hast set before us both Heaven and Hell commandest us to choose the one and avoid the other and tracedst