God in three Persons be rendred all honour and glorie now and for euer Amen Marriage is honourable amongst all men and the bed vndefiled but fornicators and adulterers God will iudge A SERMON PREACHED IN THE CATHE DRAL CHVRCH OF WELS AT WHAT TIME FOVRE PERSONS DID PENANCE FOR INCEST COMMITTED BY ONE MAN WITH HIS WIVES DAVGHTER BY THE OTHER MAN WITH HIS WIVES SISTER DEVT. 27. VERSE 22 23. 22 Cursed is he that lyeth with his sister the daughter of his father or the daughter of his mother and all the people shall say Amen 23 Cursed is he that lyeth with his mother-in-law and all the people shall say Amen WHEN GOD had deliuered the Children of Israel out of Aegypt he was pleased to enter into a Couenant with them at Mount Sinai the manner of it is set downe Exod. 24. But the Israelites quickly brake with GOD and GOD entred into iudgment with them he made them for the space of fortie yeeres to wander in the Wildernesse and in that space he so consumed them that of 600000 men remained aliue onely IOSVA and CALEB After so long displeasure GOD returned againe in mercie to them he vouchsafed to haue his Couenant renewed againe the forme of the renuing he prescribeth in this 27 of Deut. A most solemne forme for therein were to concurre three remarkable acts First The Law was to be fairly written vpon great plaistred Stones that the people before-hand might see whereunto they were to bind themselues for GOD would haue them enter into his Couenant aduisedly Secondly there was an Altar to be erected and thereon they were to offer whole burnt offerings and sacrifices of thankes-giuing which were to be reall acknowledgments that they did wholly deuote themselues to GOD and giue thankes for that GOD of his goodnesse would againe renue his Couenant GOD would haue them enter into his Couenant religiously Thirdly GOD commanded that the twelue Tribes should sort themselues into two diuisions sixe should stand vpon the descent of Mount Gerezzim and sixe vpon the descent of Mount Ebal both diuisions with their faces towards the mid Valley where the Arke of GOD the Type of his visible residence amongst the Israelites was borne vp by the Priests In this Theater as it were did GOD require that the Israelites should heare the Articles of Agreement betweene GOD and them both blessings and cursings and professe their conformitie thereunto GOD would haue them professe themselues party to his Couenant openly in the sight both of GOD and Men. In this third act you shall find a rehearfall of sinnes first in particular then ingenerall and a doome pronounced against the committers of those sinnes both by Priest and People Of the particular sinnes my Text specifieth two and specifieth withall the doome that belongeth to either of them The sinnes are vnlawfull matches one collaterall a brothers lying with his sister and because a woman may be sister more wayes then one here is an exegesis the word is expounded whether she be daughter of the mans father or daughter of his mother The second vnlawfull match is in the right line a mans lying with his mother-in law Of these matches you haue these penitent spectacles here presented before you The Text goeth on and tels these Penitents and whosoeuer else shall presume to be like vnto them what is their doome it is set downe in one word but that is a sharpe one they are cursed But farther obserue concerning this doome who doth pronounce it and who doth approue it They that pronounce it are the Leuites so we read verse 14 and they are willed to pronounce it with an audible voyce so audible that all Israel may heare They that approue it are the people they are required to say Amen in token that they all assent to that which they heare all the people must say Amen You haue the briefe of my Text I purpose GOD willing now to enlarge it I pray GOD I may so doe it as that we that stand may take heed least we fall and these that are fallen may learne to rise againe I begin with the sinne wherein we are first to make you see that the Text doth fit this occasion For neither of the matches therein specified seemeth to agree with theirs that are vnder the present Censure Not the collaterall for my Text speaketh of a sister by consanguinitie and these Penitents were brother and sister onely by affinitie not that in the right line for my Text speaketh of a mans lying with his mother in-Law or his wiues mother but this man here is censured for lying with his wiues daughter And so you may thinke that neither of these couples come within the compasse of my Text and therefore are neither of them guiltie of the sinne neither need feare the doome To take away this doubt you must take notice of two rules in Diuinitie The first is that affinitie makes persons as neere in the Law as consanguinitie doth The reason whereof is plaine Affinitie is grounded vpon mariage and by mariage two become one flesh and consequently their kinted whether ascendent or descendent or collaterall become alike neere on each side to the other Your wiues father and mother brethren and sisters sonnes and daughters are vnto you by her as neere as if they were of your owne blood This being true you perceiue that it was no lesse vnlawfull for this man to couple with his wiues sister then with his owne sister the daughter of his father or the daughter of his mother The other rule is That more then is exprest in GODS Law is to be vnderstood when by analogie it may fairly be deduced there-from GOD himselfe is our direction to take notice of such analogie for if you compare this Chapter with the 18 of Leuit. you shall find that this verie instance of a man lying with his mother-in-law which is mentioned here is omitted there whereupon you may well conclude that some particulars which GOD forbids are not named in the Letter though they are within the meaning of the Law and that the meaning is as wide as analogie will suffer I will shew you in a word what this analogie is it is that persons which are not forbidden expresly and in the letter of the Law are there forbidden implicitely and in the meaning of the Law where others in the same distance of Consanguinitie or Affinitie are expresly forbidden As for example the Law forbids expresly a nephew to marrie with his aunt it saith nothing of an vnckles marrying with his neece yet these being as neere in degree as the other we may of them reasonably conclude that they also are forbidden in the meaning of the Law the exception of the Romanists is friuolous To our purpose by the letter of my Text a man may not marrie with his mother-in-law which may be either his wiues mother or his fathers wife if not with his mother-in-law which is his fathers wife then in the
of his owne strength Happy shall we be if other mens Harmes make vs beware And indeed To beware is the true vse that wee must make of their Harmes They grossly abuse such Histories which by them countenance and excuse their sinne Dauid fecit cur non ego the Drunkard the Adulterer the Murtherer Atheistically pretendes though he hath not a good Rule yet he hath a good Example for his doing some Patriarch did that which he doth Non est hoc tollere sed geminare Peccatum this doth not mend but marre the matter such Apologies are worse then the Sinne. Saint Austin and others haue at large replyed vnto them I will onely giue two Animaduersions and so dismisse them The first is As in good deedes he that followeth another deserues lesse prayse because he doth but exemplifie an other mans fact so of ill doers the latter deserues more blame then the former because hee is so desperate as to venture where he seeth a likelier man then himselfe hath taken a fall This first Animaduersion we learne from Reason And from Religion wee must learne a second Animaduersion It is grosse Blasphemie so to peruert the meaning of the Scripture and make the Holy Ghost an Aduocate for sinne what neede such fuell for lust which hath the whole world continually to feede it and Selfe-loue will not want an Apologie though the Holy Ghost doe not penne one Certainely this fall was neuer penned for so wicked a purpose That will appeare in the next Branch of the Text or in the second state wherein King Dauid doth set forth himselfe There you shall finde that the former state was not set forth Propter se but Propter aliud he tooke no pleasure to blaze his state as a sinner but that we may thereby perceiue his other state as he was a Penitent Let vs looke now into that and we shall finde that these few words doe summe vp a good part of a whole Chapter the 12. of the 2. of Sam. wherin we are to obserue the Meanes that brought him to Repentance and the Successe of those Meanes The Meanes are Nathan the Prophet one Man but sustayning two Persons the person of a Subiect vnto King Dauid as hee was Nathan the person of an Embassador from God as he was a Prophet And indeed Though a Soueraigne haue a Command ouer all his Subiects yet is Hee himselfe a Subiect vnto God and therefore hath God his Lidgers resident about him to let him from time to time know his Sacred pleasure whose office it is to hold their Master in or call him backe when he forgets or neglects the King of Kinges that is in Heauen But this present * The Ordination of Ministers Occasion calls vpon me to enlarge this poynt and I may doe it fitly to the Occasion and not stray a whit from my Text not from the Storie of Nathan the Prophet intimated in this place You then that are to take Sacred Orders must obserue that in the Function of a Prophet there was some thing Common and something Proper it was Proper to them to foretell things to come the diuine determination of Euents which in humane iudgement were contingent But Morrall instructions and Corrections were Common to them with the Preists And indeede God did but supply the negligence of the Preist by this Ministrie of the Prophets The Ministrie of Nathan here touched though it hath something of that which is Proper vnto a Prophet yet the most part of it is Common and so concernes you You then must learne of the Prophet Nathan what Furniture a Minister must haue and How he must vse his furniture His furniture must be Lex et Euangelium both these appeare in Nathans Message the Law by that hee layd open King Dauids Sinne the Gospell by that hee absolued him from the Guilt thereof There is no Censure of Sinne but from the Law and onely from the Gospell is the Propitiation thereof therefore must you be well studied in both of them and hold your selues to be but imperfect Ministers if you be ignorant of either As you must learne of Nathan the Prophet to haue this Furniture so from him also must you learne How to vse it as you haue a Tallent so must you employ it The steward of the Lord must bring forth to his Familie things both old and new We are called Builders and the Scripture is called a Canon or a Rule all the spirituall Stones which bee laid in the Temple of God must be squared by this spirituall Rule neither without this Rule must we worke any Neither is it enough to know that wee must vse our Furniture wee must know also When it must bee vsed and How and you shall learne both of the Prophet Nathan When Praeuenienter and Subuenienter if we can we must preuent the Sinnes of our flocke Magister Historiae Ecclesiasticae obserues out of Epiphanius that Nathan would so haue preuented Dauids Fall for hearing that the Kings affection was bending towards Bathsheba he made hast towards him but was hindred by Belial Whatsoeuer is to be thought of that Narration of this we may bee sure that the Prophet would not haue been wanting to the King with a Ghostly preseruatiue if he had seene his pronenes to that Fall and a Minister if he see the signes of an imminent spirituall danger must arme his people against Temptation and asmuch as in him lieth preuent their Falls But if he cannot be so timely he must not leaue them when they are downe Qui non potuit praeuenire debet subuenire wee must lend him a Hand to rise whom we could not keepe from Falling so did Nathan the Prophet raise King Dauid But as you must learne of him When so must you also learne of him How he did it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vnpartially but Discreetly Vnpartially he was the Embassadour of God and therefore hee spake with the libertie of an Embassadour And we must not derogate frō the Authoritie of our Master to whose Tribunall all persons are Subiect euen the greatest Monarches of the World as a great Monarch Nebuchadnezzar confest in a Proclamation registred Dan. 4. But there is an Vnpartialnesse Diuine which is enioyned of God and there is an Humane one which is but a fiction of Mans braine The Humane dreames of faults which are not and taketh vp rumors vpon trust and rashly vents them to the disgrace of the innocent headie and fierie Spirits offend too often this way and in stead of Preachers turne Libellers vnder pretence of freedome of Spirit and vnpartiall Reprehension But we must not reproue That which is not a fault nor Those which are not faultie Secondly Humane Vnpartialnesse doth season Reproofe with vnmannerly language whereas Saint Paul hath taught Ministers in reprouing to giue euery man his due respect Rebuke the elder men as Fathers the younger as Brethren 1 Tim. 5. the elder woemen as Mothers
the younger as Sisters the higher Persons are in degree with the more respect must wee temper our Reproofe This is the generall Rule that we must follow particular instances of some Prophets who brought speciall Messages from God must not be drawne by vs into Example God will not haue Theologie to confound Policie Add hereunto that Nathan told his Message to Dauid in priuate because Dauid committed the Sinne priuately personall and priuate Sinnes must not haue a publike Reproofe except they haue vndergone first a iudiciall Censure where publike Authoritie hath not gone before the Reproofe of Personall faults must be priuate These Rockes being heeded our Vnpartialnes will be Diuine we may freely deliuer what difference there is betweene mens liues and Gods Lawes and set the Peoples danger before their eies yea touching Sin we may tell them that Omne animi vitium tanto conspectius in se Crimen habet quanto maior qui peccat habetur answerable to the Dignitie which God vouchsafeth vs are the Sinnes improued by which we offend him Secondly 〈…〉 Touching danger wee may let them know that Potentes potenter punientur Mercie will soone pardon the meanest but mighty men shall be mightily tormented This wee may tell them and tell them that they must expect this from God From God I say and not from Vs for we haue only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we are only Referendaries of Gods Will wee acknowledge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be the peculiar of God if any corporall chastisement bee to bee laid vpon a Soueraigne a Subiect must not draw the sword God onely hath power to vse it and they into whose hands he is pleased to put it which certainely is not the Pope nor his Assigne whether hee claime it Directly or Indirectly hee doth it Contra Ius sine Exemplo he hath no good either Rule or Example for it either in Gods word or in the writings of the Primitiue Church neither is it the People who must take Law from not giue Law to their Soueraigne both in Precept and in Sanction As Nathan did vse his Ministrie Vnpartially so did hee vse it Discreetly also 〈◊〉 de 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hee handled the King so artificially that he made him giue sentence against himselfe before he was aware That seemes a Beame in our Brothers eye Mat 7. which in our owne seemes scarse a Moate as Christ teacheth in the Gospell therefore our iudgement is best tried in another Mans Case for therein wee will see with the most if it be a fault and if it be a good deede we will see with the least Therefore hee that will handle a Mans Conscience with spirituall Wisedome must first worke vpon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 see what good Rules he hath to guide Conscience withall and exercise them with some abstracted Case and if he find that it passeth an vpright iudgement then come on to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 His Conscience and if euer you shall then make him sensible of his owne Case Certainely he must either condemne himselfe which is a signe of Grace or else contradict himselfe which will argue him to be voide of Reason Neither is this the onely poynt of spirituall wisedome which a Pastour must haue he must also vse a good method in dispensing the parts of his Ministrie Nathan will teach him asmuch who comming to Dauid furnished with the Law and the Gospell first humbled him with the Law then raised him with the Gospell first told him Thou art the Man and then when Dauid acknowledged it Nathan added The Lord hath remoued thy sinne thou shalt not die And you may not peruert this Order you may not applie a Salue before you haue vented the Corruption of a wound you may not power Oyle into it before you haue scoured it with Wine finally You may not absolue a sinner before you haue made him penitent Hauing sufficiently vnfolded the Meanes I must now let you see that these Meanes are Needfull and Powerfull Needfull that is intimated in this word Venit Nathan came to Dauid Of himselfe Dauid sinned but when hee was left vnto himselfe there appeared in him no disposition to repent To manifest this God did let him alone by the space of a whole yeare and during that time hee seemeth to haue beene senselesse of his state Mortifera securitas Austin Sermon de Temp. 51. he seemed to bee as it were dead in that sinne It was a strange thing that such a Man should take such a Fall but more stange that in so many Moneths hee should not recouer out of it What was the Cause was it because hee did not know the difference betweene good and euill it were absurd so to thinke but it was because hee did not make vse of his knowledge in weighing his owne Actions whether they were good or euill wherefore had not Nathan come to Dauid it is to be doubted Dauid would neuer haue returned vnto God It is to be doubted the rather because if you looke to the first sinne of Man you shall finde that after he had eaten of the forbidden Fruit he hid himselfe from God no mention of his returne vntill God sought and found him out And who may hope to bee better then our Father Adam surely the continuall storie of the Church shewes that we are herein all too like vnto him looke vpon all the restitutions that are recorded and you shall finde in them all the preuenting Grace of God and that saying of God is of a perpetuall truth I am found of them that sought me not and made manifest to them that inquired not after me But what shall I neede Examples of that Truth which euery man that hath grace may reade in himselfe The Conclusion is Repentance springs not Naturally from vs it is an effect of Gods word reclayming vs of our selues we are as vnapt to Rise as we are apt to Fall Wherefore we cannot too much magnifie the goodnesse of God that vouchsafeth vnto vs the Ministrie of his Word it is a great Grace that God is not wanting vnto vs when we are wanting vnto our selues wanting not only to instruct our selues but also to make vse of our knowledge for the Scripture is vsefull not only to informe but also to remember vs. Needfull then the Ministrie is It is not onely so but Powerfull also The word of God is sharper then any two-edged sword Heb. 4. it is liuely it is mighty in operation it enters through euen to the diuiding asunder of the soule spirit ioynts and marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the Heart The weapons of the Ministers warfare are mighty through God to cast downe Holds 2 Cor. 10. to cast downe Imaginations and euery high thing which is exalted against the knowledge of God and to bring into captiuitie euery thought to the obedience of Christ. And it had neede be so it hath to doe with so