Hell that follows it It was to be celebrated with a Male-lamb without blemish taken out of the Flock to note the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the World who was taken from among men a Lamb without blemish and without spot holy harmless and separate from sinners The Door-posts of the House were to be sprinkled with the blood of the Lamb to signifie our security from the Divine vengeance by the blood of sprinkling The Lamb was to be roasted and eaten whole typifying the great sufferings of our blessed Saviour who was to pass through the fire of Divine wrath and to be wholly embrac'd and entertain'd by us in all his Offices as King Priest and Prophet None but those that were clean and circumcised might eat of it to shew that only true believers holy and good men can be partakers of Christ and the merits of his Death It was to be eaten standing with their Loins girt and their staff in their hand to put them in mind what haste they made out of the house of bondage and to intimate to us what present diligence we should use to get from under the empire and tiranny of sin and Satan under the conduct and assistance of the Captain of our Salvation The eating of it was to be mixed with bitter herbs partly as a memorial of that bitter servitude which they underwent in the Land of Egypt partly as a type of that repentance and bearing of the cross duties difficult and unpleasant which all true Christians must undergo Lastly it was to be eaten with unleavened Bread all manner of leaven being at that time to be banished out of their Houses with the most critical diligence and curiosity to represent what infinite care we should take to cleanse and purifie our hearts to purge 〈◊〉 the old leaven that we may be a new lump and that since Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us therefore we should keep the Feast the Festival commemoration of his Death not with old leaven neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth 6. THE Places of their Publick Worship were either the Tabernacle made in the Wilderness or the Temple built by Solomon between which in the main there was no other difference than that the Tabernacle was an ambulatory Temple as the Temple was a standing Tabernacle together with all the rich costly Furniture that was in them The parts of it were three the Holiest of all whither none entred but the High-Priest and that but once a Year this was a type of Heaven the holy place whither the Priests entred every Day to perform their Sacred Ministrations and the outward Court whither the People came to offer up their Prayers and Sacrifices In the Sanctum Sanctorum or Holiest of all there was the Golden Censer typifying the Merits and Intercession of Christ the Ark of the Covenant as a representation of him who is the Mediator of the Covenant between God and man the Golden Pot of Manna a type of our Lord the true Manna the Bread that came down from Heaven the Rod of Aaron that budded signifying the Branch of the Root of Jesse that though our Saviour's Family should be reduced to a state of so much meanness and obscurity as to appear but like the trunk or stump of a Tree yet there should come forth a rod out of this stem of Jesse and a branch grow out of his roots which should stand for an Ensign of the People and in him should the Gentiles trust And within the Ark were the two Tables of the Covenant to denote him in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge and who is the end and perfection of the Law Over it were the Cherubims of glory shadowing the Mercy-seat who looking towards each other and both to the Mercy-seat denoted the two Testaments or Dispensations of the Church which admirably agree and both direct to Christ the Mediator of the Covenant The Propitiatory or Mercy-seat was the Golden covering to the Ark where God vailing his Majesty was wont to manifest his Presence to give Answers and shew Himself reconciled to the People herein eminently 〈◊〉 our Blessed Saviour who interposes between us and the Divine Majesty whom God hath set forth to be a Propitiation through faith in his blood for the remission of sins so that now we may come boldly to the Throne of Grace and find mercy to help us Within the Sanctuary or the Holy Place was the Golden 〈◊〉 with Seven Branches representing Christ who is the Light of the World and who enlightens every one that comes into the World and before whose Throne there are said to be seven Lamps of Fire which are the seven spirits of God The Table compassed about with a Border and a Crown of Gold denoting the Ministry and the Shew-bread set upon it shadowing out Christ the Bread of Life who by the Ministry of the Gospel is offered to the World here also was the Golden Altar of Incense whereon they burnt the sweet 〈◊〉 Morning and Evening to signifie to us that our Lord is the true Altar by whom all our Prayers and Services are rendred the odour of a sweet smell acceptable unto God to this the Psalmist refers Let my Prayer be set forth before thee as incense and the 〈◊〉 up of my hands as the Evening Sacrifice The third part of the Tabernacle as also of the Temple was the Court of Israel wherein stood the Brazen Altar upon which the Holy Fire was continually preserved by which the Sacrifices were consumed one of the Five great Prerogatives that were wanting in the second Temple Here was the Brazen Laver with its Basis made of the brazen Looking-glasses of the Women that assembled at the Door of the Tabernacle wherein the Priests washed their Hands and their Feet when going into the Sanctuary and both they and the People when about to offer Sacrifice to teach us to purifie our hearts and to cleanse our selves 〈◊〉 all filthiness of flesh and spirit especially when we approach to offer up our services to Heaven hereunto David alludes I will wash mine hands in innocency so will I compass thine Altar O Lord. Solomon in building the Temple made an addition of a fourth Court the Court of the Gentiles whereinto the unclean Jewes and Gentiles might enter and in this was the Corban or Treasury and it is sometimes in the New Testament called the Temple To these Laws concerning 〈◊〉 Place of Worship we may reduce those that relate to the holy Vessels and Utensils of the Tabernacle and the Temple Candlesticks Snuffers Dishes c. which also had their proper mysteries and significations 7. THE stated times and seasons of their worship are next to be considered and they were either Daily Weekly Monthly or Yearly Their Daily worship was at the time of the Morning and the Evening Sacrifice their Weekly solemnity
and the sons of Israel never murmured when God bad them borrow jewels and ear-rings and spoil the Egyptians But because God restrained these desires our duties are the harder because they are fetters to our Liberty and contradictions to those natural inclinations which also are made more active by evil custom and unhandsome educations From which Premisses we shall observe in order to practice That sin creeps upon us in our education so tacitely and undiscernibly that we mistake the cause of it and yet so prevalently and effectually that we judge it to be our very nature and charge it upon Adam to lessen the imputation upon us or to increase the licence or the confidence when every one of us is the Adam the man of sin and the parent of our own impurities For it is notorious that our own iniquities do so discompose our naturals and evil customs and examples do so incourage impiety and the Law of God enjoyns such Vertues which do violence to Nature that our proclivity to sin is occasioned by the accident and is caused by our selves what-ever mischief Adam did to us we do more to our selves We are taught to be revengeful in our Cradles and are taught to strike our Neighbour as a means to still our frowardness and to satisfie our wranglings Our Nurses teach us to know the greatness of our Birth or the riches of our Inheritance or they learn us to be proud or to be impatient before they learn us to know God or to say our Prayers And then because the use of Reason comes at no definite time but insensibly and divisibly we are permitted such acts with impunity too long deferring to repute them to be sins till the habit is grown strong natural and masculine and because from the infancy it began in inolinations and tender overtures and slighter actions Adam is laid in the fault and Original sin did all and this clearly we therefore confess that our faults may seem the less and the misery be pretended natural that it may be thought to be irremediable and therefore we not engaged to endeavour a cure so that the confession of our original sin is no imitation of Christ's Humility in suffering Circumcision but too often an act of Pride Carelesness Ignorance and Security 8. At the Circumcision his Parents imposed the Holy Name told to the Virgin by the Angel his Name was called JESUS a Name above every name For in old times God was known by names of Power of Nature of Majesty But his name of Mercy was reserved till now when God did purpose to pour out the whole treasure of his Mercy by the mediation and ministry of his Holy Son And because God gave to the Holy Babe the name in which the treasures of Mercy were deposited and exalted this name above all names we are taught that the purpose of his Counsel was to exalt and magnifie his Mercy above all his other works he being delighted with this excellent demonstration of it in the Mission and Manifestation and Crucifixion of his Son he hath changed the ineffable Name into a name utterable by man and desirable by all the world the Majesty is all arrayed in robes of Mercy the Tetragrammation or adorable Mystery of the Patriarchs is made fit for pronunciation and expression when it becometh the name of the Lord 's CHRIST And if JEHOVAH be full of majesty and terrour the name JESUS is full of sweetness and mercy It is GOD clothed with circumstances of facility and opportunities of approximation The great and highest name of GOD could not be pronounced truly till it came to be sinished with a Guttural that made up the name given by this Angel to the Holy Child nor God received or entertained by men till he was made humane and sensible by the adoption of a sensitive nature like Vowels pronunciable by the intertexture of a Consonant Thus was his Person made tangible and his Name utterable and his Mercy brought home to our necessities and the Mystery made explicate at the Circumcision of this Holy Babe 9. But now God's mercy was at full Sea now was the time when God made no reserves to the effusion of his mercy For to the Patriarchs and persons of eminent Sanctity and imployment in the elder Ages of the World God according to the degrees of his manifestation or present purpose would give them one letter of this ineffable Name For the reward that Abraham had in the change of his name was that he had the honour done him to have one of the letters of Jehovah put into it and so had Joshua when he was a type of Christ and the Prince of the Israelitish Armies and when God took away one of these letters it was a curse But now he communicated all the whole Name to this Holy Child and put a letter more to it to signifie that he was the glory of God the express image of his Father's person God Eternal and then manifested to the World in his Humanity that all the intelligent world who expected Beatitude and had treasured all their hopes in the ineffable Name of GOD might find them all with ample returns in this Name of JESUS which God hath exalted above every name even above that by which God in the Old Testament did represent the greatest awfulness of his Majesty This miraculous Name is above all the powers of Magical Inchantments the nightly rites of Sorcerers the Secrets of Memphis the Drugs of Thessaly the silent and mysterious Murmurs of the wise Chaldees and the Spells of Zoroastres This is the Name at which the Devils did tremble and pay their inforced and involuntary adorations by confessing the Divinity and quitting their possessions and usurped habitations If our prayers be made in this Name God opens the windows of Heaven and rains down benediction at the mention of this Name the blessed Apostles and Hermione the daughter of St. Philip and Philotheus the son of Theophila and St. Hilarion and St. Paul the Eremite and innumerable other Lights who followed hard after the Sun of Righteousness wrought great and prodigious Miracles Signs and wonders and healings were done by the Name of the Holy Child JESUS This is the Name which we should ingrave in our hearts and write upon our fore-heads and pronounce with our most harmonious accents and rest our faith upon and place our hopes in and love with the overflowings of charity and joy and adoration And as the revelation of this Name satisfied the hopes of all the World so it must determine our worshippings and the addresses of our exteriour and interiour Religion it being that Name whereby God and God's mercies are made presential to us and proportionate objects of our Religion and affections The PRAYER MOst Holy and ever-Blessed Jesu who art infinite in Essence glorious in Mercy mysterious in thy Communications affable and presential in the descents of thy Humanity I
the same Saint When we are judged we are chastened of the Lord but if we would judge our selves we should not be judged where he expounds judged by chastened if we were severer to our selves God would be gentle and 〈◊〉 And there are only these two cautions to be annexed and then the direction is sufficient 1. That when promise of Pardon is annexed to any of these or another Grace or any good action it is not to be understood as if alone it were effectual either to the abolition or pardon of sins but the promise is made to it as to a member of the whole body of Piety In the coadunation and conjunction of parts the title is firm but not at all in distinction and separation For it is certain if we fail in one we are guilty of all and therefore cannot be repaired by any one Grace or one action or one habit And therefore Charity hides a multitude of sins with men and God too Alms deliver from death 〈◊〉 pierceth the clouds and will not depart before its answer be gracious and Hope purifieth and makes not ashamed and Patience and Faith and Piety to parents and Prayer and the eight Beatitudes have promises of this life and of that which is to come respectively and yet nothing will obtain these promises but the harmony and uniting of these Graces in a holy and habitual confederation And when we consider the Promise as singularly relating to that one Grace it is to be understood comparatively that is such persons are happy if compared with those who have contrary dispositions For such a capacity does its portion of the work towards complete Felicity from which the contrary quality does estrange and disintitle us 2. The special and minute actions and instances of these three preparatives of Repentance are not under any command in the particulars but are to be disposed of by Christian prudence in order to those ends to which they are most aptly instrumental and designed such as are Fasting and corporal severities in Satisfaction or the punitive parts of Repentance they are either vindictive of what is past and so are proper acts or effects of Contrition and godly sorrow or else they relate to the present and future estate and are intended for correction or emendation and so are of good use as they are medicinal and in that proportion not to be omitted And so is Confession to a Spiritual person an excellent instrument of Discipline a bridle of intemperate Passions an opportunity of Restitution Ye which are spiritual 〈◊〉 such a person overtaken in a fault saith the Apostle it is the application of a remedy the consulting with a guide and the best security to a weak or lapsed or an ignorant person in all which cases he is 〈◊〉 to judge his own questions and in these he is also committed to the care and conduct of another But these special instances of Repentance are capable of suppletories and are like the corporal works of Mercy necessary only in time and place and in accidental obligations He that relieves the poor or visits the sick chusing it for the instance of his Charity though he do not redeem captives is charitable and hath done his Alms. And he that cures his sin by any instruments by external or interiour and spiritual remedies is penitent though his diet be not 〈◊〉 and afflictive or his lodging hard or his sorrow bursting out into tears or his expressions passionate and dolorous I only add this that acts of publick Repentance must be by using the instruments of the Church such as she hath appointed of private such as by experience or by reason or by the counsel we can get we shall learn to be most effective of our penitential purposes And yet it is a great argument that the exteriour expressions of corporal severities are of good benefit because in all Ages wise men and severe Penitents have chosen them for their instruments The PRAYER O Eternal God who wert pleased in mercy to look upon us when we were in our 〈◊〉 to reconcile us when we were enemies to forgive us in the midst of our provocations of thy infinite and eternal Majesty finding out a remedy for us which man-kind could never ask even making an atonement for us by the death of thy Son sanctifying us by the bloud of the everlasting Covenant and thy all-hallowing and Divinest Spirit let thy 〈◊〉 so perpetually assist and encourage my endeavours conduct my will and fortifie my intentions that 〈◊〉 may persevere in that holy condition which thou hast put me in by the grace of the Covenant and the mercies of the Holy Jesus O let me never fall into those sins and retire to that vain conversation from which the eternal and merciful Saviour of the World hath redeemed me but let me grow in Grace adding Vertue to vertue reducing my purposes to act and increasing my acts till they grow into habits and my habits till they be confirmed and still confirming them till they be consummate in a blessed and holy perseverance Let thy Preventing grace dash all Temptations in their approach let thy Concomitant grace enable me to resist them in the assault and overcome them in the fight that my hopes be never discomposed nor my Faith weakned nor my confidence made remiss or my title and portion in the Covenant be lessened Or if thou permittest me at any time to 〈◊〉 which Holy Jesu avert for thy mercy and compession sake yet let me not sleep in sin but recall me instantly by the clamours of a nice and tender Conscience and the quickning Sermons of the Spirit that I may never pass from sin to sin from one degree to another lest sin should get the dominion over me lest thou be angry with me and reject me from the Covenant and I perish Purifie me from all 〈◊〉 sanctifie my spirit that I may be holy as thou art and let me never provoke thy jealousie nor presume upon thy goodness nor distrust thy mercies nor 〈◊〉 my Repentance nor rely upon vain confidences but that I may by a constant sedulous and timely endeavour make my calling and election sure living to thee and dying to thee that having sowed to the Spirit I may from thy mercies reap in the Spirit bliss and eternal sanctity and everlasting life through Jesus Christ our Saviour our hope and our mighty and ever-glorious Redeemer Amen Vpon Christ ' s Sermon on the Mount and of the Eight Beatitudes Moses delivers the Law Joh. 1. 17. The Law was given by Moses but Grace and Truth came by Iesus Christ. These words the Lord spake unto all the Assembly in the mount out of the midst of the fire with a great voice he wrote them in two Tables of stone delivered them unto me Deut. 5. 22. Christ preaches in the Mount He went up into a mountain opened his mouth taught them saying Blessed are the poor in
of Christ's servants the Apostles and the Primitive Christians had no other verification of this Promise but this that rejoycing in tribulation and knowing how to want as well as how to abound through many tribulations they entered into the Kingdom of Heaven For that is the Countrey in which they are co-heirs with Jesus But if we will certainly understand what this reward is we may best know it by understanding the duty and this we may best learn from him that gave it in commandment Learn of me for I am meek said the Holy Jesus and to him was promised that the uttermost ends of the earth should be his inheritance and yet he died first and went to Heaven before it was verified to him in any sense but only of content and desire and joy in suffering and in all variety of accident And thus also if we be meek we may receive the inheritance of the Earth 10. The acts of this Grace are 1. To submit to all the instances of Divine Providence not repining at any accident which God hath chosen for us and given us as part of our lot or a punishment of our deserving or an instrument of vertue not envying the gifts graces or prosperities of our neighbours 2. To pursue the interest and imployment of our calling in which we are placed not despising the meanness of any work though never so disproportionable to our abilities 3. To correct all malice wrath evil-speaking and inordinations of anger whether in respect of the object or the degree 4. At no hand to entertain any thoughts of revenge or retaliation of evil 5. To be affable and courteous in our deportment towards all persons of our society and entercourse 6. Not to censure or reproach the weakness of our neighbour but support his burthen cover and cure his infirmities 7. To excuse what may be excused lessening severity and being gentle in reprehension 8. To be patient in afflictions and thankful under the Cross. 9. To endure reproof with shame at our selves for deserving it and thankfulness to the charitable Physician that offers the remedy 10. To be modest and fairly-mannered toward our Superiours obeying reverencing speaking honourably of and doing honour to aged persons and all whom God hath set over us according to their several capacities 11. To be ashamed and very apprehensive of the unworthiness of a crime at no hand losing our fear of the invisible God and our reverence to visible societies or single persons 12. To be humble in our exteriour addresses and behaviour in Churches and all Holy places 13. To be temperate in government not imperious unreasonable insolent or oppressive lest we provoke to wrath those whose interest of person of Religion we are to defend or promote 14. To do our endeavour to expiate any injury we did by confessing the fact offering satisfaction asking forgiveness 11. Fourthly Blessed are they that Hunger and thirst after Righteousness for they shall be filled This Grace is the greatest indication of spiritual health when our appetite is right strong and regular when we are desirous of spiritual nourishment when we long for Manna and follow Christ for loaves not of a low and terrestrial gust but of that bread which came down from heaven Now there are two sorts of holy repast which are the proper objects of our desires The bread of Heaven which is proportioned to our hunger that is all those immediate emanations from Christ's pardon of our sins and redemption from our former conversation holy Laws and Commandments To this Food there is also a spiritual Beverage to quench our thirst and this is the effects of the Holy Spirit who first moved upon the waters of Baptism and afterwards became to us the breath of life giving us holy inspirations and assistences refreshing our wearinesses cooling our fevers and allaying all our intemperate passions making us holy humble resigned and pure according to the pattern in the mount even as our Father is pure So that the first Redemption and Pardon of us by Christ's Merits is the Bread of Life for which we must hunger and the refreshments and daily emanations of the Spirit who is the spring of comforts and purity is that drink which we must thirst after A being first reconciled to God by Jesus and a being sanctisied and preserved in purity by the Holy Spirit is the adequate object of our desires Some to hunger and thirst best fancy the analogy and proportion of the two Sacraments the Waters of Baptism and the Food of the Eucharist some the Bread of the Patin and the Wine of the Chalice But it is certain they signifie one desire expressed by the most impatient and necessary of our appetites hungring and thirsting And the object is whatsoever is the principle or the effect the beginning or the way or the end of righteousness that is the Mercies of God the Pardon of Jesus the Graces of the Spirit a holy life and a holy death and a blessed Eternity 12. The blessing and reward of this Grace is fulness or satisfaction which relates immediately to Heaven because nothing here below can satisfie us The Grace of God is our Viaticum and entertains us by the way its nature is to increase not to satisfie the appetites not because the Grace is empty and unprofitable as are the things of the world but because it is excellent but yet in order to a greater perfection it invites the appetite by its present goodness but it leaves it unsatisfied because it is not yet arrived at glory and yet the present imperfection in respect of all the good of this World's possession is rest and satisfaction and is imperfect only in respect of its own future complement and perfection and our hunger continues and our needs return because all we have is but an antepast But the glories of Eternity are also the proper object of our desires that 's the reward of God's Grace this is the crown of righteousness As for me I will behold thy face in righteousness and when I awake up after thy likeness I shall be satisfied with it The acts of this Vertue are multiplied according to its object for they are only 1. to desire and 2. pray for and 3. labour for all that which is Righteousness in any sense 1. For the Pardon of our sins 2. for the Graces and Sanctification of the Spirit 3. for the advancement of Christ's Kingdome 4. for the reception of the holy Sacrament and all the instruments ordinances and ministeries of Grace 5. for the grace of Perseverance 6. and finally for the crown of Righteousness 13. Fisthly Blessed are the Merciful for they shall obtain mercy Mercy is the greatest mark and token of the 〈◊〉 elect and predestinate persons in the world Put ye on my beloved as the elect of God the bowels of mercy holy and precious For Mercy is an attribute in the manifestation of which
multitude of Law-suits the personal hatreds and the 〈◊〉 want of Charity which hath made the world miserable and wicked may in a great degree be attributed to the neglect of this great symbol and instrument of Charity The Chalice of the Sacrament is called by S. Paul The cup of blessing and if children need every day to beg blessing of their Parents if we also thirst not after this Cup of blessing blessing may be far from us It is called The communication of the bloud of Christ and it is not imaginable that man should love Heaven or felicity or his Lord that desires not perpetually to bathe in that salutary stream the Bloud of the Holy Jesus the immaculate Lamb of God 21. But I find that the religious fears of men are pretended a colour to excuse this Irreligion Men are wicked and not prepared and busie and full of cares and affairs of the world and cannot come with due Preparation and therefore better not come at all Nay men are not ashamed to say they are at 〈◊〉 with certain persons and therefore cannot come Concerning those persons who are unprepared because they are in a state of sin or uncharitableness it is true they must not come but this is so far from excusing their not coming that they increase their sin and secure misery to themselves because they do not lay aside every weight and the sin that doth so easily beset them that they may come to the Marriage-supper It is as if we should excuse our selves from the duties of Charity by saying we are uncharitable from giving Alms by saying we are covetous from Chastity by saying we are lascivious To such men it is just that they graze with the Goats because they refuse to wash their hands that they may come to the Supper of the Lamb. 2. Concerning those that pretend cares and incumbrances of the world If their affairs make sin and impure affections to stick upon them they are in the first consideration but if their office be necessary just or charitable they imitate Martha and chuse the less perfect part when they neglect the offices of Religion for duties oeconomical 3. But the other sort have more pretence and fairer vertue in their outside They suppose like the Persian Princes the seldomer such mysterious rites are seen the more reverence we shall have and they the more majesty and they are fearful lest the frequent attrectation of them should make us less to value the great earnests of our Redemption and Immortality It is a pious consideration but not becoming them For it cannot be that the Sacrament be under-valued by frequent reception without the great unworthiness of the persons so turning God's grace into lightness and loathing Manna nay it cannot be without an unworthy communication for he that receives worthily increases in the love of God and Religion and the fires of the Altar are apt to kindle our sparks into a slame and when Christ our Lord enters into us and we grow weary of him or less fond of his frequent entrance and perpetual cohabitation it is an infallible sign we have let his enemy in or are preparing for it For this is the difference between secular and spiritual objects Nothing in this world hath any pleasure in it long beyond the hope of it for the possession and enjoyment is found so empty that we grow weary of it but whatsoever is spiritual and in order to God is less before we have it but in the fruition it swells our desires and enlarges the appetite and makes us more receptive and forward in the entertainment and therefore those acts of Religion that set us forward in time and backward in affection do declare that we have not well done our duty but have communicated unworthily So that the mending of our fault will answer the objection Communicate with more devotion and repent with greater contrition and walk with more caution and pray more earnestly and meditate diligently and receive with reverence and godly fear and we shall find our affections increase together with the spiritual emolument ever remembring that pious and wise advice of S. Ambrose Receive every day that which may profit thee every day But he that is not disposed to receive it every day is not fit to receive it every year 22. And if after all diligence it be still feared that a man is not well prepared I must say that it is a scruple that is a trouble beyond a doubt and without reason next to Superstition and the dreams of Religion and it is nourished by imagining that no duty is accepted if it be less than perfection and that God is busied in Heaven not only to destroy the wicked and to dash in pieces vessels of dishonour but to break a bruised reed in pieces and to cast the smoaking flax into the flames of hell In opposition to which we must know that nothing makes us unprepared but an evil Conscience a state of sin or a deadly act but the lesser infirmities of our life against which we daily strive and for which we never have any kindness or affections are not spots in these Feasts of Charity but instruments of Humility and stronger invitations to come to those Rites which are ordained for 〈◊〉 against infirmities of the Soul and for the growth of the spirit in the strengths of God For those other acts of Preparation which precede and accompany the duty the better and more religiously they are done they are indeed of more advantage and honourary to the Sacrament yet he that comes in the state of Grace though he takes the opportunity upon a sudden offer sins not and in such indefinite duties whose degrees are not described it is good counsel to do our best but it is ill to make them instruments of scruple as if it were essentially necessary to do that in the greatest height which is only intended for advantage and the fairer accommodation of the mystery But these very acts if they be esteemed necessary preparations to the Sacrament are the greatest arguments in the world that it is best to communicate often because the doing of that which must suppose the exercise of so many Graces must needs promote the interest of Religion and dispose strongly to habitual Graces by our frequent and solemn repetition of the acts It is necessary that every Communicant be first examined concerning the state of his Soul by himself or his Superiour and that very Scrutiny is in admirable order towards the reformation of such irregularities which time and temptation negligence and incuriousness infirmity or malice have brought into the secret regions of our Will and Understanding Now although this Examination be therefore enjoyned that no man should approach to the holy Table in the state of ruine and reprobation and that therefore it is an act not of direct Preparation but an enquiry whether we be prepared or no yet this very Examination will find so many
think the infelicities of our nature and the calamities of our temporal condition to become criminal so long as they make us not omit a duty or dispose us to the election of a crime or force us to swallow a temptation nor yet to exceed the value of their impulsive cause He that grieves for the loss of friends and yet had rather lose all the friends he hath than lose the love of God hath the sorrow of our Lord for his precedent And he that fears death and trembles at its approximation and yet had rather die again than sin once hath not sinned in his fear Christ hath hallowed it and the necessitous condition of his nature is his excuse But it were highly to be wished that in the midst of our caresses and levities of society in our festivities and triumphal merriments when we laugh at folly and rejoyce in sin we would remember that for those very merriments our Blessed Lord felt a bitter sorrow and not one vain and sinful laughter but cost the Holy Jesus a sharp pang and throe of Passion 4. Now that the Holy Jesus began to taste the bitter Cup he betook him to his great Antidote which himself the great Physician of our Souls prescribed to all the world to cure their calamities and to make them pass from miseries into vertue that so they may arrive at glory he prays to his heavenly Father he kneels down and not only so but falls flat upon the earth and would in humility and fervent adoration have descended low as the centre he prays with an intension great as his sorrow and yet with a dereliction so great and a conformity to the Divine will so ready as if it had been the most indifferent thing in the world for him to be delivered to death or from it for though his nature did decline death as that which hath a natural horrour and contradiction to the present interest of its preservation yet when he looked upon it as his heavenly Father had put it into the order of Redemption of the World it was that Baptism which he was straitned till he had accomplished And now there is not in the world any condition of prayer which is essential to the duty or any circumstances of advantage to its performance but were concentred in this one instance Humility of spirit lowliness of deportment importunity of desire a fervent spirit a lawful matter resignation to the will of God great love the love of a Son to his Father which appellative was the form of his address perseverance he went thrice and prayed the same prayer It was not long and it was so retired as to have the advantages of a sufficient solitude and opportune recollection for he was withdrawn from the most of his Disciples and yet not so alone as to lose the benefit of communion for Peter and the two Boanerges were near him Christ in this prayer which was the most fervent that he ever made on earth intending to transmit to all the world a precedent of Devotion to be transcribed and imitated that we should cast all our cares and empty them in the bosom of God being content to receive such a portion of our trouble back again which he assigns us for our spiritual emolument 5. The Holy Jesus having in a few words poured out torrents of innocent desires was pleased still to interrupt his Prayer that he might visit his charge that little flock which was presently after to be scattered he was careful of them in the midst of his Agonies they in his sufferings were fast asleep He awakens them gives them command to watch and pray that is to be vigilant in the custody of their senses and obervant of all accidents and to pray that they may be strengthened against all incursions of enemies and temptations and then returns to prayer and so a third time his Devotion still encreasing with his sorrow And when his Prayer was full and his sorrow come to a great measure after the third God sent his Angel to comfort him and by that act of grace then only expressed hath taught us to continue our Devotions so long as our needs last It may be God will not send a Comsorter till the third time that is after a long expectation and a patient 〈◊〉 and a lasting hope in the interim God supports us with a secret hand and in his own time will refresh the spirit with the visitations of his Angels with the emissions of comfort from the Spirit the Comforter And know this also that the holy Angel and the Lord of all the Angels stands by every holy person when he prays and although he draws before his glories the curtain of a cloud yet in every instant he takes care we shall not perish and in a just season dissolves the cloud and makes it to distill in holy dew and drops sweet as Manna pleasant as Nard and wholsome as the breath of Heaven And such was the consolation which the Holy Jesus received by the ministery of the Angel representing to Christ the Lord of the Angels how necessary it was that he should die for the glory of God that in his Passion his Justice Wisdom Goodness Power and Mercy should shine that unless he died all the World should perish but his bloud should obtain their pardon and that it should open the gates of Heaven repair the ruine of Angels establish a holy Church be 〈◊〉 of innumerable adoptive children to his Father whom himself should make heirs of glory and that his Passion should soon pass away his Father hearing and granting his Prayer that the Cup should pass speedily though indeed it should pass through him that it should be attended and followed with a glorious Resurrection with eternal rest and glory of his Humanity with the exaltation of his Name with a supreme dominion over all the world and that his Father should make him King of Kings and Prince of the Catholick Church These or whatsoever other comforts the Angel ministred were such considerations which the Holy Jesus knew and the Angel knew not but by communication from that God to whose assumed Humanity the Angel spake yet he was pleased to receive comfort from his servant just as God receives glory from his creatures and as he rejoyces in his own works even because he is good and gracious and is pleased so to do and because himself had caused a voluntary sadness to be interposed between the habitual knowledge and the actual consideration of these discourses and we feel a pleasure when a friendly hand lays upon our wound the plaister which our selves have made and applies such instruments and considerations of comfort which we have in notion and an ineffective habit but cannot reduce them to act because no man is so apt to be his own comforter which God hath therefore permitted that our needs should be the occasion of a mutual Charity 6. It was a great season for
Antiquitates Christianae OR THE HISTORY OF THE Life and Death OF THE HOLY JESUS AS ALSO THE LIVES ACTS and MARTYRDOMS OF HIS APOSTLES IN TWO PARTS The First Part containing the Life of CHRIST Written by JER TAYLOR late Lord Bishop of Down and Connor The Second containing the Lives of the APOSTLES with an Enumeration and some Brief Remarks upon their first Successors in the Five Great APOSTOLICAL CHURCHES By WILLIAM CAVE D. D. Chaplain in Ordinary to His MAJESTY By whom also is added an APPARATUS or Discourse Introductory to the whole Work concerning the Three Great Dispensations of the Church Patriarchal Mosaical and Evangelical Orig. câ—ntr Cels. lib. 1. dâ— Prâ—â—â—â— p. 1 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 LONDON Printed by R. Norton for R. Royston Bookseller to his most Sacred Majesty at the Angel in Amen-Corner M DC LXXV THE ANNUNTIATION Ave gratiâ plena Dominus tecum Benedicta tu inter mulieres Hail thou full of grace y e Lord is with thee Blessed art thou among women Luke 1. 28. Will Fathorne sculp ANTIQUITATES CHRISTIANAE OR The Life and Death of the Holy JESUS AS ALSO The Lives Acts and Martyrdoms of his Apostles London Printed for R Royston at the Angell in Amen Corner 1675. TO THE Right Honourable and Right Reverend Father in God NATHANAEL Lord BISHOP of DURHAM And Clerk of the Closet to His MAJESTY MY LORD NOTHING but a great experience of Your Lordships Candor could warrant the laying what concernment I have in these Papers at Your Lordships feet Not but that the subject is in it self Great and Venemble and a considerable part of it built upon that Authority that needs no Patronage to defend it But to prefix Your Lordships Name to a subject so thinly and meanly manag'd may perhaps deserve a bigger Apologie than I can make I have only brought some few scattered handfuls of Primitive Story contenting my self to Glean where I could not Reap And I am well assur'd that Your Lordships wisdom and love to Truth would neither allow me to make my Materials nor to trade in Legends and Fabulous reports And yet alas how little solid Foundation is left to Build upon in these matters So fatally mischievous was the carelessness of those who ought to have been the Guardians of Books and Learning in their several Ages in suffering the Records of the Ancient Church to perish Vnfaithful Trustees to look no better after such Divine and inestimable Treasures committed to them Not to mention those infinite Devastations that in all Ages have been made by Wars and Flames which certainly have prov'd the most severe and merciless Plagues and Enemies to Books By such unhappy accidents as these we have been robb'd of the Treasures of the wiser and better Ages of the World and especially the Records of the first times of Christianity whereof scarce any footsteps do remain So that in this Enquiry I have been forc'd to traverse remote and desert paths ways that afford little fruit to the weary Passenger but the consideration that it was Primitive and Apostolical sweetned my journey and rendred it pleasant and delightful Our inbred thirst after knowledge naturally obliges us to pursue the notices of former times which are recommended to us with this peculiar advantage that the Stream must needs be purer and clearer the nearer it comes to the Fountain for the Ancients as Plato speaks were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 better than we and dwelt nearer to the Gods And though'tis true the 〈◊〉 of those times is very obscure and dark and truth oft covered over with heaps of idle and improbable Traditions yet may it be worth our labour to seek for a few Jewels though under a whole 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 heap of Rubbish Is not the Gleaning of the Ancients say the Jews better than the Vintage of later times The very fragments of Antiquity are Venerable and at once instruct our minds and gratifie our curiosity Besides I was somewhat the more inclinable to retire again into these studies that I might get as far as I could from the crowd and the noise of a quarrelsome and contentious Age. MY LORD We live in times wherein Religion is almost wholly disputed into talk and clamour men wrangle eternally about useless and insignificant Notions and which have no tendency to make a man either wiser or better And in these quarrels the Laws of Charity are violated and men persecute one another with hard names and characters of reproach and after all consecrate their fierceness with the honourable title of Zeal for Truth And what is yet a much sorer evil the Peace and Order of an excellent Church incomparably the best that ever was since the first Ages of the Gospel is broken down her holy Offices derided her solemn Assemblies deserted her Laws and Constitutions slighted the Guides and Ministers of Religion despised and reduc'd to their Primitive Character The Scum and Off-scouring of the World How much these evils have contributed to the 〈◊〉 and Impiety of the present Age I shall not take upon me to determine Sure I am the thing it self is too sadly visible men are not content to be modest and retired Atheists and with the Fool to say only in their hearts there is no God but 〈◊〉 appears with an open forehead and disputes its place in every company and without any regard to the Voice of Nature the Dictates of Conscience and the common sence of Mankind men peremptorily determine against a Supreme Being account it a pleasant divertisement to Droll upon Religion and a piece of Wit to plead for Atheism To avoid the 〈◊〉 and troublesome importunity of such uncomfortable Reflections I find no better way than to retire into those Primitive and better times those first and purest Ages of the Gospel when men really were what they pretended to be when a solid Piety and Devotion a strict Temperance and Sobriety a Catholick and unbounded Charity an exemplary Honesty and Integrity a great reverence for every thing that was Divine and Sacred rendred Christianity Venerable to the World and led not only the Rude and the Barbarous but the Learned and Politer part of Mankind in triumph after it But My Lord I must remember that the Minutes of great Men are Sacred and not to be invaded by every tedious impertinent address I have done when I have begg'd leave to acquaint Your Lordship that had it not been more through other mens fault than my own these Papers had many Months since waited upon You in the number of those Publick Congratulations which gave You joy of that great Place which You worthily sustain in the Church Which that You may long and prosperously enjoy happily adorn and successfully discharge to the honour of God the benefit of the Church and the endearing Your Lordships Memory to Posterity is the hearty Prayer of My Lord Your Lordships faithfully devoted Servant WILLIAM CAVE TO THE READER THE design of the
not be eaten not only for the former reason but because God had designed it for particular purposes to be the great Instrument of Expiation and an eminent type of the Blood of the Son of God who was to dye as the great expiatory Sacrifice for the World Nay it was re-established by the Apostles in the infancy of Christianity and observed by the Primitive Christians for several Ages as we have elsewhere observed 5. THE other Precept was concerning Circumcision given to Abraham at the time of God's entring into Covenant with him God said unto Abraham Thou shalt keep my Covenant c. This is my Covenant which ye shall keep between me and you and thy Seed after thee every Man-child among you shall be circumcised and ye shall circumcise the flesh of your fore-skin and it shall be a token of the Covenant betwixt me and you God had now made a Covenant with Abraham to take his Posterity for his peculiar People and that out of them should arise the promised Messiah and as all foederal compacts have some solemn and external rites of ratification so God was pleased to add Circumcision as the sign and seal of this Covenant partly as it had a peculiar fitness in it to denote the promised Seed partly that it might be a discriminating badge of Abraham's Children that part whom God had especially chosen out of the rest of Mankind from all other People On Abraham's part it was a sufficient argument of his hearty compliance with the terms of this Covenant that he would so chearfully submit to so unpleasing and 〈◊〉 a sign as was imposed upon him For Circumcision could not but be both painful and dangerous in one of his Years as it was afterwards to be to all new-born Infants whence 〈◊〉 complained of Moses commanding her to circumcise her Son that he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an husband of bloods a cruel and inhumane Husband And this the Jewes tell us was the reason why circumcision was omitted during their Fourty Years Journy in the Wilderness it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by reason of the trouble and inconvenience of the way God mercifully dispensing with the want of it 〈◊〉 it should hinder their travelling the soarness and weakness of the circumcised Person not comporting with hard and continual Journies It was to be administred the eighth day not sooner the tenderness of the Infant not well till then complying with it besides that the Mother of a Male-child was reckoned legally impure till the seventh Day not later probably because the longer it was deferred the more unwilling would Parents be to put their Children to pain of which they would every Day become more sensible not to say the satisfaction it would be to them to see their Children solemnly entred into Covenant Circumcision was afterwards incorporated into the Body of the Jewish Law and entertained with a mighty Veneration as their great and standing Priviledge relied on as the main Basis and Foundation of their 〈◊〉 and hopes of acceptance with Heaven and accounted in a manner equivalent to all the other Rites of the Mosaic Law 6. BUT besides these two we find other positive Precepts which though not so clearly expressed are yet sufficiently intimated to us Thus there seems to have been a Law that none of the Holy Line none of the Posterity of Seth should marry with Infidels or those corrupt and idolatrous Nations which God had rejected as appears in that it 's charged as a great part of the sin of the old World that the Sons of God matched with the Daughters of Men as also from the great care which Abraham took that his Son Isaac should not take a Wife of the Daughters of the Canaanites among whom he dwelt There was also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jus Levirationis whereby the next Brother to him who died without Issue was obliged to marry the Widow of the deceased and to raise up seed unto his Brother the contempt whereof cost Onan his Life together with many more particular Laws which the story of those Times might suggest to us But what is of most use and importance to us is to observe what Laws God gave for the administration of his Worship which will be best known by considering what worship generally prevailed in those early Times wherein we shall especially remarque the nature of their publick Worship the Places where the Times when and the Persons by whom it was administred 7. IT cannot be doubted but that the Holy Patriarchs of those days were careful to instruct their Children and all that were under their charge their Families being then very vast and numerous in the Duties of Religion to explain and improve the natural Laws written upon their minds and acquaint them with those Divine Traditions and positive Revelations which they themselves had received from God this being part of that great character which God gave of Abraham I know him that he will command his Children and his Houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment To this they joyned Prayer and Invocation than which no duty is more natural and necessary more natural because it fitly expresses that great reverence and veneration which we have for the Divine Majesty and that propensity that is in Mankind to make known their wants none more necessary because our whole dependance being upon the continuance and constant returns of the Divine power and goodness 't is most reasonable that we should make our Daily addresses to him in whom we live move and have our being Nor were they wanting in returns of praise and solemn celebrations of the goodness of Heaven both by entertaining high and venerable thoughts of God and by actions suitable to those honourable sentiments which they had of him In these acts of worship they were careful to use gestures of the greatest reverence and submission which commonly was prostration Abraham bowed himself towards the ground and when God sent the Israelites the happy news of their deliverance out of Egypt they bowed their Heads and worshipped A posture which hath ever been the usual mode of adoration in those Eastern Countries unto this day But the greatest instance of the Publick Worship of those times was Sacrifices a very early piece of Devotion in all probability taking its rise from Adam's fall They were either Eucharistical expressions of thankfulness for blessings received or expiatory offered for the remission of sin Whether these Sacrifices were first taken up at Mens arbitrary pleasure or positively instituted and commanded by God might admit of a very large enquiry But to me the case seems plainly this that as to Eucharistical 〈◊〉 such as first-fruits and the like oblations Mens own reason might suggest and perswade them that it was fit to present them as the most natural significations of a thankful mind And thus far there might be Sacrifices in the
manner that they might be able to apprehend the will of God which they presently did upon their awaking out of sleep These Divine Dreams the Jews distinguish into two sorts Monitory such as were sent only by way of instruction and admonition to give Men notice of what they were to do or warning of what they should avoid such were the Dreams of Pharaoh Abimelech Laban c. or else they were Prophetical when God by such a powerful energy acted upon the mind and imagination of the Prophet as carried the strength and force of a Divine evidence along with it This was sometimes done by a clear and distinct impression of the thing upon the mind without any dark or aenigmatical representation of it such as God made to Samuel when he first revealed himself to him in the Temple sometimes by apparition yet so as the Man though a-sleep was able to discern an Angel conversing with him By Visions God usually communicated himself two ways First when something really appeared to the sight thus Moses beheld the Bush burning and stood there while God conversed with him Manoah and his 〈◊〉 saw the Angel while he took his leave and in a flaming Pyramid went up to Heaven the three Angels appeared to Abraham a little before the fatal ruine of Sodom all which apparitions were unquestionably true and real the Angel assuming an humane shape that he might the freelier converse with and deliver his message to those to whom he was sent Secondly by powerful impressions upon the imagination usually done while the Prophet was awake and had the free and uninterrupted exercise of his reason though the Vision oft over-powered and cast him into a trance that the Soul being more retired from sensible objects might the closer intend those Divine notices that were represented to it Thus all the Prophets had the Ideas of those things that they were to deliver to the People the more strongly impressed upon their fancies and this commonly when they were in the greatest solitude and privacy and their powers most called in that the Prophetical influx might have the greater force upon them In some such way S. Paul was caught up into the third Heaven probably not so much by any real separation of his Soul from his Body or local translation of his Spirit thither as by a profound abstraction of it from his corporeal Senses God during the time of the trance entertaining it with an internal and admirable 〈◊〉 of the glory and happiness of that state as truly and effectually as if his Soul had been really conveyed thither 14. THIRDLY God was wont to communicate his mind by immediate Inspirations whereby he immediately transacted with the understandings of Men without any relation to their sancy or their senses It was the most pacate and serene way of Prophecy God imparting his mind to the Prophet not by Dreams or Visions but while they were awake their powers active and their minds calm and undisturbed This the Jews call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Holy Spirit or that kind of Revelation that was directly conveyed into the mind by the most efficacious irradiation and inspiration of the Holy Spirit God by these Divine illapses enabling the Prophet clearly and immediately to 〈◊〉 the things delivered to him And in this way the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or holy Writings 〈◊〉 dictated and conveyed to the World in which respect the Apostle says that all 〈◊〉 is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 given by divine inspiration The highest pitch of this Prophetical revelation was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the gradus Mosaicus or that way of Prophecy that God used towards Moses of whom it is particularly said that the Lord spake unto Moses face to face as a Man speaketh unto his friend and elsewhere it is evidently distinguished from all inferiour ways of Prophecy If there be a Prophet among you I the Lord will make my self known unto him in a Vision and will speak unto him in a Dream 〈◊〉 Servant Moses is not so with him I will speak mouth to mouth even apparently and not in dark speeches and the similitude of the Lord shall he behold Clearly implying a mighty 〈◊〉 in God's way of revelation to Moses above that of other Prophets which the Jewish Writers make to have lyen in four things First that in all God's communications to Moses 〈◊〉 immediately spake to his understanding without any impressions upon fancy any visible appearances any Dreams or Visions of the Night Secondly that Moses had prophecies conveyed to him without any fears or consternations whereas the other Prophets were astonished and weakned at the sight of God Thirdly that Moses had no previous dispositions or preparations to make him capable of the Divine revelation but could directly go to God and consult him as a man speaketh with his friend other Prophets being forced many times by some preparatory arts to invite the Prophetick spirit to come upon them Fourthly that Moses had a freedom and liberty of spirit to prophecy at all times and could when he pleased have recourse to the Sacred Oracle But as to this the Scripture intimates no such thing the spirit of Prophecy retiring from him at some times as well as from the rest of the Prophets And indeed the Prophetick spirit did not reside in the holy men by way of habit but occasionally as God saw fitting to pour it out upon them it was not in them as light is in the Sun but as light in the Air and consequently depended upon the immediate irradiations of the Spirit of God 15. THESE Divine Communications were so conveyed to the minds of the Prophets and inspired 〈◊〉 that they always knew them to be Divine revelations so mighty and 〈◊〉 was the evidence that came along with them that there could be no doubt but they were the birth of Heaven It 's true when the Prophetick spirit at any time seised upon wicked men they understood not its effect upon them nor were in the least improved and bettered by it the revelation passed through them as a sound through a Trunk or water through a Leaden-pipe without any particular and distinct apprehension of the thing or useful impression made upon their minds as is evident besides others in the case of Caiaphas and Balaam of which last the Jews say expresly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he prophesied according to the will of God but understood not what he prophesied But it was otherwise with the true Prophets they always knew who 't was that acted them what was the meaning of that intelligence that was communicated to them In the Gentile world when the Daemon entred into the inspired person he was usually carried out to the furious transports of rage and madness But in the Prophets of God although the impulse might sometimes be very strong and violent whence the Prophet Jeremy complains Mine heart within me is broken all my bones shake I am like a
were of considerable standing and great account in the time of our Saviour To be sure strangely wide of the mark are those Jewish Chronologists who say that the Sect of the Pharisees arose in the times of Tiberius Caesar and 〈◊〉 the AEgyptian under whom the Septuagint translation was accomplished as if Ptolomy Philadelphus and Tiberius Caesar had been Contemporaries between whom there is the distance of no less than CCLX years But when ever it began a bold and daring Sect it was not fearing to affront Princes and persons of the greatest quality crafty and insinuative and who by a shew of great zeal and infinite strictness in Religion beyond the rate of other men had procured themselves a mighty reverence from the people so strict that as a Learned man observes Pharisee is used in the 〈◊〉 writings to denote a pious and holy man and Benjamin the Jew speaking of R. Ascher says he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a truly devout man separate from the affairs of this world And yet under all this seeming severity they were but Religious villains spiteful and malicious griping and covetous great oppressors merciless dealers heady and seditious proud and scornful indeed guilty of most kinds of immorality of whose temper and manners I say the less in this place having elsewhere given an account of them They held that the Oral Law was of infinitely greater moment and value than the written Word that the Traditions of their fore Fathers were above all things to be embraced and followed the strict observance whereof would entitle a man to Eternal Life that the Souls of men are Immortal and had their dooms awarded in the Subterraneous Regions that there is a Metempsuchosis or Transmigration of pious Souls out of one Body into another that things come to pass by fate and an inevitable necessity and yet that Man's will is free that by this means men might be rewarded and punished according to their works I add no more concerning them than that some great men of the Church of Rome say with some kind of boasting that such as were the Pharisees among the Jews such are the Religious they mean the Monastical Orders of their Church among Christians Much good may it do them with the comparison I confess my self so far of their mind that there is too great a conformity between them 23. NEXT the Pharisees come the Sadducees as opposite to them in their temper as their principles so called as Epiphanius and some others will have it from 〈◊〉 justice as pretending themselves to be very just and righteous men but this agrees not with the account given of their lives They are generally thought to have been denominated from Sadock the Scholar of Antigonus Sochaeus who flourished about the year of the World MMMDCCXX CCLXXXIV years before the Nativity of our Saviour They pass under a very ill character even among the writers of their own Nation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 impious men and of very loose and debauched manners which is no more than what might be expected as the natural consequence of their principles this being one of their main dogmata or opinions that the Soul is not Immortal and that there is no future state after this life The occasion of which desperate principle is said to have been a mistake of the doctrine of their Master Antigonus who was wont to press his Scholars not to be like 〈◊〉 Servants who serve their Masters merely for what they can get by them but to serve God for himself without expectation of rewards This Sadock and Baithos two of his disciples misunderstanding thought their Master had peremptorily denied any state of future rewards and having laid this dangerous foundation these unhappy superstructures were built upon it that there is no Resurrection for if there be no reward what need that the Body should rise again that the Soul is not Immortal nor exists in the separate state for if it did it must be either rewarded or punished and if not the Soul then by the same proportion of reason no spiritual substance neither Angel nor Spirit that there is no Divine Providence but that God is perfectly placed as beyond the commission so beyond the inspection and regard of what sins or evils are done or happen in the World as indeed what great reason to believe a wise and righteous Providence if there be no reward or punishment for vertue and vice in another life These pernicious and Atheistical opinions justly exposed them to the reproach and hatred of the people who were wont eminently to stile them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Hereticks 〈◊〉 Epicureans no words being thought bad enough to bestow upon them They rejected the Traditions so vehemently asserted by the Pharisees and taught that men were to keep to the Letter of the Law and that nothing was to be imposed either upon their belief or practice but what was expresly owned and contained in it Josephus observes that they were the fewest of all the Sects 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but usually men of the better rank and quality as what wonder if rich and great men who tumble in the pleasures and advantages of a prosperous fortune be willing to take sanctuary at those opinions that afford the greatest patronage to looseness and debauchery and care not to hear of being called to account in another World for what they have done in this For this reason the Sadducees ever appeared the greatest sticklers to preserve the peace and were the most severe and implacable Justicers against the Authors or fomenters of tumults and seditions lest they should disturb and interrupt their soft and easie course of life the only happiness their principles allowed them to expect 24. THE Essenes succeed a Sect probably distinct from either of the former Passing by the various conjectures concerning the derivation of their name which when dressed up with all advantages are still but bare conjectures they began about the times of the 〈◊〉 when the violent persecutions of Antiochus forced the Jews for their own safety to retire to the Woods and Mountains And though in time the storm blew over yet many of them were too well pleased with these undisturbed solitudes to return and therefore combined themselves into Religious societies leading a solitary and contemplative course of life and that in very great numbers there being usually above four thousand of them as both Philo and Josephus tell us Pliny takes notice of them and describes them to be a solitary generation remarkable above all others in this that they live without Women without any embraces without money conversing with nothing but Woods and Palm-trees that their number encreased every day as fast as any died persons flocking to them from all quarters to seek repose here after they had been wearied with the inquietudes of an improsperous fortune They paid a due reverence to the Temple by sending gifts and presents
Birth His austere Education and way of Life His Preaching what His initiating proselytes by Baptism Baptism in use in the Jewish Church It s Original whence His resolution and impartiality His Martyrdom The character given him by Josephus and the Jews The Evangelical Dispensation wherein it exceeds that of Moses It s 〈◊〉 and perfection It s agreeableness to humane nature The Evangelical promises better than those of the Law and in what respects The aids of the Spirit plentifully assorded under the Gospel The admirable confirmation of this Occonomy The great extent and latitude of it Judaism not capable of being communicated to all mankind The comprehensiveness of the Gospel The Duration of the Evangelical Covenant The Mosaical Statutes in what sence said to be for ever The Typical and transient nature of that State The great happiness of Christians under the Occonomy of the Gospel 1. GOD having from the very infancy of the World promised the Messiah as the great Redeemer of Mankind was accordingly pleased in all Ages to make gradual discoveries and manifestations of him the revelations concerning him in every Dispensation of the Church still shining with a bigger and more particular light the nearer this Sun of Righteousness was to his rising The first Gospel and glad tidings of him commenced with the fall of Adam God out of infinite tenderness and commiseration promising to send a person who should triumphantly vindicate and rescue mankind from the power and tyranny of their Enemies and that he should do this by taking the humane nature upon him and being born of the seed of the Woman No further account is given of him till the times of Abraham to whom it was revealed that he should proceed out of his loins and arise out of the Jewish Nation though both Jew and Gentile should be made happy by him To his Grandchild Jacob God made known out of what Tribe of that Nation he should rise the Tribe of Judah and what would be the time of his appearing viz. the departure of the Scepter from Judah the abrogation of the Civil and Legislative power of that Tribe and People accomplished in Herod the Idumaean set over them by the Roman power And this is all we find concerning him under that Oeconomy Under the Legal Dispensation we find Moses foretelling one main 〈◊〉 of his coming which was to be the great Prophet of the Church to whom all were to hearken as an extraordinary person sent from God to acquaint the World with the Councils and the Laws of Heaven The next news we hear of him is from David who was told that he should spring out of his house and family and who frequently speaks of his sufferings and the particular manner of his death by piercing his hands and his feet of his powerful Resurrection that God would not leave his Soul in Hell nor suffer his holy one to see corruption of his triumphant Ascension into Heaven and glorious session at God's right hand From the Prophet Isaiah we have an account of the extraordinary and miraculous manner of his Birth that he should be born of a Virgin and his name be Immanuel of his incomparable furniture of gifts and graces for the execution of his office of the entertainment he was to meet with in the World and of the nature and design of those sufferings which he was to undergo The place of his Birth was foretold by Micah which was to be 〈◊〉 the least of the Cities of Judah but honoured above all the rest with the nativity of a Prince who was to be Ruler in Israel whose goings forth had been from everlasting Lastly the Prophet Daniel 〈◊〉 the particular period of his coming expresly affirming that the Messiah should appear in the World and be cut off as a Victim and Expiation for the sins of the people at the expiration of LXX prophetical weeks or CCCCXC years which accordingly punctually came to pass 2. FOR the date of the prophetick Scriptures concerning the time of the 〈◊〉 's coming being now run out In the fulness of time God sent his Son made of a Woman made under the Law to 〈◊〉 them that were under the Law This being the truth of which God spake by the mouth of all his holy Prophets which have been since the World began But because it was not sit that so great a Person should come into the World without an eminent Harbinger to introduce and usher in his Arrival God had promised that he would send his Messenger who should prepare his way before him even 〈◊〉 the Prophet whom he would send before the coming of that great day of the Lord who should turn the hearts of the Fathers to the Children c. This was particularly accomplished in John the Baptist who came in the power and spirit of Elias He was the Morning-star to the Son of Righteousness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as S. Cyril says of him the great and eminent Fore-runner a Person remarkable upon several accounts First for the extraordinary circumstances of his Nativity his Birth foretold by an Angel sent on purpose to deliver this joyful Message a sign God intended him for great undertakings this being never done but where God designed the Person for some uncommon services his Parents aged and though both righteous before God yet hitherto Childless Heaven does not dispence all its bounty to the same Person Children though great and desirable blessings are yet often denied to those for whom God has otherwise very dear regards Elizabeth was barren and they were both well stricken in years But is any thing too hard for the Lord said God to Abraham in the same case God has the Key of the Womb in his own keeping it is one of the Divine Prerogatives that he makes the barren Woman to keep house and to be a joyful Mother of Children A Son is promised and mighty things said of him a promise which old Zachary had scarce faith enough to digest and therefore had the assurance of it sealed to him by a miraculous dumbness imposed upon him till it was made good the same Miracle at once confirming his faith and punishing his infidelity Accordingly his Mother conceived with Child and as if he would do part of his errand before he was born he leaped in her Womb at her salutation of the Virgin Mary then newly conceived with Child of our Blessed Saviour a piece of homage paid by one to one yet unborn 3. THESE presages were not vain and fallible but produced a Person no less memorable for the admirable strictness and austerity of his 〈◊〉 For having escaped Herod's butcherly and merciless Executioners the Divine providence being a shelter and a covert to him and been educated among the rudenesses and solitudes of the Wilderness his manners and way of life were very 〈◊〉 to his Education His Garments borrowed from no other Wardrobe than the backs
had bravely discoursed of the happy state of good men in the other Life plainly consessed that he could be content 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to die a thousand times over were he but assured that those things were true and being condemned concludes his Apologie with this farewell And now Gentlemen I am going off the stage it 's your lot to live and mine to die but whether of us two shall fare better is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unknown to any but to God alone But our blessed Saviour has put the case past all peradventure having plainly published this doctrine to the World and sealed the truth of it and that by raising others from the dead and especially by his own Resurrection and 〈◊〉 which were the highest pledge and assurance of a future Immortality But besides the security he hath given the clearest account of the nature of it 'T is very probable that the Jews generally had of old as 't is certain they have at this day the most gross and carnal apprehensions concerning the state of another Life But to us the Gospel has perspicuously revealed the invisible things of the other World told us what that Heaven is which is promised to good men a state of spiritual joys of chaste and rational delights a conformity of ours to the Divine Nature a being made like to God and an endless and uninterrupted communion with him 9. BUT because in our lapsed and degenerate state we are very unable without some foreign assistance to attain the promised rewards hence arises in the next place another great priviledge of the Evangelical Oeconomy that it is blessed with larger and more abundant communications of the Divine Spirit than was afforded under the Jewish state Under the one it was given by drops under the other it is poured forth The Law laid heavy and hard commands but gave little strength to do them it did not assist humane nature with those powerful aids that are necessary for us in our 〈◊〉 state it could do nothing in that it was weak through the flesh and by reason of the weakness and unprofitableness thereof it could make nothing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was this made it an heavy yoke when the commands of it 〈◊〉 uncouth and troublesome and the assistances so small and inconsiderable Whereas now the Gospel does not only prescribe such Laws as are happily accommodate to the true temper of humane nature and adapted to the reason of mankind such as every wise and prudent man must have pitched upon but it affords the insluences of the Spirit of God by whose assistance our vitiated faculties are repaired and we enabled under so much weakness and in the midst of so many temptations to hold on in the paths of piety and vertue Hence it is that the plentiful effusions of the Spirit were reserved as the great blessing of the Evangelical state that God would then pour water upon him that is thirsty and sloods upon the dry ground that he would pour out his Spirit upon their seed and his blessing upon their off-spring whereby they should spring up as among the grass as willows by the water-courses That he would give them a new heart and put his Spirit within them and cause them to walk in his statutes and keep his judgments to do them And this is the meaning of those branches of the Covenant so oft repeated I will put my Law into their minds and write it in their hearts that is by the help of my Grace and Spirit 〈◊〉 enable them to live according to my Laws as readily and willingly as if they were written in their hearts For this reason the Law is compared to a dead letter the Gospel to the Spirit that giveth life thence stiled the ministration of the Spirit and as such said to 〈◊〉 in glory and that to such a degree that what glory the Legal Dispensation had in this 〈◊〉 is eclipsed into nothing For even that which was made glorious had no glory in this respect by reason of the glory that excelleth for if that which was done away was glorious much more that which remaineth is glorious Hence the Spirit is said to be Christ's peculiar mission I will pray the Father and he will send you another comforter even the Spirit of truth which was done immediately after his Ascension when he ascended up on high and gave gifts to men even the Holy Ghost which he shed on them abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour For the Holy Ghost was not yet given because that Jesus was not yet glorified Not but that he was given before even under the old Oeconomy but not in those large and diffusive measures wherein it was afterwards communicated to the World 10. FIFTHLY The Dispensation of the Gospel had a better establishment and confirmation than that of the Law for though the Law was introduced with great scenes of pomp and Majesty yet was the Gospel ushered in by more kindly and rational methods 〈◊〉 by more and greater miracles whereby our Lord unquestionably evinced his Divine Commission and shewed that he came from God doing more miracles in three years than were done through all the periods of the Jewish Church and many of them such as were peculiar to him alone He often raised the dead which Moses never did commanded the winds and waves of the Sea expelled Devils out of Lunaticks and possessed persons who fled assoon as ever he commanded them to be gone cured many inveterate and chronical distempers with the speaking of a word and some without a word spoken vertue silently going out from him He searched men's hearts and revealed the most secret transactions of their minds had this miraculous power always residing in him and could exert it when and upon what occasions he pleased and impart it to others communicating it to his Apostles and followers and to the Primitive Christians for the three first Ages of the Church he never exerted it in methods of dread and terror but in doing such miracles as were highly useful and beneficial to the World And as if all this had not been enough he 〈◊〉 down his own life after all to give testimony to it Covenants were ever wont to be ratified with bloud and the death of sacrifices But when out Lord came to introduce the Covenant of the Gospel he did not consecrate it with the bloud of Bulls and Goats but with his own most precious bloud as of a Lamb without spot and blemish And could he give a greater testimony to the truth of his doctrine and those great things he had promised to the World than to seal it with his bloud Had not these things been so t were infinitely unreasonable to suppose that a person of so much wisdom and goodness as our Saviour was should have made the World believe so and much less would he have chosen to die for it and that the most acute and ignominious
the first-fruits of the Ground but an honest heart and a pious life and a grateful acknowledgment of our dependance upon God in the publick Solemnities of his praise and worship For the Law and the Gospel did not differ in this that the one commanded publick worship the other not but that under the one publick worship was fixed to one only place under the other it is free to any where the providence of God has placed us it being part of the duty bound upon us by natural and unalterable obligations that we should publickly meet together for the solemn Celebration of the Divine honour and service 13. NOR is the Oeconomy of the Gospel less extensive in time than place the Old Testament was only a temporary dispensation that of the Gospel is to last to the end of the World the Law was to continue only for a little time the Gospel is an Everlasting Covenant the one to be quickly antiquated and abolished the other never to be done away by any other to succeed it The Jews indeed stickle hard for the perpetual and immutable obligation of the Law of Moses and frequently urge us with those places where the Covenant of Circumcision is called an Everlasting Covenant and God said to chuse the Temple at Jerusalem to place his name there for ever to give the Land of Canaan to Abraham and his seed for an everlasting possession thus the Law of the Passeover is called an Ordinance for ever the command of the First-fruits a statute for ever and the like in other places which seem to intimate a perpetual and unalterable Dispensation But the answer is short and plain that this phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for ever though when 't is applied to God it always denotes Eternity yet when 't is attributed to other things it implies no more than a periodical duration limited according to the will of the Law-giver or the nature of the thing thus the Hebrew Servant was to serve his Master for ever that is but for seven years till the next year of Jubilee He shall walk before mine anointed for ever says God concerning Samuel that is be a Priest all his days Thus when the Ritual services of the Mosaick Law are called Statutes for ever the meaning is that they should continue a long time obligatory until the time of the 〈◊〉 in whose days the Sacrifice and Oblation was to cease and those carnal Ceremonies to give way to the more spiritual services of the Gospel Indeed the very typical nature of that Dispensation evidently argued it to be but for a time the shadow being to cease that the substance might take place and though many of them continued some considerable time after Christ's death yet they lost their positive and obligatory power and were used only as things indifferent in compliance with the inveterate prejudices of new Converts lately brought over from Judaism and who could not quickly lay aside that great veneration which they had for the Rites of the Mosaick Institution Though even in this respect it was not long before all Jewish Ceremonies were thrown off and Moses quite turn'd out of doors Whereas the Evangelical state is to run parallel with the age and duration of the World 't is the Everlasting Covenant the Everlasting Gospel the last Dispensation that God will make to the World God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past by the Prophets hath in these last days spoken to us by his 〈◊〉 in which respect the Gospel in opposition to the Law is stiled a Kingdom that cannot 〈◊〉 moved The 〈◊〉 in the foregoing Verses speaking concerning the Mosaical state Whose voice says he then shook the Earth but now he hath promised saying Yet once more I shake not the Earth only but also the Heaven a phrase peculiar to the Scripture to note the introducing a new scene and state of things and this word Yet once more signisieth the removing of those things that are shaken as of things that are made that those things which cannot be shaken may remain that is that the state of the Gospel may endure for ever Hence Christ is said to have an unchangeable Priesthood to be a Priest for ever to be consecrated for evermore From all which it appears how incomparably happy we Christians are under the Gospel above what the Jews were in the time of the Law God having placed us under the best of Dispensations freed us from those many nice and troublesome observances to which they were tied put us under the clearest discoveries and revelations and given us the most noble rational and masculine Religion a Religion the most perfective of our natures and the most conducive to our happiness while their Covenant at best was faulty and after all could not make him that did the service perfect in things pertaining to the Conscience Blessed are the eyes which see the things that ye see for I 〈◊〉 you that many Prophets and Kings have desired to see those things which ye see and have not seen them and to hear those things which ye hear and have not heard them The End of the APPARATUS THE GREAT EXEMPLAR OF Sanctity and Holy Life according to the Christian Institution DESCRIBED In the HISTORY of the LIFE and DEATH of the ever-Blessed JESUS CHRIST THE SAVIOUR of the WORLD WITH CONSIDERATIONS and DISCOURSES upon the several parts of the Story And PRAYERS fitted to the several MYSTERIES IN THREE PARTS The Fifth Edition By JER TAYLOR Chaplain in Ordinary to King CHARLES the First and late Lord Bishop of Down and Conner LONDON Printed by R. Norton for R. Royston Bookseller to his most Sacred Majesty at the Angel in Amen-Corner 1675. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE and most truly Noble Lord CHRISTOPHER LORD HATTON Baron HATTON of Kirby c. MY LORD WHEN Interest divides the Church and the Calentures of men breathe out in Problems and unactive Discourses each part in pursuance of its own portion follows that Proposition which complies with and bends in all the flexures of its temporal ends and while all strive for Truth they hug their own Opinions dressed up in her imagery and they dispute for ever and either the Question is indeterminable or which is worse men will never be convinced For such is the nature of Disputings that they begin commonly in Mistakes they proceed with Zeal and fancy and end not at all but in Schisms and uncharitable names and too often dip their feet in bloud In the mean time he that gets the better of his adversary oftentimes gets no good to himself because although he hath fast hold upon the right side of the Problem he may be an ill man in the midst of his triumphant Disputations And therefore it was not here that God would have Man's Felicity to grow For our condition had been extremely miserable if our final state had been placed upon
Kir-haraseth and went to their own Countrey The same and much more was God's design who took not his enemie's but his own Son his only begotten Son and God himself and offered him up in Sacrifice to make us leave our perpetual fightings against Heaven and if we still persist we are hardned beyond the wildnesses of the Arabs and Edomites and neither are receptive of the impresses of Pity nor Humanity who neither have compassion to the Suffering of Jesus nor compliance with the designs of God nor conformity to the Holiness and Obedience of our Guide In a dark night if an Ignis Fatuus do but precede us the glaring of its lesser flames do so amuse our eyes that we follow it into Rivers and Precipices as if the ray of that false light were designed on purpose to be our path to tread in And therefore not to follow the glories of the Sun of Righteousness who indeed leads us over rocks and difficult places but secures us against the danger and guides us into safety is the greatest both undecency and unthankfulness in the world 5. In the great Council of Eternity when God set down the Laws and knit fast the eternal bands of Predestination he made it one of his great purposes to make his Son like us that we also might be like his Holy Son he by taking our Nature we by imitating his Holiness God hath predestinated us to be conformable to the image of his Son saith the Apostle For the first in every kind is in nature propounded as the Pattern of the rest And as the Sun the Prince of all the Bodies of Light and the Fire of all warm substances is the principal the Rule and the Copy which they in their proportions imitate and transcribe so is the Word incarnate the great Example of all the Predestinate for he is the first-born among many brethren And therefore it was a precept of the Apostle and by his doctrine we understand its meaning Put you on the Lord Jesus Christ. The similitude declares the duty As a garment is composed and made of the same fashion with the body and is applied to each part in its true figure and commensuration so should we put on Christ and imitate the whole body of his Sanctity conforming to every integral part and express him in our lives that God seeing our impresses may know whose image and superscription we bear and we may be acknowledged for Sons when we have the air and features and resemblances of our elder Brother 6. In the practice of this duty we may be helped by certain considerations which are like the proportion of so many rewards For this according to the nature of all holy Exercises stays not for pay till its work be quite finished but like Musick in Churches is Pleasure and Piety and Salary besides So is every work of Grace full of pleasure in the execution and is abundantly rewarded besides the stipend of a glorious Eternity 7. First I consider that nothing is more honourable than to be like God and the Heathens worshippers of false Deities grew vicious upon that stock and we who have fondnesses of imitation counting a Deformity full of honour if by it we may be like our Prince for pleasures were in their height in Capreae because Tiberius there wallowed in them and a wry neck in Nero's Court was the Mode of Gallantry might do well to make our imitations prudent and glorious and by propounding excellent Examples heighten our faculties to the capacities of an evenness with the best of Precedents He that strives to imitate another admires him and confesses his own imperfections and therefore that our admirations be not flattering nor our consessions phantastick and impertinent it were but reasonable to admire Him from whom really all Perfections do derive and before whose Glories all our imperfections must confess their shame and needs of reformation God by a voice from Heaven and by sixteen generations of Miracles and Grace hath attested the Holy Jesus to be the fountain of Sanctity and the wonderful Counsellor and the Captain of our sufferings and the guide of our manners by being his beloved Son in whom he took pleasure and complacency to the height of satisfaction And if any thing in the world be motive of our affections or satisfactory to our understandings what is there in Heaven or Earth we can desire or imagine beyond a likeness to God and participation of the Divine Nature and Perfections And therefore as when the Sun arises every man goes to his work and warms himself with his heat and is refreshed with his influences and measures his labour with his course So should we frame all the actions of our life by His Light who hath shined by an excellent Righteousness that we no more walk in Darkness or sleep in Lethargies or run a-gazing after the lesser and imperfect beauties of the Night It is the weakness of the Organ that makes us hold our hand between the Sun and us and yet stand staring upon a Meteor or an inflamed jelly And our judgments are as mistaken and our appetites are as sottish if we propound to our selves in the courses and designs of Perfections any copy but of Him or something like Him who is the most perfect And lest we think his Glories too great to behold 8. Secondly I consider that the imitation of the Life of Jesus is a duty of that excellency and perfection that we are helped in it not only by the assistance of a good and a great Example which possibly might be too great and scare our endeavours and attempts but also by its easiness compliance and proportion to us For Jesus in his whole life conversed with men with a modest Vertue which like a well-kindled fire fitted with just materials casts a constant heat not like an inflamed heap of stubble glaring with great emissions and suddenly stooping into the thickness of 〈◊〉 His Piety was even constant unblameable complying with civil society without affrightment of precedent or prodigious instances of actions greater than the imitation of men For if we observe our Blessed Saviour in the whole story of his Life although he was without Sin yet the instances of his Piety were the actions of a very holy but of an ordinary life and we may observe this difference in the Story of Jesus from Ecclesiastical Writings of certain beatified persons whose life is told rather to amaze us and to create scruples than to lead us in the evenness and serenity of a holy Conscience Such are the prodigious Penances of Simeon Stylites the Abstinence of the Religious retired into the mountain Nitria but especially the stories of later Saints in the midst of a declining Piety and aged Christendom where persons are represented Holy by way of Idea and fancy if not to promote the interests of a Family and Institution But our Blessed Saviour though his eternal Union
Scepter from Judah and the Law-giver from between his feet when the number of Daniel's Years was accomplished and the Egyptian and Syrian Kingdoms had their period God having great compassion towards mankind remembring his Promises and our great Necessities sent his Son into the world to take upon him our Nature and all that guilt of Sin which stuck close to our Nature and all that Punishment which was consequent to our Sin which came to pass after this manner 2. In the days of Herod the King the Angel Gabriel was sent from God to a City of Galilce named Nazareth to a holy Maid called Mary espoused to Joseph and found her in a capacity and excellent disposition to receive the greatest Honour that ever was done to the daughters of men Her imployment was holy and pious her person young her years florid and springing her Body chaste her Mind humble and a rare repository of divine Graces She was full of grace and excellencies And God poured upon her a full measure of Honour in making her the Mother of the 〈◊〉 For the Angel came to her and said 〈◊〉 thou that art highly 〈◊〉 the Lord is with thee blessed art thou among women 3. We cannot but imagine the great mixture of innocent disturbances and holy passions that in the first address of the Angel did rather discompose her settledness and interrupt the silence of her spirits than dispossess her dominion which she ever kept over those subjects which never had been taught to rebel beyond the mere possibilities of natural imperfection But if the Angel appeared in the shape of a Man it was an unusual arrest to the Blessed Virgin who was accustomed to retirements and solitariness and had not known an experience of admitting a comely person but a stranger to her closet and privacies But if the Heavenly Messenger did retain a Diviner form more symbolical to Angelical nature and more proportionable to his glorious Message although her daily imployment was a conversation with Angels who in their daily ministring to the Saints did behold her chaste conversation coupled with 〈◊〉 yet they used not any affrighting glories in the offices of their daily attendances but were seen only by spiritual discernings However so it happened that when she saw him she was troubled at his saying and cast in her mind what manner of Salutation this should be 4. But the Angel who came with designs of honour and comfort to her not willing that the inequality and glory of the Messenger should like too glorious a light to a weaker eye rather confound the Faculty than enlighten the Organ did before her thoughts could find a tongue invite her to a more familiar confidence than possibly a tender Virgin though of the greatest serenity and composure could have put on in the presence of such a Beauty and such a Holiness And the Angel said unto her Fear not Mary for thou hast found favour with God And behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb and bring forth a Son and shalt call his name JESUS 5. The Holy Virgin knew her self a person very unlikely to be a Mother For although the desires of becoming a Mother to the MESSIAS were great in every of the Daughters of Jacob and about that time the expectation of his Revelation was high and pregnant and therefore she was espoused to an honest and a just person of her kindred and family and so might not despair to become a Mother yet she was a person of a rare Sanctity and so mortified a spirit that for all this Desponsation of her according to the desire of her Parents and the custom of the Nation she had not set one step toward the consummation of her Marriage so much as in thought and possibly had set her self back from it by a vow of Chastity and holy Coelibate For Mary said unto the Angel How shall this be seeing I know not a man 6. But the Angel who was a person of that nature which knows no conjunctions but those of love and duty knew that the Piety of her Soul and the Religion of her chaste purposes was a great imitator of 〈◊〉 Purity and therefore perceived where the Philosophy of her question did consist and being taught of God declared that the manner should be as miraculous as the Message it self was glorious For the Angel told her that this should not be done by any way which our sin and the shame of Adam had unhallowed by turning Nature into a blush and forcing her to a retirement from a publick attesting the means of her own preservation but the whole matter was from God and so should the manner be For the Angel said unto her The Holy Ghost shall come upon 〈◊〉 and the power of the Highest shall over shadow thee therefore also that Holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God 7. When the Blessed Virgin was so ascertain'd that she should be a Mother and a Maid and that two Glories like the two Luminaries of Heaven should meet in her that she might in such a way become the Mother of her Lord that she might with better advantages be his Servant then all her hopes and all her desires received such satisfaction and filled all the corners of her Heart so much as indeed it was fain to make room for its reception But she to whom the greatest things of Religion and the transportations of Devotion were made familiar by the assiduity and piety of her daily practices however she was full of joy yet she was carried like a full vessel without the violent tossings of a tempestuous passion or the wrecks of a stormy imagination And as the power of the Holy Ghost did descend upon her like rain into a fleece of wool without any obstreperous noises or violences to nature but only the extraordinariness of an exaltation so her spirit received it with the gentleness and tranquillity fitted for the entertainment of the spirit of love and a quietness symbolical to the holy Guest of her spotless womb the Lamb of God for she meekly replied Behold the handmaid of the Lord be it unto me according unto thy word And the Angel departed from her having done his message And at the same time the holy Spirit of God did make her to conceive in her womb the immaculate Son of God the Saviour of the World Ad SECT I. Considerations upon the Annunciation of the Blessed MARY and the Conception of the Holy JESVS 1. THat which shines brightest presents it self first to the eye and the devout Soul in the chain of excellent and precious things which are represented in the counsel design and first beginnings of the work of our Redemption hath not 〈◊〉 to attend the twinkling of the lesser Stars till it hath stood and admired the glory and eminencies of the Divine Love manifested in the Incarnation of the Word eternal God had no necessity in order to the conservation or
but make it the more prudent and wary lest it intangle us in a vanity of spirit God having ordered that our spirits should be affected with dispositions in some degrees contrary to exteriour events that we be fearful in the affluence of prosperous things and joyful in adversity as knowing that this may produce benefit and advantage and the changes that are consequent to the other are sometimes full of mischiefs but always of danger But her Silence and Fear were her Guardians that to prevent excrescencies of Joy this of vainer complacency 9. And it is not altogether inconsiderable to observe that the holy Virgin came to a great perfection and state of Piety by a few and those modest and even exercises and external actions S. Paul travelled over the World preached to the Gentiles disputed against the Jews confounded Hereticks writ excellently-learned Letters suffered dangers injuries affronts and persecutions to the height of wonder and by these violences of life action and patience obtained the Crown of an excellent Religion and Devotion But the holy Virgin although she was ingaged sometimes in an active life and in the exercise of an ordinary and small oeconomy and government or ministeries of a Family yet she arrived to her Perfections by the means of a quiet and silent Piety the internal actions of Love Devotion and Contemplation and instructs us that not only those who have opportunity and powers of a magnificent Religion or a pompous Charity or miraculous Conversion of Souls or assiduous and effectual Preachings or exteriour demonstrations of corporal Mercy shall have the greatest crowns and the addition of degrees and accidental rewards but the silent affections the splendors of an internal Devotion the unions of Love Humility and Obedience the daily offices of Prayer and Praises sung to God the acts of Faith and Fear of Patience and Meekness of Hope and Reverence Repentance and Charity and those Graces which walk in a veil and silence make great ascents to God and as sure progress to favour and a Crown as the more ostentous and laborious exercises of a more solemn Religion No 〈◊〉 needs to complain of want of power or opportunities for Religious perfections a devout woman in her Closet praying with much zeal and affections for the conversion of Souls is in the same order to a shining like the stars in glory as he who by excellent discourses puts it into a more forward disposition to be actually performed And possibly her Prayers obtained energy and force to my Sermon and made the ground fruitful and the seed spring up to life eternal Many times God is present in the still voice and private retirements of a quiet Religion and the constant spiritualities of an ordinary life when the loud and impetuous winds and the shining fires of more laborious and expensive actions are profitable to others only like a tree of Balsam distilling precious liquor for others not for its own use The PRAYER O Eternal and Almighty God who didst send thy holy Angel in embassy to the Blessed Virgin-Mother of our Lord to manifest the actuating 〈◊〉 eternal Purpose of the 〈◊〉 of Mankind by the Incarnation of thine eternal Son put me by the 〈◊〉 of thy Divine Grace into such holy dispositions that I may never impede the event and effect of those mercies which in the counsels of thy Predestination thou didst design for me Give me a promptness to obey thee to the degree and semblance of Angelical alacrity give me holy Purity and Piety Prudence and Modesty like those Excellencies which thou didst create in the ever-blessed Virgin the Mother of God grant that my imployment be always holy unmixt with worldly affections and as much as my condition of life will bear retired from secular interests and disturbances that I may converse with Angels entertain the Holy JESUS conceive him in my Soul nourish him with the expresses of most innocent and holy affections and bring him forth and publish him in a life of Piety and Obedience that he may dwell in me for ever and I may for ever dwell with him in the house of eternal pleasures and glories world without end Amen SECT II. The Bearing of JESUS in the Womb of the Blessed Virgin MARY visiting ELIZABETH S. LUKE 1. 43. And whence is this to me that y e Mother of my LORD should come to me Josephs Dreame S MAT 1. 20. Joseph thou son of David Feare not to 〈◊〉 unto thee Marâ—â— thy wife for that 〈◊〉 is conceived in her is of the Holy 〈◊〉 1. ALthough the Blessed Virgin had a faith as prompt and ready as her Body was chast and her Soul pure yet God who uses to give full measure shaken together and running over did by way of confirmation and fixing the confidence of her assent give an instance of his Omnipotency in the very particular of an extraordinary Conception For the Angel said Behold thy Cousin Elizabeth hath also conceived a son in her old age and this is the sixth month with her that was called barren For with God nothing shall be impossible A less argument would have satisfied the necessity of a Faith which had no scruple and a greater would not have done it in the incredulity of an ungentle and pertinacious spirit But the Holy Maid had complacency enough in the Message and holy desires about her to carry her understanding as far as her affections even to the fruition of the Angel's Message which is such a sublimity of Faith that it is its utmost consummation and shall be its Crown when our Faith is turned into Vision our Hopes into actual Possessions and our Grace into Glory 2. And she who was now full of God bearing God in her Virgin-Womb and the Holy Spirit in her Heart who had also over-shadowed her enabling her to a supernatural and miraculous Conception arose with haste and gladness to communicate that joy which was designed for all the World and she found no breast to pour forth the first emanations of her over-joyed heart so fit as her Cousin Elizabeth's who had received testimony from God to have been righteous walking in all the Commandments of the Lord blameless who also had a special portion in this great honour for she was designed to be the Mother of the Baptist who was sent as a fore-runner to prepare the ways of the Lord and to make his paths straight And Mary arose in those days and went into the Hill-countrey with haste into a City of Judah 3. Her Haste was in proportion to her Joy and desires but yet went no greater pace than her Religion for as in her journey she came near to Jerusalem she turned in that she might visit His Temple whose Temple she her self was now and there not only to remember the pleasures of Religion which she had felt in continual descents and showers falling on her pious heart for the space of eleven years attendance there in her Childhood but also to pay the
first-fruits of her Thanks and Joy and to lay all her glory at his feet whose humble hand maid she was in the greatest honour of being his blessed Mother Having worshipped she went on her journey and entred into the house of Zasharias and saluted 〈◊〉 4. It is not easiè to imagine what a collision of joys was at this blessed Meeting two Mothers of two great Princes the one the greatest that was born of woman and the other was his Lord and these made Mothers by two Miracles met together with joy and mysteriousness where the Mother of our Lord went to visit the Mother of his Servant and the Holy Ghost made the meeting festival and descended upon Elizabeth and she prophesied 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Heaven was there more joy and ecstásie The persons who were Women whose fancies and affections were not only hallowed but made pregnant and big with Religion meeting together to compare and unite their joys and their Eucharist and then made prophetical and inspired must needs have discoursed like 〈◊〉 and the most ecstasied order of Intelligences for all the faculties of Nature were turned into Grace and expressed in their way the excellent Solemnity For it came to pass when Elizabeth heard the Salutation of Mary the 〈◊〉 leaped in her Womb and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost 5. After they had both prophesied and sang their Hymns and re-saluted each other with the religion of Saints and the joys of Angels Mary abode with her cousin Elizabeth about three mouths and then returned to her own house Where when she appeared with her holy burthen to her Husband Joseph and that he perceived her to be with child and knew that he had never unsealed that holy fountain of virginal purity he was troubled For although her deportment had been pious and chaste to a miracle her carriage reserved and so grave that she drave away temptations and impure visits and all unclean purposes from the neighbourhood of her holy person yet when he saw she was with child and had not yet been taught a lesson higher than the principles of Nature he was minded to put her away for he knew she was with child but yet privily because he was a good man and knew her Piety to have been such that it had a most done violence to his sense and made him disbelieve what was visible and notorious and therefore he would do it privately But while he thought on these things the Angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a Dream saying Joseph thou son of David fear not to take unto thee Mary thy 〈◊〉 for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost Then Joseph being raised from sleep did as the Angel of the Lord had bidden him and took unto him his Wife Ad SECT II. Considerations concerning the circumstances of the Interval between the Conception and Nativity 1. WHen the Blessed Virgin was ascertained of the manner of her becoming a Mother and that her tremblings were over upon the security she should preserve her Virgin purity as a clean oblation to the honour of God then she expressed her consent to the Angelical message and instantly she conceived the Holy Jesus in her Womb by the supernatural and divine influence of the Holy Ghost For she was highly zealous to reconcile her being Mother to the 〈◊〉 with those Purities and holy Coelibate which she had designed to keep as advantages to the interests of Religion and his honour who chose her from all the daughters of Adam to be instrumental of the restitution of grace and innocence to all her Father's family And we shall receive benefit from so excellent example if we be not so desirous of a Priviledge as of a Vertue of Honour as of Piety and as we submit to the weight and pressure of sadnesses and infelicities that God's will may be accomplished so we must be also ready to renounce an exteriour grace or favour rather than it should not be consistent with exemplar and rare Piety 2. When the Son of God was incarnate in the Womb of his Virgin-Mother the Holy Maid arose and though she was superexalted by an honour greater than the world yet ever saw she still dwelt upon the foundation of Humility and to make that vertue more signal and eminent she arose and went hastily to visit her Cousin Elizabeth who also had conceived a son in her old age for so we all should be curious and watchful against vanities and transportations when we are advanced to the gayeties of prosperous accidents and in the greatest priviledges descend to the lowest to exercise a greater measure of Vertue against the danger of those tentations which are planted against our heart to ruine our hopes and glories 3. But the Joys that the Virgin-Mother had were such as concerned all the world and that part of them which was her peculiar she would not conceal from persons apt to their entertainment but go to publish God's mercy toward her to another holy person that they might joyn in the praises of God as knowing that though it may be convenient to represent our personal necessities in private yet God's gracious returns and the blessings he makes to descend on us are more fit when there is no personal danger collaterally appendent to be published in the Communion of Saints that the Hopes of others may receive increase that their Faith may have confirmation that their Charity and Eucharist may grow up to become excellent and great and the praises of God may be sung aloud till the sound strike at Heaven and joyn with the Hallelujahs which the Morning-stars in their Orbs pay to their great Creator 4. When the Holy Virgin had begun her journey she made haste over the Mountains that she might not only satisfie the desires of her joy by a speedy gratulation but lest she should be too long abroad under the dispersion and discomposing of her retirements And therefore she hastens to an inclosure to her Cousin's house as knowing that all vertuous women like Tortoises carry their house on their heads and their Chappel in their heart and their danger in their eye and their Souls in their hands and God in all their actions And indeed her very little burthen which she bare hindred her not but she might make haste enough and as her spirit was full of chearfulness and alacrity so even her body was made aiery and vegete for there was no Sin in her burthen to fill it with natural inconveniences and there is this excellency in all spiritual things that they do no disadvantage to our persons nor retard our just temporal interests And the Religion by which we carry Christ within us is neither so peevish as to disturb our health nor so sad as to discompose our just and modest chearfulness nor so prodigal as to force us to needs and ignoble trades but recreates our body by the medicine of holy Fastings and Temperance fills us full of serenities
and complacencies by the sweetnesses of a holy Conscience and joys spiritual promotes our temporal interests by the gains and increases of the rewards of Charity and by securing God's providence over us while we are in the pursuit of the Heavenly Kingdom And as in these dispositions she climb'd the mountains with much facility so there is nothing in our whole life of difficulty so great but it may be managed by those assistances we receive from the Holiest Jesus when we carry him about us as the valleys are exalted so the mountains are made plain before us 5. When her Cousin Elizabeth saw the Mother of her Lord come to visit her as the Lord himself descended to visit all the world in great humility she was pleased and transported to the height of wonder and prophecy and the Babe sprang in her womb and was sanctified first doing his homage and adoration to his Lord that was in presence And we also although we can do nothing unless the Lord first prevent us with his gracious visitation yet if he first come unto us and we accept and entertain him with the expresses and correspondencies of our duty we shall receive the grace and honour of Sanctification But if S. Elizabeth who received testimony from God that she walked in all the Commandments of the Lord blameless was carried into ecstasie wondring at the dignation and favour done to her by the Mother of her Lord with what preparations and holy solemnities ought we to entertain his addresses to us by his Holy Sacrament by the immissions of his Spirit by the assistances of his Graces and all other his vouchsafings and descents into our hearts 6. The Blessed Virgin hearing her Cousin full of spirit and prophecy calling her blessed and praising her Faith and confirming her Joy instantly sang her hymn to God returning those praises which she received to him to whom they did appertain For so we should worship God with all ourpraises being willing upon no other condition to extend one hand to receive our own honour but that with the other we might transmit it to God that as God is honoured in all his Creatures so he may be honoured in us too looking upon the Graces which God hath given us but as greater instruments and abilities to serve him being none of ours but talents which are intrusted into our Banks to be improved But as a precious Pearl is orient and medicinal because God hath placed those excellencies in it for ends of his own but it self is dcad to all apprehensions of it and knows no reflexions upon its own value only God is magnified in his work so is every pious person precious and holy but mortified to all vainer complacencies in those singularities and eminencies which God placed there because he was so pleased saying there he would have a Temple built because from thence he would take delight to receive glory and adoration 7. After all these holy and festival joys which the two glad Mothers feasted themselves withal a sad cloud did intervene and passed before the face of the Blessed Virgin The just and righteous Joseph her espoused Husband perceiving her to be with child was minded to put her away as not knowing the Divinity of the fountain which watered the Virgin 's sealed and hallowed Womb and made it fruitful But he purposed to do it privily that he might preserve the reputation of his Spouse whose Piety he knew was great and was sorrowful it should now set in a sad night and be extinct But it was an exemplar charity and reads to us a rule for our deportment towards erring and lapsed persons that we intreat them with meekness and pity and fear not hastening their 〈◊〉 nor provoking their spirit nor making their remedy desperate by using of them rudely till there be no worse thing for them to fear if they should be dissolved into all licentiousness For an open shame is commonly protested unto when it is remediless and the person either despairs and sinks under the burthen or else grows impudent and tramples upon it But the gentleness of a modest and charitable remedy preserves that which is Vertue 's girdle Fear and Blushing and the beginning of a punishment chides them into the horrour of remembrance and guilt but preserves their meekness and modesty because they not feeling the worst of evils dare not venture upon the worst of sins 8. But it seems the Blessed Virgin having received this greatest honour had not made it known to her Husband Joseph and when she went to her Cousin Elizabeth the Virgin was told of it by her Cousin before she spake of it her self for her Cousin had it by revelation and the spirit of prophecy And it is in some circumstances and from some persons more secure to conceal Visions and those heavenly Gifts which create estimations among men than to publish them which may possibly minister to vanity and those exteriour Graces may do God's work though no observer note them but the person for whose sake they are sent like rain falling in uninhabited Valleys where no eye observes showers yet the Valleys laugh and sing to God in their refreshment without a witness However it is better to hear the report of our good things from the mouths of others than from our selves and better yet if the beauty of the Tabernacle be covered with skins that none of our beauties be seen but by worshippers that is when the glory of God and the interests of Religion or Charity are concerned in their publication For so it happened to be in the case of the Blessed Virgin as she related to her Cousin Elizabeth and so it happened not to be as she referred to her Husband Joseph 9. The Holy Virgin could not but know that Joseph would be troubled with sorrow and insecure apprehensions concerning her being with child but such was her Innocence and her Confidence in God that she held her peace expecting which way God would provide a remedy to the inconvenience for if we commit our selves to God in well doing as unto a faithful Creator preserving the tranquillity of our spirits and the evenness of our temper in the assault of infamy and disreputation God who loves our Innocence will be its Patron and will assert it from the scandal if it be expedient for us if it be not it is not fit we should desire it But if the Holy Jesus did suffer his Mother to fall into misinterpretation and suspect which could not but be a great affliction to her excellent spirit rarely temper'd as an Eye highly sensible of every ruder touch we must not think it strange if we be tried and pressed with a calamity and unhandsome accidents only remember that God will find a remedy to the trouble and will sanctifie the affliction and secure the person if we be innocent as was the Holy Virgin 10. But Joseph was not hasty in the execution of his purposes nor of making
his thoughts determinate but stood long in deliberation and longer before he acted it because it was an invidious matter and a rigour He was first to have defam'd and accus'd her publickly and being convicted by the Law she was to die if he had gone the ordinary way but he who was a just man that is according to the style of Scripture and other wise Writers a good a charitable man found that it was more agreeable to Justice to treat an offending person with the easiest sentence than to put things to extremity and render the person desperate and without remedy and provoked by the suffering of the worst of what she could fear No obligation to Justice does force a man to be cruel or to use the sharpest sentence A just man does Justice to every man and to every thing and then if he be also wise he knows there is a debt of mercy and compassion due to the infirmities of a man's nature and that debt is to be paid and he that is cruel and ungentle to a sinning person and does the worst thing to him dies in his debt and is unjust Pity and forbearance and long-suffering and fair interpretation and excusing our brother and taking things in the best sence and passing the gentlest sentence are as certainly our duty and owing to every person that does offend and can repent as calling men to account can be owing to the Law and are first to be paid and he that does not so is an unjust person which because Joseph was not he did not call furiously for Justice or pretend that God required it at his hands presently to undo a suspected person but waved the killing letter of the Law and secured his own interest and his Justice too by intending to dismiss her privately But before the thing was irremediable God ended his Question by a heavenly demonstration and sent an Angel to reveal to him the Innocence of his Spouse and the Divinity of her Son and that he was an immediate derivative from Heaven and the Heir of all the World And in all our doubts we shall have a resolution from Heaven or some of its Ministers if we have recourse thither for a Guide and be not hasty in our discourses or inconsiderate in our purposes or rash in judgment For God loves to give assistances to us when we most fairly and prudently endeavour that Grace be not put to do all our work but to facilitate our labour not creating new faculties but improving those of Nature If we consider warily God will guide us in the determination But a hasty person out-runs his guide prevaricates his rule and very often engages upon error The PRAYER O Holy Jesu Son of the Eternal God thy Glory is far above all Heavens and yet thou didst descend to Earth that thy Descent might be the more gracious by how much thy Glories were admirable and natural and inseparable I adore thy holy Humanity with humble veneration and the thankful addresses of religious joy because thou hast personally united Humane nature to the Eternal Word carrying it above the seats of the highest Cherubim This great and glorious Mystery is the honour and glory of man it was the expectation of our Fathers who saw the mysteriousness of thy Incarnation at great and obscure distances And blessed be thy Name that thou hast caused me to be born after the fulfilling of thy Prophecies and the consummation and exhibition of so great a love so great mysteriousness Holy Jesu though I admire and adore the immensity of thy love and condescension who wert pleased to undergo our burthens and infirmities for us yet I abhor my self and detest my own impurities which were so great and contradictory to the excellency of God that to destroy Sia and save us it became necessary that thou shouldest be sent into the World to die our death for us and to give us of thy Life 2. DEarest Jesu thou didst not breath one sigh nor shed one drop of bloud nor weep one tear nor suffer one stripe nor preach one Sermon for the salvation of the Devils and what sadness and shame is it then that I should cause so many insufferable loads of sorrows to fall upon thy sacred head Thou art wholly given for me wholly spent upon my uses and wholly for every one of the Elect. Thou in the beginning of the work of our Redemption didst suffer nine months imprisonment in the pure Womb of thy Holy Mother to redeem me from the eternal servitude of Sin and its miserable consequents Holy Jesu let me be born anew receive a new birth and a new life imitating thy Graces and Excellencies by which thou art beloved of thy Father and hast obtained for us a favour and atonement Let thy holy will be done by me let all thy will be wrought in me let thy will be wrought concerning me that I may do thy pleasure and submit to the dispensation of thy Providence and conform to thy holy will and may for ever serve thee in the Communion of Saints in the society of thy redeemed ones now and in the glories of Eternity Amen SECT III. The Nativity of our Blessed Saviour JESVS The Birth of LESUS And she brought forth her first borne son and wrapped him in swadling clothes and laid him in a manger because there was no roome sor them in the Inne Luk. 2. 7. The Virgin MOTHER S LUKE 11. 27 Blessed is the Womb that bare thee and the paps which thou hast Sucked v. 28. Yea rather Blessed are they that heare the word of God and keep it 1. THE Holy Maid longed to be a glad Mother and she who carried a burthen whose proper commensuration is the days of Eternity counted the tedious minutes expecting when the Sun of Righteousness should break forth from his bed where nine months he hid himself as behind a fruitful cloud About the same time God who in his infinite wisdom does concentre and tie together in one end things of disparate and disproportionate natures making things improbable to cooperate to what wonder or to what truth he pleases brought the Holy Virgin to Bethlehem the City of David to be taxed with her Husband Joseph according to a Decree upon all the World issuing from Augustus Caesar. But this happened in this conjunction of time that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Prophet Micah And thou Bethlehem in the land of Judah art not the least among the Princes of Judah for out of thee shall come a Governour that shall rule my people Israel This rare act of Providence was highly remarkable because this Taxing seems wholly to have been ordered by God to serve and minister to the circumstances of this Birth For this Taxing was not in order to Tribute Herod was now King and received all the Revenues of the Fiscus and paid to Augustus an appointed Tribute after the manner of other Kings Friends and
his leisure either we disrepute the infinity of his Wisdom or give clear demonstration of our own vanity 2. When God descended to earth he chose to be born in the Suburbs and retirement of a small Town but he was pleased to die at Jerusalem the Metropolis of Judaea Which chides our shame and pride who are willing to publish our gayeties in Piazza's and the corners of the streets of most populous places but our defects and the instruments of our humiliation we carry into desarts and cover with the night and hide them under ground thinking no secrecy dark enough to hide our shame nor any theatre large enough to behold our pompous vanities for so we make provisions for Pride and take great care to exclude Humility 3. When the Holy Virgin now perceived that the expectation of the Nations was arrived at the very doors of revelation and entrance into the World she brought forth the Holy Jesus who like Light through transparent glass past through or a ripe Pomegranate from a fruitful tree fell to the earth without doing violence to its Nurse and Parent She had no ministers to attend but Angels and neither her Poverty nor her Piety would permit her to provide other Nurses but her self did the offices of a tender and pious Parent She kissed him and worshipped him and thanked him that he would be born of her and she suckled him and bound him in her arms and swadling-bands and when she had 〈◊〉 to God her first scene of joy and Eucharist she softly laid him in the manger till her desires and his own necessities called her to take him and to rock him softly in her arms and from this deportment she read a lecture of Piety and maternal care which Mothers should perform toward their children when they are born not to neglect any of that duty which nature and maternal piety requires 4. Jesus was pleased to be born of a poor Mother in a poor place in a cold winter's night far from home amongst strangers with all the circumstances of humility and poverty And no man will have cause to complain of his course Robe if he remembers the swadling-clothes of this Holy Child nor to be disquieted at his hard Bed when he considers Jesus laid in a manger nor to be discontented at his thin Table when he calls to mind the King of Heaven and Earth was fed with a little breast-milk But since the eternal wisdom of the Father who knew to chuse the good and refuse the evil did chuse a life of Poverty it gives us demonstration that Riches and Honors those idols of the World's esteem are so far from creating true felicities that they are not of themselves eligible in the number of good things however no man is to be ashamed of innocent Poverty of which many wise men make Vows and of which the Holy Jesus made election and his Apostles after him made publick profession And if any man will chuse and delight in the affluence of temporal good things suffering himself to be transported with caitive affections in the pleasures of every day he may well make a question whether he shall speed as well hereafter since God's usual method is that they only who follow Christ here shall be with him for ever 5. The Condition of the person 〈◊〉 was born is here of greatest consideration For he that cried in the Manger that suck'd the paps of a Woman that hath exposed himself to Poverty and a world of inconveniences is the Son of the living God of the same substance with his Father begotten before all Ages before the Morning-stars he is GOD eternal He is also by reason of the personal Union of the Divinity with his Humane nature the Son of God not by Adoption as good Men and beatified Angels are but by an extraordinary and miraculous Generation He is the Heir of his Father's glories and possessions not by succession for his Father cannot die but by an equality of communication He is the express image of his Father's person according to both Natures the miracle and excess of his Godhead being as upon wax imprinted upon all the capacities of his Humanity And after all this he is our Saviour that to our duties of wonder and adoration we may add the affections of love and union as himself besides his being admirable in himself is become profitable to us Verè Verbum hoc est abbreviatum saith the Prophet The eternal Word of the Father is shortned to the dimensions of an infant 6. Here then are concentred the prodigles of Greatness and Goodness of Wisdom and Charity of Meekness and Humility and march all the way in mysterie and incomprehensible mixtures if we consider him in the bosome of his Father where he is seated by the postures of Love and essential Felicity and in the Manger where Love also placed him and an infinite desire to communicate his Felicities to us As he is God his Throne is in the Heaven and he fills all things by his immensity as he is Man he is circumscribed by an uneasie Cradle and cries in a Stable As he is God he is seated upon a super-exalted Throne as Man exposed to the lowest estate of uneasiness and need As God clothed in a robe of Glory at the same instant when you may behold and wonder at his Humanity wrapped in cheap and unworthy Cradle-bands As God he is incircled with millions of Angels as Man in the company of Beasts As God he is the eternal Word of the Father Eternal sustained by himself all-sufficient and without need and yet he submitted himself to a condition imperfect inglorious indigent and necessitous And this consideration is apt and natural to produce great affections of love duty and obedience desires of union and conformity to his sacred Person Life Actions and Laws that we resolve all our thoughts and finally determine all our reason and our passions and capacities upon that saying of St. Paul He that loves not the Lord Jesus Christ let him be accursed 7. Upon the consideration of these Glories if a pious soul shall upon the supports of Faith and Love enter into the Stable where this great King was born and with affections behold every member of the Holy Body and thence pass into the Soul of Jesus we may see a scheme of holy Meditations enough to entertain all the degrees of our love and of our understanding and make the mysterie of the Nativity as fruitful of holy thoughts as it was of Blessings to us And it may serve instead of a description of the Person of Jesus conveyed to us in imperfect and Apocryphal schemes If we could behold his sacred Feet with those affections which the Holy Virgin did we have transmitted to us those Mysteries in story which she had first in part by spiritual and divine infused light and afterwards by observation Those holy Feet tender and unable to support his sacred Body should bear him over
look upon my miseries thy holy Hands be stretched out to my relief and succour let some of those precious distilling Tears which nature and thy compassion and thy Sufferings did cause to distill and drop from those sacred fontinels water my stony heart and make it soft apt for the impressions of a melting obedient and corresponding love and moisten mine eyes that I may upon thy stock of pity and weeping mourn for my sins that so my tears and sorrows being drops of water coming from that holy Rock may indeed be united unto thine and made precious by such holy mixtures Amen 3. BLessed Jesus now that thou hast sanctified and exalted Humane nature and made even my Body precious by a personal uniting it to the Divinity teach me so reverently to account of it that I may not dare to prophane it with impure lusts or caitive affections and unhallow that ground where thy holy feet have troden Give to me ardent desires and efficacious prosecutions of these holy effects which thou didst design for us in thy Nativity and other parts of our Redemption give me great confidence in thee which thou hast encouraged by the exhibition of so glorious favours great sorrow and confusion of face at the sight of mine own imperfections and estrangements and great distances from thee and the perfections of thy Soul and bring me to thee by the strictnesses of a Zealous and affectionate imitation of those Sanctities which next to the hypostatical Union added lustre and excellency to thy Humanity that I may live here with thee in the expresses of a holy life and die with thee by mortification and an unwearied patience and reign with thee in immortal glories world without end Amen DISCOURSE I. Of Nursing Children in imitation of the Blessed Virgin-Mother 1. THese later Ages of the world have declined into a Softness above the effeminacy of Asian Princes and have contracted customes which those innocent and healthful days of our Ancestors knew not whose Piety was natural whose Charity was operative whose Policy was just and valiant and whose Oeconomy was sincere and proportionable to the dispositions and requisites of Nature And in this particular the good women of old gave one of their instances the greatest personages nurst their own Children did the work of Mothers and thought it was unlikely women should become vertuous by ornaments and superadditions of Morality who did decline the laws and prescriptions of Nature whose principles supply us with the first and most common rules of Manners and more perfect actions In imitation of whom and especially of the Virgin Mary who was Mother and Nurse to the Holy Jesus I shall endeavour to correct those softnesses and unnatural rejections of Children which are popular up to a custom and fashion even where no necessities of Nature or just Reason can make excuse 2. And I cannot think the Question despicable and the Duty of meanest consideration although it be specified in an office of small esteem and suggested to us by the principles of Reason and not by express sanctions of Divinity For although other actions are more perfect and spiritual yet this is more natural and humane other things being superadded to a full Duty rise higher but this builds stronger and is like a part of the foundation having no lustre but much strength and however the others are full of ornament yet this hath in it some degrees of necessity and possibly is with more danger and irregularity omitted than actions which spread their leaves fairer and look more gloriously 3. First here I consider that there are many sins in the scene of the Body and the matter of Sobriety which are highly criminal and yet the Laws of God expressed in Scripture name them not but men are taught to distinguish them by that Reason which is given us by nature and is imprinted in our understanding in order to the conservation of humane kind For since every creature hath something in it sufficient to propagate the kind and to conserve the individuals from perishing in confusions and general disorders which in Beasts we call Instinct that is an habitual or prime disposition to do certain things which are proportionable to the End whither it is designed Man also if he be not more imperfect must have the like and because he knows and makes reflexions upon his own acts and understands the reason of it that which in them is Instinct in him is natural Reason which is a desire to preserve himself and his own kind and differs from Instinct because he understands his Instinct and the reasonableness of it and they do not But Man being a higher thing even in the order of creation and designed to a more noble End in his animal capacity his Argumentative Instinct is larger than the Natural Instinct of Beasts for he hath Instincts in him in order to the conservation of Society and therefore hath Principles that is he hath natural desires to it for his own good and because he understands them they are called Principles and Laws of Nature but are no other than what I have now declared for Beasts do the same things we do and have many the same inclinations which in us are the Laws of Nature even all which we have in order to our common End But that which in Beasts is Nature and an impulsive force in us must be duty and an inviting power we must do the same things with an actual or habitual designation of that End to which God designs Beasts supplying by his wisdom their want of understanding and then what is mere Nature in them in us is Natural reason And therefore Marriage in men is made sacred when the mixtures of other creatures are so merely natural that they are not capable of being vertuous because men are bound to intend that End which God made And this with the superaddition of other Ends of which Marriage is representative in part and in part effective does consecrate Marriage and makes it holy and mysterious But then there are in marriage many duties which we are taught by Instinct that is by that Reason whereby we understand what are the best means to promote the End which we have assigned us And by these Laws all unnatural mixtures are made unlawful and the decencies which are to be observed in Marriage are prescribed us by this 4. Secondly Upon the supposition of this Discourse I consider again that although to observe this Instinct or these Laws of Nature in which I now have instanced be no great vertue in any eminency of degree as no man is much commended for not killing himself or for not degenerating into beastly Lusts yet to prevaricate some of these Laws may become almost the greatest sin in the world And therefore although to live according to Nature be a testimony fit to give to a sober and a temperate man and rises no higher yet to do an action against Nature is the greatest
it is not easily apprehended to be the portion of her care to give it spiritual milk and therefore it intrenches very much upon Impiety and positive relinquishing the education of their Children when Mothers expose the spirit of the Child either to its own weaker inclinations or the wicked principles of an ungodly Nurse or the carelesness of any less-obliged person 12. And then let me add That a Child sucks the Nurse's milk and digests her conditions if they be never so bad seldom gets any good For Vertue being superaddition to Nature and Perfections not radical in the body but contradictions to and meliorations of natural indispositions does not easily convey it self by ministrations of food as Vice does which in most instances is nothing but mere Nature grown to Custom and not mended by Grace so that it is probable enough such natural distemperatures may pass in the rivulets of milk like evil spirits in a white garment when Vertues are of harder purchase and dwell so low in the heart that they but rarely pass through the fountains of generation And therefore let no Mother venture her child upon a stranger whose heart she less knows than her own And because few of those nicer women think better of others than themselves since out of self-love they neglect their own bowels it is but an act of improvidence to let my Child derive imperfections from one of whom I have not so good an opinion as of my self 13. And if those many blessings and holy prayers which the Child needs or his askings or sicknesses or the Mother's fears or joyes respectively do occasion should not be cast into this account yet those principles which in all cases wherein the neglect is vicious are the causes of the exposing the Child are extremely against the Piety and Charity of Christian Religion which prescribes severity and austere deportment and the labours of love and exemplar tenderness of affections and piety to children which are the most natural and nearest relations the Parents have That Religion which commands us to visit and to tend sick strangers and wash the feet of the poor and dress their ulcers and sends us upon charitable embassies into unclean prisons and bids us lay down our lives for one another is not pleased with a niceness and sensual curiosity that I may not name the wantonnesses of lusts which denies suck to our own children What is more humane and affectionate than Christianity and what is less natural and charitable than to deny the expresses of a Mother's affection which certainly to good women is the greatest trouble in the world and the greatest violence to their desires if they should not express and minister 14. And it would be considered whether those Mothers who have neglected their first Duties of Piety and Charity can expect so prompt and easie returns of Duty and Piety from their Children whose best foundation is Love and that love strongest which is most natural and that most natural which is conveyed by the first ministeries and impresses of Nourishment and Education And if Love descends more strongly than it ascends and commonly falls from the Parents upon the Children in Cataracts and returns back again up to the Parents but in gentle Dews if the Child's affection keeps the same proportions towards such unkind Mothers it will be as little as atoms in the Sun and never express it self but when the Mother needs it not that is in the Sun-shine of a clear fortune 15. This then is amongst those Instincts which are natural heightned first by Reason and then exalted by Grace into the obligation of a Law and being amongst the Sanctions of Nature its prevarication is a crime very near those sins which Divines in detestation of their malignity call Sins against Nature and is never to be excused but in cases of Necessity or greater Charity as when the Mother cannot be a Nurse by reason of natural disability or is afflicted with a disease which might be 〈◊〉 in the milk or in case of the publick necessities of a Kingdom for the securing of Succession in the Royal Family And yet concerning this last Lycurgus made a Law that the Noblest amongst the Spartan women though their Kings Wives should at least nurse their Eldest son and the Plebeians should nurse all theirs and Plutarch reports that the second son of King Themistes inherited the Kingdom in Sparta only because he was nursed with his Mother's milk and the eldest was therefore rejected because a stranger was his Nurse And that Queens have suckled and nursed their own children is no very unusual kindness in the simplicity and hearty affections of elder Ages as is to be seen in Herodotus and other Historians I shall only remark one instance out of the Spanish Chronicles which Henry Stephens in his Apology for Herodotus reports to have heard from thence related by a noble personage Monsieur Marillac That a Spanish Lady married into France nursed her child with so great a tenderness and jealousie that having understood the little Prince once to have suck'd a stranger she was unquiet till she had forced him to vomit it up again In other cases the crime lies at their door who inforce neglect upon the other and is heightned in proportion to the motive of the omission as if Wantonness or Pride be the parent of the crime the Issue besides its natural deformity hath the excrescencies of Pride or Lust to make it more ugly 16. To such Mothers I propound the example of the Holy Virgin who had the honour to be visited by an Angel yet after the example of the Saints in the Old Testament she gave to the Holy Jesus drink from those bottles which himself had filled for his own drinking and her Paps were as surely blessed for giving him suck as her Womb for bearing him and reads a Lecture of Piety and Charity which if we deny to our children there is then in the world left no argument or relation great enough to kindle it from a cinder to a flame God gives dry breasts for a curse to some for an affliction to others but those that invite it to them by voluntary arts love not blessing therefore shall it be far from them And I remember that it was said concerning Annius Minutius the Censor that he thought it a prodigy and extremely ominous to Rome that a Roman Lady refused to nurse her Child and yet gave suck to a Puppy that her milk might with more safety be dried up with artificial applications Let none therefore divide the interests of their own Children for she that appeared before Solomon and would have the Child divided was not the true Mother and was the more culpable of the two The PRAYER O Holy and Eternal God Father of the Creatures and King of all the World who hast imprinted in all the sons of thy Creation principles and abilities to serve the end of their own preservation and to Men
the whole body of Sin and to destroy every Province of Satan's Kingdom for these are direct antinomies to the Lusts of the flesh the Last of the eyes and the Pride of life Against the first Christ opposed his hard and uneasie Lodging against the second the poorness of his Swadling-bands and Mantle and the third is combated by the great dignation and descent of Christ from a Throne of Majesty to the state of a sucking Babe And these are the first Lessons he hath taught us for our imitation which that we may the better do as we must take him for our pattern so also for our helper and pray to the Holy Child and he will not only teach us but also give us power and ability The PRAYER O Blessed and Eternal Jesu at whose Birth the Quires of Angels sang praises to God and proclaimed peace to Men sanctifie my Will and inferiour Affections make me to be within the conditions of Peace that I be holy and mortified a despiser of the world and exteriour vanities humble and charitable that by thy eminent example I may be so fixed in the designs and prosecution of the Ends of God and a blissful Eternity that I be unmoved with the terrors of the world unaltered with its allurements and seductions not ambitious of its honour not desirous of its fulness and plenty but make me diligent in the imployment thou givest me faithful in discharge of my trust modest in my desires content in the issues of thy Providence that in such dispositions I may receive and entertain visitations from Heaven and Revelations of the Mysteries and blisses Evangelical that by such directions I may be brought into thy presence there to see thy Beauties and admire thy Graces and imitate all thy imitable Excellencies and rest in thee for ever in this world by the perseverance of a holy and comfortable life and in the world to come in the participation of thy essential Glories and Felicities O Blessed and Eternal Jesus Considerations of the Epiphany of the B. Jesus by a Star and the Adoration of Jesus by the Eastern Magi. 1. GOD who is the universal Father of all Men at the Nativity of the Messias gave notice of it to all the World as they were represented by the grand Division of Jews and Gentiles to the Jewish Shepherds by an Angel to the Eastern Magi by a Star For the Gospel is of universal dissemination not confined within the limits of a national Prerogative but Catholick and diffused As God's Love was so was the dispensation of it without respect of persons for all being included under the curse of Sin were to him equal and indifferent undistinguishable objects of Mercy And Jesus descended of the Jews was also the expectation of the Gentiles and therefore communicated to all the Grace of God being like the air we breathe and it hath appeared to all men saith S. Paul but the conveyances and communications of it were different in the degrees of clarity and illustration The Angel told the Shepherds the story of the Nativity plainly and literally The Star invited the Wise men by its rareness and preternatural apparition to which also as by a foot-path they had been led by the Prophecy of Balaam 2. But here first the Grace of God prevents us without him we can do nothing he lays the first Stone in every Spiritual Building and then expects by that strength he first gave us that we make the Superstructures But as a Stone thrown into a River first moves the water and disturbs its surface into a Circle and then its own force wafts the neighbouring drops into a larger figure by its proper weight so is the Grace of God the first principle of our spiritual motion and when it moves us into its own figure and hath actuated and ennobled our natural Powers by the influence of that first incentive we continue the motion and enlarge the progress But as the Circle on the face of the waters grows weaker till it hath smoothed it self into a natural and even current unless the force be renewed or continued so does all our natural endeavour when first set a-work by God's preventing Grace decline to the imperfection of its own kind unless the same force be made energetical and operative by the continuation and renewing of the same supernatural influence 3. And therefore the Eastern Magi being first raised up into wonder and curiosity by the apparition of the Star were very far from finding Jesus by such general and indefinite significations but then the goodness of God's Grace increased its own influence for an inspiration from the Spirit of God admonished them to observe the Star shewed the Star that they might find it taught them to acknowledge it instructed them to understand its purpose and invited them to follow it and never left them till they had found the Holy Jesus Thus also God deals with us He gives us the first Grace and adds the second he enlightens our Understandings and actuates our Faculties and sweetly allures us by the proposition of Rewards and wounds us with the arrows of his Love and inflames us with fire from Heaven ever giving us new assistances or increasing the old refreshing us with comforts or arming us with patience sometimes stirring our affections by the lights held out to our Understanding sometimes bringing confirmation to our understanding by the motion of our Affections till by variety of means we at last arrive at Lethlehem in the service and entertainments of the Holy Jesus Which we shall certainly do if we follow the invitations of Grace and exteriour assistances which are given us to instruct us to help us and to invite us but not to force our endeavours and cooperations 4. As it was an unsearchable wisdom so it was an unmeasurable grace of Providence and dispensation which God did exhibit to the Wise men to them as to all men disposing the Ministeries of his Grace sweetly and by proportion to the capacities of the person suscipient For God called the Gentiles by such means which their Customs and Learning had made prompt and easie For these Magi were great Philosophers and Astronomers and therefore God sent a miraculous Star to invite and lead them to a new and more glorious light the lights of Grace and Glory And God so blessed them in following the Star to which their innocent Curiosity and national Customs were apt to lead them that their Custom was changed to Grace and their Learning heightned with Inspiration and God crowned all with a spiritual and glorious event It was not much unlike which God did to the Princes and Diviners among the Philistines who sent the Ark back with five golden Emrods and five golden Mice an act proportionable to the Custom and sense of their Nation and Religion yet God accepted their opinion and divination to the utmost end they designed it and took the plagues of Emrods and Mice from them For
sweetnesses which represent the glory of the reward by the Antepasts and refreshments dispensed even in the ruggedness of the way and incommodities of the journey All other delights are the pleasures of Beasts or the sports of Children these are the Antepasts and preventions of the full Feasts and overflowings of Eternity 10. When they came to Bethlehem and the Star pointed them to a Stable they entred in and being enlightned with a Divine Ray proceeding from the face of the Holy Child and seeing through the cloud and passing through the scandal of his mean Lodging and poor condition they bowed themselves to the earth first giving themselves an Oblation to this great King then they made offering of their Gifts for a man's person is first accepted then his Gift God first regarded Abel and then accepted his Offering which we are best taught to understand by the present instance for it means no more but that all outward Services and Oblations are made acceptable by the prior presentation of an inward Sacrifice If we have first presented our selves then our Gift is pleasant as coming but to express the truth of the first Sacrifice but if our Persons be not first made a Holocaust to God the lesser Oblations of outward Presents are like Sacrifices without Salt and Fire nothing to make them pleasant or religious For all other sences of this Proposition charge upon God the distinguishing and acceptation of Persons against which he solemnly protests God regards no man's Person but according to the doing of his Duty but then God is said first to accept the Person and then the Gist when the Person is first sanctified and given to God by the vows and habits of a holy life and then all the actions of his Religion are homogeneal to their principle and accepted by the acceptation of the man 11. These Magi presented to the Holy Babe Gold Frankincense and Myrrh protesting their Faith of three Articles by the symbolical Oblation By Gold that he was a King by Incense that he was a God by Myrrh that he was a Man And the Presents also were representative of interiour Vertues the Myrrh signifying Faith Mortification Chastity Compunction and all the actions of the Purgative way of Spiritual life the Incense signifying Hope Prayer Obedience good Intention and all the actions and Devotions of the Illuminative the giving the Gold representing Love to God and our Neighbours the Contempt of riches Poverty of spirit and all the eminencies and spiritual riches of the Unitive life And these Oblations if we present to the Holy Jesus both our Persons and our Gifts shall be accepted our Sins shall be purged our Understandings enlightned and our Wills united to this Holy Child and entitled to a communion of all his Glories 12. And thus in one view and two Instances God hath drawn all the world to himself by his Son Jesus in the Instance of the Shepherds and the Arabian Magi Jews and Gentiles Learned and Unlearned Rich and Poor Noble and Ignoble that in him all Nations and all Conditions and all Families and all persons might be blessed having called all by one Star or other by natural Reason or by the secrets of Philosophy by the Revelations of the Gospel or by the ministery of Angels by the Illuminations of the Spirit or by the Sermons and Dictates of spiritual Fathers and hath consigned this Lesson to us That we must never appear before the Lord empty offering Gifts to him by the expences or by the affections of Charity either the worshipping or the oblations of Religion either the riches of the World or the love of the Soul for if we cannot bring Gold with the rich Arabians we may with the poor Shepherds come and kiss the Son lest he be angry and in all cases come and serve him with fear and reverence and spiritual rejoycings The PRAYER MOst Holy Jesu Thou art the Glory of thy people Israel and a light to the Gentiles and wert pleased to call the Gentiles to the adoration and knowledge of thy sacred Person and Laws communicating the inestimable riches of thy holy Discipline to all with an universal undistinguishing Love give unto us spirits docible pious prudent and ductile that no motion or invitation of Grace be ineffectual but may produce excellent effects upon us and the secret whispers of thy Spirit may prevail upon our Affections in order to Piety and Obedience as certainly as the loudest and most clamorous Sermons of the Gospel Create in us such Excellencies as are fit to be presented to thy glorious Majesty accept of the Oblation of my self and my entire services but be thou pleased to verifie my Offering and secure the possession to thy self that the enemy may not pollute the Sacrifice or divide the Gift or question the Title but that I may be wholly thine and for ever clarifie my Understanding sanctifie my Will replenish my Memory with arguments of Piety then shall I present to thee an Oblation rich and precious as the treble gift of the Levantine Princes Lord I am thine reject me not from thy favour exclude me not from thy presence then shall I serve thee all the days of my life and partake of the glories of thy Kingdom in which thou reignest gloriously and eternally Amen SECT V. Of the Circumcision of JESUS and his Presentation in the Temple The Circumcision of Iesus S. LUKE 2. 21. And when eight daies were accomphshed for the circumcising of the Child his name was called Iesus which was so named of the angel before he was conceived in the Wombe The Purification and Presentation S. LUKE 2. 22. And when the dayes of her purification were accomplished they brought him to Ierusalem to present him to the Lord. 1. AND now the Blessed Saviour of the World began to do the work of his Mission and our Redemption and because Man had prevaricated all the Divine Commandments to which all humane nature respectively to the persons of several capacities was obliged and therefore the whole Nature was obnoxious to the just rewards of its demerits first Christ was to put that Nature he had assumed into a saveable condition by fulfilling his Father's preceptive will and then to reconcile it actually by suffering the just deservings of its Prevarications He therefore addresses himself to all the parts of an active Obedience and when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising of the Child he exposed his tender body to the sharpness of the circumcising stone and shed his bloud in drops giving an earnest of those rivers which he did afterwards pour out for the cleansing all Humane nature and extinguishing the wrath of God 2. He that had no sin nor was conceived by natural generation could have no adherences to his Soul or Body which needed to be pared away by a Rite and cleansed by a Mystery neither indeed do we find it expressed that Circumcision was ordained for abolition or pardon of original sin it
Princes in the conspiracy of Dathan that 's for the Temporal And to encourage this Duty I shall use no other words than those of Achilles in Homer They that obey in this world are better than they that command in Hell A PRAYER for the Grace of Holy OBEDIENCE O Lord and Blessed Saviour Jesus by whose Obedience many became righteous and reparations were made of the ruines brought to humane Nature by the Disobedience of Adam thou camest into the world with many great and holy purposes concerning our Salvation and hast given us a great precedent of Obedience which that thou mightest preserve to thy Heavenly Father thou didst neglect thy Life and becamest obedient even to the death of the Cross O let me imit ate so blessed example and by the merits of thy Obedience let me obtain the grace of Humility and Abnegation of all my own desires in the clearest Renunciation of my Will that I may will and refuse in conformity to thy sacred Laws and holy purposes that I may do all thy will chearfully chusingly humbly confidently and continually and thy will may be done upon me with much mercy and fatherly dispensation of thy Providence Amen 2. LOrd let my Understanding adhere to and be satisfied in the excellent 〈◊〉 of thy Commandments let my Affections dwell in their desires and all my other Faculties be set on daily work for performance of them and let my love to obey thee make me dutiful to my Superiors upon whom the impresses of thy Authority are set by thine own hand that I may never despise their Persons nor refuse their Injunctions nor chuse mine own work nor murmur at their burthens nor dispute the prudence of the Sanction nor excuse my self nor pretend 〈◊〉 or impossibilities but that I may be 〈◊〉 in my desires and resigned to the will of those whom thou hast set over me that since all thy Creatures obey thy word I alone may not disorder the Creation and cancel those bands and intermedial links of Subordination whereby my duty should pass to 〈◊〉 and thy glory but that my Obedience being united to thy Obedience I may also have my portion in the 〈◊〉 of thy Kingdom O Lord and Blessed Saviour Jesus Amen Considerations upon the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple 1. THE Holy Virgin-Mother according to the Law of Moses at the expiration of a certain time came to the Temple to be purified although in her sacred Parturition she had contracted no Legal impurity yet she exposed her self to the publick opinion and common reputation of an ordinary condition and still amongst all generations she is in all circumstances accounted blessed and her reputation no tittle altered save only that it is made the more sacred by this testimony of her Humility But this we are taught from the consequence of this instance That if an End principally designed in any Duty should be supplied otherwise in any particular person the Duty is nevertheless to be observed and then the obedience and publick order is reason enough for the observation though the proper End of its designation be wanting in the single person Thus is Fasting designed for mortification of the flesh and killing all its unruly appetites and yet Married persons who have another remedy and a Virgin whose Temple is hallowed by a gift and the strict observances of Chastity may be tied to the Duty and if they might not then Fasting were nothing else but a publication of our impure desires and an exposing the person to the confidence of a bold temptation whilst the young men did observe the Faster to be tempted from within But the Holy Virgin from these acts of which in signification she had no need because she sinned not in the Conception nor was impure in the production expressed other Vertues besides Obedience such as were humble thoughts of her self Devotion and Reverence to publick Sanctions Religion and Charity which were like the pure leaves of the whitest Lily fit to represent the beauties of her innocence but were veiled and shadowed by that sacramental of the Mosaick Law 2. The Holy Virgin received the greatest favour that any of the Daughters of Adam ever did and knowing from whence and for whose glory she had received it returns the Holy Jesus in a Present to God again for she had nothing so precious as himself to make oblation of and besides that every first-born among the Males was holy to the Lord this Child had an eternal and essential Sanctity and until he came into the World and was made apt for her to make present of him there was never in the world any act of Adoration proportionable to the honour of the great God but now there was and the Holy Virgin made it when she presented the Holy Child Jesus And now besides that we are taught to return to God whatsoever we have received from him if we unite our Offerings and Devotions to this holy Present we shall by the merit and excellency of this Oblation exhibit to God an Offertory in which he cannot but delight for the combination's sake and society of his Holy Son 3. The Holy Mother brought five Sicles and a pair of Turtle-doves to redeem the Lamb of God from the Anathema because every first-born was to be sacrificed to God or redeemed if it was clean it was the poor man's price and the Holy Jesus was never set at the greater prices when he was estimated upon earth For he that was Lord of the Kingdom chose his portion among the poor of this World that he might advance the poor to the riches of his inheritance and so it was from his Nativity hither For at his Birth he was poor at his Circumcision poor and in the likeness of a sinner at his Presentation poor and like a sinner and a servant for he chose to be redeemed with an ignoble price The five Sicles were given to the Priest for the redemption of the Child and if the Parents were not able he was to be a servant of the Temple and to minister in the inferiour offices to the Priest and this was God's seizure and possession of him for although all the servants of God are his inheritance yet the Ministers of Religion who derive their portion of temporals from his title who live upon the Corban and eat the meat of the Altar which is God's peculiar and come nearer to his Holiness by the addresses of an immediate ministration are God's own upon another and a distinct challenge But because Christ was to be the Prince of another Ministry and the chief Priest of another Order he was redeemed from attending the Mosaick Rites which he came to 〈◊〉 that he might do his Father's business in establishing the Evangelical Only remember that the Ministers of Religion are but God's 〈◊〉 as they are not Lords of God's portion and therefore must dispense it like Stewards not like Masters so the People are 〈◊〉 their Patrons in paying nor
they their Beneficiaries in receiving Tithes or other provisions of maintenance they owe for it to none but to God himself and it would also be considered that in all sacrilegious detentions of Ecclesiastical rights God is the person principally injured 4. The Turtle-doves were offered also with the signification of another mystery In the sacred Rites of Marriage although the permissions of natural desires are such as are most ordinate to their ends the avoiding Fornication the alleviation of Oeconomical cares and vexations and the production of Children and mutual comfort and support yet the apertures and permissions of Marriage have such restraints of modesty and prudence that all transgression of the just order to such ends is a crime and besides these there may be degrees of inordination or obliquity of intention or too sensual complacency or unhandsom preparations of mind or unsacramental thoughts in which particulars because we have no determined rule but Prudence and the analogy of the Rite and the severity of our Religion which allow in some cases more in some 〈◊〉 and always uncertain latitudes for ought we know there may be lighter transgressions something that we know not of and for these at the Purification of the woman it is supposed the Offering was made and the Turtures by being an oblation did deprecate a supposed irregularity but by being a chast and marital Embleme they professed the obliquity if any were was within the protection of the sacred bands of Marriage and therefore so excusable as to be expiated by a cheap offering and what they did in Hieroglyphick Christians must do in the exposition be strict observers of the main rites and principal obligations and not neglectful to deprecate the lesser unhandsomenesses of the too sensual applications 5. God had at that instant so ordered that for great ends of his own and theirs two very holy persons of divers Sexes and like Piety 〈◊〉 and Anna the one who lived an active and secular the other a retired and contemplative life should come into the Temple by revelation and direction of the holy Spirit and see him whom they and all the World did look for the Lord 's CHRIST the consolation of Israel They saw him they rejoyced they worshipped they prophesied they sang Hymns and old Simeon did comprehend and circumscribe in his arms him that filled all the World and was then so satisfied that he desired to live no longer God had verified his promise had shewn him the Messias had filled his heart with joy and made his old age honourable and now after all this sight no object could be pleasant but the joys of Paradise For as a man who hath stared too freely upon the face and beauties of the Sun is blind and dark to objects of a less splendor and is forced to shut his eyes that he may through the degrees of darkness perceive the inferiour beauties of more proportioned objects so was old Simeon his eyes were so filled with the glories of this Revelation that he was willing to close them in his last night that he might be brought into the communications of Eternity and he could never more find comfort in any other object this world could minister For such is the excellency of spiritual things when they have once filled the corners of our hearts and made us highly sensible and apprehensive of the interiour beauties of God and of Religion all things of this World are flat and empty and unsatisfying vanities as unpleasant as the lees of Vineger to a tongue filled with the spirit of high Italick Wines And until we are so dead to the World as to apprehend no gust or freer complacency in exteriour objects we never have entertained Christ or have had our cups overflow with Devotion or are filled with the Spirit When our Chalice is filled with holy oyl with the Anointing from above it will entertain none of the waters of bitterness or if it does they are thrust to the bottom they are the lowest of our desires and therefore only admitted because they are natural and constituent 6. The good old Prophetess Anna had lived long in chast Widowhood in the service of the Temple in the continual offices of Devotion in Fasting and Prayer and now came the happy instant in which God would give her a great benediction and an earnest of a greater The returns of Prayer and the blessings of Piety are certain and though not dispensed according to the expectances of our narrow conceptions 〈◊〉 shall they so come at such times and in such measures as shall crown the Piety and 〈◊〉 the desires and reward the expectation It was in the Temple the same place where she had for so many years poured out her heart to God that God poured forth his heart to her sent his Son from his bosom and there she received his benediction Indeed in such places God does most particularly exhibit himself and Blessing goes along with him where-ever he goes In holy places God hath put his holy Name and to holy persons God does oftentimes manifest the interiour and more secret glories of his Holiness provided they come thither as old Simeon and Anna did by the motions of the holy Spirit not with designs of vanity or curiosity or sensuality for such spirits as those come to profane and desecrate the house and unhallow the person and provoke the Deity of the place and blast us with unwholsom airs 7. But Joseph and Mary wondred at these things which were spoken and treasured them in their hearts and they became matter of Devotion and mental Prayer or Meditation The PRAYER O Eternal God who by the Inspirations of thy Holy Spirit didst direct thy servants Simeon and Anna to the Temple at the instant of the Presentation of the Holy Child Jesus that so thou mightest verifie thy promise and manifest thy Son and reward the 〈◊〉 of holy people who longed for Redemption by the coming of the Messias give me the perpetual assistance of the same Spirit to be as a Monitor and a Guide to me leading me to all holy actions and to the embracements and possessions of thy glorious Son and remember all thy faithful people who wait for the consolation and redemption of the Church from all her miseries and persecutions and at last satisfie their desires by the revelations of thy mercies and Salvation Thou hast advanced thy Holy Child and set him up for a sign of thy Mercies and a representation of thy Glories Lord let no act or thought or word of mine ever be in contradiction to this blessed sign but let it be for the ruine of all my vices and all the powers the Devil imploys against the Church and for the raising up all those vertues and Graces which thou didst design me in the purposes of Eternity but let my portion never be amongst the 〈◊〉 or the scornful or the Heretical or the profane or any of those who stumble at this Stone
these impurities and vanities Jesus hath redeemed all his Disciples and not only thrown out of his Temples all the impure rites of Flora and Cybele but also the trifling and unprofitable ceremonies of the more sober Deities not only Vices but useless and unprofitable Speculations and hath consecrated our Head into a Temple our Understanding to Spirit our Reason to Religion our Study to Meditation and this is the first part of the Sanctification of our Spirit 6. And this was the cause Holy Scripture commands the duty of Meditation in proportion still to the excellencies of Piety and a holy life to which it is highly and aptly instrumental Blessed is the man that meditates in the Law of the Lord day and night And the reason of the Proposition and the use of the Duty is expressed to this purpose Thy words have I hid in my heart that I should not sin against thee The placing and fixing those divine Considerations in our understandings and hiding them there are designs of high Christian prudence that they with advantage may come forth in the expresses of a holy life For what in the world is more apt and natural to produce Humility than to meditate upon the low stoopings and descents of the Holy Jesus to the nature of a Man to the weaknesses of a Child to the poverties of a Stable to the ignobleness of a Servant to the shame of the Cross to the pains of Cruelty to the dust of Death to the title of a Sinner and to the wrath of God By this instance Poverty is made honourable and Humility is sanctified and made noble and the contradictions of nature are amiable and 〈◊〉 for a wise election Thus hatred of sin shame of our selves confusion at the sense of humane misery the love of God confidence in his Promises desires of Heaven holy resolutions resignation of our own appetites 〈◊〉 to Divine will oblations of our selves Repentance and mortification are the proper emanations from Meditation of the sordidness of sin our proneness to it our daily miseries as issues of Divine vengeance the glories of God his infinite unalterable Veracity the satisfactions in the vision of God the rewards of Piety the rectitude of the Laws of God and perfection of his Sanctions God's supreme and paternal Dominion and his certain malediction of sinners and when any one of these Considerations is taken to pieces and so placed in the rooms of application that a piece of duty is conjoyned to a piece of the mystery and the whole office to the purchase of a grace or the extermination of a vice it is like opening our windows to let in the Sun and the Wind and Holiness is as proportioned an effect to this practice as Glory is to a persevering Holiness by way of reward and moral causality 7. For all the Affections that are in Man are either natural or by chance or by the incitation of Reason and discourse Our natural affections are not worthy the entertainments of a Christian they must be supernatural and divine that put us into the hopes of Perfection and Felicities and these other that are good unless they come by Meditation they are but accidental and set with the evening Sun But if they be produced upon the strengths of pious Meditation they are as perpetual as they are reasonable and excellent in proportion to the Piety of the principle A Garden that is watered with short and sudden showrs is more uncertain in its fruits and beauties than if a Rivulet waters it with a perpetual distilling and constant humectation And just such are the short emissions and unpremeditated resolutions of Piety begotten by a dash of holy rain from Heaven whereby God sometimes uses to call the careless but to taste what excellencies of Piety they neglect but if they be not produced by the Reason of Religion and the Philosophy of Meditation they have but the life of a Fly or a tall Gourd they come into the World only to say they had a Being you could scarce know their length but by measuring the ground they cover in their fall 8. For since we are more moved by material and sensible objects than by things merely speculative and intellectual and generals even in spiritual things are less perceived and less motive than particulars Meditation frames the understanding part of Religion to the proportions of our nature and our weakness by making some things more circumstantiate and material and the more spiritual to be particular and therefore the more applicable and the mystery is made like the Gospel to the Apostles Our eyes do see and our ears do hear and our hands do handle thus much of the word of life as is prepared for us in the Meditation 9. First And therefore every wise person that intends to furnish himself with affections of Religion or detestation against a Vice or glorifications of a Mystery still will proportion the Mystery and fit it with such circumstances of fancy and application as by observation of himself he knows aptest to make impression It was a wise design of Mark Antony when he would stir up the people to revenge the death of Caesar he brought his body to the pleading-place he shewed his wounds held up the rent mantle and shewed them the garment that he put on that night in which he beat the Nervii that is in which he won a victory for which his memory was dear to them he shewed them that wound which pierced his heart in which they were placed by so dear a love that he made them his heirs and left to their publick use places of delight and pleasure and then it was natural when he had made those things present to them which had once moved their love and his honour that grief at the loss of so honourable and so lov'd a person should succeed and then they were Lords of all their sorrow and revenge seldom slept in two beds And thus holy Meditation produces the passions and desires it intends it makes the object present and almost sensible it renews the first passions by a fiction of imagination it passes from the Paschal Parlour to Cedron it tells the drops of sweat and measures them and finds them as big as drops of bloud and then conjectures at the greatness of our sins it fears in the midst of Christ's Agonies it hears his groans it spies Judas his Lantern afar off it follows Jesus to Gabbatha and wonders at his innocence and their malice and feels the strokes of the Whip and shrinks the head when the Crown of Thorns is thrust hard upon his holy brows and at last goes step by step with Jesus and carries part of the Cross and is nailed fast with sorrow and compassion and dies with love For if the Soul be principle of its own actions it can produce the same effects by reflex acts of the Understanding when it is assisted by the Imaginative part as when it sees the thing
certainly take away thy need or satisfie it he will feed thee himself as he did the Israelites or take away thy hunger as he did to Moses or send ravens to feed thee as he did to Elias or make charitable people minister to thee as the Widow to Elisha or give thee his own portion as he maintained the Levites or make thine enemies to pity thee as the Assyrians did the captive Jews For whatsoever the World hath and whatsoever can be conveyed by wonder or by providence all that is thy security for provisions so long as thou doest the work of God And remember that the assurance of Blessing and Health and Salvation is not made by doing what we list or being where we desire but by doing God's will and being in the place of his appointment we may be safe in Egypt if we be there in obedience to God and we may perish among the Babes of Bethlehem if we be there by our own election 4. Joseph and Mary did not argue against the Angel's message because they had a confidence of their charge who with the breath of his mouth could have destroyed Herod though he had been abetted with all the Legions marching under the Roman Eagles but they like the two Cherubims about the Propitiatory took the Child between them and fled giving way to the fury of Persecution which possibly when the materials are withdrawn might expire and die like fire which else would rage for ever Jesus fled undertook a sad Journey in which the roughness of the ways his own tenderness the youth of his Mother the old age of his supposed Father the smalness of their viaticum and accommodation for their voyage the no-kindred they were to go to hopeless of comsorts and exteriour supplies were so many circumstances of Poverty and lesser strokes of the Persecution things that himself did chuse to remonstrate the verity of his Nature the infirmity of his Person the humility of his spirit the austerity of his undertaking the burthen of his charge and by which he did teach us the same vertues he then expressed and also consign'd this permission to all his Disciples in future Ages that they also may fly from their persecutors when the case is so that their work is not done that is they may glorifie God with their lives more than with their death And of this they are ascertained by the arguments of prudent account For sometimes we are called to glorisie God by dying and the interest of the Church and the Faith of many may be concerned in it then we must abide by it In other cases it is true that Demosthenes said in apology for his own escaping from a lost field A man that runs away may fight again And S. Paul made use of a guard of Souldiers to rescue him from the treachery of the Jewish Rulers and of a basket to escape from the Inquisition of the Governour of Damascus and the Primitive Christians of Grotts and subterraneous retirements and S. Athanasius of a fair Ladie 's House and others of desarts and graves as knowing it was no shame to fly when their Master himself had fled that his time and his work might be fulfilled and when it was he then laid his life down 5. It is hard to set down particular Rules that may indefinitely guide all persons in the stating of their own case because all things that depend upon circumstances are alterable unto infinite But as God's glory and the good of the Church are the great considerations to be carried before us all the way and in proportions to them we are to determine and judge our Questions so also our infirmities are allowable in the scrutiny for I doubt not but God intended it a mercy and a compliance with humane weakness when he gave us this permission as well as it was a design to secure the opportunities of his service and the consummation of his own work by us And since our fears and the incommodities of flight and the sadness of exile and the insecurities and inconveniences of a strange and new abode are part of the Persecution provided that God's glory be not certainly and apparently neglected nor the Church evidently scandalized by our 〈◊〉 all interpretations of the question in favour of our selves and the declension of that part which may tempt us to apostasie or hazard our confidence and the chusing the lesser part of the Persecution is not against the rule of Faith and always hath in it less glory but oftentimes more security 6. But thus far Herod's Ambition transported him even to resolutions of murther of the highest person the most glorious and the most innocent upon earth and it represents that Passion to be the most troublesome and vexatious thing that can afflict the sons of men Vertue hath not half so much trouble in it it sleeps quietly without startings and affrighting fancies it looks chearfully smiles with much 〈◊〉 and though it laughs not often yet it is ever delightful in the apprehensions of some faculty it fears no man nor no thing nor is it discomposed and hath no concernments in the great alterations of the World and entertains Death like a Friend and reckons the issues of it as the greatest of its hopes but Ambition is full of distractions it teems with stratagems as Rebecca with strugling twins and is swelled with expectation as with a tympany and sleeps sometimes as the wind in a storm still and quiet for a minute that it may burst out into an impetuous blast till the cordage of his heart-strings crack fears when none is 〈◊〉 and prevents things which never had intention and falls under the inevitability of such accidents which either could not be foreseen or not prevented It is an infinite labour to make a man's self miserable and the utmost acquist is so goodly a purchase that he makes his days full of sorrow to enjoy the troubles of a three years reign for Herod lived but three years or five at the most after the flight of Jesus into Egypt And therefore there is no greater unreasonableness in the world than in the designs of Ambition for it makes the present certainly miserable unsatisfied troublesome and discontent for the uncertain acquist of an honour which nothing can secure and besides a thousand possibilities of miscarrying it relies upon no greater certainty than our life and when we are dead all the world sees who was the fool But it is a strange caitiveness and baseness of disposition of men so furiously and unsatiably to run after perishing and uncertain interests in defiance of all the Reason and Religion of the world and yet to have no appetite to such excellencies which satisfie Reason and content the spirit and create great hopes and ennoble our expectation and are advantages to Communities of men and publick Societies and which all wise men teach and all Religion commands 7. And it is not amiss to observe how Herod vexed
himself extremely upon a mistake The Child Jesus was born a King but it was a King of all the World not confined within the limits of a Province like the weaker beauties of a Torch to shine in one room but like the Sun his Empire was over all the World and if Herod would have become but his Tributary and paid him the acknowledgments of his Lord he should have had better conditions than under Caesar and yet have been as absolute in his own Jewry as he was before His Kingdom was not of this World and he that gives heavenly Kingdoms to all his servants would not have stooped to have taken up Herod's petty Coronet But as it is a very vanity which Ambition seeks so it is a shadow that disturbs and discomposes all its motions and apprehensions 8. And the same mistake caused calamities to descend upon the Church for some of the Persecutions commenced upon pretence Christianity was an enemy to Government But the pretence was infinitely unreasonable and therefore had the fate of senseless allegations it disbanded presently for no external accident did so incorporate the excellency of Christ's Religion into the hearts of men as the innocency of the men their inoffensive deportment the modesty of their designs their great humility and obedience a life expresly in enmity and contestation against secular Ambition And it is to be feared that the mingling humane interests with Religion will deface the image Christ hath stamped upon it Certain it is the metall is much abated by so impure allay while the Christian Prince serves his end of Ambition and bears arms upon his neighbour's Countrey for the service of Religion making Christ's Kingdom to invade Herod's rights and in the state Ecclesiastical secular interests have so deep a portion that there are snares laid to tempt a Persecution and men are invited to Sacrilege while the Revenues of a Church are a fair fortune for a Prince I make no scruple to find fault with Painters that picture the poor Saints with rich garments for though they deserved better yet they had but poor ones and some have been tempted to cheat the Saint not out of ill will to his Sanctity but love to his Shrine and to the beauty of the cloaths with which some imprudent persons have of old time dressed their Images So it is in the fate of the Church Persecution and the robes of Christ were her portion and her cloathing and when she is dressed up in gawdy fortunes it is no more than she deserves but yet sometimes it is occasion that the Devil cheats her of her Holiness and the men of the world sacrilegiously cheat her of her Riches and then when God hath reduced her to that Poverty he first promised and intended to her the Persecution ceases and Sanctity returns and God curses the Sacrilege and stirs up mens minds to religious Donatives and all is well till she grows rich again And if it be dangerous in any man to be rich and discomposes his steps in his journey to Eternity it is not then so proportionable to the analogy of Christ's Poverty and the inheritance of the Church to be sedulous in acquiring great Temporalties and putting Princes in jealousie and States into care for securities lest all the Temporal should run into Ecclesiastical possession 9. If the Church have by the active Piety of a credulous a pious and less-observant Age been endowed with great Possessions she hath rules enough and poor enough and necessities enough to dispend what she hath with advantages to Religion but then all she gets by it is the trouble of an unthankful a suspected and unsatisfying dispensation and the Church is made by evil persons a Scene of ambition and stratagem and to get a German Bishoprick is to be a Prince and to defend with niceness and Suits of Law every Custom or lesser Rite even to the breach of Charity and the scandal of Religion is called a Duty and every single person is bound to forgive injuries and to quit his right rather than his Charity but if it is not a duty in the Church also in them whose life should be excellent to the degree of Example I would fain know if there be not greater care taken to secure the Ecclesiastical Revenue than the publick Charity and the honour of Religion in the strict Piety of the Clergy for as the not ingaging in Suits may occasion bold people to wrong the Church so the necessity of ingaging is occasion of losing Charity and of great Scandal I find not fault with a free Revenue of the Church it is in some sense necessary to Governours and to preserve the Consequents of their Authority but I represent that such things are occasion of much mischief to the Church and less Holiness and in all cases respect should be had to the design of Christianity to the Prophecies of Jesus to the promised lot of the Church to the dangers of Riches to the excellencies and advantages and rewards of Poverty and if the Church have enough to perform all her duties and obligations chearfully let her of all Societies be soonest content If she have plenty let her use it temperately and charitably if she have not let her not be querulous and troublesome But however it would be thought upon that though in judging the quantum of the Church's portion the World thinks every thing too much yet we must be careful we do not judge every thing too little and if our fortune be safe between envy and contempt it is much mercy If it be despicable it is safe for Ecclesiasticks though it may be accidentally inconvenient or less profitable to others but if it be great publick experience hath made remonstrance that it mingles with the world and durties those fingers which are instrumental in Consecration and the more solemn Rites of Christianity 10. Jesus fled from the Persecution as he did not stand it out so he did not stand out against it he was careful to transmit no precedent or encouragement of resisting tyrannous Princes when they offer violence to Religion and our lives He would not stand disputing for privileges nor calling in Auxiliaries from the Lord of Hosts who could have spared him many Legions of Angels every single Spirit being able to have defeated all Herod's power but he knew it was a hard lesson to learn Patience and all the excuses in the world would be sought out to discourage such a Doctrine by which we are taught to die or lose all we have or suffer inconveniences at the will of a Tyrant we need no authentick examples much less Doctrines to invite men to War from which we see Christian Princes cannot be restrained with the engagements and peaceful Theorems of an excellent and a holy Religion nor Subjects kept from Rebelling by the interests of all Religions in the world nor by the necessities and reasonableness of Obedience nor the indearments of
all publick Societies of men one word or an intimation from Christ would have sounded an alarm and put us into postures of defence when all Christ's excellent Sermons and rare exemplar actions cannot tie our hands But it is strange now that of all men in the World Christians should be such fighting people or that Christian Subjects should lift up a thought against a Christian Prince when they had no intimation of encouragement from their Master but many from him to endear Obedience and Humility and Patience and Charity and these four make up the whole analogy and represent the chief design and meaning of Christianity in its moral constitution 11. But Jesus when himself was safe could also have secured the poor Babes of Bethlehem with thousands of diversions and avocations of Herod's purposes or by discovering his own Escape in some safe manner not unknown to the Divine wisedom but yet it did not so please God He is Lord of his Creatures and hath absolute dominion over our lives and he had an end of Glory to serve upon these Babes and an end of Justice upon Herod and to the Children he made such compensation that they had no reason to complain that they were so soon made Stars when they shined in their little Orbs and participations of Eternity for so the sense of the Church hath been that they having dyed the death of Martyrs though incapable of making the choice God supplied the defects of their will by his own entertainment of the thing that as the misery and their death so also their glorification might have the same Author in the same manner of causality even by a peremptory and unconditioned determination in these particulars This sense is pious and nothing unreasonable considering that all circumstances of the thing make the case particular but the immature death of other Infants is a sadder story for though I have no warrant or thought that it is ill with them after death and in what manner or degree of well-being it is there is no revelation yet I am not of opinion that the securing of so low a condition as theirs in all reason is like to be will make recompence or is an equal blessing with the possibilities of such an Eternity as is proposed to them who in the use of Reason and a holy life glorifie God with a free Obedience and if it were otherwise it were no blessing to live till the use of Reason and Fools and Babes were in the best because in the securest condition and certain expectation of equal glories 12. As soon as Herod was dead for the Divine Vengeance waited his own time for his arrest the Angel presently brought Joseph word The holy Family was full of content and indifferency not solicitous for return not distrustful of the Divine Providence full of poverty and sanctity and content waiting God's time at the return of which God delayed not to recall them from Exile out of Egypt he called his Son and directed Joseph's fear and course that he should divert to a place in the jurisdiction of Philip where the Heir of Herod's Cruelty Archelaus had nothing to do And this very series of Providence and care God expresses to all his sons by adoption and will determine the time and set bounds to every Persecution and punish the instruments and ease our pains and refresh our sorrows and give quietness to our fears and deliverance from our troubles and sanctifie it all and give a Crown at last and all in his good time if we wait the coming of the Angel and in the mean time do our duty with care and sustain our temporals with indifferency and in all our troubles and displeasing accidents we may call to mind that God by his holy and most reasonable Providence hath so ordered it that the spiritual advantages we may receive from the holy use of such incommodities are of great recompence and interest and that in such accidents the Holy Jesus having gone before us in precedent does go along with us by love and fair assistences and that makes the present condition infinitely more eligible than the greatest splendour of secular fortune The PRAYER O Blessed and Eternal God who didst suffer thy Holy Son to fly from the violence of an enraged Prince and didst chuse to defend him in the ways of his infirmity by hiding himself and a voluntary exile be thou a defence to all thy faithful people when-ever Persecution arises against them send them the ministery of Angels to direct them into ways of security and let thy holy Spirit guide them in the paths of Sanctity and let thy Providence continue in custody over their persons till the times of refreshment and the day of Redemption shall return Give O Lord to thy whole Church Sanctity and Zeal and the confidences of a holy Faith boldness of confession Humility content and resignation of spirit generous contempt of the World and unmingled desires of thy glory and the edification of thy Elect that no secular interests disturb her duty or discompose her charity or depress her hopes or in any unequal degree possess her affections and pollute her spirit but preserve her from the snares of the World and the Devil from the rapine and greedy desires of Sacrilegious persons and in all conditions whether of affluence or want may she still promote the interests of Religion that when plenteousness is within her palaces and peace in her walls that condition may then be best for her and when she is made as naked as Jesus to his Passion then Poverty may be best for her that in all estates she may glorifie thee and in all accidents and changes thou mayest sanctifie and bless her and at last bring her to the eternal riches and abundances of glory where no Persecution shall disturb her rest Grant this for sweet Jesus sake who suffered exile and hard journeys and all the inconveniences of a friendless person in a strange Province to whom with thee and the eternal Spirit be glory for ever and blessing in all generations of the World and for ever and ever Amen SECT VII Of the younger years of JESVS and his Disputation with the Doctors in the Temple The House of Prayer It is written My house shall be called of all Nations the house of prayer Mark 11. 17. If they return confess thy name and pray and make supplication before thee in this House Then hear thou in heaven and forgive 2. Chron 6. 24. 26. IESUS disputing with the Doctors S. LUKE 2. 46. 47. They found him in the Temple sitting in the midst of the Doctors both hearing them and asking them questions And all that heard him were astonished at his understanding answers 1. FRom the return of this holy Family to Judaea and their habitation in Nazareth till the blessed Child Jesus was twelve years of age we have nothing transmitted to us out of any authentick Record but that they went to
with a private meal as Habakkuk came to Daniel yet he fills their hearts when the year of Jubilee returns and the people sing In convertendo the Song of joy for their redemption For as of all sorrows the deprivations and eclipses of Religion are the saddest and of the worst and most inconvenient consequence so in proportion are the joys of spiritual plenty and religious returns the Communion of Saints being like the Primitive Corban a 〈◊〉 to feed all the needs of the Church or like a Taper joyned to a Torch it self is kindled and increases the other's flames 2. They failed not to go to Jerusalem for all those holy prayers and ravishments of love those excellent meditations and entercourses with God their private readings and discourses were but entertainments and satisfaction of their necessities they lived with them during their retirements but it was a Feast when they went to Jerusalem and the freer and more indulgent resection of the Spirit for in publick Solemnities God opens his treasures and pours out his grace more abundantly Private Devotions and secret Offices of Religion are like refreshing of a Garden with the distilling and petty drops of a Water-pot but addresses to the Temple and serving God in the publick communion of Saints is like rain from Heaven where the Offices are described by a publick spirit heightned by the greater portions of assistance and receive advantages by the adunations and symbols of Charity and increment by their distinct title to Promises appropriate even to their assembling and mutual support by the piety of Example by the communication of Counsels by the awfulness of publick Observation and the engagements of holy Customs For Religion is a publick vertue it is the ligature of Souls and the great instrument of the conservation of Bodies politick and is united in a common object the God of all the World and is managed by publick ministeries by Sacrifice Adoration and Prayer in which with variety of circumstances indeed but with infinite consent and union of design all the sons of Adam are taught to worship God and it is a publication of God's honour its very purpose being to declare to all the World how great things God hath done for us whether in publick Donatives or private Missives so that the very design temper and constitution of Religion is to be a publick address to God and although God is present in Closets and there also distills his blessings in small rain yet to the Societies of Religion and publication of Worship as we are invited by the great blessings and advantages of Communion so also we are in some proportions more straitly limited by the analogy and exigence of the Duty It is a Persecution when we are forced from publick Worshippings no man can hinder our private addresses to God every man can build a Chappel in his breast and himself be the Priest and his heart the Sacrifice and every foot of glebe he treads on be the Altar and this no Tyrant can prevent If then there can be Persecution in the offices of Religion it is the prohibition of publick profession and Communions and therefore he that denies to himself the opportunities of publick rites and conventions is his own Persecutor 3. But when Jesus was twelve years old and his Parents had finished their Offices and returned filled with the pleasures of Religion they missed the Child and sought him amongst their kindred but there they found him not for whoever seeks Jesus must seek him in the Offices of Religion in the Temple not amongst the engagements and pursuit of worldly interests I forgat also mine own Father's house said 〈◊〉 the Father of this Holy Child and so must we when we run in an enquiry after the Son of David But our relinquishing must not be a dereliction of duty but of engagement our affections toward kindred must always be with charity and according to the endearments of our relation but without immersion and such adherencies as either contradict or lessen our duty towards God 4. It was a sad effect of their pious journey to lose the joy of their Family and the hopes of all the World but it often happens that after spiritual imployments God seems to absent himself and withdraw the sensible effects of his presence that we may seek him with the same diligence and care and holy fears with which the Holy Virgin-Mother sought the Blessed Jesus And it is a design of great mercy in God to take off the light from the eyes of a holy person that he may not be abused with complacencies and too confident opinions and reflexions upon his fair performances For we usually judge of the well or ill of our Devotions and services by what we feel and we think God rewards every thing in the present and by proportion to our own expectations and if we feel a present rejoycing of Spirit all is well with us the smoak of the Sacrifice ascended right in a holy Cloud but if we feel nothing of comfort then we count it a prodigy and ominous and we suspect our selves and most commonly we have reason Such irradiations of chearfulness are always welcom but it is not always anger that takes them away the Cloud removed from before the camp of Israel and stood before the host of Pharaoh but this was a design of ruine to the Egyptians and of security to Israel and if those bright Angels that go with us to direct our journeys remove out of our sight and stand behind us it is not always an argument that the anger of the Lord is gone out against us but such decays of sense and clouds of spirit are excellent conservators of Humility and restrain those intemperances and vainer thoughts which we are prompted to in the gayety of our spirits 5. But we often give God cause to remove and for a while to absent himself and his doing of it sometimes upon the just provocations of our demerits makes us at other times with good reason to suspect our selves even in our best actions But sometimes we are vain or remiss or pride invades us in the darkness and incuriousness of our spirits and we have a secret sin which God would have us to enquire after and when we suspect every thing and condemn our selves with strictest and most angry sentence then it may be God will with a ray of light break through the cloud if not it is nothing the worse for us for although the visible remonstrance and face of things in all the absences and withdrawings of Jesus be the same yet if a sin be the cause of it the withdrawing is a taking away his Favour and his love but if God does it to secure thy Piety and to enflame thy desires or to prevent a crime then he withdraws a Gift only nothing of his Love and yet the darkness of the spirit and sadness seem equal It is hard in these cases to discover the cause as
it is nice to judge the condition of the effect and therefore it is prudent to ascertain our condition by improving our care and our Religion and in all accidents to make no judgment concerning God's Favour by what we feel but by what we do 6. When the Holy Virgin with much Religion and sadness had sought her joy at last she found him disputing among the Doctors hearing them and asking them questions and besides that he now first opened a fontinel and there sprang out an excellent rivulet from his abyss of Wisdom he consigned this Truth to his Disciples That they who mean to be Doctors and teach others must in their first accesses and degrees of discipline learn of those whom God and publick Order hath set over us in the Mysteries of Religion The PRAYER BLessed and most Holy Jesus Fountain of Grace and comfort Treasure of Wisdom and spiritual emanations be pleased to abide with me for ever by the inhabitation of thy interiour assistances and refreshments and give me a corresponding love acceptable and unstained purity care and watchfulness over my ways that I may never by provoking thee to anger cause thee to remove thy dwelling or draw a cloud before thy holy face but if thou art pleased upon a design of charity or trial to cover my eyes that I may not behold the bright rays of thy Favour nor be refreshed with spiritual comforts let thy Love support my spirit by ways insensible and in all my needs give me such a portion as may be instrumental and incentive to performance of my duty and in all accidents let me continue to seek thee by Prayers and Humiliation and frequent desires and the strictness of a Holy life that I may follow thy example pursue thy foot-steps be supported by thy strength guided by thy hand enlightned by thy favour and may at last after a persevering holiness and an unwearied industry dwell with thee in the Regions of Light and eternal glory where there shall be no fears of parting from the habitations of Felicity and the union and fruition of thy Presence O Blessed and most Holy Jesus Amen SECT VIII Of the Preaching of John the Baptist preparative to the Manifestation of JESVS ELIAS Luke 1 17. And he shall goe before him in the spirit and power of Elias S t IOHN the Baptist Luk 1 15 And as the people were in expectation ve 16 Iohn answered saying unto them all I indeed baptize you with water but one mightier then I cometh y e latchet of whose shooes I am not worthy to unloose he shall baptize you with y e Holy Ghost and with fire WHen Herod had drunk so great a draught of bloud at Bethlehem and sought for more from the Hill-country Elizabeth carried her Son into the Wilderness there in the desert places and recesses to hide him from the fury of that Beast where she attended him with as much care and tenderness as the affections and fears of a Mother could express in the permission of those fruitless Solitudes The Child was about eighteen months old when he first sled to Sanctuary but after forty days his Mother died and his Father Zachary at the time of his ministration which happened about this time was killed in the Court of the Temple so that the Child was exposed to all the dangers and infelicities of an Orphan in a place of solitariness and discomfort in a time when a bloudy King endeavoured his destruction But when his Father and Mother were taken from him the Lord took him up For according to the tradition of the Greeks God deputed an Angel to be his nourisher and Guardian as he had formerly done to Ishmael who dwelt in the Wilderness and to Elias when he fled from the rage of Ahab so to this Child who came in the spirit of Elias to make demonstration that there can be no want where God undertakes the care and provision 2. The entertainment that S. John's Proveditóre the Angel gave him was such as the Wilderness did afford and such as might dispose him to a life of Austerity for there he continued spending his time in Meditations Contemplation Prayer Affections and Colloquies with God eating Flies and wild Honey not clothed in soft but a hairy garment and a leathern girdle till he was thirty years of age And then being the fifteenth year of Tiberius Pontius Pilate being Governour of Judaea the Word of God came unto John in the Wilderness And he came into all the countrey about Jordan preaching and baptizing 3. This John according to the Prophecies of him and designation of his person by the Holy Ghost was the fore-runner of Christ sent to dispose the people for his entertainment and prepare his ways and therefore it was necessary his person should be so extraordinary and full of Sanctity and so clarified by great concurrences and wonder in the circumstances of his life as might gain credit and reputation to the testimony he was to give concerning his LORD the Saviour of the World And so it happened 4. For as the Baptist while he was in the Wilderness became the pattern of solitary and contemplative life a School of Vertue and Example of Sanctity and singular Austerity so at his emigration from the places of his Retirement he seemed what indeed he was a rare and excellent Personage and the Wonders which were great at his Birth the prediction of his Conception by an Angel which never had before happened but in the persons of Isaac and Sampson the contempt of the world which he bore about him his mortified countenance and deportment his austere and eremitical life his vehement spirit and excellent zeal in Preaching created so great opinions of him among the people that all held him for a Prophet in his Office for a heavenly person in his own particular and a rare example of Sanctity and holy life to all others and all this being made solemn and ceremonious by his Baptism he prevailed so that he made excellent and apt preparations for the LORD 's appearing for there went out to him Jerusalem and all Judaea and all the regions round about Jordan and were baptized of him confessing their sins 5. The Baptist having by so heavenly means won upon the affections of all men his Sermons and his testimony concerning Christ were the more likely to be prevalent and accepted and the summ of them was Repentance and dereliction of sins and bringing forth the fruits of good life in the promoting of which Doctrine he was a severe reprehender of the Pharisees and Sadducees he exhorted the people to works of mercy the Publicans to do justice and to decline oppression the Souldiers to abstain from plundering and doing violence or rapine and publishing that he was not the CHRIST that he only baptized with water but the Messias should baptize with the holy Ghost and with fire he finally denounced judgment and great severities to all the World
of impenitents even abscission and fire unquenchable And from this time forward viz. From the days of John the Baptist the Kingdom of Heaven suffered violence and the violent take it by force For now the Gospel began to dawn and John was like the Morning-star or the blushings springing from the windows of the East foretelling the approach of the Sun of Righteousness and as S. John Baptist laid the first rough hard and unhewen stone of this building in Mortification Self denial and doing violence to our natural affections so it was continued by the Master-builder himself who propounded the glories of the Crown of the heavenly Kingdom to them only who should climb the Cross to reach it Now it was that Multitudes should throng and croud to enter in at the strait gate and press into the Kingdom and the younger brothers should snatch the inheritance from the elder the unlikely from the more likely the Gentiles from the Jews the strangers from the natives the Publicans and Harlots from the Scribes and Pharisees who like violent persons shall by their importunity obedience watchfulness and diligence snatch the Kingdom from them to whom it was first offered and Jacob shall be loved and Esau rejected Ad SECT VIII Considerations upon the Preaching of John the Baptist. 1. FRom the Disputation of Jesus with the Doctors to the time of his Manifestation to Israel which was eighteen years the Holy Child dwelt in Nazareth in great obedience to his Parents in exemplar Modesty singular Humility working with his hands in his supposed Father's trade for the support of his own and his Mother's necessities and that he might bear the Curse of Adam that in the sweat of his brows he should eat his bread all the while he increased in favour with God and man sending forth excellent testimonies of a rare Spirit and a wise Understanding in the temperate instances of such a conversation to which his Humility and great Obedience had engaged him But all this while the stream ran under ground and though little bublings were discerned in all the course and all the way men looked upon him as upon an excellent person diligent in his calling wise and humble temperate and just pious and rarely temper'd yet at the manifestation of John the Baptist he brake forth like the stream from the bowels of the earth or the Sun from a cloud and gave us a precedent that we should not shew our lights to minister to vanity but then only when God and publick order and just dispositions of men call for a manifestation and yet the Ages of men have been so forward in prophetical Ministeries and to undertake Ecclesiastical imployment that the viciousness and indiscretions and scandals the Church of God feels as great burthens upon the tenderness of her spirit are in great part owing to the neglect of this instance of the Prudence and Modesty of the Holy Jesus 2. But now the time appointed was come the Baptist comes forth upon the Theatre of Palestine a fore-runner of the Office and publication of Jesus and by the great reputation of his Sanctity prevailed upon the affections and judgment of the people who with much case believed his Doctrine when they had reason to approve his Life for the good Example of the Preacher is always the most prevailing Homily his Life is his best Sermon He that will raise affections in his Auditory must affect their eyes for we seldom see the people weep if the Orator laughs loud and loosely and there is no reason to think that his discourse should work more with me than himself If his arguments be fair and specious I shall think them fallacies while they have not faith with him and what necessity for me to be temperate when he that tells me so sees no such need but hopes to go to Heaven without it or if the duty be necessary I shall learn the definition of Temperance and the latitudes of my permission and the bounds of lawful and unlawful by the exposition of his practice if he binds a burthen upon my shoulders it is but reason I should look for him to bear his portion too Good works convince more than Miracles and the power of ejecting Devils is not so great probation that Christian Religion came from God as is the holiness of the Doctrine and its efficacy and productions upon the hearty Professors of the Institution S. Pachomius when he wore the military girdle under Constantine the Emperor came to a City of Christians who having heard that the Army in which he then marched was almost starved for want of necessary provisions of their own charity relieved them speedily and freely He wondring at their so free and chearful dispensation inquired what kind of people these were whom he saw so bountiful It was answered they were Christians whose Profession it is to hurt no man and to do good to every man The pleased Souldier was convinced of the excellency of that Religion which brought forth men so good and so pious and loved the Mother for the Children's sake threw away his girdle and became Christian and Religious and a Saint And it was Tertullian's great argument in behalf of Christians See how they love one another how every man is ready to die for his brother it was a living argument and a sensible demonstration of the purity of the Fountain from whence such lympid waters did derive But so John the Baptist made himself a fit instrument of preparation and so must all the Christian Clergy be fitted for the dissemination of the Gospel of Jesus 3. The Baptist had till this time that is about thirty years lived in the Wilderness under the Discipline of the Holy Ghost under the tuition of Angels in conversation with God in great mortification and disaffections to the World his garments rugged and uneasie his meat plain necessary and without variety his imployment prayers and devotion his company wilde beasts in ordinary in extraordinary messengers from Heaven and all this not undertaken of necessity to subdue a bold lust or to punish a loud crime but to become more holy and pure from the lesser stains and insinuations of too free infirmities and to prepare himself for the great ministery of serving the Holy Jesus in his Publication Thirty years he lived in great austerity and it was a rare Patience and exemplar Mortification we use not to be so pertinacious in any pious resolutions but our purposes disband upon the sense of the first violence we are free and confident of resolving to fast when our bellies are full but when we are called upon by the first necessities of nature our zeal is cool and dissoluble into air upon the first temptation and we are not upheld in the violences of a short Austerity without faintings and repentances to be repented of and enquirings after the vow is past and searching for excuses and desires to reconcile our nature and our Conscience unless
a voice from Heaven saying Thou art my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased This was the inauguration and proclamation of the Messias when he began to be the great Prophet of the new Covenant And this was the greatest meeting that ever was upon earth where the whole Cabinet of the mysterious Trinity was opened and shewn as much as the capacities of our present imperfections will permit the Second Person in the veil of Humanity the Third in the shape or with the motion of a Dove but the First kept his primitive state and as to the Israelites he gave notice by way of caution Ye saw no shape but ye heard a voice so now also God the Father gave testimony to his Holy Son and appeared only in a voice without any visible representment 4. When the Rite and the Solemnity was over Christ ascended up out of the waters and left so much vertue behind him that as Gregorius Turonensis reports that creek of the River where his holy body had been baptized was indued with a healing quality and a power of curing Lepers that bathed themselves in those waters in the faith and with invocation of the holy Name of Jesus But the manifestation of this power was not till afterwards for as yet Jesus did no Miracles 5. As soon as ever the Saviour of the World was baptized had opened the Heavens which yet never had been opened to Man and was declared the Son of God Jesus was by the Spirit driven into the Wilderness not by an unnatural violence but by the efficacies of Inspiration and a supernatural inclination and activity of resolution for it was the Holy Spirit that bare him thither he was led by the good Spirit to be tempted by the evil whither also he was pleased to retire to make demonstration that even in an active life such as he was designed to and intended some recesses and temporary dimissions of the world are most expedient for such persons especially whose office is Prophetical and for institution of others that by such vacancies in prayer and contemplation they may be better enabled to teach others when they have in such retirements conversed with God 6. In the Desart which was four miles 〈◊〉 the place of his Baptism and about twenty miles from Jerusalem as the common computations are he did abide forty days and forty nights where he was perpetually disturbed and assaulted with evil spirits in the midst of wild beasts in a continual fast without eating bread or drinking water And the Angels ministred to him being Messengers of comfort and sustentation sent from his Father for the support and service of his Humanity and imployed in resisting and discountenancing the assaults and temporal hostilities of the spirits of darkness 7. Whether the Devils 〈◊〉 in any horrid and affrighting shapes is not certain but it is more likely to a person of so great Sanctity and high designation they would appear more Angelical and immaterial in representments intellectual in words and Idea's temptations and inticements because Jesus was not a person of those low weaknesses to be affrighted or troubled with an ugly 〈◊〉 which can do nothing but abuse the weak and imperfect conceptions of persons nothing extraordinary And this was the way which Satan or the Prince of the Devils took whose Temptations were reserved for the last assault and the great day of trial for at the expiration of his forty days Jesus being hungry the Tempter invited him only to eat bread of his own providing which might refresh his Humanity and prove his Divinity hoping that his hunger and the desire of convincing the Devil might tempt him to eat before the time appointed But Jesus answered It is written Man shall not live by Bread alone but by every word that 〈◊〉 out of the mouth of God meaning that in every word of God whether the Commandment be general or special a promise is either expressed or implied of the supply of all provisions necessary for him that is doing the work of God and that was the present case of Jesus who was then doing his Father's work and promoting our interest and 〈◊〉 was sure to be provided for and therefore so are we 8. The Devil having failed in this assault tries him again requiring but a demonstration of his being the Son of God He sets him upon the battlement of the Temple and invites him to throw himself down upon a pretence that God would send his Angels to keep his Son and quotes Scripture for it But Jesus understood it well and though he was secured of God's protection yet he would not tempt God nor solicite his Providence to a dereliction by tempting him to an unnecessary conservation This assault was silly and weak But at last he unites all his power of stratagem and places the Holy Jesus upon an exceeding high mountain and by an Angelical power draws into one Centre Species and Idea's from all the Kingdoms and glories of the World and makes an admirable Map of beauties and represents it to the eyes of Jesus saying that all that was put into his power to give and he would give it him if he would fall down and worship him But then the Holy Lamb was angry as a provoked Lion and commanded him away when his temptations were violent and his demands impudent and blasphemous Then the Devil leaveth him and the Angels came and ministred unto him bringing such things as his necessities required after he had by a forty days Fast done penance for our sins and consigned to his Church the Doctrine and Discipline of Fasting in order to a Contemplative life and the resisting and overcoming all the Temptations and allurements of the Devil and all our ghostly enemies Ad SECT IX Considerations upon the Baptizing Fasting and Temptation of the Holy JESVS by the Devil 1. WHen the day did break and the Baptist was busie in his Offices the Sun of Righteousness soon entred upon our Hemisphere and after he had lived a life of darkness and silence for thirty years together yet now that he came to do the greatest work in the World and to minister in the most honourable Embassie he would do nothing of singularity but fulfil all righteousness and satisfie all Commands and joyn in the common Rites and Sacraments which all people innocent or penitent did undergo either as deleteries of 〈◊〉 or instruments of Grace For so he would needs be baptized by his servant and though he was of Purity sufficient to do it and did actually by his Baptism purifie the Purifier and sanctifie that and all other streams to a holy ministery and effect yet he went in bowing his head like a sinner uncloathing himself like an imperfect person and craving to be washed as if he had been crusted with an impure Leprosie thereby teaching us to submit our selves to all those Rites which he would institute and although 〈◊〉 of them be like the
imitation of the whole action and the rite of Institution And the purpose of it is that we might secure the excellency and holiness of such predispositions and concomitant Graces which are necessary to the worthy and effectual susception of the external Rites of Christianity 4. After the Holy Jesus was baptized and had prayed the Heavens opened the holy Ghost descended and a voice from Heaven proclaimed him to be the Son of God and one in whom the Father was well pleased and the same 〈◊〉 that was cast upon the head of our High Priest went unto his 〈◊〉 and thence sell to the borders of his garment for as Christ our Head felt these effects in manifestation so the Church believes God does to her and to her meanest children in the susception of the holy Rite of Baptism in right apt and holy dispositions For the Heavens open too upon us and the Holy Ghost descends to 〈◊〉 the waters and to hallow the Catechumen and to pardon the passed and repented sins and to consign him to the inheritance of 〈◊〉 and to put on his military girdle and give him the Sacrament and oath of fidelity for all this is understood to be meant by those frequent expressions of Scripture calling Baptism the Laver of Regeneration Illumination a washing away the filth of the flesh and the Answer of a good conscience a being buried with Christ and many others of the like purpose and signification But we may also learn hence sacredly to esteem the Rites of Religion which he first sanctified by his own personal susception and then made necessary by his own institution and command and God hath made to be conveyances of blessing and ministeries of the Holy Spirit 5. The Holy Ghost descended upon Jesus in the manner or visible representment of a Dove either in similitude of figure which he was pleased to assume as the Church more generally hath believed or at least he did descend like a Dove and in his robe of fire hovered over the Baptist's head and then sate upon him as the Dove uses to sit upon the house of her dwelling whose proprieties of nature are pretty and modest Hieroglyphicks of the duty of spiritual persons which are thus observed in both Philosophies The Dove sings not but mourns it hath no gall strikes not with its bill hath no crooked talons and forgets its young ones soonest of any the inhabitants of the air And the effects of the Holy Spirit are symbolical in all the sons of Sanctification For the voice of the Church is sad in those accents which express her own condition but as the Dove is not so sad in her breast as in her note so neither is the interiour condition of the Church wretched and miserable but indeed her Song is most of it Elegy within her own walls and her condition looks sad and her joys are not pleasures in the publick estimate but they that afflict her think her miserable because they know not the sweetnesses of a holy peace and serenity which supports her spirit and plains the heart under a rugged brow making the Soul festival under the noise of a Threne and sadder groanings But the Sons of consolation are also taught their Duty by this Apparition for upon whomsoever the Spirit descends he teaches him to be meek and charitable neither offending by the violence of hands or looser language For the Dove is inoffensive in beak and foot and feels no disturbance and violence of passions when its dearest interests are destroyed that we also may be of an even spirit in the saddest accidents which usually discompose our peace and however such symbolical intimations receive their efficacy from the fancy of the contriver yet here whether this Apparition did intend any such moral representment or no it is certain that where-ever the holy Spirit does dwell there also Peace and Sanctity Meekness and Charity a mortisied will and an active dereliction of our desires do inhabit But besides this hieroglyphical representment this Dove like that which Noah sent out from the Ark did aptly signifie the World to be renewed and all to be turned to a new creation and God hath made a new Covenant with us that unless we provoke him he will never destroy us any more 6. No sooner had the voice of God pronounced Jesus to be the well-beloved Son of God but the Devil thought it of great concernment to attempt him with all his malice and his art and that is the condition of all those whom God's grace hath separated from the common expectations and societies of the world and therefore the Son of Sirach gave good advice My son if thou come to serve the Lord prepare thy Soul for temptation for not only the Spirits of darkness are exasperated at the declension of their own Kingdom but also the nature and constitution of vertues and eminent graces which holy persons exercise in their lives is such as to be easily assailable by their contraries apt to be lessened by time to be interrupted by weariness to grow flat and insipid by tediousness of labour to be omitted and grow infrequent by the impertinent diversions of society and secular occasions so that to rescind the 〈◊〉 of Vice made firm by nature and evil habits to acquire every new degree 〈◊〉 Vertue to continue the holy fires of zeal in their just proportion to 〈◊〉 the Devil and to reject the invitations of the World and the 〈◊〉 embraces of the Flesh which are the proper employment of the sons of God is a perpetual difficulty and every possibility of 〈◊〉 the strictness of a Duty is a Temptation and an insecurity to them who have begun to serve God in hard battels 7. The Holy Spirit did drive Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted by the Devil And 〈◊〉 we are bound to pray instantly that we fall into no Temptation yet if by Divine permission or by an inspiration of the Holy Spirit we be engaged in an action or course of life that is full of Temptation and empty of comfort let us apprehend it as an issue of Divine Providence as an occasion of the rewards of Diligence and Patience as an instrument of Vertue as a designation of that way in which we must glorifie God but no argument of disfavour since our dearest Lord the most Holy Jesus who could have driven the Devil away by the Breath of his mouth yet was by the Spirit of his Father permitted to a trial and molestation by the spirits of Darkness And this is S. James's counsel My brethren count it all joy when ye enter into divers temptations knowing that the trial of your Faith worketh Patience So far is a Blessing when the Spirit is the instrument of our motion and brings us to the trial of our Faith but if the Spirit leaves us and delivers us over to the Devil not to be tempted but to be abused and ruined it is a sad
under the Gospel is led by the Spirit and walks in the Spirit and brings forth the fruits of the Spirit It is not our excuse but the aggravation of our sin that we fall again in despite of so many resolutions to the contrary And let us not flatter our selves into a confidence of sin by supposing the state of Grace can stand with the Custom of any sin for it is the state either of an animalis homo as the Apostle calls him that is a man in pure naturals without the clarity of divine Revelations who cannot perceive or understand the things of God or else of the carnal man that is a person who though in his mind he is convinced yet he is not yet freed from the dominion of sin but only hath his eyes opened but not his bonds loosed For by the perpetual analogy and frequent expresses in Scripture the spiritual person or the man redeemed by the spirit of life in Christ Jesus is free from the Law and the Dominion and the Kingdom and the Power of all sin For to be carnally minded is death but to be spiritually minded is life and peace 10. But sins of Infirmity in true sence of Scripture signifie nothing but the sins of an unholy and an unsanctified nature when they are taken for actions done against the strength of resolution out of the strength of natural appetite and violence of desire and therefore in Scripture the state of Sin and the state of Infirmity is all one For when we were yet without strength in due time Christ died for the ungodly saith the Apostle the condition in which we were when Christ became a sacrifice for us was certainly a condition of sin and enmity with God and yet this he calls a being without strength or in a state of weakness and infirmity which we who believe all our strength to be derived from Christ's death and the assistance of the holy Spirit the fruit of his Ascension may soon apprehend to be the true meaning of the word And in this sence is that saying of our Blessed Saviour The whole have no need of a Physician but they that are weak for therefore Christ came into the world to save sinners those are the persons of Christ's Infirmary whose restitution and reduction to a state of life and health was his great design So that whoever sin habitually that is constantly periodically at the revolution of a temptation or frequently or easily are persons who still remain in the state of sin and death and their intervals of Piety are but preparations to a state of Grace which they may then be when they are not used to countenance or excuse the sin or to flatter the person But if the intermediate resolutions of emendation though they never run beyond the next assault of passion or desire be taken for a state of Grace blended with infirmities of Nature they become destructive of all those purposes through our mistake which they might have promoted if they had been rightly understood observed and cherished Sometimes indeed the greatness of a Temptation may become an instrument to excuse some degrees of the sin and make the man pitiable whose ruine seems almost certain because of the greatness and violence of the enemy meeting with a natural aptness but then the question will be whither and to what actions that strong Temptation carries him whether to a work of a mortal nature or only to a small irregularity that is whether to death or to a wound for whatever the principle be if the effect be death the man's case was therefore to be pitied because his ruine was the more inevitable not so pitied as to excuse him from the state of death For let the Temptation be never so strong every Christian man hath assistances sufficient to support him so as that without his own yielding no Temptation is stronger than that grace which God offers him for if it were it were not so much as a sin of infirmity it were no sin at all This therefore must be certain to us When the violence of our Passions or desires overcomes our resolutions and fairer purposes against the dictate of our Reason that indeed is a state of Infirmity but it is also of sin and death a state of Immortification because the offices of Grace are to crucifie the Old man that is our former aud impurer conversation to subdue the petulancy of our Passions to reduce them to reason and to restore Empire and dominion to the superiour Faculties So that this condition in proper speaking is not so good as the Infirmity of Grace but it is no Grace at all for whoever are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts those other imperfect ineffective resolutions are but the first approaches of the Kingdom of Christ nothing but the clarities of lightning dark as 〈◊〉 as light and they therefore cannot be excuses to us because the contrary weaknesses as we call them do not make the sin involuntary but chosen and pursued and in true speaking is the strength of the Lust not the infirmity of a state of Grace 11. But yet there is a condition of Grace which is a state of little and imperfect ones such as are called in Scripture Smoaking flax and bruised reeds which is a state of the first dawning of the Sun of Righteousness when the lights of Grace new rise upon our eyes and then indeed they are weak and have a more dangerous neighbourhood of Temptations and desires but they are not subdued by them they sin not by direct election their actions criminal are but like the slime of Nilus leaving rats half formed they sin but seldom and when they do it is in small instances and then also by surprise by inadvertency and then also they interrupt their own acts and lessen them perpetually and never do an act of sinfulness but the principle is such as makes it to be involuntary in many degrees For when the Understanding is clear and the dictate of Reason undisturbed and determinate whatsoever then produces an irregular action excuses not because the action is not made the less voluntary by it for the action is not made involuntary from any other principle but from some defect of Understanding either in act or habit or faculty For where there is no such defect there is a full deliberation according to the capacity of the man and then the act of election that follows is clear and full and is that proper disposition which makes him truly capable of punishment or reward respectively Now although in the first beginnings of Grace there is not a direct Ignorance to excuse totally yet because a sudden surprise or an inadvertency is not always in our power to prevent these things do lessen the election and freedom of the action and then because they are but seldom and never proceed to any length of time or any great instances of
God at first designed to us And therefore as our Baptism is a separation of us from unbelieving people so the descent of the Holy Spirit upon us in our Baptism is a consigning or marking us for God as the Sheep of his pasture as the Souldiers of his Army as the Servants of his houshold we are so separated from the world that we are appropriated to God so that God expects of us Duty and Obedience and all Sins are acts of Rebellion and Undutifulness Of this nature was the sanctification of Jeremy and John the Baptist from their mothers womb that is God took them to his own service by an early designation and his Spirit marked them to a holy Ministery To this also relates that of S. Paul whom God by a decree separated from his mother's womb to the Ministery of the Gospel the 〈◊〉 did antedate the act of the Spirit which did not descend upon him until the day of his Baptism What these persons were in order to exteriour Ministeries that all the faithful are in order to Faith and Obedience consigned in Baptism by the Spirit of God to a perpetual relation to God in a continual service and title to his Promises And in this sence the Spirit of God is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Seal In whom also after that ye believed ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of Promise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Water washes the body and the Spirit seals the Soul viz. to a participation of those Promises which he hath made and to which we receive a title by our Baptism 22. Secondly The second effect of the Spirit is Light or Illumination that is the holy Spirit becomes unto us the Author of holy thoughts and firm perswasions and sets to his seal that the Word of God is true into the belief of which we are then baptized and makes Faith to be a Grace and the Understanding resigned and the Will confident and the Assent stronger than the premises and the Propositions to be believed because they are beloved and we are taught the ways of Godliness after a new manner that is we are made to perceive the Secrets of the Kingdom and to love Religion and to long for Heaven and heavenly things and to despise the World and to have new resolutions and new perceptions and new delicacies in order to the establishment of Faith and its increments and perseverance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God sits in the Soul when it is illuminated in 〈◊〉 as if he sate in his Throne that is he rules by a firm perswasion and intire principles of Obedience And therefore Baptism is called in Scripture 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the baptized 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 illuminated Call to mind the former days in which you were illuminated and the same phrase is in the 6. to the Hebrews where the parallel places expound each other For that which S. Paul calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 illuminated he calls after 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a receiving the knowledge of the truth and that you may perceive this to be wholly meant of Baptism the 〈◊〉 expresses it still by Synonyma's Tasting of the heavenly gift and made partakers of the Holy Ghost sprinkled in our hearts from an evil conscience and washed in our bodies with pure water all which also are a syllabus or collection of the several effects of the graces bestowed in Baptism But we are now instancing in that which relates most properly to the Understanding in which respect the Holy Spirit also is called Anointing or Unction and the mystery is explicated by S. John The Anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you and ye need not that any man teach you but as the same Anointing teacheth you of all things 23. Thirdly The Holy Spirit descends upon us in Baptism to become the principle of a new life to become a holy seed springing up to Holiness and is called by S. John 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 of God and the purpose of it we are taught by him Whosoever is 〈◊〉 of God that is he that is regenerated and entred into this New birth doth not 〈◊〉 sin for his seed remaineth in him and he cannot sin because he is born of God The Spirit of God is the Spirit of life and now that he by the Spirit is born anew he hath in him that principle which if it be cherished will grow up to life to life eternal And this is the Spirit of Sanctification the victory over the World the deletery of Concupiscence the life of the Soul and the perpetual principle of Grace sown in our spirits in the day of our Adoption to be the sons of God and members of Christ's body But take this Mystery in the words of S. Basil. There are two Ends proposed in Baptism to wit to abolish the body of Sin that we may no more bring forth fruit unto death and to live in the Spirit and to have our fruit to Sanctification The Water represents the image of death receiving the body in its bosom as in a Sepulchre but the quickning Spirit sends upon us a vigorous 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 power or 〈◊〉 even from the beginning renewing our Souls from the death of sin unto life For as our Mortification is 〈◊〉 in the water so the Spirit works life in us To this purpose is the discourse of S. Paul having largely discoursed of our being baptized into the death of 〈◊〉 he adds this as the Corollary of all He that is dead is freed from sin that is being mortified and buried in the waters of Baptism we have a new life of Righteousness put into us we are quitted from the dominion of Sin and are planted together in the likeness of Christ's Resurrection that henceforth we should not serve sin 24. Fourthly But all these intermedial Blessings tend to a glorious Conclusion for Baptism does also consign us to a holy Resurrection It takes the sting of death from us by burying us together with Christ and takes 〈◊〉 Sin which is the sting of death and then we shall be partakers of a blessed Resurrection This we are taught by S. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his Death For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his Death we shall be also in the likeness of his Resurrection That declares the real event in its due season But because Baptism consigns it and admits us to a title to it we are said with S. Paul to be risen with Christ in Baptism Buried with him in Baptism wherein also you are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God which hath raised him from the dead Which expression I desire to be remembred that by it we may better understand those other
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Be not pure in the laver but in the mind adds I suppose that an exact and a firm Repentance is a sufficient purification to a man if judging and considering our selves for the facts we have done before we proceed to that which is before us considering that which follows and cleansing or washing our mind from sensual affections and from former sins Just as we use to deny the effect to the instrumental cause and attribute it to the principal in the manner of speaking when our purpose is to affirm this to be the principal and of chief 〈◊〉 So we say It is not the good Lute but the skilful hand that makes the musick It is not the Body but the Soul that is the Man and yet he is not the man without both For Baptism is but the material part in the Sacrament it is the Spirit that giveth life whose work is Faith and Repentance begun by himself without the Sacrament and consigned in the Sacrament and actuated and increased in the cooperation of our whole life And therefore Baptism is called in the Jerusalem Creed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one Baptism of Repentance for the remission of sins and by Justin Martyr 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Baptism of Repentance and the knowledge of God which was made for the sins of the people of God He explains himself a little after 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Baptism that can only cleanse them that are penitent In Sacrament is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fides credentium professio quae apud Act a conficitur Angelorum 〈◊〉 miscentur 〈◊〉 spiritualia semina ut sancto germine nova possit renascentium indoles procreari ut dum Trinitas cum Fide concordat qui natus fuerit seculo renascatur spiritualiter Deo Sic fit hominum Pater Deus sancta fit Mater Ecclesia said Optatus The Faith and Profession of the Believers meets with the ever-blessed Trinity and is recorded in the Register of Angels where heavenly and spiritual seeds are mingled that from so holy a Spring may be produced a new nature of the Regeneration that while the Trinity viz. that is invocated upon the baptized meets with the Faith of the Catechumen he that was born to the world may be born spiritually to God So God is made a Father to the man and the holy Church a Mother Faith and Repentance stript the Old man naked and make him fit for Baptism and then the Holy Spirit moving upon the waters cleanses the Soul and makes it to put on the New man who grows up to perfection and a spiritual life to a life of glory by our verification of our undertaking in Baptism on our part and the Graces of the Spirit on the other For the waters pierce no farther than the skin till the person puts off his affection to the sin that he hath contracted and then he may say Aquae intraverunt 〈◊〉 ad animam meam The waters are entred even unto my Soul to purifie and cleanse it by the washing of water and the renewing by the Holy Spirit The summ is this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Being baptized we are illuminated being illuminated we are adopted to the inheritance of sons being adopted we are promoted towards perfection and being perfected we are made immortal Quisquis in hos fontes vir venerit exeat indè Semideus tactis citò nobilitetur in undis 28. This is the whole Doctrine of Baptism as it is in it self considered without relation to rare Circumstances or accidental cases and it will also serve to the right understanding of the reasons why the Church of God hath in all Ages baptized all persons that were within her power for whom the Church could stipulate that they were or might be relatives of Christ sons of God heirs of the Promises and partners of the Covenant and such as did not hinder the work of Baptism upon their Souls And such were not only persons of age and choice but the Infants of Christian Parents For the understanding and verifying of which truth I shall only need to apply the parts of the former Discourse to their particular case premising first these Propositions Of Baptizing Infants Part II. 1. BAPTISM is the Key in Christ's hand and therefore opens as he opens and shuts by his rule and as Christ himself did not do all his Blessings and effects unto every one but gave to every one as they had need so does Baptism Christ did not cure all mens eyes but them only that were blind Christ came not to call the righteous but sinners to 〈◊〉 that is They that lived in the fear of God according to the Covenant in which they were debtors were indeed improved and promoted higher by Christ but not called to that Repentance to which he called the vicious Gentiles and the Adulterous persons among the Jews and the hypocritical Pharisees There are some so innocent that they need no repentance saith the Scripture meaning that though they do need Contrition for their single acts of sin yet they are within the state of Grace and need not Repentance as it is a Conversion of the whole man And so it is in Baptism which does all its effects upon them that need them all and some upon them that need but some and therefore as it pardons sins to them that have committed them and do repent and believe so to the others who have not committed them it does all the work which is done to the others above or besides that Pardon 2. Secondly When the ordinary effect of a Sacrament is done already by some other efficiency or instrument yet the Sacrament is still as obligatory as before not for so many reasons or necessities but for the same Commandment Baptism is the first ordinary Current in which the Spirit moves and descends upon us and where God's Spirit is they are the Sons of God for Christ's Spirit descends upon none but them that are his and yet Cornelius who had received the holy Spirit and was heard by God and visited by an Angel and accepted in his Alms and Fastings and Prayers was tied to the susception of Baptism To which may be added That the receiving the effects of Baptism before-hand was used as an argument the rather to administer Baptism The effect of which consideration is this That Baptism and its effect may be separated and do not always go in conjunction the effect may be before and therefore much rather may it be after its susception the Sacrament operating in the virtue of Christ even as the Spirit shall move according to that saying of S. Austin Sacrosancto lavacro inchoata innovatio novi hominis perficiendo perficitur in aliis citiùs in aliis tarà iùs and S. Bernard Lavari quidem citò possumus sed ad sanandum multâ curatione opus est The work of Regeneration that is begun in the ministery of Baptism is perfected in some sooner in some later We
to him are forgiven not his own but the 〈◊〉 of another man None ought to be driven from Baptism and the Grace of God who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 gentle and pious unto all and therefore much less Infants who more 〈◊〉 our aid and more need the Divine mercy because in the first beginning of their birth crying and 〈◊〉 they can do nothing but call for mercy and relief 〈◊〉 this reason it was saith 〈◊〉 that they to whom the secrets of the Divine 〈◊〉 were committed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their 〈◊〉 because there was born with them the impurities of sin which did need material Ablution as a Sacrament of spiritual purification For that it may appear that our sins have a proper analogy to this Sacrament the Body it self is called the 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 and therefore the washing of the Body is not ineffectual towards the great work of Pardon and abolition Indeed after this Ablution there remains 〈◊〉 or the material part of our misery and sin For Christ by his death only took away that which when he did die for us he bare in his own body upon the tree Now Christ only bare the punishment of our sin and therefore we shall not die for it but the material part of the sin Christ bare not Sin could not come so near him it might make him sick and die but not disordered and stained He was pure from Original and Actual sins and therefore that remains in the body though the guilt and 〈◊〉 be 〈◊〉 off and changed into advantages and grace and the Actual are 〈◊〉 by the Spirit of Grace descending afterwards upon the Church and sent by our Lord to the same purpose 33. But it is not rationally to be answered what S. Ambrose says Quia omnis peccato 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For it were strange that sin and misery should seize upon the innocent and most 〈◊〉 persons and that they only should be left without a Sacrament and an instrument of expiation And although they cannot consent to the present susception yet neither do they refuse and yet they consent as much to the grace of the Sacrament as to the prevarication of Adam and because 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 under this it were but reason they should be relieved by that And it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Gregory 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they should be consigned and sanctified without their own knowledge than to die without their being sanctified for so it happened to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Israel and if the conspersion and washing the door-posts with the bloud of a Lamb did sacramentally preserve all the first-born of Goshen it cannot 〈◊〉 thought impossible or unreasonable that the want of understanding in Children should hinder them from the blessing of a Sacrament and from being redeemed and washed with the bloud of the Holy Lamb who was 〈◊〉 for all from the beginning of the world 34. After all this it is not inconsiderable that we say the Church hath great power and authority about the Sacraments which is observable in many instances She appointed what persons she pleased and in equal power made an unequal dispensation and ministery The Apostles first dispensed all things and then they left off exteriour ministeries to attend to the Word of God and Prayer and S. Paul accounted it no part of his office to Baptize when he had been separated by imposition of hands at Antioch to the work of Preaching and greater ministeries and accounted that act of the Church the act of Christ saying Christ sent me not to baptize but to preach the Gospel They used various forms in the ministration of Baptism sometimes baptizing in the name of Christ sometimes expresly invocating the Holy and ever-Blessed Trinity one while 〈◊〉 baptize 〈◊〉 as in the Latine Church but in the Greek Let the servant of Christ be baptized And in all Ecclesiastical ministeries the Church invented the forms and in most things hath often changed them as in Absolution Excommunication And sometimes they baptized people under their profession of Repentance and then taught them as it happened to the Goaler and his family in whose case there was no explicit Faith 〈◊〉 in the mysteries of Religion so far as appears and yet he and not only he but all his house were baptized at that hour of the night when the Earthquake was terrible and the 〈◊〉 was pregnant upon them and this upon their Master's account as it is likely but others were baptized in the conditions of a previous Faith and a new-begun Repentance They baptized in Rivers or in Lavatories by dipping or by sprinkling for so we find that S. Laurence did as he went to martyrdom and so the Church did sometimes to Clinicks and so it is highly convenient to be done in Northern Countries according to the Prophecy of 〈◊〉 So shall 〈◊〉 sprinkle many Nations according as the typical expiations among the Jews were usually by sprinkling And it is fairly relative to the mystery to the sprinkling with the 〈◊〉 of Christ and the watering of the furrows of our Souls with the dew of Heaven to make them to bring forth fruit unto the Spirit and unto Holiness The Church sometimes dipt the Catechumen three times sometimes but once Some Churches use Fire in their Baptisms so do the Ethiopians and the custom was ancient in 〈◊〉 places And so in the other Sacrament sometimes they stood and sometimes kneeled and sometimes received it in the mouth and sometimes in the hand one while in 〈◊〉 another while in unlevened bread sometimes the wine and water were mingled sometimes they were pure and they admitted some persons to it sometimes which at other times they rejected sometimes the Consecration was made by one form sometimes by another and to conclude sometimes it was given to Infants sometimes not And she had power so to do for in all things where there was not a Commandment of Christ expressed or implied in the nature and in the end of the Institution the Church had power to alter the particulars as was most expedient or conducing to edification And although the after-Ages of the Church which refused to communicate Infants have 〈◊〉 some little things against the lawfulness and those Ages that used it found out some pretences for its 〈◊〉 yet both the one and the other had liberty to follow their own necessities so in all things they followed Christ. Certainly there is 〈◊〉 more reason why Insants may be Communicated than why they may not be Baptized And that this discourse may 〈◊〉 to its first intention although there is no record extant of any Church in the world and from the Apostles days inclusively to this very day ever refused to Baptize their Children yet if they had upon any present reason they might also change 〈◊〉 practice when the reason should be 〈◊〉 and therefore if there were nothing else in it yet the universal practice of all Churches in all Ages is abundantly sufficient to determine us and to
the time of his first MIRACLE until the Second Year of his PREACHING WITH CONSIDERATIONS and DISCOURSES upon the several parts of the Story And PRAYERS fitted to the several MYSTERIES THE SECOND PART Chrysost. ad Demet. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 LONDON Printed by R. Norton for R. Royston 1675. TO The Right Honourable and Excellent Lady THE LADY MARY Countess Dowager of NORTHAMPTON I AM now to present to your Honour part of that Production of which your great love to Sanctity was Parent and which was partly designed to satisfie those great appetites to Vertue which have made you hugely apprehensive and forward to entertain any Instrument whereby you may grow and encrease in the Service of God and the Communion and Charities of holy people Your Honour best knows in what Soil the first Design of these Papers grew and but that the Excellent Personage who was their first Root is transplanted for a time that he may not have his righteous Soul vexed with the impurer Conversation of ill-minded men I am confident you would have received the fruits of his abode to more excellent purposes But because he was pleased to leave the managing of this to me I hope your Honour will for his sake entertain what that rare Person conceived though I was left to the pains and danger of bringing forth and that it may dwell with you for its first relation rather than be rejected for its appendent imperfections which it contracted not in the fountain but in the chanels of its progress and emanation Madam I shall beg of God that your Honour may receive as great increment of Piety and ghostly strength in the reading this Book as I receive honour if you shall be pleased to accept and own this as a confession of your great Worthiness and a testimony of the Service which ought to be payed to your Honour by Madam Your Honour 's most humble and most obliged Servant JER TAYLOR SECT X. Of the first Manifestation of JESVS by the Testimony of John and a Miracle Iohn points to Iesus The next day Iohn seeth Iesus coming unto him and saith Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world This is he of whom I said after me cometh a man which is preserred before me for he was before me And I knew him not but that he should be made manifest to Israel Ioh. 1. 29 30 31. Christ turns water into wine There was a marriage in Cana of Galilee And there were set there six water pots of stone after the manner of the purifying of the Iewes containing two or three firkins a peice Iesus saith unto them fill the water pots with water and they filled them to the brim Iesus saith unto them draw out now c. This begin̄ing of miracles did Iesus in Cana of Galilee and manifested forth his glory Ioh. 2 6 7 8-11 1. AFTER that the Baptist by a sign from Heaven was confirmed in spirit and understanding that Jesus was the Messias he immediately published to the Jews what God had manifested to him and first to the Priests and 〈◊〉 sent in legation from the Sanhedrim he professed indefinitely in answer to their question that himself was not the CHRIST nor Elias nor that Prophet whom they by a special Tradition did expect to be revealed they knew not when And concerning himself definitely he said nothing but that he was the voice of one crying in the wilderness Make straight the way of the Lord. He it was who was then amongst them but not known a person of great dignity to whom the Baptist was not worthy to do the office of the lowest Ministery who coming after John was preferred far before him who was to increase and the Baptist was to decrease who did baptize with the Holy Ghost and with Fire 2. This was the Character of his personal Prerogatives but as yet no demonstration was made of his Person till after the descent of the Holy Ghost upon Jesus and then when-ever the Baptist saw Jesus he points him out with his finger Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the World This is he Then he shews him to Andrew Simon Peter's brother with the same designation and to another Disciple with him who both followed Jesus and abode with him all night Andrew brings his brother Simon with him and then Christ changes his name from Simon to Peter or Cephas which signifies a Stone Then Jesus himself finds out Philip of Bethsaida and bad him follow him and Philip finds out Nathanael and calls him to see Thus persons bred in a dark cell upon their first ascent up to the chambers of light all run staring upon the beauties of the Sun and call the partners of their darkness to communicate in their new and stranger revelation 3. When Nathanael was come to Jesus Christ saw his heart and gave him a testimony to be truly honest and full of holy simplicity a true Israelite without guile And Nathanael being overjoyed that he had found the Messias believing out of love and loving by reason of his joy and no suspicion took that for a proof and verification of his person which was very insufficient to 〈◊〉 a doubt or ratifie a probability But so we believe a story which we love taking probabilities for demonstrations and casual accidents for probabilities and any thing creates vehement presumptions in which cases our guides are not our knowing faculties but our 〈◊〉 and if they be holy God guides them into the right perswasions as he does little birds to make rare nests though they understand not the mystery of operation nor the design and purpose of the action 4. But Jesus took his will and forwardness of affections in so good part that he promised him greater things and this gave occasion to the first Prophecy which was made by Jesus For Jesus said 〈◊〉 him 〈◊〉 I said I saw thee under the Fig-tree believest thou Thou shalt see greater things than these and then he prophesied that he should see Heaven open and the Angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man But being a Doctor of the Law Christ chose him not at all to the Colledge of Apostles 5. Much about the same time there happened to be a Marriage in Cana 〈◊〉 Galilee in the vicinage of his dwelling where John the Evangelist is by some supposed to have been the Bridegroom but of this there is no certainty and thither Jesus being with his 〈◊〉 invited he went to do civility to the persons espoused and to do honour to the holy rite of Marriage The persons then married were but of indifferent fortunes richer in love of neighbours than in the 〈◊〉 of rich possessions they had more company than wine For the Master of the Feast whom according to the order and piety of the Nation they chose 〈◊〉 the order of Priests to be the president of the Feast
of Religion ought to be greater than the affections of Society And though we are bound in all offices exteriour to prefer our Relatives before others because that is made a Duty yet to purposes spiritual all persons eminently holy put on the efficacy of the same relations and pass a duty upon us of religious affections 10. At the command of Jesus the Water-pots were filled with water and the water was by his Divine power turned into wine where the different oeconomy of God and the world is highly observable Every man sets forth good wine at first and then the worse But God not only turns the water into wine but into such wine that the last draught is most pleasant The world presents us with fair language promising 〈◊〉 convenient fortunes pompous honours and these are the outsides of the bole but when it is swallowed these dissolve in the instant and there remains 〈◊〉 and the malignity of Coloquintida Every sin 〈◊〉 in the first address and carries light in the face and hony in the lip but when we have well drunk then comes that which is worse a whip with six strings fears and terrors of Conscience and shame and displeasure and a caitive disposition and diffidence in the day of death But when after the manner of the purifying of the Christians we fill our Water-pots with water watering our couch with our tears and moistening our cheeks with the perpetual distillations of Repentance then Christ turns our water into wine first Penitents and then Communicants first waters of sorrow and then the wine of the Chalice first the justifications of Correction and then the sanctifications of the Sacrament and the effects of the Divine power joy and peace and serenity hopes full of confidence and confidence without shame and boldness without presumption for Jesus keeps the best wine till the last not only because of the direct reservations of the highest joys till the nearer approaches of glory but also because our relishes are higher after a long 〈◊〉 than at the first Essays such being the nature of Grace that it increases in relish as it does in fruition every part of Grace being new Duty and new Reward The PRAYER O Eternal and ever-Blessed Jesu who didst chuse Disciples to be witnesses of thy Life and Miracles so adopting man into a participation of thy great imployment of bringing us to Heaven by the means of a holy Doctrine be pleased to give me thy grace that I may 〈◊〉 and revere their Persons whom thou hast set over me and follow their Faith and imitate their Lives while they imitate thee and that I also in my capacity and proportion may do some of the meaner offices of spiritual building by Prayers and by holy Discourses and 〈◊〉 Correption and friendly Exhortations doing advantages to such Souls with whom I shall converse And since thou wert pleased to enter upon the stage of the World with the commencement of Mercy and a Miracle be pleased to visit my Soul with thy miraculous grace turn my water into wine my natural desires into supernatural perfections and let my sorrows be turned into joys my sins into vertuous habits the weaknesses of humanity into communications of the 〈◊〉 nature that since thou keepest the best unto the last I may by thy assistance grow from Grace to Grace till thy Gifts be turned to Reward and thy Graces to participation of thy Glory O Eternal and ever-Blessed Jesu Amen DISCOURSE VII Of Faith 1. NAthanael's Faith was produced by an argument not demonstrative not certainly concluding Christ knew him when he saw him first and he believed him to be the Messias His Faith was excellent what-ever the argument was And I believe a GOD because the Sun is a glorious body or because of the variety of Plants or the fabrick and rare contexture of a man's Eye I may as fully assent to the Conclusion as if my belief dwelt upon the Demonstrations made by the Prince of Philosophers in the 8. of his Physicks and 12. of his Metaphysicks This I premise as an inlet into the consideration concerning the Faith of ignorant persons For if we consider upon what 〈◊〉 terms most of us now are Christians we may possibly suspect that either Faith hath but little excellence in it or we but little Faith or that we are mistaken generally in its definition For we are born of Christian parents made Christians at ten days old interrogated concerning the Articles of our Faith by way of anticipation even then when we understand not the difference between the Sun and a Tallow-candle from thence we are taught to say our Catechism as we are taught to speak when we have no reason to judge no discourse to dilcern no arguments to contest against a Proposition in case we be catechised into False doctrine and all that is put to us we believe infinitely and without choice as children use not to chuse their language And as our children are made Christians just so are thousand others made Mahumetans with the same necessity the same facility So that thus sar there is little thanks due to us for believing the Christian Creed it was indifferent to us at first and at last our Education had so possest us and our interest and our no temptation to the contrary that as we were disposed into this condition by Providence so we remain in it without praise or excellency For as our beginnings are inevitable so our progress is imperfect and insufficient and what we begun by Education we retain only by Custom and if we be instructed in some slighter Arguments to maintain the Sect or Faction of our Country Religion as it disturbs the unity of Christendom yet if we examine and consider the account upon what slight arguments we have taken up Christianity it self as that it is the Religion of our Country or that our Fathers before us were of the same Faith or because the Priest bids us and he is a good man or for something else but we know not what we must needs conclude it the good providence of God not our choice that made us Christians 2. But if the question be Whether such a Faith be in it self good and acceptable that relies upon insufficient and unconvincing grounds I suppose this case of Nathanael will determine us and when we consider that Faith is an 〈◊〉 Grace if God pleases to behold his own glory in our weakness of understanding it is but the same thing he does in the instances of his other Graces For as God enkindles Charity upon variety of means and instruments by a thought by a chance by a text of Scripture by a natural tenderness by the sight of a dying or a tormented beast so also he may produce Faith by arguments of a differing quality and by issues of his Providence he may engage us in such conditions in which as our Understanding is not great enough to chuse the best so neither is it furnished with
dedicated I have accepted what you have consecrated I have hallowed I have taken it to the same purpose to which your desires and designation pretended it in your first purposes and expence So that since the purpose of man in separating places of Worship is that thither by order and with convenience and in communities of men God may be worshipped and prayed unto God having declared that he accepts of such separate places to the same purposes says that there he will be called upon that such places shall be places of advantage to our Devotions in respect of humane order and Divine acceptance and benediction 3. Now these are therefore God's Houses because they were given by men and accepted by God for the service of God and the offices of Religion And this is not the effect or result of any distinct Covenant God hath made with man in any period of the world but it is merely a favour of God either hearing the Prayer of Dedication or complying with humane order or necessities For there is nothing in the Covenant of Moses's Law that by virtue of special stipulation makes the assignment of a house for the service of God to be proper to Moses's rite Not only because God had memorials and determinations of this manner of his Presence before Moses's Law as at 〈◊〉 where Jacob laid the first stone of the Church nothing but a Stone was God's memorial and the beginning and first rudiments of a Temple but also because after Moses's Law was given as long as the Nation was ambulatory so were their places and instruments of Religion and although the Ark was not confined to a place till Solomon's time yet God was pleased in this manner to confine himself to the Ark and in all places where-ever his Name was put even in Synagogues and Oratories and Threshing-floors when they were hallowed with an Altar and Religion thither God came that is there he heard them pray and answered and blessed accordingly still in proportion to that degree of Religion which was put upon them And those places when they had once entertained Religion grew separate and sacred for ever For therefore David bought the Threshing-floor of Araunah that it might never return to common use any more for it had been no trouble or inconvenience to Araunah to have used his floor for one solemnity but he offered to give it and David resolved to buy it because it must of necessity be aliened from common uses to which it could never return any more when once it had been the instrument of a religious solemnity and yet this was no part of Moses's Law that every place of a temporary Sacrifice should be holy for ever David had no guide in this but right Reason and the Religion of all the world For such things which were great instruments of publick ends and thing of highest use were also in all societies of men of greatest honour and immured by reverence and the security of Laws For honour and reputation is not a thing inherent in any creature but depends upon the estimate of God or men who either in diffusion or representation become fountains of a derivative honour Thus some Men are hohourable that is those who are fountains of Honour in civil account have commanded that they shall be honoured And so Places and Things are made honourable that as honourable Persons are to be distinguished from others by honourable usages and circumstances proper to them so also should Places and Things upon special reason separate have an usage proper to them when by a publick Instrument or Minister they are so separated No common usage then something proper to tell what they are and to what purposes they are designed and to signifie their separation and extraordinariness Such are the Person of the Prince the Archives and Records of a Kingdom the Walls and great Defences of the Imperial City the Eagles and Ensigns of war amongst the 〈◊〉 and above all things though not above all persons the Temples and Altars and all the instruments of Religion And there is much reason in it For thus a servant of a King though his employment be naturally mean yet is more honourable because he relates to the most excellent person and therefore much more those things which relate to God And though this be the reason why it should be so yet for this and other reasons they that have power that is they who are acknowledged to be the fountains and the chanels of Honour I mean the Supreme power and publick fame have made it actually to be so For whatsoever all wise men and all good men and all publick societies and all supreme Authority hath commanded to be honoured or rever'd that is honourable and reverend and this Honour and Reverence is to be expressed according to the Customs of the Nation and instruments of honour proper to the nature of the thing or person respectively Whatsoever is 〈◊〉 so is so because Honour and Noble separations are relative actions and terms creatures and productions of Fame and the voice of Princes and the sense of people and they who will not honour those things or those persons which are thus decreed to be honourable have no communications with the civilities of humanity or the guises of wise Nations they do not give honour to whom honour belongs Now that which in civil account we call honourable the same in religious account we call sacred for by both these words we mean things or persons made separate and retired from common opinion and vulgar usages by reason of some excellency really inherent in them such as are excellent men or for their relation to excellent persons or great ends publick or religious and so servants of Princes and Ministers of Religion and its Instruments and Utensils are made honourable or sacred and the expressions of their honour are all those actions and usages which are contrary to despite and above the usage of vulgar Things or Places Whatsoever is sacred that is honourable for its religious relation and whatsoever is honourable that also is sacred that is separate from the vulgar usages and account for its civil excellency or relation The result is this That when publick Authority or the consent of a Nation hath made any Place sacred for the uses of Religion we must esteem it sacred just as we esteem Persons honourable who are so honoured And thus are Judges and the very places of Judicature the King's Presence-chamber the Chair of State the Senate-house the royal Ensigns of a Prince whose Gold and Purple in its natural capacity hath in it no more dignity than the Money of the bank or the Cloth of the Mart but it hath much more for its signification and relative use And it is certain these things whose excellency depends upon their relation must receive the degree of their Honour in that proportion they have to their term and foundation and therefore what belongs to
God as holy Places of Religion must rise highest in this account I mean higher than any other places And this is besides the honour which God hath put upon them by his presence his title to them w ch in all Religions he hath signified to us 4. Indeed among the Jews as God had confined his Church and the rites of Religion to be used only in communion and participation with the Nation so also he had limited his Presence and was more sparing of it than in the time of the Gospel his Son declared he would be It was said of old that at Jerusalem men ought to worship that is by a solemn publick and great address in the capital expresses of Religion in the distinguishing rites of Liturgy for else it had been no new thing For in ordinary Prayers God was then and long before pleased to hear Jeremy in the dungeon Manasses in prison Daniel in the Lion's den Jonas in the belly of the deep and in the offices yet more solemn in the Proseuchae in the houses of prayer which the Jews had not only in their dispersion but even in Palestine for their diurnal and nocturnal offices But when the Holy Jesus had broken down the partition-wall then the most solemn Offices of Religion were as unlimited as their private Devotions were before for where-ever a Temple should be built thither God would come if he were worshipped spirituallly and in truth that is according to the rites of Christ who is Grace and Truth and the dictate of the Spirit and analogy of the Gospel All places were now alike to build Churches in or Memorials for God God's houses And that our Blessed Saviour discourses of places of publick Worship to the woman of Samaria is notorious because the whole question was concerning the great addresses of Moses's rites whether at Jerusalem or Mount Gerizim which were the places of the right and the 〈◊〉 Temple the 〈◊〉 of the whole Religion and in antithesis Jesus said Nor here nor there shall be the solemnities of address to God but in all places you may build a Temple and God will dwell in it 5. And this hath descended from the first beginnings of Religion down to the consummation of it in the perfections of the Gospel For the Apostles of our Lord carried the Offices of the Gospel into the Temple of Jerusalem there they preached and prayed and payed Vows but never that we read of offered Sacrifice which 〈◊〉 that the Offices purely Evangelical were proper to be done in any of God's proper places and that thither they went not in compliance with Moses's Rites but merely for Gospel-duties or for such Offices which were common to Moses and Christ such as were Prayers and Vows While the Temple was yet standing they had peculiar places for the Assemblies of the faithful where either by accident or observation or Religion or choice they met regularly And I instance in the house of John surnamed Mark which as Alexander reports in the life of S. Barnabas was consecrated by many actions of Religion by our Blessed Saviour's eating the 〈◊〉 his Institution of the holy Eucharist his Farewell-Sermon and the Apostles met there in the Octaves of Easter whither Christ came again and hallowed it with his presence and there to make up the relative Sanctification complete the Holy Ghost descended upon their heads in the 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 and this was erected into a fair 〈◊〉 and is mentioned as a famous Church by S. Jerome and V. Bede in which as 〈◊〉 adds S. Peter preached that 〈◊〉 which was miraculoasly prosperous in the Conversion of three thousand there S. James Brother of our Lord was 〈◊〉 first Bishop of Jerusalem S. Stephen and the other six were there ordained Deacons there the Apostles kept their first Council and 〈◊〉 their Creed by these actions and their frequent conventions shewing the same reason order and prudence of Religion in 〈◊〉 of special places of Divine service which were ever observed by all the Nations and Religions and wise men of the world And it were a strange imagination to 〈◊〉 that in Christian Religion there is any principle contrary to that wisdom or God and all the world which for order for necessity for convenience for the solemnity of Worship hath set apart Places for God and for Religion Private Prayer had always an unlimited residence and relation even under Moses's Law but the publick solemn Prayer of 〈◊〉 in the Law of Moses was restrained to one Temple In the Law of Nature it was not confined to one but yet determined to publick and solemn places and when the Holy Jesus disparked the inclosures of Moses we all returned to the permissions and liberty of the Natural Law in which although the publick and solemn Prayers were confined to a Temple yet the Temple was not consined to a place but they might be any-where so they were at all instruments of order conveniences of assembling residences of Religion and God who always loved order and was apt to hear all holy and prudent Prayers and therefore also the Prayers of Consecration hath often declared that he loves such Places that he will dwell in them not that they are advantages to him but that he is pleased to make them so to us And therefore all Nations of the world built publick Houses for Religion and since all Ages of the Church did so too it had need be a strong and a convincing argument that must shew they were deceived And if any man list to be 〈◊〉 he must be answered with S. Paul's reproof We have no such custom nor the Churches of God 6. Thus S. Paul reproved the Corinthians for despising the Church of God by such uses which were therefore unsit for God's because they were proper for their own that is for common houses And although they were at first and in the descending Ages so afflicted by the tyranny of enemies that they could not build many Churches yet some they did and the Churches themselves suffered part of the persecution For so 〈◊〉 reports that when under Severus and Gordianus 〈◊〉 and Galienus the Christian affairs were in a tolerable condition they built Churches in great number and expence But when the Persecution waxed hot under Diocletian down went the Churches upon a design to extinguish or disadvantage the Religion Maximinus gave leave to re-build them Upon which Rescript saith the story the Christians were overjoyed and raised them up to an incredible height and incomparable beauty This was Christian Religion then and so it hath continued-ever since and unless we should have new reason and new revelation it must continue so till our Churches are exchanged for Thrones and our Chappels for seats placed before the Lamb in the eternal Temple of celestial Jerusalem 7. And to this purpose it is observed that the Holy Jesus first ejected the Beasts of Sacrifice out of the Temple and then proclaimed the Place
and peace where wearied Souls were to lay their heads and dispose their cares and there to turn them into joys and to gild their thorns with glory That holy tongue which was parched with heat streamed forth rivulets of holy Doctrine which were to water all the world to turn our Deserts into Paradise And though he begged water at Jacob's Well yet Jacob drank at his For at his charge all Jacob's flocks and family were sustained and by him Jacob's posterity were made honourable and redeemed But because this Well was deep and the woman had nothing to draw water with and of her self could not fathom so great a depth therefore she refused him just as we do when we refuse to give drink to a thirsty Disciple Christ comes in that humble manner of address under the veil of poverty or contempt and we cannot see Christ from under that robe and we send him away without an alms little considering that when he begs an alms of us in the instance of any of his poor relatives he asks of us but to give him occasion to give a blessing for an alms Thus do the Ministers of Religion ask support but when the Laws are not more just than many of the people are charitable they shall fare as their Master did they shall preach but unless they can draw water themselves they shall not drink but si scirent if men did but know who it is that asks them that it is Christ either in his Ministers or Christ in his poor servants certainly they could not be so obstructed in the issues of their Justice and Charity but would remember that no honour could be greater no love more fortunate than to meet with an opportunity to be expressed in so noble a manner that God himself is pleased to call his own relief 5. When the Disciples had returned from the Town whither they went to buy provision they wondred to see the Master talking alone with a woman They knew he never did so before they had observed him to be of a reserved deportment and not only innocent but secure from the dangers of Malice and suspicion in the matter of Incontinence The Jews were a jealous and froward people and as nothing will more blast the reputation of a Prophet than effeminacy and wanton affections so he knew no crime was sooner objected or harder cleared than that Of which because commonly it is acted in privacy men look for no probation but pregnant circumstances and arguments of suspect so nothing can wash it off until a man can prove a negative and if he could yet he is guilty enough in the estimate of the vulgar for having been accused But then because nothing is so destructive of the reputation of a Governour so contradictory to the authority and dignity of his person as the low and baser appetites of Uncleanness and the consequent shame and scorn insomuch that David having faln into it prayed God to confirm or establish him spiritu principali with the spirit of a Prince the spirit of Lust being uningenuous and slavish the Holy Jesus who was to establish a new Law in the authority of his person was highly curious so to demean himself that he might be a person uncapable of any such suspicions and of a temper apt not only to answer the calumny but also to prevent the jealousie But yet now he had a great design in hand he meant to reveal to the Samaritans the coming of the Messias and to this his discourse with the Woman was instrumental And in imitation of our great Master Spiritual persons and the Guides of others have been very prudent and reserved in their societies and entercourse with women Hereticks have served their ends upon the impotency of the Sex and having led captive silly women led them about as triumphs of Lust and knew no scandal greater than the scandal of Heresie and therefore sought not to decline any but were infamous in their unwary and lustful mixtures Simon Magus had his Helena partner of his Lust and Heresie the author of the Sect of the Nicolaitans if S. Hierom was not misinformed had whole troups of women Marcion sent a woman as his Emissary to Rome Apelles had his Philomene Montanus Prisca and Maximilla Donatus was served by Lucilla Helpidius by Agape Priscillian by Galla and 〈◊〉 spreads his nets by opportunity of his conversation with the Prince's Sister and first he corrupted her then he seduced the world 6. But holy persons Preachers of true Religion and holy Doctrines although they were careful by publick Homilies to instruct the female Disciples that they who are heirs together with us of the same Hope may be servants in the same Discipline and Institution yet they remitted them to their Husbands and Guardians to be taught at home And when any personal transactions concerning the needs of their spirit were of necessity to intervene between the Priest and a woman the action was done most commonly under publick test or if in private yet with much caution and observation of circumstance which might as well prevent suspicion as preserve their innocence Conversation and frequent and familiar address does too much rifle the ligaments and reverence of Spiritual authority and amongst the best persons is matter of danger When the Cedars of Libanus have been observed to fall when David and Solomon have been dishonoured he is a bold man that will venture farther than he is sent in errand by necessity or invited by charity or warranted by prudence I deny not but some persons have made holy friendships with women S. Athanasius with a devout and religious Virgin S. Chrysostome with Olympia S. Hierome with Paula Romana S. John with the elect Lady S. Peter and S. Paul with Petronilla and Tecla And therefore it were a jealousie beyond the suspicion of Monks and Eunuchs to think it impossible to have a chaste conversation with a distinct Sex 1. A pure and right intention 2. an entercourse not extended beyond necessity or holy ends 3. a short stay 4. great modesty 5. and the business of Religion will by God's grace hallow the visit and preserve the friendship in its being spiritual that it may not degenerate into carnal affection And yet these are only advices useful when there is danger in either of the persons or some scandal incident to the Profession that to some persons and in the conjunction of many circumstances are oftentimes not considerable 7. When Jesus had resolved to reveal himself to the Woman he first gives her occasion to reveal her self to him fairly insinuating an opportunity to confess her sins that having purged her self from her impurity she might be apt to entertain the article of the revelation of the Messias And indeed a crime in our Manners is the greatest indisposition of our Understanding to entertain the Truth and Doctrine of the Gospel especially when the revelation contests against the Sin and professes open hostility to the Lust.
For Faith being the gift of God and an illumination the Spirit of God will not give this light to them that prefer their darkness before it either the Will must open the windows or the light of Faith will not shine into the chamber of the Soul How can ye believe said our Blessed Saviour that receive honour one of another Ambition and Faith believing God and seeking of our selves are incompetent and totally incompossible And therefore Serapion Bishop of Thmuis spake like an Angel saith Socrates saying that the Mind which feedeth upon spiritual knowledge must throughly be cleansed The Irascible faculty must first be cured with brotherly Love and Charity and the Concupiscible must be suppressed with Continency and Mortification Then may the Understanding apprehend the mysteriousness of Christianity For since Christianity is a holy Doctrine if there be any remanent affections to a sin there is in the Soul a party disaffected to the entertainment of the Institution and we usually believe what we have a mind to Our Understandings if a crime be lodged in the Will being like icterical eyes transmitting the species to the Soul with prejudice disaffection and colours of their own framing If a Preacher should discourse that there ought to be a Parity amongst Christians and that their goods ought to be in common all men will apprehend that not Princes and rich persons but the poor and the servants would soonest become Disciples and believe the Doctrines because they are the only persons likely to get by them and it concerns the other not to believe him the Doctrine being destructive of their interests Just such a perswasion is every persevering love to a vicious habit it having possessed the Understanding with fair opinions of it and surprised the Will with Passion and desires whatsoever Doctrine is its enemy will with infinite difficulty be entertained And we know a great experience of it in the article of the Messias dying on the Cross which though infinitely true yet because to the Jews it was a scandal and to the Greeks 〈◊〉 it could not be believed they remaining in that indisposition that is unless the Will were first set right and they willing to believe any Truth though for it they must disclaim their interest Their Understanding was blind because the Heart was hardened and could not receive the impression of the greatest moral demonstration in the world 8. The Holy Jesus asked water of the Woman unsatisfying water but promised that himself to them that ask him would give waters of life and satisfaction infinite so distinguishing the pleasures and appetites of this world from the desires and complacencies spiritual Here we labour but receive no 〈◊〉 we sow many times and reap not or reap and do not gather in or gather in and do not 〈◊〉 or possess but do not enjoy or if we enjoy we are still 〈◊〉 it is with 〈◊〉 of spirit and circumstances of vexation A great heap of riches make 〈◊〉 our 〈◊〉 warm nor our meat more nutritive nor our beverage more 〈◊〉 and it seeds the eye but never fills it but like drink to an hydropick person increases the thirst and promotes the torment But the Grace of 〈◊〉 though but like a grain of 〈◊〉 dseed fills the furrows of the heart and as the capacity increases it self grows up in equal degrees and never suffers any emptiness or dissatisfaction but carries content and fulness all the way and the degrees of augmentation are not steps and near approaches to satisfaction but increasings of the capacity the 〈◊〉 is satished all the way and receives more not because it wanted any but that it can now hold more is more receptive of 〈◊〉 and in every minute of 〈◊〉 there is so excellent a condition of joy and high satisfaction that the very calamities the afflictions and persecutions of the world are turned into 〈◊〉 by the activity of the prevailing ingredient like a drop of water falling into a tun of wine it is ascribed into a new family losing its own nature by a conversion into the more noble For now that all passionate desires are dead and there is nothing remanent that is vexatious the peace the 〈◊〉 the quiet sleeps the evenness of spirit and contempt of things below remove the Soul from all neighbourhood of displeasure and place it at the foot of the throne whither when it is ascended it is possessed of Felicities eternal These were 〈◊〉 waters which were given to us to drink when with the rod of God the Rock 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was smitten the Spirit of God moves for ever upon these waters and when the Angel of the Covenant hath stirred the pool who ever descends hither shall find health and peace joys spiritual and the satisfactions of Eternity The PRAYER O Holy Jesus Fountain of eternal life thou Spring of joy and spiritual satisfactions let the holy stream of bloud and water issuing from thy sacred side cool the thirst soften the hardness and refresh the barrenness of my desert Soul that I thirsting after thee as the wearied Hart after the cool stream may despise all the vainer complacencies of this world refuse all societies but such as are safe pious and charitable mortifie all 〈◊〉 appetites and may desire nothing but thee seek none but thee and rest in thee with intire 〈◊〉 of my own caitive inclinations that the desires of Nature may pass into desires of Grace and my thirst and my hunger may be spiritual and my hopes placed in thee and the expresses of my Charity upon thy relatives and all the parts of my life may speak thy love and obedience to thy Commandments that thou possessing my Soul and all its Faculties during my whole life I may possess thy glories in the fruition of a blessed Eternity by the light of thy Gospel here and the streams of thy Grace being guided to thee the fountain of life and glory there to be inebriated with the waters of Paradise with joy and love and contemplation adoring and admiring the beauties of the Lord for ever and ever Amen Considerations upon Christ's first Preaching and the Accidents happening about that time Jesus preaching to the people Mauh 4. 17. From that time Jesus began to preach saying Repent for the Kingodm of heaven is at hand V. 29. And he went about all Gallilee teaching preaching the Gospel of the kingdom and healing all manner of sickness c. V. 25. And there followed him great multitudes of people from Galilee and from Dâ—â—apolis and from Ierusalem etc. Christ sending forth his Apostles Mark 6. 7. And he called unto him y e twelve began to send them forth by two and two and gave them power over unclean spirits And conunanded them that they should take nothing for their journey etc. V. 12 And they went out and preached that men should repent 1. WHen John was cast into Prison then began Jesus to preach not only because the Ministery of John
Souls let them have the diligence and the craft of Fishers the watchfulness and care of Shepherds the prudence of Politicks the tenderness of Parents the spirit of Government the wariness of Observation great knowledge of the dispositions of their people and experience of such advantages by means of which they may serve the ends of God and of Salvation upon their Souls 7. When Peter had received the fruits of a rich Miracle in the prodigious and prosperous draught of fishes he instantly falls down at the feet of Jesus and confesses himself a sinner and unworthy of the presence of Christ. In which confession I not only consider the conviction of his Understanding by the testimony of the Miracle but the modesty of his spirit who in his exaltation and the joy of a sudden and happy success retired into Humility and consideration of his own unworthiness lest as it happens in sudden joys the lavishness of his spirit should transport him to intemperance to looser affections to vanity and garishness less becoming the severity and government of a Disciple of so great a Master For in such great and sudden accidents men usually are dissolved and melted into joy and inconsideration and let fly all their severe principles and discipline of manners till as Peter here did though to another purpose they say to Christ Depart from me O Lord as if such excellencies of joys like the lesser Stars did disappear at the presence of him who is the fountain of all joys regular and just When the spirits of the Body have been bound up by the cold Winter air the warmth of the Spring makes so great an aperture of the passages and by consequence such dissolution of spirits in the presence of the Sun that it becomes the occasion of Fevers and violent diseases Just such a thing is a sudden Joy in which the spirits leap out from their cells of austerity and sobriety and are warmed into Fevers and wildnesses and forfeiture of all Judgment and vigorous understanding In these accidents the best advice is to temper and allay our joys with some instant consideration of the vilest of our sins the shamefulness of our disgraces the most dolorous accidents of our lives the worst of our fears with meditation of Death or the terrours of Dooms-day or the unimaginable miseries of damned and accursed spirits For such considerations as these are good instruments of Sobriety and are correctives to the malignity of excessive Joys or temporal prosperities which like Minerals unless allayed by art prey upon the spirits and become the union of a contradiction being turned into mortal medicines 8. At this time Jesus preached to the people from the Ship which in the fancies and tropical discoursings of the old Doctors signifies the Church and declares that the Homilies of order and authority must be delivered from the Oracle they that preach must be sent and God hath appointed Tutors and Instructors of our Consciences by special designation and peculiar appointment if they that preach do not make their Sermons from the Ship their discourses either are the false murmurs of Hereticks and false Shepherds or else of Thieves and invaders of Authority or corrupters of Discipline and Order For God that loves to hear us in special places will also be heard himself by special persons and since he sent his Angels Ministers to convey his purposes of old then when the Law was ordained by Angels as by the hands of a Mediatour now also he will send his servants the sons of men since the new Law was ordained by the Son of man who is the Mediatour between God and man in the New Covenant And therefore in the Ship Jesus preach'd but he had first caused it to put off from land to represent to us that the Ship in which we preach must be put off from the vulgar communities of men separate from the people by the designation of special appointment and of special Holiness that is they neither must be common men nor of common lives but consecrated by order and hallowed by holy living lest the person want authority in destitution of a Divine Character and his Doctrine lose its energy and power when the life is vulgar and hath nothing in it holy and extraordinary 9. The Holy Jesus in the choice of his Apostles was resolute and determined to make election of persons bold and confident for so the Galilaeans were observed naturally to be and Peter was the boldest of the Twelve and a good Sword-man till the spirit of his Master had fastened his sword within the scabbard and charmed his spirit into quietness but he never chose any of the Scribes and Pharisees none of the Doctors of the Law but persons ignorant and unlearned which in design and institutions whose divinity is not demonstrated from other Arguments would seem an art of concealment and distrust But in this which derives its raies from the fountain of wisdom most openly and infallibly it is a contestation against the powers of the world upon the interests of God that he who does all the work might have all the glory and in the productions in which he is fain to make the instruments themselves and give them capacity and activity every part of the operation and causality and effect may give to God the same honour he had from the Creation for his being the only workman with the addition of those degrees of excellency which in the work of Redemption of Man are beyond that of his Creation and first being The PRAYER O Eternal Jesu Lord of the Creatures and Prince of the Catholick Church to whom all Creatures obey in acknowledgment of thy supreme Dominion and all according to thy disposition cooperate to the advancement of thy Kingdom be pleased to order the affairs and accidents of the world that all things in their capacity may do the work of the Gospel and cooperate to the good of the Elect and retrench the growth of Vice and advance the interests of Vertue Make all the states and orders of men Disciples of thy holy Institution Let Princes worship thee and defend Religion let thy Clergy do thee honour by personal zeal and vigilancy over their Flocks let all the world submit to thy Scepter and praise thy Righteousness and adore thy Judgments and revere thy Laws and in the multitudes of thy people within the enclosure of thy Nets let me also communicate in the offices of a strict and religious duty that I may know thy voice and obey thy call and entertain thy Holy Spirit and improve my talents that I may also communicate in the blessings of the Church and when the Nets shall be drawn to the shore and the Angels shall make separation of the good Fishes from the bad I may not be rejected or thrown into those Seas of fire which shall afflict the enemies of thy Kingdom but be admitted into the societies of Saints and the everlasting communion of
nature and manner of the present communication Only this last because it is more malicious and a declension from a greater grace is something like the fall of Angels And of this the Emperour Julian was a sad example 19. But as these are degrees immediately next and a little less so the hopes of pardon are the more visible Simon Magiss spake a word or at least thought against the Holy Ghost he thought he was to be bought with mony Concerning him S. Peter pronounced Thou art in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity Yet repent pray God if perhaps the thought of thine heart may be forgiven thee Here the matter was of great difficulty but yet there was a possibility 〈◊〉 at least no impossibility of recovery declared And therefore S. Jude bids us of some to have compassion making a difference and others save with fear pulling them out of the fire meaning that their condition is only not desperate And still in descent retaining the same proportion every lesser sin is easier pardoned as better consisting with the state of Grace the whole Spirit is not destroyed and the body of sin is not introduced Christ is not quite ejected out of possession but like an oppressed Prince still continues his claim and such is his mercy that he will still do so till all be lost or that he is provoked by too much violence or that Antichrist is put in substitution and sin reigns in 〈◊〉 mortal body So that I may use the words of Saint John These things I write unto you that ' you sin not But if any man sin we have an Advocate with the 〈◊〉 Jesus Christ the Righteous And he is a propitiation for our sins and not for ours only but for the sins of the whole world That is plainly Although the design of the Gospel be that we should erect a Throne for Christ to reign in our spirits and this doctrine of Innocence be therefore preached that ye sin not yet if one be overtaken in a fault despair not Christ is our Advocate and he is the Propitiation he did propitiate the Father by his death and the benefit of that we receive at our first access to him but then he is our Advocate too and prays perpetually for our perseverance or restitution respectively But his purpose is and he is able so to do to keep you from falling and to present you faultless before the presence of his Glory 20. This consideration I intend should relate to all Christians of the world And although by the present custom of the Church we are baptized in our infancy and do not actually reap that fruit of present Pardon which persons of a mature age in the primitive Church did for we yet need it not as we shall when we have past the calentures of Youth which was the time in which the wisest of our Fathers in Christ chose for their Baptism as appears in the instance of S. Ambrose S. Austin and divers others yet we must remember that there is a Baptism of the Spirit as well as of water and when-ever this happens whether it be together with that Baptism of water as usually it was when only men and women of years of discretion were baptized or whether it be ministred in the rite of Confirmation which is an admirable suppletory of an early Baptism and intended by the Holy Ghost for a corroborative of Baptismal grace and a defensative against danger or that lastly it be performed by an internal and merely spiritual Ministery when we by acts of our own election verifie the promise made in Baptism and so bring back the Rite by receiving the effect of Baptism that is when-ever the filth of our flesh is washt away and that we have the answer of a pure conscience towards God which S. Peter affirms to be the true Baptism and which by the purpose and design of God it is expected we should not defer longer than a great reason or a great necessity enforces when our sins are first explated and the sacrifice and death of Christ is made ours and we made God's by a more immediate title which at some time or other happens to all Christians that pretend to any hopes of Heaven then let us look to our standing and take heed lest we fall When we once have tasted of the heavenly gift and are made partakers of the Holy Ghost and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come that is when we are redeemed by an actual mercy and presential application which every Christian that belongs to God is at some time or other of his life then a fall into a deadly crime is highly dangerous but a relapse into a contrary estate is next to desperate 21. I represent this sad but most true Doctrine in the words of S. Peter If after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ they are again entangled therein and overcome the latter end is worse with them than the beginning For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than after they have known it to turn from the holy Commandment delivered unto them So that a relapse after a state of Grace into a state of sin into confirmed habits is to us a great sign and possibly in it self it is more than a sign even a state of reprobation and final abscission 22. The summ of all is this There are two states of like opposite terms First Christ redeems us from our vain conversation and reconciles us to God putting us into an intire condition of Pardon Favour Innocence and Acceptance and becomes our Lord and King his Spirit dwelling and reigning in us The opposite state to this is that which in Scripture is called a crucifying the Lord of Life a doing despite to the Spirit of grace a being entangled in the pollutions of the world the Apostasie or falling away an impotency or disability to do good viz. of such who cannot cease from sin who are slaves of sin and in whom sin reigns in their bodies This condition is a full and integral deletery of the first it is such a condition which as it hath no Holiness or remanent affections to Vertue so it hath no hope or revelation of a mercy because all that benefit is lost which they received by the death of Christ and the first being lost there remains no more sacrifice for sins but a certain fearful expectation of Judgment But between these two states stand all those imperfections and single delinquencies those slips and falls those parts of recession and apostasie those grievings of the Spirit and so long as any thing of the first state is left so long we are within the Covenant of grace so long we are within the ordinary limits of mercy and the Divine compassion we are in possibilities of
that there is the same conformity of spirit and fortune by complying with my fortune as if my fortune did comply with my spirit And therefore in the order of Beatitudes Meekness is set between Mourning and Desire that it might balance and attemper those actions by indifferency which by reason of their abode are apt to the transportation of passion The reward expressed is a possission of the earth that is a possession of all which is excellent here below to consign him to a future glory as Canaan was a type of Heaven For Meekness is the best cement and combining of friendships it is a great endearment of us to our company It is an ornament to have a meek and quiet spirit a prevention of quarrels and pacifier of wrath it purchaseth peace and is it self a quietness of spirit it is the greatest affront to all injuries in the world for it returns them upon the injurious and makes them useless ineffective and innocent and is an antidote against all the evil consequents of anger and adversity and tramples upon the usurping passions of the irascible faculty 9. But the greatest part of this Paisage and Landtschap is Sky and as a man in all countreys can see more of Heaven than of the earth he dwells on so also he may in this Promise For although the Christian hears the promise of the inheritance of the Earth yet he must place his eye and fix his heart upon Heaven which by looking downward also upon this Promise as in a vessel of limpid water he may see by reflexion without looking upwards by a direct intuition It is Heaven that is designed by this Promise as well as by any of the rest though this Grace takes in also the refreshments of the earth by equivalence and a suppletory 〈◊〉 But here we have no abiding city and therefore no inheritance this is not our Countrey and therefore here cannot be our portion unless we chuse as did the Prodigal to go into a strange Countrey and spend our portion with riotous and beastly living and forfeit our Father's blessing The Devil carrying our Blessed Saviour to a high mountain shewed him all the Kingdoms of the world but besides that they were offered upon ill conditions they were not eligible by him upon any And neither are they to be chosen by us for our inheritance and portion Evangelical for the Gospel is founded upon better promises and therefore the hopes of a Christian ought not to determine upon any thing less than Heaven Indeed our Blessed Saviour chose to describe this Beatitude in the words of the Psalmist so inviting his Disciples to an excellent precept by the insinuation of those Scriptures which themselves admitted But as the earth which was promised to the meek man in David's Psalm was no other earth but the terra 〈◊〉 the Land of Canaan if we shall remember that this Land of promise was but a transition and an allegory to a greater and more noble that it was but a type of Heaven we shall not see cause to wonder why the Holy Jesus intending Heaven for the reward of this Grace also together with the rest did call it the inheritance of the earth For now is revealed to us a new heaven and a new earth an habitation made without hands 〈◊〉 in the heavens And he understands nothing of the excellency of Christian Religion whose affections dwell below and are satisfied with a portion of dirt and corruption If we be risen with Christ let us seek those things that are above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God But if a Christian desires to take possession of this earth in his way as his inheritance or portion he hath reason to fear it will be his All. We have but one inheritance one countrey and here we are strangers and Pilgrims Abraham told Dives that he had enjoyed his good things here he had the inheritance of the earth in the crass material sense and therefore he had no other portion but what the Devils have And when we remember that Persecution is the lot of the Church and that Poverty is her portion and her quantum is but food and raiment at the best and that Patience is her support and Hope her refreshment and Self-denial her security and Meekness is all her possession and title to a subsistence it will appear certain that as Christ's Kingdom was not of this world so neither shall his Saints have their portion in that which is not his Kingdom They are miserable if they do not reign with him and he never reigned here but if we suffer with him we shall also reign with him hereafter True it is Christ promised to him that should lose any interest for his sake the restitution of a hundred fold in this world But as the sense of that cannot be literal for he cannot receive a hundred Mothers or a hundred Wives so whatsoever that be it is to be enjoyed with persecution And then such a portion of the Earth as Christ hath expressed in figure and shall by way of recompence restore us and such a recompence as we can enjoy with Persecution and such an enjoyment as is consistent with our having lost all our temporals and such an acquist and purchace of it as is not destructive of the grace of Meekness all that we may enter into our accounts as part of our lot and the emanation from the holy Promise But in the foot of this account we shall not find any great affluence of temporal accruements However it be although when a meek man hath earthly possessions by this Grace he is taught how to use them and how to part with them yet if he hath them not by the vertue here commanded he is not suffered to use any thing violent towards the acquiring them not so much as a violent passion or a stormy imagination for then he loses his Meekness and what ever he gets can be none of the reward of this Grace He that sights for temporals unless by some other appendent duty he be obliged loses his title by striving incompetently for the reward he cuts off that hand by which alone he can receive it For unless he be indeed meek he hath no right to what he calls the inheritance of the earth and he that is not content to want the inheritance of the earth when God requires him is not meek So that if this Beatitude be understood in a temporal sense it is an offer of a reward upon a condition we shall be without it and be content too For in every sense of the word Meekness implies a just satisfaction of the spirit and acquiescence in every estate or contingency whatsoever though we have no possessions but of a good Conscience no bread but that of carefulness no support but from the Holy Spirit and a providence ministring to our natural necessities by an extemporary provision And certain it is the meekest
partakers of thy Purities give unto us tender bowels that we may suffer together with our calamitous and necessitous Brethren that we having a fellow-feeling of their miseries may use all our powers to help them and ease our selves of our common sufferings But do thou O Holy Jesu take from us also all our great calamities the Carnality of our affections our Sensualities and Impurities that we may first be pure then peaceable living in peace with all men and preserving the peace which thou hast made for us with our God that we may never commit a sin which may interrupt so blessed an atonement Let neither hope nor fear tribulation nor anguish pleasure nor pain make us to relinquish our interest in thee and our portion of the everlasting Covenant But give us hearts constant bold and valiant to confess thee before all the world in the midst of all disadvantages and contradictory circumstances chusing rather to beg or to be disgraced or 〈◊〉 or to die than quit a holy Conscience or renounce an Article of Christianity that we either in act when thou shalt call us or always in preparation of mind suffering with thee may also reign with thee in the Church Triumphant O Holy and most merciful Saviour Jesu Amen DISCOURSE X. A Discourse upon that part of the Decalogue which the Holy JESVS adopted into the Institution and obligation of Christianity 1. WHen the Holy Jesus had described the Characterisms of Christianity in these Eight Graces and Beatitudes he adds his Injunctions that in these Vertues they should be eminent and exemplar that they might adorn the Doctrine of God for he intended that the Gospel should be as Leven in a lump of dough to season the whole mass and that Christians should be the instruments of communicating the excellency and reputation of this holy Institution to all the world Therefore Christ calls them Salt and Light and the societies of Christians a City set upon a hill and a 〈◊〉 set in a candlestick whose office and energy is to illuminate all the vicinage which is also expressed in these preceptive words Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorifie your Father which is in heaven which I consider not only as a Circumstance of other parts but as a precise Duty it self and one of the Sanctions of Christianity which hath so confederated the Souls of the Disciples of the Institution that it hath in some proportion obliged every man to take care of his Brother's Soul And since Reverence to God and Charity to our Brother are the two 〈◊〉 Ends which the best Laws can have this precept of exemplary living is enjoyned in order to them both We must shine as lights in the world that God may be glorified and our Brother edified that the excellency of the act may 〈◊〉 the reputation of the Religion and invite men to confess God according to the sanctions of so holy an Institution And if we be curious that vanity do not mingle in the intention and that the intention do not spoil the action and that we suffer not our lights to shine that men may magnifie us and not glorifie God this duty is soon performed by way of adherence to our other actions and hath no other difficulty in it but that it will require our prudence and care to preserve the simplicity of our purposes and humility of our spirit in the midst of that excellent reputation which will certainly be consequent to a holy and exemplary life 2. But since the Holy Jesus had set us up to be lights in the world he took care we should not be stars of the least magnitude but eminent and such as might by their great emissions of light give evidence of their being immediately derivative from the Sun of Righteousness He was now giving his Law and meant to retain so much of Moses as Moses had of natural and essential Justice and Charity and superadd many degrees of his own that as far as Moses was exceeded by Christ in the capacity of a Law-giver so far Christianity might be more excellent and holy than the Mosaical Sanctions And therefore as a Preface to the Christian Law the Holy Jesus declares that unless our righteousness exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees that is of the stricter sects of the Mosaical Institution we shall not enter into the Kingdom of heaven Which not only relates to the prevaricating Practices of the Pharisees but even to their Doctrines and Commentaries upon the Law of Moses as appears evidently in the following instances For if all the excellency of Christianity had consisted in the mere command of Sincerity and prohibition of Hypocrisie it had nothing in it proportionable to those excellent promises and clearest revelations of Eternity there expressed nor of a fit imployment for the designation of a special and a new Law-giver whose Laws were to last forever and were established upon foundations stronger than the pillars of Heaven and Earth 3. But S. Paul calling the Law of Moses a Law of Works did well insinuate what the Doctrine of the Jews was concerning the degrees and obligations of Justice for besides that it was a Law of Works in opposition to the Law of Faith and so the sence of it is formerly explicated it is also a Law of Works in opposition to the Law of the Spirit and it is understood to be such a Law which required the exteriour Obedience such a Law according to which S. Paul so lived that no man could reprove him that is the Judges could not tax him with prevarication such a Law which being in very many degrees carnal and material did not with much severity exact the intention and purposes spiritual But the Gospel is the Law of the spirit If they failed in the exteriour work it was accounted to them for sin but to Christians nothing becomes a sin but a failing and prevaricating spirit For the outward act is such an emanation of the interiour that it enters into the account for the relation sake and for its parent When God hath put a duty into our hands if our spirits be right the work will certainly follow but the following work receives its acceptation not from the value the Christian Law hath precisely put upon it but because the spirit from whence it came hath observed its rule the Law of Charity is acted and expressed in works but hath its estimate from the spirit Which discourse is to be understood in a limited and qualified signification For then also God required the Heart and interdicted the very concupiscences of our irregular passions at least in some instances but because much of their Law consisted in the exteriour and the Law appointed not nor yet intimated any penalty to evil thoughts and because the expiation of such interiour irregularities was easie implicite and involved in their daily Sacrifices without special trouble therefore the old Law
yet there was some imperfection in David and more violent recessions for so saith the Scripture of Josiah Like unto him was there no King before him David was not so exact as he and yet he followed God with all his heart From which these two Corollaries are certainly deducible That to love God with all our heart admits variety of degrees and the lower degree is yet a Love with all our heart and yet to love God requires a holy life a diligent walking in the Commandments either according to the sence of innocence or of penitence either by first or second counsels by the spirit of Regeneration or the spirit of Renovation and restitution The summ is this The sence of this Precept is such as may be reconciled with the Infirmities of our Nature but not with a Vice in our Manners with the recession of single acts seldom 〈◊〉 and always disputed against and long fought with but not with an habitual aversation or a ready obedience to sin or an easie victory 15. This Commandment being the summ of the First Table had in Moses's Law particular instances which Christ did not insert into his Institution and he added no other particular but that which we call the Third Commandment concerning Veneration and reverence to the Name of God The other two viz. concerning Images and the Sabbath have some special considerations 16. The Jews receive daily offence against the 〈◊〉 of some Churches who 〈◊〉 COM. in the recitation of the Decalogue omit the Second Commandment as supposing it to be a part of the first according as we account them and their offence rises higher because they observe that in the New Testament where the Decalogue is six times repeated in special recitation and in summaries there is no word prohibiting the making retaining or respect of Images Concerning which things Christians consider that God for bad to the Jews 〈◊〉 very having and making Images and Representments not only of the true God or of false and imaginary Deities but of visible creatures which because it was but of temporary reason and relative consideration of their aptness to Superstition and their conversing with idolatrous Nations was a command proper to the Nation part of their Govenant not of essential indispensable and eternal reason not of that which we usually call the Law of Nature Of which also God gave testimony because himself commanded the signs and representment of Seraphim to be set upon the Mercy 〈◊〉 toward which the Priest and the people made their addresses in their religious Adorations and of the Brazen Serpent to which they looked when they called to God for help against the sting of the venomous Snakes These instances tell us that to make Pictures or Statues of creatures is not against a natural reason and that they may have uses which are profitable as well as be abused to danger and Superstition Now although the nature of that people was apt to the abuse and their entercourse with the Nations in their confines was too great an invitation to entertain the danger yet Christianity hath so far removed that danger by the analogy and design of the Religion by clear Doctrines Revelations and infinite treasures of wisdom and demonstrations of the Spirit that our Blessed Law-giver thought it not necessary to remove us from Superstition by a prohibition of the use of Images and Pictures and therefore left us to the sence of the great Commandment and the dictates of right Reason to take care that we do not dishonour the invisible God with visible representations of what we never saw nor cannot understand 〈◊〉 yet convey any of God's incommunicable Worship in the forenamed instances to any thing but himself And for the matter of Images we have no other Rule left us in the New Testament the rules of Reason and Nature and the other parts of the Institution are abundantly sufficient for our security And possibly S. Paul might relate to this when he affirmed concerning the Fifth that it was the first Commandment with promise For in the Second Commandment to the Jews as there was a great threatning so also a greater promise of shewing mercy to a thousand generations But because the body of this Commandment was not transcribed into the Christian Law the first of the Decalogue which we retain and in which a promise is inserted is the Fifth Commandment And therefore the wisdom of the Church was remarkable in the variety of sentences concerning the permission of Images At first when they were blended in the danger and impure mixtures of Gentilism and men were newly recovered from the snare and had the reliques of a long custom to superstitious and false worshippings they endured no Images but merely civil but as the danger ceased and Christianity prevailed they found that Pictures had a natural use of good concernment to move less-knowing people by the representment and declaration of a Story and then they knowing themselves permitted to the liberties of Christianity and the restraints of nature and reason and not being still weak under prejudice and childish dangers but fortified by the excellency of a wise Religion took them into lawful uses doing honour to Saints as unto the absent Emperors according to the custom of the Empire they erected Statues to their honour and transcribed a history and sometimes a precept into a table by figures making more lasting impressions than by words and sentences While the Church stood within these limits she had natural reason for her warrant and the custom of the several Countreys and no precept of Christ to countermand it They who went farther were unreasonable and according to the degree of that excess were Superstitious 17. The Duties of this Commandment are learned by the intents of it For it was directed against the false Religion of the Nations who believed the Images of their Gods to be filled with the Deity and it was also a caution to prevent our low imaginations of God lest we should come to think God to be like Man And thus far there was indispensable and eternal reason in the Precept and this was never lessened in any thing by the Holy Jesus and obliges us Christians to make our addresses and worshippings to no God but the God of the Christians that is of all the world and not to do this in or before an Image of him because he cannot be represented For the Images of Christ and his Saints they come not into either of the two considerations and we are to understand our duty by the proportions of our reverence to God expressed in the great Commandment Our Fathers in Christianity as I observed now made no scruple of using the Images and Pictures of their Princes and Learned men which the Jews understood to be forbidden to them in the Commandment Then they admitted even in the Utensils of the Church some coelatures and engravings Such was that Tertullian speaks of The good
must be severe in our discourses and neither lie in a great matter nor a small for the custom thereof is not good saith the son of Sirach I could add concerning this Precept That Christ having left it in that condition he found it in the Decalogue without any change or alteration of circumstance we are commanded to give true testimony in Judgment which because it was under an Oath there lies upon us no prohibition but a severity of injunction to swear truth in Judgment when we are required The securing of Testimonies was by the sanctity of an Oath and this remains unaltered in Christianity 41. Thou shalt not covet This Commandment we find no-where repeated in the Gospel by our Blessed Saviour but it is inserted in the repetition of the Second Table which S. Paul mentioned to the Romans for it was so abundantly expressed in the inclosures of other Precepts and the whole design of Christ's Doctrine that it was less needful specially to express that which is every-where affixed to many Precepts Evangelical Particularly it is inherent in the first Beatitude Blessed are the poor in spirit and it means that we should not wish our Neighbour's goods with a deliberate entertained desire but that upon the commencement of the motion it be disbanded instantly for he that does not at the first address and 〈◊〉 of the passion suppress it he hath given it that entertainment which in every period of staying is a degree of morose delectation in the appetite And to this I find not Christ added any thing for the Law it self forbidding to entertain the desire hath commanded the instant and present suppression they are the same thing and cannot reasonably be distinguished Now that Christ in the instance of Adultery hath commanded to abstain also from occasions and accesses towards the Lust in this hath not the same severity because the vice of Covetousness is not such a wild-fire as Lust is not inflamed by contact and neighbourhood of all things in the world every thing may be instrumental to libidinous desires but to covetous appetites there are not temptations of so different natures 42. Concerning the order of these Commandments it is not unusefully observed that if we account from the first to the last they are of greatest perfection which are last described and he who is arrived to that severity and dominion of himself as not to desire his Neighbour's goods is very far from actual injury and so in proportion it being the least degree of Religion to confess but One God But therefore Vices are to take their estimate in the contrary order he that prevaricates the First Commandment is the greatest sinner in the world and the least is he that only covets without any actual injustice And there is no variety or objection in this unless it be altered by the accidental difference of degrees but in the kinds of sin the Rule is true this onely The Sixth and Seventh are otherwise in the Hebrew Bibles than ours and in the Greek otherwise in Exodus than in Deuteronomy and by this rule it is a greater sin to commit Adultery than to Kill concerning which we have no certainty save that S. Paul in one respect makes the sin of Uncleanness the greatest of any sin whose scene lies in the body Every sin is without the body but he that commits Fornication sins against his own body The PRAYER O Eternal Jesus Wisdome of the Father thou light of Jews and Gentiles and the great Master of the world who by thy holy Sermons and clearest revelations of the mysteries of thy Father's Kingdom didst invite all the world to great degrees of Justice Purity and Sanctity and instruct us all in a holy Institution give us understanding of thy Laws that the light of thy celestial Doctrine illuminating our darknesses and making bright all the recesses of our spirits and understandings we may direct our feet all the lower man the affections of the inferiour appetite to walk in the paths of thy Commandments Dearest God make us to live a life of Religion and Justice of Love and Duty that we may adore thy Majesty and reverence thy Name and love thy Mercy and admire thy infinite glories and perfections and obey thy Precepts Make us to love thee for thy self and our neighbours for thee make us to be all Love and all Duty that we may adorn the Gospel of thee our Lord walking worthy of our Vocation that as thou hast called us to be thy Disciples so we may walk therein doing the work of faithful servants and may receive the adoption of sons and the gift of eternal glory which thou hast reserved for all the Disciples of thy holy Institution Make all the world obey thee as a Prophet that being redeemed and purified by thee our High Priest all may reign with thee our King in thy eternal Kingdom O Eternal Jesus Wisdom of thy Father Amen Of the Three additional Precepts which Christ superinduced and made parts of the Christian Law DISCOURSE XI Of CHARITY with its parts Forgiving Giving not Judging Of Forgiveness PART I. 1. THE Holy Jesus coming to reconcile all the world to God would reconcile all the parts of the world one with another that they may rejoyce in their common band and their common Salvation The first instance of Charity forbad to Christians all Revenge of Injuries which was a perfection and endearment of duty beyond what either most of the old Philosophers or the Laws of the Nations 〈◊〉 of Moses ever practised or enjoyned For Revenge was esteemed to unhallowed unchristian natures as sweet as life a satisfaction of injuries and the onely cure of maladies and affronts Onely Laws of the wisest Commonwealths commanded that Revenge should be taken by the Judge a few cases being excepted in which by sentence of the Law the injured person or his nearest Relative might be the Executioner of the Vengeance as among the Jews in the case of Murther among the Romans in the case of an Adulteress or a ravished daughter the Father might kill the Adulteress or the Ravisher In other things the Judge onely was to be the Avenger But Christ commanded his Disciples rather than to take revenge to expose themselves to a second injury rather offer the other cheek than be avenged for a blow on this For vengeance belongs to God and he will retaliate and to that wrath we must give place saith S. Paul that is in well-doing and evil suffering commit our selves to his righteous judgment leaving room for his execution who will certainly do it if we snatch not the sword from his arm 2. But some observe that our Blessed Saviour instanced but in smaller injuries He that bad us suffer a blow on the cheek did not oblige us tamely to be sacrificed he that enjoyned us to put up the loss of our Coat and Cloak did not signifie his pleasure to be that we should 〈◊〉
Thy Name being called upon us let us walk worthy of that calling that our light may shine before men that they seeing our good works may glorifie thee our Father which art in heaven In order also to the sanctification of thy Name grant that all our praises hymns Eucharistical remembrances and representments of thy glories may be useful blessed and esfectual for the dispersing thy fame and advancing thy honour over all the world This is a direct and formal act of worshipping and adoration The Name of God is representative of God himself and it signifies Be thou worshipped and adored be thou thanked and celebrated with honour and Eucharist 5. Thy Kingdom come That is As thou hast caused to be preached and published the coming of thy Kingdom the peace and truth the revelation and glories of the Gospel so let it come verily and esfectually to us and all the world that thou mayest truly reign in our spirits exercising absolute dominion subduing all thine Enemies ruling in our Faculties in the Understanding by Faith in the Will by Charity in the Passions by Mortification in the Members by a chaste and right use of the parts And as it was more particularly and in the letter proper at the beginning of Christ's Preaching when he also taught the Prayer that God would hasten the coming of the Gospel to all the world so 〈◊〉 also and ever it will be in its proportion necessary and pious to pray that it may come still making greater progress in the world extending it self where yet it is not and intending it where it is already that the Kingdom of Christ may not only be in us in name and form and honourable appellatives but in effect and power This Petition in the first Ages of Christianity was not expounded to signifie a prayer for Christ's second coming because the Gospel not being preached to all the world they prayed for the delay of the day of Judgment that Christ's Kingdom upon earth might have its proper increment but since then every Age as it is more forward in time so it is more earnest in desire to accomplish the intermedial Prophecies that the Kingdom of God the Father might come in glories infinite And indeed the Kingdom of Grace being in order to the Kingdom of Glory this as it is principally to be desired so may possibly be intended chiefly which also is the more probable because the address of this Prayer being to God the Father it is proper to observe that the Kingdom of Grace or of the Gospel is called the Kingdom of the Son and that of Glory in the style of the Scripture is the Kingdom of the Father S. German Patriarch of Constantinople expounds it with some little difference but not ill Thy Kingdom come that is Let thy Holy Spirit come into us for the Kingdom of Heaven is within us saith the Holy Scripture and so it intimates our desires that the promise of the Father and the Prophecies of old and the Holy Ghost the Comforter may come upon us Let that anointing from above descend upon us whereby we may be anointed Kings and Priests in a spiritual Kingdom and Priesthood by a holy Chrism 6. Thy will be done in Earth as it is in Heaven That is The whole Oeconomy and dispensation of thy Providence be the guide of the world and the measure of our desire that we be patient in all accidents conformable to God's will both in doing and in suffering submitting to changes and even to persecutions and doing all God's will which because without God's aid we cannot do therefore we beg it of him by prayer but by his aid we are 〈◊〉 we may do it in the manner of Angelical obedience that is promptly readily chearfully and with all our faculties Or thus As the Angels in Heaven serve thee with harmony concord and peace so let us all joyn in the service of thy Majesty with peace and purity and love unfeigned that as all the Angels are in peace and amongst them there is no persecutor and none persecuted there is none afflicting or afflicted none assaulting or assaulted but all in sweetness and peaceable serenity glorifying thee so let thy will be done on earth by all the world in peace and unity in charity and tranquillity that with one heart and one voice we may glorifie thee our universal Father having in us nothing that may displease thee having quitted all our own desires and pretensions living in Angelick conformity our Souls subject to thee and our Passions to our Souls that in earth also thy will may be done as in the spirit and Soul which is a portion of the heavenly substance These three Petitions are addressed to God by way of adoration In the first the Soul puts on the affections of a Child and devests it self of its own interest offering it self up wholly to the designs and glorifications of God In the second it puts on the relation and duty of a Subject to her legitimate Prince seeking the promotion of his Regal Interest In the third she puts on the affection of a Spouse loving the same love and chusing the same object and delighting in unions and conformities The next part descends lower and makes addresses to God in relation to our own necessities 7. Give us this day our daily bread That is Give unto us all that is necessary for the support of our lives the bread of our necessity so the Syriack Interpreter reads it This day give us the portion of bread which is day by day necessary Give us the bread or support which we shall need all our lives only this day minister our present part For we pray for the necessary bread or maintenance which God knows we shall need all our days but that we be not careful for to morrow we are taught to pray not that it be all at once represented or deposited but that God would minister it as we need it how he pleases but our needs are to be the measure of our desires our desires must not make our needs that we may be consident of the Divine Providence and not at all covetous for therefore God feeds his people with extemporary provisions that by needing always they may learn to pray to him and by being still supplied may learn to trust him for the future and thank him for that is past and rejoyce in the present So God rained down Manna giving them their daily portion and so all Fathers and Masters minister to their children and servants giving them their proportion as they eat it not the meat of a year at once and yet no child or servant fears want if his Parent or Lord were good and wise and rich And it is necessary for all to pray this Prayer the Poor because they want the bread and have it not deposited but in the hands of God mercy ploughing the 〈◊〉 of Heaven as Job's expression is brings them corn
coat that lies by him as the portion of moths and for the shoes which are the spoils of mouldiness and the contumely of plenty Grant me O Lord not what I desire but what is profitable for me For sometimes we desire that which in the succeeding event of things will undo us This rule is in all things that concern our selves There is some little difference in the affairs and necessities of other men for provided we submit to the Divine Providence and pray for good things for others only with a tacite condition so far as they are good and profitable in order to the best ends yet if we be particular there is no covetousness in it there may be indiscretion in the particular but in the general no fault because it is a prayer and a design of Charity For Kings and all that are in authority we may yet enlarge and pray for a peaceable reign true lieges strong armies victories and fair success in their just wars health long life and riches because they have a capacity which private persons have not and whatsoever is good for single persons and whatsoever is apt for their uses as publick persons all that we may and we must pray for either particularly for so we may or in general significations for so we must at least that we may lead a godly peaceable and quiet life in all godliness and honesty that is S. Paul's rule and the prescribed measure and purpose of such prayers And in this instance of Kings we may pray for defeating all the King's enemies such as are truly such and we have no other restraint upon us in this but that we keep our desires confined within the limits of the end we are commanded that is so far to confound the King's enemies that he may do his duty and we do ours and receive the blessing ever as much as we can to distinguish the malice from the person But if the enemies themselves will not also separate what our intentions distinguish that is if they will not return to their duty then let the prayers operate as God pleases we must be zealous for the end of the King's authority and peaceable government By enemies I mean Rebels or Invaders Tyrants and 〈◊〉 for in other Wars there are many other considerations not proper for this place 13. The next consideration will be concerning the Manner I mean both the manner of our Persons and the manner of our Prayers that is with what conditions we ought to approach to God and with what circumstances the Prayers may or ought to be performed The Conditions to make our Prayers holy and certain to prevail are 1. That we live good lives endeavouring to conform by holy obedience to all the Divine Commandments This condition is expresly recorded by S. John Beloved if our hearts condemn us not then have we confidence towards God and whatsoever we ask of him we shall obtain and S. James affirms that the effectual servent prayer of a righteous man availeth much and our Blessed Saviour limiting the confidence of our Prayers for Forgiveness to our Charity and forgiving others plainly tells us that the uncharitable and unrighteous person shall not be heard And the blind man in the Gospel understood well what he said Now we know that God heareth not sinners but if any man be a worshipper and doth his will him he heareth And it was so decreed and resolved a point in the doctrine of their Religion that it was a proverbial saying And although this discourse of the blind man was of a restrained occasion and signified if Christ had been a false Prophet God would not have attested his Sermons with the power of Miracles yet in general also he had been taught by David If I regard iniquity in my heart the Lord will not hear my prayer And therefore when men pray in every place for so they are commanded let them lift up pure hands without anger and contention And indeed although every sin entertained with a free choice and a full understanding is an obstruction to our Prayers yet the special sin of Uncharitableness makes the biggest cloud and is in the proper matter of it an indisposition for us to receive mercy for he who is softned with apprehension of his own needs of mercy will be tender-hearted towards his brother and therefore he that hath no bowels here can have no aptness there to receive or heartily to hope for mercy But this rule is to be understood of persons who persevere in the habit and remanent affections of sin so long as they entertain sin with love complacency and joy they are in a state of enmity with God and therefore in no fit disposition to receive pardon and the entertainment of friends but penitent sinners and returning souls loaden and grieved with their heavy pressures are next to holy innocents the aptest persons in the world to be heard in their Prayers for pardon but they are in no farther disposition to large favours and more eminent charities A sinner in the beginning of his Penance will be heard for himself and yet also he needs the prayers of holy persons more signally than others for he hath but some very few degrees of dispositions to reconciliation but in prayers of intercession or mediation for others only holy and very pious persons are fit to be interested All men as matter of duty must pray for all men but in the great necessities of a Prince of a Church or Kingdom or of a family or of a great danger and calamity to a single person only a Noah a David a Daniel a 〈◊〉 an Enoch or Job are fit and proportioned advocates God so requires Holiness in us that our Prayers may be accepted that he entertains them in several degrees according to the degrees of our Sanctity to fewer or more purposes according as we are little or great in the kingdom of Heaven As for those irregular donations of good things which wicked persons ask for and have they are either no mercies but instruments of cursing and crime or else they are designs of grace intended to convince them of their unworthiness and so if they become not instruments of their Conversion they are aggravations of their Ruine 14. Secondly The second condition I have already explained in the description of the Matter of our Prayers For although we may lawfully ask for whatsoever we need and this leave is consigned to us in those words of our Blessed Saviour Your heavenly Father knoweth what you have need of yet because God's Providence walks in the great deep that is his foot-steps are in the water and leave no impression no former act of grace becomes a precedent that he will give us that in kind which then he saw convenient and therefore gave us and now he sees to be inconvenient and therefore does deny Therefore in all things but what are matter of necessary and
in the same mystical Head is an adunation nearer to identity than those distances between Parents and Children which are only cemented by the actions of Nature as it is of distinct consideration from the spirit For Jesus pointing to his Disciples said Behold my Mother and my Brethren for whosoever doth the will of my Father which is in heaven he is my Brother and Sister and Mother 14. But the Pharisees upon the occasion of the Miracles renewed the old quarrel He casteth out Devils by Beelzebub Which senseless and illiterate objection Christ having confuted charged them highly upon the guilt of an unpardonable crime telling them that the so charging those actions of his done in the virtue of the Divine Spirit is a sin against the Holy Ghost and however they might be bold with the Son of Man and prevarications against his words or injuries to his person might upon Repentance and Baptism find a pardon yet it was a matter of greater consideration to sin against the Holy Ghost that would find no pardon here nor hereafter But taking occasion upon this discourse he by an ingenious and mysterious Parable gives the world great caution of recidivation and backsliding after Repentance For if the Devil returns into a house once swept and garnished he bringeth seven spirits more impure than himself and the last estate of that man is worse than the first 15. After this Jesus went from the house of the Pharisee and coming to the Sea of Tiberias or Genezareth for it was called the Sea of Tiberias from a Town on the banks of the Lake taught the people upon the shore himself sitting in the ship but he taught them by Parables under which were hid mysterious senses which shined through their veil like a bright Sun through an eye closed with a thin eye-lid it being light enough to shew their infidelity but not to dispell those thick Egyptian darknesses which they had contracted by their habitual indispositions and pertinacious aversations By the Parable of the Sower scattering his seed by the way side and some on stony some on thorny some on good ground he intimated the several capacities or indispositions of mens hearts the carelesness of some the frowardness and levity of others the easiness and softness of a third and how they are spoiled with worldliness and cares and how many ways there are to miscarry and that but one sort of men receive the word and bring forth the fruits of a holy life By the Parable of Tares permitted to grow amongst the Wheat he intimated the toleration of dissenting Opinions not destructive of Piety or civil societies By the three Parables of the Seed growing insensibly of the grain of Mustard-seed swelling up to a tree of a little Leven qualifying the whole lump he signified the increment of the Gospel and the blessings upon the Apostolical Sermons 16. Which Parables when he had privately to his Apostles rendred into their proper senses he added to them two Parables concerning the dignity of the Gospel comparing it to Treasure hid in a field and a Jewel of great price for the purchace of which every good Merchant must quit all that he hath rather than miss it telling them withall that however purity and spiritual perfections were intended by the Gospel yet it would not be acquired by every person but the publick Professors of Christianity should be a mixt multitude like a net inclosing fishes good and bad After which discourses he retired from the Sea side and went to his own City of Nazareth where he preached so excellently upon certain words of the Prophet 〈◊〉 that all the people wondred at the wisdom which he expressed in his Divine discourses But the men of Nazareth did not do honour to the Prophet that was their Countryman because they knew him in all the disadvantages of youth and kindred and trade and poverty still retaining in their minds the infirmities and humilities of his first years and keeping the same apprehensions of him a man and a glorious Prophet which they had to him a child in the shop of a Carpenter But when Jesus in his Sermon had reproved their infidelity at which he wondred and therefore did but few Miracles there in respect of what he had done at Capernaum and intimated the prelation of that City before 〈◊〉 they thrust him out of the City and led him to the brow of the hill on which the City was built intending to throw him down headlong But his work was not yet finished therefore he passing through the midst of them went his way 17. Jesus therefore departing from Nazareth went up and down to all the Towns and Castles of Galilce attended by his Disciples and certain women out of whom he had cast unclean spirits such as were Mary Magdalen Johanna wife to Chuza Herod's Steward Susanna and some others who did for him offices of provision and ministred to him out of their own substance and became parts of that holy Colledge which about this time began to be 〈◊〉 because now the Apostles were returned from their Preaching full of joy that the Devils were made subject to the word of their mouth and the Empire of their Prayers and invocation of the holy Name of Jesus But their Master gave them a lenitive to asswage the tumour and excrescency intimating that such priviledges are not solid foundations of a holy joy but so far as they cooperate toward the great end of God's glory and their own Salvation to which when they are consigned and their names written in Heaven in the book of Election and Registers of Predestination then their joy is reasonable holy true and perpetual 18. But when Herod had heard these things of Jesus presently his apprehensions were such as derived from his guilt he thought it was John the Baptist who was risen from the dead and that these mighty works were demonstrations of his power increased by the superadditions of immortality and diviner influences made proportionable to the honour of a Martyr and the state of separation For a little before this time Herod had sent to the Castle of Macheruns where John was prisoner and caused him to be beheaded His head Herodias buried in her own Palace thinking to secure it against a re-union lest it should again disturb her unlawful Lusts and disquiet Herod's conscience But the body the Disciples of John gathered up and carried it with honour and sorrow and buried it in Sebaste in the confines of Samaria making his grave between the bodies of 〈◊〉 and Abdias the Prophets And about this time was the Passeover of the Jews DISCOURSE XV. Of the Excellency Ease Reasonableness and Advantages of bearing Christ ' s Yoke and living according to his Institution Ecce agnus Dei gui toâ—lit peccata Mundi Iohn 1. 29. Behold the lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the World The Christian's Work and Reward Matth. 11. 29 30. Take my yoke upon
they deny the fact and double it When they would repair their losses they fall to Gaming and besides that they are infinitely full of fears passions wrath and violent disturbances in the various chances of their game that which they use to restore their 〈◊〉 ruines even the little remnant and condemns them to beggery or what is worse Thus evil men 〈◊〉 for content out of things that cannot satisfie and take care to get that content that is they raise War to enjoy present Peace and renounce all Content to get it They strive to depress their Neighbours that they may be their equals to disgrace them to get reputation to themselves which arts being ignoble do them the most disparagement and resolve never to enter into the felicities of God by content taken in the prosperities of man which is a making our selves wretched by being wicked Malice and Envy is indeed a mighty curse and the Devil can shew us nothing more foolish and unreasonable than Envy which is in its very formality a curse an eating of coals and vipers because my neighbour's table is full and his cup is crowned with health and plenty The Christian Religion as it chuseth excellent ends so it useth proportionate and apt means The most contradictory accident in the world when it becomes hallowed by a pious and Christian design becomes a certain means of felicity and content To quit our lands for Christ's sake will certainly make us rich to depart from our friends will encrease our relations and beneficiaries but the striving to secure our temporal interests by any other means than obedient actions or obedient sufferings is declared by the Holy Jesus to be the greatest improvidence and ill husbandry in the world Even in this world Christ will repay us an hundred fold for all our losses which we suffer for the interests of Christianity In the same proportion we find that all Graces do the work of humane felicities with a more certain power and 〈◊〉 effect than their contraries Gratitude endears Benefits and procures more Friendships Confession gets a Pardon Impudence and lying doubles the fault and exasperates the offended person Innocence is bold and rocks a man asleep but an evil Conscience is a continual alarm Against this folly of using disproportionate means in order to their ends the Holy Jesus hath opposed the Eight Beatitudes which by contradictions of nature and improbable causes according to humane and erring estimate bring our best and wisest ends to pass infallibly and divinely 32. But this is too large a field to walk in for it represents all the flatteries of sin to be a mere cozenage and deception of the Understanding and we find by this scrutiny that evil and unchristian persons are infinitely unwise because they neglect the counsel of their superiours and their guides They dote passionately upon trifles they rely upon false foundations and deceiving principles they are most confident when they are most abused they are like shelled fish singing loudest when their house is on fire about their ears and being merriest when they are most miserable and perishing when they have the option of two things they ever chuse the worst they are not masters of their own actions but break all purposes at the first temptation they take more pains to do themselves a mischief than would 〈◊〉 Heaven that is they are rude ignorant foolish unwary and undiscerning people in all senses and to all purposes and are incurable but by their Obedience and conformity to the Holy Jesus the eternal Wisdome of the Father 33. Upon the strength of these premisses the yoke of Christianity must needs be apprehended light though it had in it more pressure than it hath because lightness or heaviness being relative terms are to be esteemed by comparison to others Christianity is far easier than the yoke of Moses's Law not only because it consists of fewer Rites but also because those perfecting and excellent Graces which integrate the body of our Religion are made easie by God's assisting and the gifts of the Holy Ghost and we may yet make it easier by Love and by Fear which are the proper products of the Evangelical Promises and Threatnings For I have seen persons in affrightment have carried burthens and leaped ditches and climbed walls which their natural power could never have done And if we understood the sadnesses of a cursed Eternity from which we are commanded to fly and yet knew how near we are to it and how likely to fall into it it would create fears greater than a sudden fire or a mid-night alarm And those unhappy souls who come to feel this truth when their condition is without remedy are made the more miserable by the apprehension of their stupid folly For certainly the accursed Spirits feel the smart of Hell once doubled upon them by considering by what vain unsatisfying trifles they lost their happiness with what pains they perished and with how great ease they might have been beatified And certain it is Christian Religion hath so furnished us with assistences both exteriour and interiour both of perswasion and advantages that whatsoever Christ hath doubled upon us in perfection he hath alleviated in aids 34. And then if we compare the state of Christianity with Sin all the preceding discourses were intended to represent how much easier it is to be a Christian than a vile and wicked person And he that remembers that whatever fair allurements may be pretended as invitations to a sin are such false and unsatisfying pretences that they drive a man to repent him of his folly and like a great laughter end in a sigh and expire in weariness and indignation must needs confess himself a fool for doing that which he knows will make him repent that he ever did it A sin makes a man afraid when it thunders and in all dangers the sin detracts the visour and affrights him and visits him when he comes to die upbraiding him with guilt and threatning misery So that Christianity is the easiest Law and the easiest state it is more perfect and less troublesome it brings us to Felicity by ways proportionable landing us in rest by easie and unperplexed journeys This Discourse I therefore thought necessary because it reconciles our Religion with those passions and desires which are commonly made the instruments and arguments of sin For we rarely meet with such spirits which love Vertue so metaphysically as to abstract her from all sensible and delicious compositions and love the purity of the Idea S. Lewis the King sent Ivo Bishop of Chartres on an Embassy and he told that he met a grave Matron on the way with fire in one hand and water in the other and observing her to have a melancholick religious and phantastick deportment and look asked her what those symbols meant and what she meant to do with her fire and water She answered My purpose is with the fire to burn Paradise and with my water to quench
the flames of Hell that men may serve God without the incentives of hope and fear and purely for the love of God Whether the Woman were onely imaginative and sad or also zealous I know not But God knows he would have few Disciples if the arguments of invitation were not of greater promise than the labours of Vertue are of trouble And therefore the Spirit of God knowing to what we are inflexible and by what we are made most ductile and malleable hath propounded Vertue clothed and dressed with such advantages as may entertain even our Sensitive part and first desires that those also may be invited to Vertue who understand not what is just and reasonable but what is profitable who are more moved with advantage than justice And because emolument is more felt than innocence and a man may be poor for all his gift of 〈◊〉 the Holy Jesus to endear the practices of Religion hath represented Godliness unto us under the notion of gain and sin as unfruitful and yet besides all the natural and reasonable advantages every Vertue hath a supernatural reward a gracious promise attending and every Vice is not only naturally deformed but is made more ugly by a threatning and horrid by an appendent curse Henceforth therefore let no man complain that the Commandments of God are impossible for they are not onely possible but easie and they that say otherwise and do accordingly take more pains to carry the instruments of their own death than would serve to ascertain them of life And if we would do as much for Christ as we have done for Sin we should find the pains less and the pleasure more And therefore such complainers are without excuse for certain it is they that can go in foul ways must not say they cannot walk in fair they that march over rocks in despight of so many impediments can travel the even ways of Religion and Peace when the Holy Jesus is their Guide and the Spirit is their Guardian and infinite felicities are at their journey's end and all the reason of the world political oeconomical and personal do entertain and support them in the travel of the passage The PRAYER O Eternal Jesus who gavest Laws unto the world that man-kind being united to thee by the bands of Obedience might partake of all thy glories and felicities open our understanding give us the spirit of discerning and just apprehension of all the beauties with which thou hast enamelled Vertue to represent it beauteous and amiable in our eyes that by the allurements of exteriour decencies and appendent blessings our present desires may be entertained our hopes promoted our affections satisfied and Love entring in by these doors may dwell in the interiour regions of the Will O make us to love thee for thy self and Religion for thee and all the instruments of Religion in order to thy glory and our own felicities Pull off the visors of Sin and discover its deformities by the lantern of thy Word and the light of the Spirit that I may never be bewitched with sottish appetites Be pleased to build up all the contents I expect in this world upon the interests of a vertuous life and the support of Religion that I may be rich in Good works content in the issues of thy Providence my Health may be the result of Temperance and severity my Mirth in spiritual emanations my Rest in Hope my Peace in a good Conscience my Satisfaction and acquiescence in thee that from Content I may pass to an eternal Fulness from Health to Immortality from Grace to Glory walking in the paths of Righteousness by the waters of Comfort to the land of everlasting Rest to feast in the glorious communications of Eternity eternally adoring loving and enjoying the infinity of the ever-Blessed and mysterious Trinity to whom be glory and 〈◊〉 and dominion now and for ever Amen DISCOURSE XVI Of Certainty of Salvation 1. WHen the Holy Jesus took an account of the first Legation and voyage of his Apostles he found them rejoycing in priviledges and exteriour powers in their authority over unclean spirits but weighing it in his balance he found the cause too light and therefore diverted it upon the right object Rejoyce that your names are written in Heaven The revelation was confirmed and more personally applied in answer to S. Peter's Question We have for saken all and followed thee what shall we have therefore Their LORD answered Ye shall sit upon twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel Amongst these persons to whom Christ spake Judas was he was one of the Twelve and he had a throne allotted for him his name was described in the book of life and a Scepter and a Crown was deposited for him too For we must not judge of Christ's meaning by the event since he spake these words to produce in them Faith comfort and joy in the best objects it was a Sermon of duty as well as a Homily of comfort and therefore was equally intended to all the Colledge and since the number of Thrones is proportioned to the number of men it is certain there was no exception of any man there included and yet it is as certain Judas never came to sit upon the throne and his name was blotted out of the book of life Now if we put these ends together that in Scripture it was not revealed to any man concerning his final condition but to the dying penitent Thief and to the twelve Apostles that twelve thrones were designed for them and a promise made of their inthronization and yet that no man's final estate is so clearly declared miserable and lost as that of Judas one of the Twelve to whom a throne was promised the result will be that the election of holy persons is a condition allied to duty absolute and infallible in the general and supposing all the dispositions and requisites concurring but fallible in the particular if we fall off from the mercies of the Covenant and prevaricate the conditions But the thing which is most observable is that if in persons so eminent and priviledged and to whom a revelation of their Election was made as a particular grace their condition had one weak leg upon which because it did rely for one half of the interest it could be no stronger than its supporters the condition of lower persons to whom no revelation is made no priviledges are indulged no greatness of spiritual eminency is appendent as they have no greater certainty in the thing so they have less in person and are therefore to work out their salvation with great fears and tremblings of spirit 2. The purpose of this consideration is that we do not judge of our final condition by any discourses of our own relying upon God's secret Counsels and Predestination of Eternity This is a mountain upon which whosoever climbs like Moses to behold the land of Canaan at great distances may please his eyes or
else Faith and Hope are not two distinct Graces God's 〈◊〉 and vocation are without repentance meaning on God's part but the very people concerning whom S. Paul used the expression were reprobate and cut off and in good time shall be called again in the mean time many single persons perish There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus God will look to that and it will never fail but then they must secure the following period and not walk after the Flesh but after the Spirit Behold the goodness of God towards thee saith S. Paul if thou continue in his goodness otherwise thou also shalt be cut off And if this be true concerning the whole Church of the Gentiles to whom the Apostle then made the address and concerning whose election the decree was publick and manifest that they might be cut off and their abode in God's favour was upon condition of their perseverance in the Faith much more is it true in single persons 〈◊〉 election in particular is shut up in the abyss and permitted to the condition of our Faith and Obedience and the revelations of Dooms-day 7. Certain it is that God hath given to holy persons the Spirit of adoption enabling them to cry Abba Father and to account themselves for sons and by this Spirit we know we dwell in him and therefore it is called in Scripture the earnest of the Spirit though at its first mission and when the Apostle wrote and used this appellative the Holy Ghost was of greater signification and a more visible earnest and endearment of their hopes than it is to most of us since For the visible sending of the Holy Ghost upon many Believers in gifts signs and prodigies was infinite argument to make them expect events as great beyond that as that was beyond the common gifts of men just as Miracles and Prophecy which are gifts of the Holy Ghost were arguments of probation for the whole Doctrine of Christianity And this being a mighty verification of the great Promise the promise of the Father was an apt instrument to raise their hopes and confidences concerning those other Promises which Jesus made the promises of Immortality and eternal life of which the present miraculous Graces of the Holy Spirit were an earnest and in the nature of a contracting peny and still also the Holy Ghost though in another manner is an earnest of the great price of the heavenly calling the rewards of Heaven though not so visible and apparent as at first yet as certain and demonstrative where it is discerned or where it is believed as it is and ought to be in every person who does any part of his duty because by the Spirit we do it and without him we cannot And since we either feel or believe the presence and gifts of the Holy Ghost to holy purposes for whom we receive voluntarily we cannot casily receive without a knowledge of his reception we cannot but entertain him as an argument of greater good hereafter and an earnest-peny of the perfection of the present Grace that is of the rewards of Glory Glory and Grace differing no otherwise than as an earnest in part of payment does from the whole price the price of our high calling So that the Spirit is an earnest not because he always signifies to us that we are actually in the state of Grace but by way of argument or reflexion we know we do belong to God when we receive his Spirit and all Christian people have received him if they were rightly baptized and confirmed I say we know by that testimony that we belong to God that is we are the people with whom God hath made a Covenant to whom he hath promised and intends greater blessings to which the present gifts of the Spirit are in order But all this is conditional and is not an immediate testimony of the certainty and future event but of the event as it is possibly future and may without our fault be reduced to act as certainly as it is promised or as the earnest is given in hand And this the Spirit of God oftentimes tells us in secret visitations and publick testimonies and this is that which S. Paul calls tasting of the heavenly gift and partaking of the Holy Ghost and tasting of the good word of God and the powers of the world to come But yet some that have done so have fallen away and have quenched the Spirit and have given back the earnest of the Spirit and contracted new relations and God hath been their Father no longer for they have done the works of the Devil So that if new Converts be uncertain of their present state old Christians are not absolutely certain they shall persevere They are as sure of it as they can be of future acts of theirs which God hath permitted to their own power But this certainty cannot exclude all fear till their Charity be perfect only according to the strength of their habits so is the confidence of their abodes in Grace 8. Beyond this some holy persons have degrees of perswasion superadded as Largesses and acts of grace God loving to bless one degree of Grace with another till it comes to a Confirmation in Grace which is a state of Salvation directly opposite to Obduration and as this is irremediable and irrecoverable so is the other inamissible as God never saves a person obdurate and obstinately impenitent so he never loses a man whom he hath confirmed in grace whom he so loves he loves unto the end and to others indeed he offers his persevering love but they will not entertain it with a persevering duty they will not be beloved unto the end But I insert this caution that every man that is in this condition of a confirmed Grace does not always know it but sometimes God draws aside the curtains of peace and shews him his throne and visits him with irradiations of glory and sends him a little star to stand over his dwelling and then again covers it with a cloud It is certain concerning some persons that they shall never fall and that God will not permit them to the danger or probability of it to such it is morally impossible but these are but few and themselves know it not as they know a demonstrative proposition but as they see the Sun sometimes breaking from a cloud very brightly but all day long giving necessary and sufficient light 9. Concerning the multitude of Believers this discourse is not pertinent for they only take their own accounts by the imperfections of their own duty blended with the mercies of God the cloud gives light on one side and is dark upon the other and sometimes a bright ray peeps through the fringes of a shower and immediately hides it self that we might be humble and diligent striving forwards and looking upwards endeavouring our duty and longing after Heaven working out our Salvation with fear and trembling and
a great calamity within a little while after the Spirit of God had sent them two Epistles by the ministery of S. Paul their Cities were buried in an Earthquake and yet we have reason to think they were Churches beloved of God and Congregations of holy People The PRAYER OEternal and powerful God thou just and righteous Governour of the world who callest all orders of men by Precepts Promises and Threatnings by Mercies and by Judgments teach us to admire and adore all the Wisdome the effects and infinite varieties of thy Providence and make us to dispose our selves so by Obedience by Repentance by all the manners of Holy living that we may never provoke thee to jealousie much less to wrath and indignation against us Keep far from us the Sword of the destroying Angel and let us never perish in the publick expresses of thy wrath in diseases Epidemical with the furies of War with calamitous sudden and horrid Accidents with unusual Diseases unless that our so strange fall be more for thy glory and our eternal benefit and then thy will be done We beg thy grace that we may chearfully conform to thy holy will and pleasure Lord open our understandings that we may know the meaning of thy voice and the signification of thy language when thou speakest 〈◊〉 Heaven in signs and Judgments and let a holy fear so soften our spirits and an intense love so 〈◊〉 and sanctifie our desires that we may apprehend every intimation of thy pleasure at its first and remotest and most obscure representment that so we may with Repentance go out to meet thee and prevent the expresses of thine anger Let thy restraining grace and the observation of the issues of thy Justice so allay our spirits that we be not severe and forward in condemning others nor backward in passing sentence upon our selves Make us to obey thy voice described in holy Scripture to tremble at thy voice expressed in wonders and great effects of Providence to condemn none but our selves nor to enter into the recesses of thy Sanctuary and search the forbidden records of Predestination but that we may read our duty in the pages of Revelation not in the labels of accidental effects that thy Judgments may confirm thy Word and thy Word teach us our Duty and we by such excellent instruments may enter in and grow up in the ways of Godliness through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen SECT XV. Of the Accidents happening from the Death of Lazarus untill the Death and Burial of JESVS Bartimeus healed of blindnesse Mark 10. 46. And as he went out of Iericho with his Disciples and a great number of people blind Bartimeus sate by the high way begging 47. And when he heard that it was Iesus of Nazareth he began to cry out and say Iesus thou son of David have mercy on me Lazarus raysed from death Ioh. 11. 44. And he that was dead came forth bound hand and foot with gravecloths and his face was bound about with a napkin Iesus saith unto them Loose him and let him go 45. Then Many of the Iewes which came to Mary and had seen the things which Iesus did believed on him 1. VVHile Jesus was in Galilee messengers came to him from Martha and her Sister Mary that he would hasten into Judaea to Bethany to relieve the sickness and imminent dangers of their Brother Lazarus But he deferred his going till Lazarus was dead purposing to give a great probation of his Divinity Power and Mission by a glorious Miracle and to give God glory and to receive reflexions of the glory upon himself For after he had stayed two days he called his Disciples to go with him into Judaea telling them that Lazarus was dead but he would raise him out of that sleep of death But by that time Jesus was arrived at Bethany he found that Lazarus had been dead four days and now near to putrefaction But when Martha and Mary met him weeping their pious tears for their dead Brother Jesus suffered the passions of piety and humanity and wept distilling that precious liquor into the grave of Lazarus watering the dead plant that it might spring into a new life and raise his head above the ground 2. When Jesus had by his words of comfort and institution strengthened the Faith of the two mourning Sisters and commanded the stone to be removed from the grave he made an address of Adoration and Eucharist to his Father confessing his perpetual propensity to hear him and then cried out Lazarus come forth And he that was dead came forth from his bed of darkness with his night-cloaths on him whom when the Apostles had unloosed at the command of Jesus he went to Bethany and many that were present believed on him but others wondring and malicious went and told the Pharisees the story of the Miracle who upon that advice called their great Council whose great and solemn cognisance was of the greater causes of Prophets of Kings and of the holy Law At this great Assembly it was that Caiaphas the High Priest prophesied that it was expedient one should die for the people And thence they determined the death of Jesus But he knowing they had passed a decretory sentence against him retired to the City 〈◊〉 in the Tribe of Judah near the desart where he stayed a few days till the approximation of the Feast of Easter 3. Against which Feast when Jesus with his Disciples was going to Jerusalem he told them the event of the journey would be that the Jews should deliver him to the Gentiles that they should scourge him and mock him and crucifie him and the third day he should rise again After which discourse the Mother of 〈◊〉 's Children begg'd of Jesus for her two Sons that one of them might sit at his right hand the other at the left in his Kingdom For no discourses of his Passion or intimations of the mysteriousness of his Kingdom could yet put them into right understandings of their condition But Jesus whose heart and thoughts were full of phancy and apprehensions of the neighbour Passion gave them answer in proportion to his present conceptions and their future condition For if they desired the honours of his Kingdom such as they were they should have them unless themselves did decline them they should drink of his Cup and dip in his Lavatory and be washed with his baptism and sit in his Kingdom if the heavenly Father had prepared it for them but the donation of that immediately was an issue of Divine election and predestination and was only competent to them who by holy living and patient suffering put themselves into a disposition of becoming vessels of Election 4. But as Jesus in this journey came near Jericho he cures a blind man who sate begging by the way-side and espying Zaccheus the chief of the Publicans upon a tree that he being low of stature might upon that advantage of station see Jesus passing by he invited
served their present design and his own great intendment The Devil never fails to promote every evil purpose and except where God's restaining grace does intervene and interrupt the opportunity by interposition of different and cross accidents to serve other ends of Providence no man easily is fond of wickedness but he shall receive enough to ruine him Indeed Nero and Julian both witty men and powerfull desired to have been Magicians and could not and although possibly the Devil would have corresponded with them who yet were already his own in all degrees of security yet God permitted not that lest they might have understood new ways of doing despight to Martyrs and 〈◊〉 Christians And it concerns us not to tempt God or invite a forward enemy for as we are sure the Devil is ready to promote all vicious desires and bring them out to execution so we are not sure that God will not permit him and he that desires to be undone and cares not to be prevented by God's restraining grace shall finde his ruine in the folly of his own desires and become wretched by his own election Judas hearing of this Congregation of the Priests went and offered to betray his Lord and made a Covenant the Price of which was Thirty Pieces of Silver and he returned 11. It is not intimated in the History of the Life of Jesus that Judas had any Malice against the Person of Christ for when afterwards he saw the matter was to end in the death of his Lord he repented but a base and unworthy spirit of Covetousness possessed him and the reliques of 〈◊〉 for missing the Price of the Ointment which the holy Magdalen had poured upon his feet burnt in his bowels with a secret dark melancholick 〈◊〉 and made an eruption into an act which all ages of the world could never parallel They appointed him for hire thirty pieces and some say that every piece did in value equal ten ordinary current Deniers and so Judas was satisfied by receiving the worth of the three hundred pence at which he valued the Nard pistick But hereafter let no Christian be ashamed to be despised and undervalued for he will hardly meet so great a reproach as to have so disproportioned a price set upon his life as was upon the Holy Jesus S. Mary 〈◊〉 thought it not good enough to aneal his sacred feet Judas thought it a sufficient price for his head for Covetousness aims at base and low purchaces whilest holy Love is great and comprehensive as the bosome of Heaven and aims at nothing that is less than infinite The love of God is a holy fountain limpid and pure sweet and salutary lasting and eternal the love of Mony is a vertiginous pool sucking all into it to destroy it it is troubled and uneven giddy and unsafe serving no end but its own and that also in a restless and uneasie motion The love of God spends it self upon him to receive again the reflexions of grace and benediction the love of Money spends all its desires upon it sell to purchase nothing but unsatisfying instruments of exchange or supernumerary provisions and ends in dissatisfaction and emptiness of spirit and a bitter curse S. Mary Magdalen was defended by her Lord against calumny and rewarded with an honourable mention to all Ages of the Church besides the unction from above which she shortly after received to consign her to crowns and sceptres but Judas was described in the Scripture the Book of life with the black character of death he was disgraced to eternal Ages and presently after acted his own tragedy with a sad and ignoble death 12. Now all things being fitted our Blessed Lord sends two Disciples to prepare the Passeover that he might fulfill the Law of Moses and pass from thence to institutions Evangelical and then fulfill his Sufferings Christ gave them a sign to guide them to the house a man bearing a pitcher of water by which some that delight in mystical significations say was typified the Sacrament of Baptism meaning that although by occasion of the Paschal solemnity the holy Eucharist was first instituted yet it was afterwards to be applied to practice according to the sence of this accident only baptized persons were apt suscipients of the other more perfective Rite as the taking nutriment supposes persons born into the world and within the common conditions of humane nature But in the letter it was an instance of the Divine omniscience who could pronounce concerning accidents at distance as if they were present and yet also like the provision of the Colt to ride on it was an instance of Providence and security of all God's sons for their portion of temporals Jesus had not a Lamb of his own and possibly no money in the bags to buy one and yet Providence was his guide and the charity of a good man was his Proveditore and he found excellent conveniences in the entertainments of a hospitable good man as if he had dwelt in Ahab's Ivory-house and had had the riches of Solomon and the meat of his houshold The PRAYER O Holy King of Sion Eternal Jesus who with great Humility and infinite Love didst enter into the Holy City riding upon an Asse that thou mightest verisie the Predictions of the Prophets and give example of Meekness and of the gentle and paternal government which the eternal Father laid upon thy shoulders be pleased deares̄t Lord to enter into my Soul with triumph trampling over all thine enemies and give me grace to entertain thee with joy and adoration with abjection of my own desires with lopping off all my supersluous branches of a temporal condition and spending them in the offices of Charity and Religion and devesting my self of all my desires laying them at thy holy feet that I may bear the yoke and burthen of the Lord with alacrity with love and the wonders of a satisfied and triumphant spirit Lord enter in and take possession and thou to whose honour the very stones would give testimony make my stony heart an instrument of thy praises let me strew thy way with flowers of Vertue and the holy Rosary of Christian Graces and by thy aid and example let us also triumph over all our infirmities and hostilities and then lay our victories at thy feet and at last follow thee into thy heavenly Jerusalem with palms in our hands and joy in our hearts and eternal acclamations on our lips rejoycing in thee and singing Hallelujahs in a happy Eternity to thee O holy King of Sion eternal Jesus Amen 2. O Blessed and dear Lord who wert pleased to permit thy self to be sold to the assemblies of evil persons for a vile price by one of thy own servants for whom thou hadst done so great favours and hadst designed a crown and a throne to him and he turned himself into a sooty coal and entred into the portion of evil Angels teach us to value thee above all the joys of men to prize
praise so when it is presented to him he takes no contentment in it and if it be easie to want Praise when it is denied yet it is harder not to be delighted with it when it is offered But there is much reason that we should put restraints upon our selves lest if we be praised without desert we find a greater Judgment of God or if we have done well and received praise for it we 〈◊〉 all our reward which God hath deposited for them that receive not their good things in this life For as silver is tried in the melter and gold in the Crucible so is a man tried by the mouth of him that praises him that is he is either clarified from his dross by looking upon the praise as a homily to teach and an instrument to invite his duty or else if he be already pure he is consolidated strengthned in the sobriety of his spirit and retires himself closer into the strengths and securities of Humility Nay this step of Humility uses in very holy persons to be enlarged to a delight in affronts and disreputation in the world Now I begin to be Christ ' s Disciple said 〈◊〉 the Martyr when in his journey to Rome he suffered perpetual revilings and abuse S. Paul rejoyced in his infirmities and reproach and all the Apostles at Jerusalem went from the tribunal rejoycing that they were esteemed worthy to suffer shame for the name of Jesus This is an excellent condition and degree of Humility But I chuse to add one that is less but in all persons necessary 9. Fourthly Christ's Humble man is careful never to speak any thing that may redound to his own praise unless it be with a design of Charity or Duty that either God's glory or the profit of his neighbour be concerned in it but never speaking with a design to be esteemed learned or honourable S. Arsenius had been Tutor to three Caesars Theodosius Arcadius and Honorius but afterwards when he became Religious no word escaped him that might represent and tell of his former greatness and it is observable concerning S. Jerome that although he was of noble extraction yet in all his own Writings there is not the smallest intimation of it This I desire to be understood only to the sence and purposes of Humility and that we have no designs of vanity and phancy in speaking learnedly or recounting our exteriour advantages but if either the 〈◊〉 of our brother or the glory of God if either there be Piety or Charity in the design it is lawful to publish all those excellencies with which God hath distinguished us from others The young Marquess of Castilion being to do publick exercise in his course of Philosophy made it a case of Conscience whether he were bound to dispute his best fearing lest vanity might transport him in the midst of those praises which his Collegiates might give him It was an excellent consideration in the young Gentleman but in actions civil and humane since the danger is not so immediate and a little complacency becoming the instrument of vertue and encouragement of studies may with like care be referred to God as the giver and 〈◊〉 his praises he might with more safety have done his utmost it being in some sense a duty to encourage others to give account of our Graces and our labours and all the appendent vanity may quickly be suppressed A good name may give us opportunity of perswading others to their duty especially in an Age in which men chuse their Doctrines by the men that preach them and S. Paul used his liberty when he was zealous for his Corinthian Disciples but restrained himself when it began to make reflexions upon his own spirit But although a good name be necessary and in order to such good ends whither it may serve it is lawful to desire it yet a great name and a pompous honour and secular greatness hath more danger in it to our selves than ordinarily it can have of benefit to others and although a man may use the greatest honours to the greatest purposes yet ordinary persons may not safely desire them because it will be found very hard to have such mysterious and abstracted considerations as to separate all our proper interest from the publick end To which I add this consideration That the contempt of Honour and the instant pursuit of Humility is more effective of the ghostly benefit of others than Honours and great Dignities can be unless it be rarely and very accidentally 10. If we need any new incentives to the practice of this Grace I can say no more but that Humility is Truth and Pride is a Lie that the one glorifies God the other dishonours him Humility makes men like Angels Pride makes Angels to become Devils that Pride is Folly Humility is the temper of a holy spirit and excellent Wisdom that Humility is the way to glory Pride to ruine and confusion Humility makes Saints on Earth Pride undoes them Humility beatifies the Saints in Heaven and the Elders throw their Crowns at the foot of the Throne Pride disgraces a man among all the Societies of Earth God loves one and Satan solicits the cause of the other and promotes his own interest in it most of all And there is no one Grace in which Christ propounded himself imitable so signally as in this of Meekness and Humility for the enforcing of which he undertook the condition of a Servant and a life of Poverty and a death of Disgrace and washed the feet of his Disciples and even of Judas himself that his action might be turned into a Sermon to preach this Duty and to make it as eternal as his own Story The PRAYER O Holy and Eternal Jesus who wert pleased to lay aside the Glories and incomprehensible Majesty which clothed thy Infinity from before the beginning of Creatures and didst put on a cloud upon thy Brightness and wert invested with the impure and imperfect broken robe of Humane nature and didst abate those Splendors which broke through the veil commanding Devils not to publish thee and men not to proclaim thy Excellencies and the Apostles not to reveal those Glories of thine which they discovered incircling thee upon mount Tabor in thy transfiguration and didst by perpetual Homilies and symbolical mysterious actions as with deep characters engrave Humility into the spirits of thy Disciples and the Discipline of Christianity teach us to approach near to these thy Glories which thou hast so covered with a cloud that we might without amazement behold thy Excellencies make us to imitate thy gracious Condescensions take from us all vanity and phantastick complacencies in our own persons or actions and when there arises a reputation consequent to the performance of any part of our Duty make us to 〈◊〉 the glory upon thee suffering nothing to adhere to our own spirits but shame at our own imperfection and thankfulness to thee for all thy assistences let us never seek the
the Angel's coming because it was a great necessity which was incumbent upon our Lord for his sadness and his Agony was so great mingled and compounded of sorrow and zeal fear and desire innocent nature and perfect grace that he sweat drops as great as if the bloud had started through little undiscerned fontinels and outrun the streams and rivers of his Cross. Euthymius and Theophylact say that the Evangelists use this as a tragical expression of the greatest Agony and an unusual sweat it being usual to call the tears of the greatest sorrow tears of 〈◊〉 But from the beginning of the Church it hath been more generally apprehended literally and that some bloud mingled with the 〈◊〉 substance issued from his veins in so great abundance that they moistened the ground and bedecked his garment which stood like a new firmament studded with stars portending an approaching storm Now he came from Bozrah with his garments red and bloudy And this Agony verified concerning the Holy Jesus those words of David I am poured out like water my bones are dispersed my heart in the midst of my body is like melting wax saith Justin Martyr Venerable Bede saith that the descending of these drops of bloud upon the earth besides the general purpose had also a particular relation to the present infirmities of the Apostles that our Blessed Lord obtained of his Father by the merits of those holy drops mercies and special support for them and that effusion redeemed them from the present participation of death And S. Austin meditates that the Body of our Lord all overspread with drops of bloudy sweat did prefigure the future state of Martyrs and that his Body mystical should be clad in a red garment variegated with the symbols of labour and passion sweat and bloud by which himself was pleased to purifie his Church and present her to God holy and spotless What collateral designs and tacite significations might be designed by this mysterious sweat I know not certainly it was a sad beginning of a most dolorous Passion and such griefs which have so violent permanent and sudden effects upon the body which is not of a nature symbolical to interiour and immaterial causes are proclaimed by such marks to be high and violent We have read of some persons that the grief and fear of one night hath put a cover of snow upon their heads as if the labours of thirty years had been extracted and the quintessence drank off in the passion of that night but if Nature had been capable of a greater or more prodigious impress of passion than a bloudy sweat it must needs have happened in this Agony of the Holy Jesus in which he undertook a grief great enough to make up the imperfect Contrition of all the Saints and to satisfie for the impenitencies of all the world 7. By this time the Traitor Judas was arrived at Gethsemani and being in the vicinage of the Garden Jesus rises from his prayers and first calls his Disciples from their sleep and by an Irony seems to give them leave to sleep on but reproves their drousiness when danger is so near and bids them henceforth take their rest meaning if they could for danger which now was indeed come to the Garden-doors But the Holy Jesus that it might appear he undertook the Passion with choice and a free election not only refused to flie but called his Apostles to rise that they might meet his Murtherers who came to him with swords and staves as if they were to surprise a Prince of armed Out-laws whom without force they could not reduce So also might Butchers do well to go armed when they are pleased to be afraid of Lambs by calling them Lions Judas only discovered his Master's retirements and betrayed him to the opportunities of an armed band for he could not accuse his Master of any word or private action that might render him obnoxious to suspicion or the Law For such are the rewards of innocence and prudence that the one secures against sin the other against suspicion and appearances 8. The Holy Jesus had accustomed to receive every of his Disciples after absence with entertainment of a Kiss which was the endearment of persons and the expression of the oriental civility and Judas was confident that his Lord would not reject him whose feet he had washed at the time when he foretold this event and therefore had agreed to signifie him by this sign and did so beginning war with a Kiss and breaking the peace of his Lord by the symbol of kindness which because Jesus entertained with much evenness and charitable expressions calling him Friend he gave evidence that if he retained civilities to his greatest enemies in the very acts of hostility he hath banquets and crowns and scepters for his friends that adore him with the kisses of Charity and love him with the sincerity of an affectionate spirit But our Blessed Lord besides his essential sweetness and serenity of spirit understood well how great benefits himself and all the World were to receive by occasion of that act of Judas and our greatest enemy does by accident to holy persons the offices of their dearest friends telling us our faults without a cloak to cover their deformities but out of malice laying open the circumstances of aggravation doing us affronts from whence we have an instrument of our Patience and restraining us from scandalous crimes lest we become a scorn and reproof to them that 〈◊〉 us And it is none of God's least mercies that he permits enmities amongst men that animosities and peevishness may reprove more sharply and correct with more severity and simplicity than the gentle hand of friends who are apter to bind our wounds up than to discover them and make them smart but they are to us an excellent probation how friends may best do the offices of friends if they would take the plainness of enemies in accusing and still mingle it with the tenderness and good affections of friends But our Blessed Lord called Judas Friend as being the instrument of bringing him to glory and all the World to pardon if they would 9. Jesus himself begins the enquiry and leads them into their errand and tells them he was JESUS of Nazareth whom they sought But this also which was an answer so gentle had in it a strength greater than the Eastern wind or the voice of thunder for God was in that still voice and it struck them down to the ground And yet they and so do we still persist to persecute our Lord and to provoke the eternal God who can with the breath of his mouth with a word or a sign or a thought reduce us into nothing or into a worse condition even an eternal duration of torments and cohabitation with a never-ending misery And if we cannot bear a soft answer of the merciful God how shall we dare to provoke the wrath of the Almighty Judge But in
this instance there was a rare mixture of effects as there was in Christ of Natures the voice of a Man and the power of God For it is observed by the Doctors of the Primitive Ages that from the Nativity of our Lord to the day of his Death the Divinity and Humanity did so communicate in effects that no great action passed but it was like the Sun shining through a cloud or a beauty with a thin veil drawn over it they gave illustration and testimony to each other The Holy Jesus was born a tender and a crying Infant but is adored by the Magi as a King by the Angels as their GOD. He is circumcised as a Man but a name is given him to signifie him to be the SAVIOUR of the World He flies into Egypt like a distressed Child under the conduct of his helpless Parents but as soon as he enters the Country the Idols fall down and confess his true Divinity He is presented in the Temple as the Son of man but by Simeon and Anna he is celebrated with divine praises for the MESSIAS the SON OF GOD. He is baptized in Jordan as a Sinner but the Holy Ghost descending upon him proclaimed him to be the well-beloved of God He is hungry in the Desart as a Man but sustained his body without meat and drink for forty days together by the power of his Divinity There he is tempted of Satan as a weak Man and the Angels of light minister unto him as their supreme Lord. And now a little before his death when he was to take upon him all the affronts miseries and exinanitions of the most miserable he receives testimonies from above which are most wonderful For he was tranfigured upon Mount Tabor entred triumphantly into Jerusalem had the acclamations of the people when he was dying he darkned the Sun when he was dead he opened the sepulchres when he was fast nailed to the Cross he made the earth to tremble now when he suffers himself to be apprehended by a guard of Souldiers he strikes them all to the ground only by replying to their answer that the words of the Prophet might be verified Therefore my people shall know my Name therefore they shall know in that day that I am he that doth speak behold it is I. 10. The Souldiers and servants of the Jews having recovered from their fall and risen by the permission of Jesus still persisted in their enquiry after him who was present ready and desirous to be sacrificed He therefore permitted himself to be taken but not his Disciples for he it was that set them their bounds and he secured his Apostles to be witnesses of his suffering and his glories and this work was the Redemption of the world in which no man could have an active share he alone was to tread the wine-press and time enough they should be called to a fellowship of sufferings But Jesus went to them and they bound him with cords and so began our liberty and redemption from slavery and sin and cursings and death But he was bound faster by bands of his own his Father's Will and Mercy Pity of the world Prophecies and Mysteries and Love held him fast and these cords were as strong as death and the cords which the Souldiers malice put upon his holy hands were but symbols and figures his own compassion and affection were the morals But yet he undertook this short restraint and condition of a prisoner that all sorts of persecution and exteriour calamities might be hallowed by his susception and these pungent sorrows should like bees sting him and leave their sting behind that all the sweetness should remain for us Some melancholick Devotions have from uncertain stories added sad circumstances of the first violence done to our Lord That they bound him with three cords and that with so much violence that they caused bloud to start from his tender hands That they 〈◊〉 then also upon him with a violence and incivility like that which their Fathers had used towards Hur the brother of Aaron whom they choaked with impure spittings into his throat because he refused to consent to the making a golden Calf These particulars are not transmitted by certain Records Certain it is they wanted no malice and now no power for the Lord had given himself into their hands 11. S. Peter seeing his Master thus ill used asked Master shall we strike with the sword and before he had his answer cut off the ear of Malchus Two swords there were in Christ's family and S. Peter bore one either because he was to kill the Paschal Lamb or according to the custom of the Country to secure them against beasts of prey which in that region were frequent and dangerous in the night But now he used it in an unlawful war he had no competent authority it was against the Ministers of his lawful Prince and against our Prince we must not draw a sword for Christ himself himself having forbidden us as his kingdom is not of this world so neither were his defences secular he could have called for many legions of Angels for his guard if he had so pleased and we read that one Angel slew 185000 armed men in one night and therefore it was a vast power which was at the command of our Lord and he needs not such low auxiliaries as an army of Rebels or a navy of Pirates to 〈◊〉 his cause he first lays the foundation of our happiness in his sufferings and hath ever since supported Religion by patience and suffering and in poverty and all the circumstances and conjunctures of improbable causes Fighting for Religion is certain to destroy Charity but not certain to support Faith S. Peter therefore may use his keys but he is commanded to put up his sword and he did so and presently he and all his fellows fairly ran away and yet that course was much the more Christian for though it had in it much infirmity yet it had no malice In the mean time the Lord was pleased to touch the ear of Malchus and he cured it adding to the first instance of power in throwing them to the ground an act of miraculous mercy curing the wounds of an enemy made by a friend But neither did this pierce their callous and obdurate spirits but they led him in uncouth ways and through the brook Cedron in which it is said the ruder souldiers plunged him and passed upon him all the affronts and rudenesses which an insolent and cruel multitude could think of to signifie their contempt and their rage And such is the nature of evil men who when they are not softned by the instruments and arguments of Grace are much hardned by them such being the purpose of God that either Grace shall cure sin or accidentally increase it that it shall either pardon it or bring it to greater punishment for so I have seen healthful medicines abused by the incapacities of a
he bearing them upon his tender body with an even and excellent and dispassionate spirit offered up these beginnings of sufferings to his Father to obtain pardon even for them that injured him and for all the World 6. Judas now seeing that this matter went farther than he intended it repented of his fact For although evil persons are in the progress of their iniquity invited on by new arguments and supported by confidence and a careless spirit yet when iniquity is come to the height or so great a proportion that it is apt to produce Despair or an intolerable condition then the Devil suffers the Conscience to thaw and grow tender but it is the tenderness of a Bile it is soreness rather and a new disease and either it comes when the time of Repentance is past or leads to some act which shall make the pardon to be impossible and so it happened here For Judas either impatient of the shame or of the sting was thrust on to despair of pardon with a violence as hasty and as great as were his needs And Despair is very often used like the bolts and bars of Hell-gates it 〈◊〉 upon them that had entred into the suburbs of eternal death by an habitual sin and it secures them against all retreat And the Devil is forward enough to bring a man to Repentance provided it be too late and Esau wept bitterly and repented him and the five foolish Virgins lift up their voice aloud when the gates were shut and in Hell men shall repent to all eternity But I consider the very great folly and infelicity of Judas it was at midnight he received his money in the house of Annas betimes in that morning he repented his bargain he threw the money back again but his sin stuck close and it is thought to a 〈◊〉 eternity Such is the purchace of Treason and the reward of Covetousness it is cheap in its offers momentany in its possession unsatisfying in the fruition uncertain in the stay sudden in its 〈◊〉 horrid in the remembrance and a ruine a certain and miserable ruine is in the event When Judas came in that sad condition and told his miserable story to them that set him on work they 〈◊〉 him go away unpitied he had served their ends in betraying his Lord and those that hire such servants use to leave them in the disaster to shame and to sorrow and so did the Priests but took the money and 〈◊〉 to put it into the treasury because it was the price of bloud but they made no scruple to take it from the treasury to buy that bloud Any thing seems lawful that serves the ends of ambitious and bloudy persons and then they are scrupulous in their cases of Conscience when nothing of Interest does intervene for evil men make Religion the servant of Interest and sometimes weak men think that it is the 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 Religion and suspect that all of it is a design because many great Politicks make it so The end of the Tragedy was that Judas died with an ignoble death marked with the circumstances of a horrid Judgment and perished by the most infamous hands in the world that is by his own Which if it be confronted against the excellent spirit of S. Peter who did an act as contradictory to his honour and the grace of God as could be easily imagined yet taking sanctuary in the arms of his Lord he lodged in his heart for ever and became an example to all the world of the excellency of the Divine Mercy and the efficacy of a holy Hope and a hearty timely and an operative Repentance 7. 〈◊〉 now all things were ready for the purpose the High Priest and all his Council go along with the Holy Jesus to the house of Pilate hoping he would verifie their Sentence and bring it to execution that they might 〈◊〉 be rid of their fears and enjoy their sin and their reputation quietly S. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the High Priest caused the Holy Jesus to be led with a cord about his neck and in memory of that the Priests for many Ages 〈◊〉 a stole about theirs But the Jews did it according to the custom of the Nation to signifie he was condemned to death they desired Pilate that he would crucifie him they having 〈◊〉 him worthy And when Pilate enquired into the particulars they gave him a general and an indefinite answer If he were not guilty we would not have brought him 〈◊〉 thee they intended not to make Pilate Judge of the cause but 〈◊〉 of their cruelty But Pilate had not learned to be guided by an implicite faith of such persons which he knew to be malicious and violent and therefore still called for instances and arguments of their Accusation And that all the world might see with how great unworthiness they prosecuted the 〈◊〉 they chiefly there accused him of such crimes upon which themselves condemned him not and which they knew to be false but yet likely to move Pilate if he had been passionate or inconsiderate in his sentences He offered to make himself a King This 〈◊〉 happened at the entry of the Praetorium for the 〈◊〉 who made no conscience of killing the King of Heaven made a conscience of the external customs and ceremonies of their Law which had in them no interiour sanctity which were apt to separate them 〈◊〉 the Nations and remark them with characters of Religion and abstraction it would defile them to go to a Roman Forum 〈◊〉 a capital action was to be judged and yet the effusion of the best bloud in the world was not esteemed against their 〈◊〉 so violent and blind is the spirit of malice which turns humanity into 〈◊〉 wisdom into craft diligence into subornation and Religion into Superstition 8. Two other articles they alledged against him but the first concerned not Pilate and the second was involved in the third and therefore he chose to examine him upon this only of his being a King To which the Holy Jesus answered that it is true he was 〈◊〉 King indeed but not of this world his Throne is Heaven the Angels are his Courtiers and the 〈◊〉 Creation are his Subjects His Regiment is spiritual his 〈◊〉 are the Courts of Conscience and Church-tribunals and at Dooms-day the Clouds The Tribute which he demands are conformity to his Laws Faith 〈◊〉 and Charity no other Gabels but the duties of a holy Spirit and the expresses of a religious Worship and obedient Will and a consenting Understanding And in all this Pilate thought the interest of 〈◊〉 was not invaded For certain it is the Discipline of Jesus confirmed it much and supported it by the strongest pillars And here Pilate saw how impertinent and malicious their Accusation was And we who declaim against the unjust proceedings of the Jews against our dearest Lord should do well to take care that we in accusing any of our Brethren either with malicious purpose or with
to God and even holy purposes are good actions of the Spirit and Principles of Religion and though alone they cannot do the work of Grace or change the state when they are ineffectual that is when either we will not bring them into act or that God will not let us yet to a Man already in the state of Grace they are the additions of something good and are like blowing of coals which although it can put no life into a dead coal yet it makes a live coal shine brighter and burn clearer and adds to it some accidental degrees of heat 23. Having thus disposed himself to the peace of God let him make peace with all those in whom he knows or suspects any minutes of anger or malice or displeasure towards him submitting himself to them with humility whom he unworthily hath displeased asking pardon of them who say they are displeased and offering pardon to them that have displeased him and then let him crave the peace of Holy Church For it is all this while to be supposed that he hath used the assistence and prayers the counsel and the advices of a spiritual man and that to this purpose he hath opened to him the state of his whole life and made him to understand what emendations of his faults he hath made what acts of Repentance he hath done how lived after his fall and reparation and that he hath submitted all that he did or undid to the discerning of a holy man whose office it is to guide his Soul in this agony and last offices All men cannot have the blessing of a wise and learned Minister and some die where they can have none at all yet it were a safer course to do as much of this as we can and to a competent person if we can if we cannot then to the best we have according as we judge it to be of spiritual advantage to us for in this conjuncture of accidents it concerns us to be sure if we may and not to be deceived where we can avoid it because we shall never return to life to do this work again And if after this entercourse with a Spiritual guide we be reconciled by the solemn prayer of the Church the prayer of Absolution it will be of great advantage to us we depart with our Father's blessing we die in the actual Communion of the Church we hear the sentence of God applied after the manner of men and the promise of Pardon made circumstantiate material present and operative upon our spirits and have our portion of the promise which is recorded by S. James that if the Elders of the Church pray over a sick person fervently and effectually add solemnly his sins shall be forgiven him that is supposing him to be in a capacity to receive it because such prayers of such a man are very prevalent 24. All this is in a spiritual sense washing the hands in innocency and then let him go to the altar let him not for any excuse less than impossibility omit to receive the holy Sacrament which the Father 's assembled in the great Nicene Council have taught all the Christian world to call the most necessary provisions for our last journey which is the memory of that Death by which we hope for life which is the seed of Immortality and Resurrection of our bodies which unites our spirit to Christ which is a great defensative against the hostilities of the Devil which is the most solemn Prayer of the Church united and made acceptable by the Sacrifice of Christ which is then represented and exhibited to God which is the great instrument of spiritual increase and the growth of Grace which is duty and reward food and Physick health and pleasure deletery and cordial prayer and thanksgiving an union of mysteries the marriage of the Soul and the perfection of all the Rites of Christianity dying with the holy Sacrament in us is a going to God with Christ in our arms and interposing him between us and his angry sentence But then we must be sure that we have done all the duty without which we cannot communicate worthily For else Satan comes in the place of Christ and it is a horrour not less than infinite to appear before God's Tribunal possessed in our Souls with the spirit of darkness True it is that by many Laws of the Church the Bishop and the Minister are bound to give the holy Eucharist to every person who in the article or apparent danger of death desires it provided that he hath submitted himself to the imposition and counsels of the Bishop or Guide of his Soul that in case he recovers he may be brought to the peace of God and his Church by such steps and degrees of Repentance by which other publick sinners are reconciled But to this gentleness of Discipline and easiness of Administration those excellent persons who made the Canons thought themselves compelled by the rigour of the 〈◊〉 and because they admitted not lapsed persons to the peace of the Church upon any terms though never so great so publick or so penal a Repentance therefore these not onely remitted them to the exercise and station of Penitents but also to the Communion But the Fathers of the Council of Eliberis denied this favour to persons who after Baptism were Idolaters either intending this as a great argument to affright persons from so great a crime or else believing that it was unpardonable after Baptism a contradiction to that state which we entred into by Baptism and the Covenant Evangelical However I desire all learned persons to observe it and the less learned also to make use of it that those more ancient Councils of the Church which commanded the holy Communion to be given to dying persons meant only such which according to the custome of the Church were under the conditions of Repentance that is such to whom punishment and Discipline of divers years were injoyned and if it happened they died in the intervall before the expiration of their time of reconciliation then they admitted them to the Communion Which describes to us the doctrine of those Ages when Religion was purer and Discipline more severe and holy life secured by rules of excellent Government that those only were fit to come to that Feast who before their last sickness had finished the Repentance of many years or at least had undertaken it I cannot say it was so always and in all Churches for as the Disciples grew slack or mens perswasions had variety so they were more ready to grant Repentance as well as Absolution to dying persons but it was otherwise in the best times and with severer Prelates And certainly it were great charity to deny the Communion to persons who have lived viciously till their death provided it be by competent authority and done sincerely prudently and without temporal interest to other persons who have lived good lives or repented of their bad
though less perfectly it ought not to be denied and they less ought to neglect it 25. But as every man must put himself so also he must put his house in order make his Will if he have an Estate to dispose of and in that he must be careful to do Justice to every man and Charity to the poor according as God hath enabled him and though Charity is then very late if it begins not earlier yet if this be but an act of an ancient habit it is still more perfect as it succeeds in time and superadds to the former stock And among other acts of Duty let it be remembred that it is excellent Charity to leave our Will and desires clear plain and determinate that contention and Law-suits may be prevented by the explicate declaration of the Legacies At last and in all instances and periods of our following days let the former good acts be renewed let God be praised for all his Graces and Blessings of our life let him be intreated for Pardon of our sins let acts of Love and Contrition of Hope of Joy of Humility be the work of every day which God still permits us always remembring to ask remission for those sins we remember not And if the condition of our sickness permits it let our last breath expire with an act of Love that it may begin the Charities of Eternity and like a Taper burnt to its lowest base it may go out with a great emission of light leaving a sweet smell behind us to perfume our Coffin and that these lights newly made brighter or trimmed up in our sickness may shine about our Herse that they may become arguments of a pious sadness to our friends as the charitable Coats which Dorcas made were to the widows and exemplar to all those who observed or shall hear of our holy life and religious death But if it shall happen that the disease be productive of evil accidents as a disturbed phancy a weakned understanding wild discoursings or any deprivation of the use of Reason it concerns the sick persons in the happy intervalls of a quiet untroubled spirit to pray earnestly to God that nothing may pass from him in the rages of a Fever or worse distemper which may less become his duty or give scandal or cause trouble to the persons in attendance and if he shall also renounce and disclaim all such evil words which his disease may speak not himself he shall do the duty of a Christian and a prudent person And after these 〈◊〉 he may with Piety and confidence resign his Soul into the hands of God to be deposited in holy receptacles till the day of restitution of all things and in the mean time with a quiet spirit descend into that state which is the lot of Caesars and where all Kings and Conquerours have laid aside their glories The PRAYER O Eternal and Holy Jesus who by Death hast overcome Death and by thy Passion hast taken out its sting and made it to become one of the gates of Heaven and an entrance to Felicity have mercy upon me now and at the hour of my death let thy Grace accompany me all the days of my life that I may by a holy Conversation and an habitual performance of my Duty wait for the coming of our Lord and be ready to enter with thee at whatsoever hour thou shalt come Lord let not my death be in any sence unprovided nor untimely nor hasty but after the common manner of men having in it nothing extraordinary but an extraordinary Piety and the manifestation of a great and miraculous Mercy Let my Senses and Understanding be preserved intire till the last of my days and grant that I may die the death of the righteous having first discharged all my obligations of justice leaving none miserable and unprovided in my departure but be thou the portion of all my friends and relatives and let thy blessing descend upon their heads and abide there till they shall meet me in the bosom of our Lord. Preserve me ever in the communion and peace of the Church and bless my Death bed with the opportunity of a holy and a spiritual Guide with the assistence and guard of Angels with the perception of the holy Sacrament with Patience and dereliction of my own 〈◊〉 with a strong Faith and a firm and humble Hope with just measures of Repentance and great treasures of Charity to thee my God and to all the world that my Soul in the arms of the Holy Jesus may be deposited with safety and joy there to expect the revelation of thy Day and then to partake the glories of thy Kingdom O Eternal and Holy Jesus Amen Considerations upon the Crucifixion of the Holy JESUS He beareth his Cross Ioh 19. 16. 17. And they took Iesus and lead him away 17. And he bearing his Cross went forth into a place called the place of a Scult which is called in y e Hebrew Golgotha They Erect the Crucifixe Ioh 3. 14. 15. And as Moses lifted up the Serpent in y e wilderness even so must y e Son of man be lifted up 15. That whosoever believeth on him should not perish but haue eternall life 1. WHen the Sentence of Death pronounced against the Lord was to be put in execution the Souldiers pulled off the Robe of mockery the scarlet Mantle which in jest they put upon him and put on his own garments But as Origen observes the Evangelist mentioned not that they took off the Crown of thorns what might serve their interest they pursue but nothing of remission or mercy to the afflicted Son of man but so it became the King of Sufferings not to lay aside his Imperial thorns till they were changed into Diadems of Glory But now Abel is led forth by his brother to be slain A gay spectacle to satisfie impious eyes who would not stay behind but attended and waited upon the hangman to see the Catastrophe of this bloudy Tragedy But when Piety looks on she beholds a glorious mystery Sin laughed to see the King of Heaven and Earth and the great lover of Souls in stead of the Scepter of his Kingdom to bear a Tree of 〈◊〉 and shame But Plety wept tears of pity and knew they would melt into joy when she should behold that Cross which loaded the shoulders of her Lord afterward sit upon the Scepters and be engraved and signed upon the Foreheads of Kings 2. It cannot be thought but the Ministers of Jewish malice used all the circumstances of affliction which in any case were accustomed towards malefactors and persons to be crucified and therefore it was that in some old Figures we see our Blessed Lord described with a Table appendent to the fringe of his garment set full of nails and pointed iron for so sometimes they afflicted persons condemned to that kind of Death and S. Cyprian affirms that Christ did stick to the wood that he carried being
parent of as great Religion as the good women make their fancy their softness and their passion 12. Our Blessed Lord appeared next to Simon and though he and John ran forthtogether and S. John outran Simon although Simon Peter had denied and forsworn his Lord and S. John never did and followed him to his Passion and his death yet Peter had the savour of seeing Jesus first Which some Spiritual persons understand as a testimony that penitent 〈◊〉 have accidental eminences and priviledges sometimes 〈◊〉 to them beyond the temporal graces of the just and innocent as being such who not only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 against the remanent and inherent evils even of repented sins and their aptnesses to relapse but also because those who are true Penitents who understand the infiniteness of the Divine mercy and that for a sinner to pass from death to 〈◊〉 from the state of sin into pardon and the state of Grace is a greater gift and a more excellent and improbable mutation than for a just man to be taken into glory out of gratitude to God and indearment 〈◊〉 so great a change added to a fear of returning to such danger and misery will re-enforce all their industry and double their study and 〈◊〉 more diligently and watch more carefully and redeem the 〈◊〉 and make amends for their omissions and oppose a good to the former evils beside the duties of the 〈◊〉 imployment and then commonly the life of a holy Penitent is more holy active zealous and impatient of Vice and more rapacious of Vertue and holy actions and arises to greater 〈◊〉 of Sanctity than the even and moderate affections of just persons who as our Blessed Saviour's expression is 〈◊〉 no Repentance that is no change of state nothing but a perseverance and an improvement of degrees There is more joy in heaven before the Angels of God over 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that 〈◊〉 than 〈◊〉 ninety nine just persons that need it not for where sin hath abounded there doth grace super abound and that makes joy in Heaven 13. The Holy Jesus having received the affections of his most passionate Disciples the women and S. 〈◊〉 puts himself upon the way into the company of two good men going to Emmaus with troubled spirits and a reeling faith shaking all its upper building but leaving some of its foundation firm To them the Lord discourses of the necessity of the Death and Resurrection of the 〈◊〉 and taught them not to take estimate of the counsels of God by the designs and proportions of man for God by ways contrary to humane judgment brings to pass the purposes of his eternal Providence The glories of Christ were not made pompous by humane circumstances his Kingdom was spiritual he was to enter into Felicities through the gates of Death he refused to do Miracles before 〈◊〉 and yet did them before the people he confuted his accusers by silence and did not descend from the Cross when they offered to believe in him if he would but 〈◊〉 them to be perswaded by greater arguments of his power the miraculous circumstances of his Death and the glories of his Resurrection and by walking in the secret paths of Divine election hath commanded us to adore his footsteps to admire and revere his Wisdom to be satisfied with all the events of Providence and to rejoyce in him if by Afflictions he makes us holy if by Persecutions he supports and enlarges his Church if by Death he brings us to life so we arrive at the communion of his Felicities we must let him chuse the way it being sufficient that he is our guide and our support and our exceeding great reward For therefore Christ preached to the two Disciples going to 〈◊〉 the way of the Cross and the necessity of that passage that the wisdom of God might be glorified and the conjectures of man ashamed But whilest his discourse lasted they knew him not but in the breaking of bread he discovered himself For he turned their meal into a Sacrament and their darkness to light and having to his Sermon added the Sacrament opened all their discerning faculties the eyes of their body and their understanding too to represent to us that when we are blessed with the opportunities of both those instruments we want no exteriour assistence to guide us in the way to the knowing and enjoying of our Lord. 14. But the Apparitions which Jesus made were all upon the design of laying the foundation of all Christian Graces for the begetting and establishing Faith and an active Confidence in their persons and building them up on the great fundamentals of the Religion And therefore he appointed a general meeting upon a mountain in Galilee that the number of witnesses might not only disseminate the same but establish the Article of the Resurrection for upon that are built all the hopes of a Christian and if the dead rise not then are we of all men most miserable in quitting the present possessions and entertaining injuries and affronts without hopes of reparation But we lay two gages in several repositories the Body in the bosome of the earth the Soul in the 〈◊〉 of God and as we here live by Faith and lay them down with hope so the 〈◊〉 is a restitution of them both and a state of re-union And therefore although the glory of our spirits without the body were joy great enough to make compensation for mere than the troubles of all the world yet because one shall not be glorified without the other they being of themselves incomplete substances and God having revealed nothing clearly concerning actual and complete felicities till the day of Judgment when it is promised our bodies shall rise therefore it is that the Resurrection is the great Article upon which we rely and which Christ took so much care to prove and ascertain to so many persons because if that should be disbelieved with which all our felicities are to be received we have nothing to establish our Faith or entertain our Hope or satisfie our desires or make retribution for that state of secular inconveniences in which by the necessities of our nature and the humility and patience of our Religion we are engaged 15. But I consider that holy Scripture onely instructs us concerning the life of this world and the life of the Resurrection the life of Grace and the life of Glory both in the body that is a life of the whole man and whatsoever is spoken of the Soul considers it as an essential part of man relating to his whole constitution not as it is of it self an intellectual and separate substance for all its actions which are separate and removed from the body are relative and incomplete Now because the Soul is an incomplete substance and created in relation to the Body and is but a part of the whole man if the Body were as eternal and incorruptible as the Soul yet the separation of the one from the other would be
of Visions 61. 23. Sins of Infirmity explicated 105. 10. seq Intentions though good excuse not evil Actions 107. 13. Incontinence destroys the Spirit of Government 189. 5. Instruments weak and unlikely used by GOD to great purposes 197. Incarnation of Jesus instrumental to God's Glory and our Peace 31. Inevitable Infirmities consistent with a state of Grace 207. Injuries great and little to be forgiven 252. Intention of Spirit how necessary in our Prayers 267. 17. Images their Lawfulness or unlawfulness considered 237. 16. Admitted into the Church with difficulty and by degrees 237. 16. Images of Jupiter and Diana Cyndias did ridiculous and weak Miracles 279. 7. Imprisonment sanctified by the binding of Jesus 387. Ingratitude of Judas 360. 9. John the Baptist his Life and Death 66. 5. 77. 78. and 79. 93. 292. 18. His Baptism 93. Whether the form of it were in the Name of Christ to come ibid. Joyes spiritual increase by communication 156. 3. Joyes of Eternity recompense all our Sorrowes in every instant of their fruition 426. Joyes sudden and violent are to be allayed by reflexion on the vilest of our Sins 196. 7. John Patriarch of Alexandria appeased the anger of Patricius 245. 30. Innocence is security against evil Actions 10. Justice of GOD in punishing Jesus cleared 415. 7 8. Several degrees of Justification answerable to several degrees of Faith 162. 7. Judgment of Life and Death is to be only by the supreme Power or his Deputy 253. A Jew condemned of Idolatry for throwing stones though in detestation at the Idol of Mercury 354. 32. Judging our Brother how far prohibited 260. 5. Judas's name written in Heaven and blotted 〈◊〉 again 313. 1. His manner of death 352. 25. Ingrateful 360. 8. He valued the Ointment at the same rate he sold his Lord 361. 11. He enjoyed his Money not Ten Hours 386. 7. Julian desired but could not be a Magician 361. 10. Judgment of GOD upon Sinners their causes and manner 336. 1. seq Judgments National 340. 8. Not easily understood by Men 339. 5. Joseph of Arimath embalmed the Body of Jesus 356. 38. Whether Judas received the Holy Sacrament 375. 13. K. KIng and Church have the same Friends and Enemies 336. Kingdom of Christ not of this World 352. What it is 392. 8. Kingdom of God what 263. 5. Kingdom of Grace and Glory ibid. A King came to Jesus in behalf of his Son 182. 6. Kings specially to be prayed for 365. 13. King's Enemies how to be prayed against ibid. To Kill the assaulting Person in what cases lawful 253. 3. L. LAws evil make a National Sin 341. 10. Law of Nature Vide Pref. per tot 20. 7. Laws of Man to be obeyed but not always to be thought most reasonable 42. 7. 48. 21. Laws of God and Man in respect of the greatness of the subject matter compared 46. 49. Laws of Men bind not to Death or an insufferable Calamity rather than not to break them 48. 21. Laws of Superiours not to be too freely disputed by Subjects 49. 23. Laws of order to be observed even when the first reason ceases 52. 1. It is not safe to do all that is lawful 45. 15 16. Law and Gospel how differ 194. 3. 232. 3. 295. S. Paul often by a Fiction of Person speaks of himself not as in the state of Regeneration under the Gospel but as under the imperfections of the Law 104. 8. Law of Nature perfected by Christianity Pref. Law of Moses a Law of Works how 232. Law of Jesus a Law of the Spirit and not of Works in what sence ibid. Law-Suits to be managed charitably 256. When lawful to be undertaken ibid. Lazarus restored to Life 345. 2. Leonigildus kill'd his Daughter for not communicating with the Arians 188. 2. Leven of Herod what 321. 8. Lepers cured 324. 18. Sent to the Priest ibid. Unthankful ibid. The Levantine Churches afflicted the cause uncertain 338. 4. S. Laurence his Gridiron less hot than his Love 358. 2. 7. 〈◊〉 17. Life of Man cut off for Sin 303. 305. It hath several periods ibid. 274. Good life necessary to make our Prayers acceptable 266. 13. A comparison between a Life in Solitude and in Society 80. 5. Lord's Supper the greatest of Christian Rites 369. It manifests God's Power 371. 4. His Wisdome and his Charity 371. 5 6. It is a Sacrament of Union 371. 5 6. A Sacrament and a Sacrifice in what sence 372. 7. As it is an act of the Ecclesiastical Officer of what efficacy 373. 8. It is expressed in mysterious words when the value is recited 373. Not to be administred to vicious persons 374. 12. Whether persons vicious under suspicion only are to be deprived of it 376. 13. How to be received 377. 15. What deportment to be used after it 378. 17. To be received by dying Persons 407. 23. Of what benefit it is to them ibid. Love and Obedience Duties of the first Commandment 234. 8. Love and Obedience reconciled 427. 9. Love of God its extension 234. 9. It s intension ibid. n. 11. Love the fulfilling of the Law explicated 233. 5. It consists in latitude 236. 13. It must exclude all affection to sin ibid. 14. Signs of true love to God 236. 14. Love to God with all our hearts possible and in what sence ibid. Love of God and love of money compared 361. 11. Lord's Day by what authority to be observed 244. 24. And how ibid. Lucian's Cynick an Hypocrite 366. 7. Likeness to God being desired at first ruined us now restores us 364. 3. Lying in that degree is criminal as it is injurious 250. 40. M. MArriage honoured by Christ's presence and the first Miracle 154. Hallowed to a Mystery 158. 8. Marriage-breakers are more criminal now than under Moses's Law 158. The smaller undecencies must be prevented or deprecated Of Martyrdom 229. 18. Magi at the sight of Christ's Poverty renounce the World and retire into Philosophy 28. 13. Mary a Virgin alwayes 14. 2. An excellent Personage 2 3. 8. She conceived Jesus without Sin and brought him forth without Pain 13. Her joy at the Prophecies concerning her Son attempered with Predictions of his Passion 30. 4. Full of Fears when she lost Jesus 73. 1. She went to the Temple to pray and there found him ibid. Full of Piety in Her countenance and deportment 113. 32. She converted many to thoughts of Chastity by her countenance and aspect ibid. Mary Magdalen's Story 377. 9. 360. 5. 391. 9. 346. 5. 349. 13. Mary's Choice preferred 326. 26. Mark for sook Jesus upon a Scandal taken but was reduced by S. Peter 320. 3. Malchus an Idumaean Slave smote Jesus on the Face 389. 1. Meditation described 54. It turns the understanding into spirit 55. Its Parts Actions manner of Exercise Fruits and Effects Disc. 3. per tot 54. Men ought not to run into the Ministery till they are called 99. 3.
we find him paying Tribute an House over which Nicephorus tells us that Helen the Mother of Constantine erected a beautiful Church to the honour of S. Peter This place was equally advantageous for the managery of his Trade standing upon the Influx of Jordan into the Sea of Galilee and where he might as well reap the fruits of an honest and industrious diligence A mean I confess it was and a more servile course of life as which besides the great pains and labour it required exposed him to all the injuries of wind and weather to the storms of the Sea the darkness and tempestousness of the Night and all to make a very small return An imployment whose restless troubles constant hardships frequent dangers and amazing horrours are for the satisfaction of the learned Reader thus elegantly described by one whose Poems may be justly stiled Golden Verses receiving from the Emperour Antoninus a piece of Gold for every Verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But meanness is no bar in God's way the poor if virtuous are as dear to Heaven as the wealthy and the honourable equally alike to him with whom there is no respect of persons Nay our Lord seemed to cast a peculiar honour upon this profession when afterwards calling him and some others of the same Trade from catching of Fish to be as he told them Fishers of men 5. AND here we may justly reflect upon the wise and admirable methods of the Divine providence which in planting and propagating the Christian Religion in the World made choice of such mean and unlikely instruments that he should hide these things from the wise and prudent and reveal them unto babes men that had not been educated in the Academy and the Schools of Learning but brought up to a Trade to catch Fish and mend Nets most of the Apostles being taken from the meanest Trades and all of them S. Paul excepted unfurnished of all arts of learning and the advantages of liberal and ingenuous education and yet these were the men that were designed to run down the World and to overturn the learning of the prudent Certainly had humane wisdome been to manage the business it would have taken quite other measures and chosen out the profoundest Rabbins the acutest Philosophers the smoothest Orators such as would have been most likely by strength of reason and arts of rhetorick to have triumph'd over the minds of men to grapple with the stubberness of the Jews and baffle the finer notions and speculations of the Greeks We find that those Sects of Philosophy that gain'd most credit in the Heathen-world did it this way by their eminency in some Arts and Sciences whereby they recommended themselves to the acceptance of the wiser and more ingenious part of mankind Julian the Apostate thinks it a reasonable exception against the Jewish Prophets that they were incompetent messengers and interpreters of the Divine will because they had not their minds cleared and purged by passing through the Circle of polite arts and learning Why now this is the wonder of it that the first Preachers of the Gospel should be such rude unlearned men and yet so suddainly so powerfully prevail over the learned World and conquer so many who had the greatest parts and abilities and the strongest prejudices against it to the simplicity of the Gospel When Celsus objected that the Apostles were but a company of mean and illiterate persons sorry Mariners and Fishermen Origen quickly returns upon him with this answer That hence 't was plainly evident that they taught Christianity by a Divine power when such persons were able with such an uncontrouled success to subdue men to the obedience of the Word for that they had no eloquent tongues no subtle and discursive heads none of the refin'd and rhetorical Arts of Greece to conquer the minds of men For my part says he in another place I verily believe that the Holy Jesus purposely made use of such Preachers of his Doctrine that there might be no suspicion that they came instructed with Arts of Sophistry but that it might be clearly manifest to all the World that there was no crafty design in it and that they had a Divine power going along with them which was more efficacious than the greatest volubility of expression or ornaments of speech or the artifices which were used in the Graecian compositions Had it not been for this Divine power that upheld it as he elsewhere argues the Christian Religion must needs have sunk under those weighty pressures that lay upon it having not only to contend with the potent opposition of the Senate Emperors People and the whole power of the Roman Empire but to conflict with those home-bred wants and necessities wherewith its own professors were oppressed and burdened 6. IT could not but greatly vindicate the Apostles from all suspicion of forgery and imposture in the thoughts of sober and unbyassed persons to see their Doctrine readily entertained by men of the most discerning and inquisitive minds Had they dealt only with the rude and the simple the idiot and the unlearned there might have been some pretence to suspect that they lay in wait to deceive and designed to impose upon the World by crafty and insinuative arts and methods But alas they had other persons to deal with men of the acutest wits and most profound abilities the wisest Philosophers and most subtle disputants able to weigh an argument with the greatest accuracy and to decline the force of the strongest reasonings and who had their parts edg'd with the keenest prejudices of education and a mighty veneration for the Religion of their Country a Religion that for so many Ages had governed the World and taken firm possession of the minds of men And yet notwithstanding all these disadvantages these plain men conquered the wise and the learned and brought them over to that Doctrine that was despised and scorned opposed and persecuted and that had nothing but its own native excellency to recommend it A clear evidence that there was something in it beyond the craft and power of men Is not this says an elegant Apologist making his address to the Heathens enough to make you believe and entertain it to consider that in so short a time it has diffused it self over the whole World civilized the most barbarous Nations softned the roughest and most intractable tempers that the greatest Wits and Scholars Orators Grammarians Rhetoricians Lawyers Physicians and Philosophers have quitted their formerly dear and beloved sentiments and heartily embraced the Precepts and Doctrines of the Gospel Upon this account Theodoret does with no less truth than elegancy insult and
our Lord's Apostles being betrayed by his own covetous and insatiable mind had lately fallen from the honour of his place and ministery that this was no more than what the Prophet had long since foretold should come to pass and that the rule and oversight in the Church which had been committed unto him should be devolved upon another that therefore it was highly necessary that one should be substituted in his room and especially such a one as had been familiarly conversant with our Saviour from first to last that so he might be a competent witness both of his doctrine and miracles his life and death but especially of his Resurrection from the dead For seeing no evidence is so valid and satisfactory as the testimony of an eye-witness the Apostles all along mainly insisted upon this that they delivered no other things concerning our Saviour to the World than what they themselves had seen and heard And seeing his rising from the dead was a principle likely to meet with a great deal of opposition and which would hardliest gain belief and entertainment with the minds of men therefore they principally urg'd this at every turn that they were eye-witnesses of his Resurrection that they had seen felt eaten and familiarly conversed with him after his return from the Grave That therefore such an Apostle might be chosen two Candidates were proposed Joseph called Barsabas and Matthias And having prayed that the Divine Providence would immediately guide and direct the choice they cast lots and the lot fell upon Matthias who was accordingly admitted into the number of the twelve Apostles 2. FIFTY days since the last Passeover being now run out made way for the Feast of Pentecost At what time the great promise of the Holy Ghost was fully made good unto them The Christian Assembly being met together for the publick services of their Worship on a sudden a sound like that of a mighty wind rush'd in upon them representing the powerful efficacy of that Divine Spirit that was now to be communicated to them After which there appeared little flames of fire which in the fashion of Cloven Tongues not only descended but sate upon each of them probably to note their perpetual enjoyment of this gift upon all occasions that when necessary they should never be without it not like the Prophetick gifts of old which were conferred but sparingly and only at some particular times and seasons As the seventy Elders prophesied and ceased not but it was only at such times as the Spirit came down and rested upon them Hereupon they were all immediately filled with the Holy Ghost which enabled them in an instant to speak several Languages which they had never learn't and probably never heard of together with other miraculous gifts and powers Thus as the confounding of Languages became a curse to the old World separating men from all mutual offices of kindness and commerce rendring one part of mankind Barbarians to another so here the multiplying several Languages became a blessing being intended as the means to bring men of all Nations into the unity of the saith and of the knowledge of the Son of God into the fellowship of that Religion that would banish discords cement differences and unite mens hearts in the bond of peace The report of so sudden and strange an action presently spread it self into all corners of the City and there being at that time at Jerusalem multitudes of Jewish Proselytes Devout men out of every Nation under Heaven Parthians Medes Elamites or Persians the dwellers in Mesopotamia and Judaea Gappadocia Pontus and Asia minor from Phrygia and Pamphylia from Egypt and the parts of Libya and Cyrene from Rome from Crete from Arabia Jews and Proselytes probably drawn thither by the general report and expectation which had spread it self over all the Eastern parts and in a manner over all places of the Roman Empire of the Jewish Messiah that about this time should be born at Jerusalem they no sooner heard of it but universally flocked to this Christian Assembly where they were amazed to hear these Galileans speaking to them in their own native Languages so various so vastly different from one another And it could not but exceedingly encrease the wonder to reflect upon the meanness and inconsiderableness of the persons neither assisted by natural parts nor polished by education nor improved by use and custom which three things Philosophers require to render a man accurate and extraordinary in any art or discipline 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Plutarch Natural disposition without institution is blind instruction without a genius and disposition is defective and exercise without both is lame and imperfect Whereas these Disciples had not one of these to set them off their parts were mean below the rate of the common people the Galileans being generally accounted the rudest and most stupid of the whole Jewish Nation their education had been no higher than to catch Fish and to mend Nets nor had they been used to plead causes or to deliver themselves before great Assemblies but spoke on a sudden not premeditated discourses not idle stories or wild roving fancies but the great and admirable works of God and the mysteries of the Gospel beyond humane apprehensions to find out and this delivered in almost all the Languages of the then known World Men were severally affected with it according to their different tempers and apprehensions Some admiring and not knowing what to think on 't others deriding it said that it was nothing else but the wild raving effect of drunkenness and 〈◊〉 At so wild a rate are men of prophane minds wont to talk when they take upon them to pass their censure in the things of God 3. HEREUPON the Apostles rose up and Peter in the name of the rest took this occasion of discoursing to them He told them that this scandalous slander proceeded from the spirit of 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 that their censure was as uncharitable as it was unreasonable that they that are drunken are drunk in the night that it was against nature and custom for men to be in drink so soon too early for such a suspicion to take place it being now but about nine of the clock the hour for Morning Prayer till when men even of ordinary sobriety and devotion on Festival days were wont to fast That these extraordinary and miraculous passages were but the accomplishment of an ancient prophecy the fulfilling of what God had expresly foretold should come to pass in the times of the Messiah that Jesus of Nazareth had evidently approv'd himself to be the Messiah sent from God by many unquestionable miracles of which they themselves had been eye-witnesses And though by God's permission who had determined by this means to bring about the Salvation of mankind they had wickedly crucified and slain him yet that God had raised him from the dead That it was not possible he should be holden always under
the dominion of the Grave nor was it consistent with the justice and goodness of God and especially with those Divine predictions which had expresly foretold he should rise again from the dead David having more particularly foretold That his 〈◊〉 should rest in hope that God would not leave his Soul in Hell neither suffer his holy one to see corruption but would make known to him the ways of life That this prophecy could not be meant concerning David himself by whom it was spoken he having many Ages since been turn'd to ashes his body resolv'd into rottenness and putrefaction his Tomb yet visible among them from whence he never did return that therefore it must needs have been prophetically spoken concerning Christ having never been truly fulfill'd in any but him who both died and was risen again whereof they were witnesses Yea that he was not only risen from the dead but ascended into Heaven and according to David's prediction State down on God's right hand until he made his Enemies his foot-stool which could not be primarily meant of David he never having yet bodily ascended into Heaven that therefore the whole house of Israel ought to believe and take notice that this very Jesus whom they had crucified was the person whom God had appointed to be the Messiah and the Saviour of his Church 4. THIS discourse in every part of it like so many daggers pierc'd them to the heart who thereupon cried out to Peter and his Brethren to know what they should do Peter told them that there was no other way than by an hearty and sincere repentance and a being baptized into the Religion of this crucified Saviour to 〈◊〉 their guilt to obtain pardon of sin and the gifts and benefits of the Holy Ghost That upon these terms the promises of the new Covenant which was ratified by the death of Christ did belong to them and their children and to all that should effectually believe and embrace the Gospel Further pressing and perswading them by doing thus to save themselves from that unavoidable ruine and destruction which this wicked and untoward generation of obstinate unbelieving Jews were shortly to be exposed to The effects of his preaching were strange and wonderful as many as believed were baptized there being that day added to the Church no less than three thousand souls A quick and plentiful harvest the late sufferings of our Saviour as yet fresh bleeding in their memories the present miraculous powers of the Holy Ghost that appeared upon them the zeal of his Auditors though heretofore misplaced and misguided and above all the efficacy of Divine grace contributing to this numerous conversion 5. THOUGH the converting so vast a multitude might justly challenge a place amongst the greatest miracles yet the Apostles began now more particularly to exercise their miraculous power Peter and John going up to the Temple about three of the clock in the afternoon towards the conclusion of one of the solemn hours of prayer for the Jews divided their day into four greater hours each quarter containing three lesser under it three of which were publick and stated times of prayer instituted say they by the three great Patriarchs of their Nation the first from six of the clock in the morning till nine called hence the third hour of the day instituted by Abraham this was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or morning prayer the second from nine till twelve called the sixth hour and this hour of prayer ordain'd by Isaac this was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or mid-day prayer the third from twelve till three in the afternoon called the ninth hour appointed by Jacob called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or evening prayer and at this hour it was that these two Apostles went up to the Temple where they found a poor impotent Cripple who though above forty years old had been lame from his Birth lying at the beautiful Gate of the Temple and asking an Alms of them Peter earnestly looking on him told him he had no money to give him but that he would give him that which was a great deal better restore him to his health and lifting him up by the hand commanded him in the Name of Jesus of Nazareth to rise up and walk The word was no sooner said than the thing was done Immediately the Nerves and Sinews were inlarged and the Joynts returned to their proper use The man standing up went into the Temple walking leaping and praising God The beholding so suddain and extraordinary a Cure begot great admiration in the minds of the People whose curiosity drew them to the Apostles to see those who had been the Authors of it Which Peter taking notice of began to discourse to them to this effect That there was no reason they should wonder at them as if by their own skill and art they had wrought this Cure it being intirely done in the Name of their crucified Master by the Power of that very Christ that Holy and Just Person whom they themselves had denyed and delivered up to Pilate and preferred a Rebel and a Murtherer before him when his Judge was resolved to acquit him and that though they had put him to death yet that they were witnesses that God had raised him up again and that He was gone to Heaven where he must remain till the times of the General Restitution That he presumed that this in them as also in their Rulers was in a great measure the effect of ignorance and the not being throughly convinced of the Greatness and Divinity of his Person which yet God made use of for the bringing about his Wife and Righteous Designs the accomplishing of what he had foretold concerning Christ's Person and Sufferings by Moses and Samuel and all the holy Prophets which had been 〈◊〉 the World began That therefore it was now high time for them to repent and turn to God that their great wickedness might be expiated and that when Christ should shortly come in Judgment upon the Jewish Nation it might be a time of comfort and refreshing to them what would be of vengeance and destruction to other men that they were the peculiar persons to whom the blessings of the promises did primarily appertain and unto whom God in the first place sent his Son that he might derive his blessing upon them by turning them away from their iniquities While Peter was thus discoursing to the People in one place we may suppose that John was preaching to them in another and the success was answerable The Apostles cast out the seed and God immediately gave the increase There being by this means no 〈◊〉 than Five Thousand brought over to the Faith though'tis possible the whole Body of Believers might be comprehended in that Number 6. WHILE the Apostles were thus Preaching the Priests and Sadducees who particularly appeared in this business as being enemies to all tumults or what ever might disturb their present ease and quiet the only
attain to though otherwise sunk into the deepest degeneracy and over-spread with the grossest darkness he every where affording such palpable evidences of his own being and providence that he seemed to stand near and touch us It being intirely from him that we derive our life motion and subsistence A thing acknowledged even by their own Poct that We also are his Off-spring If therefore God was our Creator it was highly unreasonable to think that we could make any Image or Representation of Him That it was too long already that the Divine patience had born with the manners of Men and suffered them to go on in their blind Idolatries that now he expected a general repentance and reformation from the World especially having by the publishing of his Gospel put out of all dispute the case of a future judgment and particularly appointed the Holy Jesus to be the Person that should sentence and judge the World By whose Resurrection he had given sufficient evidence and assurance of it No sooner had he mentioned the Resurrection but some of the Philosophers no doubt Epicureans who were wont to laugh at the notion of a future state mocked and derided him others more gravely answered that they would hear him again concerning this matter But his discourse however scorned and slighted did not wholly want its desired effect and that upon some of the greatest quality and rank among them In the number of whom was Dionysius one of the grave Senators and Judges of the Areopagus and Damaris whom the Ancients not improbably make his Wife 8. THIS Dionysius was bred at Athens in all the learned Arts and Sciences at sive and twenty Years of Age he is said to have travelled into Egypt to perfect himself in the study of Astrology for which that Nation had the credit and renown Here beholding the miraculous Eclipse that was at the time of our Saviour's Passion he concluded that some great accident must needs be coming upon the World Returning to Athens he became one of the Senators of the Arcopagus disputed with S. Paul and was by him converted from his Errours and Idolatry and being thoroughly instructed was by him as the Ancients inform us made the first Bishop of Athens As for those that tell us that he went afterwards into France by the direction of Clemens of Rome planted Christianity at and became Bishop of Paris of his suffering Martyrdom there under Domitian his carrying his Head for the space of two Miles in his Hand after it had been cut off and the rest of his Miracles done before and after his Death I have as little leisure to enquire into them as I have faith to believe them Indeed the foundation of all is justly denied viz. that ever he was there a thing never heard of till the times of Charles the Great though since that Volumes have been written of this controversie both heretofore and of later times among which J. Sirmondus the Jesuit and Monsieur Launoy one of the learned Doctors of the Sorbon have unanswerably proved the Athenian and Parisian Dionysius to be distinct Persons For the Books that go under his name M. Daillé has sufficiently evinced them to 〈◊〉 of a date many Hundred Years younger than S. Denys though I doubt not but they may claim a greater Antiquity than what he allows them But whoever was their Author I am sure Suidas has over-stretched the praise of them beyond all proportion when he gives them this character 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that whoever considers the elegancy of his discourses and the profoundness of his notions and speculations must needs conclude that they are not the issue of any humane understanding but of some Divine and Immaterial Power But to return to our Apostle SECT IV. Of S. Paul's Acts at Corinth and Ephesus S. Paul's arrival at Corinth The opposition made by the Jews The success of his Preaching upon others His first Epistle to the Thessalonians when written His Arraignment before Gallio The second Epistle to the Thessalonians and the design of it S. Paul's voyage to Jerusalem His coming to Ephesus Disciples baptized into John's Baptism S. Paul's preaching at Ephesus and the Miracles wrought by him Ephesus noted for the study of Magick Jews eminently versed in Charms and Inchantments The Original of the Mystery whence pretended to have been derived The ill attempt of the Sons of Sceva to dipossess Daemons in the name of Christ. S. Paul's doctrine greatly successful upon this sort of men Books of Magick forbidden by the Roman Laws S. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians why and when written Diana's Temple at Ephesus and its great stateliness and magnificence The mutiny against S. Paul raised by Demetrius and his party S. Paul's first Fpistle to the Corinthians upon what occasion written His Epistle to Titus Apollonius Tyanaeus whether at Ephesus at the same time with S. Paul His Miracles pretended to be done in that City 1. AFTER his departure from Athens he went to Corinth the Metropolis of Greece and the residence of the Proconsul of Achaia where he found Aquila and Priscilla lately come from Italy banished out of Rome by the Decree of Claudius And they being of the same trade and profession wherein he had been educated in his youth he wrought together with them lest he should be unnecessarily burdensom unto any which for the same reason he did in some other places Hither after some time Silas and Timothy came to him In the Synagogue he frequently disputed with the Jews and Proselytes reasoning and proving that Jesus was the true Messiah They according to the nature of the men made head and opposed him and what they could not conquer by argument and sorce of reason they endeavoured to carry by noise and clamour mixed with blasphemies and revilings the last refuges of an impotent and baffled cause Whereat to testifie his resentment he shook his Garments and told them since he saw them resolved to pull down vengeance and destruction upon their own heads he for his part was guiltless and innocent and would henceforth address himself unto the Gentiles Accordingly he left them and went into the house of Justus a religious Proselyte where by his preaching and the many miracles which he wrought he converted great numbers to the Faith Amongst which were Crispus the chief Ruler of the Synagogue Gaius and Stephanus who together with their Families embraced the doctrine of the Gospel and were baptized into the Christian Faith But the constant returns of malice and ingratitude are enough to tire the largest charity and cool the most generous resolution therefore that the Apostle might not be discouraged by the restless attempts and machinations of his enemies our Lord appeared to him in a Vision told him that not withstanding the bad success he had hitherto met with there was a great harvest to be gathered in that place that he should not be afraid of his enemies but go
Eusebius tells us 't was not received by many because rejected by the Church of Rome as none of S. Paul's genuine Epistles Origen affirms the style and phrase of it to be more fine and elegant and to contain in it a richer vein of purer Greek than is usually found in S. Paul's Epistles as every one that is able to judge of a style must needs confess That the sentences indeed are grave and weighty and such as breath the Spirit and Majesty of an Apostle That therefore 't was his judgment that the matter contained in it had been dictated by some Apostle but that it had been put into phrase form and order by some other person that did attend upon him That if any Church owned it for S. Paul's they were not to be condemned it not being without reason by the Ancients ascribed to him though God only knew who was the true Author of it He further tells us that report had handed it down to his time that it had been composed partly by Clemens of Rome partly by Luke the Evangelist Tertullian adds that it was writ by Barnabas What seems most likely in such variety of opinions is that S. Paul originally wrote it in Hebrew it being to be sent to the Jews his Country-men and by some other person probably S. Luke or Clemens Romanus translated into Greek Especially since both Eusebius and S. Hierom observed of old such a great affinity both in style and sence between this and Clement's Epistle to the Corinthians as thence positively to conclude him to be the Translator of it 'T was written as we may conjecture a little after he was restored to his liberty and probably while he was yet in some parts of Italy whence he dates his salutations The main design of it is to magnifie Christ and the Religion of the Gospel above Moses and the Jewish Oeconomy and Ministration that by this means he might the better 〈◊〉 and confirm the convert-Jews in the firm belief and profession of Christianity notwithstanding those sufferings and persecutions that came upon them endeavouring throughout to arm and 〈◊〉 them against Apostasie from that noble and excellent Religion wherein they had so happily engaged themselves And great need there was for the Apostle severely to urge them to it heavy persecutions both from Jews and Gentiles pressing in upon them on every side besides those trains of specious and plausible 〈◊〉 that were laid to reduce them to their Ancient Institutions Hence the Apostle calls Apostasie the sin which did so easily beset them to which there were such frequent temptations and into which they were so prone to be betrayed in those suffering times And the more to deter them from it he once and again sets before them the dreadful state and condition of Apostates those who having been once enlightned and baptized into the Christian Faith tasted the promises of the Gospel and been made partakers of the miraculous gifts of the Holy Ghost those powers which in the world to come or this new state of things were to be conferred upon the Church if after all this these men fall away and renounce Christianity it 's very hard and even impossible to renew them again unto repentance For by this means they trod under foot and crucified the Son of God afresh and put him to an open shame prophaned the bloud of the Covenant and did despite to the Spirit of Grace So that to sin thus wilfully after they had received the knowledge of the truth there could remain for them no more sacrifice for sins nothing but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which should devour these adversaries And a searful thing it was in such circumstances to fall into the hands of the living God who had particularly said of this sort of sinners that if any man drew back his soul should have no pleasure in him Hence it is that every where in this Epistle he mixes exhortations to this purpose that they would give earnest heed to the things which they had heard lest at any time they should let them slip that they would hold fast the confidence and the rejoycing of the hope firm unto the end and beware lest by an evil heart of unbelief they departed from the living God that they would labour to enter into his 〈◊〉 lest any man fall after the example of unbelief that leaving the first principles of the doctrine of Christ they would go on to perfection shewing diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end not being slothful but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises that they would hold fast the profession of the faith without wavering not forsaking the assembling of themselves together as the manner of some was nor cast away their confidence which had great recompence of reward that they had need of patience that after they had done the will of God they might receive the promise that they would not be of them who drew back unto perdition but of them that believed to the saving of the Soul that being encompassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses who with the most unconquerable constancy and resolution had all holden on in the way to Heaven they would lay aside every weight and the sin which did so easily beset them and run with patience the race that was set before them especially looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of their faith who endured the cross and despised the shame that therefore they should consider him that endured such 〈◊〉 of sinners against himself lest they should be wearied and faint in their minds for that they had not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin looking diligently lest any man should fail of the grace of God lest any root of bitterness springing up should trouble them and thereby many be defiled By all which and much more that might be observed to this purpose it is evident what our Apostles great design was in this excellent Epistle 7. OUR Apostle being now after two Years custody perfectly restored to liberty remembred that he was the Apostle of the Gentiles and had therefore a larger Diocese than Rome and accordingly prepared himself for a greater Circuit though which way he directed his course is not absolutely certain By some he is said to have returned back into Greece and the parts of Asia upon no other ground that I know of than a few intimations in some of his Epistles that he intended to do so By others he is thought to have preached both in the Eastern and Western parts which is not inconsistent with the time he had after his departure from Rome But of the latter we have better evidence Sure I am an Author beyond all exception S. Paul's contemporary and Fellow-labourer I mean Clemens in his famous Epistle to the Corinthians expresly tells us that being a Preacher both in the East and
all measures and under the patronage of his name began to set up for a party he severely rebuked them told them that it was Christ not he that was crucified for them that they had not been baptized into his name which he was so far from that he did not remember that he had baptized 〈◊〉 three or four of them and was heartily glad he had baptized no more 〈◊〉 a foundation might have been laid for that suspicion that this Paul whom they so much extolled was no more than a minister of Christ whom our Lord had appointed to plant and build up his Church 4. GREAT was his temperance and sobriety so far from going beyond the bounds of regularity that he abridged himself of the conveniencies of lawful and necessary accommodations frequent his hungrings and thirstings not constrained only but voluntary it 's probably thought that he very rarely drank any Wine certain that by abstinence and mortification he kept under and subdued his body reducing the extravagancy of the sensual appetites to a perfect subjection to the laws of Reason By this means he easily got above the World and its charms and frowns had his mind continually conversant in Heaven his thoughts were fixed there his desires always ascending thither what he taught others he practised himself his conversation was in Heaven and his desires were to depart and to be with Christ this World did neither arrest his affections nor disturb his fears he was not taken with its applause nor frighted with its threatnings he studied not to please men nor valued the censures and judgments which they passed upon him he was not greedy of a great estate or titles of honour or rich presents from men not seeking theirs but them food and raiment was his bill of fare and more than this he never cared for accounting that the less he was clogged with these things the lighter he should march to Heaven especially travelling through a World over-run with troubles and persecutions Upon this account it 's probable he kept himself always within a single life though there want not some of the Ancients who expresly reckon him in the number of the married Apostles as Clemens Alexandrinus Ignatius and some others 'T is true that passage is not to be found in the genuine Epistle of Ignatius but yet is extant in all those that are owned and published by the Church of Rome though they have not been wanting to banish it out of the World having expunged S. Paul's name out of some ancient Manuscripts as the learned Bishop Usher has to their shame sufficiently discovered to the World But for the main of the question we can readily grant it the Scripture seeming most to favour it that though he asserted his power and liberty to marry as well as the rest yet that he lived always a single life 5. HIS kindness and charity was truly admirable he had a compassionate tenderness for the poor and a quick sense of the wants of others To what Church soever he came it was one of his first cares to make provision for the poor and to stir up the bounty of the rich and the wealthy nay himself worked often with his own hands not only to maintain himself but to help and relieve them But infinitely greater was his charity to the Souls of men fearing no dangers refusing no labours going through good and evil report that he might gain men over to the knowledge of the truth reduce them out of the crooked paths of vice and idolatry and set them in the right way to eternal life Nay so insatiable his thirst after the good of Souls that he affirms that rather than his Country-men the Jews should miscarry by not believing and entertaining the Gospel he could be content nay wished that himself might be accursed from Christ for their sake i. e. that he might be anathematized and cut off from the Church of Christ and not only lose the honour of the Apostolate but be reckoned in the number of the abject and execrable persons such as those are who are separated from the communion of the Church An instance of so large and passionate a charity that lest it might not find room in mens belief he ushered it in with this solemn appeal and attestation that he said the truth in Christ and lied not his conscience bearing him witness in the Holy Ghost And as he was infinitely solicitous to gain men over to the best Religion in the World so was he not less careful to keep them from being seduced from it ready to suspect every thing that might corrupt their minds from the simplicity that is in Christ. I am jealous over you with a godly jealousie as he told the Church of Corinth An affection of all others the most active and vigilant and which is wont to inspire men with the most passionate care and concernment for the good of those for whom we have the highest measures of love and kindness Nor was his charity to men greater than his zeal for God endeavouring with all his might to promote the honour of his Master Indeed zeal seems to have had a deep foundation in the natural forwardness of his temper How exceedingly zealous was he while in the Jews Religion of the Traditions of his Fathers how earnest to vindicate and assert the Divinity of the Mosaick dispensation and to persecute all of a contrary way even to rage and madness And when afterwards turned into a right 〈◊〉 it ran with as swift a current carrying him out against all opposition to ruine the kingdom and the powers of darkness to beat down idolatry and to plant the World with right apprehensions of God and the true notions of Religion When at Athens he saw them so much overgrown with the grossest superstition and idolatry giving the honour that was alone due to God to Statues and Images his zeal began to ferment and to boil up into 〈◊〉 of indignation and he could not but let them know the resentments of his mind and how much herein they dishonoured God the great Parent and Maker of the World 6. THIS zeal must needs put him upon a mighty diligence and industry in the execution of his office warning reproving intreating perswading preaching in season and out of season by night and by day by Sea and Land no pains too much to be taken no dangers too great to be overcome For five and thirty years after his Conversion he 〈◊〉 staid long in one place from Jerusalem through Arabia 〈◊〉 Greece round about to Illyricum to Rome and even to the utmost bounds of the Western-world fully preaching the Gospel of Christ Running says S. Hierom from Ocean to Ocean like the Sun in the Heavens of which 't is said His going forth is from the end of the Heaven and his circuit unto the ends of it sooner wanting ground to tread on than a desire to propagate the Faith of Christ.
34. Behold I send unto you prophets and wisemen and scribes some of them ye shall kill and crucifie some of them shall ye scurge in your synagogues and persecute them from Cyty to City The Sacred History sparing in the Acts of the succeeding Apostles and why S. Andrew's Birth-place Kindred and way of Life John the Baptist's Ministry and Discipline S. Andrew educated under his Institution His coming to Christ and 〈◊〉 to be a Disciple His Election to the Apostolate The Province assigned for his Ministry In what places he chiesly preached His barbarous usage at Sinope His planting Christianity at Byzantium and ordaining Stachys Bishop there His travails in Greece and preaching at Patrae in Achaia His arraignment before the Proconsul and resolute defence of the Christian Religion The Proconsul's displeasure against him whence An account of his Martyrdom His preparatory sufferings and crucifixion On what kind of Cross he suffered The Miracles reported to be done by his Body It s translation to Constantinople The great Encomium given of him by one of the Ancients 1. THE Sacred Story which has hitherto been very large and copious in describing the Acts of the two first Apostles is henceforward very sparing in its accounts giving us only now and then a few oblique and accidental remarques concerning the rest and some of them no further mentioned than the meer recording of their Names For what reasons it pleased the Divine wisdom and providence that no more of their Acts should be consigned to Writing by the Pen-men of the Holy story is to us unknown Probably it might be thought convenient that no more account should be given of the first plantations of Christianity in the World than what concerned Judaea and the Neighbour-countries at least the most eminent places of the Roman Empire that so the truth of the Prophetical Predictions might appear which had foretold that the Law of the Messiah should come forth from Sion and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem Besides that a particular relation of the Acts of so many 〈◊〉 done in so many several Countries might have swell'd the Holy Volumes into too great a bulk and rendred them less serviceable and accommodate to the ordinary use of Christians Among the Apostles that succeed we first take notice of S. Andrew He was born at Bethsaida a City of Galilee standing upon the banks of the Lake of Gennesareth Son to John or Jonas a Fisherman of that Town Brother he was to Simon Peter but whether Elder or Younger the Ancients do not clearly decide though the major part intimate him to have been the younger Brother there being only the single authorlty of Epiphanius on the other side as we have formerly noted He was brought up to his Father's Trade whereat he laboured till our Lord called him from catching Fish to be a Fisher of men for which he was fitted by some preparatory Institutions even before his coming unto Christ. 2. JOHN the Baptist was lately risen in the Jewish Church a Person whom for the efficacy and impartiality of his Doctrine and the extraordinary strictness and austerities of his Life the Jews generally had in great veneration He trained up his Proselytes under the Discipline of Repentance and by urging upon them a severe change and reformation of life prepared them to entertain the Doctrine of the Messiah whose approach he told them was now near at hand representing to them the greatness of his Person and the importance of the design that he was come upon Besides the multitudes that promiscuously flock'd to the Baptists discourses he had according to the manner of the Jewish Masters some peculiar and select Disciples who more constantly attended upon his Lectures and for the most part waited upon his Person In the number of these was our Apostle who was then with him about Jordan when our Saviour who some time since had been baptized came that way upon whose approach the Baptist told them that this was the 〈◊〉 the great Person whom he had so 〈◊〉 spoken of to usher in whose appearing his whole Ministry was but subservient that this was the Lamb of God the true Sacrifice that was to expiate the sins of Mankind Upon this testimony Andrew and another Disciple probably S. John follow our Saviour to the place of his abode Upon which account he is generally by the Fathers and ancient Writers stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the first called Disciple though in a strict sence he was not so for though he was the first of the Disciples that came to Christ yet was he not called till afterwards After some converse with him Andrew goes to acquaint his Brother Simon and both together came to Christ. Long they stayed not with him but returned to their own home and to the exercise of their calling wherein they were imployed when somewhat more than a Year after our Lord passing through Galilee found them 〈◊〉 upon the Sea of Tiberias where he fully satisfied them of the Greatness and Divinity of his Person by the convictive evidence of that miraculous draught of Fishes which they took at his command And now he told them he had other work for them to do that they should no longer deal in Fish but with Men whom they should catch with the efficacy and influence of that Doctrine that he was come to deliver to the World commanding them to follow him as his immediate Disciples and Attendants who accordingly left all and followed him Shortly after S. Andrew together with the rest was called to the Office and Honour of the Apostolate made choice of to be one of those that were to be Christ's immediate Vice-gerents for planting and propagating the Christian Church Little else is particularly recorded of him in the Sacred story being comprehended in the general account of the rest of the Apostles 3. AFTER our Lord's Ascension into Heaven and that the Holy 〈◊〉 had in its miraculous powers been plentifully shed upon the Apostles to fit them for the great errand they were to go upon to root out prophaneness and idolatry and to subdue the World to the Doctrine of the Gospel it is generally affirmed by the Ancients that the Apostles agreed among themselves by lot say some probably not without the special guidance and direction of the Holy Ghost what parts of the World they should severally take In this division S. Andrew had Scythia and the Neighbouring Countries primarily allotted him for his Province First then he travelled through Cappadocia Galatia and Bithynia and instructed them in the Faith of Christ pasling all along the Euxin Sea formerly called Axenus from the barbarous and inhospitable temper of the People thereabouts who were wont to sacrifice strangers and of their skulls to make Cups to drink in in their Feasts and Banquets and so into the solitudes of Scythia An ancient Author though whence deriving his intelligence I know not gives us a more particular
repentance Guilt is naturally troublesome and uneasie it disturbs the peace and serenity of the mind and fills the Soul with storms and thunder Did ever any harden himself against God and prosper And indeed how should he when God has such a powerful and invisible executioner in his own bosom Whoever rebels against the Laws of his duty and plainly affronts the dictates of his Conscience does that moment bid adieu to all true repose and quiet and expose himself to the severe resentments of a self-tormenting mind And though by secret arts of wickedness he may be able possibly to drown and stifle the voice of it for a while yet every little affliction or petty accident will be apt to awaken it into horror and to let in terror like an armed man upon him A torment infinitely beyond what the most ingenious Tyrants could ever contrive Nothing so effectually invades our ease as the reproaches of our own minds The wrath of man may be endured but the irruptions of Conscience are irresistible it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Chrysostom very elegantly stiles it to be choaked or strangled with an evil Conscience which oft reduces the man to such distresses as to make him chuse death rather than life A sad instance of all which we have in this unhappy man who being wearied with furious and melancholy reflexions upon what was past threw back the wages of iniquity in open Court and dispatched himself by a violent death Vainly hoping to take sanctuary in the Grave and that he should meet with that ease in another World which he could not find in this He departed and went and hanged himself and falling down burst asunder and his bowels gushed out Leaving a memorable warning to all treacherous and ingrateful to all greedy and covetous persons not to let the World insinuate it self too far into them and indeed to all to watch and pray that they enter not into temptation Our present state is slippery and insecure Let him that thinketh he 〈◊〉 take heed lest he fall What priviledges can be a sufficient fence a foundation firm enough to rely upon when the Miracles Sermons favours and familiar converses of Christ himself could not secure one of the Apostles from so fatal an Apostasie 3. A VACANCY being thus made in the Colledge of Apostles the first thing they did after their return from Mount Olivet where our Lord took his leave of them to S. John's house in Mount Sion the place if we may believe Nicephorus where the Church met together was to fill up their number with a fit proper person To which purpose Peter acqualnted them that Judas according to the prophetical prediction being fallen from his ministry it was necessary that another should be substituted in his room one that had been a constant companion and disciple of the holy Jesus and consequently capable of bearing witness to his life death and resurrection Two were propounded in order to the choice Joseph called Barsabas and Justus whom some make the same with Joses one of the brothers of our Lord and Matthias both duly qualified for the place The way of election was by Lots a way frequently used both among Jews and Gentiles for the determination of doubtful and difficult cases and especially the chusing Judges and Magistrates And this course the Apostles the rather took because the Holy Ghost was not yet given by whose immediate dictates and inspirations they were chiefly guided afterwards And that the business might proceed with the greater regularity and success they first solemnly make their address to Heaven that the Omniscient Being that governed the World and perfectly understood the tempers and dispositions of men would immediately guide and direct the choice and shew which of these two he would appoint to take that part of the Apostolick charge from which Judas was so lately fallen The Lots being put into the Urn Matthias his name was drawn out and thereby the Apostolate devolved upon him 4. NOT long after the promised powers of the Holy Ghost were conferred upon the Apostles to fit them for that great and difficult imployment upon which they were sent And among the rest S. Matthias betook himself to his Charge and Province The first-fruits of his Ministry he spent in 〈◊〉 where having reaped a considerable harvest he betook himself to other Provinces An Author I confess of no great credit in these matters tells us that he preached the Gospel in Macedonia where the Gentiles to make an experiment of his Faith and Integrity gave him a poisonous and intoxicating potion which he chearfully drunk off in the name of Christ without the least prejudice to himself and that when the same potion had deprived above two hundred and fifty of their sight he laying his hands upon them restored them to their sight with a great deal more of the same stamp which I have neither faith enough to believe nor leisure enough to relate The Greeks with more probability report him to have travelled Eastward he came says Nicephorus into the first says Sophronius into the second AEthiopia and in both I believe it is a mistake either of the Authors or Transcribers for Cappadocia his residence being principally near the irruption of the River Apsarus and the Haven Hyssus both places in Cappadocia Nor is there any AEthiopia nearer those places than that conterminous to Chaldaea whereof before And as for those that tell us that he might well enough preach both in the Asian and African AEthiopia and that both might be comprehended under that general name as the Eastern and Western parts of the World were heretofore contained under the general title of the India's it's a fancy without any other ground to stand on 〈◊〉 their own bare conjecture The place whither he came was very barbarous and his usage was accordingly For here meeting with a people of a fierce and intractable temper he was treated by them with great rudeness and inhumanity from whom after all his labours and sufferings and a numerous conversion of men to Christianity he obtained at last the crown of Martyrdom Ann. Chr. LXI or as others LXIV Little certainty can be retrieved concerning the manner of his death Dorotheus will have him to die at Sebastople and to be buried there near the Temple of the Sun An ancient Martyrologic reports him to have been seised by the Jews and as a blasphemer to have been first stoned and then beheaded But the Greek Offices seconded herein by several ancient Breviaries tell us that he was crucified and that as Judas was hanged upon a Tree so Matthias suffered upon a Cross. His Body is said to have been kept a long time at Jerusalem thence thought by Helen the Mother of the Great Constantine to have been translated to Rome where some parts of it are shewed with great veneration at this day Though others with as great eagerness and probably as much truth
the Apostle says He that is in Christ walks as he also walked But thus the actions of our life relate to him by way of Worship and Religion but the use is admirable and effectual when our actions refer to him as to our Copy and we transcribe the Original to the life He that considers with what affections and lancinations of spirit with what effusions of love Jesus prayed what fervors and assiduity what innocency of wish what modesty of posture what subordination to his Father and conformity to the Divine Pleasure were in all his Devotions is taught and excited to holy and religious Prayer The rare sweetness of his deportment in all Temptations and violences of his Passion his Charity to his enemies his sharp Reprehensions to the Scribes and Pharisees his Ingenuity toward all men are living and effectual Sermons to teach us Patience and Humility and Zeal and candid Simplicity and Justice in all our actions I add no more instances because all the following Discourses will be prosecutions of this intendment And the Life of Jesus is not described to be like a Picture in a chamber of Pleasure only for beauty and entertainment of the eye but like the Egyptian Hieroglyphicks whose every feature is a Precept and the Images converse with men by sense and signification of excellent 〈◊〉 16. It was not without great reason advised that every man should propound the example of a wise and vertuous personage as Cato or Socrates or Brutus and by a fiction of imagination to suppose him present as a witness and really to take his life as the direction of all our actions The best and most excellent of the old Law-givers and Philosophers among the Greeks had an allay of Viciousness and could not be exemplary all over Some were noted for Flatterers as Plato and Aristippus some for Incontinency as Aristotle Epicurus Zeno Theognis Plato and Aristippus again and Socrates whom their Oracle affirmed to be the wisest and most perfect man yet was by Porphyry noted for extreme intemperance of Anger both in words and actions And those Romans who were offered to them for Examples although they were great in reputation yet they had also great Vices Brutus dipt his hand in the bloud of Caesar his Prince and his Father by love endearments and adoption and Cato was but a wise man all day at night he was used to drink too liberally and both he and Socrates did give their Wives unto their friends the Philosopher and the Censor were procurers of their Wives Unchastity and yet these were the best among the Gentiles But how happy and richly furnished are Christians with precedents of Saints whose Faith and Revelations have been productive of more spiritual Graces and greater degrees of moral perfections And this I call the priviledge of a very great assistance that I might advance the reputation and account of the Life of the Glorious Jesu which is not abated by the imperfections of humane Nature as they were but receives great heightnings and perfection from the Divinity of his Person of which they were never capable 17. Let us therefore press after Jesus as 〈◊〉 did after his Master with an inseparable prosecution even whithersoever he goes that according to the reasonableness and proportion expressed in S. Paul's advice As we have born the image of the earthly we may also bear the image of the heavenly For in vain are we called Christians if we live not according to the example and discipline of Christ the Father of the Institution When S. Laurence was in the midst of the torments of the Grid-iron he made this to be the matter of his joy and Eucharist that he was admitted to the Gates through which Jesus had entred and therefore thrice happy are they who walk in his Courts all their days And it is yet a nearer union and vicinity to imprint his Life in our Souls and express it in our exterior converse and this is done by him only who as S. Prosper describes the duty despises all those gilded vanities which he despised that fears none of those sadnesses which he suffered that practises or also teaches those Doctrines which he taught and hopes for the accomplishment of all his Promises And this is truest Religion and the most solemn Adoration The PRAYER OEternal Holy and most glorious Jesu who hast united two Natures of distance infinite descending to the lownesses of Humane nature that thou mightest exalt Humane nature to a participation of the Divinity we thy people that sate in darkness and in the shadows of death have seen great light to entertain our Understandings and enlighten our Souls with its excellent influences for the excellency of thy Sanctity shining gloriously in every part of thy Life is like thy Angel the Pillar of Fire which called thy children from the darknesses of Egypt Lord open mine eyes and give me power to behold thy righteous Glories and let my Soul be so entertained with affections and holy ardours that I may never look back upon the flames of 〈◊〉 but may follow thy Light which recreates and enlightens and guides us to the mountains of Safety and Sanctuaries of Holiness Holy Jesu since thy 〈◊〉 is imprinted on our Nature by Creation let me also express thy Image by all the parts of a holy life 〈◊〉 my Will and Affections to thy holy Precepts submitting my Understanding to thy Dictates and Lessons of perfection imitating thy sweetnesses and Excellencies of Society thy Devotion in Prayer thy Conformity to God thy Zeal tempered with Meekness thy Patience heightned with Charity that Heart and Hands and Eyes and all my Faculties may grow up with the increase of God till I come to the full measure of the 〈◊〉 of Christ even to be a perfect man in Christ Jesus that at last in thy light I may see light and reap the fruits of Glory from the seeds of Sanctity in the 〈◊〉 of thy holy Life O Blessed and Holy Saviour Jesus Amen THE HISTORY OF THE Life and Death OF THE HOLY JESUS BEGINNING At the Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin MARY until his Baptism and Temptation inclusively WITH CONSIDERATIONS and DISCOURSES upon the several parts of the Story And PRAYERS fitted to the several MYSTERIES THE FIRST PART Qui sequitur me non ambulat in Tenebris LONDON Printed by R. Norton for R. Royston 1675. THE LIFE Of our Blessed Lord and Saviour JESUS CHRIST The Evangelical Prophet Behold a Virgin shall conceive beare a son and shall call his name Immanuel Isa 7 14. Mat 1 22 23 The Annunciation S. LUKE 1. 28 Haile thou that art highly favoured the Lord is with thee Blessed art thou among women SECT I. The History of the Conception of JESVS 1. WHen the fulness of time was come after the frequent repetition of Promises the expectation of the Jewish Nation the longings and tedious waitings of all holy persons the departure of the
spirit when Rebellion and Pride when secular Interest or ease and Licenciousness set men up against the Laws the Laws then are upon the defensive and ought not to give place It is ill to cure particular Disobedience by removing a Constitution decreed by publick wisdom for a general good When the evil occasioned by the Law is greater than the good designed or than the good which will come by it in the present constitution of things and the evil can by no other remedy be healed it concerns the Law-giver's charity to take off such positive Constitutions which in the authority are merely humane and in the matter indifferent and evil in the event The summ of this whole duty I shall chuse to represent in the words of an excellent person S. Jerome We must for the avoiding of Scandal quit everything which may be omitted without prejudice to the threefold truth of Life of Justice and Doctrine meaning that what is not expresly commanded by God or our Superiours or what is not expresly commended as an act of Piety and Perfection or what is not an obligation of Justice that is in which the interest of a third person or else our own Christian liberty is not totally concerned all that is to be given in sacrifice to Mercy and to be made matter of Edification and Charity but not of Scandal that is of danger and sin and falling to our neighbour The PRAYER O Eternal Jesus who art made unto us Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification and Redemption give us of thy abundant Charity that we may love the eternal benefit of our 〈◊〉 Soul with a true diligent and affectionate care and tenderness Give us a fellow-feeling of one another's calamities a readiness to bear each others burthens aptness to forbear wisdom to advise counsel to direct and a spirit of meekness and modesty trembling at our 〈◊〉 fearful in our Brother's dangers and joyful in his restitution and securities Lord let all our actions be pious and prudent our selves wise as Serpents and innocent as Doves and our whole life exemplar and just and charitable that we may like Lamps shining in thy Temple serve thee and enlighten others and guide them to thy Sanctuary and that shining clearly and burning zealously when the Bridegroom shall come to bind up his Jewels and beautifie his Spouse and gather his Saints together we and all thy Christian people knit in a holy fellowship may enter into the joy of our Lord and partake of the eternal refreshments of the Kingdom of Light and Glory where thou O Holy and Eternal Jesu livest and reignest in the excellencies of a Kingdom and the infinite durations of Eternity Amen DISCOURSE XVIII Of the Causes and Manner of the Divine Judgments 1. GOD's Judgments are like the Writing upon the wall which was a missive of anger from God upon Belshazzar it came upon an errand of Revenge and yet was writ in so dark characters that none could read it but a Prophet When-ever God speaks from Heaven he would have us to understand his meaning and if he declares not his sence in particular signification yet we understand his meaning well enough if every voice of God lead us to Repentance Every sad accident is directed against sin either to prevent it or to cure it to glorifie God or to humble us to make us go forth of our selves and to rest upon the centre of all Felicities that we may derive help from the same hand that smote us Sin and Punishment are so near relatives that when God hath marked any person with a sadness or unhandsome accident men think it warrant enough for their uncharitable censures and condemn the man whom God hath smitten making God the executioner of our uncertain or ungentle sentences Whether sinned this man or his parents that 〈◊〉 was born blind said the Pharisees to our blessed LORD Neither this man nor his parents was the answer meaning that God had other ends in that accident to serve and it was not an effect of wrath but a design of mercy both directly and collaterally God's glory must be seen clearly by occasion of the curing the blind man But in the present case the answer was something different Pilate slew the Galileans when they were sacrificing in their Conventicles apart from the Jews For they first had separated from Obedience and paying Tribute to Caesar and then from the Church who disavowed their mutinous and discontented Doctrines The cause of the one and the other are linked in mutual complications and endearment and he who despises the one will quickly disobey the other Presently upon the report of this sad accident the people run to the Judgment-seat and every man was ready to be accuser and witness and judge upon these poor destroyed people But Jesus allays their heat and though he would by no means acquit these persons from deserving death for their denying tribute to Caesar yet he alters the face of the tribunal and makes those persons who were so apt to be accusers and judges to act another part even of guilty persons too that since they will needs be judging they might judge themselves for Think not these were greater sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered such things I tell you nay but except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish meaning that although there was great probability to believe such persons 〈◊〉 I mean and Rebels to be the greatest sinners of the world yet themselves who had designs to destroy the Son of God had deserved as great damnation And yet it is observable that the Holy Jesus only compared the sins of them that suffered with the estate of the other Galileans who suffered not and that also applies it to the persons present who told the news to consign this Truth unto us That when persons consederate in the same crimes are spared from a present Judgment falling upon others of their own society it is indeed a strong alarm to all to secure themselves by Repentance against the hostilities and eruptions of sin but yet it is no exemption or security to them that escape to believe themselves persons less sinful for God sometimes decimates or tithes delinquent persons and they die for a common crime according as God hath cast their lot in the decrees of Predestination and either they that remain are sealed up to a worse calamity or left within the reserves and mercies of Repentance for in this there is some variety of determination and undiscerned Providence 2. The purpose of our Blessed Saviour is of great use to us in all the traverses and changes and especially the sad and calamitous accidents of the world But in the misfortune of others we are to make other discourses concerning Divine Judgments than when the case is of nearer concernment to our selves For first when we see a person come to an unfortunate and untimely death we must not conclude such a man perishing
and miserable to all eternity It was a sad calamity that fell upon the Man of Judah that returned to eat bread into the Prophet's house contrary to the word of the Lord He was abused into the act by a Prophet and a pretence of a command from God and whether he did violence to his own understanding and believed the man because he was willing or did it in sincerity or in what degree of sin or excuse the action might consist no man there knew and yet a Lion slew him and the lying Prophet that abused him escaped and went to his grave in peace Some persons joyned in society or interest with criminals have perished in the same Judgments and yet it would be hard to call them equally guilty who in the accident were equally miserable and involved And they who are not strangers in the affairs of the world cannot but have heard or seen some persons who have lived well and moderately though not like the 〈◊〉 of the Holocaust yet like the ashes of Incense sending up good perfumes and keeping a constant and slow fire of Piety and Justice yet have been surprised in the midst of some unusual unaccustomed irregularity and died in that sin A sudden gayety of fortune a great joy a violent change a friend is come or a marriage-day hath transported some persons to indiscretions and too bold a licence and the indiscretion hath betrayed them to idle company and the company to drink and drink to a fall and that hath hurri'd them to their grave And it were a sad sentence to think God would not repute the untimely death for a punishment great enough to that deflexion from duty and judge the man according to the constant tenor of his former life unless such an act was of malice great enough to outweigh the former habits and interrupt the whole state of acceptation and grace Something like this was the case of 〈◊〉 who espying the tottering Ark went to support it with an unhallowed hand God smote him and he died immediately It were too severe to say his zeal and indiscretion carried him beyond a temporal death to the ruines of Eternity Origen and many others have made themselves Eunuchs for the Kingdome of Heaven and did well after it but those that did so and died of the wound were smitten of God and died in their folly and yet it is rather to be called a sad consequence of their indiscretion than the express of a final anger from God Almighty For as God takes off our sins and punishments by parts remitting to some persons the sentence of death and inflicting the fine of a temporal loss or the gentle scourge of a lesser sickness so also he lays it on by parts and according to the proper proportions of the man and of the crime and every transgression and lesser deviation from our duty does not drag the Soul to death eternal but God suffers our Repentance though imperfect to have an imperfect effect knocking off the fetters by degrees and leading us in some cases to a Council in some to Judgment and in some to Hell-fire but it is not always certain that he who is led to the prison-doors shall there lie entombed and a Man may by a Judgment be brought to the gates of Hell and yet those gates shall not prevail against him This discourse concerns persons whose life is habitually fair and just but are surprised in some unhandsome but less criminal action and 〈◊〉 or suffer some great Calamity as the instrument of its expiation or amendment 3. Secondly But if the person upon whom the Judgment falls be habitually vicious or the crime of a clamorous nature or deeper tincture if the man sin a sin unto death and either meets it or some other remarkable calamity not so feared as death provided we pass no farther than the sentence we see then executed it is not against Charity or prudence to say this calamity in its own formality and by the intention of God is a Punishment and Judgment In the favourable cases of honest and just persons our sentence and opinions ought also to be favourable and in such questions to encline ever to the side of charitable construction and read other ends of God in the accidents of our neighbour than Revenge or express Wrath. But when the impiety of a person is scandalous and notorious when it is clamorous and violent when it is habitual and yet corrigible if we find a sadness and calamity dwelling with such a sinner especially if tho punishment be spiritual we read the sentence of God written with his own hand and it is not 〈◊〉 of opinion or a pressing into the secrets of Providence to say the same thing which God hath published to all the world in the 〈◊〉 of his Spirit In such cases we are to observe the severity of God on them that fall severity and to use those Judgments as instruments of the fear of God arguments to hate sin which we could not well do but that we must look on them as verifications of God's threatning against great and impenitent sinners But then if we descend to particulars we may easily be deceived 4. For some men are diligent to observe the accidents and chances of Providence upon those especially who differ from them in Opinion and whatever ends God can have or whatever sins man can have yet we lay that in fault which we therefore hate because it is most against our interest the contrary Opinion is our enemy and we also think God hates it But such fancies do seldom serve either the ends of Truth or Charity Pierre Calceon died under the Barber's hand there wanted not some who said it was a Judgement upon him for condemning to the fire the famous Pucelle of France who prophesied the expulsion of the English out of the Kingdom They that thought this believed her to be a Prophetess but others that thought her a Witch were willing to 〈◊〉 out another conjecture for the sudden death of the Gentleman Garnier Earl of Gretz kept the Patriarch of Jerusalem from his right in David's Tower and the City and died within three days and by Dabert the Patriarch it was called a Judgment upon him for his Sacrilege But the uncertainty of that censure appeared to them who considered that Baldwin who gave commission to Garnier to withstand the Patriarch did not die but Godsrey of 〈◊〉 did die immediately after he had passed the right of the Patriarch and yet when Baldwin was beaten at Rhamula some bold People pronounced that then God punished him upon the Patriarch's score and thought his Sacrilege to be the secret cause of his overthrow and yet his own Pride and Rashness was the more visible and the Judgment was but a cloud and passed away quickly into a succeeding Victory But I instance in a trisle Certain it is that God removed the Candlestick from the Levantine Churches because he had