Selected quad for the lemma: virtue_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
virtue_n	brazen_a	look_v	serpent_n	839	5	9.9901	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A04168	The humiliation of the Sonne of God by his becomming the Son of man, by taking the forme of a servant, and by his sufferings under Pontius Pilat, &c. Or The eighth book of commentaries vpon the Apostles Creed: continued by Thomas Jackson Dr. in Divinitie, chaplaine to his Majestie in ordinarie, and president of Corpus Christi Colledge in Oxford. Divided into foure sections.; Commentaries upon the Apostles Creed. Book 8	Jackson, Thomas, 1579-1640.	1635 (1635)	STC 14309; ESTC S107480	214,666	423

this God of mercy and consolation infallibly know that Abraham would be ready to doe all that hee commanded him to doe Yes certainely and more then so that Abraham should not doe all which he first commanded him to doe Why then did he command him to sacrifice his only son Isaac To this end that he might have Abrahams full consent to offer up one of his seed but not Isaac for the accomplishing of the blessing promised to mankind from the date of the curse pronounced against the first woman Inasmuch as Abraham was willing to sacrifice his onely sonne the son of his old age whom he loved more dearely then he could have done any one or more sonnes or then he could have loved him if he had been the sonne of his middle age his consent for the sacrificing of any other either of his or Isaacs posterity whosoever hee were was evidently included in this his extraordinary obedience And yet so graciously and lovingly did God deale with Abraham that albeit he was the Lord of all and Abrahams most gracious Lord in particular that he would not seize upon any of Abrahams seed for a sacrifice of atonement betwixt himself and the whole world without Abrahams consent This gracious Lord then by interposing the forementioned oath that in Abrahams seed all the Natiōs of the Earth should be blessed was abundantly mercifull not to Abraham onely but unto all mankinde by him And yet as Rupertus out of S. Chrysostom if my memory failes me not observeth this abundant mercy was not diluta misericordia that is this mercy though incomparable was well placed and the accomplishment of it assured upon most just and equitable though not upon any valuable considerations Quaesivit Deus titulum in Abrahamo saith this Author c. God from the first promise made to mankinde did expect a fit occasion to confirme it by solemn oath and found out Abraham a man quoad haec according to his owne heart for accepting this league or covenant betwixt him and man upon earnest given or resolved to be given by Abraham For God had before determined to give his Sonne for the redemption of men and now finding Abraham most willing and ready to give him his onely Son and finding also Abrahams onely son obedient unto death he binds himself by solemn oath that he would give his onely Son that his onely Sonne being made the seed of Abraham should be more willing then Isaac was to be offered up in bloody sacrifice for the redemption of Mankinde But the contents or importances of Gods covenant made by oath unto Abraham were they to be handled alone would require a larger volume and longer disquisition then I dare in these yeares and in this weaknesse project So much of them as I conceive to be pertinent unto these Commentaries upon the Apostles Creed shall be intermingled by Gods assistance in the explication of the articles following 4. But taking all that hath beene said for granted to wit that God by demanding Isaac in sacrifice or by pressing Abraham to be the Sacrificer did binde himself by oath to offer up his onely sonne in such a bloody sacrifice as Abraham had destinated Isaac unto Yet the captious Jews or other Infidels would thus except that Abraham never intended nor was he by God commanded to offer up his onely sonne Isaac upon the crosse for that did not onely imply a bloody but an accursed kinde of death This indeed is the maine stumbling block to the Jew who perhaps would not so much as have scunnered at the Altar if our Saviour had beene offered upon it specially in the Temple or in the Courts adjoyning The next quaeries then for satisfaction of the Jews or other Infidels if God at any time shall vouchsafe them eyes to see or eares to heare are in what sacred writings acknowledged by them the bloody sacrifice of Abrahams seed or his sufferings upon a tree or crosse without the City of Jerusalem not in the courts or precincts of the Lords house were either foretold or foreshadowed CHAP. XXXI That the Sonne of God should be offered upon a tree or crosse was prefigured by Moses his erection of the brazen Serpent in the wildernesse 1 THat the death of the Messias or Sonne of God upon the Crosse was prefigured by Moses his lifting up of the brazen Serpent upon a pole perhaps a crosse in the wildernesse this Sonne of God did instruct his timorous Disciple Nicodemus who came to him by night more fully then he did such as were his daily followers untill the time approached wherein he was to suffer this ignominious death His sacred Catechisme to this Disciple is exactly registred by S. Iohn and uttered by him some yeares before that last feast of Tabernacles whereat Nicodemus was present Ioh. 7. No man saith our Saviour unto him hath ascended up to heaven but he that came downe from heaven even the Sonne of man which is in heaven and as Moses lifted up the Serpent in the wildernesse even so must the Sonne of man be lifted up While the Sonne of man was lifted up the Sonne of God was likewise lifted up that is by way of sacrifice or atonement That the efficacy of this atonement should proceed from vertue or power of himself as he was the Sonne of God he himself instructeth us ver 16. For God so loved the world that he gave his onely begotten Sonne that whosoever beleeved in him should not perish but have everlasting life for God sent not his Sonne into the world to condemne it but that the world through him might be saved The end then of his comming into the world was to save it and the end of his lifting up upon the crosse was to draw all men to look upon him as the Israëlites who were stung with fiery serpents did upon the brazen Serpent which Moses erected in the wildernesse To this purpose he afterwards expounds himself when he repeateth his Catechisme made to Nicodemus unto the people Ioh. 12. And I if I be lift up from the earth will draw all men unto me He did and doth draw all men unto him not drag any after him Such as will not be gently drawn by him their perdition is from themselves and however all shall not in the issue be saved by him yet he is the Saviour of all though especially of such as beleeve that is of such as out of the sense and feeling of their sinnes which are the stings of death seeke that remedy for their souls from meditations upon the crosse or upon him crucified which Gods people in the wildernesse did for their bodies by looking upon the brazen Serpent erected by Moses 2. That bodily salvation which they enjoyed by observing of this divine prescript was not procured by the materiall Serpent on which they looked but by the vertue of that invisible power whose spirituall efficacie was in times following to bee more visibly manifested in the accomplishment of

that grand mystery which this strange temporall healing did prefigure and that was the future cure of our Soules our deliverance from the tyranny of the old Serpent by the Sonne of God becomming the Sonne of man and vouchsafing to bee lift up from the earth upon the Crosse For it was requisit that upon them exercising tyranny should come penury which they could not avoid but to these it should onely be shewed how their Enemies were tormented For when the horrible fiercenesse of beasts came upon these and they perished with the stings of crooked Serpents thy wrath endured not for ever But they were troubled for a small season that they might bee admonished having a signe of salvation to put them in remembrance of the commandment of thy Law For hee that turned himself toward it was not healed by the thing which hee saw but by thee which art the Saviour of all Wisd 16.4 5 6 7. 3. Shall wee say then that the brazen Serpent was a true picture or type of Christ So many have from the forecited place of S. Iohn concluded and of these many not a few have sought out divers properties of brasse and of Serpents more then accurate naturalists before had knowne to salve up the apparant incongruity betwixt the picture and the body which they would have it to represent But when they have said all they can or others more then they could for them the congruity will bee no better then si gryphes jungantur equis For what correspondencie or conveniency can there bee betweene the Serpent and the womans seed Shall we attempt to foreshadow light by darknesse or make a league betwixt Christ and Beliall All that which our Saviours exposition upon Moses his fact will concludently inferre is briefly this that the mystery of his suffering upon the Crosse was prefigured by the erection of the brazen Serpent and by the comfort which the wounded Israelites found by looking upon it 4. Ahitophels treachery against his Master David did truely foreshadow the betraying of Davids Lord by Iudas yet no man will hence conclude that Ahitophel was a type of Christ or of his death but rather of Iudas and his fearefull end Nor was the brazen Serpent any other wayes a type of Christs person then Ahitophel was that is no type at all yet a more excellent type of that old Serpent whom the womans seed was to vanquish then Ahitophel was of Iudas And the erection of this Serpent upon a pole or tree was a prophecie or speaking picture that the victory of the womans seed or Sonne of God over Satan should be accomplisht upon the Crosse This Interpretation I learne from our Saviour himself Iohn 12.31 Now is the judgement of this world now shall the prince of this world bee cast out Now that is when the Sonne of man shall bee lift up The Crosse then was the scene or stage wherein the long duell was to bee determined and the destruction of the old fiery Serpent upon the stage was excellently foreshadowed by the lifting up of the brazen Serpent in the wildernesse which questionlesse did better represent a dead wounded or bruised Serpent then a live or active one This interpretation or display of that sacred Embleme is most consonant to the historicall circumstances and occasions which Moses had to make and set up the brazen Serpent upon a pole to the view of all the people God from the fall of our first Parents did by way of punishment as well upon the woman and her seed as upon the Serpent and his seed which had seduced her denounce a perpetuall enmity betweene them Now albeit this enmity did principally consist between the womans seed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is our Saviour and the old Serpent that is the Devill and their followers Yet this spirituall enmitie was visibly represented to the world by that antipathy which in course of nature is usually experienced betweene men and bodily Serpents And this enmity specially on the Serpents part was never more remarkable then in the wildernesse when the murmuring Israelites did tempt the Lord their God after the same manner as the first woman had done that is by lusting after meats for that time and place forbidden by loathing Manna and heavenly food which God had plentifully provided for them And they departed from the mount Hor by the way of the red Sea to compasse the land of Edom and the people were sore greeved because of the way And the people spake against God and against Moses saying Wherefore have yee brought us out of Aegypt to die in the wildernesse for here is neither bread nor water and our soule loatheth this light bread Wherefore the Lord sent fiery Serpents among the people which stang the people so that many of the children of Israel died Therefore the people came to Moses and said Wee have sinned for wee have spoken against the Lord and against thee pray unto the Lord that hee take away the Serpents from us And Moses prayed for the people And the Lord said unto Moses Make thee a fiery Serpent and set it upon a pole and it shall come to passe that every one that is bitten when hee looketh upon it shall live And Moses made a Serpent of brasse and put it upon a pole and it came to passe if a Serpent had bitten any man when hee beheld the Serpent of brasse hee lived Num. 21.4 5 6 7 8 c. 5. The importance or implication of the historie is that as God had now brought that curse upon them which had been denounced against the womans seed from her first sinne so in case they would not tempt the Lord their God by renewing their first Parents sinne they should in good time see the curse denounced against the old Serpent that is the crushing of his head as exactly fulfilled as the punishment upon the womans seed had beene by the fiery Serpents in biting their heeles That the same Lord who had now saved them from the poison of these lesser bodily Serpents would in his good time deprive the old Serpent of his deadly sting and destroy death it self by dying upon the Crosse The experience of woes or calamities threatned against disobedience is usually given by Gods Prophets as a pledge or earnest for the accomplishment of the good things which he hath promised to the penitent 6. That which specially did first perswade me thus to display the Embleme of the brazen Serpent was the demolition of it by good Hezekiah who questionlesse would never have done to it as he did had hee knowen or taken it to have been the type or figure of his expected Redeemer rather then of his Enemy The good King by this zealous fact did foreshadow the future accomplishment of that grand mystery which the erection of the brazen Serpent was appointed to represent to wit the dissolution of the old Serpents Kingdome over this world The adoration of this Serpent whilst