Do not find any desert in man that entitled him to a property in the creature but sure none can be found to entitle him to have a property in the Creator Yet he that saith unto his Saviour as Saint Thomas did My God and my Lord seems to claim a property in him For how can a man assume or apply that unto himself in which he hath no property Wherefore it is necessary that we examine how Christ is made ours that so we may see the ground both of our property and of this application I say then that Christ is ours in a threefold respect because of a threefold conjunction of Christ with us in his nature in his person and in his office First Christ is ours in his nature by a real conjunction having taken our nature upon him and in that respect he is ours as we are men and he hath bestowed on all mankind a greater capacity of his Grace then otherwise they would have had by reason of their corrupt nature for which cause the Evangelical Promises which God maketh to man in Christ are universal as excluding none because Christ hath taken the nature of all but yet conditional as including only those who repent and believe the Gospel for no others make a right use or attain the end of Christs Merits and Mercies Secondly Christ is ours in his person by a voluntary conjunction having taken our sin upon him as our surety or pledge for he hath born our griefs and carried our sorrows Isa 53. 4. And in that respect he is ours as we are Christians and hath bestowed on us the knowledge of his grace though very many of us by our own infidelity and impenitency make but a little and a bad use of that knowledge Thirdly Christ is ours in his office by a mystical conjunction such as is between a King and his Subjects both making but one mystical body and in that respect Christ is ours only as we are good Christians and hath bestowed on us the communion or rather the communication of his grace incorporating nay more inspiriting us as his members into himself And this is the happiest conjunction that we can have with Christ whiles we live here on earth To be one with him in the same mystical body or in the same actual communion not only external of his nature or of his person as many are that are little benefited thereby but also to be one with him in the same actual internal Communion of his grace to the inestimable benefit of our souls which are first sanctified and at last saved by this communicating with Christ For all the priviledges and blessings of his Regal of his Prophetical of his Sacerdotal function of his power as King of his instruction as Prophet of his sacrifice or intercession as Priest are made ours by this blessed conjunction according to that comfortable assertion of the Apostle 1 Cor. 3. 22 23. All are yours and ye are Christs for the words are not spoken consequutive sed causaliter not by way of consequence but by way of causality and accordingly import this sense All are therefore yours because ye are Christs Ye are Christs and Christ is yours and he being All in All in and through him All is yours but without him All is nothing and you are worse then nothing O then let me so rejoyce for his coming to me in the body as much more to desire and long for his coming to me in the soul That as the Lord of all is joyned with me in one flesh so I may be joyned with him in one Spirit that I may dwell in him and he may dwell in me for ever There is a mutual In-being betwixt Christ and every good Christian saith Saint Bernard even as betwixt Christ and God As the Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father and therefore Father and Son make but one essentially So Christ is in the good Christian and the good Christian is in Christ and therefore Christ and the good Christian make but one mystically If either the Father were not in the Son or the Son were not in the Father they could not be perfectly one by essential Unity And if either Christ be not in the Christian or the Christian be not in Christ they cannot be one by mystical Unity Sic igitur Anima cui adherere Deo bonum est non ante se existimet ipsi perfecte unitam nisi quum illum in se se in illo manentem persenserit Bern. Serm. 71. super Cant. Therefore let not the soul which is happy only through her union with Christ think her self perfectly united unto him till she perceive that he so dwelleth and abideth in her as that she also dwelleth and abideth in him and desireth so to dwell and abide for ever O happy soul that is thus wedded to her Saviour by a spiritual marriage for man and wife are not more nearly and more indissolubly joyned together by being one flesh then Christ and the Christian soul by being one Spirit Vere Spiritualis sanctique connubii contractus est iste Parum dixi contractus complexus est Complexus plane ubi idem velle nolle idem unum facit spiritum â— duobus This is more then a spiritual contract it is a compleat marriage when the same will being in two persons shall make them both but one Spirit So the same Saint Bernard and so likewise saith Saint Paul He that is joyned unto the Lord is one spirit 1 Cor. 6 17. Then let me be joyned to him that I may be one spirit with him and that my spirit may be his rather then mine own For mine own spirit will be death to me because of sin but his spirit will be life to me because of righteousness Rom. 8. 10. In my self I can see nothing but sin and death In my Saviour I see both righteousness and life righteousness to deliver me from sin and life to deliver me from death Therefore I will greatly rejoyce in the Lord my soul shall be joyful in my God for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation he hath covered me with the robe of righteousness Isa 61. 10. A fit Epithalamium to celebrate this spiritual marriage betwixt Christ and the good Christian wherein though the Angels be ready to make up the Chorus yet the devout soul her self alone sings the song There is joy in them but much more in us for this marriage because we have such a wedding garment bestowed on us as expells the fear both of a Divorce and of a Dissolution the first of which may be the second of which must be in all other marriages They may be under a divorce by sin they must be under a dissolution by death But the marriage betwixt Christ and the good Christian if it be once indeed truly consummated is under neither for the blessed Bridegroom of souls bestows both righteousness and salvation upon all those who
enim est Constantini M. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 non solum hebdomadem post Pascha sed antecedentem excipit ab opere faciendo sed de posteriore hebdomade usus tantum obtinuit The sum of all is this Because Easter weeke was the first weeke in the year and the dayes of that week were all accounted and kept holy and accordingly were thus computed the first second third fourths fifth holy day Hence it is that the same computation still hold of the days in the other weeks throughout the whole year that instead of the first second third fourth and fifth day it is said the first second third fourth and fifth holy-day For the Emperour Constantine the great made a Law that all Easter week and the week before it should be kept as one Holy-day And though in our age this Law holds only of Easter week yet we have some footsteps of that observation still in the week before it for our Church appoints Epistles and Gospels for every day of the week before Easter and most Churches beyond the seas still call it the holy week and some make it so For which Religious practice it is not to be doubted but the Church of Christ hath warrant enough from that Text Mark 14. 8. She hath done what she could she is come aforehand to anoint my body for the burying or rather to anoint her self for my body to prepare her self for to receive the Holy Eucharist and to celebrate the Resurrection Wherefore it is evident that in the judgement of the first and best Christians Easter day was a greater Sunday then any other all the year after it even as the Sabboth of the Passover was in the Jews account a greater Sabboth then any other of all the year nor was this judgement any way superstitious but truely Religious since we find it authorized by the Text saying for that Sabboth day was an high day John 19. 32. as if he had said that Sabboth day was higher then any other Sabbath because the Passover was joyned with it I will not then quarrel with the Church for preferring one Sunday before another since she observeth them all as holy to the same Lord there was the Holy of Holyes in the Sanctuary without any disparagement to the rest of the Temple The Paschal Sabbath was a high day and yet the other Sabbaths not put down the lower By taking off the opinion of holiness I see much profaness and irreligion in all respects which makes me conclude that though the Church should proclaim Holy Holy Holy never so much before the place and time of Gods worship yet all would be little enough to beget the love and practice of holiness in the worshippers SECT VI. That the Lords day which is observed weekly is to be observed in memory of our Saviours Resurrection and hath a double sanctification one by relation to its duâ—y which is publickly to serve God and to give him thanks for our Redemption by Christ and is the principal The other by institution as consecrated to this duty and is the less principal That the Antisabbatarian Doctrine which advanceth duties above days is not only of Christs but also of Moses his own teaching and makes most for the true observation of the Sabbath which yet is more properly called the Lords Day then the Sabbath WE may not pass by that memorable Canon in the Council of Trullo cap. 66. which hath these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 From the Holy Festival of the Resurrection of Christ our God untill the New Lords Day all true believers ought to go to Church and there uncessantly praise God in Psalms and Hymns and Spiritual songs T is worth our notice that the Fathers of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 holden in the Emperours Pallace called Easter day it self 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Resurrection day but the Sunday after it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The New Lords day not simply the Lords Day of its self or by its own virtue but as it was a repetition or renovation of the former 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the day of our Lords Resurrection For to say it was called the New Lords Day because of the renewing by Baptism which antiently was administred at that time is not satisfactory for besides that other Sundays must have been called New as well as that upon the same account to wit those of Easter and Pentecost it is manifest that Baptism cannot justly cause any Sunday to be called the Lords day and therefore surely not the New Lords day Whence it follows that if this Sunday was called the New Lords Day as renewing the day of our Lords Resurrection this and all other Sundayes do belong unto the Lord chiefly upon this account that they are memorials of his Resurrection So that though the Law of the Sabbath as well as of other things came by Moses yet the grace and truth of it came by Jesus Christ John 1. 17. And for this reason was the Sabbath translated from its own day to our Lords Day that the Law of Moses might give place to the grace and truth of Jesus Christ and happily for that cause amongst others hath the Church appointed some annual memorials of the grace and truth which came by Jesus Christ to be solemnized as so many Sabbaths least we should think that in this weekly memorial she did rather follow the Law given by Moses then the grace and truth which came by Jesus Christ And doubtless when we have said all that we can there can be no entire keeping of a Sabbath from Moses but only from Christ because in him alone the soul may seek for rest and in him alone is sure to find it For as the souls trouble is from sin so her rest is from the expiation and forgiveness of sins Therefore as her trouble is from her self so her rest is from her Saviour Saint Paul hath taught us both together in his Sermon and our own Church in her Anthymn of the Resurrection For seeing that by man came death by man also commeth the Resurrection of the dead for as by Adam all men do dye so by Christ all men shall be restored to life By man came death by Adam all men do die There 's the souls trouble from her sin for the wages of sin is death By man commeth the Resurrection of the dead by Christ all men shall be restored to life there 's the souls rest or Sabbath from her Saviour for the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. If we will needs gainsay the Judgement of our own Church to set up the Sabbath instead of the Lords day yet we may not gainsay the Doctrine of Saint Paul which requires us to set up the Lords day instead of the Sabbath so that if we will needs borrow the name from Moses yet we can have the thing it self only from Christ for it is not Moses but Christ which can give the
and necessary in regard of the Jews to keep them in obedience and from idolatry as circumcision sacrificing of beasts the distinction of meats and the rigorous observation of the Sabbath But the Christian Religion requires nothing of us save what is usefull and necessary in it self though it were not commanded as it requires us not to circumcise the foresking of our flesh but of our hearts not to keep a Sabbath by the external rest of the body ceasing from motion but by the internal rest of the soul ceasing from sin and taking its repose in God Not to offer the blood of bullocks but to be ready to offer our own blood for Gods glory not to abstain from certain kinds of meats but to use them all with sobriety for the chastisement of the body and sometimes to use none at all for the advantage of the soul And whereas other Religions have too much of Mammon in them to teach men to forsake their estates ours teacheth us to forsake our selves nor if I had the tongue of men and Angels were I able to express the incomparable purity of that faith whereby we are taught to hope in God not only above hope but also against it in the midst of death to hope for life in the extremity of Justice to hope for mercy and so wholly to trust God with our souls as not to hope for salvation but only to glorifie him thereby desiring his glory equally with our own eternal bliss or rather above it Nor if I had a Seraphins quill were I able to delineate the purity of that worship which teacheth us to pray for nothing but in relation to the honour and with subordination to the will of God and to rest secure in the deniall of temporal blessings whiles we rely upon the promises of those which are eternal This being such a purity as is above our Praise and yet required to come under our Practice plainly sheweth that our Religion is too much above our selves either to proceed from our own understanding or to depend upon our own wills and consequently that God alone was the first founder and is still the Master-builder and defender of it Nor doth our Christian Religion teach us this admirable purity and holiness only in conversing with our God but also in conversing with our selves not only in our duty towards God but also in our duty towards our neighbour Do but consider the ordinary offices of humanity and the Christian Religion will shew you there is some thing of Divinity in those offices for that teacheth you to relieve your brother not only as a member of your own body having the same flesh and blood with your self which is according to the office of humanity but also to relieve him as a member of your Saviours body as a member of God the Son as a temple of God the Holy-Ghost which adds something of divinity to that office Humanitas quà m sit proprium hominis ipsum nomen indicat shew the offices of Humanity to another man for your own sake because you are a man unless you would be accounted a beast was a forcible argument for men to be curteous and friendly one to another before Christ came in the flesh But now that argument must be strained to a higher pitch and we must say shew the offices of humanity to another man for the Son of Gods sake because you are a Christian unless you would be accounted not a beast but a devil So undeniable is the argument of the Christian Religion for the practise of Charity So inexcusable are Christians above other men for the practice of uncharitableness For surely we cannot deny but this doctrine of doing good to all and hurt to none for Christs sake is nowhere to be found but among Christians though their practise in this yron age of the hard-hearted world hath much disagreed from this doctrine As for the Turks religion it was born in the camp smells of the camp lives by the camp it was brought in by the sword savours of the sword is preserved and propagated by the Sword And yet in this respect shame it is to say it but the shame is theirs of whom it may be truly said many Christians are of late turned Turks So that the black-mouthed calumnie of Calvino-Turcismus is in this sense a Truth and the retaliation of that by Papismo-Turcismus is in this sense not to be thought a calumnie for both Protestants and Papists as much as they have of cutting of purses and cutting of throats in their late inhumane rapines and butcheries so much they have of Turcism not of Christianity For that hath said If thine enemy hunger feed him if he thirst give him drink Rom. 12. 20. That is strive to make thine enemy thy friend by overcoming evil with good but in no case to make thy friend and much less thy God thine enemy by overcoming good with evil And indeed this mild voice is only the voice of the Christian religion For even the Jew who came neerest to God and his goodness did nevertheless say An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth and thou shalt love thy neighbour but hate thine enemy T is only the Christians hath learned this lesson from the mouth of their master Love your enemies blâ—ss them that curse you and do good to them that hate you and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you that ye may be the children of your father which is in heaven Mat. 5. 42. As much then as love is above hatred blessing above cursing forgiving above reviling relieving above revenging and praying above persecuting or in one word heaven above hell so much is the Christians Religion above all other religions in the offices of humanity or in the conversation of man with man Again look upon the conversation of man with woman and you shall find the Christian is taught and the good Christian doth practice a greater chastity in his marriage then other men look after in their virginity He knows he is bound to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour not in the lust of concupiscence even as the Gentiles which know not God 1 Thes 4. 1. and therefore will take heed of making his remedy his disease of adding oyle to the fire of provoking that lust of concupiscence which he should banish and expel for what he retains of lust that he loses of sanctification and honour in his body and of the knowledge of God in his soul This chast consideration being grounded in the hearts of good Christians will either keep them innocent or make them penitent whereas other men that know not this Doctrine or regard it not do let loose the rains of their concupiscence and are further from chastity in their virginity then these men are in their marriage For the one follow the Apostles advice It remaineth that they who have wives be as though they had none 1 Cor. 7. 29. The other
be the Spirit of God dwell in you and if any man have not the Spirit of Christ Rom. 8. 9. The Spirit of God and the Spirit of Christ are one and the same Spirit for Christ is God And it were also to deny the greatest and chiefest comfort of Christianity which is this That the Spirit of Christ dwelleth in us to revive our souls now from the death of sin to revive our bodies hereafter from the death of the grave the Apostle plainly attributeth thr Resurrection of the soul from sin and of the body from death only to the dwelling of Christs Spirit in us Rom. 8. 10. And if Christ be in you the body is dead because of sin but the spirit is life because of righeeousness there 's the resurrection of the soul from sin and again ver 11. If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his spirit that dwelleth in you There 's the resurrection of the body from death And this is also from the Spirit that dwelleth in us as well as the other the Spirit of Christ raiseth the soul from sin the Spirit of Christ raiseth the body from death so that to deny the Holy Ghost to be the Spirit of Christ is to deny both our Regeneration and our Resurrection Wherefore this being of so dangerous a consequence The Master of the sentences would not impute this Tenent to the Greek Church as if they denyed the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son though they would not say in their Creed I believe in the Holy Ghost the Lord and giver of life who proceedeth from the Father and the Son but only who proceedeth from the Father who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified But he saith plainly that the Greek Church did agree with the Latine Church concerning that Article of Faith in sense though not in words Sensu nobis conveniunt dum aiunt Spiritum Sanctum esse Patris Filii They agree with us in the sense whilst they say that the Holy Ghost is the Spirit of the Father and of the Son only we speak a little more plainly saying who proceedeth from the Father and the Son nor are we to be blamed saith he for adding to the Creed much less to be anathematized because our addition is not of a contrary assertion but of a necessary interpretation Nos enim non praedicamus contrarium sed addimus quod deerat ideoque non subjecti anathemati Lomb. 1. Sent. Dist 11. He is more careful to justifie his own Church for adding to the Creed then to condemn the Greek Church for not allowing that addition But his Scholars are not so moderate for Aquinas taxes Damascene of Nestorianism in the case and saith he was carried away with the Schism of the Greeks Damascenus sequitur errorem Nestorii Quod Sp. S. non procedit à Filio quia fuit tempore quo incepit illud Schisma Graecorum Aqu. 3. par qu. 36. art 2. ad 3. And Bonaventure is yet much mor fierce when he saith that the Greek Church denyed this article out of ignorance pride and perverseness Graecos negâsse hunc articulum ex ignorantiâ superbiâ pertinaciâ Bonav in lib. 1. sent dist 11. Three unmerciful words from a Church-mans mouth against a whole Church and surely altogether underserved For the Greek Church always acknowledged the Holy Ghost to be consubstantial with the Son as well as with the Father as appears by the Confession of Faith exhibited by Charisius in the Council of Ephesus in the sixth Action 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Spirit of truth the comforter being of the same essence or substance with the Father and the Son which plainly shews the Greek Church did not deny the article though they were loth to change their Creed wherein they found it was thus expressed Who proceedeth from the Father no mention at all made of the Son For this is their own profession in the Council of Florence in the 25. Session 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 We have our Creed from seven general Councils and weneither add thereto nor take therefrom And t is evident that the Latine Church it self did a long time demurr about this addition of Filioque to the Greek Creeds Nay Leo the third did strongly oppose it and that not only Papally in his Chair but also Episcopally in his Chancel for he did absolutely refuse this addition when he was thereto intreated by Charles the great and did set up the Creed over the Altar at Rome without it nor did Filioque get into the Article till the time of Benedict the seventh saith Binius in Syn. Constant which was above nine hundred and fifty years after Christ and about six hundred years after the divulging of that Creed But without doubt the Addition it self is to be justified for it was not Additio corrumpentium Symbolum sed perficientium as saith Bonaventure not an addition to corrupt the Creed but to perfect it or rather an explication not an addition as Bellarmine seems to distinguish Explicatio Doctrine non additio contrarii but the manner of maintaining it seems altogether unjustifiable For those of the Latine Church shewed little temper and as little charity in rejecting the Greek Church for hereticks which was trampled on enough by Turks and needed not Christians to help tread it more under foot for not admitting the same addition meerly because they thought themselves under the curse which the Latines are willing to put off by a distinction if they should recede but one tittle or syllable from the language of their own Creeds But this it seems was the fault of the Greek Church which hath been ever since accounted damnable Schism in all other Churches they could not swallow much less digest that crude position Ad summum Pontificem pertinet fidei Symbolum ordinare It belongs to the Pope to order and dispose of the Creeds A position so unreasonable that Aquinas himself the greatest Master of reason among all the Schoolmen is fain to fly to Gratians decree to fetch a proof for it and that proof depends altogether upon the Authority of some few Popes who were very partial Judges in their own cause This is clear that the objection about Athanasius his Creed doth so puzzle him that he is fain in effect to say his Creed is no Creed because he cannot find the Popes hand was in the making of it Athanasius non composuit manifestationem fidei per modum Symboli sed per modum cuiusdam Doctrin◠Athanasius did not set out this manifestation of the faith as a Creed but as a Doctrinal institution notwithstanding the very title of it in Greek is the same which is prefixed to the Apostles Creed and the Latine Church calleth it Symbolum Athanasii unto this day It is not suitable with my purpose and much less with my desire
communicating of himself Praesens autem est in quantum praesentat seu praesentem facit beatitudinem quae est in ipso in habitu tantum ut in parvulis in affectu tantum ut in adultis in habitu effectu et intellectu ut in beatis saith that excellent Schoolman Alensis par 3. qu. 61. God is then present with the soul when he represents unto it his own blessedness either in habit or disposition as in children that know him not and yet love him or in desire or affection as to men that know him and love him or in a habit desire and comprehension as to the blessed souls that not only know and love but also enjoy him So that according to the degrees of Gods presence are also the degrees of his communion where his presence is incompleat and imperfect as in grace there his communion is so too where his presence is compleat and perfect as in glory there so also is his communion But it is best for us to examine the effects of our communion with God in the presence of his grace that so we the more may undoubtedly attain to a communion with him in the presence of his glory And these effects are excellently set down in few words by the Casuists saying Spirituale bonum Divinum consistit in amicitia inter Deum hominem ac per hoc in consentire conversari convivere colloqui cum Deo The blessing of the soul consists in this that a man hath friendship or communion with God and consequently that he lives for him by consent lives to him by conversation lives with him by cohabitation lives in him by contentation I will briefly explain them all that the good Christian may know his own happiness in that he is called to live in this communion by vertue whereof First he lives for God by consent Fiat volunt as tuaâ— Thy will be done is a petition twice sanctified unto us by our Saviours own lips in two several prayers One of them taught us by his Doctrine in the Mount Mat. 6. So that we cannot contemn his prayer but we must also contemn his Sermon The other taught us by his practice or example Mat. 26. 42. where he made but one speech yet three prayers he prayed the third time saying the same words ver 44 It was one and the same expression of his voice it was not one and the same elevation of his soul therefore he prayed the third time though he spake but his first words We place the gift of prayer in the volubility of our tongues our Saviour placed it in the groans of his heart He prayed thrice in the same words we use many words scarce pray at all It is the heart that pants it not the tongue that chants it out when we truly say Thy will be done Conformitas in volito formali must be in all our desires where in volito materiali cannot be Here was a conformity of our Saviours will with Gods will in what he desired formally in his intention though a seeming non-formity in what he desired materially in his expression And so it must ever be with us For we are most sure that in this case the Non Conformist cannot be a good Christian but the want of conformity is the want of Christianity The second effect of this communion is that the good Christian lives to God by conversation T is a pleasant contemplation of Aquinas that local distance is no impediment in the Angels conversing one with another or speaking one to the other because that is a meer intellectual operation In loquutione Angelorum nullum impedimentum praestat localis distantia quia est mere intellectualis operatio Aqu. 1. par qu. 107. art 4. But t is a much more comfortable assertion of the Apostle that the distance of heaven from earth cannot hinder the conversation of man with God for so much he plainly asserteth when he saith For our conversation is in heaven for whence also we look for the Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ Phil. 3. 20. In which words the Apostle affordeth us three observations concerning the heavenly conversation of good Christians 1. that it is nothing else but a serious study and exercise of Christian piety in imitation of Christ to whom they are always lifting up their eyes and their hearts 2. that they only are true Christians who firmly and constantly exercise this piety for they only have true faith in Christ they only have a firm hope of immortality 3. that we have all two great Motives for this exercise the one is that Christ our Saviour on whom all our hopes rely and in whom all our joys are fixed is in heaven thefore what have we to do on earth The other is that the same Christ will at the last day come from heaven to judge us according to the works that we have done therefore if we will have a favourable judgement we must have an innocent conversation Conversation is but a frequent conversion and requires our often turning to God by our repentance as we often turn away from him by our sins The third effect of this communion is that he lives with God by cohabitation I am crucified with Christ nevertheless I live yet not I but Christ liveth in me and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God Gal. 2. 20. Saint Paul by this losing his life did indeed save it had he kept his life in himself he might have lost it by a temporal a spiritual an eternal death for he would have been subject to the separation of his body from his soul of his soul from grace and of his soul and body from God But having lost his life in himself that he might keep it in his Saviour he keeps it for ever He keeps his natural life which else he could not but lose for his dissolution is not to him a death but only a change making good his We shall all be changed even before the last day for he had a change only when others had a death Our departure hence if looked upon as a change is our greatest consolation for it must needs be much for the better because our corruptible shall thereby put on incorruption our mortal shall put on immortality But if looked upon as a death must needs be our greatest horror and confusion for that can only tell us of the destroying not of the amending or bettering our present state and condition He keeps also his spiritual life so continuing as moreover improving it His soul being more knit and united with grace then before which is the spiritual life the union of the soul with grace for though we suppose it the same grace yet the soul must needs be united to it the more neerly and the more firmly the longer it abides in the communion of Christ the fountain of grace But we may well suppose the good Christian to grow
yet he will not forsake us for ever The Psalmist that asks the question Will the Lord absent himself for ever and will he be no more intreated Is his mercy clean gone for ever and is his promise come utterly to an end for evermore Hath God forgotten to be gracious and will he shut up his loving kindness in displeasure Answers it negatively in that he checks himself for asking it saying It is mine own infirmity Psalm 77. 8 9 10. And agreeable to this Doctrine is that distinction of the Schools desertio explorationis Poenae There is a twofold spiritual desertion a Desertion of tryal and of punishment by the first God may and often doth withdraw his presence from his best servants to prove them but not by the second to punish them taking punishment properly not as the chastisement of a loving Father but as the vengeance of an angry Judge Thus saith the Evangelist Jesus having loved his own which were in the world he loved them unto the end John 13. 1. If he had not loved them he would never have come to them and loving them to the end how shall he depart from them And lest we should think this peculiarly spoken of the Apostles contrary to that rule of Rom. 4. 23 24. Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him but for us also to whom it shall be imputed where we may plainly see that the Scripture though it often is but particular in the occasion yet is alwayes universal in the instruction I say lest we should think this occasionally spoken of the Apostles Saint Paul saith it also Doctrinally of all others whom God hath been pleased to call to his communion Who shall also confirm you unto the end that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ 1 Cor. 1. 8. And he gives the reason of his Doctrine in the next verse God is faithful by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord as if he had said he hath converted you and he will confirm you not for a while but unto the end and the reason is because he is faithful He hath called you to the fellowship or the communion of his Son Jesus Christ and he will keep and confirm you in it unto the end He forsakes not the fellowship which himself hath ordained for he is faithful He hath ordained that you should have fellowship with him in his Son and he is so faithful to his own ordination that he gives his Holy Spirit to call you to and keep you in that fellowship to the intent you may be joyned with him in the communion of grace till he bring you to the communion of glory So that the fault is wholly our own if God make not his perpetual abode with us after once he is come unto us T is because either we do not stick to our Saviour the Son of his love or because we do stick to our sins which he cannot love For he will not constantly abide either with an unfaithful or with an unfruitful soul The unfaithfull soul forsakes his communion the unfrui tfll soul forgets it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Aristotle Children are the bond of Wedlock Nay God saith so too Now this time will my husband be joyned unto me because I have born him three sons Gen. 29. 34. Therefore was his name called Levi The Levite had his name from conjunction for shame let him not be the author of separation And again yet more fully God hath endued me with a good dowry now will my husband dwell with me because I have born him six sons and she called his name Zebulon Gen. 30. 20. Zebulon id est donum cohabitationis saith Tremelius Donatum filium ad conciliandam cohabitationem viri a pledge or pawn of the husbands dwelling with his wife and delighting in her society So is it also in the Spiritual Matrimony in the Marriage of the soul with Christ That he may betroth us unto himself for ever he doth betroth us in righteousness and judgement in loving-kindness and in mercies and in faithfulness Hos 2. There is righteousness and faithfulness as well as there is loving-kindness and mercy in this blessed wedlock Righteousness and faithfulness required on our parts as well as loving-kindness and mercies on his part and we must take heed of losing the righteousness and the faithfulness for fear we should lose the loving-kindness and the mercies Gratia est habitus mentis totius vit◠ordinativus Grace is a habit of the mind ordering the whole life saith Alensis par 3. qu. 61. m. 2. In what but in righteousness Grace ordereth the whole life in righteousness will not suffer any part of it to be spent in unrighteousness so likewise saith Saint Paul Grace reigneth through righteousness to eternal life Rom. 5. 21. Take away the righteousness take away the reign of grace take away the reign of grace and farewell to the reign of glory unless you will look for glory without eternal life O blessed Jesus who art the only guest and joy of religious souls I confess that I am not worthy thou shouldest once come under my roof yet I beseech thee to make me fit for thine everlasting abode That I being faithfull and fruitfull in all righteousness unto the death may receive of thee a Crown of life who didst dye for my sins and rise again for my Justification and now sittest on the right hand of God making intercession for me Thou hast been the Mediator of this blessed communion betwixt God and my soul O be thou also the preserver of it that in it and for it I may bless and praise thee with the Father and the Holy Ghost one God world without end Amen Christ reteined in the true Christian Communion Now I beseech you brethren mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the Doctrine which ye have learned and avoid them for they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ but their own belly and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple Rom. 16. 17 18. Nec Haereticus pertinet ad Ecclesiam Catholicam quae diligit Deum Nec Schismaticus quoniam diligit Proximum Aug. de fide Symbolo cap. 10. Neither doth a Heretick belong to the Catholick Church because she loves God nor a Schismatick because she loves her neighbour The Prooem Christian Communion is to be considered in its Authority in its Excellency and in its Sincerity GReat are the divisions of wicked and ungodly men whilst at first they run away from God and as great are their distractions when at last they run away from one another It is their sin that they will needs be at enmity with God it is their punishment that they cannot but be at enmity among themselves This small Treatise endeavours either to keep us from this great misery or to recover us out of
69. super Cantic Si sensero aperiri mihi sensum ut intelligâ—m Scripturas aut uberiores desursum influere animo meditationum imbres non ambigo sponsum adesse Verbi siquidem hae copiae sunt de plenitudine ejus ista accipimus If I perceive my understanding opened to understand the Scripture or the influence and distillation of heavenly meditations upon my soul I cannot doubt but the Bridegroom is at hand for these are the armies that the word doth march withall and it is from his fulness that my soul is thus filled The second proof of our communion with Christ is this that we continue and abide in his love and this is a consequent of the former as it is said ver 10. If ye keep my commandments ye shall abide in my love No keeping of his commandments no abiding in his love Wherefore the Solifidian is in a dangerous condition who seeks not to joyn obedience to his faith For he abides not in the love of Christ and how then can he expect that Christ should interpose his death and passion betwixt the judgement of God and his sinful soul since that interposition is clearly the greatest effect that can be of Christs love Greater love hath no man then this that a man lay down his life for his friends John 15. 13. Our blessed Saviour dyed for his enemies but none shall have the benefit of his death in the day of Judgement but only his friends and none are his friends but they that abide in his love and none abide in his love but they that keep his commandments if not by their righteousness yet at least by their repentance The third proof of our communion with Christ is this that his joy remaineth in us ver 11. These things have I spoken unto you sc the things that belong to your abiding in me that my joy might remain in you and that your joy might be full Lord what a mercy is it that thy joy doth come unto us much more that it doth remain in us And from whence coâ—â—â—h thy joy but from the testimony of thy Holy Spirit that thou hast reconciled us unto the Father and from the testimony of our own consciences that we do not abide in any sin to hinder the comfort and hazard the fruit of that reconciliation This is the very joy of the Holy Ghost a joy not heard of but amongst Christian a joy not found but amongst good Christians who have the Spirit of Christ witnessing with their spirits that they are the children of God and if children then heirs heirs of God and joynt-heirs with Christ if so be that they suffer with him that they may be also glorified together Rom. 8. 16 17. T is not all the losses of the earth can discourage those who are the heirs of heaven t is not all the sufferings of this world can dismay those who have the joy of the next world because they know they can be losers and sufferers only for a time but they are sure they shall have gain and glory for ever SECT II. That our communion with Christ is as our participation of Christ exteral or internal The one may be the communion of hypocrites the other only of good Christians The way to be a good Christian in a bad Church NO man can hope to be wise without wisdom righteous without righteousness holy without holiness true without truth or to see without light or to live without life And therefore no man can hope to be wise righteous holy true or to see or to live without Christ for he of God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification 1 Cor. 1. 30. and he alone is the light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world John 1. 9. and he alone is the truth and the life John 14. 6. Therefore we must have Communion with him or we cannot have wisdom righteousness sanctification truth light or life from him But how can we have communion with Christ since He is in heaven and we are on earth I answer as we can partake of him so we can communicate with him For participation and communion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are in Saint Pauls language equipollent one and the same thing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Quae participatio quae communio are set down as terms convertible 2 Cor. 6. 14. So far therefore as we participate of Christ so far forth we communicate with Christ If we participate of him only externally whether in his Word or in his Sacraments we communicate with him only externally If we participate of him internally we communicate also with him internally according to that excellent determination of that irrefragable Doctor upon this question An mali pertineant ad unionem capitis cum corpore Ecclesiae whether wicked men belong to that Union of the Church wherein Christ as head is united with the body which question he determines in the negative saying thus Mali quidem sunt in unitate Ecclesiae dummodo habent fidem rectam ut zizania cum tritico Mat. 13. sed non sunt in unitate corporis Ecclesiae sunt ergo de Ecclesia sed non de corpore Ecclesiae nam ut in corpore humano est unio membrorum duplex sc materialis per nervos formalis per vitam sic in corpore Ecclesiae est duplex unio membrorum una quasi materialis quae est per fidem alia formalis quae est per charitatem Alâ—n. par 3. qu. 12. m. 2. ar 3. Wicked men are in the Unity of the Church as long as they profess the true faith as the tares are with the wheat Mat. 13. But they are not in the unity of the body of the Church therefore they are of the Church but not of the body of the Church For as in the body of a man there is a twofold Union of the members to wit a material union by nerves ligaments and a formal union by spirit and life so in the body of the Church there is a twofold union of the members the one as it were a material union in the outward profession of the same Christian Faith the other a formal union in the inward affection and love of that Faith which they profess And hence is that distinction of Aquinas for Stapleton and the later writers have it from him Quidam sunt de Ecclesiae numero tantum quidam merito numero Some men are members of the Christian Church only in their number or in their persons some also in their merit or in their Dispositions some men partake of the Word and Sacraments only with their ears and with their mouths but others partake of them also with their hearts as it is said of the blessed Virgin-mother She kept all these sayings in her heart Luke 2. 51. the one we may say are Christs external the other his internal communicants And the Apostle in the same place useth three other
my hands accept of any offering SECT XIII A new song for the coming of Christ God the Father Son and Holy Ghost carefully observed the time of our Saviours coming into the world therefore it can be no true piece of Reformation for men not to observe it THE Church had a new song put into her mouth meerly for the knowledge of the great mercy of her Saviours Nativity How much more then for the enjoyment of it He hath put a new song in my mouth saith the Psalmist even a Thanksgiving to our God Psalm 40. 3. And Saint Paul tells us wherefore this new song was put into his mouth in that he applyes this very Psalm to the coming of our Saviour Christ Heb. 10. 5 c. Wherefore when he cometh into the world he saith Sacrifice and offering thou wouldst not but a body hast thou prepared me which words are quoted out of this same very Psalm and point as directly at Christs coming into the flesh as that finger of the Baptist did point at him after he was come when he said Behold the Lamb of God which finger for that very cause as some would perswade us could not be burnt with the rest of his body Gentiles ossa collegerant cumbusserant sed digitus ille quo Dominum ad Jordanum venientem monstravit dicens ecce agnus Dei non potuit comburi Durandus in rationali lib. 7. de decollatione S. Johannis This was indeed a sufficient cause why a New song should be put in the mouth even of the sweet singer of Israel To shew that great was his Thanksgiving yet greater his Thankfulness for this inestimable and undeserved mercy as it appears Psalm 40. 6 7. O Lord my God great are thy wonderous works which thou hast done like as be also thy thoughts which are to us-ward If I would declare them and speak of them they should be more then I am able to express And all these wonderous works and thoughts are summed up together by the Apostle in this saying when he cometh into the world as indeed they were consummated and compleated by Christ himself in his coming when he cometh into the world he saith And yet the words were said above five hundred years before he came It seems God the Son was so long before observing the time of his own coming into the world surely not that the sons of men should labour to forget and resolve not to observe it And God the Father did the like Heb. 1. 6. When he bringeth in the first begotten into the world he saith And let all the Angels of God worship him Pointing as it were at the very day of Christs Nativity or coming into the world yet some men perswade themselves they do enough if they believe his going out of the world and think only upon his Death and Passion And God the Holy Ghost did the same as being the Pen-man and Interpreter of these Texts and the Applyer of them to our blessed Saviour For he it was that spake both by the Prophets and by the Apostles God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Ghost did look and point very punctually at Christs coming into the world Telling the Angels of it that they might worship him and the Angels accordingly sing a most heavenly Hymn of Thanksgiving at his Birth not only in heaven for their own Joy and Exultation for which they are alwaies singing to him there but also on the earth or at least very near it so near as that the Shepherds did both hear and see them singing for our comfort and imitation And therefore it cannot justly be accounted a Piece of Reformation to teach men to look away as far as they can from that time wherein the Church doth celebrate the memorial of Christs coming as if God who had bid the Angels worship him had bid men not worship him which is surely a strain of very bad Logick and of far worse Divinity SECT XIV Everlasting Thankfulness is due to God for this Everlasting Mercy THE Psalmist teacheth us a Lesson of everlasting Thankfulness for this everlasting Mercy as appears Psalm 72. The chief argument of the Psalm is Christ as is proved in the 8. and 9. verses from the extent of his Dominion far beyond Solomons even to the worlds end and much more in the 10. and 11. verses from the excellency of his Person That All Kings should fall down before him And particularly That the Kings of Arabia and Saba should bring him gifts which was literally fulfilled in the Presents of the wise men Mat. 2. who by the Antients were both called and reputed Kings And the Conclusion that is inferred from these Premises is Thanksgiving The argument of the Psalm is everlasting mercy even the mercy of God to man in Christ and the Conclusion of it is everlasting Thankfulness for so it follows ver 18. 19. Blessed be the Lord God even the God of Israel which only doth wonderous things and this wonderous thing above all the rest That the Son of God was made the Son of man that we who were by nature the children of wrath might be made the Sons of God there 's the Thankfulness And blessed be the name of his Majesty for ever and all the earth shall be filled with his Majesty Amen Amen There 's the everlasting Thankfulness Heaven was from the first instant of its creation filled with his Majesty but now the earth was also filled with it And if heaven and earth are both filled with his Majesty what shall we say if our sinful souls be empty For if we be not filled with his Majesty How shall we come to be filled with his Mercy SECT XV. Time not perfect in Gods account from our Creation but from our Redemption The Jews not destroyed and Time not Vntimed meerly in relation to the coming of Christ Time still continued for the world to make a right use of his coming No other Time perfect in Gods account but that wherein he gives his Son and no other Time should be perfect in our account but that wherein we receive him GOD accounted that only the Perfection of Time wherein he wrought the work of our Redemption as if all that had passed before that from the beginning of the Creation had been but an imperfect Time He had no rest in the Creation till he made man He had no rest after it till he Redeemed him Divinely Saint Ambrose in his Hexameron and not the less Divinely because he took it out of Saint Basil for the Latine Fathers borrowed of the Greek-Fathers as later Divines have since borrowed from them Fecit Deus coelum non lego quod requieverit fecit solem lunam stellas nec ibi lego quod requieverit sed lego quod fecerit Hominem tunc requieverit habens câ—i Peccata dimitteret God made Heaven and I do not read that he did rest He made the Earth and I do not read that
to man in teaching him how to rejoyce for his Redemption Hymns expressing that joy may be only to the honour of God and directed to him The evil spirit silenced at the coming of Christ but the mouth of the good Spirit was opened THere is no man but naturally desires joy and delight as a remedy against his labours naturaliter appetit delectationes medicinas contra labores sensuum motuum saith Aquinas The reason why the natural man looks so much after his delights is because he looks upon them as medicines to heal his sicknesses or as remedies against the continual labours of his sense and of his motion And for this reason the spiritual man ought much more to look after his spiritual delights because he is much more under the labours of sense and motion then is the natural man for there is no sense so irksom as the sense of Gods wrath and of mans unworthiness and no motion so toilsom as that which seeks to climb up from earth to heaven and this is the sense this is the motion of the spiritual man he is continually feeling the burden of flesh and much more of sin upon his soul there 's his sense He is continually panting and â—ighing after God for rest there 's his motion In so great a labour both of his sense and of his motion how should he be able to subsist if it were not for the comfort of spiritual delight which proceeds only from Gods Holy Spirit For delight cannot be but from some good that is convenient and present and known to be so Ad delectationem duo requiruntur conjunctio boni convenientis cognitio hujus conjunctionis saith the same Aquinas A man cannot have delight without two things first the conjunction or acquisition of some convenient good then the knowledge of that conjunction so is it in this case The Redemption of our souls from death is undoubtedly both a convenient and a present good and yet few men have true joy and delight from it because few apprehend it as actually present Wherefore it is the singular gift and love of God the Holy Ghost to any man to give him the true knowledge of his Saviour that he may give him the true joy of his salvation For this indeed is the joy in the Holy Ghost and comes only from him It is he that teacheth the Church Militant to sing a new song on earth for her joy in Christ it is he that teacheth the Church Triumphant to sing a new song in heaven for the same joy O sing unto the Lord a new song saith the Psalmist Psal 98. and that Psalm is nothing else but a song of Joy and Thanksgiving for the Redemption of mankind by Jesus Christ there 's the new song on earth and again Rev. 5. 9. They sung a new song saying Thou art worthy to take the Book and to open the seals thereof for thou wast slain and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood there 's the new song in heaven to express the joy of the same Redemption For the Holy Spirit teacheth them to practise this new song in earth who are to sing their part of it in heaven For those men are not like to come to Abrahams bosom who are not Abrahams sons and those men are not yet Abrahams sons who have not his faith and do not his works Now this was the Faith of Abraham to see the day of Christ and this was his work to joy in that sight John 8. 56. Your Father Abraham rejoyced to see my day and he saw it and was glad 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exultavit gestivit He rejoyced and he desired to express his joy His desire encreased his joy and his joy inflamed his desire He did see it a far off by faith the eye of his soul and he desired to see it nearer by sense with the eye of his body the joy of the one did not hinder but advance the joy of the other for if the heart of them must rejoice that seeke the Lord Psal 105. 3. then much more must the heart of them rejoce that have found him Accordingly good Christians do indeede shew no other then Abrahams faith by desiring to looke on Christ and no other then Abrahams worke by rejoycing in that vision which we may well suppose was the cause that the Latine Church antiently used and still useth some such peculiar hymns before the nativity of Christ as it is hard to determine whether they have more of desire in them to see his day comming or of joy to see it come our Calander still retains the memory of the first of those hymns which was O sapientia on the 17 of December but the hymns themselves in the Latine Church hold out till Christmas eve I will give you a short scheme of them 1. O Sapientia veni ad docendum nos viam prudentiae O Thou who art the eternal wisdom of God come and Teach us the way of true wisedom 2. O Adonai veni ad redimendum nos in brachio extento O thou who art the Lord of might come and redeem us by thy mighty hand 3. O radix Jesse veni ad liberandum nos O thou root of Jesse come and deliver us 4. O Clavis David veni educ vinctum de domo carceris O thou Key of David come and open the prison doors and let out the Prisoners 5. O oriens splendor lucis aeternae veni illumina sedentes in tenebris umbrâ mortis O thou Day-spring of eternal light come and enlighten us who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death 6. O Rex gentium salva hominem quem de limo formasti O thou who art the King of the Nations come and save man whom thou hast formed of the dust of the earth 7. O Emanuel veni ad salvandum nos Domine Deus noster O thou who art God with us be also a God to us and save us O Lord our God These greater and more solemn hymns called Antiphone majores were at first made only in the honour of Christ though in process of time after the Invocation of Saints had crept into the Church there were two more added to them O Thoma Didyme and O virgo Virginum as Hugo testifieth in his Commentary upon the 38. Psalm which now the office it self of the blessed Virgin blusheth at and taketh no notice of at all and it were to be wished it had left out other prayers to the Blsseed Virgin which are as grosly superstitious as were those Hymns For they that believe Christ to be God must confess him to be a jealous God and that he hath said I am the Lord that is my name and my glory will I not give to another Isa 42. 8. and what is his glory but that of Prayer and of Praise Accordingly it is observable that at the time of his coming in the flesh the Oracles of Jupiter Apollo Hecate were
not find So should every one of us keep the feast of our Christian Passeover cleanse our vessels from the leaven of all sin and wickedness then search the corners of our hearts to find it out then burn and consume what we have found then detest and abandon what we cannot find crying out with a hearty sorrow and repentance never to be repented of Who can tell how oft he offendeth O cleanse thou me from my secret faults Psal 19. 12. Secret not only to others but also to my self He that so heartily repents of the sins he knows not doth much more repent of those he knows And indeed the Paschal Lamb might not be eaten without bitter herbs nor can Christ be received without sorrow and bitterness of Spirit so as to become the nourishment of our souls and those men are grosly mistaken who think they can receive him by faith alone without repentance for who dares preach Christ otherwise then he preached himself and that was by repentance So saith the Evangelist Jesus began to preach and to say Repent Mat. 4. 17. We cannot phansie but we may weep our selves into our Saviours mercy nor can we truly rely upon his righteousness by faith till we have first bewailed our own unrighteousness by repentance And indeed the strange faith that some of late have desired and devised and therefore devised because they desired it of being in Christ whiles they be in malice injustice disobedience profaneness perversness and other such like grievous sins is much like the strange woman spoken of in the Proverbs Her lips drop as a honey-comb and her mouth is sweeter then oyl but her end is bitter as wormwood Porv. 5. 3 4. for such a faith begins in honey and oyl promising salvation with much sweetness and smoothness but its end is as bitter as wormwood for it bringeth death and damnation upon the soul Sixthly and lastly The Paschal Lamb was to be eaten whole and to be eaten only by the circumcised So Christ is to be taken whole in all the Doctrines of the Christian faith That which he hath commanded is as necessary to salvation as that which he hath promised and we may not expect to inherit his promises if we neglect and disobey his commands not a bone of his natural body was broken by the Jew nor may a bone of his spiritual or of his mystical body be broken by the Christian They brake the legs of the malefactors who were not yet dead but they brake not the legs of Christ Saint John 19. so may the Magistrate break the legs and stop the proceedings of malefactors especially if they be not yet dead to their sins by a hearty repentance and amendment of life but he may not break the legs of Christ or crush any of those whom Christ hath appointed to be the supporters of Christianity Again we must remember that unless the Jew was circumcised he had no right to eat of the Paschal Lamb So we Christians may not hope to receive Christ unless we be spiritually circumcised in our ears and in our hearts in our ears to hear his voice in our hearts to obey it Else it were possible for us so to receive God the Son as to resist God the Holy Ghost for so saith Saint Stephen Act. 7. 51. ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in hearts and ears ye do alwaies resist the Holy Ghost The uncircumcised in hearts and ears cannot be the receivers of Christ because they are the resisters of his Spirit because they resist the Holy Ghost SECT IV. The great vertue of this Propitiation and the great goodness wisdom justice and power of God in finding it for us and giving it to us WHere shall a good Christian look for comfort but in the Word of comfort what word of comfort like that which proceeded immediately from the Comforter And what text so comfortable in that word as that which assures us not only of God the Holy Ghost but also of God the Son to be our Assistant and Advocate to intercede for us For we may have the assistance of the Holy Ghost and yet say My God my God why hast thou forsaken me when we seriously consider how often we have deserved to be forsaken But there is nothing to discomfit or dismay an offender though his offences be never so many and great if he may be sure that his Judge will be his friend to absolve and to acquit him Now we all believe that the Son of God is to be our Judge and therefore must needs be most rejoyced with that saying that assures us he will be our friend in the Judgement and that saying is recorded 1 John 2. 1 2. If any man sin we have an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the righteous No greater friend to a poor Client that hath a bad cause then a good Advocate to plead for him unless it be a favourable and friendly Judge to absolve him And behold the Penitent sinner hath here both these joyned in one for the same Christ that is his Advocate to plead for him is also his Judge to absolve him And therefore he is called in the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is a Comforter the same title which is given to the Holy Ghost John 14. 16. I will pray the Father and he shall give you another Comforter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not only an Advocate but also a Comforter The Spirit of God is both the Son of God is both to the true Penitent The Spirit is our Advocate to make intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered Rom. 8. 26. And he is our Comforter to assist us in our Temptations and to stengthen us against them And so also is the Son our Advocate to make intercession for us with the Father And our Comforter in that the Father will not refuse nay more cannot resist his intercession For the same Christ who is the Advocate to plead for penitent sinners is also the propitiation for their sins to make good his own Plea as it followeth and he is the propitiation for our sins So that as he is our Advocate to undertake our cause so he is our Comforter to assist and to deliver our souls by one and the same Plea defending us against the Devil who will busily accuse us and delivering us from the fear of hell which will be ready to receive us in that he is our Advocate to plead for us before him and to prevail for us with him who alone is able to destroy both body and soul in hell So that our blessed Saviour is our 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in both senses as it signifies an Advocate and as it signifies a Comforter and indeed in one and the same respect as he is our Mediator is he both our Advocate and our Comforter Our Advocate to plead our cause our Comforter to rescue and to free our persons Wherefore we may with reverence and without derogation to the Spirit of
heaven and earth and all things in them above them and below them did so fully set forth the power of God as did this condescention that God was made man saith the same Father He looked upon it as an act of great power That God had emptied himself then that he had filled all the world CAP. III. Christ admired in his Satisfaction SECT I. The necessity of Christs satisfaction for that he was the only sacrifice to expiate sin NExt those Hereticks that oppose Christ in his person they are in the saddest condition who seek to oppose him in his Satisfaction for as the one overthroweth the foundation so the other hindereth the edification of the Christian Faith both acting the wicked parts of Sanballet and Geshem whiles true Christians with Nehemiah are labouring to build up the Temple of God For if there needed no satisfaction for sin why was the eternal Son of God offered up as a sacrifice for our sins And if we be indeed pattakers of his satisfaction what madness is it for us to rely upon our own Let the first question be seriously pondered there will be no Pelagian to deny original sin for fear he find not cause enough for the death of Christ if there were no sin of mans nature to be expiated Let the second question be seriously pondered there will be no Pharisee to maintain personal righteousness for fear he make not a right use of Christs death in that he thinks he hath not so great need as others of that his expiation Alexander Hales who was reputed and called the irrefragable Doctor is opposed by Aquinas his greatest admirer and by Bonaventure his choicest Schollar for teaching that Christ should have come into the world though with flesh not capable of suffering â—arne tamen impassibili if so be that Adam had not sinned The Angelical and Seraphical Doctors thought it unreasonable that Christ should come in the flesh not to suffer and shall not we think it irreligious to extenuate the vertue of his sufferings Sure we are that the whole creation of men and Angels are not able to satisfie the justice of God for one sin because there is no proportion betwixt their Satisfaction and his Justice for the one is finite the other is infinite And as sure we ought to be That God did not give us his Son to satisfie for our sins that we should question the necessity much less that we should undervalue the efficacy of his satisfaction For all other sacrifices were but Types of this great sacrifice which in the end of the world appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself Heb. 9. 26. Judah desired to be a bondman for Benjamin but he was his brother Saint Paul said He could wish himself accursed for the people of the Jews but they were also his brethren and his kinsmen But our Saviour Christ was contented to be made both a bondman and a Curse for us whiles we were yet his enemies His bondage was our freedom His Curse was our blessing but let not his love be our enmity for though he came to save us whiles we were his enemies yet he will not save us if we continue so O thou art my Priest to bring me unto God and my sacrifice to reconcile me to him make me to present my self body and soul as a living sacrifice unto thee that thou maist at the last day present me both in soul and body without spot and blemish unto thy heavenly Father in thine eternal and everlasting kingdom that though thou wilt then cease to be my Priest yet thou maist never cease to be my King SECT II. The commemoration of Christs sacrifice enjoyned not the repetition of it and that the Ordination of Ministers for administring the Sacraments not of Priests for the offering of Sacrifice is most agreeable with the institution of Christ and the constitution of a true Christian Church WE cannot consider Christ as a sacrifice but we must consider that sacrifice as a full expiation of and satisfaction for all our sins and consequently we must look upon it as such a sacrifice as may only be remembred but not repeated For other sacrifices shewed their own insufficiency by their often repetition they were offered year by year continually because they could not make the Commers thereunto perfect Heb. 10. 1. But this sacrifice is proved to have been sufficient because it is not again to be repeated So saith the Apostle ver 10. We are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all to say there is more offering were to say there is less Sanctification to say his body is more offered were to say that our souls are less Sanctified ver 11. And every Priest standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices which can never take away sins¿ This saepe in the Sacrifice is nunquam in the Satisfaction because there is an oftentimes in the offering there is a Never in the taking away of sins ver 12. But this man after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever sate down on the right hand of God This man hath so fully expiated all sin by one sacrifice that it is as absurd to think he may be sacrificed again as to confound his state of exaltatation with his state of humiliation or to think he may be brought again to his cross now he is sate down at the right hand of God And indeed our blessed Saviour himself in that he saith Do this in remembrance of me doth evidently call for the commemoration of his sacrifice upon the cross till his coming again for as long as he shall be out of sight He may not be out of mind whiles he cannot be seen he must be remembred But he that cals only for a commemoration doth in effect dissallow of a Repetition So that the burning of the blessed Sacrament into a sacrifice properly so called is neither sound divinity as they teach it nor sound devotion as they use it who by pretending to repeat and renew the corporal Sacrifice of Christ do in effect according to the Apostles rule bring it under the suspicion or at least leave it under the imputation of insufficiency for what is done once sufficiently as to all intents and purposes is in vain desired to be done again yet we deny not that Christ is offered in the holy Eucharist but we say he is offered mystically not corporally We deny not that he is also there Sacrificed but we say it is by way of Commemoration and representation not by way of renovation or repetition when Christ was corporally offered and sacrificed he himself alone was the Priest who was the Offering and the Sacrifice But he is still mystically offered and sacrificed by those Priests or Ministers who are obliged to continue the representation of his corporal offering and sacrifice though not the repetition of it Accordingly it is much to be observed that such as was
are espoused unto him Such a righteousness as will keep off sin from causing a Divorce He hath covered me with the robe of righteousness such a salvation as will keep off death from causing a dissolution in their marriage He hath clothed me with the garments of salvation Therefore I will greatly rejoyce in the Lord my soul shall be joyful in my God for neither shall my sins disturb this joy since I am covered with his righteousness nor shall my death diminish it since I am cloathed with his salvation To him be glory for this righteousness and for this salvation for evermore Amen Christ adored in his Resurrection CAP. I. That Christ is to be adored chiefly in his Resurrection SECT I. The resurrection of Christ the grand cause of joy to Christià ns but strongly opposed by the Jews whose Commentaries are not to be followed on those texts which concern our Saviour Christ though even those texts have not been corrupted by them WHat is the sorrow of the soul for sin we may partly see by every true penitent who cannot but say for his sins as our Saviour once said for them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 My soul is exceeding sorrowful even to the death Mat. 26. 38. But what is the sorrow of the soul for death the wages of sin God make us such true penitents that we may never see for if we are so unfit by reason of our impatience and so unable by râ—â—son of our infirmity to pass over the momentary sorâ—oâ—â— of the earth it must needs fill our souls with astonishment and confusion but once seriously to think of the sorrows the everlasting sorrows of hell Wherefore most welcom to the Christian soul is that joy which delivers it from this sorrow and that is the joy of Christs resurrection whereby we have been delivered from the sting and mischief of the temporal from the pangs horrours of the eternal death Accordingly it hath been observed by Christian Chronologers that our blessed Saviour did rise from the dead on that very same day of the year on which Moses and the children of Israel had almost two thousand years before passed safely through the red Sea And indeed as their deliverance by Moses from the Egyptians was a type of our deliverance by Christ from our spiritual bondage so their joy may well be in our hearts and their Song in our mouths only heightned by a greater measure of thankfulness and of thanksgiving for as much as ours hath of the two been infinitely the greater deliverance Therefore let me say as they did but let me say it with a more thankfull heart and with a more cheerfull voice for greater is my duty though lesser is my ability I will sing unto the Lord for he hath triumphed gloriously Exod. 15. 1. Never was so glorious a triumph as this which triumphed over the grave that devours all this worlds triumphs nay over Hell which makes the bare memory of them odious and detestable either that they were gained unjustly or used immoderately or abused intemperately The Lord is my strength and song and he is become my Salvation ver 2. What can my soul say more what should it say less for being delivered from the pangs and horrours of the temporal and eternal death but that the Lord is my Song for being my strength to rescue and to redeem me much more for being my salvation to receive me and to crown me Again Who is like unto thee O Lord amongst the Gods who is like unto thee glorious in holiness fearfull in praises doing wonders ver 11. Let me but think of the Son of God dying for my sins and rising from the dead to make me righteous and I must needs say he was glorious in holiness and ought to be fearfull in praises for doing such wonders as to bring glory out of shame holiness out of Sin and life out of death Lastly Thou in thy mercy hast led forth the people which thou hast redeemed Thou hast guided them in thy strength to thy holy habitation ver 13. All those Saints that did rise from the dead when our Saviour Christ arose to go along with him into heaven and all those Saints that shall rise hereafter by vertue of his resurrection to follow him thither can say no more then this to express their joy and thankfulness Thou hast led us forth from the grave thou hast redeemed us from death thou hast guided us in thy strength to thy holy habitation there to see and bless and enjoy thee for ever So that those late Hebr. Criticks are too much in love with the glosses of the Jews who oppose them against the Judgement of the whole Catholick Church that they may enervate one of the soundest proofs of the Resurrection that is to be found in all the Old Testament And that proof is Job 19. 25 26 27. I know that my redeemer liveth and that I shall rise out of the earth at the last day and shall be covered again with my skin and shall see God in my flesh Yea and my self shall behold him not with other but with these same eyes Words so expresly spoken of the resurrection that the Church hath thought fit to use them at the burial of the dead as the chiefest comfort and consolation against death yet upon these words thus saith the Learned Mercer Nostri ferè omnes tam veteres quà m recentiores hunc versiculum cum duobus sequentibus ad resurrectionem referunt sâ—d ego cum Hebraeis aliter accipio Quod si de resurrectione futura hic loqueretur Job non erant haud dubie id praetermissuri Hebraei qui ipsi resurrectionem credunt At ne unum quidem ex sex aut septem Hebraeorum commentariis invenies qui eò referat Almost all Christian writers ancient and modern do expound these three verses of the Resurrection but I with the Jews do expound them otherwise For if Job had here spoken of the resurrection to come doubtless the Hebrew doctors would not have pretermitted it in their Commentaries since they also believed this Doctrine but in six or seven of their Expositors there is not one that expounds these words of the resurrection This reason is unsound in it self and therefore unsatisfactory in its Proof For the Jewish expositors labour after nothing more then not to see Christ in the Old Testament And their Doctors knowing that the Christians did believe and profess the Resurrection of the dead by vertue of Christs resurrection had rather leave the doctrine of the resurrection out of their glosses then allow it to be by vertue of our blessed Saviour whom their fathers had crucified and whom themselves not only hated but also accursed and blasphemed every day Thus Saint Mathew tells us plainly that the Jews gave the Souldiers mony to say that our Saviours disciples came by night and stole him away And they that were so willing to put a lye in other mens mouths were as
doth not love those who do not love him and they do not love him who do not keep his commandments This is such a Doctrine as our Saviour did not think he could teach too much and therefore sure we cannot learn enough If ye love me keep my Commandments John 14. 15. and ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you John 15. 14. Love is the inchoation of friendship and that is not shewed without some obedience If ye love me keep my Commandments But friendship is the consummation of love and that is not shewed without an universal obedience Ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you he that will be thus universally obedient must be sure to interpret all Christs commands after the true rules of Logical supposition that an universal Affirmative must hold in every particular as thou shalt love thy neigbbour as thy self must reach to all mankind and to all offices of love thou shalt honour thy father must reach to all our governours and to all offices of reverence and honour We may not leave out any one particular either of the subject or of the predicate but we shall make a false supposition in Logick and a false interpretation in Divinity And so on the other side that an universal negative must hold in no one particular as do no wrong bindeth us to our good behaviour not only in our wordâ— and deeds but also in our very thoughts and that in regard of all men whatsoever and much more in regard of those to whom we have been obliged either for natural or civil or spiritual benefits So that if I have but an uncharitable thought of any man living I do him wrong but I do my self more wrong in sinning against this Commandment Wherefore though other men be never so confident of their own innocency yet will I weigh my self in this ballance for this is the ballance of the sanctuary and I am sure God will one day weigh me in it that seeing I have many wayes been a delinquent for want of obedience I may not accumulate my delinquencies by want of repentance For this I cannot but see that if Zaccheus had not at last been as willing to give and to restore as he was at first to take away he would not easily have gotten that comfortable saying from our Saviours own lips to which all the comforts of this world are comfortless This day is salvation come to this house for so much as he also is the son of Abraham Luke 19. 9. And let not my profit be the impediment of my piety for what is a man profited if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul Mat. 16. 26. I know that my Saviour hath given his blood in exchange for my soul that he might redeem it from death and damnation and therefore as I will love my soul above my estate because it was redeemed at so great a price so I will love my Saviour above my soul because he paid that price for my redemption to make me of an enemy a servant of a servant a friend that I might not only be in his love but also abide in it Therefore I will offer my soul to him to do whatsoever he commandeth me for I cannot hope to be confirmed in his love as his friend unless I be desirous to offer unto him this universal obedience or at least be sorry that I have not offered or cannor offer it A little of this affection will more strengthen my faith in Christ then my greatest perswasion can strengthen it And I shall more truly know my Saviour by devoting my will then my understanding to him by obeying his law then by studying it Therefore I will pray the Lord to make me increase and abound in love to the end he may establish my heart unblameable in holiness 1 Thes 3. 12 13. For himself hath told me If any man will do his will he shall know of the Doctrine whether it be of God John 7. 17. That is he and he only shall have an experimental knowledge of Religion that it will bring him to God who labours to do the will of God such a man shall know that Christ is the way the truth and the life and that the Christian Religion is the way to Christ not only by a speculative knowledge which swims in his brain and may be ejected thence by arguments of Sophistry but also by an effective knowledge which sinks into his heart and which he will keep as carefully and as faithfully as he will keep his heart Thus to know Christ is truly to have him manifested in our souls and this manifestation is not gotten so much by speculation as by practice not so much by knowing Gods will as by doing it For it is undeniable by Saint Pauls argument Gal. 3. 1. That though Jesus Christ were evidently set forth crucified among the Galatians yet it was before their eyes only not in their hearts whilst they obeyed not the truth And that the Jews had not known Christ though he had stretched out his hands unto them all the day long because they were still a disobedient and a gainsaying people Rom. 10. 20 21. And Saint John saith expresly hereby we do know that we do know him if we keep his Commandments 1 John 2. 3. Telling us of a twofold knowledge of God and of Christ the one inefficacious to salvation such as hypocrites may have who know God but glorifie him not as God Rom. 1. 21. or who profess that they know God but in works they deny him being abominable and disobedient and to every good work reprobate Tit. 1. 16. The other is a saving knowledge of God and of Christ such as only good Christians can have who keep his Commandments for this knowledge is joyned with obedience and that is the cheif ground of its assurance hereby we know that we know him if we keep his Commandments A man may have some evidence of faith without obedience but he cannot have the assurance of faith without it Whence we may gather that the true knowledge of God is not that which enables a man to talk sublimely of his essence or to talk confidently of his secrets but that which knows him in his precepts and in his promises seriously obeying the one no less then truly relying on the other And only he that thus knows God knows him truly to salvation because he only knows him truly in his Saviour and only he so knows God as to love him because only he knows him in the Son of his love Thirdly it may be demanded whether the Jews before the comming of Christ had the same love of God that we Christians now have since they seem not to have had the same knowledge or manifestation of Christ I answer yes they had the same love of God for they had the same knowledge or manifestation of Christ
all will-worship in his service though proceeding out of never so good intentions because it is without and therefore against his Commission And if it were an act of profanation and provocation to uphold his Ark without his leave when it was shaken what is it to help shake it or rather to throw it down I pray God speedily make such men to see how much they have out-gone Vzzah in their sin and therefore cannot come short of him in their punishment For he that struck Vzzah with a corporal can strike them with a spiritual death and except they repent will undoubtedly so strike them unless it may be feared he hath already so stricken them because they have not repented To affront Christ in his Priest-hood whereby he reconciled man to God is the ready way to lose the benefit of that reconciliation He will not have his Priestly office invaded by Angels much less will he have it invaded by men He will not let Angels preach his Gospel least their preaching should beget uncertainties whiles the Devils might come and preach among them And much less will he have men that are not called of God to preach his Gospel because their preaching can beget nothing but Impieties whiles the Devils may come and preach in them He will have no other witnesses of his truth but such as are of his own choice For thus he declared his own will and hath never since reversed that declaration Acts 10. 40 41. Him God raised up the third day and shewed him openly not to all the people but unto witnesses chosen before of God He would then have his choice and select witnesses and would not entrust his Sacred Mysteries with all in common least they should be neglected of all But he chose such men for his witnesses as should rather lay down their lives then the profession of the Christian Faith And we cannot reasonably deny but that he still hath his choice witnesses whom he hath entrusted with his truth whom he hath enabled to discharge that trust whom he will call to a strict account for not discharging it so that we must say God is still pleased to shew his Son openly as he did then not to all the people but only to some chosen witnesses And he will have the people still to depend upon those witnesses to be instructed and informed in the Sacred truths concerning his Son or in the mysteries of the Christian Religion And the gadding humour which now possesseth the people to run from Gods witnesses is the ready way for them to fall into all kinds of false Doctrine and heresie and that will in a short time bring them to hardness of heart and contempt of Gods word and commandments especially since they are not now taught to pray against it but rather to expell and revile such heavenly prayers And thus we plainly see that the more Christs Ministers have of late been hindred from being the witnesses of his saving Truth the more they have been forced to be the witnesses of this sad Truth even of the encreasing of Heresies and hardnesses in his people And though they may be denyed to be Christs witnesses to the people for their conversion yet they cannot be denyed to be his witnesses against the people for their condemnation Jesu God what an infinite misery is it for thy Ministers to be such witnesses and yet infinitely more miserable are thy people in that thy Ministers must bear thee such witness Surely when thou didst first say And ye shall be witnesses unto me unto the uttermost parts of the earth Acts 1. 8. thou didst intend a succession of witnesses whereby the uttermost parts of the earth should come to hear of thee and that no sort of men should stop their mouthes from testifying or witnessing concerning thee nor stop their own ears against their testimony And doubtless Saint Peter advising the Elders to feed the flock of God under so many introductive perswasions That he was also an elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ and a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed 1 Pet. 5. 1. did use that strain which is called by Rhetoritians Titulus argumentosus a title that hath as many arguments as words for an Elder is fit for the office of looking to others and may not neglect his office a witness of Christs sufferings may not shrink from his testimony unless he will betray his trust And a partaker of Christs glory may not renege that blessed Communion unless he will betray his own soul T is true that his first witnesses forsook him and fled Mar. 14. 50. and one of them also denyed him yet after his resurrection he neither upbraids the one nor the other as if they had been scandalous Ministers but pitties their infirmities and encourages and confirms them in their Ministry They had parted with him before his death but would not part with him again after his resurrection till he was taken away from them For they found it sadness enough unto their souls that they had forsook him once and durst not so much as go out of his sight for fear they should be tempted to forsake him again Good God what a deep sadness would possess if not over-whelm our guilty consciences should we but seriously consider how often we have out of meer peevishness forsaken our blessed Saviour Running away from him in his Nativity Passion Resurrection for we look upon Sunday more as the Sabbath then as the Lords day and Ascention as if either these Festivals did not invite us to converse with Christ or conversing with Christ were not the best platform and exactest practise of Christianity Then all the Disciples forsook him and fled saith Saint Matthew Mat. 26. 56. Then that is when they were possessed with carnal fear but we forsake him meerly out of spiritual pride and presumption and we forsake him in his Authority in his Church and in his Ordinances as if we needed no good examples to move us no instructions to inform us no directions to guide us no duties to sanctifie us no affections to inflame us God grant that we come not at last to think that we need not no Word to govern us and no Christ to save us Then the Disciples forsook him and fled In this we can be as good Disciples as the best in forsaking our blessed Saviour and in flying from him but not so in returning and in cleaving unto him again Alfonsus is so bold as to say that during the time of our blessed Saviours Passion till his Resurrection true faith remained only in the blessed Virgin And this seems not to have been his private opinion for the Missale ad usum Sarum gives this for the main reason why chiefly on Saturday or the seventh day of the week there called the Sabbath day as indeed in all other antient Missals or Liturgies the office made in honour of the Virgin Mary is appointed to be said Quia
bind If we break one of those bonds asunder how shall we be held by the other If we cast away Religion what do we talk of communion it is more just to call it a conspiracy If we cast away communion what do we pretend Religion it is more just to call it an apostacy Let both Religion and Communion be truely for the honour of Christ or let neither be called Christian For indeed this is the only true touchstone whereby we may try which Churches are the dross of Christendom and which are the gold of it they who most labour to glorifie Christ are the best Christians according that short but pithy prayer of the Latine Church Et quia tuum est quod credimus tuum sit omne quod vivimus Orat. in Sabbato quatuor temporum quadragesimae And because that all our Faith is from thee grant that all our Life may be for thee and to thee All our faith is from Christ all our life must be to Christ or we shall live infidels though in belief Christians Therefore they who most labour to glorifie Christ both by their Faith and by their life are undoubtedly the best Christians They who most labour to glorifie him as King to be ruled by his government as Prophet to be guided by his Word as Priest to be reconciled by his satisfaction they are clearly the best Christians and they who are defective in any of these as they less glorifie Christ so have they less the purity and truth of Christianity Great is the preeminence of Christians above other men that they know Christ but greater is their preeminence above other Christians that they glorifie him agreeably to their knowledge such are truly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The faithful in Saint Chrysostomes sense 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christians are called the Faithful not only for trusting in God but also for being trusted by him in that they have been entrusted with those mysteries of Christ which not the Angels themselves did know before them They were accordingly best take heed they do not betray that trust which they did not could not deserve and they will certainly betray it if once they seek to take the preeminence to themselves and not give it to their Saviour We may not judge some of the antient Churches for so doing because they were swallowed up by an Earth-quake soon after they had received Christianity as Coloss Laodicea and Hâ—erapolis in the reign of Nero saith Orasius But we most look carefully to our selves that we may not do so who dayly hear many amongst us saying We are of Paul others we are of Cephas others we are of Apollos meerly to divide the Church and others saying We are of Christ meerly to contemn it For they intend not to advance our Saviour but to debase his Ministers not to come neerer Christ but only to run further from his Church I say we must look carefully to our selves leâ—t some such dreadful Earthquake swallow us up also who have provoked heaven wearied earth and therefore may justly go down quick into hell or lest we be swallowed up by the Earth without an Earth quake as were Corah Dathan and Abiram who were the first notorious authors of divisions in the people of God and themselves perished by a strange division for saith the Text The ground clave asunder that was under them Numb 16. 31. And the ground is still cleaving asunder under us in so much that it is to be feared That the Earth the sons of the earth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Filii terrae as the Text calls them Psalm 49. 2. the lowest and meanest of the people will at last quite swallow up both Moses and Aaron that is all authority and preeminence both Civil and Ecclesiastical This we are sure of the only way for the Kings and Potentates of this world to keep their own authority is by it to defend and maintain the authority of Christ who is the blessed and only Potentate the King of Kings and Lord of Lords 1 Tim. 6. 15. nor is it just they should look to have any preeminence without and much less against him whose proper right it is in all things to have the preeminence Col. 1. 18. Therefore give glory to the Lord your God before he cause darkness in despite of all your new lights and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains and while ye look for light he turn it into the shadow of death and make it gross darkness But if ye will not hear it my soul shall weep in secret places for your pride and mine eye shall weep sore and run down with tears because the Lords flock is carried away captive Jer. 13. 16 17. Carried away captive from the communion of the Lord to the divisions and distractions of his enemies A captivity beyond that of Babylon because of a confusion beyond that of Babel for there only tongues but here minds and spirits also are confounded O sweet Jesus restore again to thy communion those that have departed from it retain and confirm those that still abide and continue in it Thou blessed Mediator betwixt God and Angels and men and by that thy mediation the blessed author to the Angels of union to men of reunion to both Angels and men of communion with the everliving God be pleased so to joyn all Christians in one communion here on earth that thou mayst joyn them all in one communion hereafter in heaven even that eternal and most blessed communion wherein thou our Head now livest and reignest with the Father and the Holy Ghost one God world without end Amen Deo Trin-uni gloria THE IVSTIFICATION OF THE Church of England According to the true principles of Christian Religion and Communion consisting of three Chapters The first Chapter sheweth that the Church of England is Gods Trustee for the Christian Religion as to the people of this Nation The second Chapter sheweth that the same Church of England hath carefully discharged that Trust as a most Christian or most Catholick Church The third Chapter sheweth that the Communion of the said Church of England is conscionably embraced and reteined by all the people of that Nation but unconscionably declined or deserted by any of them I marvel that you are so soon removed from him that called you into the Grace of Christ unto another Gospel which is not another but there be some that trouble you and would pervert the Gospel of Christ Gal. 1. 6 7. I would they were even cut off which trouble you Gal. 5. 12. LONDON Printed Anno Domini 1658. The Preface to the Iudicious and unprejudicate Reader I Hope it will not be said I seek to justifie a Church which is not for the truth and righteousness whereby it was a Church are the same they ever were or that I seek to justifie a Church which ought not to be for no man can shew a better truth and righteousness whereby to make a better Church Till
bleating of unprepared boyes and lowing of unhallowed men which must needs be all for noise and nothing for sacrifice unless they will say That God will accept of vain babling instead of Praying and of prating instead of Preaching for some such answer they must provide or give none who are resolved to turn all Praying into Preaching and to allow every one that listeth to turn Preacher SECT XI That Prayer as a Duty is above Prayer as a Gift The Gift of Prayer examined That it is not a Gift of Sanctifying Grace That the Spirit of Prayer is often without the Gift of Prayer and yet the Gift of Prayer is not perfect without the Spirit of it Those Christians who have obtained the Gift of Prayer most compleatly that is jointly with the Spirit of it are not thereby qualified to be the mouths of the Congregation Those Ministers who have not attained that Gift are not for that reason to be despised as not sufficiently qualified for the Ministry And those Ministers who have attained it may not for the exercising thereof be allowed to reject set forms of Prayer in their Congregations because set forms in publick are more for the Ministers and the peoples good more for Gods glory and more agreeable with Gods command HE that bids us examine our own Hearts lest we should deceive our selves doth much more bid us examine other mens mouths that they should not deceive us and he that commands us to try the Spirits doth much more command us to try the Gifts Upon this ground we come now to try and examine the Gift of Prayer which hath of late so filled the heads of men with Phancies the mouthes of men with Pretences the ears of men with Clamours the hearts of men with Anxieties and which is worst of all the Devotions of men with impertinencies if not with Impieties whiles they forsake the Prayers which Gods Spirit and Gods Church hath made for them that they may exercise their own either acquired or pretended Gifts And we have reason to be very impartial in this examination because some men have been so bold to teach and others have been so credulous to believe That all Christians are bound to attain this Gift and that none are true members of Christ or ought to be his Ministers who have not attained it with many other such unwarrantable assertions which tend directly to 〈…〉 â—eaking of the Peace and not at all to the establishing of the Truth to the destruction of Charity and not at all to the edification of Piety For all the world is not able to prove that the Gift of prayer is either a means of engrafting a man in Christ or a testimony that he is ingrafted in him so that either they should much rejoyce though they commonly do glory in their preheminence who have it or they should be dismayed for their defects who have it not For that holy communion which is exercised with God by Prayer is altogether heavenly and spiritual in an holy attention and affection which belongs to the Spirit of Prayer not at all earthly or carnal in a ready apprehension or a voluble expression which two alone properly belong to the Gift of Prayer For as concerning supernatural assistance as was heretofore in Miracles and in Tongues there is little reason to suppose or mention it in the Gift of Prayer 1. Because those men amongst us who most have it have it not in any other language but only in that which is to them most natural even in their own mother-tongue 2. Because those men who have it do so much blame and revile those who have it not which sure they would not do if they themselves thought it supernatural For in the Gift of Continency they are contented to consult with humane infirmity for an allay of any harsh censures in those that want it And why not so also in the Gift of Prayer if both were alike in their conceits supernatural And yet if we should suppose a supernatural assistance in the Gift of Prayer it would little advantage either it or them For we see the Spirit of God did over-rule the tongue of Balaam when he uttered that most heavenly Prayer Let me die the death of the righteous and let my last end be like his Numb 23. 10. though the same Spirit did not sanctifie his heart for he loved the waies of unrighteousness 2 Pet. 2. 15. Wherefore it is plain A man may be a member of Christ without the Gift of Prayer because it is not a Gift that immediately flows from the grace of Sanctification And as plain that a man may lawfully and laudably be a Minister of Christ without it as well as without the Gift of Continency because it is not a Gift that either principally or necessarily tends to edification Not principally for set forms of Prayer taken out of the holy Scriptures or made agreeable to them do edifie much more as having more suitable expressions both to engage and to enlarge holy â—…ns Not necessarily because the Jews under the Law were and Christians under the Gospel may be and are daily edified without it I know I am fallen upon a subject that hath a great noise and a greater form of godliness but not the power of it answerable either to the noise or form and therefore I will not make any apologie for the plainness and almost rudeness of speech I shall be forced to use in unmasking their hypocrisie who abuse this Gift since our blessed Saviour by denouncing a terrible woe against those Hypocrites who for a pretence made long Prayers that they might devour widows houses Mat. 23. 14. hath declared it not only fit but also necessary for his Ministers to shew to all the world the great danger and greater crime of those hypocrites which for a pretence make long prayers that they may devoure Gods own house that is to say not only his Church but also his Religion For when Prayer as a Gift shall dare to oppose it self against nay to exalt it self above Prayer as a Duty it is high time to undeceive the world and to shew that God hath placed Duties above Gifts giving Gifts only to enable men to perform Duties so that Gifts must give place to Duties and not Duties give place to Gifts And consequently Prayer as a Gift must give place to Prayer as a Duty even in our private and much more in our publick Devotions He that hath not the Gift of Prayer may not for that reason neglect the duty of prayer in private And he that hath the gift of prayer may not for that reason disturb the Duty of Prayer in publick Wherefore since publick Prayer is a Duty that no more belongs to One then to All no more belongs to the Minister then to the People for the fourth Commandement obligeth them to Gods publick worship as well as him in acknowledgement of and homage for the redemption of mankind it is manifest