TWO SERMONS PREACHED BEFORE KING CHARLES Upon the xxvi verse of the first Chapter of GENESIS By Dr. DONNE DEAN OF PAVLS ¶ Printed by the Printers to the Vniversitie of CAMBRIDGE MDCXXXIIII Genesis 1.26 And God said Let us make man in our image after our likenesse NEver such a frame so soon set up as this in this chapter For for the thing it self there is no other thing to compare it with for it is all it is the whole world And for the time there was no other time to compare it with for this was the beginning of time In the beginning God created heaven and earth That earth which in some thousands of yeares men could not look over nor discern what form it had for neither Lactantius almost three hundred yeares after Christ nor S. Augustine more then a hundred yeares after him would beleeve the earth to be round That earth which no man in his person is ever said to have compassed till our age That earth which is too much for man yet for as yet a very great part of the earth is unpeopled That earth which if we will cast it all but into a Map costs many moneths labour to grave it nay if we will but cast a piece of an acre of it into a garden costs many yeares labour to fashion and furnish it all that earth And then that heaven which spreads so farre as that subtill men have with some appearance of probabilitie imagined that in that heaven in those manifold Spheres of the Planets and the Starres there are many earths many worlds as big as this which we inhabit That earth and that heaven which spent God himself Almightie God six dayes in finishing Moses sets up in a few syllables in one line In principio In the beginning God created heaven and earth If a Livie or a Guicciardine or such extensive and voluminous authours had had this story in hand God must have made another world to have made them a library to hold their books of the making of this world Into what wire would they have drawn out this earth Into what leaf-gold would they have beat out these heavens It may assist our conjecture herein to cōsider that amongst those men who proceed with a sober modestie and limitation in their writing make a conscience not to clog the world with unnecessary books yet the volumes which are written by them upon the beginning of Genesis are scarce lesse then infinite God did no more but say Let this this be done and Moses doth no more but say that upon Gods saying it was done God required not Nature to help him to do it Moses required not Reason to help him to beleeve The holy Ghost hovered upon the waters and so God wrought The holy Ghost hovered upon Moses too and so he wrote And we beleeve these things to be so by the same Spirit in the mouth of Moses by which they were made so in Gods hand Onely Beloved remember that a frame may be thrown down in much lesse time then it was set up A childe an ape can give fire to a cannon and a vapour can shake the earth and when Christ said Throw down this Temple and in three dayes I will raise it they never stood upon the consideration of throwing it down they knew that might be soon done but they wondered at the speedy raising of it Now if all this earth were made in that minute may not all come to the generall dissolution in this minute Or may not thy acres thy miles thy shires shrink into feet and so few feet as shall but make up thy grave when he who was a great lord must be but a cottager not so wel for a cottager must have so many acres to his cottage but in this case a little piece of an acre five foot is become the house it self the house and the land the grave is all lower then that the grave is the land and the tenement the tenant too He that lies in it becomes the same earth that he lies in they all make but one earth and but a little of it But then raise thy self to a higher hope again God hath made better land the land of promise a stronger citie the new Jerusalem inhabitants for that everlasting citie us whom he made not by saying Let there be men but by consultation by deliberation God said Let us make man c. We shall pursue our great examples Divisio God in doing Moses in saying and so make haste in applying the parts But first receive them and since we have the whole world in contemplation consider in these words the foure quarters of the world by application by fair and just accommodations of the words First in the first word that God speaks here Faciamus Let Vs in the plurall a denotation of divers persons in the Godhead we consider our East where we must begin at the knowledge and confession of the Trinity for though in the way to heaven we have travelled beyond the Gentiles when we come to confesse but one God the Gentiles could not do that yet we are still among the Jews if we think that one God to be but one person Zech. 6.12 Christs name is Oriens the East if we will be named by him called Christians we must look to this East the confession of the Trinitie there is then our East in the Faciamus Let Vs Vs make man And then our West is in the next word Faciamus hominem Though we be thus made made by the councell made by the concurrence made by the hand of the whole Trinity yet we are made but men and man but in the appellation in this Text and man there is but Adam and Adam is but earth but red earth died red in bloud in bloud in soul the bloud of our own souls To that West we must all come to the earth The sunne knoweth his going down Psal 104.19 even the sunne for all his glory and height hath a going down and he knows it The highest cannot devest mortality nor the discomfort of mortality Luc. 12.54 When you see a cloud rise out of the west straightway you say There cometh a storm sayes Christ When out of the region of your West that is your latter dayes there comes a cloud a sicknesse you feel a storm even the best morall constancie is shaken But this cloud and this storm and this West there must be and that is our second consideration But then the next word designes a North a strong and powerfull North to scatter and dissipate these clouds Ad imaginem similitudinem that we are made according to a pattern to an image to a likenesse which God proposed to himself for the making of man This consideration that God did not rest in that preexistent matter out of which he made all other creatures and produced their forms out of their matter for the making of man
many gods as men that beleeved in them and I am got out of that throng and out of that noise when I am come into the knowledge of one God but I am got above stairs got into the bed-chamber when I am come to see the Trinitie and to apprehend not onely that I am in the care of a great powerfull God but that there is a Father that made me a Sonne that redeemed me a holy Ghost that applies this good purpose of the Father and Sonne upon me to me The root of all is God But it is not the way to receive fruits to dig to the root but to reach to the boughs I reach for my creation to the Father for my redemption to the Sonne for my sanctification to the holy Ghost and so I make the knowledge of God a tree of life unto me and not otherwise Truely it is a sad contemplation to see Christians scratch and wound and teare one another with the ignominious invectives and uncharitable names of Heretick and Schismatick about ceremoniall and problematicall and indeed but criticall verball controversies and in the mean time the foundation of all the Trinitie undermined by those numerous those multitudinous ant-hills of Socinians that overflow some parts of the Christian world and multiply every where And therefore the adversaries of the Reformation were wise in their generation when to supplant the credit of both those great assistants of the Reformation Luther Calvin they impute to Calvin fundamentall errour in the divinitie of the second person of the Trinitie the Sonne And they impute to Luther a detestation of the word Trinitie and an expunction thereof in all places of the Liturgie where the Church had received that word They knew well if that slander could prevail against those persons nothing that they could say could prevail upon any good Christians But though in our Doctrine we keep up the Trinitie aright yet God knows in our Practise we do not I hope it cannot be said of any of us that he beleeves not the Trinitie but who amongst us thinks of the Trinitie considers of the Trinitie Father and Sonne do naturally imply and induce one another therefore they fall oftener into our consideration but for the holy Ghost who feels him when he feels him who takes knowledge of his working when he works Indeed our Fathers provided not well enough for the worship of the whole Trinitie nor of the holy Ghost in particular in the endowments of the Church and consecrations of the Churches and possessions in their names what a spirituall dominion in the Prayers worship of the people what a temporall dominion in the possessions of the world had the Virgin Marie Queen of heaven and Queen of earth too She was made joynt-purchaser of the Church with the Sonne and had asmuch of the worship thereof as he though she paid her Fine in milk and he in bloud And till a new sect came in her Sonnes name and in his name the name of Jesus took the Regencie so farre out of that Queen-mothers hands and sued out her sonnes liverie so farre as that though her name be used the Virgin Marie is but a Feofee in trust for them all was hers And if God oppose not these new usurpers of the world posteritie will soon see S. Ignatius worth all the Trinitie in possessions and endowments and that sumptuous and splendid foundation of his first Temple at Rome may well create a conjecture and suspicion Travell no farther Survey but this Citie and of their not one hundred Churches the Virgin Marie hath a dozen The Trinitie hath but one Christ hath but one the holy Ghost hath none But not to go into the Citie nor out of our selves which of us doth truely considerately ascribe the comforts that he receives in dangers or in distresses to that God of all comfort the Comforter the holy Ghost We know who procured us our presentation and our dispensation you know who procured you your offices and your honours Shall I ever forget who gave me my comfort in sicknesse who gave me my comfort in the troubles and perplexities and diffidencies of my conscience The holy Ghost the holy Ghost brought you hither The holy Ghost opens your eares and your hearts here Till in all your distresses you say Veni Creator Spiritus Come holy Ghost and that you feel a comfort in his coming you can never say Veni Domine Jesu Come Lord Jesus come to judgement Never to consider the day of judgement is a fearfull thing but to consider the day of judgement without the holy Ghost is a thousand times more fearfull This seal then this impression this notion of the Trinitie being set upon us in this first plurall word of our Text Faciamus Let us for Father Sonne and holy Ghost made man and this seal being reimprinted upon us in our second Creation or Regeneration in Baptisme man is baptized in the name of the Father and of the Sonne and of the holy Ghost this notion of the Trinitie being our distinctive character from Jew and Gentile this being our specificall form why doth not this our form this soul of our Religion denominate us why are we not called Trinitarians a name that would embrace the profession of all the persons but onely Christians which limits and determines us upon one The first Christians amongst whose manifold persecutions scorn and contempt was not the least in contempt and scorn were called Nazaraei Nazarites in the mouth of the vulgar and Galilaei Galileans in the mouth of Julian Judaei Jews in the mouth of Nero when he imputed the burning of Rome his own art to them and Christiani Christians so that as Tertullian sayes they could accuse Christians of nothing but the name of Christians and yet they could not call them by their right name of Christians which was gentle quiet easie patient men made to be troden upon but they gave them divers names in scorn yet never called them Trinitarians Christians themselves amongst themselves were called by divers names in the Primitive Church for distinction Fideles the Faithfull and Fratres the Brethren and Discipuli Disciples after by common custome at Antioch Christians and after that they say by a councell which the Apostles held at the same Citie at Antioch there passed an expresse Canon of the Church that they should be called so Christians And before they had this name at Antioch first by common usage after by a determinate Canon to be called Christians from Christ at Alexandria they were called most likely from the name of Jesus Jesseans And so Philo Judaeus in that book which he writes de Jessaeis intends by his Jesseans Christians And in divers parts of the world into which Christians travell now they finde some elements some fragments some reliques of the Christian religion in the practise of some religious men whom those Countreys call Jesseans doubtlesly derived and continued from the name of
the Fathers were expresses it Ille suae splendorem cernere formae Gaudebat It was the Fathers delight to look upon himself in the Sonne Numénque suum triplicique parique Luce nitens And to see the whole Godhead in a threefold and equall glorie It was Gods own delight and it must be the delight of every Christian upon particular occasions to carry his thoughts upon the severall persons of the Trinitie If I have a barre of iron that barre in that form will not nail a doore If a sow of lead that lead in that form will not stop a leak If a wedge of gold that wedge will not buy my bread The generall notion of a mighty God may lesse fit my particular purposes But I coyn my gold into currant money when I apprehend God in the severall notions of the Trinitie That if I have been a prodigall son I have a Father in heaven and can go to him and say Father I have sinned and be received by him That if I be a decayed father and need the sustentation of my own children there is a Sonne in heaven that will do more for me then my own children of what good means or good nature soever they be can or will do If I be dejected in spirit there is a holy Spirit in heaven which shall bear witnesse to my spirit that I am a childe of God And if the ghosts of those sinners whom I made sinners haunt me after their deaths in returning to my memorie reproaching my conscience with the heavy judgements that I have brought upon them If after the death of my own sinne when my appetite is dead to some particular sinne the memorie and sinfull delight of those passed sinnes the ghosts of those sinnes haunt me again yet there is a holy Ghost in heaven that shall exorcise these and shall overshadow me The God of the whole world is God alone in the generall notion as he is so God but he is my God most especially most appliably as he is received by me in the severall notions of Father Sonne and holy Ghost This is our East II. Part. Occidens here we see God God in all the persons consulting concurring to the making of us But then my West presents it self that is an occasion to humble me in the next word he makes but man a man that is but Adam but Earth I remember 4. names by which man is often called in the scriptures of these foure three do absolutely carry miserie in their significations three to one against any man that he is miserable One name of man is Ish and that they derive à sonitu Man is but a voice but a sound but a noise he begins the noise himself when he comes crying into the world when he goes out perchance friends celebrate perchance enemies calumniate him with a diverse voice a diverse noise A melancholick man is but a groning a sportfull man but a song an active man but a trumpet a mighty man but a thunder-clap every man but Ish but a sound but a noyse An other name is Enosh Enosh is meer calamitie miserie depression It is indeed most properly oblivion And so the word is most elegantly used by David Quid est homo where the name of man is Enosh And so that which we translate What is man that thou art mindfull of him is indeed What is forgetfulnesse that thou shouldest remember it that thou shouldest think of that man whom all the world hath forgotten first man is but a voice but a sound but because fame honour may come within that name of a sound of a voice therefore he is overtaken with another damp man is but oblivion his fame his name shall be forgotten One name man hath that hath some taste of greatnesse and power in it Gheber and yet I that am that man sayes the Prophet for there that name of man Gheber is used I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of Gods wrath Man Ish is so miserable Lam. 3.1 as that he afflicts himself cries and whines out his own time and man Enosh so miserable as that others afflict him and bury him in ignominious oblivion and man that is Gheber the greatest powerfullest of men is yet but that man that may possibly that may justly see affliction by the rod of Gods wrath And from Gheber he made Adam which is the fourth name of man indeed the first name of man the name in this text and the name to which every man must be called and referre himself and call himself by earth and red earth Now God did not say of man as of other creatures Let us or let the earth bring forth herbs and fruits and trees as upon the third day Now let the earth bring forth cattell and worms as upō the sixth day the same day that he made man Non imperiali verbo sed familiari manu sayes Tertullian God calls not man out with an imperious command but he leads him out with a familiar with his own hand And it is not Fiat homo but Faciamus not Let there be but Let us make man Man is but an earthen vessell It is true but when we are upon that consideration God is the potter if God will be that I am well content to be this let me be any thing so that that I am be from my God I am as well content to be a sheep as a lion so God will be my shepherd and the Lord is my shepherd to be a cottage as a castle the house as a citie so God will be the builder and the Lord builds and watches the citie the house this house this citie me to be rye as wheat so God will be the husbandman and the Lord plants me and waters and weeds and gives the increase and to be clothed in leather as well as in silk so God will be the merchant and he clothed me in Adam and assures me of clothing in clothing the lilies of the field and is fitting the robe of Christs righteousnesse to me now this minute Adam is as good to me as Gheber a clod of earth as a hill of earth so God be the potter God made man of earth not of aire not of fire Man hath many offices that appertain to this world and whilest he is here must not withdraw himself from those offices of mutuall societie upon pretence of zeal or better serving God in a retired life A ship will no more come to the harbour without ballast then without sails A man will no more get to heaven without discharging his duties to other men then without doing them to God himself Man liveth not by bread onely sayes Christ Luke 4.4 but yet he liveth by bread too every man must do the duties every man must bear the encumbrances of some calling Pulvis es Thou art earth he whom thou treadest upon is no lesse and he that treads upon thee
of the angels of heaven would break out into sinne but for that confirmation which those angels have received in the bloud of Christ This rednesse he carried to heaven and this rednesse he hath left upon earth that all we miserable clods of earth might be tempered with his bloud that in his bloud exhibited in his holy blessed Sacrament our long robes might be made white in the bloud of the Lambe that though our sinnes be robes habits of long continuance in sinne yet through that rednesse which our sinnes have cast upon him we might come to participate of that whitenesse that righteousnesse which is his own We that is all we for as to take us in who are of low condition and obscure station a cloud is made white by his sitting upon it He sat upon a white cloud so to let the highest see that they have no whitenesse but from him he makes the throne white by sitting upon it He sat upon a great white throne It had been great if it had not been white white is the colour of dilatatiō Goodnesse enlarges the throne It had not been white if he had not sat upon it That goodnesse onely which consists in glorifying God and God in Christ and Christ in the sinceritie of the truth is true whitenesse God hath no rednesse in himself no anger towards us till he considers us as sinners God casts no rednesse upon us inflicts no necessitie no constraint of sinning upon us we have died our selves in sinnes as red as scarlet we have drowned our selves in such a red sea But as a garment that was washed in the Red sea Psal 106.22 would come out white so wonderfull works hath God done at the Red sea sayes David so doth his whitenesse work through our red and makes this Adam this red earth Calculum candidum that white stone that receives a new name not Ish not Enosh not Gheber no name that tasts of miserie nor of vanitie but that name renewed and manifested which was imprinted upon us in our elections the sonnes of God the irremoveable the undisinheritable sonnes of God Be pleased to receive this note at parting that there is Macula alba a spot and yet white as well as a red spot a whitenesse that is an indication of a leprosie as well as a rednesse It is whole-Pelagianisme to think nature alone sufficient half-Pelagianisme to think grace once received to be sufficient super-Pelagianisme to think our actions can bring God in debt to us by merit and supererogation Catharisme imaginarie puritie in canonizing our selves as present saints and condemning all that differ from us as reprobates All these are white spots and have the colour of goodnesse but are indications of leprosie So is that that God threatens Joel 1.7 Decorticatio ficûs albi rami that the fig-tree shall be barked and the boughs thereof left white To be left white without bark was an indication of a speedy withering Ostensa candescunt arescunt sayes S. Gregorie of that place the bough that lies open without bark looks white but perisheth The good works that are done openly to please men have their reward sayes Christ that is shall never have reward To pretend to do good and not mean it to do things good in themselves but not to good ends to go towards good ends but not by good wayes to make the deceiving of men thine end or the praise of men thine end all this may have a whitenesse a colour of good but all this is a barking of the bough and an indication of a mischievous leprosie There is no good whitenesse but a reflexion from Christ Jesus in an humble acknowledgement that we have none of our own and in a confident assurance that in our worst estate we may be made partakers of his We are all red earth In Adam we would not since Adam we could not avoid sinne and the concomitants thereof miseries which we have called our West our cloud our darknesse But then we have a North that scatters these clouds in the next word Adimaginem that we are made to another pattern in another likenesse then our own Faciamus hominem So farre we are gone East and West which is half our compasse and all this dayes voyage for we are struck upon the sand and must stay another tide and another gale for our North and South FINIS THE SECOND SERMON PREACHED BEFORE KING CHARLES Upon the xxvi verse of the first Chapter of GENESIS By Dr. DONNE DEAN OF PAVLS ¶ Printed by the Printers to the Vniversitie of CAMBRIDGE MDCXXXIIII Genesis 1.26 And God said Let us make man in our image after our likenesse BY fair occasion from these words we proposed to you the whole compasse of mans voyage from his launching forth in this world to his anchoring in the next from his hoysing sail here to his striking sail there in which compasse we designed to you his foure quarters first his East where he must begin the fundamentall knowledge of the Trinitie for that we found to be the specification distinctive character of a Christian where though that be so we shewed you also why we were not called Trinitarians but Christians and we shewed you the advantage that man hath in laying hold upon God in these severall notions That the prodigall sonne hath an indulgent father that the decayed father hath an abundant sonne that the dejected spirit hath a Spirit of comfort to fly to in heaven And as we shewed you from S. Paul that it was an Atheisme to be no Christian Without God sayes he as long as without Christ so we lamented the slacknesse of Christians that they did not seriously and particularly consider the persons of the Trinitie and especially the holy Ghost in their particular actions And then we came to that consideration whether this doctrine were established or directly insinuated in this plurall word of our text Faciamus Let us make man and we found that doctrine to be here and here first of any place in the Bible and finding God to speak in the plurall we accepted for a time that interpretation which some had made thereof That God spake in the person of a Soveraigne Prince and therefore as they do in the plurall We And thereby having established reverence to Princes we claymed in Gods behalf the same reverence to him that men would demean themselves here when God is spoken to in prayer as reverently as when they speak to the King But afterwards we found God to speak here not onely as our King but as our Maker as God himself and God in councel Faciamus And we applied thereunto the difference of our respect to a person of that honourable rank when we came before him at the councel-table and when we came to him at his own table and thereby advanced the seriousnesse of this consideration God in the Trinitie And farther we sailed not with our Eastern winde Our West we considered