Selected quad for the lemma: earth_n
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A34199
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Urim and thummim, or, The clergies dignity and duty recommended in a visitation sermon preached at Lewes April 27, 1669 / by Malachi Conant ...
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Connant, M. (Malachi), d. 1680.
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1669
(1669)
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Wing C5690; ESTC R43114
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15,761
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30
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beams in it's noon-day glory whether it sport and twinkle in a star or blaze and glare out in a Comet or frisk and dance in a jewel or dissemble and play the hypocrite in a Glow-worm or shew it's zeal and the ruddiness of it's Complexion in the yolk of fire or grow more pale pining and consuming away in a Candle However it appears it carries a commanding lustre in it's face and well deserveth the name of the Lady and Queen of all sensible beauties The first born of corporeal beings The clarifier and refiner of the Chaos the unspotted beauty of the universe Now herein Christ's Apostles and Successors bear a resemblance unto it being for the spiritual excellency of their Calling denominated not only stars but Angels chosen Vessels Men of a thousand Revel 1.20 2.1 Acts 9.15 Job 33.23 Rom. 10.15 2 Cor. 8.23 their very feet are styled beautiful and they themselves the Glory of Christ We know that the Judaical Priesthood was externally very glorious and yet that being only a Type of ours is made much inferior by the Apostle to ours 2 Cor. 3.9 If the ministration of condemnation were glorious much more doth the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory Called therefore we are God's stewards Messengers 1 Cor. 4.1 2 Cor. 5.20 and Ambassadors And how indeed can their employment chuse but be honourable whose business is to menage the affairs of heaven upon earth No wonder therefore that Christ himself though Lord of heaven and earth did not disdain to undertake it for our sakes Rom. 15.8 when he became a Minister of the New Testament And though it is true that this holy function is esteemed now adays Vile and Contemptible by those earth-worms that neither fear God nor value their own Souls but esteem of men according to their external wealth and grandeur weighing them by the pound and measuring them by the Acre and therefore account of us as for the same reason they would the Apostles themselves were they now alive as the dung and off-scouring of all things Yet it is no wonder that these persons judging according to appearance judge not righteous judgement 1 Cor. 4.13 but they measuring themselves by themselves and comparing themselves amongst themselves are not wise 2 Cor. 10 12. Wherefore we are to turn our just wonder and indignation into Pity and Commiseration of them that they will so much stand in their own light forsake their own mercy and shew themselves their own greatest enemies It is but their weakness and ignorance that they know not how to prize things or persons according to their true worth or discern things that differ but entertain wrong notions of excellencies What if Children prefer their bables before the Tower of London or the Cock the grain of Barly before the Jewel or Glaucus in the story glistering Brass before Massy Gold or Esau a Morsel of bread before his birth-right or the Gadarens their Swine before their Saviour It is but mens gross mistakes and vulgar prejudices Matth. 13.57 that prophets are not accepted in their own Country and that the English Clergy which are the admiration of the more Impartial World abroad are the scorn and derision of any of their own more ungrateful Country-men Or that they are guilty of the other extreme from that into which they ran in the times of Popery defying that Order of Church-men which the others then almost deified and adored and all for mumbling over a few Oraisons in a strange tongue making their Breaden God Chanting Dirges for the Living and Requiems for the Dead and such like other fopperies We must for our parts learn from this their carriage to us not to think meaner of that Honour which the King of Heaven thinketh fit to put upon us but rather with the Apostle to magnifie Our Office Rom. 11.13 and in compliance with our Lord and Masters instructions to his Disciples Mark 6.11 let us bravely shake off the dust of our feet against them that receive not us or our Ministry 1 Cor. 4.3 Let it be a very small thing with us to be judged with man's judgment while God vouchsafes us such Honour No let us rather with an holy and generous disdain scorn the scorner trample upon Contempt despise Affronts and slight Indignities Let us shew our selves Men of more raised Spirits and Principles and let us account that calling Our greatest Honour which the World may think Our debasement Let us learn to leave this base World behind us let us live above it as having ever shewed it self false treacherous and disingenuous whose guise it hath been to be guilty of unworthy fordid and dirty carriage to be most injurious to it's greatest benefactors to set at nought him who came to save them and then to Crucifie him to persecute and abuse His Apostles and Ministers that were Content to undergo the loss of all things that they might shew them the way to Salvation and to be poor in temporals that they may be rich in Spirituals as if according to that Historians Observation Courtesies and kindnesses change their Nature and are looked upon as injuries when they are too great to be repaid and as it is here people owe their own selves also Philem. 19. How indeed can we expect that the World should alter it's Nature for us now in it's old declining age Or that the Men of this World among whom we shine as lights Philip. 2.15 should cease to be a crooked and perverse generation Our comfort is the Moon shines never the less bright because barked at by Dogs nor is the light less glorious in it's Nature John 1.5 because the darkness comprehendeth it not 2. Lux est fortissima effectu Light herein discovereth it's celestial Original and imitates heavenly bodies in it's motion and influence as well as in it's enlightning Whether it be a quality according to the Aristotelians or a more subtile body according to the Epicurean Phylosophy it will be here impertinent to determine This is certain that all things else become visible It 's own true nature still remains unintelligible being in the dark it self how sensible soever it is in it's effects which are as God himself rather to be admired than understood It is most admirably diffusive of its self and with a motion if not instantaneous yet insensibly successive is propagated in the medium Have you never seen one torch in the twinkling of an eye expel the darkness of an whole Street One Beacon or Boonfire discover it self to the whole Vicinage All the shadows flying away at the dawning of the day Light is the vehicle of the sweet influences of heaven It is the great guide and director of Actions and so it 's not only for shew but Service He that walketh in the Light John 11.9 saith Christ who was the true light stumbleth not because he seeth the light of this World Now thus
worst out that he speaks as well as never man spake and lives as ill as never man liv'd and therefore as a Right Reverend Father of our Church expresseth it It is so far from being serious piety Lord Bishop of Norwich that it is the worse sort of pageantry for men to preach Angelical Sermons and live Diabolical lives that it should be cast justly in any ones teeth Rom. 2.21 Thou that teachest another teachest thou not thy self that their mouthes should speak great swelling words and yet still walk after their own lusts and be like the Stoical Philosophers who could talk big of vertue till they came to practise it whom therefore Lucian derides 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Their works contradicting their words and their practice giving a lie to their profession How foolish ridiculous and disparaging must it needs be to make a long formal starch'd harangue about Religion and Vertue and declame Rhetorically against vice which they yet renounter in the whole course of their lives Which made the Comick say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He loathed such Sophisters and pretended Philosophers that were unwise for themselves Turpe est doctori c. 2. Consider the bad influence our example hath upon other men How can we expect that others should follow our doctrine when as we our selves forsake it as unpracticable or at least uneligible We see men rather apt to be lead by precedents than precepts and go like sheep Quo itur non quo cundum and especially to imitate their guides and Leaders Such persons therefore who are great talkers and little doers take the ready way to make more Atheists in the world than hath been hitherto made by the late licentious times which have corrupted Religion in the very foundations Will not men of loose principles be ready to look on Religion as a non-entity a cunning devised Fable of interested Priests which go about to perswade that to others which they believe not themselves These persons shine but in a wrong sense as if they understood the words of the Text so as a Romish Priest profanely applyed them who being to do Penance for some scandalous offence by going in Procession to the Church with a burning Taper in his hand scoffingly said sic luceat Lux vestra coram hominibus c. They shine but it is with the Devils light to Light men down to the Chambers of Death and make more Proselytes for his Kingdom He useth them indeed as some ill barbarous people do lights by the Sea-side which they hang up in dark stormy nights near rocks and quick-sands to make passengers cast away themselves upon their Coast that so they may make a prey of them What readier course could they take to open mens mouthes against Christianity and to say as that Indian did to one perswading him to turn Christian observing the Spaniards wicked lives What are Christians They are Gamesters Dicers wicked blasphemers backbiters quarrellers and concluded Christians could not be good and so we shall find it proportionably if we walk Antipodes to our doctrine and shew our selves such as Tertullian sharply inveighs against Quibus venter Deus est popina templum aqualiculus altare sacerdos Coquus Spiritus Sanctus nidor condimenta charismata especially there being more holyness expected of us then others and a spot in our Coat making more shew than in others We had need be clean who bear the vessels of the Lord especially in an hypocritical age Isaiah 52.11 wherein people are apt to espy motes in our eyes and look on all our faults through a magnifying and multiplying glass Which may serve for a 3d Consideration that we have so many enemies in the world to encounter what through the contradiction of sinners and scoffing Atheists on one hand and the weakness and peevishness of some at least pretended Saints on the other neither are we ignorant of Satans old devise of casting Ignominy and Contempt on Religion by disgracing and disparaging the publishers and professors of it Great reason have we therefore to walk circumspectly Ephes 5. not as fools but as wise and to take heed that we defile not our garments For we shall meet with but few Constantines in our days so tender of the Clergies honour as if he espyed them in a fault to cover them with his Imperial Robes but they will rather publish to the world all the evil they know by us and more than they know their own Inventions and misconstructions There are too many in the world that contemne our Calling envy our Dignities gape after our Revenues censure our most Innocent Actions and hate our very Persons Others separate from our Church as Impure and Anti-Christian abhor our Garments as Babylonish our Ceremonies as Popish and Superstitious our very Worship as Idolatrous look upon us as no better than Priests of Baal and Limbs of Anti-Christ Among these I cannot forget a leading high-flown separatist too well known in this place who not long since bespake the State in this Language Be wise now therefore O ye Kings be instructed O ye Judges of the earth Take away Parishes by Act of State away with all consecrated places for worship away with Patrones or Lay-founders away I say with all the appurtenances of a Parish Priest and again I profess quoth he were I a man in absolute Authority in a Nation I would make Scavengers of all the Parish Priests in England to clean the ways and to rake the Dunghills And this he confidently calls a voice from heaven when alass it is only such a noise as that of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 proceeding out of it 's own belly and not knowing what Spirit he is of mistakes the strange fire in his own brain for a fire from heaven and minds me of the proud Gnosticks of old that arrogated to themselves so great a measure of knowledge and sanctity as to dictate to the world and obtrude their private sentiments on others as if they were Articles of faith and themselves guided by an infallible Spirit It is opinionativeness and spiritual pride of mens gifts and graces that puts men on separation and confining sanctity as the Donatists of old to their own party in one Corner of Africa and thus none must be Saints but those of their Calendar This makes them like sheep stealers take members out of other mens flocks and boast of things in other mens line made ready to their hand 2 Cor. 10.16 mistaking for conversion to God a bringing men over to their own forms and some petty inconsiderable matters in which the kingdom of God consisteth not These mind me of those in Prov. 30.12 a generation pure in their own eyes and yet not cleansed from their filthiness or of those in Esay 65.5 that say stand off come not nigh me for I am holier than thou These are a smoak in my nose a fire that burneth all the day and these