know any thing The soul say they of men so purified understands no longer per phantasmata rerum corporalium not by having any thing presented by the fantasie to the senses and so to the understanding but altogether by a familiar conversation with God and an immediate revelation from God whereas Christ himself contented himself with the ordinary way He was hungry Mat. 21.20 and a fig-tree presented it self to him upon the way and he went to it to eat This is that Pureness in the Romane Church by which the founder of the last Order amongst them Philip Nerius had not onely utterly emptied his heart of the world but had fill'd it too full of God for Congrega Orator so say they he was fain to cry sometimes Recede ame Domine O Lord go farther from me and let me have a less portion of thee But who would be loath to sink by being over-fraited with God or loath to over-set by having so much of that winde the breath of the Spirit of God Privation of the presence of God is Hell a diminution of it is a step toward it Fruition of his presence is Heaven and shall any Man be afraid of having too much Heaven too much God There are many among them that are over laden oppressed with Bishropricks and Abbeys and yet they can bear it and never cry Retrahe domine domine Resume O Lord withdraw from me Resume to thy self some of these superabundancies and shall we think any of them to be so over-fraited and surcharg'd with the presence and with the grace of God as to be put to his Recede domine O Lord withdraw thy self and lessen thy grace towards me This Pureness is not in their heart but in their fantasie We read in the Ecclesiastick story of such a kinde of affectation of singularity very early in the primitive Church Catharsitae We finde two sorts of false Puritans then The Catharists and The Cathari The Catharists thought no creatures of God pure and therefore they brought in strange ceremonial purifications of those Creatures In which error they of the Romane Church succeed them in a great part in their Exorcismes and Consecrations Particularly in the greatest matter of all in the Sacraments For the Catharists in the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of our Saviour thought not the bread pure except it were purified by the aspersion of something issuing from the body of man not fit to be nam'd here And so in the Romane Church they induc'd a use of another Excrement in the other Sacrament They must have spittle in the Sacrament of Baptisme For in those words of Tertullian Tertul. In Baptismo Daemones respuimus In Baptism we Renounce the Devil they will admit no other interpretation of the Respuimus but that Respuere is sputo detestari Durantius de citib l. 1.19 n. 30. That we can drive the Devil away no way but by spitting at him Their predecessors in this the Catharists thought no Creatures pure and therefore purified them by abhominable and detestable ways The second sort of primitive Puritans the Cathari Cathari They thought no men pure but themselves and themselves they thought so pure as to have no sin and that therefore they might and so did leave out as an impertinent clause in the Lords prayer that petition Dimitte nobis debita nostra for they thought they ought God nothing In natural things Monsters have no propagation A Monster does not beget a Monster In spiritual excesses it is otherwise for for this second kinde of Puritans that attribute all purity to themselves and spend all their thoughts upon considering others that weed hath grown so far that whereas those Puritans of the Primitive Church did but refuse to say Dimitte nobis Forgive us our trespasses because they had no sin the Puritan Papist is come to say Recede a nobis O Lord stand farther off for I have too much of thee And whereas the Puritan of the primitive Church did but refuse one Petition of the Lords prayer the later puritan amongst our selves hath refused the whole Prayer Towards both these sorts of false puritans Catharists and Cathari derived down to our time we acknowledge those words of the Apostle to belong 2 Tim. 4.2 Reprove Rebuke Exhort that is leave no such means untryed as may work upon their Understandings and remove their just scruples Preach write confer But when that labor hath been bestow'd and they fear up their Understanding against it so that the fault lies not then in the darkness of their Understanding but meerly in the perversness of the will over which faculty other men have no power towards both these sorts we acknowledge those other words of the Apostle to belong too Gal. 5.12 Utinam abscindantur Would to God they were even cut off that disquiet you Cut off that is removed from means by which and from places in which they might disquiet you These two kinds of false Puritans we finde in the Primitive Church And Satan who lasts still makes them last still too But if we shall imagine a third sort of Puritans and make men afraid of the zeal of the glory of God make men hard and insensible of those wounds that are inflicted upon Christ Jesus in blasphemous oaths and execrations make men ashamed to put a difference between the Sabbath and an ordinary day and so at last make sin an indifferent matter If any man list to be contentious we have no such custome 1 Cor. 11.16 neither the Chuch of God The Church of God encourages them and assists them in that sanctity that purity with all those means wherewith Christ Jesus hath trusted her for the advancement of that purity and professes that she prefers in her recommendations to God in her prayers one Christian truly fervent and zealous before millions of Lukewarme Onely she says in the voice of Christ Jesus her head Wo be unto you Mat. 23 25. if you make clean the outside of cups and platters but leave them full of extortion and excess within Christ calls them to whom he says that blinde Pharisees if they have done so If they think to blinde others Christ calls them blinde But if their purity consist in studying practising the most available means to sanctification and in obedience to lawful authority established according to Gods Ordinance and in acquiescence in fundamental doctrines believed in the ancient Church to be necessary to salvation If they love the peace of conscience and the peace of Sion as Balaam said Let me dye the death of the righteous and let my last end he like his So I say let me live the life of a Puritan Num. 23.10 let the zeal of the house of God consume me let a holy life and an humble obedience to the Law testifie my reverence to God in his Church and in his Magistrate For this is Saint Pauls Puritan To have a pure heart
only in the earth nature and naturall reason do not produce grace but yet grace can take root in no other thing but in the nature and reason of man whether we consider Gods subsequent graces which grow out of his first grace formerly given to us and well employed by us or his first grace which works upon our natural faculties and grows there still this salvation that is this grace is near us for it is within us then the third term believing is either quando credidistis primum when you began to believe either in an imputative belief of others in your baptism or a faint belief upon your first Catechisings and Instrustions or quando credidistis tantum when you only professed a belief or faith and did nothing in declaration of that faith to the edification of others Salus First then salvation in this second sense is the internal operation of the holy Ghost in infusing grace for therefore doth St. Basil call the holy Ghost verbum Dei the word of God which is the name properly peculiar to the Son quia interpres filii sicut filius patris that as the Father had revealed his will in the Prophets and then the Son comes and interprets all that actually this prophecy is meant of my coming this of my dying and so makes a real comment and an actual interpretation of all the prophecies for he does come and he does die accordingly so the holy Ghost comes and comments upon this comment interprets this interpretation and tels thy soul that all this that the Father had promised and the Son had performed was intended by them and by the working of their spirit is now appropriated to thy particular soul In the constitution and making of a natural man the body is not the man nor the soul is not the man but the union of these two makes up the man the spirits in a man which are the thin and active part of the blood and so are of a kind of middle nature between soul and body those spirits are able to doe and they doe the office to unite and apply the faculties of the soul to the organs of the body and so there is a man so in a regenerate man a Christian man his being born of Christian Parents that gives him a body that makes him of the body of the Covenant it gives him a title an interest in the Covenant which is jus ad rem thereby he may make his claim to the seal of the Covenant to baptism and it cannot be denied him and then in his baptism that Sacrament gives him a soul a spiritual seal jus in re an actual possession of Grace but yet as there are spirits in us which unite body and soul so there must be subsequent acts and works of the blessed spirit that must unite and confirm all and make up this spiritual man in the wayes of sanctification for without that his body that is his being born within the Covenant and his soul that is his having received Grace in baptism do not make him up This Grace is this Salvation and when this Grace works powerfully in thee in the wayes of sanctification then is this Salvation neer thee which is our second term in this second acceptation propè neer This neerness which is the effectuall working of Grace Prope Heb. 4.12 the Apostle expresses fully That it pierceth to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit for though properly the soul and spirit of a man be all one yet divers faculties and operations give them somtimes divers names in the Scriptures Anima quia animat sayes St. Ambrose and spiritus quia spirat The quickning of the body is the soul but the quickning of the soul is the spirit If this Salvation be brought to this neerness that is this grace to this powerfulness thou shalt find it in anima in thy soul in those organs wherein thy soul uses thy body in thy senses and in the sensible things ordain'd by God in his Church Sacraments and Ceremonies and thou shalt find it neerer in spiritu as the spirit of God hath seal'd it to thy spirit invisibly inexpressibly It shall be neer to thee so as that thy reason shall apprehend it and neerer then that thy faith shall establish it and neerer then all this it shall create in thee a modest and sober but yet an infallible assurance that thy salvation shall never depart from thee Magnificabit anima tua Dominum as the B. Virgin speaks Thy soul shall magnifie the Lord all thy natural faculties shall be employed upon an assent to the Gospel thou shalt be able to prove it to thy self and to prove it to others to be the Gospel of Salvation And then Exultabit spiritus Thy spirit shall rejoyce in God thy Saviour because by the farther seal of sanctification thy spirit shall receive testimony from the spirit that as Christ is Idem homo cum te the same man that thou art so thou art Idem spiritus cum Domino the same spirit that he is so far as that as a spirit cannot be separated in it self so neither canst thou be separated from God in Christ And this this exaltation of Grace when it thus growes up to this height of sanctification is that neerness which brings Salvation farther than our believing does and that 's the last term in this part Believing Credidistis Now neerer then Believing neerer than Faith a man might well think nothing can bring Salvation for Faith is the hand that reaches it and takes hold of it But yet as though our bodily hand reach to our temporal food yet the mouth and the stomach must do their office too and so that meat must be distributed into all parts of the body and assimilated to them so though our faith draw this salvation neer us yet when our mouth is imployed that we have a delight to glorifie God in our discourses and to declare his wonderfull works to the sons of men in our thankfulness And when this faith of ours is distributed over all the body that the body of Christs Church is edified and alienated by our good life and sanctification then is this Salvation neerer us that is safelier seal'd to us then when we believed only Either then this quando credidistis when you believed may be refer'd to Infants or to the first faith and the first degrees thereof in men In Infants when that seminall faith or potentiall faith which is by some conceived to be in the Infants of Christian parents at their baptism or that actuall faith which from their parents or from the Church is thought to be applyed to them accepted in their behalf in that Sacrament when this faith growes up after by this new comming of Christ in the power of his Grace and his Spirit to be a lively faith expressed in charity then Salus proprior then is Salvation neerer than when they believed whether this belief were their
may make a Prayer a Libel if upon colour of preaching or praying against toleration of Religion or persecution for Religion he would insinuate that any such tolerations are prepared for us or such persecutions threatned against us But if for speaking the mysteries of your salvation plainly sincerely inelegantly inartificially for the Gold and not for the Fashion for the Matter and not for the Form Nanciscor populi gratiam my service may be acceptable to Gods people and available to their Edification Nonne Dei donum shall not I call this a great Blessing of God Beloved in him I must I do And therefore because I presume I speak to such I take to my self that which follows there in the same Father that he that speaks to such a people does not his duty if he consider not deliberately Quibus Quando Quantum loquatur both to whom and at what time and how much he is to speak I consider the persons and I consider that the greatest part by much are persons born since the Reformation of Religion since the death of Idolatry in this Land and therefore not naturaliz'd by Conversion by Transplantation from another Religion to this but born the natural children of this Church and therefore to such persons I need not lay hold upon any points of controverted Doctrine I consider also Quando the time and I consider that it is now in these days of Easter when the greatest part of this Auditory have or will renew their Hands to Christ Jesus in the Sacrament of his Body and his Blood that they will rather loose theirs then lack his and therefore towards persons who have testified that disposition in that seal I need not depart into any vehement or passionate Exhortations to constancy and perseverance as though there were occasion to doubt it And I consider lastly Quantum how much is necessary to be spoken to such a people so disposed and therefore farther then the custom and solemnity of this day and place lays an Obligation upon me I will not extend my self to an unnecessary length especially because that which shall be said by me and by my Brethren which come after and were worthy to come before me in this place is to be said to you again by another who alone takes as much pains as all we and all you too Hears all with as much patience as all you and is to speak of all with as much and more labour then all we Much therefore for your ease somewhat for his a little for mine own with such succinctness and brevity as may consist with clearness and perspicuity in such manner and method as may best enlighten your understandings and least encumber your memories I shall open unto you that light which God commanded out of darkness and that light by which he hath shin'd in our hearts and this light by which we shall have the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ Jesus Divisio Our parts therefore in these words must necessarily be three three Lights The first shows us our Creation the second our Vocation the third our Glorification In the first We who were but but what but nothing were made Creatures In the second we who were but Gentiles were made Christians In the third we who were but men shall be made saints In the first God took us when there was no world In the second God sustains us in an ill world In the third God shall crown us in a glorious and joyful world In the first God made us in the second God mends us in the third God shall perfect us First God commanded light out of darkness that man might see the Creature then he shin'd in our hearts that man might see himself at last he shall shine so in the face of Christ Jesus that man may see God and live and live as long as that God of light and life shall live himself Every one of these Parts will have divers Branches and it is time to enter into them In the first the Creation because this Text does not purposely and primarily deliver the Doctrine of the Creation not prove it not press it not enforce it but rather suppose it and then propose it by way of Example and Comparison for when the Apostles says God who commanded light out of darkness hath shin'd in our hearts he intimates therein these two Propositions first that the same God that does the one does the other too God perfects his works and then this Proposition also As God hath done the one he hath done the other God himself works by Patterns by Examples These two Propositions shall therefore be our two first Branches in this first Part. First Idem Deus the same God goes through his works and therefore let us never fear that God will be weary and then Sicut Deus as God hath done he will do again he works by pattern and so must we and then from these two we shall descend to our third Proposition Quid Deus what God is said to have done here and it is that he commanded light out of darkness In these three we shall determine this Part and for the Branches of the other two Parts our Vocation and our Glorification it will be a less burden to your memories to open them then when we come to handle the Parts themselves then altogether now Now we shall proceed in the Branches of the first Part. Part 1. Memb. 1. Idem Deus In this our first Consideration is Idem Deus the same our God goes through all Those divers Hereticks who thought there were two Gods for Cordon thought so and Marcion thought so too the Gnostiques thought so and the Maniches thought so too though they differ'd in their mistakings for errour is always manifold and multiform yet all their errours were upon this ground this root They could nor comprehend that the same God should be the God of Justice and the God of Mercy too a God that had an earnestness to punish sin and an easiness to pardon sin too Cordon who was first though he made two Gods yet he used them both reasonable well for with him Alter Bonus Alter Justus Iren. 1.28.29 one of his Gods is perfectly good merciful and the other though he be not so very good yet he is just Marcion who came after says worse because he could not discern the good purposes of God in inflicting Judgements nor the good use which good men make of his Corrections but thought all acts of his Justice to be calamitous and intolerable and naturally evil therefore with him Alter Bonus Alter Malus he that is the merciful God is his good God and he that is so just but just is an ill God Hence they came to call the God of the New Testament a good God because there was Copiosa Redemptio plentiful Redemption in the Gospel and the God of the Old Testament Malum Deum an ill God
names but yet the name that he chose is Vox clamantis The voyce of him that cryes in the wilderness What names and titles soever we receive in the School or in the Church or in the State if we lose our voice we lose our proper name our Christian name But then John Baptists name is not A voyce Any voyce but The voyce in the Prophesie of Esay in all the four Evangelists constantly The voyce Christ is verbum The word not A word but The word the Minister is Vox voyce not A voyce but The voyce the voyce of that word and no other and so he is a pleasing voyce because he pleases him that sent him in a faithfull executing of his Commission and speaking according to his dictate and pleasing to them to whom he is sent by bringing the Gospel of Peace and Reparation to all wounded and scattered and contrite Spirits Instrumentum They shall be Musick both wayes in matter and in manner and pleasing both wayes to God and to men but yet to none of these except the Musick be perfect except it be to an Instrument that is as we said at first out of S. Basil and S. Augustine except the Doctrine be express'd in the life too Who will believe me when I speak if by my life they see I do not believe my self how shall I be believed to speak heartily against Ambition and Bribery in temporall and civil places if one in the Congregation be able to jogge him that sits next him and tell him That man offered me money for spirituall preferment To what a dangerous scorn shall I open my selfe and the service of God if I shall declaime against Usury and look him in the face that hath my money at use One such witness in the Congregation shall out-preach the Preacher and God shall use his tongue perchance his malice to make the service of that Preacher uneffectual Quam speciosi pedes Evangelicantium sayes S. Paul Rom. 10. and he sayes that out of Esay and out of Nahum too as though the Holy Ghost had delighted himself with that phrase in expressing it How beautifull are the feet of them that preach the Gospel Men look most to our feet to our wayes the power that makes men admire may lie in our tongues but the beauty that makes men love lies in our feet in our actions And so we have done with all the pieces that constitute our first part God in his promise to that Nation prophesied upon us that which he hath abundantly performed a Ministry that should first be Trumpets and then Musick Musick in fitting a reverent manner to religious matter and Musick in fitting an instrument to the voyce that is their Lives to their Doctrine Eris said God here to this Prophet All this thou shalt be and that leads us into our second part Now in this second part there is more for it is not onely Eris Part. II. Eris illis thou shalt be so in thy self and as thou art employed by me but Eris illis thou shalt be so unto them they shall receive thee for such acknowledge thee to be such God provides a great measure of ability in the Prophet and some measure of good inclination in the people Eris illis Tuba thou shalt be to them they shall feel thee to be a Trumpet they shall not say in their hearts There is no God they shall not say Tush the Lord sees us not or he is a blind or an indifferent God or the Lord is like one of us he loves peace and will be at quiet but they shall acknowledge that he is Dominus Exercituum the Lord of Hosts and that the Prophet is his Trumpet to raise them up to a spiritual battel Eris illis Tuba thou shalt be to them a Trumpet they shall not be secure in their sins and Eris illis carmen musicum by thy preaching they shall come to confess That God is a God of harmony and not of discord of order and not of confusion and that as he made so he governs all things in weight and number and measure that he hath a Succession and a Hierarchy in his Church that it is a household of the Faithfull and a Kingdome of Saints and therefore regularly governed and by order and that in this government no man can give himself Orders no man can baptize himselfe nor give himself the Body and Blood of Christ Jesus nor preach to himself nor absolve himself and therefore they shall come to thee whom they shall confess to be appointed by God to convey these graces unto them Eris illis carmen musicum from thee they shall accept that musick the orderly application of Gods mercies by visible and outward meanes in thy Ministry in the Church Eris illis vox suavis they shall confess thou preachest true Doctrine and appliest it powerfully to their consciences and Eris illis vox ad Citharam thou shalt be a voyce to an Instrument they shall acknowledge thy life to be agreeable to thy Doctrine they shall quarrel thee challenge thee in neither not in Doctrine not in Manners Such as God appoints thee to be Eris thou shalt be and Eris illis they shall respect thee as such and reward thee as such and they shall express that in that which followes Audient Audient they shall hear thy word The worldly man though it trouble him to hear thee though it put thorns and brambles into his conscience yet though it be but to beget an opinion of holiness in others Audiet he will hear thee The fashionall man that will do as he sees great men do if their devotion or their curiosity or their service and attendance draw him hither Audiet he will come with them and he will hear He that is disaffected in his heart to the Doctrine of our Church rather then incur penalties of Statutes and Canons Audiet he will come and hear yea there is more then that intended Audient they shall hear willingly and more then that too Audient they shall hear cheerfully desirously Here is none of that action which was in S. Stephens persecutors Act. 7.57 Continuerunt aures they withheld their eares they withdrew themselves from hearing they kept themselves out of distance here is no such Recusancy intended Psal 58. neither is there any of their actions Qui obturant aures as the Psalmist sayes the Serpent does who as the Fathers note often stops one ear with laying it close to the ground and the other with covering it with his tail here is none of their action Jer. 7.26 Prov. 28.9 Qui in durant nor qui declinant none that turneth away his ear for even his prayer shall be an abomination sayes Solomon his very being here is a sin here in our case in our Text is none of these indispositions but here is a ready a willing and in appearance a religious coming to hear Expectation Acceptation Acclamation
and he hath transgressed that The necessary precipitations into sudden executions to which States are forced in rebellious times we are faine to call by the name of Law Martial Law The Torrents and Inundations which invasive Armies pour upon Nations we are fain to call by the name of Law The Law of Armes No Judgement no Execution without the name the colour the pretence of Law for still men call for a Law for every Execution And shall not the Judge of all the earth doe right Shall God judge us condemn us execute us at the last day and not by a Law by something that we never saw never knew never notified never published and judge me by that and leave out the consideration of that Law which he bound me to keep 1 Cor. 1.20 I ask S. Pauls question Where is the disputer of the world Who will offer to dispute unnecessary things especially where Authority hath made it necessary to us to forbear such Disputations Blessed are the peace-makers that command and blessed are the peace-keepers that obey and accommodate themselves to peace in forbearing unnecessary and uncharitable controversies 1 Tim. 3.16 but without controversie great is the mystery of Godliness The Apostle invites us to search into no farther mysteries then such as may be without controversie the Mystery of Godlinesse is without controversie and godliness is to believe that God hath given us a Law and to live according to that Law This this godliness that is Knowledge and Obedience to the Law hath the promises of this life and the next too all referr'd to his Law for without this this godliness which is holiness no man shall see God All referr'd to a Law This is Christs Catechisme in S. John That we might know the onely true God 17.3 and Jesus Christ whom he sent A God commanding and a Christ reconciling us if we have transgressed that Commandment And this is the Holy Ghosts Catechisme in S. Paul Deus remunerator Heb. 11.6 That we believe God to be and to be a just rewarder of mans actions still all referr'd to an obedience or disobedience of a Law The Mystery of godliness is great that is great enough for our salvation and yet without controversie for though controversies have been moved about Gods first act there can be none of his last act though men have disputed of the object of Election yet of the subject of Execution there is no controversie No man can doubt but that when God delivers over any soule actually and by way of execution to eternall condemnation that he delivers over that soule to that eternal condemnation for breaking his Law In this we have no other adversary but the over-sad the despairing soule and it becomes us all to lend our hand to his succour and to pour in our Wine and our Oyle into his Wounds that lies weltring and surrounded in the blood of his own pale and exhausted soule That soule who though it can testifie to it self some endeavour in the wayes of holinesse yet upon some collateral doubts is still suspicious and jealous of God How often have we seen that a needlesse jealousie and suspition conceived without cause hath made a good body bad A needlesse jealousie and suspition of his purposes and intentions upon thee may make thy mercifull God angry too Nothing can alienate God more from thee then to think that any thing but sin can alienate him How wouldst thou have God mercifull to thee if thou wilt be unmercifull to God himself And Qui quid tyrannicum in Deo Basil He that conceives any tyrannical act in God is unjust to the God of Justice and unmercifull to the God of Mercy Therefore in the 17. of our Injunctions we are commanded to arm sad souls against Despaire by setting forth the Mercy and the Benefits and the Godliness of Almighty God as the word of the Injunction is the godliness of God for to leave God under a suspicion of dealing ill with any penitent soule were to impute ungodliness to God Therefore to that mistaking soule that discomposed that shiver'd and shrivel'd and ravel'd and ruin'd soule to that jealous and suspicious soule onely I say Let no man judge you Coloss 2.16 sayes the Apostle intruding into those things which he hath not seene Let no man make you afraid of secret purposes in God which they have not nor you have not seen for that by which you shall be judged is the Law that Law which was notified and published to you The Law alone were much too heavy if there were not a superabundant ease and alleviation in that hand that Christ Jesus reaches out to us Consider the weight and the ease and for pity to such distrustfull souls and for establishment of your owne stop your devotions a little upon this consideration There is Chyrographum a hand-writing of Ordinances against me 14. a Debt an Obligation contracted by our first Parents in their disobedience and falne upon me And even that be it but Originall sin is shrewd evidence there 's my first charge But Deletum est sayes the Apostle there that 's blotted that 's defaced that cannot be sued against me after Baptisme Nay Sublatum cruci affixum it is cancel'd it is nailed to the Crosse of Christ Jesus it is no more sin in its self it is but to me to condemnation it is not here 's my charge and my discharge for that 28.15 But yet there is a heavier evidence Pactum cum inferno as the Prophet Esay speaks I have made a covenant with death and with Hell I am at an agreement that is says S. Greg. Audacter Indesinenter peccamus diligendo amicitiam profitemur We sin constantly we sin continually and we sin confidently and we finde so much pleasure and profit in sin as that we have made a league and sworn a friendship with sin and we keep that perverse and irreligious promise over-religiously and the sins of our youth flow into other sins when age disables us for them But yet there is a Deletum est in this case too our covenant with death is disanull'd sayes that Prophet when we are made partakers of the death of Christ in the blessed Sacrament Mine actuall sins lose their act and mine habituall sins fall from me as a habit as a garment put off when I come to that there 's my charge and my discharge for that But yet there is worse evidence against me then either this Chyrographum the first hand-writing of Adams hand or then this pactum this contract of mine own hand actuall and habituall sin for of these one is wash'd out in water and the other in blood in the two Sacraments But then there is Lex in Membris sayes the Apostle Rom. 7.21 I finde a law that when I would do good evil is present with me Sin assisted by me is now become a tyrant over me and hath established a government
Prophets now he is really actually come venit he is come we look for no other after him we joyn no other Angels nor Saints with him venit he is actually come and then venit sponte he is come freely and of his good-will we assigne we imagine no cause in us that should invite him to come but humbly acknowledge all to have proceeded from his own goodness and that 's the Action He came And then the Errand and purpose for which he came is vocare he came to call It is not Occurrere That he came to meet them who were upon the way before for no man had either disposition in himself or faculty in himself neither will nor power to rise and meet him no nor so much as to wish that Christ would call him till he did call him He came not occurrere to meet us but yet he came not cogere to compel us to force us but onely vocare to call us by his Word and Sacraments and Ordinances and lead us so and that 's his errand and purpose in coming And from that we shall come to the persons upon whom his coming works where we have first a Negative a fearful thing in Christs lips and then an Affirmative a blessed seal in his mouth first an Exclusive a fearful banishment out of his Ark and then an Inclusive a blessed naturalization in his Kingdom Non justos I came to call not the righteous but sinners And then lastly we have not as before his general intention and purpose To call but the particular effect operation of this calling upon the godly it brings them to repentance Christ does not call us to a satisfaction of Gods justice by our selves that 's impossible to us it is not ad satisfactionem but then it is not adgloriam he does not call us to an immediate possession of glory without doing any thing before but it is ad Resipiscentiam I came to call not the righteous but sinners to Repentance And so have you the whole frame mark'd out which we shall set up and the whole compass design'd which we shall walk in In which though the pieces may seem many yet they do so naturally flow out of one another that they may easily enter into your understanding and so naturally depend upon one another that they may easily lay hold upon your memory Part I. Ambrose First then our first Branch in the first Part is That Christ jufied Feasting festival and chearful conversation For as S. Ambrose says Frustra fecisset God who made the world primarily for his own glory had made Light in vain if he had made no creatures to see and to be seen by that light wherein he might receive glory so frustra fecisset God who intended secondarily mans good in the Creation had made creatures to no purpose if he had not allow'd Man a use and an enjoying of those creatures Our Mythologists who think they have conveyed a great deal of Moral doctrine in their Poetical Fables and so indeed they have had mistaken the matter much when they make it one of the torments of hell to stand in a fresh River and not be permitted to drink and amongst pleasant fruits and not to be suffered to eat if God requir'd such a forbearing such an abstemiousness in Man as that being set to rule and govern the creatures he might not use and enjoy them Priviledges are lost by abusing but so they are by not using too Of those three Opinions which have all pass'd through good Authors Whether before the Floud had impaired and corrupted the herbs and fruits of the earth men did eat flesh or no of which the first is absolutely Negative both in matter of law and in matter of fact No man might no man did and the second is directly contrary to this Affirmative in both All men might all men did and the third goes a Middle way It was always lawful and all men might but sober and temperate men did forbear and not do it of these three though the later have prevail'd with those Authors and be the common opinion yet the later part of that later opinion would very hardly fall into proof That all their sober and temperate men did forbear this eating of flesh or any lawful use of Gods creatures God himself took his portion in this world so in meat and drink in his manifold sacrifices and God himself gave himself in this world so in bread and wine in the blessed Sacrament of his body and his bloud And the very joys of heaven after the Resurrection are convey'd to us also in the Marriage-supper of the Lamb. That mensa laqueus which is in the Psalm is a curse 69.22 Let their table be made a snare let their plenty and prosperity be an occasion of sin to them that 's a malediction but for that mensa propositionum The table of Shew-bread Num. 4.7 where those blessings which God had given to man were brought again and presented in his sight upon that table the loaves were great in quantity and many in number and often renew'd God gives plentifully richly and will be serv'd so himself In all those festivals amongst the Jews which were of Gods immediate institution as the Passover and Pentecost and the Trumpets and Tabernacles and the rest you shall often meet in the Scriptures these two phrases Humiliabitis animas and then Laetaberis coram Domino first upon that day you shall humble your souls that you have Levit. 16.29 and very often and then upon that day You shall rejoyce before the Lord and that you have Deut. 16.11 and very often besides Now some Interpreters have applied these two phrases to the two days That upon the Eve we should humble our souls in Fasting and upon the Day rejoyce before the Lord in a festival chearfulness but both belong to the Day it self that first we should humble our souls as we do now in these holy Convocations and then return and rejoyce before the Lord in a chearful use of his creatures our selves and then send out a portion to them that want as it is expresly enjoyn'd in that feast Nehem. 8.10 and in that Esth 9.22 where their feasting is as literally commanded as their giving to the poor And besides those Stationary and Anniversary Feastings which were of Gods immediate institution And that Feast which was of the Churches institution after in the time of the Macchabees which was the Encoenia The Dedication of the Temple the Jews at this day in their Dispersion observe a yearly Feast which they call Festum Letitiae The feast of Rejoycing in a festival thankfulness to God that he hath brought the year about and afforded them the use of the Law another year When Christ came to Jairus house and commanded away the Musick and all the Funeral-solemnities it was not because he disallowed those solemnities but because he knew there was no Funeral to be solemniz'd in that
those faculties by the help of the Law And he calls it Suam their righteousness because they thought none had it but they And upon this Pelagian righteousness it thought Nature sufficient without Grace or upon this righteousness of the Cathari the Puritans in the Primitive Church that thought the Grace which they had received sufficient and that upon that stock they were safe and become impeccable and therefore left out of the Lords Prayer that Petition Dimitte nobis Forgive us our trespasses upon this Pelagian righteousness and this Puritan righteousness Christ does not work He left out the righteous not that there were any such but such as thought themselves so and he took in sinners not all effectually that were simply so but such as the sense of their sins and the miserable state that that occasioned brought to an acknowledgement that they were so Non Justos sed peccatores Peccatores Here then enters our Affirmative our Inclusive Who are called peccatores for here no man asks the Question of the former Branch there we asked Whether there were any righteous and we found none here we ask not whether there were any sinners for we can finde no others no not one He came to call sinners and only sinners that is only in that capacity in that contemplation as they were sinners for of that vain and frivolous opinion that got in and got hold in the later School That Christ had come in the flesh though Adam had stood in his innocence That though Man had nor needed Christ as a Redeemer yet he would have come to have given to man the greatest Dignity that Nature might possibly receive which was to be united to the Divine Nature of this Opinion one of those Jesuites whom we named before Maldonat who oftentimes making his use of whole sentences of Calvins says in the end This is a good Exposition but that he is an Heretick that makes it He says also of this Opinion That Christ had come though Adam had stood this is an ill Opinion but that they are Catholicks that have said it He came for sinners for sinners onely else he had not come and then he came for all kind of sinners Mat. 21.31 for upon those words of our Saviours to the High Priests and Pharisees Publicans and Harlots go into the Kingdom of Heaven before you good Expositors note that in those two Notations Publicans and Harlots many sorts of sinners are implyed in the name of Publicans all such as by their very profession and calling are led into tentations and occasions of sin to which some Callings are naturally more exposed then other such as can hardly be exercised without sin and then in the Name of Harlots and prostitute Women such as cannot at all be exercised without sin whose very profession is sin and yet for these for the worst of these for all these there is a voice gone out Christ is come to call sinners onely sinners all sinners Comes he then thus for sinners What an advantage had S. Paul then to be of this Quorum and the first of them Quorum Ego Maximus That when Christ came to save sinners he should be the greatest sinner the first in that Election If we should live to see that acted Mat. 24.41 which Christ speaks of at the last day Two in the field the one taken the other left should we not wonder to see him that were left lay hold upon him that were taken and offer to go to Heaven before him therefore because he had killed more men in the field or robbed more men upon the High-way or supplanted more in the Court or oppressed more in the City to make the multiplicity of his sins his title to Heaven Or two women grinding at the Mill one taken the other left to see her that was left offer to precede the other into Heaven therefore because she had prostituted her self to more men then the other had done Is this S. Pauls Quorum his Dignity his Prudency I must be saved because I am the greatest sinner God forbid God forbid we should presume upon salvation because we are sinners or sin therefore that we may be surer of salvation S. Pauls title to Heaven was not that he was primus peccator but primus Confessor that he first accused himself came to a sense of his miserable estate for that implies that which is our last word and the effect of Christs calling That whomsoever he calls or how or whensoever it is ad Resipiscentiam Non ad satisfactionem to repentance It is not ad satisfactionem Christ does not come to call us to make satisfaction to the justice of God he call'd us to a heavy to an impossible account if he call'd us to that If the death of Christ Jesus himself be but a satisfaction for the punishment for my sins for nothing less then that could have made that satisfaction what can a temporary Purgatory of days or hours do towards a satisfaction And if the torments of Purgatory it self sustain'd by my self be nothing towards a satisfaction what can an Evenings fast or an Ave Marie from my Executor or my Assignee after I am dead do towards such a satisfaction Canst thou satisfie the justice of God for all that blood which thou hast drawn from his Son in thy blasphemous Oaths and Execrations or for all that blood of his which thou hast spilt upon the ground upon the Dunghil in thy unworthy receiving the Sacrament Canst thou satisfie his justice for having made his Blessings the occasions and the instruments of thy sins or for the Dilapidations of his Temple in having destroyed thine own body by thine incontinency and making that the same flesh with a Harlot If he will contend with thee Job 9.9 thou canst not answer him one of a thousand Nay a thousand men could not answer one sin of one man It is not then Ad satisfactionem but it is not Ad gloriam neither Non ad Gloriam Christ does not call us to an immediate possession of glory without doing any thing between Our Glorification was in his intention as soon as our Election in God who sees all things at once both entred at once but in the Execution of his Decrees here God carries us by steps he calls us to Repentance The Farmers of this imaginary satisfaction they that fell it at their own price in their Indulgencies have done well to leave out this Repentance both in this text in S. Matthew and where the same is related by S. Mark In both places they tell us that Christ came to call sinners but they do not tell us to what as though it might be enough to call them to their market to buy their Indulgencies The Holy Ghost tells us it is to repentance Are ye to learn now what that is He that cannot define Repentance he that cannot spell it may have it and he that hath
his alleigance induces an addition of punishment upon the devil himself Consider a little further our wretchedness in this prodigality we think those Laws barbarous and inhumane which permit the sute of men in debt for the satisfaction of Creditors but we sell our selves and grow the farther in debt by being sold we are sold and to even rate our debts and to aggravate our condemnation We find in the history of the Muscovits that it is an ordinary detainder amongst them to sell themselves and their posterity into everlasting bondage for hot drink In one winter a wretched man will drink himself and his posterity into perpetual slavery But we sell our selves not for drink but for thirst we are sory when our appetite too soon decaies and we would fain sin more than we do At what a high rate did the blessed Martyrs sell their bodies They built up Gods Church with their blood They sowed his field and prepared his harvest with their blood they got heaven for their bodies and we give bodies souls for hell In a right inventary every man that ascends to a true value of himself considers it thus First His Soul then His life after his fame and good name And lastly his goods and estate for thus their own nature hath ranked them and thus they are as in nature so ordinarily in legal consideration preferred before one another But for our souls because we know not how they came into us we care not how they go out because if I aske a Philosopher whither my soul came in by propagation from my parents or by an immediate infusion from God perchance he cannot tell so I think a divine can no more tell me whither when my soul goes out of me it be likely to turn on the right or on the left hand if I continue in this course of sin And then for the second thing in this inventary Life the Devil himself said true skin for skin and all that a man hath will he give for his life Indeed we do not easily give away our lives expresly and at once but we do very easily suffer our selves to be cousened of our lives we pour in death in drink and we call that health we know our life to be but a span and yet we can wash away one inche in ryot we can burn away one inch in lust we can bleed away one inch in quarrels we have not an inch for every sin and if we do not pour out our lives yet we drop them away For the third peece of our self our fame and reputation who had not rather be thought an usurer then a beggar who had not rather be the object of envy by being great than of scorn and contempt by being poor upon any conditions And for the last of all which is our goods Seneca though our coveteousness appears most in the love of them in that lowest thing of all Adeo omnia homini cariora seipso so much does every man think every inferiour thing better than himself than his fame than his body than his soul which is a most perverse undervaluing of himself and a damnable humility yet even with these goods also as highly as he values them a man will past if to fuell and foment and maintain that sin that he delights in that which is the most precious our souls we undervalue most and that which we do esteem most though naturally it should be lowest our estate we are content to wast and dissipate for our sins And whereas the Heathens needed laws to restrain them from an expensive and wastful worship of their Gods every man was so apt to exceed in sacrifices and such other religious duties til that law Deus frugi Colunto Let men be thrifty moderate in religious expenses was enacted which law was a kind of mortmain and inhibition That every man might not bestow what he would upon the service of those Gods we have turned our prodigality the other way upon the devil whom we have made Haeredem in esse and our sole executor and sacrificed soul and life and fame and fortune all the gifts of God and God himself by making his religion and his Sacraments and the profession of his name in an hypocriticall use of them to be the devils instruments to draw us the easilyer and hold us the faster and what prodigality can be conceived to exceed this in which we do not onely mispend our selves Nihil but mispend our God The other point in this exprobration is that as we have prodigally sold our selves so we have inconsiderately sold our selves for nothing we have in our bargain diseases and we have poverty and we have unsensibleness of our miseries but diseases are but privations of health and poverty but a privation of wealth and unsensibleness but a privation of tenderness of Conscience all are privations and privations are nothing if a man had got nothing by a bargain but repentance he would think and justly he had got little but if thou hadst repentance in this bargain thy bargain were the better if thou couldst come to think thy bargain bad it were a good bargain but the height of the misery is in this that one of those nothings for which we have sold our selves is a stupidity an unsensibleness of our own wretchedness The Laws do annull and make void fraudulent conveyances and then the laws presume fraud in the conveyance if at least half the value of the thing be not given now if the whole world be not worth one soul who can say that he hath half his value it were not meerly nothing if considering that inventary which we spoke of before we had the worse for the better that were but an ill exchange but yet it were not nothing If we had bodies for our souls it were not meerly nothing but we finde that sin that sells our souls decays and withers our bodies our bodies grow incapable of that sin unable to commit that sin which we sold our souls for If we had fame and reputation for out bodies it were not nothing but we see that Heretiques that give their bodies to the fire are by the very law infamous and they are infamous in every mans apprehension If we had worldly goods for loss of fame and of our good name yet still it were not nothing but we see that witches who are infamous persons for the most part live in extreme beggery too So that the exprobration is just we have sold our selves for nothing and however the ordinary murmuring may be true in other things that all things are grown dearer our souls are still cheap enough which at first were all sold in gross for perchance an Apple and are now retailed every day for nothing Joseph was sold underfoot by his brethren but it is hard to say for how much some Copies have that he was sold for 20 pieces and some for 25 and some for 30 and S. Ambrose and S.
Augustin collects arguments at least allusions from this variety of Copies but all these say it was but so many pieces of silver The Septuagints in their translation extend them to gold to so many crowns or such Josephus multiplies them to pounds so many pounds all think it too low a price for Joseph to be sold for twenty pieces of silver But yet if it were so this was not for nothing and for this selling his brethren had some pretence of excuse ne polluantur manus they would but sell him least their hands should be defiled with blood but we sell our selves ut polluantur manus therefore that our hands may be defiled with blood even with our own blood with the loss of our bodies which we consume by sin and of our souls which perish eternally by it Our Saviour Christ every drop of whose blood was of infinite value for one of our souls is more worth than the whole world and one drop of his blood had been sufficient for all the souls of 1000 worlds if it had been applied unto them was sold scornfully and basely at a low price at most not above six pound of our money but vve sell our selves and him too we crucifie him again every day for nothing when our sin is the very crucifying of him that should save us who shall save us Earthly Princes have been so jealous of their honours as that they have made it Treason to carry their pictures into any low Office or into any irreverend place Beloved whensoever we commit any sin upon discourse upon consideration upon purpose and plot the image of God which is engraved and imprinted in us and lodged in our understanding and in that reason which we employ in that sin is mingled with that sin we draw the image of God into all our incontinencies into all our oppressions into all our extortions and supplantations we carry his image into all soul places which we haunt upon earth yea we carry his image down with us to eternal condemnation for even in Hell uri potest non exuri Imago Dei says S. Bernard The image of God burns in us in hell but can never be burnt out of us as long as the understanding soul remains the Image of God remains in it and so we have used the image of God as witches are said to do the images of men by wounding or melting the image they destroy the person and we by defacing the image of God in our selves by sin to the painful shameful death of the Cross Gen. 31. Rachel and Lea complained of their father Laban thus He hath sold us and hath eat and consumed the money they lamented it much to see themselves sold and by their father and their father never the better for the bargain But still our case is worse than any the devil hath bought us and he he who hath bought us hath eaten and consumed the money he pretends to buy us by giving us pleasure or profit for our selves and then those very pleasures and those riches which he pretends to give us are his food and his instruments to effect his mischievous and tyrannous purposes upon us And therefore let no man think himself exempt from this challenge that he hath sold himself for nothing Let no man present his Dutals his Court-rolls his Bacus his good Debts his titles of honour his Maces or his Staves or his Ensignes of power and Office and say call you all this nothing Compare all these with thy soul and they are nothing Now whilest thou wallowest in all these here thou mayest hear God say Quid habes quod non accepisti What hast thou of all this which thou hast not received but when the Bell tols then he shall say in the voyce of that Bell Quid habes quod accepisti What hast thou of all that thou hast received Is not all that come to nothing and then thou that thoughtest thy self strong enough in purse in power in favour to compass any thing and to embrace many things shalt not finde thy self able to attain to a door-keepers place in the kingdome of heaven Let no man therefore take too much joy to apply to himself those words of the parable Filii saeculi The children of this world which grow rich are wiser than the children of light for it is but In generatione sua Wiser in their generation and how litle a while that generation shall last God knows and what fools they shall appear to be for all generations after we know They are called the wisest amongst men as the Serpent was called the wisest amongst Beasts that is still the fittest for the devil to work in to make his instruments and engines to desire a curse upon themselves and their posterity Let no man wrest Gods example to his purpose and say if he do sell himself for nothing he does but as God himself did and as David told him he did Psal 44. Thou sellest thy people without gain and doest not increase their price That was not for nothing God had his end in that neither was it an absolute sale but a short term God sels us over to sickness to tribulations to afflictions for sometime perchance for the whole term of this short life but all this is but to improve us and that we may be the fitter for him when he Takes us into his owne hand again in that surrender of our self In manus tuas when we shall deliver up our souls to him that gave them for here no propriety is Destroyed still here is meum tuum betwen God and me It is still my soul and still his soul and when God looked mercyfully towards Job then Satans lease expired God doth not give his saints â—or Nothing for sanguis Semen The blood of the Martyrs was the seed of the Church ye are bought with a price sayes the Apostle 1. Cor. 6. It is pretiore ye are pretiously bought even with the pretious blood of the onely Sone of God And for our temporall and secular value in Gods account we see how God expressed his care of the people when he diverted Sennachrib from afflicting them Esa 43. by turning him upon other wars I gave Egypt for thy ransome Ethiopia and seba for the because thou wast pretious in my sight and thou wast honourable and I loved the therfore will I give man for the and people for thy sake And this leads us in to the second part The Consolation that Though nay because we have sold our selves for nothing we shall be Redemed with out mony Into this part then there is at first a strange Enterance 2 Part. Therfore That therfore because we have sold our selves we should be redeemed Therefore because we have been prodigal we should be made rich But this Therfore this reason relates to the prise not to the worke of the Redemption Because it was for nothing that we were sold it
the devil If God have made thy staff to blossom and bear ripe fruit in a night enriched thee preferred thee a pace this is not thy staff it is a Mace a mark of thy office that he hath made thee his Steward of those blessings To end this a mans own staff truly properly is nothing but his own natural faculties nature is ours but grace is not ours and he that is left to this staff of his own for heaven is as ill provided as Jacob was for this world when he was left to his own staff at Jordan when he was banished and banished in poverty and banished alone Thus far we have seen Jacob in his low estate Revertitur now we bring him to his happyness in which it is always one degree to make hast and so we will all is comprised in this that is was present Now I am two bands now it was first now quando revertitur now when he returned to his Countrey for he was come very near it when he speaks of Jordan as though he stood by it I came over this Jordan It is hard to say whether the returning to a blessing formerly possessed and lost for a while be not a greater pleasure then the coming to a new one It is S. Augustins observation that that land Aug. which is so often called the land of promise was their land from the beginning from the beginning Sem of whom they came dwelt there and though God restored them by a miraculous power to their possession yet still it was a returning and so the blessing is ever more expressed a return from Egypt a return from Babylon and a return from their present dispersion is that which comforts them still Christ himself had this apprehension clarifica me Glorifie me thou father Joh. 17.5 with that glory which I had with thee before the world was Certainly our best assurance of salvation is but a returning to our first state in the decree of God for our election when we can consider our interest in that decree we return Our best state in this life is but a returning to the purity which we had in our baptism whosoever surprises himself in the act or in the remorse of any sin that he is fallen into would think himself in a blessed state if he could bring his conscience to that peace again which he remembers he had the last time he made up his accounts to God and had his discharge sealed in the Sacrament of the body and blood of Christ Jesus Cleanse thy self often therefore and accustome thy soul to that peace that thou mayest still when thou fallest into sin have such a state in thy memory as thou mayest have a desire to return to and the Spirit of God shall still return to thee Eccles 12.7 who lovest to receive it and at last thy spirit shall return to him that gave it and gave his own spirit for it Jacobs happiness appears first now quando revertitur Jubenrâ— Domino and now quando jubente Domino now when he returned and now when he returned upon Gods bidding God had said unto him Gen. 31.3 turn again into the land of thy fathers and I will be with thee Think no step to be directly made towards preferment if thou have not heard Gods voice directing the way Stre in usque stand upon the ways and inquire not of thy fathers but of the God of thy fathers which way thou shalt go for Gods voice may be heard in every action if we will stand still a little and hearken to it Remember ever more that Applica Ephod 1 Sam. 30.7 where David comes to ask counsell of the Lord he said to Abiathar Applica Ephod bring the Ephod and there David askes Shall I follow this company shall I overtake them when thou doubtest of any thing Applica Ephod take this book of God if to thine understanding that reach not home punctually to thy particular case thou hast an Ephod in thy self God is not departed from thee thou knowest by thy self it is a vain complaint that Plutrarch makes desectu oraculorum that oracles are ceased there is no defect of oracles in thine own bosome as soon as thou askest thy self how may I corrupt the integrity of such a Judge undermine the strength of such a great person shake the chastity of such a woman thou hast an answer quickly it must be done by bribing it must be done by swearing it must be done by calumniating Here is no defectus Oraculorum no ceasing of Oracles there is a present answer from the Devil There is no defect of the Vrim and Thummim of God neither If thou wilt look into it for as it is well said of the Morall Man Sua cuique providentia Deus every mans Diligence and discretion is a God to himselfe so it is well said of the Christian Father Augustin Rectaratio Verbum Dei a rectified Conscience is the word of God Applica Ephod bring thine Actions to the question of the Ephod to the debatment of thy conscience rectified and still shalt hear Jubentem Dominus or duni Revocantem God will bid thee stop or God will bid thee go forwards in that way Angeli But herein had Jacob another degree of happiness That the Commandement of God was persued with the Testimony of Angells Not that the voyce of God needs strength Teste me ipso witness my selfe was always witness enough and Quia os Domini Locutum The Mouth of the Lord hath spoken it was always seal enough But that hath been Gods abundant And overflowing goodness ever to succor the infirmity of Man with sensible and visible things unto the pillars in the Wilderness with the Tabarnacle after and with the temple and all the Misterious and significative furniture thereof after all So God leaves not Jacob to the general knowledge that the Angels of God protect Gods Children but he manifested those Angels unto him Occurrerunt ei the Angels of God met him The word of God is an infalible guid to thee But God hath provided thee also visible and manifest assistants the Pillar his Church and the Angels his Ministers in the Church The Scripture is thine onely Ephod but Applica Ephod apply it to thee by his Church and by his visible Angels and not by thine own private interpretation This was Jacobs nunc now when he was returned 2. Turmae returned upon Gods Commandement upon Gods Commandement pursued and testified by Angels and Angels visibly manifested now he could take a comfort in the contemplation of his fortune of his estate to see that he was two bands Here 's a great change we see his vowe and we see how far his wishes extended at his going out Gen. 28.20 If God will give me bread to eate and cloathes to put on so that I come againe unto my fathers house in safety then shall the Lord be my God In which
You would not go into a Medicinal Bath without some preparatives presume not upon that Bath the blood of Christ Jesus in the Sacrament then without preparatives neither Neither say to your selves we shall have preparatives enough warnings enough many more Sermons before it come to that and so it is too soon yet you are not sure you shall have more not sure you shall have all this not sure you shall be affected with any If you be when you are remember that as in that good Custome in these Cities you hear cheerful street musick in the winter mornings but yet there was a sad and doleful bel-man that wak'd you and call'd upon you two or three hours before that musick came so for all that blessed musick which the servants of God shall present to you in this place it may be of use that a poor bell-man wak'd you before and though but by his noyse prepared you for their musick And for this early office I take Christs earliest witness his Proto-Martyr his first witness St. Stephen and in him that which especially made him his witness and our example his his death and our preparation to death what he suffered what he did what he said so far as is knit up in those words When he had said this he fell a sleep Divisio From which example I humbly offer to you these two general considerations first that every man is bound to do something before he dye and then to that man who hath done those things which the duties of his calling bind him to death is but a sleep In the first we shall stop upon each of those steps first there is a sis aliquid every man is bound to be something to take some calling upon him Secondly there is a hoc age every man is bound to do seriously and scedulously and sincerely the duties of that calling And Thirdly there is a sis aliquis the better to performe those duties every man shall do well to propose to himself some person some pattern some example whom he will follow and imitate in that calling In which third branch of this first part we shall have just occasion to consider some particulars in him who is here propos'd for our Example St. Stephen and in these three sis aliquid be something profess something and then hoc age do truly the duties of that profession and lastly sis aliquis propose some good man in that profession to to follow and in the things intended in this text propose St. Stephen we shall determine our first part And in the other we shall see that to them that do not this that do not settle their consciences so death is a bloody conflict and no victory at last a tempestuous sea and do harbor at last a slippery heighth and no footing a desperate fall and no bottom But then to them that have done it their pill is gilded and the body of the pill hony too mors lucrum death is a gain a treasure and this treasure brought some in a calm too they do not only go to heaven by death but heaven comes to them in death their very manner of dying is an inchoative act of their glorified state therefore it is not call'd a dying but asseeping which one metaphor intimates two blessings that because it is a sleep it gives a present rest and because it is a sleep it promises a future waking in the resurrection First part Sis aliquid First Then for our first branch of our first part we begin with our beginning our birth man is born to trouble so we read it to trouble The original is a little milder then so yet there it is Man is born unto labor Job 5 7. God never meant less then labor to any man Put us upon that which we esteem the honorablest of labors the duties of martial discipline yet where it is said that man is appointed to a warfare upon earth it is seconded with that His dayes are like the dayes of an hireling 7.1 How honorable soever his station be he must do his daies labor in the day the duties of the place in the place How far is he from doing so that never so much as considers why he was sent into this world who is so sar from having done his errand here that he knows not considers not what his errand was nay knows not considers not whether he had any errand hither or no. But as though that God who for infinite millions of millions of generations before any creation any world contented himself with himself satisfied delighted himself with himself in heaven without any creatures yet at last did bestow six daies labor upon the Creation accommodation of man as though that God who when man was sour'd in the whole lump poysoned in the fountain perished at the chore withered in the root in the fall of Adam would them in that dejection that exainantion that evacuation of the dignity of man and not in his sormer better estate engage his own Son his only his beloved Son to become man by a temporary life and then to become no man by a violent and yet a voluntary death as though that God who he was pleased to come to a creation might yet have left thee where thou wast before amongst privations a nothing or if he would have made thee something a creature yet he might have shut thee up in the closs prison of a bare being and no more without life or sense as he hath done earth and stones or if he would have given thee life and sense he might have left thee a toad without the comeliness of shape without that reasonable and immortal Soul which makes thee a man or if he had made thee a man yet he might have lost thee upon the common amongst the Heathen and not have taken thee into his inclosures by giving the a particular form of religion or if he would have given thee a religion He might have left thee a Jew or if he would have given thee Christianity He might have left thee a Papist as though this God who had done so much more for thee by breeding thee in a true Church had done all this for nothing thou pussest through this world as a flash as a lightning or which no man knows the beginning or the ending as an ignis fatuus in the air which does not only not give light for any use but does not so much as portend or signifie any thing and thou passest out of the world as a hand passes out of a bason or a body out of a bath where the water may be the fouler for thy having washed in it else the water retains no impression of thy hand or body so the world may be the worse for thy having liv'd in it else the world retains no marks of thy having been there When God plac'd Adam in the world God enjoyned Adam to fill the world to subdue
then this pactum this contract of mine own hand actual and habitual sin for of these one is wash'd out in water and the other in blood Ro. 7.20 in the two Sacraments But then there is Lex in membris saith the Apostle I find a law that when I would do good evil is present with me Sin assisted by me is now become a Tyrant over me and hath establish'd a government upon me and therefore is a law of sin and a law in my flesh which after the water of baptism taken and the water of penitent tears given after the blood of Christ Jesus taken and mine one blood given that is a holy readiness at that time when I am made partaker of Christs death to die for Christ throws me back by relapses into those repented sins This put the Apostle to that passionate exclamation O wretched man that I am and yet he found a deliverance even from the body of his death through Jesus Christ his Lord that is a free and open recourse and access to him in all oppressions of heart in all dejections of spirit Now when this Chirographum this band of Adams hand Original sin is cancell'd upon the Cross of Christ and this pactum this band of mine own hand actual sins wash'd away in the blood of Christ and this Lex in membris this disposition to relapse into repented sins which as a tide that does certainly come every day does come every day in one form or other is beaten back as a tide by a bank by a continual opposing the merits and the example of Christ Jesus and the practice of his fasting such other medicinal disciplines as I find to prevail against such relapses when by this blessed means the whole law against which I am a trespasser is evacuated will God condemn me for all this and not by a law when I have pleaded Christ Christ and Christ baptism and blood and tears will God condemn mean oblique way when he cannot by a direct way by a secret purpose when he hath no law to condemn me by Sad and discomposed distorted and distracted soul if it be well said in the School absurdum est disputare ex manuscriptis it is an unjust thing in controversies and disputations to press arguments out of manuscripts that cannot be seen by every man it were ill said in thy conscience that God will proceed against thee ex manuscriptis or condemn thee upon any thing which thou never sawst any unreveal'd purpose of his Suspicious soul ill-presaging soul is there something else besides the day of Judgment that the Son of man does not know disquiet soul does he not know the proceeding of that Judgment wherin himself is to be Judg but that when he hath died for thy sins and so fulfill'd the law in thy behalf thou maist be condemn'd without respect of that law and upon something that shall have had no consideration no relation to any such breach of any such law in thee Intricated entangled conscience Christ tels thee of a Judgment because thou didst not do the works of mercy not feed not cloth the poor for these were enjoyn'd thee by a law but he never tels thee of any Judgment therefore because thy name was written in a dark book of death never unclaps'd never opened unto thee in thy life He saies to the lovingly indulgently fear not for it is Gods good pleasure to give you the Kingdom but he never saies to the wickedest in the world live in fear dy in anxiety in suspition and suspension for his displeasure a displeasure conceiv'd against you before you were sinners before you were men hath thrown you out of that kingdom into utter darkness There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus The reason is added because the law of the Spirit of life hath made them free from the law of sin and of death All upon all sides is still refer'd to a law And where there is no law against thee as there is not to him that is in Christ and he is in Christ who hath endeavoured the keeping or repented the breaking of the law God wil never proceed to execution by any secret purpose ever notified never manifested Suspicious jealous scattered soul recollect thy self and give thy self that redintegration that acquiescence which the spirit of God in the means of the Church offers thee study the mysterie of godliness which is without all controversie that is endeavour to keep repent the not keeping of the law and thou art safe for that you shall be judged by is a law But then this law is called here a law of liberty and whether that denotation that it is called a law of liberty import an ease to us or heavier weight upon us is our last disquisition and conclusion of all So speak ye and so do as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty Lex libertatis That the Apostle here by the law of liberty means the Gospel was never doubted he had call'd the Gospel so before this place whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty 1.25 and continueth therein shal be blessed in his deed that is blessed in doing so blessed in conforming himself to the Gospel but why does he call it so A law of liberty not because men naturally affecting liberty might be drawn to an affection of the Gospel by proposing it in that specious name of liberty though it were not so The holy Ghost calls the Gospel a pearl and a treasure and a kingdome and joy and glory Not to allure men with false names but because men love these and the Gospel is truly all these a pearl and a treasure and a kingdome and joy and glory And it is truly a law of liberty but of what kind and in what respect not such a liberty as they have established in the Roman Church where Ecclesiastical liberty must exempt Ecclesiastical persons from participating all burdens of the State and from being traitors though they commit treason because they are Subjects to no secular Prince nor the liberty of the Anabaptist that overthrows Magistracy and consequently all subjection both Ecclesiastical Laick for when upon those words 1 Cor. 7.23 Be ye not servants of men St. Chrysostome sayes This is Christian liberty Nec aliis nec sibi servire neither to be subjects to others nor to our selves that 's spoken with modification an allegiance with relation to our first allegiance to God not to be so subject to others or to our selves as that either for their sakes or our own we depart from any necessary declaration of our service to God Deo First then the Gospel is a Law of Liberty in respect of the author of the Gospel of God himself because it leaves God at his liberty Not at liberty to judg against his Gospel where he hath manifested it for a law for he hath laid a holy necessity upon himself
plura because they are more and so as the more beautiful and better proportioned a body is the more it draws the eye to look upon it so they are nearer quia potiora because they are better and so as the more evidence and light and lustre they have in themselves the easier things are discerned so they are nearer Plura quia manifestiora because they are more visible First how there should be more helps in the Christian religion then in the Jewish is not so evident at first for first if we consider the law to be salvation they had a vast multiplicity of laws scarse less then 600 several laws whereas the honor of the Christian religion is that it is verbum abbreviatum an abridgment of all into ten words as Moses cals the Commandements and then a re-abridgment of that abridgment into two love God and love thy Neighbour that is faith and works If we consider their laws to be their salvation they had more and if we consider their sacrifices to be their salvation they had more too for their Rabbins observe at least 50 several kinds of contracting uncleaness to which there were appropriated several expiations and sacrifices whereas we have only the sacrifices of prayer and of praise and of Christ in the sacrament for so it is the ordinary phrase manner of speech in the Fathers to call that a sacrifice not only as it is a commemorative sacrifice for that is amongst our selves and so every person in the congregation may sacrifice that is do that in remembrance of Christ but as it is a real sacrifice in which the Priest doth that which none but he does that is really to offer up Christ Jesus crucified to Almighty God for the sins of the people so as that that very body of Christ which offered himself for a propitiatory sacrifice upon the cross once for all that body and all that that body suffered is offered again and presented to the Father the Father is intreated that for the merits of that person so presented and offered unto him and in contemplation thereof he will be merciful to that congregation and applie those merits of his to their particular souls These are our sacrifices prayer and praise and Christ thus offered and how are these more then the Jews had they had more laws and more sacrifices and as many sacraments as we and if nearness of salvation consist in the plurality of these how is salvation nearer to us then to them quatenus plura in that first respects as the means are more as it is truly and properly said that there are more ingredients more simples more means of restoring in our dram of triacle or mithridate then in an ounce of any particular syrup in which there may be 3 or 4 in the other perchance so many hundred so in that receit of our Saviour Christ quicquid ligaveris in the absolution of the Minister that whatsoever he shall bind or loose upon earth shall be bound or loose in heaven there is more physick then in all the expiations and sacrifices of the old law There an expiation would serve to day which would not serve to morrow if it were omitted till the sun were set upon it it required a more severe expiation and so also an expiation would serve for one transgression which would not serve for another but here in the absosolution of the Minister there is a concurrence a confluence of medecines of all qualities purgative in confession and restorative in absolution corasive in the preaching of Judgments and cordial in the balm of the sacrament here is no limitation of time at what time soever a sinner repenteth nor limitation of sins whatsoever is forgiven in earth is forgiven in heaven salvation is nearer us in this respect that we have plura adminicula more outward and visible means then the Jews had because we may receive more in one action then they could in all theirs It is so also not only quia plura because we have more means Potiora but quia potiora because those means which we have are in their nature better more attractive and more winning The means as we have said before were their laws and their sacrifices and their sacraments and for their law it was lex interficiens non perficiens it was a law August that punished unrighteousness but it did not confer righteousness and their sacrifices being in blood if we remove from them their typical signification and what they prefigured which was the shedding of the blood of the lamb which takes away the sins of the world must necessarily create and excite a natural horror in man and an aversness from them Take their sacraments into comparison and then one of their sacraments Circumcision was limited to one sex it reached not to women and their other sacrament the passover was in the primary signification and institution thereof only a gratulatory commemoration of a temporal benefit of their deliverance from Egypt And therefore to constitute a judgment proportionably by the effects we see the law and the sacrifice and the sacraments of thy Jews did not much work upon foraign Nations it was salvation but salvation shut up amongst themselves whereas we see that the law of the Chrstians which is to conforme our selves to our great example and pattern Christ Jesus who if we would consider him meerly as man was the most exemplar man for all Theological vertues moral too that ever any history presented the sacrifices of Christians which are all spiritual therein more proportional to God who is all spirit and the sacraments of Christians in which though not ex opere operator not because that action is performed not because that sacrament is administred yet ex pacto and quando opus operamur by Gods covenant when soever that action is performed whensoever that sacrament is administred the grace of God is exhibited and offered nec fallaciter as Calvin saies well it is offered with a purpose on Gods part that that grace should be accepted we see I say that these laws and these sacrifices and these sacraments have gain'd upon the whole world for in their nature and in their attractiveness and in their applyableness and so in their effect they are potiora better and in that respect salvation is nearer us then it was to the Jews Manifestiora And so it is lastly quia manifestiora because they have an evidence and manifestation of themselves in themselves Now this is especially true in the sacraments because the sacraments exhibit and convey grace and grace is such a light such a torch such a beacon as where it is it is easily seen As there is a lustre in a precious stone which no mans eye or finger can limit to a certain place or point in that stone so though we do not assign in the sacrament where that is in what circumstance or part of that holy action
fixt the Almighty and immoveable God if it can be content to inquire after it self and take knowledge where it is and in what way it will finde the means of cleansing And so this second consideration The placing of this pureness in the heart enlarges it self also into the third branch of this part which is De Modo by what means this pureness is fix'd in the heart in which is involved the Affection with which it must be embrac'd Love He that loveth pureness of heart Both these then are setled Our heart is naturally foul Modus And our heart may be cleansed But how is our present disquisition Who can bring a clean thing out of filthiness There is not one Job 14.4 Adam foul'd my heart and all yours nor can we make it clean our selves Who can say I have made clean my heart There is but one way Prov. 20.9 a poor beggarly way but easie and sure to ask it of God And even to God himself it seems a hard work to cleanse this heart and therefore our prayer must be with David Cor mundum crea Create Psal 51.12 O Lord a pure heart in me And then comes Gods part not that Gods part begun but then for it was his doing that thou madest this prayer but because it is a work that God does especially delight in to build upon his own foundations when he hath disposed thee to pray and upon that prayer created a new heart in thee then God works upon that new heart and By faith purifyes it Act. 15.9 enables it to preserve the pureness as Saint Peter speaks He had kindled some sparks of this faith in thee before thou askedst that new heart else the prayer had not been of faith but now finding thee obsequious to his beginnings he fuels this fire and purifies thee as Gold and Silver in all his furnaces through Believing and Doing and suffering through faith and works and tribulation we come to this pureness of heart And truely he that lacks but the last but Tribulation as fain as we would be without it lacks one concoction one refining of this heart But in this great work the first act is a Renovation a new heart Coâ— Novâ—m and the other That we keep clean that heart by a continual diligence and vigilancy over all our particular actions In these two consists the whole work of purifying the heart first an Annihilating of the former heart which was all sin And then a holy superintendency over that new heart which God vouchsafes to create in us to keep it as he gives it clean pure It is in a word a Detestation of former sins and a prevention of future And for the first Chromakus Anno 390. Mundi corde sunt qui deposuere cor peccati That 's the new heart that hath disseised expelled the heart of sin There is in us a heart of sin which must be cast up for whilst the heart is under the habits of sin we are not onely sinful but we are all sin as it is truly said that land overflow'd with sea is all sea And when sin hath got a heart in us it will quickly come to be that whole Body of Death Rom. 7.24 which Saint Paul complains of who shall deliver me from the Body of this Death when it is a heart it will get a Braine a Brain that shall minister all Sense and Delight in sin That 's the office of the Brain A Brain which shall send for the sinews and ligaments to tye sins together and pith and marrow to give a succulencie and nourishment even to the bones to the strength and obduration of sin and so it shall do all those services and offices for sin that the brain does to the natural body So also if sin get to be a heart it will get a liver to carry blood and life through all the body of our sinful actions That 's the office of the liver And whilst we dispute whether the throne and seat of the soul be in the Heart or Brain or Liver this tyrant sin will praeoccupate all and become all so as that we shall finde nothing in us without sin nothing in us but sin if our heart be possest inhabited by it And if it be true in our natural bodies that the heart is that part that lives first and dyes last it is much truer of this Cor peccati this heart of sin for this hearty sinner that hath given his heart to his sin doth no more foresee a Death of that sin in himself then he remembers the Birth of it and because he remembers not or understands not how his soul contracted sin by coming into his body he leaves her to the same ignorance how she shall discharge her self of sin when she goes out of that body But as his sin is elder then himself for Adams sin is his sin so is it longer liv'd then his body for it shall cleave everlastingly to his soul too God asks no more of thee but fili da mihi cor Prov. 23.26 My son give me thy heart Because when God gave it thee it was but one heart But since thou hast made it Cor cor as the Prophet speaks a Heart and a Heart a double Heart give both thy Hearts to God thy natural weakness and disposition to sin The inclinations of thy heart And thy habitual practise of sin The obduration of thy heart cor peccans and Cor peccati and he shall create a new heart in thee which is the first way of attaining this pureness of heart to become once in a good state to have as it were paid all thy former debts and so to be the better able to look about thee for the future for prevention of subsequent sins which is the other way that we proposed for attaining this pureness detestation of former habits watchfulness upon particular actions Till this be done till this Cor peccati Peccata Minutiora this hearty habitualness in sin be devested there is no room no footing to stand and sweep it a heart so filled with foulness will admit no counsel no reproof The great Engineir would have undertaken to have removed the World with his Engine if there had been any place to fix his Engine upon out of the World I would undertake by Gods blessing upon his Ordinance to cleanse the foulest heart that is if that Engine which God hath put into my hands might enter into his heart if there were room for the renouncing Gods Judgements and for the application of Gods mercies in the merits of Christ Jesus in his heart they would infallibly work upon him But he hath petrified his heart in sin and then he hath immur'd it wall'd it with a delight in sin and fortified it with a justifying of his sin and adds daily more and more out-works by more and more daily sins so that the denouncing of Judgement the application of Mercies
nobis esse hic as St. Peter said there It is good to dwell here in this consideration of his death and therefore transfer we our Tabernacle our devotion through some of these steps which God the Lord made to his issue of death that day Take in his whole day from the hour that Christ eat the passover upon Thursday to the hour in which he died the next day Make this present day Conformitas that day in thy devotion and consider what he did and remember what you have done Before he instituted and celebrated the sacrament which was after the eating of the passover he proceeded to the act of humility to wash his Disciples feet even Peters who for a while resisted him In thy preparation to the holy and blessed sacrament hast thou with a sincere humilty sought a reconciliation with all the world even with those who have been averse from it and refused that reconciliation from thee If so and not else thou hast spent that first part of this his last day in a conformity with him After the sacrament he spent the time til night in prayer in preaching in Psalms Hast thou considered that a worthy receiving of the sacrament consists in a continuation of holiness after as wel as in a preparation before If so thou hast therein also conformed thy self to him so Christ spent his time till night At night he went into the garden to pray and he prayed prolixius He spent much time in prayer Luc. 22.24 How much because it is literally expressed that he praied there three several times and that returning to his Disciples after his first prayer and finding them asleep said could ye not watch with me one hour Mat. 26.40 it is collected that he spent three houres in prayer I dare scarce ask thee whither thou wentst or how thou disposedst of thy self when it grew dark and after last night If that time were spent in a holy recommendation of thy self to God and a submission of thy will to his that it was spent in a conformity to him In that time and in those prayers was his agony and bloody sweat I will hope that thou didst pray but not every ordinary and customary prayer but prayer actually accompanied with shedding of tears and dispositively in a readiness to shed blood for his glory in necessary cases puts thee into a corformity with him About midnight he was taken and bound with a kiss Art thou not too conformable to him in that Is not that too literally too exactly thy case At midnight to have been taken and bound with a kiss from thence he was carried back to Jerusalem first to Annas then to Caiphas and as late as it was there he was examined and buffeted and delivered over to the custody of those officers from whom he received all those irrâ—sions and violences the covering of his face the spitting upon his face the blasphemies of words and the smartness of blows which that Gospel mentions In which compass fell that Gallicinium that crowing of the Cock which called up Peter to his repentance How thou passedst all that time last night thou knowest If thou didst any thing then that needed Peters tears and hast not shed them let me be thy Cock do it now now thy Master in the unworthyest of his servants looks back upon thee Do it now Betimes in the morning as soon as it was day the Jews held a Councel in the high Priests house and agreed upon their evidence against him then carried him to Pilate who was to be his Judg. Didst thou accuse thy self when thou wak'dst this morning wast thou content to admit even fals accusations that is rather to suspect actions to have been sin which were not then to smother justifie such as were truly sins then thou spendst that hour in conformity to him Pilat found no evidence against him therefore to ease himself to pass a complement upon Herod Tetrarch of Galilee who was at that time at Jerusalem because Christ being a Galilean was of Herods jurisdiction Pilat sent him to Herod rather as a mad man then a malefactor Herod remanded him with scorns to Pilat to proceed against him this was about 8 of the Clock Hast thou been content to come to this inquisition this examination this agitation this cribration this pursuit of thy conscience to sift it to follow it from the sins of thy youth to thy present sins from the sins of thy bed to the sins of thy board and from the substance to the circumstance of thy sins that 's time spent like thy Saviours Pilat would have sav'd Christ by using the priviledg of the day in his behalf because that day one prisoner was to be delivered but they chose Barrabas He would have sav'd him from death by satisfying their fury with inflicting other torments upon him scourging and crowning with thorns loading him with many scornful ignominious contumelies but this redeem'd him not they press'd a crucifying Hast thou gone about to redeem thy sin by fasting by alms by disciplines mortifications in the way of satisfaction to the justice of God that will not serve that 's not the right way We press an utter crucifying of that sin that governs thee and that conforms thee to Christ Towards noon Pilat gave Judgment and they made such hast to execution as that by noon he was upon the Cross There now hangs that sacred body upon the cross re-baptiz'd in his own tears sweat and embalm'd in his own blood alive There are those bowels of compassion which are so conspicuous so manifested as that you may see them through his wounds There those glorious eyes grew faint in their light so as the Sun asham'd to survive them departed with his light too And there that Son of God who was never from us yet had now come a new way unto us in assuming our nature delivers that soul which was never out of his Fathers hands into his Fathers hands by a new way a voluntary emission thereof for though to this God our Lord belong these issues of death so that considered in his own contract he must necessarily dy yet at no breach nor battery which they had made upon his sacred body issues his soul but emisit he gave up the Ghost as God breath'd a soul into the first Adam so this second Adam breath'd his soul into God into the hands of God There we leave you in that blessed dependancy to hang upon him that hangs upon the cross There bath in his tears there suck at his wounds lie down in peace in his grave till he vouchsafe you a Resurrection an ascension into that Kingdome which he hath purchas'd for you with the inestimable price of his incorruptible blood Amen FINIS